The Poppies of Terra #44 - Loscon and Found

Over the long Thanksgiving weekend I was fortunate to travel, figuratively and literally, through fascinating realms of the fantastic. 

On Friday, the irrepressible and indefatigable filmmaker and commentator Robert Meyer Burnett hosted the special behemoth 1,000th episode of his YouTube show “Robservations,” and I was honored to be included as one of his guests.

One of the topics I brought up during our conversation was various ways of discovering writers, books, films, etc. that step outside the pervasive “my streaming platform/online retailer of choice recommended X to me” paradigm through which so much content is consumed these days. I’ve talked before, in this context of algorithmic call and response, about “volitional viewers” and “passive viewers,” and this is a broader take on the same idea. I’ll recap briefly here a few suggestions to discover interesting material. 

One such is the adjacency method, which simply consists of looking slightly off-center from whatever typical works are recommended by a beloved author or filmmaker. With our vast access to information, it’s remarkably easy to summon up anyone’s entire body of work. Next time you do so, try picking a title you’ve never heard of before. As I write this, it’s the birthday of the brilliant Joseph Conrad: his novel Under Western Eyes, for example, beckons.

Another way of proceeding is the cross-cutting method, where we follow a creator from our genre or aesthetic of choice into undiscovered territory. Ian Banks, for example, published more mainstream literary novels than he did in the science fiction Culture series (where he used the middle initial “M” in his name to alert readers he was working in a different mode). To take another interesting example: writer extraordinaire John Banville has penned a series of crime novels under the pseudonym of Benjamin Black. If you like the Black works, it could lead you to Banville’s historical novels. In the reverse direction, an entire new vista of detective romps might open up before you.

I mentioned Conrad’s birthday a moment ago, and this relates back to another useful notion, namely that of imposing a temporal restriction for your next book or film that eliminates material from the last 10, 20, or however many years. It can be refreshing to immerse oneself in a work no one is currently discussing, if simply as a poignant reminder that most storytelling falls from fashion with alarming rapidity, but by no means does this reflect a work’s value or capacity to entertain. Popularity can solidarize, but we need not be perenially beholden to its caprice.

Seeking out works in translation can lead to numerous rewards. Tapping into lesser-known prize winners within genre, such as Philip K. Dick award recipients, again takes us past the oft-repeated figures into more curious canons still in the making. I’m also a big fan of the “Random” button at the gargantuan Encyclopedia of Science Fiction website. As a teenager, I would peruse the print edition of this volume and then try to find the authors who caught my fancy when browsing in used bookstores. Secondhand bookshops remain a wonderful pathway to all kinds of unexpected treasures. On Saturday, I headed to LA to attend the 50th iteration of Loscon, and spent a free hour I had in between panels doing precisely that in the convention’s dealer’s room.

Some of the authors I spotted, mostly obscure today except for students of genre history, were names that had been discussed just a few minutes before on a panel I moderated titled “Lost Legends: SF/F Authors Awaiting Rediscovery.” The conversation was a blast, with many deserving submissions by my co-panelists, such as French author Stefan Wul (Pierre Pairault), associated with the film Fantastic Planet, or the once omnipresent Jack L. Chalker. Miles J. Breuer, brought to our attention by Jaroslav Olša Jr., who was in attendance, was another marvelous suggestion. In preparation for this panel I had asked some writers and editors to nominate names for inclusion. Herewith an abbreviated list–the original ran to over fifty names–based on a blend of their recommendations and my own: A. A. Attanasio, Barrington Bayley, Bob Shaw, Carol Emshwiller, D. G. Compton, Damon Knight, George Alec Effinger, Henry Kuttner, James Blish, John Sladek, Kate Wilhelm, Kit Reed, Margaret St. Clair, Mark S. Geston, Melissa Hardy, Pamela Sargent, Rachel Pollack, Raymond Z. Gallun, William Tenn, Wilma Shore, and Wilson Tucker.

The second panel I was on, now toting a bag full of paperbacks, was about the future of Star Trek. As with the first panel, I’m very grateful to friends who helped me prep for the discussion, in this case with a riveting in-depth conversation about the franchise a few days earlier. A question I brought up, which I’d like to record here, concerns an upcoming milestone. When the fifth, and as far as we know, final season of Star Trek: Lower Decks ends on December 19th, Star Trek will boast a staggering 940 episodes. Given announcements of renewals for ongoing series, like Strange New Worlds, and new productions, like Starfleet Academy, it’s reasonable to extrapolate the universe will be hitting 1,000 episodes sometime in 2027-2028. Will this monumental, record-making installment (no other science fiction franchise has attained 1,000 episodes) be explicitly acknowledged and celebrated by the franchise runners? Another query: what are the chances that William Shatner, now ninety-three years old, will return to the fold and play James T. Kirk one more time?

Our panel was moderated with gusto and precision by Larry Nemecek, a name recognizable to Trek fans for his decades of involvement with the franchise in all manner of supporting capacities. I warned Larry at the outset that I had brought with me my original copy, purchased in 1996 while I was still in high school in Munich, of his indispensable reference book Star Trek: The Next Generation Companion, for him to sign. Naturally, I also had in my possession his wonderful Stellar Cartography: The Starfleet Reference Library. Larry was kind enough to personalize these and to indulge my curiosity about their makings. Hanging out with him in the green room after the panel was certainly a convention highlight.

The last few days, in short, were a stimulating science fiction escapade. Not so much a Lost Weekend, if you will, as a Loscon weekend–with much to be thankful for.