Stuffed Crocodiles SF and poetry share a certain garishness. That's one thing they have in common. At least, that's true of the stuff I like. Ordinary literature -- by this I mean anything that bears a close resemblance to the stuff written by Joseph O'Neill -- has as its goal a world we can depend on. It's a flawed world, displaying every knotty compromise the author has had to make with it. The chief encomium for these worlds is that they go unadorned. I'm not knocking it. But no art goes unadorned. Some of it just goes out in old khakis.

SF and poetry are defined by their adornments. So much so that a lot of modernism --which in the end, in its English-language form, is a defense of realism -- has erupted over the last century in an embarrassed attempt to disguise the fact. But the physical presence of adornment remains: both genres have in their past, and on public record, depictions of winged men. It suffers perfectionists: the type of unrealist who wears formal gowns, or cravats, or "furry" outfits, or cosplay.

And the fear in all this adornment is that something uncanny will be produced, that something that shouldn't talk will be made not only to talk but also to recite:



And, you know, if enough of these uncanny presences take voice, the world may disintegrate into a thousand factions. Or just plain look silly.  ¶ 4:24 PM