Clute

I think that criticisms of John Clute's style ignore the fact that he is (unlike most critics) an original prose stylist. His innovative, if sometimes contorted, writing has vastly enriched SF criticism, not only because of his cogent insights, but because he has unlocked a critical vocabulary equal to the complete expression of those insights. He has his clumsy and inattentive moments, but I'd rather have him review OBW than leave the task to pedestrian hacks like the authors of certain other published reviews cited on amazon. =====

He has, but I think that alga was correct in pointing out that his convolutions sometimes serve the work poorly. The diction and content which are appropriate when one is writing a review for a general audience who might or might not have read the work are not the same as those appropriate for an informed audience, and I think that alga properly pegged Clute as having used the latter in a work targetted at the former, to his detriment. Wombat, a.k.a. Kevin Maroney kmaroney at crossover.com Kitchen Staff Supervisor, New York Review of Science Fiction http://ebbs.english.vt.edu/olp/nyrsf/nyrsf.html *This is WHORL, for discussion of Gene Wolfe's Book of the Long Sun.

What Clute says in his review is

He's basically pointing out that Horn is writing "on the run", as it were, and so we will continue to find out what happens to Horn as he makes his way back to New Viron from Gaon. Kieran C. North West Labs Stephen St. Court Sligo Republic of Ireland Tel. +353 71 69441 Fax. +353 71 69451 email: kierannwn at tinet.ie *This is WHORL, for discussion of Gene Wolfe's Book of the Long Sun.