(no subject)

[digitaldiscipline]

I think I've figured out what it is about Neil Gaiman.

No matter what he writes, it sounds about a century old, as if an author from the turn of the previous century were to arrive here and tell stories without suffering cultural whiplash.

Comments

[geeki.livejournal.com]

Ok I'm sorry I just cant love you anymore :P

I believe that would be called writing style. Which would be why some people love the Xanth series and others...do not....

Did you try American Gods? or perhaps Coraline?

[gooddamon.livejournal.com]

I think Xanth is another matter entirely. That series got worse and worse as I grew older. Then one day, I realized the entire series was bad; it's just that I'd started reading it when I was eleven years old, and couldn't tell.

[mighty-man.livejournal.com]

Sheesh, that sounds like me and the bible. (no flames please)

[kungfugimp.livejournal.com]

Nah, I'm with you on that one. The only thing is I thought it was bad even at 11.

Xanth - that is written for 11 yr old boys who fantasize being with 17 yr old large breasted girls.

[etcet.livejournal.com]

no wonder i never read it... by the time i knew what tits were for, i was too old to enjoy the books...?

[etcet.livejournal.com]

I loved American Gods; it just seems like a storytelling style from another age applied to ours.

[geeki.livejournal.com]

Oh ok. :)

I really seep into his writing and can get absorbed (well I can do that with pretty much any author). He does kinda talk like that as well. Like if you read his blog, or speak to him in person.. it's very... like his mind wraps itself around things and then he speaks on them.

[gooddamon.livejournal.com]

I particularly liked that aspect of American Gods. Despite the modern, contemporary setting, something about that book just seemed wonderfully quaint.

He's that way in person, too. He dresses in black teeshirts and leather jackets, but for some reason I can easily picture him riding one of those turn-of-the-last-century bicycles, the ones with the giant front wheel.

[geeki.livejournal.com]

*nods*

I've met him in person several times, and he always strikes me as... very british old world.

Like he doesnt quite belong here, which is also weird because he loves toys... and has several including IPODS, laptops, etc.

Of course I also appreciate the fact that he raised his daughters on stories of things like "Wolves in the Walls" and 'coraline' which would rightly fuck up most children of this generation, but his took it in stride :)

[razerwolfe.livejournal.com]

I'm finding his new crap ... er, storytelling to be much more of the Ultra-modern, chock-ful of cutsey asides kinda thing. Still like Nevermore, but can't keep anything else down. He doesn't exemplify to me 19th century writing style (ala Poe or Twain or Verne or Wells or Lovecraft (who was 20th century but wrote veeerrry 19th)) because he doesn't use the word 'breast' when he means 'chest'. Where I can kinda see what you're talking about is the pet peeve to me of addressing your audience -- that annoying "gentle reader" bullshit -- that his prose can sometimes do: that is, break the line between storyteller and audience, thus destroying whatever wonderment and flavor you've been building. Stop nudge-nudging me and saying 'hey, isn't this kewl, and poignant and funny?' Neil, because when you do that my only answer is: "No, it isn't."

[razerwolfe.livejournal.com]

Oh, and Xanth, indeed the vast majority of P. Anthony, blows hurling, hairy chunks, and is horribly, horibly and embarassingly '11-year old just discovered that big boobed bimboes makes his dick hard' tripe, and whose heroes are always the scrawny, smart geek who gets to fuck these horny sex goddesses.