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dustydigger
Posted 2015-01-30 9:20 AM (#9401 - in reply to #9162)
Subject: Re: The Definitive 1950s Reading Challenge		Quote Reply



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Location: UK		Wow! AT LAST someone who agrees with me about the psychohistory. I found it ridiculous from chapter one! And I never did understand why the Mule was such a catastrophe and derailed the whole thing. I particularly found it disconcerting when,after taking up large amounts of space in the first two books he was summarily dismissed from the tale! Not with a bang but a whimper - if even that.
I recently read Foundation's Edge and here we were suddenly expected to join up the Seldon universe with the robots,which I found a bit odd.. I much preferred good old Daneel and Lige stories,even Fantastic Voyage,which at least was fast paced and amusing! I also was pretty unmoved by The Gods Themselves,so I seem not to be much of an Asimov fan..
About Day of the Triffids. I know Brian Aldiss was pretty scathing about it,calling it the founder of the Cozy Catastrophe school,but it is still very readable today,and was massively influential. I remember the first time I saw 28 Days Later,being dimly aware that the early scenes were very familiar,when it dawned what the source was,Bill coming out of the hospital.As for cozy catastrophes,I dont think the characters found it all very cozy at all!
I cant locate Aldiss's comments on the genre but TVTropes had a typically wry and amusing explanation -
"Cosy Catastrophe" is a term coined by Brian Aldiss . The End of the World as We Know It has arrived and ... our heroes feel fine. Sure, it's a pity for all those billions who just perished at the hands of super-plague/aliens/nuclear war. But for our safe, middle-class, (usually) white heroes, it means a chance to quit their day job, steal expensive cars without feeling guilty, sleep in a five-star hotel for free, and relax while the world falls apart around them. Maybe things weren't as good as they were in The Beforetimes, but all in all, life is still enjoyable. Especially if you brought your dog.
Maybe later they'll band together to recreate a humble yet sustainable pretechnological society. Maybe, if they're of mixed genders, they'll see it as their duty to repopulate the species (wink wink). Maybe they'll just learn to accept the extinction of the human race with quiet dignity. Either way, the end of the world shouldn't be the ... end of the world, so to speak.Expect Arcadia since there's not as much pollution and construction''
I think we need to look at the conditions of the time Wyndham was writing. That very uncozy catastrophe World War II was still fresh and painful,devastating and with looming problems to come. Hey,we were still on rationing in UK! I think seeing hope through the ruins of the fictional,however bleak, world made the real world more manageable. Some adventure,some excitement,yes some getting perks by grabbing what you wanted was a nice little sop to the rigours of life. Its very similar in the crime fiction arena,James Bond exploded on the scene in - was it 1953,and was drinking champagne,eating fancy food driving a fancy car at a time when my mother was trading her clothing coupons with a neighbour to give her kids two bananas a month instead of one,half the houses in the area were ruins,and life was very grey. I think cozy catastrophes with their wish fulfilment and hope that things can only get better were an excellent source of reassurance and comfort for the times,and the Triffids was well enough written and had such a strong story it has manage to live far beyond the label,which wasnt particularly fair anyway.

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