(no subject)

[tanaise]

You know, it's one thing to read really good novels. I mean, they're really good, but I don't write novels. So I just shrug and say, well, if I wrote a novel, it could be this good. It doesn't work that way for short stories. I do write short stories. So when I read collections of really good short stories (damn you Ted Chiang), I get all freaked and stuff. Rationally, I sit myself down and go over the facts. I don't write SF. Not the hard stuff, anyways. So it's not like I'm trying to write this stuff. I wouldn't mind writing it, but it's not what happens when I start typing. For the sake of my sanity though, I decided to not finish off Kelly Link's book before bed tonight, cause that *is* what I want to read, and I'm depressed enough: if I read her stuff, I'll just want to throw myself off the loft bed or something. Lock the cat in the hall way all night, who knows what depths my mind will descend to. Anyways, because it wasn't yet one, and therefore too early to go to be, I decided instead to stalk Ted Chiang, cause he went to Clarion in 89, so I wasn't sure what they meant by 'best young writer" blah blah blah. Young as in younger than the old guys? well, based on this he must have been like 12 at clarion. Okay, I exagerate. Still, that was 11 years before the picture (13 years before now), and the oldest story in his collection was pre-Clarion, written in college, so I'm thinking he was at the youngest 21? at the time. probably older to have a roommate reading Sartre in his past already. Though I suppose I'd not only read Sartre by winter of my freshman year, I'd read Sartre in french, so maybe not. (Huis Clos/No Exit, which has the line, "Hell is other people." Heaven though is also other people, they're just (sometimes) different people.)

Comments

ted chiang

[(Anonymous)]

Ted is 35, but he looks about 25. He lives near Seattle here, and came to several of the Clarion West parties. Not only is he a writer of great genius, he's absolutely beautiful. He's also incredibly sweet. I am under the impression he is married, however.

-bluejack

Re: ted chiang

[tanaise.livejournal.com]

Well, that's okay cause I rarely plan to marry people I haven't met yet, just in case they're married already.

Re: ted chiang

[(Anonymous)]

Tut tut. You need to throw caution to the wind! Live, Tanaise! Live!