Re: stylistic consideration of Zealia Bishop's "The Mound"
Posted by:
Zabdamar (IP Logged)
Date: 13 June, 2018 05:55AM
Thanks for the quote and citation Radovarl, but that wasn’t the quote I was referring to. You said in your post that Vance said that Smith was a: “terrible writer†which closely matches the quote that I had in mind and have seen bandied about the net. Here is the quote in its entirety:
“Then there was Clark Ashton Smith who wrote for Weird Tales and who had a wild imagination. He wasn’t a very talented writer but his imagination was wonderfulâ€.
THIS is the quote I take exception to. The quote you produced from Dream Makers is tangental and perfectly fine. Vance labelling Smith as a ‘genius’ is adequate and appropriate praise, and him saying that Smith could be “clumsy at times†is no great slight, and a generalisation that could be applied to any author.
You’ve come to a CAS fan site, of which there are few, and labelled him an “undisciplined messâ€, I would’ve thought it common sense to anticipate some pushback? Unlike many fans of weird fiction who are first and foremost acolytes of HPL or Howard, and come to Smith merely to round out the triumvirate, I am a genuine CAS aficionado, and I make no apologies for ‘defending the turf’ so to speak. If I were to visit a Jack Vance fan site and declare him an “undisciplined messâ€, I would expect some fiery rebuttals, as you should here.
Your point regarding the ‘thesaurus’ is apposite though not in the manner you intended. I could imagine the ‘journeyman’ writer, Jack Vance doing that very thing while he worked dutifully on a craft that he had a modest amount of talent for. Writing and consulting the thesaurus as he wrote, looking for the right word like a plumber looking for the appropriate wrench. Contrast this with CAS who was a veritable genius, and worked directly from memory, a mystic channeling rather than contriving. The man had a command of English vocabulary unparalleled in modern literature (and even taught himself multiple foreign languages and translated many French and Spanish works). I cite the testimony of George Haas, who said that when he queried CAS about his remarkable vocabulary, Smith replied that when he was young he had simply gone through an unabridged dictionary and learnt all the words even down to their Sanskrit origins. Joshi amongst others also speaks of Smith’s eidetic memory.
This is the nub of the affair. There are a myriad of writers but only so much time to devote to reading, and Jack Vance was a tradesman at best and hack at worst. Contrast this with Smith who was a bonafide literary genius across multiple formats. ’The Hashish-Eater/The Apocalypse of Evil’, by itself, invalidates anything penned by Vance.
You say ‘shiftless dreamer’, I say inspired genius. If some workmanlike ethic is your barometer for artistic merit, then we may as well toss out the lions share of great artists across the ages. All the depressives, opium eaters, ether drinkers, alcoholics, suicidal men and women of genius…OUT!
Zelazny is garbage and I would agree that Vance is superior though that is no great distinction. (BTW I was referring to Glen Cook whose ‘Black Company’ gets praise but is barely readable.)
My Vance library is extensive, but in all honestly the only story of his that I thought carried any merit was ‘Eyes of the Overworld’. I’ve encountered nothing else of his beyond the mediocre.
The other authors you cite are all legitimate artists and worthy of praise. Even Hodgson, who in terms of sporadic clumsiness exceeds anyone heretofore discussed, was a genius in his own right. ‘House on the Borderlands’ is pure visionary art, a numinous work. Even ‘The Night Land’, despite its shortcomings, is an original, transcendent work. A legitimate work. There is nothing in Vance’s canon that comes close to its originality or profundity.
You are mistaken about Gygax. Granted that certain idiosyncrasies would be missing from D&D sans Vance, but the game would’ve rolled on, just with a different flavour. The game can sustain itself without ‘prismatic spray’ and ‘imprisonment’, and though the magic system would be different who can say if it would be better or worse? Incidentally there is much debate in the community about the merits of the Vancian system (I am actually a proponent) and as far as Gygax’s writing style is concerned, that is no point of praise for Jack. High Gygaxian is distinctive but it is rarely good. In fact aside from the description of the ‘Vault of the Drow’ I can’t recall anything redeeming by Gary as a writer.
Make no mistake, whilst Gygax was undeniably influenced by Vance, that influence was not integral to the game itself. I’ll go as far as wagering that Vance would’ve gained more readers from Gygax’s endorsement than from any other means. Gygax made Vance, not the other way around.
But I digress, if you have any recommendations of Vance then by all means let me know and I’ll check them out. In the meantime I’ll keep flying the flag.
Edited 6 time(s). Last edit at 13 Jun 18 | 06:27AM by Zabdamar.