The high point for me was getting to hang out a bit with Michael Dirda and talk literature.\u00c2\u00a0 I also caught up with Andy and Sydney Duncan, Scott Edelman, and Ed Schubert.\u00c2\u00a0 Most of the readings I wanted to see conflicted with my stuff, but I did get to hear Hildy Silverman read a fun piece about witches at the mall.\u00c2\u00a0 The panel on endings I served on suffered from an overly controlling, verbose, and opinionated moderator, so that the rest of us didn’t get much chance to say anything.\u00c2\u00a0 Appropriately, I just wanted it to end!\u00c2\u00a0 One of the side trails that panel went down, as well as a couple of others, is the battle between the academy and science fiction.\u00c2\u00a0 Each seems determined to demonize the other with pointless strawman attacks.\u00c2\u00a0 One panel Michael Dirda was on, Is Genre Good?\u00c2\u00a0 addressed the issue directly, and Michael was surprised at the level of lingering antipathy in the academy toward sf\u00e2\u20ac\u201dsurely we’d gotten past all that.\u00c2\u00a0 Afraid not.\u00c2\u00a0 But then sf folks hauling out the most absurd deconstructionists to be the norm of the academy doesn’t help the cause either.\u00c2\u00a0 Why can’t we all just get along?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The high point for me was getting to hang out a bit with Michael Dirda and talk literature.\u00c2\u00a0 I also caught up with Andy and Sydney Duncan, Scott Edelman, and Ed Schubert.\u00c2\u00a0 Most of the readings I wanted to see … Continue reading