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Message: <blockquote data-quote="fusangite" data-source="post: 979009" data-attributes="member: 7240">Ravellion statesHow do you suppose new genres become traditions? Furthermore, how can you state that space opera is a valueless genre? Surely, its value cannot simply be subjectively declared by you on the basis of its supposed literary merits. This genre has value for the thousands of people who read it. It seems absurd to me that on a site filled with sci-fi and fantasy readers that one would dare make the sweeping declaration that an entire genre or subgenre is devoid of value based on your subjective determination of its "literary merits." Wait a minute!? Didn't you just declare the genre utterly valueless based on some kind of subjective standard for determining if it is "literary?" Doesn't such a rationale conflict with your justification for it continuing to exist in its original, allegedly unspoiled form on the basis of popular appeal? If you're going to be a snob, at least choose whether you are a popularity snob or an elitist snob; you cannot have it both ways.So how many levels of the Literary Augur prestige class do you have!? Surely, the special ability conferred at level 2 makes you understand that there is no clear boundary between the popular and the literary. Are they not part of a continuum with no clear boundary lines?To recap, you have argued: 1. the space opera genre is, by definition, non-literary2. genres that are non-literary do not "deserve" to be the subject of satire, inversion or any other literary tactic3. what happens in non-literary genres and subgenres of fiction should be exclusively determined by (a) the anticipated popularity of proposed innovations with the whole reading community and not any subset thereof nor any potential new readers; and (b) the anticipated future popularity of proposed innovations two generations henceThis way of thinking about fiction and literature is unhelpful, based on an incoherent intellectual hierarchy and premised on the existence of firm, objectively perceptible category boundaries which clearly are not there. Furthermore, in order to make your argument, you set yourself up as an arbiter of the imaginary line between popular fiction and literature and an accurate predictor of the values of society in the mid 21st century.</blockquote>

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