Quote:
Originally Posted by kennyc
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That's why I'm biting my tongue and not egging it on.  |
I suppose if I jump into a thread with heavy political/social thoughts, I should actually participate in the topic, as well. Hmm.
There's a problem with that. I'm horribly undiscriminating when it comes to sci-fi. There are authors I don't read or recommend for political reasons (Card, Norman), and a number whose styles I don't care for but know they're good anyway (Gibson tops the list), but almost nothing I actively *disliked* reading.
There are books written more than about 40 years ago that I don't like or recommend because of the social themes in them, because racism and sexism were commonly accepted when the books were written. They make me wince, and I can't recommend them to people today. But that's not at all the same as "badly written." There are authors I'm avoiding because of the author's political or social beliefs, but again, that doesn't seem to be the kind of non-recommendation going on here.
I suspect I'd think Hubbard's sci-fi was badly written. But I suspect that, if I got it in the right mood, I'd enjoy it just fine. (Okay, I suspect I'd put it down half-written and never get back to it; my reading time these days is limited and I want to spend it on stuff I'll actively enjoy. When I run out of Baen books and 150k-word fanfic novels is plenty soon enough to consider authors I know I'm not going to love.)
I loved everything by Heinlein. Even the stuff I vehemently disagreed with. I loved Dune and the first several sequels; I didn't like Chapterhouse but couldn't say if that was because it had gotten complex in ways I didn't care about. I like the Wheel of Time series; recognizing that they could probably edited to half their wordcount and have the same impact doesn't change that. I liked the Earl Dumarest series by EC Tubbs, and I'm sure they were formulaic tripe.
I like it all. I have trouble wrapping my head around the purpose of this thread.