Covering Much Ground
Dec. 5th, 2010 06:00 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
krpalmerThrough a serendipitous search, I happened on a site tracing the history of the covers of the science fiction published by Penguin Books. The different styles and trends are interesting to look at and a sort of concentrated history of the paperback publisher itself, but I suppose it has got me thinking. I just don't seem to be reading as much science fiction as I used to, as much new stuff anyway; I can walk into even a large bookstore, look at the volumes on the shelves, and not have any real idea of where to start or what would appeal to me.
It's possible to worry about "larger" issues, if we're all convinced "the future isn't what it used to be" and the thread of optimism long twined with pessimism in SF is now just dismissed as "foolish." (However, I recall seeing an anthology paperback a little while ago that was intent on being a collection of "optimistic" SF, even if I didn't buy it...) However, personal failings of my own do seem to play a role too; I can worry that my attention span is eroding away just like everyone else's in this wired age and I can't sit down to work my way through a book any more. (However, I've been moved away from the desk job I used to read books during breaks at.) For some reason, I wonder if my detachment has something to do with how visual science fiction may have picked up so much of the old toolkit of written SF, from effortless interstellar travel to psychic powers, that written SF has moved to "heavier," more focused, and more limited horizons. At the same time, though, I do have to admit that a central part of my dissociation might be that I don't regularly follow any online discussions about or sites on written SF, pretty much because of a general leeriness (however unfounded) that they're all just itching to badmouth Star Wars...
In mulling over all of this, though, I do happen to remember that while I'm also not as engaged with manga as I once might have been, I am reading one particular title with a (North American) cover design that loops back to the beginning of this post. Those who compliment the designs (for, of course, there are always those who'll recoil from any breath of "compromise" in a different market) keep mentioning how it looks like an old SF paperback, but nobody ever seems to realise the resemblance to one particular slice of Penguin science fiction...
It's possible to worry about "larger" issues, if we're all convinced "the future isn't what it used to be" and the thread of optimism long twined with pessimism in SF is now just dismissed as "foolish." (However, I recall seeing an anthology paperback a little while ago that was intent on being a collection of "optimistic" SF, even if I didn't buy it...) However, personal failings of my own do seem to play a role too; I can worry that my attention span is eroding away just like everyone else's in this wired age and I can't sit down to work my way through a book any more. (However, I've been moved away from the desk job I used to read books during breaks at.) For some reason, I wonder if my detachment has something to do with how visual science fiction may have picked up so much of the old toolkit of written SF, from effortless interstellar travel to psychic powers, that written SF has moved to "heavier," more focused, and more limited horizons. At the same time, though, I do have to admit that a central part of my dissociation might be that I don't regularly follow any online discussions about or sites on written SF, pretty much because of a general leeriness (however unfounded) that they're all just itching to badmouth Star Wars...
In mulling over all of this, though, I do happen to remember that while I'm also not as engaged with manga as I once might have been, I am reading one particular title with a (North American) cover design that loops back to the beginning of this post. Those who compliment the designs (for, of course, there are always those who'll recoil from any breath of "compromise" in a different market) keep mentioning how it looks like an old SF paperback, but nobody ever seems to realise the resemblance to one particular slice of Penguin science fiction...