A few days ago I said I'd convince Martin Lewis (![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif)
ninebelow) to post his views on some past winners of the Aurealis Awards, just to give you an idea of how the scene is viewed outside the country.
Well, here it is:
Link.
ninebelow) to post his views on some past winners of the Aurealis Awards, just to give you an idea of how the scene is viewed outside the country.Well, here it is:
One problem is that the pool of Australian fiction is simply not large enough to credibly support such an award. There is no shame in this. There is shame, however, in falsely praising minor works, a process which merely serves to undermine the reputations of all involved. There are two issues involved here. Firstly, the major fan and juried awards of the much bigger markets of Britain and the United States are not closed to entrants from outside those countries (although, of course, native entries often win.) It is an understandable fear that such an open borders policy in Australian awards would leave little, if any, Australian fiction on the shortlists. Perhaps, though, only lauding that rare fiction that can compete on the international stage is preferable to the current situation. Secondly, and more troubling, is the fact that the award is split into five categories - science fiction, fantasy, horror, young adult and children – further reducing the amount of fiction available. Even if the award is restricted to Australian fiction (and there is a clear case for this, especially given how liberally the judges interpret “Australian”) there can be no reason to sub-divide so excessively. Something has to give: together these two facts make the awards simply unsustainable.
Link.
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The point of awards open only to Australian work is to give recognition to the best Australian work, even if it usually is not on a par with the best of the best internationally.
If Campbell Primary School were to have short story awards and encourage its students to nominate their work, would you expect those awards to be open also to Neil Gaiman and Ted Chiang? Would it make the Campbell Primary School short story award a better and more credible award if it were? Would the students of the school be better off?
There is room for awards at different levels, and there is, and should be, kudos for winning an award at whatever level it is pitched. Not as much kudos for the Campbell Primary School writing award as for the Aurealis, and not as much for the Aurealis as for the World Fantasy Award, Hugo or Nebula. But that doesn't make it irrelevant.
the difference, i guess, is that the australian spec fic writers aren't children (though in some ways... ;)). they want to be seen as professionals, with a reputation that is equal to that around the world, and you can only do that when you're competing on an international stage. after all, aren't we pleased when an australian wins the world fantasy award? of course, because now they're an adult.
personally, it doesn't bother me that the award is australian only. to me, that's not the important part of lewis' comment: the important part is that the local scene doesn't have enough content to support so many divisions.
But doesn't that then just support the argument for an award like the Golden Aurealis? You've said in the past, Ben, that it was silly to compare works across the genres but now you're saying the opposite.
i have always said that you could do away with the divisions and just have a novel and short fiction category and a stronger award. i figure i've written it somewhere here one time or another.
Perhaps instead of the Campbell Primary School award, I should have used the CSIRO Staff short story competition as an example, to remove the imp[lication of treating writers like children. (The CSIRO staff newsletter has run such a competition twice, fwiw. The first time, it was open only to scientists working at CSIRO, the second time, it was open to all CSIRO staff).
The number of categories isn't something I feel strongly about. If there are at least 30 eligible published stories to choose among, that seems enough to me, but if you wanted to combine the categories into one award, I wouldn't complain.
If your work can't make it into a Datlow/Link/Grant, Dozois or Strahan year's best antho does that mean its sub par because it's chosen for one of the Congreve or Challis Australian best ofs?
I note you haven't turned down the chance to be published in an Australian Year's Best when it has come your way. So, you tell me - is it okay to acknowledge Australian work as a subset of a broader set of writing through an Australian award or Australian year's best or isn't it?
Edited at 2008-06-24 05:49 am (UTC)
anyhow, me, i don't turn down the congreve and marquardt anthos because i support locally produced books, presses, and projects, especially if their goal is to be a professional project on par with everything produced world wide. bill and michelle's year's best books have attempted this from the start.
i have, however, turned down the challis and cummings year's best, which may surprise you. i do this because i find their personal opinion of me is of such that i simply won't associate myself with them or their product.
so, like, hey, i'm playing both sides of the fence--but in the latter case it is not because of what you would suggest.
however, i have (and do so) turn down local projects that i do not think are going to be of professional standard. if i don't think the world will be competing internationally, i don't participate. mostly, this is because to do so is good for myself as a writer, but whether or not you think that works relies entirely on your opinion of my work and reputation there.
so, to recap: if an australian produced work aims to be professional and up to an international standard, i will gladly particpate and support it. i want to see a strong scene here. my conversations about AAs and such relate to this. but if the book is going to be substandard, i turn it down, even if it is australian, because i do not want to be contributing to a piece i know is aiming beneath the bar.
(which, given the multitude of ways in which the independent press exists, is sometimes the prupose of smaller projects, to give authors a place to start. but that's a different thing.)
I think the AAs are supposed to recognise the best Australian work. Their job is to select the best out of what's available. Not to compete with the Hugos or the World Fantasy awards... that would be redundant.
As Peek has suggested I do not neccessarily endorse such a position and it is a response to the least important of the two problems I identify.
However, I do not find it hard to believe that if the Aurealis Awards had exactly the same entry criteria as, say, the Arthur C Clarke Award (again, I am not advocating this) then the judges would still pick a very different shortlist.
With great respect to Mr Lewis... Peek, your post reeks of cultural cringeism. Why do we need a Brit to tell us what our own country's awards mean? I don't believe that Australian spec fic awards mean any more to foreigners than, say, Lithuanian spec fic awards would mean to us. Why shouldn't Australians have an award for Australian spec fic? Why is everything only shiny when it comes from overseas?
the entire point of giving lewis' opinion was that it was someone outside the country. imo, that's what makes it interesting: it's the view outside, it's the one we don't see because we're in it. like it, dislike it, that's not the point. the point is that is it, and what can you do about it?
me, i don't particularly care that the award is for australians or not. i didn't say i agreed or disagreed. i simply said here was the view from outside. this is it, and whatcha going to do about it? ignore it? cool. doesn't change that's what some people are thinking.
really, the idea than an opinion is less valid just because you're not from there is... well, kinda odd, y'know? i have opinions about all sorts of things outside this country. so do you. are they not valid now?
and i doubt lewis read the two books to find the flaws, but he can cover those qs if he wants.
what is kinda odd is how you won't leave this old dead horse alone. You don't like the AAs. You've been saying this for years. Now you're scouring the Net for foreign experts to back you up. Why?
i didnt actually need to scour the net for lewis' opinion. he linked it in his blog, which i read. as for linking it? why not. i talked about the AAs a few days ago. it's all discussion, so why's it so bad to do?
i know a condesencding darl when i see one.
Look at the list of winners of the SF Award: Egan has won twice, Williams has won twice, McMullen has won twice, Broderick has won three times. Williams has also won twice for the Fantasy Award and there is a similar pattern in that category. It seems to me that this is objective evidence that the pool of high quality fiction available to the judges is extremely limited.
Can anyone here justify further limiting this pool in a way that the larger award do not?
Harlan Ellison - 9 Hugos
Robert Silverberg - 5 Hugos
Connie Willis - 9 Hugos
Connie Willis - 6 Nebulas
Ellen Datlow - 7 World Fantasy Awards
Terri Windling - 7 World Fantasy Awards
Gardner Dozois - 15 Hugos
And I'll save you the embarrassment of counting the number of Hugos Dave Langford has won, shall I.
Did you stop to think that Williams, Egan, Broderick and others had won the award more than once because they were writers at the top of their respective field at the time. And that's probably why you see multiple awards for writers like Ellison, Silverberg, and editors like Dozois and Datlow.
Editor and Fan Writer are substanially different types of category to Best Novel but your supposed counter-examples of Dozois and Langford actually prove my point. These categories have little credibility simply because the same person wins ever year.
As Ben Payne points out elsewhere 80% of the 2006 Aurealis SF Award shortlist were also shortlisted the year before. You don't think that is suggestive?
I would agree with you that there is evidence that the pool of talent in terms of the SF and Horror awards are quite small (chiefly because so little of it is published in this country) and that recurring names are likely to occur, and that this could be seen as reflecting poorly on the competitive nature of those categories.
I don't believe it's conclusive that competition is not strong enough for an award; I think if you look at the potential for a year in which Broderick, Egan, Williams, McMullen and Dann are up for a SF award is enough indication that there is room for a contest... some years are gonna be stronger than others... them's the breaks.
I believe the rationale behind the different genre divisions was to avoid comparing apples with oranges. If awards function as a form of recommendation then it makes sense to recommend different works to fans of Sf than to fans of Horror (while allowing room for crossover). I don't believe the decision had anything to do with the competitiveness of categories (many years there is no award for Horror novel). Whether the awards would be stronger with only one category and potentially stronger shortlist or whether it would lose the value provided by its diversity is, I suspect, a matter of opinion.
Even in that one category, he's ignored works by Sean Williams and Jack Dann... hardly a thoroughly researched position.
I must say, I am impressed at least with the tone of the debate here...
and what's with the link?