Friday, 12 October 2012













  1. The problem with 'transparency' as a qualifier for prose is that it ignores the entire issue of voice in prose. All prose has a voice, so your choice as a writer is either to acknowledge that voice and control it, or ignore it and lose control. Transparent prose is attempting to do the latter. To make the prose just a medium through which film like images are conveyed to a reader. The problem is that it's actual voice then is very far from transparent. Usually it sounds a bit like a stilted version of the author in conversation. It's also not as popular as people think. If you look at some of the real big hitters in genre - Terry Pratchett, Iain Banks, Neil Gaiman, Stephen King et al - actually their work is VERY strongly voiced. You can hear the voice of the author rising off the page as the voice of a masterly storyteller. the flip side is fiction which is far too concerned with voice - which includes much literary fiction, including Mitchell in places - where the voice is clearly contrived. Again, off putting.

  2. I'm personally inclined to the idea that SF should aspire to at least the heights of traditional, 'literary' prose. I have long felt that SF is more than a genre of entertainment, that it can be a tool to illuminate the truth of humanity in a way that perhaps other forms of fiction can not. It's obvious to all that SF is used to explore the possibilities of future technology, but it is when an author uses it to explore how people work that it begins to show its potential.

    This function of the genre may have pre-existed the genre itself. Consider "The Time Machine" by H.G.Wells: The fanciful technology is not the important thing, it is the speculation about what might become of humanity and our world; the author's reflection on our place in the universe is the true subject. Wrapped up in his marvellously stylistic writing that short story is a classic of literature.

    The idea that art has a purpose greater than entertainment may be old fashioned, one could argue that the fight for that was lost by the Dada movement, but literature is at once old and new. The art of storytelling is as old as humanity, revived by each generation. If SF is essentially modern then we must strive to encapsulate the best of the old within it.

  3. It would be nice if you could provide some examples of writers who fit into that camp (I think we can all cite examples of the "bricklayers")

  4. Damien - I'm trying to work out whether voice is a modal thing that can be usefully separated from the degree of transparency of the prose, or whether the two are too complexly interdependent.

  5. Which camp, Orin - the third mode?

  6. As a reader, I've found myself less and less tolerant of "merely functional" writing as I've got older, partly because I have less reading time, and partly because there are less "new" ideas to carry me past that. (I don't mean SF has got less original, but when you're starting out, inevitably everything feels new). I suspect you're right to say that most SF fans don't see prose quality as a big factor in their judgement of a work, and in fact there is probably a large contingent that view literary fiction as shallow, writing for writing sake and would distrust some of those tricks and styles becoming more common in-genre. You have to look at the mistrust of lit-fics "tourist books" such as Cloud Atlas or Never Let Me Go.

  7. More complex indeed ... seems to me that dividing fiction into genres never really carves literature at the joints. Maybe that's because these divisions are only a "marketing device that got out of hand", as M John Harrison suggests.

    But with that proviso in place, I've always thought that "literary fiction" is a different kind of label, since literary fiction - unlike SF, or crime, or romance - is not restricted at all in form or content. All it takes for something to be "literary fiction" is that it's good.

    Now identifying what's "good", and working out who we should trust to judge "goodness" is a whole 'nother set of problems, but I guess some sort of willingness to follow a story across "genre tramlines", to reach for some "intentional non-transparency" might very well be involved.

    Readers of House of Suns, or Century Rain, or Revelation Space, or Scales, or ... (I could go on) ... would probably agree that you've been writing "interesting stuff" all along, but I can't wait to see what happens when you start "pushing beyond" a little further ...

  8. Yes - third mode. Would McHugh's China Mountain Zhang (which you expressed deep admiration for on twitter) be along those lines?

  9. CMZ might be an example of the second done really well, I suspect, but one shouldn't over-categorize these things. However, I'd definitely mention M John Harrison. Many others, of course.

    1. "But when I noticed my bridge circuitry, I knew I was no longer in control: it had melted to slag!"

  10. I don't believe such a separation is possible. A reader will construct a voice from the words on the page, regardless of the writer's intentions. It's part of the reason why SF fans will happily read workmanlike or worse prose which other readers reject...they construct a voice from the writing that they enjoy. Often it's a voice they've been carrying with them since childhood or whenever they first fell in love with the genre.

  11. I've felt for a long time that Ray Bradbury wrote with pixie dust, and Harlan Ellison with razor blades. Brilliant, "literary" prose from both of them. Artful writing - when not overdone - makes the reading more enjoyable. Continue to strive for this, Mr. Reynolds; it is an endeavor that will reap rewards for you and us.

  12. For what it's worth, Al, it struck me almost within the very first few pages of BRE that you were aiming for something a little bit different with your prose. The imagery you evoked was, in my mind, equally as stunning and original as the on-board life of the Nostalgia for Infinity, or the dark years on Janus. But the language you used to paint the scene was distinctly more epic, or perhaps poetic, than anything I'd read of yours previously. It was an interesting shift in direction for you, and its reward was a suitably epic and grandiose feel for a novel which, comparatively speaking, was quite small in scope.

    My favourite passage came immediately in BRE, a particularly elegant phrase wherein "the sky claimed its debt" of the wet ground. That passage set the tone for, in my mind, a new kind of Reynolds novel, one which aspired to literary grandeur as well as SF greatness. Was this a conscious decision on your part?

  13. I've never been a literary reader. I don't particularly care all that much about language, but when it is done particularly well, the story does make much more of an impact. For example Hyperion by Dan Simmons or the book I'm reading now: Neverness by Davind Zindell. Both of these have very distinct writing. The afore mentioned Harlan Ellison is another that came to my mind when reading you posting. But to me the story and ideas are much more important than the language. So for me, with genre-literature the story comes first and writing can add an extra dimension, but isn't essential for the prose to be literary to enjoy a book (hell, my favorite writer is Arthur C. Clarke, not the most literary of writers :). O and by the way, I do see the progression in you work Alastair and think it's a good progression. What I do dislike in books is when too much words are spent on details that don't matter all that much to the story. But this is a disease most modern writers seem to have nowadays, so perhaps a topic for another time...

  14. Hi Al:

    As an aspiring writer I really notice prose (I 'try' to pay attention to every comma!). The quality of your prose is one of the main reasons I always return to your work, and prefer it over the work of other SF authors.

    Even before I began writing myself (at a time when I used to be a tiny bit impatient when confronted with too much description) I remember reading paragraphs of Chasm City twice over, because the description was so good!

    In terms of "pushing beyond" I guess I'd like to say a couple more things:

    1) For me the writing prose shouldn't be the end in itself, because for me great writing isn't about technique per se. It's writing that engages my emotions. So, perhaps you can look for ways to write that better encapsulate passion, that puts the characters' hearts onto the page? I think Richard Morgan, for example, is great at this – lots of anger, bitterness, loss, occasionally love, right there in black and white.

    2) I don't know what it's like for you, having begun your first novel 20yrs ago. However, maybe sometimes writing becomes like second nature? Perhaps another challenge is to avoid switching to a sort of 'auto pilot'?


  15. You can probably get as many answers to that as you have readers - I think we all have different tresholds of enjoyment regarding transparency versus a very obvious writer's voice. And I don't think it's an either/ or position (as in, you either write transparently, or you deliberately push your "author's voice": no two writers will achieve transparency in quite the same way, and transparency isn't the one size-fits-all baggy tracksuit to the author's voice bespoke Saville Row suit.)

    But I think you make a very fair point when you call it a tool for the task, because it does boil down to what story you want to write, and what best serves that story (from your point of view - myself, the reader, might disagree with you when I read the finished product... but that doesn't matter). Having said that, I think yet another side of the transparency question is communication. I've read books where the writing feels like it's oh so in love with its own cleverness, and oh so I'm-so-much-smarter-than-you, and oh, look, I'm a real writer, me!!! And, well, when I say read... That sort of thing doesn't really agree with me (and I speak as a HUGE fan of Harlan Ellison - writing with razorblades, too true!- , and Terry Pratchett, and Ray Bradbury, and Roger Zelazny, and William Gibson, and Ursula Le Guin, and Richard Morgan, to name but a few - all writers who have a very strong (and very beautiful) voice. And I savour their books like fine [insert alcoholic beverage of your choice here].

    It's a fine line. But hey, as a reader, I want it all: good story, great characters, interesting world AND elegant writing.

  16. I've always liked your prose. Personally, I think there's more than one type of clarity. Clarity of emotion is often helped by the potency of words. It's easy to do poorly, though. There's a difference between being colourful and being vivid.