Dept. of Good Things

[kaffy_r]

Stuff I'm Happy About

Since I think I've spent too many recent posts bitching and moaning about stuff, here are some random — very random — things about which I'm happy. 

I remembered, thanks to this neat piece at Tor.com, how much I adore Cordwainer Smith. He is, as the writer states, one of the Great Peculiars of SF&F. Anyone out there a reader of his work? 

In what is a first for me, or certainly for the first time in a long time, I started and completed a news feature story in the same day, without the nerves and trepidation which that task has lately engendered in me; what's more, I feel as if I've done a good job. 

After two days of undoubtedly necessary rain, we had a glorious fall day. 

I managed to confirm that my iPad and laptop bag, which I'd mistakenly left in a union meeting when I grabbed the wrong bag, was safe, and that I could swap the bags tomorrow. Relief!

I am not achy today, and that's good. 

Kitties!

And tomorrow is Friday. Hurrah!

Comments

[kerravonsen]

Anyone out there a reader of his work?

Oh YES.
Sense-of-wonder Times Infinity. Peculiar, yes, and odd, and darn strange, but in a poetic and wondrous way.

(later)
Okay, read the article now... and I'm thinking that, while Cordwainer Smith is a one-and-only, he isn't completely alone. The following names spring to mind: Terry Dowling, Samuel R. Delany, Alfred Bester, and Ray Bradbury.

[kaffy_r]

I can see Ray Bradbury and Samuel R. Delany being their own kind of Great Peculiars, although I continue to think Smith's Peculiar is a particularly peculiar type of Peculiar. I don't believe I've ever read Dowling, and only one of Bester's, a long time ago. I do like both Bradbury and Delany, so my mind must reach out for Peculiar.

Do you have any favorites amongst Smith's works?

[kerravonsen]

No surprise you haven't heard of Terry Dowling, he's Australian. His "Rynosseros" cycle has a style which I feel was heavily influenced by Smith. So you might call him a Cordwainer Smith imitator. But still original enough to be worth checking out.

The Bester novels that made me think of Cordwainer Smith are "The Demolished Man" and "Tyger! Tyger!" (which has a different title in the US, and I can't remember right now what it is). Not as Peculiar, but still unconventional in its style and worldbuilding.

Do you have any favorites amongst Smith's works?

It's hard to pick!

[kaffy_r]

Hmm. Dowling seems to be the kind of writer I might like. I may search for some, especially the Rynosseros works.