For what it's worth: a year of Moorcock

revelshade

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I've never seen E.T.
I'm trying to jump-start my reading habits with a stunt: read more or less all of Moorcock's work in a year - and blog about it.

Tim and Nick Have a Library

I'm off to a good start so far (the reading part, anyway).

Composition isn't my strong suit so if you visit I'm afraid you won't find elegant little essays, just a few thoughts in no particular order.

I try to avoid all but the mildest spoilers.

Any comments, corrections, etc... appreciated etc...

Thanks.
 
I applaud your efforts - but I'd have thought that it's a bit like eating nothing but, say, Big Macs for a year - tasty at first but...:p
 
Is that even possible ? ;)

The guy must have written more than 100 books,collections. At least that what it seems like.

My much smaller goal is to get the better Elric stories,his famous sf and see if MM is truly a writer for me or if my affection for his Corum stories is a fluke.
 
Is that even possible ? ;)

Oh, it's possible. I've done it before -- twice.....

I applaud your efforts - but I'd have thought that it's a bit like eating nothing but, say, Big Macs for a year - tasty at first but...:p

As I think I've said before, Moorcock's a bit like Balzac, in that his work is rather uneven; but when you read a representative amount of his work -- let alone a large selection -- then the cumulative effect is to experience a stunningly rich creation: multilayered, full of thought, examining issues and the human condition from various perspectives, and something which only grows with rereading.

That's the pity with so much of his earlier work... there really is a lot more thought there but, as he was writing so much in a popular mode, it is easily passed by with the seeming simplicity of the tale. This was largely because he was not only attempting to pay the normal bills a writer faces, but also support a magazine which was becoming increasingly experimental -- and therefore losing a lot of its popular appeal (at the time -- in retrospect, it has garnered a lot of respect, and a fair amount of what was published to lukewarm reception then has since been accepted as major contributions to the sf field). Add to that the fact he really does write at a ridiculously fast pace (Gloriana, for instance, was written in a matter of weeks), and you end up with a glibness that, in some cases, can overshadow the substance beneath, unless one becomes familiar enough with his work to realize there's more there than meets the casual eye.

No, I'd say that, taken collectively (much, as I say, like Balzac's Comédie humaine), Moorcock's work is amont the most substantial I've encountered in the sff field, though some individual works are, indeed, less substantive than I would like....
 
Well, having had a chance to read all the existing entries now, I must say that, while they aren't formal essays, they are nonetheless nicely done (whether irreverent or otherwise). Some good thoughts there, and I hope this can branch into something of a discussion of Moorcock's work over time.

I don't always agree with your assessments -- I would rate some things higher, others lower, than you indicate -- but I like your discussions of your reasons.

Nice to see some life in this part of the forum again lately....
 

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