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to convene in San Diego
ConDor is a small San Diego convention that ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
sartorias and others have been recommending for years, but I hadn't gone there for various reasons until Diana Glyer picked it as the site to hold a publicity party for her newly-released book that I'd also worked on. It was fairly convenient geographically for her, and the timing turned out to be perfect, as the book actually came out the Monday before the convention.
The two of us plus our friend and partner in Inklings-mania Lynn Maudlin shared a panel on "C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien: Collaborators? Critics? Curmudgeons?" to which the answer was, all of the above. I also appeared on one of a whole track of alternate history panels (why were there so many alternate history panels? Because the guest of honor was Eric "1632" Flint, that's why) which went pretty well, and two other panels that quite astonished me with their quality.
There's nothing easier than moderating a panel with a question mark in the title, and on "Fantasy in Medieval Settings. Why?" I just posed the question and watched as the panelists poured out brilliant, eloquent, and quite different (but not contradictory) observations on this question. And I should have taped it, or at least written down more than a few cryptic words. Medieval power relationships, the paradigm of supernatural belief of those times, the relative ease for most readers of identifying with medieval characters as opposed to those of earlier times or far away places, and the tradition of romanticizing the medieval all played a part in the discussion.sartorias, Bill Stoddard (whom I hadn't seen in, oh, 15 years), James Floyd, and the awesomely articulate Allison Lonsdale were the brilliant panelists.
Another panel on "Fantasy Outside the Tolkienian Model" had Stephen Potts and Jacqueline Lichtenberg naming authors while I identified the non-Tolkienian traditions that they belonged to, demonstrating that there's plenty of other worthy models to draw on. The epic sagas of George R.R. Martin and Terry Goodkind? More Howardian than Tolkienian, really, no matter what the blurbs say. Gene Wolfe's Book of the New Sun? In the tradition of Jack Vance. China Mieville? Mervyn Peake, of course, and Peake in turn is Dickensian. Peter Beagle? Robert Nathan is his acknowledged master. Robert Holdstock? Uh, the only comparable author I can think of is Alan Garner. And the one set of books that's firmly in the Tolkien tradition while being equally original and not a cheap imitation? Ursula Le Guin's Earthsea.
I attended a few other panels of interest. At one for "Authors Telling Tales of Nightmare Agents/Editors/Publishers" one of the panelists began by saying he presumed we were all there because we were budding authors. This kind of assumption - that there's no such thing as fans or readers at conventions, only authors and author wanna-bes - irritates me, but I found a non-irritated way to express it. I shot back, "Or maybe we just like to read horror."
Best overheard conversations:
A: That would make a good movie.
B: It would, but it didn't.
X: Zombies are the monster du jour.
Y: I can't wait till the zombie romance novels start replacing the vampire romance novels.
X: Nah, zombies aren't romantic.
Y: What about mummies?
X: Mummies are zombies in gift-wrapping.
sartorias and others have been recommending for years, but I hadn't gone there for various reasons until Diana Glyer picked it as the site to hold a publicity party for her newly-released book that I'd also worked on. It was fairly convenient geographically for her, and the timing turned out to be perfect, as the book actually came out the Monday before the convention.The two of us plus our friend and partner in Inklings-mania Lynn Maudlin shared a panel on "C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien: Collaborators? Critics? Curmudgeons?" to which the answer was, all of the above. I also appeared on one of a whole track of alternate history panels (why were there so many alternate history panels? Because the guest of honor was Eric "1632" Flint, that's why) which went pretty well, and two other panels that quite astonished me with their quality.
There's nothing easier than moderating a panel with a question mark in the title, and on "Fantasy in Medieval Settings. Why?" I just posed the question and watched as the panelists poured out brilliant, eloquent, and quite different (but not contradictory) observations on this question. And I should have taped it, or at least written down more than a few cryptic words. Medieval power relationships, the paradigm of supernatural belief of those times, the relative ease for most readers of identifying with medieval characters as opposed to those of earlier times or far away places, and the tradition of romanticizing the medieval all played a part in the discussion.
sartorias, Bill Stoddard (whom I hadn't seen in, oh, 15 years), James Floyd, and the awesomely articulate Allison Lonsdale were the brilliant panelists.Another panel on "Fantasy Outside the Tolkienian Model" had Stephen Potts and Jacqueline Lichtenberg naming authors while I identified the non-Tolkienian traditions that they belonged to, demonstrating that there's plenty of other worthy models to draw on. The epic sagas of George R.R. Martin and Terry Goodkind? More Howardian than Tolkienian, really, no matter what the blurbs say. Gene Wolfe's Book of the New Sun? In the tradition of Jack Vance. China Mieville? Mervyn Peake, of course, and Peake in turn is Dickensian. Peter Beagle? Robert Nathan is his acknowledged master. Robert Holdstock? Uh, the only comparable author I can think of is Alan Garner. And the one set of books that's firmly in the Tolkien tradition while being equally original and not a cheap imitation? Ursula Le Guin's Earthsea.
I attended a few other panels of interest. At one for "Authors Telling Tales of Nightmare Agents/Editors/Publishers" one of the panelists began by saying he presumed we were all there because we were budding authors. This kind of assumption - that there's no such thing as fans or readers at conventions, only authors and author wanna-bes - irritates me, but I found a non-irritated way to express it. I shot back, "Or maybe we just like to read horror."
Best overheard conversations:
A: That would make a good movie.
B: It would, but it didn't.
X: Zombies are the monster du jour.
Y: I can't wait till the zombie romance novels start replacing the vampire romance novels.
X: Nah, zombies aren't romantic.
Y: What about mummies?
X: Mummies are zombies in gift-wrapping.