jameswharris

Lord of Light

A couple weeks ago I reread Lord of Light by Roger Zelazny, a favorite novel from my memory of 1967 by listening to the new audio book edition from Audible Frontiers. For days afterward, I hammered out an ever wordier review that I never could finish because what I kept striving to say became ever more complex and out of my grasp. So welcome to try number two.

Here’s my problem. Forty-one years ago I read Lord of Light and thought it deserved its book of the year, 1968 Hugo Award, that made Zelazny, as well as Samuel R. Delany, the new comets streaking across the science fictional sky. Lord of Light took a traditional idea of colonizing a new world and jazzed it up by blending in Hindu mythology. It was colorful, had lots of vivid scenes, and Zelazny deserved high praise for trying to do something new and break out of John W. Campbell’s vision of space opera.

Fast forward to our future and I read Lord of Light again. It’s not the same book – well, I’m not the same reader, so the exact same book came out different this time. In the 1960s, New Wave science fiction felt sophisticated compared to 1930s and 1940s classic science fiction, but looking back now, Lord of Light seems primitive and crude, like The Skylark of Space felt when I read it around the same time I read Lord of Light the first time. Lord of Light is still clever and somewhat vivid, but now I feel like Zelazny didn’t spend enough time developing his ambitious fantasy.

The idea of tech savvy first colonists setting themselves up as gods and enslaving their descendants in a pre-tech world is a far out concept, although I don’t know what Freud would have done with the idea. The idea is so anti-science fictional that’s it’s amazing to think that it won the Hugo that year, now that I’m looking backwards.

The trouble with this contrived plot is it has no philosophical weight, a quality that makes science fiction novels have lasting power. That, and the fact that the characterization is so minimal that it has zero emotional impact. There are people that still love this story, but I’m not one of them. So, do I savage a classic novel of my beloved genre, or do I promote it as a worthy read for historical purposes? In my first attempt to review this story I struggled to find all it’s positive aspects and compare them to great SF/F that’s been written since then. But the more I work to find comparisons, the more I realized that the field of writing has evolved, even for the lowly science fiction genre, leaving Lord of Light shipwrecked in the past.

I’m currently reading The Little Book by Selden Edwards, a literary time travel novel that is so well written, so imaginative, so deep in characterization that it makes the once dazzling Lord of Light fizzle. I also listened to Heinlein’s 1951 Starman Jones just after Lord of Light and it still shines. Why? Heinlein had great science fictional ideas, but he also had characterization and good page turning plotting, at least in the 1950s. Lord of Light would make a great comic book – it has colorful scenes, super heroes and the depth of characterization that matches the average DC or Marvel comic.

I know my science fiction friends think I love to make inflammatory statements like the one I’m about to make, but I don’t. Writers outside of the science fiction and fantasy genre are taking science fictional concepts and writing much better stories than the guys inside of the genre. Look how Michael Chabon swept our awards this year. Read The Time Traveler’s Wife, The Life of Pi, Never Let Me Go, The Sparrow, His Dark Materials, Cloud Atlas, and other outsider novels that build their stories around our fantastic themes.

Part of Zelazny’s failure is he wrote for a genre where he had to hammer out the books. If he had worked on Lord of Light with the same time and applied study as J. R. R. Tolkien did for his books, Lord of Light would be a fantastic SF classic. Instead it’s basically a foundation for a great SF novel. The forty-one years since 1967 has up the ante on what it takes to write a stand-out SF novel. If a young new writer took Zelazny’s idea and made it into a genuine statement about reality, space exploration and added real characterization she would be a new comet blazing across our science fiction skies.

To understand what I mean, read Lord of Light and imagine how it would be filmed. It might have much of the feel of the recent Transformers, Ironman and Hellboy movies. That’s okay if all you want is an ephemeral summer blockbuster that will seem silly in forty years. I just finished reading Edith Wharton’s An Age of Innocence (1920) and I’m now reading The House of Mirth (1905), and these books have lasting power. To last, you have to have something to say, not preaching like later Heinlein, but careful observations about our reality. Wharton is brilliant at observing communication between men and women.

All Zelazny did was take ancient super heroes, now called Hindu gods, and created a science fictional setting to justify their returned existence, which essentially is what every super hero comic does. They are flashy action myths that offer no hidden parables. We assume Sam is the good guy and the gods of this planet’s heaven are the bad guys, but that was never justified by skillful writing. Lord of Light was written just as the the 1960s was about to peak in its social transformations, and Zelazny fails to even try to tie it in – what a wasted opportunity.

Now imagine writing a philosophical novel that realistically tries to capture what it’s like to become godlike. Let’s say in the future we have access to virtual worlds where artificial beings dwell, but we don’t want them to know about our world. This has all kinds of philosophical possibilities. Then imagine using such a setup for first person shooter wars. How limp would that be? That’s sort of what Zelazny did.

Zelazny faintly hints at greater possibilities in wayward places within Lord of Light, but his plot is so thin about overthrowing heaven that we never feel that that it goes beyond setting up battle scenes.

I wish I could write fiction. This is an exciting time to be a writer. Writing techniques have evolved to dizzy heights of sophistication. Yes, I urge you to listen to the new edition of Lord of Light to see why 1967 science fiction was so exciting then, but don’t accept it as a great novel, instead imagine how to retool it with modern writing technology.

I think science fiction has been coasting for years, with the exciting new Turks coming from outside of the field. Don’t get me wrong, there’s lot of sense of wonder left in science fiction, at least I hope there is, but the genre tends to be a record label repacking old hits rather than putting time and money into finding new forms of music. I don’t read many new novels from within the genre any more, but I still try to read a certain number of novellas, novelettes and short stories from the best-of anthologies every year.

There’s no lack of far out ideas. What’s needed is a New Wave of story telling techniques. In this decade, the new Zelaznys and Delanys are coming from outside of the genre, so SF isn’t getting the credit. To the larger outside world, only a tiny handful of true SF novels have caught the attention of their bigger pond. The most famous is Ender’s Game. Novels like Neuromancer and Snow Crash are on the distant radar of a few non-science fiction readers, but for the most part, the world of science fiction is as isolated as the star writers known to MFA majors.

The place to be are those tables in bookstores, near the front door, that display the trade paperbacks of titles that stay on them for months, if not years – the books that all the hardcore bookworms read. The ones that get produced as audio books, studied by book clubs and made into movies. These are the books that surf the cresting wave of popular literature. SF and fantasy books are seldom seen on these tables, and that’s because the SF/F/H genre writers aren’t using the latest writing techniques to tell their stories.

It’s not about literary quality, not in the academic sense. It’s why books like Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight series are stacked on floor all around these tables. I know my science fiction fans think I keep bashing the genre, but I’m trying to be helpful. Twilight succeeds where other fantasy books fail because most genre books are tone deaf to emotion and characterization. Lord of Light will never be a classic outside of it’s tiny puddle because it measures almost absolute zip at expressing emotion warmth, and barely climbs to the level of one-dimension for its characters.

I’m not trying to be nasty here, but I know it sounds like it. If you’ve never read any good novels, and spent your life reading within the science fiction genre, then Lord of Light will feel brilliant. Compared to E. E. Doc Smith, Edmund Hamilton and most of the other SF up to the 1960s, it is. In terms of storytelling plotting, it doesn’t even get up to average Edgar Rice Burroughs John Carter novel. Where Lord of Light shines is fantastic ideas. Science fiction is a literature of fantastic ideas. What I want to see are SF novels that mix great ideas with good story telling. Can you imagine the success of SF if science fictional ideas could be conveyed with the storytelling techniques of J. K. Rowling?

Jim

Is Prince Charming A Hero?

During one of my many ongoing arguments with the ladies at work about the never ending battle between the sexes, I was surprised to hear one very astonishing assertion put forth, at least to me, that Prince Charming is a hero that every boy fantasizes about becoming. Peggy and Heather were ganging up on me to defend their belief that people are not animals and biology is not the overwhelming motivating force I claim it to be. I keep trying to convince Peggy that many of her basic beliefs are due to biology and not as she adamantly insists, due to what we choose to believe through free will.

I argued that popular myths often reflect underlying sexual motivations, and that our private fantasies reflect biological impulses to reproduce, whether sexual or romantic. They countered back that Cinderella is a universal fantasy that doesn’t deal with sexuality, but is about pure romance, and it certainly doesn’t grow out of biochemistry. I shot back that it was only universal to girls. Both of them, talking at the same time, essentially said my philosophy was warped by crude sexual impulses and that Prince Charming was indeed a universal fantasy hero for boys.

“You’ve gotta be kidding!” I said, amazed that both of them could think that. “Boys don’t fantasize about being Prince Charming.” Okay, that was over-generalizing, but no friend of mine ever revealed such a desire.

“Of course they do,” the ladies insisted loudly. “Prince Charming is a hero! All boys dream of saving women is distress.” They went on to imply that Prince Charming fell into the categories of heroes like those Joseph Campbell described in his famous books.

“First off, Prince Charming is not a hero. He doesn’t fight anyone. He faces no dangers. He’s just a fancy royal dude that all the courtly ladies twitter over. Heroes are guys who face great perils and beat unbeatable odds – not guys using glass shoes to interview potential wives.”

My lady friends did not like this at all. They argued that Prince Charming saves Cinderella, and that little boys everywhere loved to fantasize about rescuing girls. “You two obviously haven’t spent any time inside the brain of the average male adolescent.” I didn’t say this, but I also thought of suggesting they rent some porn to see how boys cast Cinderella in their dreams.

Just to get a reality check, I asked my friend Mike about this, and he was also amused by the idea of boys idolized Prince Charming. Then I decided I should ask another woman, and picked Susan, my wife. She suggested that Prince Charming was the metrosexual of his day, and wasn’t a hero. Now that a creative response!

This got me to thinking and it occurred to me that if we used the same motifs as Cinderella, boys fantasies, especially if they hadn’t reached puberty and XXX brain theater time, might consider The Princess Bride a more realistic fairy tale for their mental television inspiration. Westley is a hero because he fights the evil Prince Humperdinck. The key element here is not Buttercup – the hot chick to be saved, but swords. Boys love swords and sword fights, and the real issue will be whether they want to emulated Wesley or Inigo Montoya. Before puberty, the majority of fantasies will be about using metal swords and afterwards their dominant thoughts will focus on their fleshy swords.

Look at the whole light saber thing for a modern variation. I assume young boys have spent far more time pretending to fight with light sabers than thinking about rescuing Princess Leia. It not that Princess Leia didn’t inspire fantasies in boys, but out of the trillions of cerebral performances that Carrie Fisher’s image has given, damn few involved rescue. At most, the rescue is setup for the real action, either before or after.

I can see how women get confused. They think saving the hot chick is the whole point of the story. But it’s not – it’s the violence. Boys love violence, and its the dominant fantasy element before sex drives them crazy. Heroes are the last man standing, the alpha male, the winner of the game, the king of the hill, the slayer of dragons, the dude you don’t want to mess with. Women are the prizes, and what they plan for their prizes are not elegant banquet dining and courtly romance, but the same plans Prince Humperdinck had.

I think Prince Charming is the fantasy that women have for how they want us men to act. And there are lots of savvy men out there who know this and are willing to play the game to get what they want, but that doesn’t mean they fantasize about being Prince Charming. Acting like George Clooney is only the romantic costume we all wished we had to hide our wolfish selves.

Our fantasies aren’t about rescuing women, they are fantasies about competing for women. The Iliad wasn’t about rescuing Helen, it was a major war fantasy. How many lines does Helen get as oppose to the number of lines glorifying battle?

If you want to know about the inner life of young dudes, look at the LCD screen in front of their faces – first person shooters, sports and porn. As males mature, they add in dreams of ambition. Men and women just aren’t on the same wavelength when it comes to personally created fantasies, or the mass consumption fantasies they buy.

I know Peggy and Heather will think my opinions are the representation of some male deviant minority but I don’t think so. To make my case, how many males like to go to chick flicks? When I go it’s because I get to earn points with a female, I get to see lots of beautiful female images on the screen, and its hilarious how they portray men.

Of course the reality is real women are not like Keira Knightley characters, and us guys don’t get to act like Daniel Craig. Prince Charming is not going to rescue you gals from humdrum life, and we guys don’t get to whip out .45s to solve minor disagreements. We all have to be who we are.

And by the way Peggy, the dream of finding Prince Charming is based in biology. Females are programmed to search out the best male provider they can find, and I can easily believe Prince Charming is a universal male archetype that females want in their dreams, and those dreams have their seeds deep in your cells. And male fantasies of violence and sex also come from biology. Just watch nature shows to see how males fight for the right to mate.

It would be very interesting if we didn’t have these biological impulses. If males and females were totally intellectual creatures who dated because of shared interests how would society be different? Can you imagine what life and fiction would be like? Without the biological impulse would we ever sacrifice our time, energy and money to raise the next generation? Without the biological drive would we even think kids as cute and lovable to have around? Without the biological imperative would women want to be seeded no matter how charming the prince?

Would women be more independent without the Prince Charming programming planted into their brains? Would men consider women as equal souls if they didn’t have the XXX Cinderella programming in their brains?

Of course, I think male humans would have remained uncivilized chimps if it hadn’t been for the Prince Charming myth. Lady frogs only expect Prince Charming frogs to croak the loudest. Lady humans expect men to act nice, give up their weapons, stay home, guard the kids, and bring home the antelope – with Prince Charming the tune we all try to harmonize with our croaking behaviors. Instead of bashing heads like mountain goats we’re expected to earn lots money and buy sparkling diamonds to prove our worth. It’s weird, but it’s still biology.

I think in the end, the higher brain functions that Peggy wants to defend has to deal with sex on a different level. Most of our lives aren’t about reproduction. As adults we spend most of our time not thinking about sex, but it still taints our actions. Women want men to give up their XXX fantasies about women – well ladies, men hate to be typecast as Prince Charming. These are both very hard roles to play. Peggy, for you to be right about people not being animals, both genders have to give up their fantasies. I don’t think that will happen, but it’s what’s needed.

Jim

Where’s The Jazz

My friend Lee pointed out that Rhapsody.com is weak on jazz, so I decided to test it. I went to Jazz Review and checked the 11 albums that are marked “New” on the Jazz CD Review Database. Rhapsody only had 5 of the 11. However, 3 of the 6 that weren’t on Rhapsody were missing from Amazon.com as well. How obscure are some jazz CDs?

Albums on Rhapsody

Future Day by David Finck
Night Town by The Hot Club of Detroit
I Had the Craziest Dream by David Berger Octet
Bluelisted by JW Jones
Do5 by Mahogany Frog

Albums not on Rhapsody

Dry Bridge Road by Noah Preminger Group
Explorations by David Leonhardt Trio
Renewal by various
Vicky Christina Barcelona soundtrack
Home by Kelley Johnson
Incandescence by Bill Stewart

Over at JazzTimes.com I found five reviews listed online from their September issue and Rhapsody had 3 of the 5.

Here and Gone by David Sanborn (Rhapsody)
Encuentro by Afro-Cuban Jazz Project
Stompin’ the Blues by Harry Allen-Joe Cohn Quartet (Rhapsody)
I Am I Am by JD Allen Trio (Rhapsody)
Tenor Talk by Jerry Bergonzi

That’s 8 out of 16, or .500 batting average for Jazz using this simple test. Not bad, but not anywhere like the Rhapsody’s success with pop music.

Lee also asked about world music. I went to RootsWorld.com and checked their first 10 album reviews, and Rhapsody had 7 out of 10.

Albums on Rhapsody

Lonquén by Francesca Ancarola
Duo by Bibaia
Here to Stay by BR6
3 Nights by Zulya and the Children of the Underground
Teknochek Collision by Slavic Soul Party!
Alevanta! by Benjamin Escoriza
Klezmer at the Cotton Club by Helmut Eisel and Band

Albums not on Rhapsody

Essai by Bastien Lucas
English Country Garden by Jenny McCormick
Orm by Sågskära

This really shows how little I know about jazz and world music. I had only heard of David Sanborn before. If also shows I’m not making full use of Rhapsody.com. I could create quite a musical education regimen if I just made myself try one new album a day from diverse musical sources.

I wonder if there are any bloggers out there who are subscribers to Rhapsody that try to review as many albums as they can. If I was retired, I think I would be tempted to start an “Album of the Day” site.

Jim

How Comprehensive is Rhapsody Music

The other day I wrote Music Lovers Nirvana, about the ready availability of online music, and how Rhapsody.com had 5 out of 5 albums reviewed in Entertainment Weekly. I thought I test that further with the latest issue of Utne Reader (Sept/Oct 2008 ) and a slightly old issue of Rolling Stone (6/12/08). The Utne Reader reviewed 6 albums and Rhapsody.com had 4, with one album not yet released but since they had the artist’s 7 other albums it’s pretty sure they will get it. The one hold out even looks promising since they had the artist’s previous album. For Rolling Stone, Rhapsody.com had 13 out of 13 albums reviewed. I should go out and buy some obscure music journals to test further, but that’s for the future.

I really have to wonder why all true music fans don’t subscribe to Rhapsody.com. Many say they don’t want to rent music, At $12.99 a month, it could be considered a music preview service so you listen to Rhapsody first and then buy your favorites on CD later.

Here are the albums reviewed. The number in () are the number of albums Rhapsody.com have by the artist. I also checked Amazon.com to see what it would cost to buy the album. The first price is for CD/the second for MP3 album if it’s available. All were available on Rhapsody.com unless noted.

Utne Reader Sept/Oct 2008

Soul Sides, v 1 & v 2 Various Artists $13.98
Fair Ain’t Fair by Tim Fite (1) $15.98/$8.99 – not on Rhapsody
Seasons of Change by Brian Blade (3) $14.99/$9.49
Carried to Dust by Calexico (7) $13.99 not yet released
The Best of Lydia Mendoza (7) $16.98/$8.99

Rolling Stone 6/12/8

Evil Urges by My Morning Jacket (9) $8.99/$8.99
Weezer by Weezer (6) $9.99/$5.00
Fleet Foxes by Fleet Foxes (1) $10.49/$5.00
Seeing Sound by N.E.R.D. (3) $11.99/$9.49
Like a Fire by Solomon Burke (24) $14.99/$9.90
We Started Nothing by The Ting Tings (1) $6.99/$7.99
Perfectly Clear by Jewel (6) $9.99/$8.99
Flavor of Entanglement by Alanis Morrisette (9) $9.99/$8.99
All I Intended to Be by Emmylou Harris (31) $9.99/$8.99
Circus Monkey by Walter Becker (6) $9.99/$8.99
The Declaration by Ashanti (8 ) $9.99/$8.99
Here We Stand by The Fratellis (2) $12.99
Wanderlust by Gavin Rossdale (1) $9.99/$8.99

This is like being a music store owner and getting to play all the albums, or like being a music reviewer and getting all the new albums sent to you. It’s hard to believe it’s legal. It’s hard to believe that music companies would support this, but they do.

The only downside I can see to using Rhapsody.com is when an album goes out of print it gets removed from their server. So if you love an album and want it for all time then you should buy it. However, if the album is popular enough to always stay in print you don’t have to worry.

I wonder how much the artists make from their music being on subscription music services? Anyone know?

Jim

Pandora and Internet Radio

On August 16, 2008, the Washington Post ran the news story, “Giant of Internet Radio Nears Its ‘Last Stand’,” referring to Pandora.com. Pandora is a standout Internet site that allows users to create custom Internet radio stations based on their favorite songs and artists. It’s a unique way to discover undiscovered music showcasing technology that gets about a million daily listeners. The Post quotes Pandora’s founder Tim Westergren, “We’re approaching a pull-the-plug kind of decision. This is like a last stand for webcasting.”

The problem is one of paying royalties. Right now there are a number of technologies that broadcast music: traditional radio, satellite radio, cable TV radio and Internet radio. Oddly, they each pay different rates to play music, and it looks like the music industry wants Internet radio to pay the most. If this happens many sites will shut down. Pandora has yet to make money but anticipated to go into the black in 2009 if the rates were not increased.

There are many articles about the death knell of Internet radio showing up now, with the implication that if the rates these sites have to pay goes up they will close their doors. I think other things might happen. Why give up on a new business model so quickly? Pandora is actually a superior way to listen to random music – it’s superior because it’s less random but still random.

There are two way to listen to music. You think of a song you want to hear and you play it, or you turn on a broadcasting system to play music for you. The first method usually involves owning the song, but subscription music is a variation of that. The second method, random listening, involves finding a source that’s close to your musical mood. In the old days, a city might have a dozen radio stations and you picked one to play, or if you were in your car, you programmed your five radio buttons and jumped between them. Satellite music offers more variety by giving you more stations to choose from. Internet radio ups the variety factor further.

Pandora let’s you pick a seed song and then Pandora plays songs their Music Genome Project software thinks will match your taste. You can click thumbs up or thumbs down on their picks to help the software zero in on what you like. It works exceedingly well, but it’s still random music, or broadcast music.

Now I want musicians and music producers to get all the money they can, but I don’t want them to unfairly charge one random music technology more than another, and that appears to be a key issue with Pandora and other Internet radio sites. Another random site I like is Playa Cofi Jukebox, which allows you to seed your mood by picking a year and it broadcasts random songs that came out in that year. That’s another triumph of technology in my book. I want these sites to succeed.

Pandora is thinking of ways to improve its ad revenue and that’s good, but I think they should think of other ways to generate revenue. I pay for cable TV and a DVR so I see less television ads. I would be willing to pay a fee to Pandora to not hear ads. They should run ads, but allow users who want to pay not to listen to them. Another possibility is to merge with a subscription service like Rhapsody or Napster and be an extra selling point for those companies. Rhapsody has random radio stations for when I don’t want to pick my songs, but it would be even better if they had the Music Genome Project technology.

I have come to see great value in random music because of shuffle play of my MP3s. I can even add Music Genome Project like tech to my own MP3 library with MusicIP software. But Pandora beats my collection of 17,081 songs by light years. And I can play it on my iPod touch. I really do not want to see Pandora and other Internet radio stations go out of business.

Another option, rather than increasing royalty rates, could require Pandora to provide links to songs that take users to sites selling the song. Sites that would also provide a commission to Pandora. Pandora could offer a variety of online music stores and users could check box their favorite when they register. Increased sales should offer better revenue than broadcast royalties.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not wanting free music. I believe free is bad. I want the music industry to make their money and I want Pandora to make money and I’m willing to either listen to ads or pay a subscription to get what I want. It will be a shame if the industry that collects royalties forces these new sources of random music out of business. I don’t listen to traditional radio anymore. I’m not interested in satellite radio. I have cable TV radio but I don’t use it. I’m an Internet person. Why should random music businesses pay more per song for customers like me than the other businesses pay for their customers?

Jim

If you read the Slashdot thread listed below one reader posts the suggestion that Internet radio should just stop using songs that require royalties. That’s an interesting idea, but I think ultimately it’s a bad idea. Free is not good. If this idea succeeded it would kill off a whole industry and destroy legions of jobs. If the writer’s purpose is to promote new artists and bands, it would be better to use Pandora and help these new musicians gain an economic footing, rather than turn the music industry into all amateurs. The Music Genome Project would work just as well with unknown artists.

The real virtue of Pandora is when it plays a song for you that you’ve never heard but you love it so much that you buy it.

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