Locus 2012 "All-Centuries" Polls

Surprised I missed this as I am kind of addicted to these things.

"In November 2012 Locus Online hosted a set of polls for the best science fiction and fantasy novels and short fiction of the 20th and 21st (so far) centuries, with five categories in each century: SF novel, fantasy novel, novella, novelette, and short story. For 20th century categories, up to 10 votes in each category were allowed; for 21st century categories, 5 items in each were allowed. Results depend on rank of votes within each category, using algorithms that reward a 1st place vote twice as many points as a 5th or 10th place vote, but not 5 times or 10 times as many."

The big winners were as follows:

20th Century

SF Novel:
Dune by Frank Herbert

Fantasy Novel:
The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien

Novella:
Story of Your Life by Ted Chiang

Novellette:
"Flowers for Algernon" by Daniel Keyes

Short Story:
"The Nine Bilion Names of God" by Arthur C. Clarke

21st Century

SF Novel:
Old Man's War by John Scalzi

Fantasy Novel:
American Gods by Neil Gaiman

Novella:
Magic for Beginners by Kelly Link

Novellette:
"Hell Is the Absence of God" by Ted Chiang

Short Story
"Exhalation" by Ted Chiang

Detailed results can be found here:

http://www.locusmag.com/2012/AllCenturyPollsResults.html

Really detailed results (along with more methodological information) on the short fic part of the poll are here:

http://www.locusmag.com/2012/CompleteResultsShf.html

***

As always, I eagerly await your comments. :)

Dune is an appropriate poll topper for SF novel and it would have been a travesty if Tolkein had not been number one on the Fantasy side.

Clarke's story is one of my favourites and I was very happy to see it topping the poll for short story.

Ted Chiang's "Hell is the Absence of God" is a great story and deserves the 21st Century (so-far) novellette position. I was surprised to see his "Exhalation" and "Story of Your Life" topping poll categories. I think he is a great writer but I do not think his work necessarily warrants three poll topping positions across the 20th & 21st centuries. (One of my favourite stories is his "Divide by Zero" which I think is better than "Exhalation" and "Story of Your Life".)

Of course, when you ask me to nominate other stories for those categories I will have to go away and think about the answer.

I have not read any of the other stories so cannot comment authoritatively on them...yet.

Now I will await the arrows of affliction to shower down upon me for expressing my opinion.

Thank you for starting this thread. It promises to be interesting and divisive. Just what we need. :-)

>2 pgmcc:

Ted Chiang's "Hell is the Absence of God" is a great story and deserves the 21st Century (so-far) novellette position. I was surprised to see his "Exhalation" and "Story of Your Life" topping poll categories. I think he is a great writer but I do not think his work necessarily warrants three poll topping positions across the 20th & 21st centuries. (One of my favourite stories is his "Divide by Zero" which I think is better than "Exhalation" and "Story of Your Life".)

Yeah, that's a pretty extraordinary performance, isn't it? I have not read any of Mr. Chiang's work - something I hope to rectify in the near future.

I have not read any of the other stories so cannot comment authoritatively on them...yet.

Flowers for Algernon (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flowers_for_Algernon) is an astonishingly great story in both its short story and novel forms. Read that one first!

Thank you for starting this thread. It promises to be interesting and divisive. Just what we need. :-)

Ha! :)

Interesting to note that Gene Wolfe's The Book of the New Sun is both the #24 20th Century SF Novel and the #18 20th Century Fantasy Novel. :)

Does it involve time travel?
;)

^3

"Story of Your Life" and "Hell is the Absence of God" are my two favorite short stories (in that order) that I've read in my 45 years of life. I also highly regard much of his other work -- the Tower of Babylon story in the same collection, for instance. There has only been one story of his that I really disliked. Perhaps tellingly, he declined his Hugo nomination for that one.

#3 To my shame I have had Flowers for Algernon, the novel, on my shelf for years but have never gotten round to it.

#6 The Tower of Babylon is very good. If my memory serves me correctly it was the first story in the collection.

In terms of his other stories I felt many of them had great concepts but that he lost his way in the middle of the stories and struggled with the endings.

"Hell is the Absence of God" is excellent. It creeps up on you and makes its point right between the eyes.

^Agreed re: "Hell is the Absence of God". It blew me away. Would be my favorite, but "Story of Your Life" has a special place in my mind because of the emphasis on aliens and linguistics, my two favorite things in SF.

I feel comfortable with the 20th century results - no need to break out the torches and pitchforks.

I have not read Chiang, or Link. I have read some of Gaiman's stuff but not the American Gods novel.

I, embarrassingly, read a collection of Gaiman's short stories and thought somehow they were stories he had collected by other authors and himself. I complemented most by saying their best feature was being short. I was quickly corrected on the authorship by the denizens of SF on LT but no one argued vehemently against my indifference on many of the tales.

>5 pgmcc:

Wikipedia sez:

The Book of the New Son tetralogy chronicles the journey and ascent to power of Severian, a disgraced journeyman torturer who becomes Autarch, the one ruler of the free world. It is a first-person narrative, ostensibly translated by Wolfe into contemporary English, set in the distant future when the Sun has dimmed and Earth is cooler (a "Dying Earth" story).

>6 amysisson:

I just placed a hold on Chiang's Stories of Your Life and Others at my local public library. 8)

>11 DugsBooks:

Gaiman is someone I've always liked but never felt like I liked as much as I was supposed to (if that makes any sense). The only thing that he's written that has absolutely blown me out of the water is his story "24 Hours" from when he was on the Sandman comics series (http://www.librarything.com/series/The+Sandman) - that one's f***ing creepy. Having said that, Gaiman is hugely prolific and I've only checked out about 3% of his total output, so I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt and say that perhaps I've simply missed most of the really good stuff/the stuff that would be most appealing to me.

Taste can never be accounted for, of course, but American gods strikes me as a particularly bad choice. I wouldn't even rate it among the best 100 SFF novels of this century.

I voted in the poll. Needless to say, none of my choices made it into the top ten in any category. Several of them didn't even make it onto the full choice as they scored zero points - see http://iansales.com/2013/01/02/locus-all-centuries-poll-short-fiction-results/

#12 I haven't read American Gods but it has been recommended to me as the one Gaiman I should read.

I've read Neverwhere and The Graveyard Book, neither of which impressed me as anything special. I felt Neverwhere was an early teens book with a few bits of sexy talk to help pretend it was YA and that The Graveyard Book was an ok children's book, but again, nothing special.

The people I know who are ardent Gaiman fans tend to be peole who grew to love his work through reading his graphic novels. I have not read any of his GN's so cannot comment on them.

I will be reading American Gods at some stage, but if it doesn't bowl me over I will not waste any more time on Gaiman novels.

Sandman is great. Fabulous. Personally, I would rate both Neverwhere and The Graveyard Book higher than American Gods.

That's not promising me anything good from my reading American Gods. At least my expectations are low.

>14 iansales:

A typically contentious blog post, Ian; I would honestly be disappointed with anything else. :)

the novelette {is} a completely useless category and should be roundly expunged from, well, everything

No argument from me there. If something is a work of prose fiction, it's one of three things: a short story, a novella, or a novel (well, there's prose poetry and "flash fiction", but I won't go there). "Novelette" is as useless to literary terminology as a bicycle is to a fish. I think it's interesting and perhaps instructive that you never hear that term used outside of genre fiction; e.g., you never hear anyone speak of an Ernest Hemingway novelette or a James Joyce novelette.

#18 I live to please :-)

As I understand it, in the old days of pulp magazines, short stories, novelettes and novellas all offered different word rates. That's no longer true, and hasn't been for decades. Which means the distinction now exists only in certain genre magazines and certain genre awards. They'll never kill it, of course, because it's an opportunity to give more of their mates awards...

#18 & #19
Your discussion of the novelette reminded me of George A. Birmingham’s words in his introduction to, “Irish Short Stories”, which he edited for its 1932 publication. Commenting on the difficulties he faced once he had agreed to edit the book, he wrote:

“In the first place what is a story? I might have asked what is a short story as distinguished from a long one? But that question seems to have solved itself. Stories are either 70,000 words and upwards in length, or 6,000 words, and downwards. The first are novels and the second short stories, and there is practically nothing in between. It is odd that this is so, and perhaps the explanation lies not so much in the nature of stories as in the exigencies of the publishing business.”

Birmingham would obviously agree with Ian’s analysis of the creation of additional categories of literature.

On the same subject, my OED edition (Compact) has the following definitions:

Novella: A short novel or long short story (a nice clear delineation, not)

Novelette: chiefly derogatory a short novel, typically a light romantic one

>20 pgmcc:

From the Wikipedia article on the novella (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Novella):

Stephen King, in his introduction to Different Seasons, a collection of four novellas, has called the novella "an ill-defined and disreputable literary banana republic"; King notes the difficulties of selling a novella in the commercial publishing world, since it does not fit the typical length requirements of either magazine or book publishers. Despite these problems, however, the novella's length provides unique advantages; in the introduction to a novella anthology titled Sailing to Byzantium, Robert Silverberg writes:

{The novella} is one of the richest and most rewarding of literary forms...it allows for more extended development of theme and character than does the short story, without making the elaborate structural demands of the full-length book. Thus it provides an intense, detailed exploration of its subject, providing to some degree both the concentrated focus of the short story and the broad scope of the novel.

ETA: Another thing that I understand is problematic with novellas is their inclusion in anthologies. If an editor includes a novella in an anthology, he or she usually does so at the expense of having to cut at least a short story or two from it due to page limitations; for example, he or she might say, "If I include Kafka novella a, I'm not gonna be able to include Faulkner short story b or Stevenson short story c because I'm not gonna have room for them"; he or she may therefore be more inclined to cut it than he or she would a ten-page short story.

I cannot remember the Greek philosopher's name but when asked how long a play should be his response was, "The tragedy will take as long as it requires." (Possibly slight paraphrasing involved, but the meaning is the same.)

I suggest a story will take as long as it takes to tell, be it a tragedy or otherwise. If this length does not fit a predefined limitation then it will not fit the predefined space allowed for it. Whether editing a story down or up to fit a given category improves the telling or not is a subject for another discussion...although in my experience editing down seems to improve a story more often than editing up.

Other examples of "literary forms" developed for purposes other than literary intent would be the "drabble" (a story of exactly 100 words), flash fiction, and those attempts at writing stories in a tweet. All good fun, but generally developed as a form for the entertainment of fitting a story into a specific word/character count rather than being natural storytelling forms.

You're just lucky there's no category for "doorstopper"!

Ha! They are called novels nowadays. It's seem that the requirement to be published as a novel in genre fiction these days is a length of at least 350 pages.

#24 a length of at least 350 pages.

That's just the free teaser.

Well, there's "long novels" and then there's "doorstoppers". I'm thinking of the notorious Hamilton, though King often lands in the category.

My model of typical novel length was formed in the days of 180 page small print paperbacks, but then I hit Dickens and Thackeray.

>22 pgmcc:

One of the things those of you who have created artworks already know is that once you get going on these things, they have volition. To use someone we were talking about earlier as an example, Tolkien famously told the story of how, once he got a couple of chapters into The Lord of the Rings, it kept wanting to get darker and darker, even as he attempted to maintain the "kid lit" tone of its predescesor. Sometimes the writer is a creator; other times, he or she is more like a stenographer.

>23 brightcopy: et al.

Yeah - these days it's more like: short story, novella, novel, and "Good Lord! How much does that thing weigh?" :D

short story, novella, novel, hamilton

I haven't read Old Man's War. I know it is very well liked, but I didn't realize it was highly regarded critically. Tolkien is the one obvious choice on the list, and Dune is certainly not a surprise, although I always thought that it's satisfying ambition to be great was damaged by it's heavy reliance on earth-arab culture. I was surprised that two of the ten winners were religious stories. The Clarke always struck me as merely clever, in the same way that Asimov's The Last Question is clever. I like both writers, but neither Clarke nor Asimov are at their best in short fiction. I've been a big Ted Chiang fan from the beginning, but it's ridiculous that he's taken three of a possible six spots (he hasn't written any novels). He's a fine writer and he was a fresh voice, but the Locus voters are gaga for him in just the same way they once were for the equally excellent Lucius Shepard who used to win almost every Locus vote. As much as I like Ted Chiang, and as much as I like Hell is the Absence of God, I don't think he's written up to his potential yet. Story of Your Life was a tour de force, but as good as it is, there's a whiff of contrivance in it's set up that muffles the effect and makes it seem just a little stiff. I haven't read Gaiman or Link, but I'll read her piece soon.

Ian, what did you vote for?

Here are my votes for the novels, and how they actually fared in the final results: http://iansales.com/2012/12/22/the-novel-poll-results-are-in/

And no, Old Man's War isn't highly regarded critically. But Scalzi has huge fanbase.

"And no, Old Man's War isn't highly regarded critically. But Scalzi has huge fanbase."

I vote for that ^^

Another, and probably more accurate, way to put it: in terms of social capital, Scalzi is one of the genre's ultra-rich.

Works for the present. I'm skeptical about the future. Can he take his riches with him when he departs?

Given the way our economies are going, pretty soon it'll be the only capital we'll be able to spend...

>31 iansales:

From your blog post:

I’ve read neither {Old Man's War nor American Gods}, I have no intention of reading them, they are not books I’d ever consider would merit the description “best”.

That's kind of nonsensical, isn't it? How can you know whether or not they merit the description "best" if you haven't read them?

As far as I am concerned any list that puts Dune at No 1 has my respect. I still read it every few years and it takes me back to being 15 and reading my first sci fi novel. I still get a thrill reading every page and thinking of the vast imagination that went behind the creation of this great space opera.

I'm a Scalzi fan, and Old Man's War is a fun read, but I wouldn't put it at the top of a list. To be fair, Scalzi is quite open about writing to appeal to a large audience (and making a living). His social capital is by design and he's worked for it, so i give him a tip of the hat.

I admire his internet self-promotion, but recoil at his actual fiction.

#36 Because I know enough about the books - from reviews, commentary and discussion - to get a good idea of what they're like. I have read other fiction by both writers, so I'm familiar with their style. And on the basis of that, I don't consider either to be capable of producing a novel that is the best of the century so far. So no, it's not nonsensical at all.

>40 iansales:

So (in the case of American Gods) a novel that won the Hugo, Nebula, and Locus awards is still not even worthy of consideration? You must not think very highly of your peers. :)

If I'm not mistaken, Ian AFAICT correctly believes that his criteria for a truly superb work of fiction are different from what the general Hugo/Locus voter wants to give awards to. As to why American Gods got the Nebula, search me. I have no idea.

Books don't get nominated for, or win, the Hugo Award because they're good. It's a popularity contest. Among a relatively small group of people. And the Nebula was infamous for its logrolling, until it was cleaned up a few years ago.

Gaiman is hugely popular, but I can't see what the appeal is. It's been suggested that he carried over a lot of fans from his Sandman days, but I've no idea if that's true. I've also heard Gaiman described as a bland Stephen King. Perhaps that's why he's so popular...

Leaving Gaiman out of it for the moment (I will neither defend nor attack him since I simply haven't gotten around to reading him), let me pose the following question:

Is it possible that someone could produce a novel that is both a "best of the century" and simultaneously be someone whose writing you do not like?

Yes, indeed. There are books that are clearly the product of real talent and skill, but just rub me up the wrong way. There's usually one or two of them on the Clarke shortlist each year :-)

^39 "I admire his internet self-promotion, but recoil at his actual fiction."

Funnily enough, I admire most of his fiction, but occasionally recoil at his internet self-promotion. :-)

Actually, I do admire most of his online persona as well, but sometimes a post will veer into an arrogance that I'm not comfortable with. But hey, nobody's forcing me to read it, and I find the good outweighs the bad.

I can easily imagine that. I didn't necessarily mean I follow his online comments closely, only that he has skillfully used it to marshall support and a fan base.

#45 by iansales> Just didn't know if that would apply to best of the century.

Personally, I'm not sure of my answer.

I did qualify it as century "so far" :-)

Re: 27- It's not so very long ago that Dickens' greatness was still suspect due to his immense popularity. Greil Marcus asked in Mystery Train if it was possible to be a great rock and roller if you weren't popular. The auteur theory proposed that Pickup on South Street could be a finer artistic achievement than Gone With the Wind. Ian seems to be what used to be called highbrow and I doubt if he'd mind if his favorites were more popular with awards voters. In fact, some, such as Red Mars and The Book of the New Sun were popular. It's easy to be irritated by genuinely talented artists who are overrated, just as it's easy to be annoyed (a lesser grumble) by cult figures who are undeservedly puffed up by a coterie of overenthusiastic followers.

I recently read Norman Lebrecht's excellent The Life and Death of Classical Music, in which he makes the point that classical music was doomed when contemporary composers stopped writing music that the audience wanted to hear. The one thing I'm sure of is that it's worthwhile to continue to wrestle with questions of excellence in the arts. It's a free country (in most of the first world), and everyone's entitled to their own taste and opinion (and there are such an astonishing welter of them on any and all subjects, and so may of them are disappointing) but that doesn't mean that all opinions are equally valid. You have to be able make a reasonable case for your opinion, and be able to defend it against naysayers and the unsure.

I once saw two guys making fun of someone buying 1984. They were buying a Dostoevsky novel and thought his choice was too lowbrow.

Ian, I enjoyed seeing your novel choices, did you vote for the short fiction as well?

Actually, it brings up another topic. Was it that Dickens' greatness was later "recognized", or was it that eventually generations that were molded and influenced by Dickens work just had different opinions about his work?

I'm wondering if anyone can think of other authors who were unrecognized at the time, became "recognized" as classics after a bit, then faded away again. It's probably harder, because it's a lot harder to kick someone out of that club than it is to keep them out. You just get called a philistine if you refuse to go along with the groupthink.

>50 lansingsexton:

Thought I was the only person ever to make a Greil Marcus reference in the midst of a discussion about speculative fiction (see, for example, http://www.librarything.com/topic/153228#4061981). Wonders will never cease. :)

I once saw two guys making fun of someone buying 1984. They were buying a Dostoevsky novel and thought his choice was too lowbrow.

Yeah, well, y'know, Orwell only changed the course of history with that one. Pretty lame. *rolls eyes*

>51 brightcopy:

I'm wondering if anyone can think of other authors who were unrecognized at the time, became "recognized" as classics after a bit, then faded away again.

Poe seems to sort of go in and out of fashion amongst the literati periodically. I think that someone who is still being read for pleasure a century and a half (plus!) after his death is probably gonna be okay, though.

Ian, I found your link to your short fiction lists @ 14. I too love Great Work of Time, but I found The Merchant and the Alchemists' Gate disappointing. Superficially dazzling, but ultimately overthought, and overwritten.

#53 I thought the construction of the story, aping The Arabian Nightmare and the whole Islamic storytelling tradition, was done quite well.

Serendipitously, I picked up hardcover copies of both Kelly Link's Magic for Beginners (see #1) and Gene Wolfe's The Shadow of the Torturer (see #4) at my local public library's used book sale today (for a quarter each, no less!).

I am looking at reading more short stories and art posted this great list way back when.from Locus..
I also enjoyed Ian's rather acerbic views on the results,and his own take and choices. People were much more forthcoming - and active - back in 2013! lol
Somewhere,either on here or WWE there was a great list,possibly the long list for this poll,but I have not been able to locate it,but this is long enough to get started! :0)
I'm going to star this and keep it in view.

This was the list of best SF novels. Some thought the list too predictable and boring,but I found it useful when starting out in SF after a decades long hiatus of reading the genre.
Gratifying to see I have now read a respectable number of the novels,while showing woeful results in the shorter fiction. Of course,the shorter fiction can be difficult to find.
Anyhoo,best novels:
20th Century SF Novel:
underlined still to read

1 Herbert, Frank : Dune
2 Card, Orson Scott : Ender's Game
3 Asimov, Isaac : The Foundation Trilogy
4 Simmons, Dan : Hyperion
5 Le Guin, Ursula K. : Left Hand of Darkness
6 Adams, Douglas : The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
7 Orwell, George : Nineteen Eighty-Four
8 Gibson, William : Neuromancer
9 Bester, Alfred : The Stars My Destination
10 Bradbury, Ray : Fahrenheit 451
11 Heinlein, Robert A. : Stranger in a Strange Land
12 Heinlein, Robert A. : The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress
13 Haldeman, Joe : The Forever War
14 Clarke, Arthur C. : Childhood's End
15 Niven, Larry : Ringworld
16 Le Guin, Ursula K. : The Dispossessed
17 Bradbury, Ray : The Martian Chronicles
18 Stephenson, Neal : Snow Crash
19 Miller, Walter M. , Jr. : A Canticle for Leibowitz
20 Pohl, Frederik : Gateway
21 Heinlein, Robert A. : Starship Troopers
22 Dick, Philip K. : The Man in the High Castle
23 Zelazny, Roger : Lord of Light
24 Wolfe, Gene : The Book of the New Sun
25 Lem, Stanislaw : Solaris
26 Dick, Philip K. : Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
27 Vinge, Vernor : A Fire Upon The Deep
28 Clarke, Arthur C. : Rendezvous with Rama
29 Huxley, Aldous : Brave New World
30 Clarke, Arthur C. : 2001: A Space Odyssey
31 Vonnegut, Kurt : Slaughterhouse-Five
32 Strugatsky, Arkady & Boris : Roadside Picnic
33 Card, Orson Scott : Speaker for the Dead
34 Brunner, John : Stand on Zanzibar
35 Robinson, Kim Stanley : Red Mars
36 Niven, Larry (& Pournelle, Jerry) : The Mote in God's Eye
37 Willis, Connie : Doomsday Book
38 Atwood, Margaret : The Handmaid's Tale
39 Sturgeon, Theodore : More Than Human
40 Simak, Clifford D. : City
41 Brin, David : Startide Rising
42 Asimov, Isaac : Foundation
43 Farmer, Philip Jose : To Your Scattered Bodies Go
44 Dick, Philip K. : Ubik
45 Vonnegut, Kurt : Cat's Cradle
46 Vinge, Vernor : A Deepness in the Sky
47 Simak, Clifford D. : Way Station
48 Wyndham, John : The Day of the Triffids
49 Stephenson, Neal : Cryptonomicon
50 Delany, Samuel R. : Dhalgren
50 Keyes, Daniel : Flowers for Algernon
52 Bester, Alfred : The Demolished Man
53 Stephenson, Neal : The Diamond Age
54 Russell, Mary Doria : The Sparrow
55 Dick, Philip K. : A Scanner Darkly
56 Asimov, Isaac : The Caves of Steel
56 Banks, Iain M. : Use of Weapons
58 Strugatsky, Arkady & Boris : Hard to Be a God
59 Delany, Samuel R. : Nova
60 Crichton, Michael : Jurassic Park
61 Heinlein, Robert A. : The Door Into Summer
62 L'Engle, Madeleine : A Wrinkle in Tme
63 Clarke, Arthur C. : The City and the Stars
63 Banks, Iain M. : The Player of Games
65 Bujold, Lois McMaster : Memory
66 Asimov, Isaac : The End of Eternity
67 Stewart, George R. : Earth Abides
68 Heinlein, Robert A. : Double Star
68 Burgess, Anthony : A Clockwork Orange
70 Bujold, Lois McMaster : Barrayar
71 Stapledon, Olaf : Last and First Men
71 McHugh, Maureen F. : China Mountain Zhang
73 Cherryh, C. J. : Cyteen
74 McCaffrey, Anne : Dragonflight
75 Heinlein, Robert A. : Citizen of the Galaxy

read 70/75

>1 artturnerjr: Hmmm, interesting lists. I see I have a lot of reading ahead of me!

>56 dustydigger: "acerbic? :-)

>57 dustydigger: I have read all but 15; some of those I have no intention of reading.

What was the other book in the tie at 71?

>57 dustydigger: I've read 57 of those (including the double counting of 'Foundation' and 'The Foundation Trilogy'), six are on the TBR pile, leaving twelve I haven't read. Of those twelve, I can probably live with not reading them, though if I come across a copy I may well add to the TBR pile.

>57 dustydigger: I've read 65 from that list. At least half of the remaining 10 are on my TBR shelf. Of course, a few titles I'm counting as 'read' were so long ago that, should I re-read today, they would likely feel brand new to me.