Pirate by ~Loserbabooser on deviantART
I’m not at all so sure that the connection between current crisis and future speculation (or speculative futures) is as straightforward as Felix Gilman suggests at Ecstatic Days, but I find these questions quite the fascinating nevertheless:
Economic collapse, the heat death of the earth, and the forthcoming resource wars of the 2010s: what do these things mean for genre fiction? Some subgenres will prosper, presumably, others will decline. As we are plunged into a real-life gothic-punk nightmare, what people are looking for in escapism and exoticism seems likely to change.
What’s going to happen to all those books about gritty decaying Dickensian cities once we’re all actually living in one?
Test case: pirates. There’s been a bit of a resurgence of pirate stories recently. Fun and light-hearted escapism, with just a touch of tongue-in-cheek jokiness. What’s going to happen to the demand for pirate stories now that pirates are actually a problem again?
Pirates in recessionary genre literature?
I’ve got that beat.
How about the theory that Hollywood makes vampire movies under Democratic presidents and zombie films under Republicans.
(The picture above looks really familiar. Like something I’ve seen on SBS…)
Dunno. However, as The War Nerd observes, skinny Somali blokes armed with RPGs are unlikely to be quite as appealing to audiences as Johnny Depp hamming it up as a metrosexual pirate.
No doubt pirate queens will soon be packing RPGs in their falsies – the RPeGleg – though they’d have to tread carefully, o’course.
I’ll say it, Siberian Hamster.
Mongols. I want adequate representation of Mongols in fictional distopia.
1. dystopia
2. Proper Pirate Queens have no need of ‘falsies’, at least not on their chests
3. RPGs are not standard piratical queen kit: she has powers that would make any RPG wilt under her withering scorn.
4. Pirate Queens rule and abhor dystopiae.
Dystopiae, then.
And I for one welcome the future rule of Pirate Queens. Hell, when the libertarianism of economic collapse comes and we’re all granted a stateless freedom, I’m running for the protection of the first nutty sword-wielding despot I can find.
Kim, consider this my official job application. I’m particularly interested in the position of hired goon with the well-oiled RPK and ammunition belts in a golf bag, drinking grain alcohol and rainwater, like a skinny General Ripper.
I too wish to apply, although my build probably suits the twin-revolving-machine-gun tank like dude with crew cut and cigar who gets killed in the final act. Tipple of choice is crates of beer in long necks, which when emptied will be filled with petrol and stuffed with a rag.
These modern pirates with their sppedboats and AK-47s are no match for cutlass weilding, sword carrying, musket or blunderbuss shooting pirates swinging onto Spanish galleons from ships rigging. From what I can gather the only thing they have in common is they share the black flag.
Well, actually, Pedestrian Pete, given that the origins of the word are Greek, not Latin, that really should be dystopiai, not dystopiae.
Are we going to have ninjas in this pirate moofy? If so, I want to be Lone Wolf.
Yeah, Paul. These Somalians don’t even have letters of marque.
I have to say fireships would be a cool revived technology—in this age of oil supertankers, that is.
Polytropos (heh), that Lone Wolf thing is disgusting. People are eating black pudding in the novel I’m reading (Irish cardiologists, what can you do) and it’s not a happy conjunction.
Besides, won’t all that leaping about and sweating make your eyeshadow run?
Let’s hope this resurgence of pirates is the real deal, because it will mean that global warming is on the wane.
Efaristou, Polytropos! Kalimera.
[reaches back into memory]
I think we’ve danced this dance before, Kim and Apropostrophos.
And ninja pirate horror: you can’t go past Brotherhood of the Wolf.
Memo: Liam, David Rubie. Your applications received & vetted. Have you read and signed the Occupational Health and Safety Sheets on Liquor, Swords, Grappling Hooks, Tanks, Cutlasses, RPGs, Ammunition belts, Machine Guns, and Golf Bags? Interviews will be conducted at a time and place to be determined by the Piratickal Ladies, with no forewarning. Be warned. She (they) will swoop upon you like a ravening pack of sea-wolves. Black flag might not be shown. Should you perish, consider your application rejected on-the-spot.
Do not bring bandages or surgery-axes; the Piratickal Ladies hate wimps.
Finally: be reminded that the law of MurkChoices governs this employ. It’s a very grey area. Sea mists, blood, smoke and cannon. Do NOT, I beg of you, utter “Your Fights At Work!” in front of the Ladies.
De gustibus, yada yadius. There’s dozens of books and hours more where that came from. Believe it or not, that’s one of the tamer set-pieces of gory mayem.
Ecky Thump! Don’t knock it ’til you try it. Preferably with Guinness for breakfast – now THERE is an unholy conjunction.
What, more than usual? Besides, the upside is I won’t have to shave. Swings and roundabouts, swings and roundabouts.
Actually I reckon the impending energy wars and socioeconomic global collapse will be good for pirates’ core business too, which was always more in moving scarce and valuable shit around the world for mostly peaceful, if illegal, profit.
I would sign up in a moment. Waterworld here we come.
SF and fantasy have always been good at casting dystopian/apocalyptic fantasies. Any one will do. It’s no surprise that some recent ones have been drawing on current fears about the global economy/environment (perhaps the most commented-on example would be ‘Children of Men’, which is an interesting extrapolation of the basic conservative fear about the failure of western societies to reproduce, and the decline of culture.)
But it would be pointless to try and limit all, or even most, examples of the genre to the ‘current crisis’. One of the core strengths of imaginative literature is that it is able to range at liberty over any number of outlandish possibilities. Take away that basic fictional liberty, and you’re not going to be left with much.
Well, I don’t need to steenkin’ badges but overtime pay and superannuation cancellable upon death would be enough. Happy to bring own weapons but ammo must be supplied by employer. Also, no sodomy, although rum and lashes are acceptable.
Heh. TSYCHIMLEHNSMIDSMICMOYTI. It’s the nature of blogging’s existential crisis – everything important has already been lulzd, most probably on the IMHL? thread. As some bloke once said.
PWND. I bow to your ennui.
TMI, David, TMI and a half.
Sodomy aversion duly noted. As perpetrator?
Rum and lashes of course standard, as well you know. Point of clarification: leather whiplashes, or the Ladies’ eyelashes?? Both are equally stinging, as well you know.
Make sure your scribes keep fair copies of all contracts and epistles. Fires on board, sudden sinkings – all hands and paperwork sodden, etc.
You two have been in this caper before, methinks. Avast!!
Neither bowler nor wicketkeeper, I think he means, HRO(PL). Though I don’t know how he’d feel about fielding at short leg. Or deep in the slips.
No sodomy? What gives? What happens up the mizzenmast, stays up the &c &c
Having been undone by ladies lashes in the past, I prefer the leather kind but not needed on contract. No further comment on playing on the poop deck, lest ye want a lashing yerself. Them cabin boys will not be required in me bunk, just reg’lar subscriptions to “Pirate Queen Esquire” and occasional shore leave in suitably squalid ports’o'call. Now hoist up your John B Sail, see how the mainsail sets…
So THAT’S who ate up all of my grits!
While I share not his distaste for the act, I agree with DR that any more talk of botty sex is likely to earn us a stern admonition from Kimberella. Me first!
FDB wrote:
Oi, That’s dirty joke shipmate.
Nobody has mentioned booty carvin’ yet. What’ll be my share o’ the booty? Or will we be castin’ lots at booty call?
Recently demoted from HRO (PL). Thanks very much lads! Yes, it was the botty s** that did for me. I mean, the talk of it, not the doing. Fearful tongue-lashing from a Pirate Lady. Don’t snigger. ‘Twas not pleasant. ‘Twas not the sort of tongue ……
No, I must NOT descend to reverie. There are cutlasses to sharpen, floors to sweep, muck to tip, fires to tend.
I hated HR, really I did. Shameful acts I saw and did, them so rotten as ye’d not credit.
What’s going to happen to all those books about gritty decaying Dickensian cities once we’re all actually living in one?
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It stops being speculative fiction and becomes social realism?
Well, I shall be burning mine for heat, and no you may not sit near the fire. It’s mine, I tell you, mine.
In that event does Donal Trump get to keep his wig or should we burn that too? Should we burn it anyway? While he’s still wearing it?
What an odd sentence that is about ‘decaying Dickensian cities’. Presumably Dickens wrote about a decaying Dickensian cities (London) because he lived in it. And he wasn’t really noted for indulging in speculative fiction.
I don’t buy all this stuff about economic or environmental collapse. We’re being warned of these things constantly by people who, 999 times out of 1000, derive a clear political or professional benefit from scaring us.
But there is an interesting historical phenomenon at work here. One hundred, two hundred years ago science-fiction utopias and grand visions of a paradisical future were common: the future was depicted as something to be desired, something to work forwards to with urgency and ardour. Now, it is being increasingly portrayed as something to avoid, something terrifying or at the very least miserable and disappointing.
Yep, those Morlocks sure sounded like a paradisical future to me. I’m pretty sure Tony Abbott is a Morlock already.
Dave Rubie, Wells initially thought that a socialist world state was achievable, but become progressively more cynical about this as he get older. If you want a 19th century fictional Utopia without Morlocks and without any real technology, try William Morris (News from Nowhere.) Utopian beliefs were current in the 19th and early 20th centuries and were closely allied with the development of science fiction and fantasy.
I dunno Tim – without a proper literature survey I think it’d be hard to class the 17th and 18th century birth of science fiction writing as being biased towards utopian ideals (and our current time to be biased towards dystopias). After all, we’re in the age of Star Trek (ostensibly a utopia) and other space operas. I’d be surprised if it wasn’t evenly balanced once you remove all the satire and irony.
“Well, I shall be burning mine for heat, and no you may not sit near the fire. It’s mine, I tell you, mine.”
Um PC, in the dystopian globally warmed future I can assure you that Adelaide residents will not be burning anything for heat. Now if you know how to rig up a solid fueled airconditioning system…
Oh — I thought it was ‘extreme weather events’ we were looking forward to, rather than simply things getting uniformly hotter. My understanding was that that means extreme in more than one direction. And it does get bloody cold here in the winter sometimes.
I automatically read that sentence as referring to the futuristic dystopias of people like Angela Carter, TimT — surely ‘Dickensian’ in this context is just a descriptive adjective?
Come over to my place for afternoon tea, and I shall show you what’s happened to my garden and my superannuation.
Steam age refrigeration required? It’s already been done. Now, you just have to source the ammonia…
Dr Cat, seeing as Goyder’s Line is rapidly moving south to its final position along the cenreline of Melbourne St, I don’t think we’re going to be cold in Adelaide.
Mr Rubie, there’s plenty of ammonia in animal manure, I believe, so we could have bullshit-powered air conditioners …
Well, why not? I mean, we already have bull-shit powered Govenments.
Maybe we could genetically engineer our pollies to make chook poo? You still have to burn something to get the refrigeration going though.
Um PC, in the dystopian globally warmed future I can assure you that Adelaide residents will not be burning anything for heat.
.
Yeah. There won’t be any. There will be the movie: Ghost City about mutant zombies with fluro green skin and eyes that glow red in the night. They crawl over the rubble in search of Anglican churches, arts festivals and flesh.
Wot’s needed are Sweeny Todds y’Know too many people!!
Adrien @30, The Trump should never keep his wig. He and it should be sacrificed to the sun god on the roof of whichever Trump Tower is still above water. Or alternatively to the shark god if they’re all under water.