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Orvan and I have been following the According to Hoyt blog of Sarah Hoyt. A few days ago a guest entry was about "The rise of the Self-Insertion fic[tion]" where the reader of this or that group had to have a protaganist of the same group or else things were too conservative, traditional, triggering, whatever. And Orvan made a comment that he could go on about the lack of minotaur "good guys" but "Why waste the effort? There are plenty of good guys (and gals, of various species) out there – why limit myself?" And that had precisely the effect it was not actually asking for. A demonstration point sort of backfired. No less than three different replies mentioned a minotaur character now trying to get into a work, or story ideas involving a minotaur or minotaurs.
One of those replies went thus: What Sarah said, Orvan. I’ve got this mental image of Rada and Zabet trying to negotiate a minor social problem while making a delivery to a minotaur – something about two predators and . . . aw, chuck it. *pulls up blank Word document* ‘Scuze me. It's been a few days and one of the pieces of, fallout, from that comment is Story Bit: Sharp Dealings. It's only few paragraphs, so far, but is a nice little diversion. And the minotaur-ish character isn't a villain - or a hero. He just is this guy... with horns.
The "Old News" section of TXRed's (Alma T.C. Boykin) blog, Cat Rotator's Quarterly has other snippets with Rada and Zabet, so if you want to get some background, you can. And then perhaps you might like to buy a book or a few. See the 'A Cat Among Dragons' link if you are so inclined.
And Orvan points out that he is technically not a minotaur, as the Minotaur had a human body, and he (Orvan) has a tail and stands on hooves - he's moo all the way down. Also, he has never been to Crete. That said, he understands that given his form, he might get called a minotaur and isn't offended by that. Or at least he tries not to show it, if he is.
On Dystopia
30 June 2008 19:03
"I don't try to predict the future. I try to prevent it." -- Ray Bradbury
That line explains why I find many of Ray Bradbury's works to be depressing. He's not describing a future he hopes for, but one he hopes against. It's certainly useful to have such warnings as Ray's own Fahrenheit 451 and Orwell's Animal Farm (I haven't read 1984 having not done so by 1984 and then hearing of it almost endlessly such that even without having read it I am quite sick of the thing.) and others. Some futures do need to be prevented.
Yet it seems that somewhere along the time, the dystopian future became the default. Rather than the somewhat hopeful futurism of, say, Star Trek and such, we got the hopelessness of Mad Max and Max Headroom. At the last Penguicon there was even a panel, "How We Learned to Love the Dystopia." Yes, it's good to have warning signs and know where not to go, but it's also good to have an idea of where we might want to go. Dystopias are depressing and a lousy default. I'm not asking for Utopian stories as that has the two problems of being rather dull and of being plainly unrealistic. It's very easy to poke holes in a Utopia. But there is the idea of a generally brighter future, or at least one where things haven't become horrendously worse.
I am not sure of the cause of the depressing trend. Is it that many editors only tend to go for dystopias? Is it that authors find it easier to write for dystopian worlds? Is it a backlash against futures perceived as too bright and so there is a nasty over-correction? And this is just actual fiction or science fiction, not the Hollywood error of claiming something to be science fiction when it's really just a horror movie set in space or such.
Maybe I do want some escapism. But I don't enjoy seeing dark futures. The "Hey, it's not me." effect doesn't work for me. I tend to empathize, so it's more "great, just what I need, more crap happening." It's the future, yes? We're all going there, all the time. How about a future that can we feel good about going to? Not perfection, not utopia, not heaven, just something that doesn't make the trip seem pointless.
[A bit of amusement: The spell checker I use evidently does not know of 'dystopia' and suggests 'dustpan' -- a substitute I find rather apt.]
