Jonathan Palfrey
asked
Lois McMaster Bujold:
I'm rereading the Penric stories yet again, enjoyment undiminished, and it seems to me that Nikys has become a bit of an author's problem. Would you agree? Up to "The prisoner of Limnos" she was a full part of the story, but then her status changed, and the problem is what to do with her now. Although there's still plenty of room for more stories about Penric before he met her.
Lois McMaster Bujold
Well, Nikys and Penric don't have a problem with what Nikys does now -- she's fully engaged with her busy life. It's only the antipathy of the genre to domesticity in general and caregivers in particular that makes that what she's doing un-story-able. Producing all the thread and fabric and clothing for her household, ferex, is pretty interesting to the maker, and perhaps to the fabric artists in the audience, but it's not what most people tune in to a fantasy tale for. Nor are the hour-to-hour tasks of keeping small children from killing themselves. Nor is gestation. Yet readers automatically expect grownup infants to populate their stories, dressed, without ever thinking about how they got there and how much labor it took.
Pen, between adventures, sitting happily in his study translating the same book into yet another language, finds it a perfectly absorbing task to him (tho' Des is getting pretty bored with it) but it couldn't be a story either.
Stories happen in the interruptions, I guess. Plenty of room for them in all sorts of spots in the timeline. Especially if one isn't writing yet another universe-saving War To End Wars (and the series.)
Though giving a woman with nursing infants or small children bolted to her an adventure turns it into something a lot less fun, more of a horror story, a genre I don't care to explore at present. Though arguably, Cordelia and Dubauer in Shards of Honor might qualify. (Giving such a tale to a woman with older children has been done from time to time -- readers could probably chime in below with examples. Wrede's Caught in Crystal comes to mind. )
Ta, L.
Well, Nikys and Penric don't have a problem with what Nikys does now -- she's fully engaged with her busy life. It's only the antipathy of the genre to domesticity in general and caregivers in particular that makes that what she's doing un-story-able. Producing all the thread and fabric and clothing for her household, ferex, is pretty interesting to the maker, and perhaps to the fabric artists in the audience, but it's not what most people tune in to a fantasy tale for. Nor are the hour-to-hour tasks of keeping small children from killing themselves. Nor is gestation. Yet readers automatically expect grownup infants to populate their stories, dressed, without ever thinking about how they got there and how much labor it took.
Pen, between adventures, sitting happily in his study translating the same book into yet another language, finds it a perfectly absorbing task to him (tho' Des is getting pretty bored with it) but it couldn't be a story either.
Stories happen in the interruptions, I guess. Plenty of room for them in all sorts of spots in the timeline. Especially if one isn't writing yet another universe-saving War To End Wars (and the series.)
Though giving a woman with nursing infants or small children bolted to her an adventure turns it into something a lot less fun, more of a horror story, a genre I don't care to explore at present. Though arguably, Cordelia and Dubauer in Shards of Honor might qualify. (Giving such a tale to a woman with older children has been done from time to time -- readers could probably chime in below with examples. Wrede's Caught in Crystal comes to mind. )
Ta, L.
More Answered Questions
Nilekh S
asked
Lois McMaster Bujold:
Hi,is there any plan to reprint the entire vorkosigan saga,can't find any trade paperbacks in print?
Thatfondimpossibility
asked
Lois McMaster Bujold:
Is there any chance that we will see life from Aral Alexander/ Helen/ Lizzie/ Taurie's point of view? Or perhaps, since those Vorkosigans would be so privilleged all through life, it might be really fun to see life through the eyes of some little Vorpatrils, especially those who have connections and ambitions, but are forced to grow up on planets far away from the known world. (Looking forward to Gntmn Jole)
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