(urth) If I already like ...

[DAVID STOCKHOFF]

Well put. Ordinary terms like "suspension of disbelief" don't seem up to describing what happens to me. I have even reread the book with the express purpose of finding where the wonder lies, and Jeff is right that there are very few parts---perhaps a dozen, including the talking stork, getting lost in the wood and finding Mrs Underhill's cottage (very Alice-y), Grandfather Trout, the oddness of Old Law Farm---that actually would require supernatural explanation, if explanation were demanded. 


But they are so woven into the tale.... the whole thing works on you all at once. It can't be coincidental that Crowley says of Little, Big, that he threw into it every storytelling trick he learned from writing soaps (Wolfe has said similar things about BOTNS, except for the soap part).



________________________________
 From: Craig Brewer <cnbrewer at yahoo.com>
To: The Urth Mailing List <urth at lists.urth.net> 
Sent: Wednesday, April 18, 2012 12:31 PM
Subject: Re: (urth) If I already like ...
 

I'm with David on this one. As much as I love Wolfe and the Sun books, _Little, Big_ is one of the books that I stand in dumbfaced, slackjawed awe over. To me, it's one of the few works that convincingly recounts what actual "fantasy" would be like if it crept into mundane life. It's always been to me what "real" fantasy would be like...there's nothing "speculative" about it at all. (Plus, it's also one of the most realistic love stories I think I've ever read.)

_Little, Big_ does what I think _Peace_ does: completely transcend genre while retaining everything wonderful that makes me a genre reader. There's no "suspension of disbelief"; just wonder.

Granted, that's a very romantic notion and begs a lot of questions of taste. But it may explain why _Little, Big_ doesn't satisfy a lot of people to whom I recommended it when they were expecting something more fantastic.



________________________________
 From: DAVID STOCKHOFF <dstockhoff at verizon.net>
To: The Urth Mailing List <urth at lists.urth.net> 
Sent: Wednesday, April 18, 2012 10:04 AM
Subject: Re: (urth) If I already like ...
 

It's often strange to see a favorite book through another reader's eyes. I find fantasy in every word and sentence of the book and can't imagine seeing it otherwise. 


Perhaps this is because I approach Wolfe and fantasy from a third perspective in addition to those mentioned: (1) ideology (Catholicism) and (2) sensibility (pre-postmodernism, as someone put it). A fourth approach might be science. But I consider style over all else; to me, style defines SF.


What writers like Charles de Lint do is called "urban fantasy" by some. I find the "fantasy" in these stories to be highly separable from the "urban" part, which invariably holds no interest for me because its style is flat.

What Crowley does shows how de Lint falls flat.


________________________________
 From: Jeff Wilson <jwilson at clueland.com>
To: The Urth Mailing List <urth at lists.urth.net> 
Sent: Wednesday, April 18, 2012 8:11 AM
Subject: Re: (urth) If I already like ...
 
On 4/18/2012 6:59 AM, David Stockhoff wrote:
> On 4/17/2012 10:42 PM, Jeff Wilson wrote:
>> On 4/17/2012 2:08 PM, Jerry Friedman wrote:
>>> I strongly second the recommendation for Crowley, and I'd start with
>>> /Little, Big, /although he's never written anything bad since /Beasts/.
>>
>> _Little, Big_ was a disappointment for me. Part of the novel is urban,
>> but the specks of actual fantasy come before and after.
>>
>
> Do you mean classic Victorian-style fantasy vs urban fantasy?


I was ready for either, but outside of a talking fish and bird, I came 
up empty. It has to be the least fantastic fantasy I've ever encountered.

Other than that, it was okay.


-- 
Jeff Wilson - jwilson at clueland.com
Computational Intelligence
 Laboratory - Texas A&M
 Texarkana
< http://www.tamut.edu/CIL >
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