Posted by Dan Gunter on February 23, 1999 at 00:02:33:
In Reply to: Re: Clark Ashton Smith posted by Frank Denton on January 28, 1999 at 20:15:23:
I've read almost all of both Smith and Vance, and I think that Smith was both a better and a weaker writer than Vance. Some of Smith's short stories in the Zothique cycle (series, grouping--whatever term you want) are among the best fantasy stories around. Given the setting of those stories--Earth in the far future, with a dying sun and magic rampant--it seems difficult to believe that Vance wasn't profoundly influenced by Smith. If you take Smith, Dunsany and Wodehouse, shake them all up and add a dash of randomness (jazz?), you'll get something close to Vance on five of ten tries.
One other quite Vancian book (in my estimation) is Zelazny's "Jack of Shadows." It's not entirely successful, but some of the scenes are worthy of Vance. Also, Zelazny there managed something that Vance pulls off wonderfully: giving just enough of a scene or milieu to give it life. Vance gives wonderful hints about his created worlds; he leaves much in shadows (an appropriate notion, given the Zelazny book), and those shadows lend depth to his work.
For some reason, I find Patrick O'Brian somewhat Vancian. The milieu is entirely different, and the styles aren't much alike; yet there's some similarity (other than my fondness for both authors).
I always thought that Michael Shea took some of the more obvious Vancian elements and overstressed them. His works are Vance (or Lovecraft) caricatures. I don't think anyone can set off to write like Vance and succeed--except, of course, for Vance himself. Every imitator overstresses the obvious elements.
An autobiographical note: I wrote Mr. Vance about twelve or thirteen years ago to tell him how much I enjoyed his work. About a year later I received a kind letter from him. Shortly after, I bought "Araminta Station" (just published) and had the joy of seeing my last name--Gunter--appear (once) as the name of an utterly minor character (as I recall, a valet or servant of sorts). I've always assumed--perhaps swollen with vanity--that Mr. Vance added the name because of my letter. I wrote him a Christmas card or two after that, but never asked whether my surmise was correct: too vain a question.
--Dan Gunter ("Gunter! Where are you?")
: : : Fired up the trusty Grolier Science Fiction Encyclopedia CD. Re CAS they say "of most interest to the sf reader as a fantasist whose rich style and baroque invention had a loosening effect on the SF field, doing much to transform the interplanetary romance of the early years of the century into the full-fledged 'planetary romance', whose characteristic attitude towards the far future and the possibilities therein was capitalized upon by JACK VANCE and others."
: : : CAS 1893-1961 wrote most of his fantasy of note between
: 1930 and 1936 after which he virtually stopped writing. He was "not much interested in science, or in expressing the forward thrust of conventional sf, and it is perhaps inadvisable to think of him in sf terms. His work is better considered in conjunction with the weird fantasies written by his friend H.P. Lovecraft and by Robert E. Howard. His best work has not dated."
: : : A lot of his work seems to have been reprinted over the last 20 years in England mostly in chaps.
: : : Sounds a lot like the "fantasy" JV to me.
: : : John