Diana Gabaldon's Blog, page 36

BEWARE THE GREEN SLIME!!

BEWARE THE GREEN SLIME!

Back in the day, when I was sixteen, I won a speech contest. The contest was sponsored by the International Order of Oddfellows, and the prize was a three-week trip (by bus) to New York City, and a week at the UN, with other winners from all over the country.

I traveled on a chartered Greyhound bus with thirty-three other sixteen-year-olds, winners from California, Arizona, and New Mexico, and it was one of the big highlights of my teenage years, not only for the tri...

WALKING BATTLEFIELDS

Walking Battlefields

I had a wonderful time last week in North Carolina. I talked at the Literary Symposium in honor of New Bern's 300th anniversary—the city was covered in decorated bears (Bears being a symbol of Switzerland, and New Bern being named after…well, old Berne, which is _in_ Switzerland. [g:])—and to the New Bern Scottish Heritage Society.

Yes, I hear you all muttering, "Why is she running around talking to symposia instead of staying home and writing BOOKS?" (My husband keeps say...

THE METHADONE LIST: The Tome of the Undergates

I don't know that one could really say that any author or book is the "opposite" of any other author or book—but by contrast to A.S. Byatt's THE CHILDREN'S BOOK, a literary novel by an old master at the height of her craft…here's an epic fantasy by a young debut author—though equally crafty, it couldn't be much more different in either style or structure.

Sam Sykes's TOME OF THE UNDERGATES _is_ what's called "epic fantasy." It's not, however, anything like the classic "You know…boy/scroll/...

The "Dr. Who" Connection

Frazer Hines (the actor who played Jamie MacCrimmon, a companion to the second Doctor, on "Dr. Who") sent me these photos this morning—they were taken last summer in Edinburgh (by a nice journalist named Jean Brittain—thanks, Jean!) while I was appearing at the Gathering there. You can't see any of it, alas, but we're on the grounds of Holyrood Palace here, talking with fans who'd come to my reading.

Now, I've known Frazer on paper for years; when my first book was published, I sent him a cou...

THE METHADONE LIST: The Children's Book

THE CHILDREN'S BOOK

I love A.S. Byatt's work. She writes "literary fiction"--this being on one hand a catchall phrase for any book that doesn't fit conveniently into a genre designation, and on the other, a term that generally implies particularly good writing, often accompanied by unique insight and acute perception. Byatt's got all of this, in spades. (Some of you might remember her earlier book, POSSESSION: A Romance. (One British friend told me he'd picked up a copy of this in the lib...

P.S.

Hey…

In the recent discussion re fan-fiction, art, etc., I hadn't actually been able to read more than the first few comments posted here—though I caught the general tenor of the remarks.

As I said, I've said all I need to regarding the matter—both my intial reactions, the evolution of my thoughts in light of talking to some of y'all who do fan-fiction, and my eventual conclusions.

Looking over some of the comments now, though, I see that some of you were not responding to the discussion of fan-...

Fan-Fic III - The Final Word

Moving on from the last post—

I've been having an interesting (and amicable) discussion with a couple of fanfic writers, and while I can't say that our frames of reference overlap to any marked extent, we do at least adjoin on one point.

Universal Ownership of Art

There is a philosophical ideal that states that art, once created, belongs to the world at large—that it can't be contained or constrained—and both as a philosophical premise and as a matter of simple observation, I think this is true....

Fan-Fic II

Well, thanks, guys. I appreciate the thoughtful and insightful posts on the question of fan-fiction. You've raised a couple of aspects that I hadn't considered—or at least had not considered in the same light that you've suggested.

Before I discuss any of that, though, I did want to tell you that I've been having a nice conversation with the person who inadvertently started all this with her well-intentioned desire to help a friend.

Stacie apparently does exist, and is fortunate to have a l...

FAN-FICTION AND MORAL CONUNDRUMS

OK, my position on fan-fic is pretty clear: I think it's immoral, I _know_ it's illegal, and it makes me want to barf whenever I've inadvertently encountered some of it involving my characters.


Now, if I understand the arguments presented in favor of it, they run like this:


1) But I/we aren't trying to make any money out of it!

Well, see, this is where "illegal" comes in. You can't break into somebody's house, even if you don't mean to steal anything. You can't camp in someone's backyard with...

THE METHADONE LIST: DANA STABENOW

For those who like series, mysteries, books with rich, idiosyncratic settings, engaging characters, Strong Women (which frankly, I think is getting to be something of a cliché'—not the women themselves, of course, but the mention of them as a talking point for a book. I mean, who recommends a book by saying, "The heroine is a weak, whiny, wilted piece of toast—but it's a great book!") and reasonably hot sex on occasion….let me recommend Dana Stabenow.
Dana is one of those amazing people who ...