On Saturday I led a panel at UCLA with three writers who work in what we might call slipstream, literary fantasy, conceptual fiction, surrealism, or some other school still to be named. While the specific label isn't particularly important, the emphasis on rethinking realism, on embracing the best of genres like fantasy and science fiction, and moving into what Michael Chabon has called "the … [Read more...]
Los Angeles Times Festival of Books
THIS Saturday I am quite honored to be moderating a panel with three very fine novelists of my generation at the LA Times Festival of Books. The panel -- "Writing the Fantastic" -- takes place at 2, in Moore 100 on the UCLA Campus.One of my obsessions the last few years has been the move away from realism -- and in many cases toward genre -- by writers born in the late '60s and early '70s. I sort … [Read more...]
Salman Rushdie vs. Los Angeles
WHEN i agreed to hang out with novelist salman rushdie in and around hollywood for a few hours, i would not have been surprised to find myself embroiled in a discussion about george harrison's facility for the sitar, or to be shown the very drugstore where an acid-tripping aldous huxley encountered "the doors of perception." but i did not expect to get into a hilarious story about "starsky and … [Read more...]
Eight Decades of Ursula K. Le Guin
TODAY one of the most innovative and intriguing writers in the english language marks her 80th birthday. there aren't many novelists who i enjoy as much today as i did when i was in elementary school; ursula le guin is one of them. here is the recent LA Times piece i wrote on her after visiting her in portland and re-immersing myself in her body of work and the debates around it. she was a very … [Read more...]
Lydia Millet vs. Domestic Realism
ONE of the key impulses of my generation -- what we used to call generation x -- has been the move away from old-school psychological realism into fiction's "borderlands." that's michael chabon's term, and he's generally talking about the wild frontier between literary fiction and fantasy, pulp crime, sci-fi, lovecraftian horror and comics. but lydia millet is less interested in those fan-boy … [Read more...]
Ursula Le Guin Vs. Oliver Cromwell
SOMEHOW, without quite knowing it, i wrote two brief pieces on ursula le guin, and both have recently gone up.the first is mostly an extended intro to my LATimes profile, which adds some excised lines from author/ essayist/ cosmopolitan pico iyer as well as sci-fi scholar/ critic annalee newitz.the second, here, is the seed of what i hope is a bigger project some day on the transition away from … [Read more...]