Hugos: Related Works category
Jul. 28th, 2019 09:29 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cahnAck! Voting is almost over and I never did post on this category! And it was my favorite, too!
An Informal History of the Hugos (Walton): Talked about Walton already here.
Ursula K. Le Guin: Conversations on Writing: This was a very slight Le Guin -- an interview with her, in fact -- but I feel like even slight Le Guin has interesting and profound things to say. She talked about pastiche being valuable -- she didn't use the word fanfic, and she was right not to, as that word carries with it other interesting connotations -- and yet, what she was saying about mimicking other writers being a good apprenticeship resonated heavily with me, somewhat interestingly because I feel that mimicking Le Guin's writing style has given me the potential to be a much better writer and reader. (Not that I am, necessarily -- you'll note that these posts are written in as convoluted and un-readable-out-loud prose as they ever were -- and of course I haven't written any fic for a while so it's all worn off anyway, but I have found that I can turn on much more of an awareness of the sound and rhythm of prose than I could before.) And it's interesting to me that her poetry is not, as a whole, SFF, but that it comes from the same place -- a keen observation of the world. And her thoughts about Women in the Canon... well. You can see I had a lot of feelings about a short slight book.
Hobbit Duology (documentary in three parts): I was actually not gonna watch this because, well, video, untilpsocoptera reviewed it favorably. It's actually quite good! Though it reinforces my sense that I was absolutely right never to watch the Hobbit movies. Link to the first here and the other two parts after.
The Mexicanx Initiative Experience at Worldcon 76: I think the experience was pretty cool! The documentation provided was kind of a slog for me, honestly. Not sure whether I'm supposed to be voting for the experience or the materials, but I assume it's the former (which I would actually vote for, but I wouldn't vote for the materials).
Astounding: This is pretty well-written! Though I will probably not finish it before deadline. It's not the book's fault that I'm not super interested in the subject, I guess. What I've read of it I've liked and it has made me more interested in it (...but man, they were all kinda messed up...)
Archive of Our Own: ...I don't have anything to say about this?
I don't even know how to vote on this! Strong category, and I'd be happy with any of these winning. (Although most happy about the Walton because robbed!) Probably the order of this post, though.
An Informal History of the Hugos (Walton): Talked about Walton already here.
Ursula K. Le Guin: Conversations on Writing: This was a very slight Le Guin -- an interview with her, in fact -- but I feel like even slight Le Guin has interesting and profound things to say. She talked about pastiche being valuable -- she didn't use the word fanfic, and she was right not to, as that word carries with it other interesting connotations -- and yet, what she was saying about mimicking other writers being a good apprenticeship resonated heavily with me, somewhat interestingly because I feel that mimicking Le Guin's writing style has given me the potential to be a much better writer and reader. (Not that I am, necessarily -- you'll note that these posts are written in as convoluted and un-readable-out-loud prose as they ever were -- and of course I haven't written any fic for a while so it's all worn off anyway, but I have found that I can turn on much more of an awareness of the sound and rhythm of prose than I could before.) And it's interesting to me that her poetry is not, as a whole, SFF, but that it comes from the same place -- a keen observation of the world. And her thoughts about Women in the Canon... well. You can see I had a lot of feelings about a short slight book.
Hobbit Duology (documentary in three parts): I was actually not gonna watch this because, well, video, until
psocoptera reviewed it favorably. It's actually quite good! Though it reinforces my sense that I was absolutely right never to watch the Hobbit movies. Link to the first here and the other two parts after.The Mexicanx Initiative Experience at Worldcon 76: I think the experience was pretty cool! The documentation provided was kind of a slog for me, honestly. Not sure whether I'm supposed to be voting for the experience or the materials, but I assume it's the former (which I would actually vote for, but I wouldn't vote for the materials).
Astounding: This is pretty well-written! Though I will probably not finish it before deadline. It's not the book's fault that I'm not super interested in the subject, I guess. What I've read of it I've liked and it has made me more interested in it (...but man, they were all kinda messed up...)
Archive of Our Own: ...I don't have anything to say about this?
I don't even know how to vote on this! Strong category, and I'd be happy with any of these winning. (Although most happy about the Walton because robbed!) Probably the order of this post, though.
no subject
Date: 2019-07-29 11:27 am (UTC)I second this! (Or third it). Circumstances conspired to make me watch the first Hobbit movie three times with different family groups, and what minimal positive feelings I had about it after the first time were all beaten out of me by the third. Probably why I enjoyed that video so much. (Oh, such rants we had! For weeks, all it took was someone mentioning Radagast...)
no subject
Date: 2019-07-30 03:31 am (UTC)(I think the most appalling thing about that video, to me, was the Gandalf/Galadriel bits it showed. EEEEEK.)
no subject
Date: 2019-07-29 05:57 pm (UTC)I'm confused about this, too, but treating it as voting for the materials because I caught only a tiny bit of the actual experience and don't feel like I can evaluate it otherwise. And I did find the materials kind of a slog, so it's pretty low on my list.
(...but man, they were all kinda messed up...)
That was my main take-away. Plus the beginnings of Scientology being even more messed up than I had realized, wow.
no subject
Date: 2019-07-30 03:32 am (UTC)Yeah, I agree -- it's kind of amazing that Scientology is even more messed up than I thought! A low bar, and yet.
no subject
Date: 2019-07-30 04:19 am (UTC)First Hobbit movie: saw it 5 times in the theaters in various formats. Voluntarily. In between the cringeworthy parts were parts I couldn't stop watching, and immediately started rewatching the same day the DVD came out, because I had it on pre-order. YMMV: my love/hate relationship to The Hobbit (the book) is intense and was formative to a degree that is difficult to articulate.
Second Hobbit movie: saw it once. Spent most of the time averting my eyes from the screen.
Third Hobbit movie: still haven't seen it. Not sure I'm going to.
no subject
Date: 2019-07-30 02:01 pm (UTC)I have opinions about it! I realize how hard it is to judge in the context of the Hugos qua Awards, but it is so, so valuable to me as a fanfic person in Worldcon fandom to have that recognition that AO3 is a thing that we value. Among other things, I think the fact that AO3 is a Hugo nominee has opened the door to programming including more fanfic related panels than is typical.
I know your attachments are to the Hugos and not to Worldcon, and if I cared about the Hugos as anything more than an award for things that Worldcon fandom finds cool, I might share your struggles, but mostly I'm just "Yay, fanfic is being recognized at the Hugos, that's awesome!"