So he goes

[wombat_socho]

Frankly, I don't understand the sorrow over Kurt Vonnegut among the science fiction fans on my f-list. To call the man a second-rate writer is to be overly generous, imao, especially when you compare him to the major figures in the genre. He missed no opportunity to shit on science fiction and its fandom even as he stole concepts, filed off the serial numbers, and knocked out crappy imitations to the everlasting adulation of the mainstream press, which couldn't be bothered to read "that trashy sci-fi stuff".

It's possible people aren't old enough to remember this. For my part, I remember reading Vonnegut as a teenager (after already having read Asimov, Clarke, Ellison, Heinlein, Niven and Silverberg, to take just a few off the top) and thinking he was nothing special, maybe on a par with Ira Levin. Maybe. At least Chip in Levin's This Perfect Day was someone you could sympathize with, unlike the sad sacks, assholes and losers in Vonnegut's novels.

Comments

[wombat-socho.livejournal.com]

Sorry you never liked him, but please let those of us who mourn him do so in peace.
This is why I kept my opinions to my own LJ and didn't shitpostcomment in other peoples' journals about this. Maybe I should have used a cut? *shrug*

[(Anonymous)]

'Scuse me? I thought I was being polite (the thing about literary scholarship was meant to be self-deprecating). Figured you might be interested in another point of view. I didn't mean to be down on you.

But if you're going to react like that over a simple, non-confrontational comment, then forget it. Bye.

[wombat-socho.livejournal.com]

You were, and I think you misunderstood what I meant by my reply. It occurs to me that since what I post appears on your LJ (albeit in your friends page) it might have been more polite of me to put what I had to say about Vonnegut behind a cut.