Dennis Danvers’ Web Site

I had a wonderful birthday, the best parts of which were this card Sarah made for me and spending the day with her.

I was recently asked to speak at the Library of Congress at an SF lecture series hosted by Colleen Cahill and Nate Evans on the subject of my teaching in SF.  It’s nothing fancy, a lunchtime lecture, but I enjoyed reflecting on the classes I’ve had, the  hundreds of minds I’ve poisoned with evil genre literature.  A few friends have asked me what I said, so here it is:

What I’ve Learned Teaching Science Fiction
A Talk Presented at the Library of Congress, August 5, 2010

I finished teaching the most recent versions of these classes I’ll be talking about just a week ago. It’s been humbling after a summer of assigning homework to my students, to then be faced with homework of my own. First let me say that I had prepared a breathtaking Power Point presentation with slow dissolves that would’ve made your teeth ache with envy, but my dog ate my jump drive, and all I have are these few crummy paper pages.

As those who know my fiction may have noticed, I’m excessively fond of epigraphs, so I’ve appended one to this talk with my apologies to T. S. Eliot and J. Alfred Prufrock, Hamlet too, I suppose. For those of you who might not know, John Clute is the author of The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction and knows everything:

I am not John Clute, nor was meant to be;
Am an adjunct faculty, one that will do
To swell enrollment, fill a section or two.

I suppose I should apologize to John too, but he’s a friend, with a good sense of humor.

It’s been my good fortune for the last seven years to teach a science fiction literature course every summer at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond. For five years, I’ve  taught an Urban Fantasy class every summer as well. Most of my students are seniors, from a wide range of majors. While there’s always a fan or two in every class, the vast majority are, to use the snobbish fan term, Mundanes, those who never browse the Science Fiction & Fantasy ghetto at Barnes & Noble or attend conventions where people don costumes or filk. Many of them aren’t big fiction readers of any sort. They’re looking to graduate, to become doctors, artists, engineers; they need credits. “Science Fiction? Urban Fantasy? Why not?” they say. “I’ve learned plenty of useless shit already.” In a fluke this last summer, no one in the science fiction class knew that was what they were signing up for. The class schedule just said “Readings in Literature.” One of the best classes I’ve had in a recent years, as it turned out. (more…)

I love saying that.  People are so impressed, as well they should be—with the library not me.  As part of the What IF… Science Fiction & Fantasy Forum series, I’ll be speaking on “What I’ve Learned Teaching Science Fiction.” The lecture will be held Thursday, August 5 at 12:10 pm in the Pickford Theater in  the Madison Building of the Library of Congress.  Please come.  I promise it will be wildly entertaining and brief.  I spoke in this series a few years ago and found them a very congenial bunch.  Any former students out there who’d like to tell me what I should’ve learned by now, keep it clean.

And none too soon. I’m giving a talk at the Library of Congress next week entitled, “What I’ve Learned Teaching Science Fiction.” More about that later, but what I learned this summer is not to put so much new stuff in the middle of the syllabus. Worn to a frazzle, I am. Hence my silence here for some weeks now. Still, it was a wonderful experience as always, getting to meet bright young people and teach them something about the literature I love. The honors for favorite movie in the Urban Fantasy class was a tie this year, between Let the Right One In and Donnie Darko. The favorite book was Miéville’s The City & The City, with Empire of Ice Cream and Anansi Boys a tie for second.  Adaptation and Stranger Than Fiction were invited to leave in equal measure.  They resist the notion of metafiction as a fantasy device, and Stranger Than Fiction fell to the cheesy accusation.  Fair enough.  Peter Straub’s lost boy lost girl didn’t charm them as it did me, and was the least favorite.  In a departure from previous years, feelings didn’t run so strong one way or the other on Kafka on the Shore, though I suspect more than a few might not have finished it.  I do need to find a shorter book, though once again I loved rereading it.

The finals are read.  The grades turned in.  Now where did I put that glass of wine?

Prayer

I am not a good man.
No need of a god to confess
that one to,
to offer penance—
passion’s ashes and a spent bag of wind—
every god’s treasure:
Another sorry old man
like Himself.

Or so the old ones say.
Not old like me, you understand,
but older-better, wiser, deader:
Eternal life, salvation, all of that.
That’s not what I’m after—what comes after.
I’ve had a glimpse, caught a whiff.
That changes things, the small disaster.
Tenses shift.
Time is altered.
I have not been a good man.

They were a terrific bunch, very likable and smart and thoughtful.  These kids today.  I didn’t always feel at the top of my game, especially on bad hamstring days, but they usually had something interesting to say.  Their unfavorite book, by a wide margin, was Snow Crash—even worse than Neuromancer in years past.  Forever War was once again the class favorite, though Boneshaker was a strong second.  They were quite enthusiastic about Boneshaker the first day we discussed it, when a construction worker accidentally set off the wrath-of-God alarm system, ending that discussion.  When we returned the next day, the spark had gone, but I would definitely teach the book again.  One thing the class especially liked about the book was Briar, a strong female character.  The one thing most liked about Snow Crash was the character of Y.T., another strong female character.  Some of the best papers were definitely on Boneshaker.  They liked the book better than I did (I wearied immediately of the sullen whiny adolescent boy), so I learned a lot about it from them.  I love it when that happens.  Monday Urban Fantasy begins, and I’m spending the weekend with Anansi Boys.  We’re practically old friends.  Throw me in that briar patch, Neil!

The envelope please.  Every year I ask my students to vote on their favorite and least favorite items on the syllabus.  We watched the last of the films, and the somewhat surprising winner was 2001: A Space Odyssey.   The clear loser?  T2.  So much for the conventional wisdom that these kids today require non-stop action and will reject Kubrick’s glacial pace like a bowl of cold oatmeal.  Second place went to Sleep Dealer, which pleased me.  It’s a very smart film.  The Rocky Horror Picture Show was beloved by fans, but as is often the case with fans, they weren’t eager to articulate the sources of their affection.  While Body Snatchers was nobody’s fave, it was still a success with most of the class.  I also just read their papers in which they review an sf film of their choosing.  A particularly good paper on Repo Man has me reconsidering that cult gem for the problematic 80′s.

It seemed like such a good idea—to include the most watched sf movie ever made—The Rocky Horror Picture Show—but I discovered that watching a movie in an inebriated state, throwing food, and shouting ritual responses are poor preparation for any critical appreciation of a film.  It’s become inseparable from its ritual.  There was a small but quiet group of loyalists, but for the most part, the movie tanked.  I identified with Eddie.  Looks like its back to Alien next year.  The Forever War, however, was successful once again.  This is an excellent class, their papers were quite good, and they’re not afraid to talk and disagree.  We screen T2 today, and who doesn’t like the Governator?  My classroom is next to the stairwell, so the noise doesn’t carry fortunately.  We can blow shit up to our heart’s content.  I’m showing the superior theatrical cut.  Cameron’s restored scenes in DVD release are mostly plot-bloating cheese, especially the dopey ghost-of-Kyle scene in the mental hospital.  Then on to Snow Crash, a book that’s growing on me, especially the incisive descriptions of the burbscape.  I do wish Neal Stephenson would follow Miéville’s fine example and write something of a teachable length!