come back, Ms. Tepper

[metaphortunate]

It occurs to me that one of the annoying things about the GOP's war on women is that I miss feeling like Sheri Tepper was over the top.

Comments

[ithiliana]

Wow--I have been a fan for decades--I never thought she was that over the top! This could be a great topic for paper, esp. in context of popularity of YAdystopias.

[metaphortunate]

Well, you know - over the top in that dystopian sort of way. I don't think she was ever going for realism, but even given that, she does wield the Anvil of Subtlety a fair amount. Someone pointed out how in Singer from the Sea literally the stuff from women gives life and the stuff from men is deadly poison? And so on.

I'm a fan too, though. :) Though I haven't read anything of hers in a while.

[tam_nonlinear]

I'm reminded of the line about reactions to The Handmaid's Tale being "In Canada, they said, 'Could it happen here?' In England, they said, 'jolly good yarn.' In the United States, they said, 'How long have we got?'"

[ithiliana]

I think in her earlier work (Marianne series), and the first novels, she was perceived as a bit less didactic (I feel a re-read coming on, by golly) (I did a paper on GRASS and some of the comments and reviews I quoted were about her "not strident" feminism or something like that (memory aging).

Other than GATE, I don't see her work as truly dystopian (though there are dystopian elements to some, more than others).

*agggh* I always meant to write some papers about her stuff because it's fascinating to me (part of it is how it reflects her work at Planned Parenthood, how it uses some Second Wave feminist ideas--not always in the best ways--and the sense I got overall that she as an author did not believe that human beings were capable of changing--i.e. like Butler's Oankali, the genetic tendency towards intelligence and hierarchy--without external/biological/impetus).

Now.....must......re-read..........

[starlady]

Mm, yes. Halcyon days…

[metaphortunate]

Aaaargh!

[jesse_the_k]

There's a low-budget indie movie Rain Without Thunder set in a near future where all parties to an abortion are jailed. It's got some surprising actors in it, including Linda Hunt, and I thought it was completely over the top when I saw it back then.

No more.