41–50 of 145 posts
To me There Are Doors really punches way above its weight.
I love Wolfe. Which book to read first depends on your attitude towards the fantasy genre. If you're skeptical of it, I would recommend starting with the compact sci-fi short story trilogy of "Fifth Head of Cerberus" rather than the magnum opus of "The Book of the New Sun". If Cerberus works for you, there is a ton more to chew in New Sun, and you should absolutely read it whether or not you like more mainstream fant…
Despite this, I love Vance's work (AFAIK I have read almost all of his work except the detective fiction and his one book for teens), but there's really some hard stuff to justify from a modern perspective about assault, gender and race in there.
I have one criticism of him and it's a strong one -- I hate it because it has locked out just about every woman I've introduced to his corpus: his treatment of women. So very many of them: Chenille, the fire nymphs, just about every one Severian sleeps with save for dear Thecla, Chenille-as-Scylla, the prostitutes of Fifth Head, Jahi, Jolenta, Hyacinth, Jesus there must be a legion more I can't recall just now... So many of them are vampish, buxom women who are either put on a pedestal or written to be beauteous victims. That's not to say strong women don't exist in his books: there are a few but it's by and large the men who are written as whole people. One woman runs around for a few hundred pages stark naked with a flimsy premise as to why.
If readers can repeatedly forgive him for these excesses, his writing can transform the way you see the world and the purpose of living in it. A small excerpt: "We believe that we invent symbols. The truth is that they invent us; we are their creatures, shaped by their hard, defining edges."
I love Wolfe. Which book to read first depends on your attitude towards the fantasy genre. If you're skeptical of it, I would recommend starting with the compact sci-fi short story trilogy of "Fifth Head of Cerberus" rather than the magnum opus of "The Book of the New Sun". If Cerberus works for you, there is a ton more to chew in New Sun, and you should absolutely read it whether or not you like more mainstream fant…
I love Wolfe. Which book to read first depends on your attitude towards the fantasy genre. If you're skeptical of it, I would recommend starting with the compact sci-fi short story trilogy of "Fifth Head of Cerberus" rather than the magnum opus of "The Book of the New Sun". If Cerberus works for you, there is a ton more to chew in New Sun, and you should absolutely read it whether or not you like more mainstream fant…
For all those who are saying now "Who's Gene Wolfe??" I strongly, strongly, urge you to read his tetralogy "The Book of The New Sun," it's one of the finest sci-fi/fantasy series I've ever read and I have a pretty damn critical taste when it comes to literature. (not trying to sound snobby by the way, I just don't praise books like these lightly or without good reason) So I love Lord of the Rings, the Silmarillion, M…
Haven't read Gene Wolfe (yet), but I can strongly recommend 'Hyperion Cantos' by Dan Simmons.
In that decade, Wolfe produced three large works (The Fifth Head of Cerberus, Peace and The Book of the New Sun) and a number of short stories where the prose was incredibly rich and beautiful, fully the equal of Proust or Nabokov. His reputation should rest on these.
But from the early 1980s, his prose became drab, lackluster. He still could impress readers with his plots that invariably featured unreliable narrators and ellipsis, but even this was gradually taken to the point of absurdity. By the turn of the millennium, he felt like a one-trick pony. His editors at Tor apparently accepted every manuscript he submitted, but the late flood of weak novels IMHO diluted his stature.
Back in the 80's I started seeing so many raves for TBotNS that I went out and bought them all at once.
About 80 pages into the first one, I was turned off, bored really. They sat on my shelf for a decade at least, before I just gave them away.
My question is this: how long did it take you to "get into" this series. Should I have plowed on further? Or tried a restart? (I read the first 100 pages of Dune about 3 times before it clicked, and I loved it all after that)
Or is it a taste/style thing, and if someone doesn't like it within 80 pages, they're not likely to enjoy the rest?
I've read lots of SciFi over the years, some of it challenging. I can read hard books. Back in the 80's I started seeing so many raves for TBotNS that I went out and bought them all at once. About 80 pages into the first one, I was turned off, bored really. They sat on my shelf for a decade at least, before I just gave them away. My question is this: how long did it take you to "get into" this series. Should I have p…
I find it hard to appreciate art that revels in torture, graphic violence and emotional abuse as an end unto itself. If you want an example of science fiction as high art, personally I would suggest Vernor Vinge (specifically A Fire Upon the Deep and A Deepness in the Sky ) and Ursula Le Guin.
I can see how you get there, but strongly disagree with that assessment of BotNS. It’s far from an endorsement of torture and abuse. Master Gurloes is a deeply broken man. Severian’s childhood trauma colors the entire story, especially his relationships with women. Part of Severian’s maturation throughout the books is his slow abandonment of his life and identity as a torturer. To get anything out of BotNS you need t…
Compare the similar "eww" reaction to Larry Niven's The Ringworld Throne where the author kept describing the characters' casual sex with the locals of the places they passed through.