tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3377586.post1528473380699625247..comments2024-03-27T02:13:13.079-04:00Comments on Original Content: Science Fiction FormulasGail Gauthierhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01673131515563387968noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3377586.post-58178512291040553882009-11-20T19:48:34.065-05:002009-11-20T19:48:34.065-05:00I would like to see some variation in the post fai...I would like to see some variation in the post failure. Why, after a certain amount of time has passed, doesn't a healthy civilization evolve in any of these books? Isn't that what has happened historically? Rome fell. You had a Dark Age period. Then the Middle Ages come along. Not the greatest time for humanity, perhaps, but wasn't it a functioning--and evolving--civilization? Wasn't the Renaissance a move forward? The culture of the antebellum south is gone. Is the American south a dystopian culture? In that case, couldn't it be argued the that pre-fall culture was the dystopian one?<br /><br />Historically, I don't think we've ever stayed stuck in a dystopian culture. We've moved on. Why can't we see something like that in an apocalyptic novel?Gail Gauthierhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01673131515563387968noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3377586.post-55270415966975809932009-11-18T23:13:24.296-05:002009-11-18T23:13:24.296-05:00While it's true that there's a formula to ...While it's true that there's a formula to dystopic novels, that's never bothered me much. A lot of genres I like follow a formula. Maybe it's not even a formula so much as the agreed-upon structure of the genre. You know boy is going to get girl, you know the detective will solve the mystery, you know civilization is shot to flinders.<br /><br />The formula is accepted; it's seeing *how* civilization does a massive FAIL that interests me. There's always some little variation.Bibliovorehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08642058689885973447noreply@blogger.com