Subject: (urth) More Ghastliness

From: Alice Turner <pei047 at attglobal.net>
Date: Fri, 29 Jun 2001 11:25:09 +0000

In the current (July/August, first ever double ish that I know of, not a
good sign) Atlantic Monthy there is a long bracingly splenetic rant or
manifesto about the current sorry state of American fiction by someone
named B.R. Myers. I wouldn't bring this up on the list (though I loved
it for its crankiness), as it is about mainstream fiction, except for an
aside so odd, near the end, that I must quote: "...many of the adults
who enjoy Harry Potter would be even happier with Mervyn Peake's
Gormenghast trilogy (1946-1959) if only they knew about it."

Huh? This struck such a jarring note that it threw all the preceding
into doubt. Absolutely the only thing that the Rowling and Peake books
have in common is that they are both fantasy, and one would have to have
an ear of sheer tin to connect them. Since Myers does not appear to have
a tin ear, I would guess that Peake is the only fantasy he has ever
read, that he has only heard about Potter, and that no one on the
editorial staff was familiar with both writers. Any other opinions?

-alga

*More Wolfe info & archive of this list at http://www.urth.net/urth/

---

From: Kevin J. Maroney <kmaroney at ungames.com>
Date: Fri, 29 Jun 2001 12:01:44 +0000

>editorial staff was familiar with both writers. Any other opinions?

That sounds like a very probable guess. Throw in a dash of "anything must 
be better than Harry Potter" and you're probably 99% correct.

-- 
Wombat, a.k.a. Kevin J. Maroney kmaroney at ungames.com
Kitchen Staff Supervisor, New York Review of Science Fiction
http://www.nyrsf.com