Bewildering Stories News

The Critics’ Corner

Bewildering Stories has been building toward a “new era” for a long time now, and the Critics’ Corner is part of it. We thank the contributors who, on our forum, generated the intellectual momentum and enthusiasm that has led to the creation of this new department. It fulfills a long-held aspiration: that Bewildering Stories be a meeting place rather than a museum or library.

What is the Critics’ Corner?
It’s a department in which readers and contributors can discuss whatever has appeared in Bewildering Stories, whether in the most recent issue or in any earlier one. Why now? Because our contributors are responding to the official Challenge in a big way: they want to hear from readers and other contributors about their stories, and they’re willing to take part in the same spirit.

Creating a community requires communication. Even when we scribble notes, we write to ourselves in the future; and when we write anything else, we have someone in mind, even if only vaguely. Everyone wants to know whether the message has been received, and how. The Critics’ Corner gives the audience a way to say “message received, and here’s how I understand it.”

What’s the dress code?
None in particular. Consider the Critics’ Corner a table in a café of Paris’ Latin Quarter complete with virtual bottles of wine, virtual blue smoke of Gauloises and Gitanes... and the eternal staple: the discussion of ideas. Anybody can pull up a chair and join in.

The Critics’ Corner can be more “gloves off” than the official Challenges. Just don’t take things personally. Readers won’t always tell writers what they want to hear; likewise, readers must be ready to concede that they may miss a point at times. In short, only two people will feel out of place here: Mr. Omniscience and Miss Perfection!

Who’s invited and what’s on the menu?
The department is a free-for-all. Everybody is welcome to take part. Anything in Bewildering Stories is open for discussion, and Ye Copy Editor will provide a link to it wherever one seems useful.

Can we talk about works that appear elsewhere than in Bewildering Stories?
Yes, but discussions limited to works outside of Bewildering Stories might better appear in the Reading Room. True, that department usually features formal book and film reviews, but letters and short commentaries are also welcome. Or the submission may be an essay that qualifies as a review article. Whatever you prefer.

What’s expected?
We have no formal guidelines. Surprise us. The inaugural publications are partly letters, partly essays. Contributions may take other forms, as well, such as interviews or round-table discussions between one, two or even more people. We have ample precedents in the interviews we’ve published.

The contributions may be long or short, formal or informal. Simple or complex questions are welcome, too, and no one is expected to have all the answers. If the questions are accompanied by an answer — which is the format of this News bulletin — then it at least resembles a discussion and is quite appropriate for the Critics’ Corner.

What does the title “Critics’ Corner” imply?
Our reading experience would be very flat, even insipid, if we didn’t have personal preferences. However, strictly speaking, “criticism” is a technical term. It doesn’t mean that the “critic” necessarily likes or dislikes something and leaves it at that. Commentaries of that sort fall into the category of “fan mail” (or “anti-fan mail”?) and usually tell us more about the reader than the story. That may be interesting or it may not be.

Literary criticism — whether academic or popular — is no mystery: it answers in some way one or more of four basic questions:

What does the text say? (a huge question especially for classicists and medievalists, who often have to determine what a text actually is)
How does it say it? (How does the story hold together? What is the style?)
What did it mean in its own time? (History of literature)
What might it mean for ours? (Our interpretation)

Of our four inaugural contributions, Mike Tyzuk’s and Julian Lawler’s address mainly questions 2 and 4; Danielle Parker’s also touches on question 1 in a way.

What’s going to happen to the Challenge?
The Critics’ Corner is an evolutionary outgrowth of the official Challenge, which has served a similar purpose for a long time now. We’re glad to be hearing at last from more than a couple of faithful readers and contributors. And if we don’t get submissions to the Critics’ Corner for any particular issue, the official Challenge may reappear in that guise. We’ll see.

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