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Back from VP X

Well, actually I got back from Viable Paradise late last night. Still unpacking, figuratively and literally.

At one of the late night get-togethers, Mur went around with her well-worn microphone and asked us what we had learned at VP X. I think I said something about plotting, which was the best I could come up with after N glasses of wine. That answer is at best incomplete, so let me try again:

• Well okay, I did a great deal about plotting, mostly from sitting down with Jim Patrick Kelly for 45 minutes. The man is a mad genius.

• I also learned how to make and use quill pens (or more properly, simply "pens"). And I learned the basics of how to spin yarn, but not how to knit. Next time for sure, Nikki...

• I learned that if you're writing fantasy, you need to get medieval on your characters' asses. If you write a novel about an imaginary Crusader state, you cannot afford to have prose that reeks of "bloodless modernism." The big question is, how to write about pre-modern people and politics in a manner that doesn't totally repulse an enlightened 21st century reader? Food for thought. In the meantime, I will be reading Icelandic sagas and pondering what is best in life.

• Most important of all, I learned that SF is a fundamentally social genre. There is a huge ecosystem of SF readers and writers out there, and you need to be a part of that community to make any headway. Thank you to my amazing classmates and instructors for finally managing to drive this concept through my thick skull after all these years.

I'll probably be talking about Viable Paradise and other SFnal things for some time to come. But overall, Viable Paradise was an amazing and possibly life-changing experience. I miss my classmates already, and no doubt I will be leaning on them heavily in the future...

Posted by Evan Goer on Oct. 18, 2006 at 11:44 PM | Comments (1)

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