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Fantasy Matters Post
Nov. 20th, 2007 11:06 amSo, a bit of a report on Fantasy Matters. Fantasy Matters started on Friday. Lucky preregistrants could participate in a cool tour of the world's largest children's literature collection at the University of Minnesota. Buried 60 miles underground (no kidding!) the collection contains original art, manuscripts, and correspondence of countless authors, rare books and dime novels, toys, an amazing wealth of information. And, you can play with it. I intend to do some serious folklore research there during the time of writing Gossamer and Viridian. It was wonderful.
The conference was full of interesting authors and academics. I had a wonderful organic conversation with 5 women at the opening reception, and it was so much fun to attend each other's papers throughout the event. There was much discussion of all fantasy mediums: books, tales, movies, comics. I was pleased that there was no hierarchy or snobbery about "superior fantasy."
One event that stands out was a reading by Nnedi Okorafor-Mbachu of her new novel The Shadow Speaker where African folklore meets science fiction. Smart, wonderful writing. I bought both her books.![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
pegkerr read wonderfully from her fiction and presented a fine paper on the many types of hearts in the literature. I met new authors, among them blackaire and jackiekessler.
Jack Zipes spoke on the co-opting of faerie tales into a commercial capitalist agenda. Cool. Changeling players, hold on to your glamour and fight banality, that's all I'm saying. And we heard Neil Gaiman read from his new piece Graveyard Tales which isn't out yet. Yes, I know you're jealous. It is wonderful, by the way, Gaiman at his best, a set of short stories emulating Kipling's Jungle Book. Be more jealous, sure.
While I wasn't at the conference,amabaku and Kim, and had a great time eating much too much and talking. All very fun and good. My only complaint? I didn't have Bryon along, and I had to drive a lot.
I would plug Fantasy Matters, especially to those of you who like Wiscon. It's not as fannish, it's more academic, but it's also a good chance to hear readings and talk with all sorts of fantasy writers and scholars on a mortal plain.
The conference was full of interesting authors and academics. I had a wonderful organic conversation with 5 women at the opening reception, and it was so much fun to attend each other's papers throughout the event. There was much discussion of all fantasy mediums: books, tales, movies, comics. I was pleased that there was no hierarchy or snobbery about "superior fantasy."
One event that stands out was a reading by Nnedi Okorafor-Mbachu of her new novel The Shadow Speaker where African folklore meets science fiction. Smart, wonderful writing. I bought both her books.
pegkerr read wonderfully from her fiction and presented a fine paper on the many types of hearts in the literature. I met new authors, among them blackaire and jackiekessler.Jack Zipes spoke on the co-opting of faerie tales into a commercial capitalist agenda. Cool. Changeling players, hold on to your glamour and fight banality, that's all I'm saying. And we heard Neil Gaiman read from his new piece Graveyard Tales which isn't out yet. Yes, I know you're jealous. It is wonderful, by the way, Gaiman at his best, a set of short stories emulating Kipling's Jungle Book. Be more jealous, sure.
While I wasn't at the conference,
amabaku and Kim, and had a great time eating much too much and talking. All very fun and good. My only complaint? I didn't have Bryon along, and I had to drive a lot. I would plug Fantasy Matters, especially to those of you who like Wiscon. It's not as fannish, it's more academic, but it's also a good chance to hear readings and talk with all sorts of fantasy writers and scholars on a mortal plain.
