#samuel r delany | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

haveyoureadthisbook-poll · 30 days

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#stars in my pocket like grains of sand #samuel r delany #science fiction #book poll #have you read this book poll #polls

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tygerland · 1 year

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Author Samuel R. Delany, photographed by Laurie Toby Edison at his Upper West Side apartment in New York City, 2003.

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librarycards · 2 months

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If not for climate change, I could roughly predict what kind of racism I will face for the rest of my life, because I have faced the same kind of racism for my entire life so far. What destabilizes that future survivance is precisely the climate. Current models predict that global warming will result in a global refugee crisis. That crisis has already started. Russia has invaded the Ukraine for oil. South Asians are being shot in the Mediterranean trying to get to Europe. It is easier to write about a future you can make up to the last detail than it is to write about a present you can’t describe. How do you imagine being in the world when the world is unimaginable?

Here is the whole Samuel Delany quote: “Science fiction is not ‘about the future.’ Science fiction is in dialogue with the present . We SF [sic] writers often say that science fiction prepares people to think about the real future — but that’s because it relates to the real present in the particular way it does; and that relation is neither one of prediction nor one of prophecy. It is one of dialogic, contestatory, agonistic creativity. In science fiction the future is only a writerly convention that allows the SF writer to indulge in a significant distortion of the present that sets up a rich and complex dialogue with the reader’s here and now.”

In other words, climate fiction set in the future presents us with possibilities we might use to know and contest the present reality. And yet, I confess my interest lies in the possibility of alienating readers from Delany’s dialogue, in making the experience of distortion the experience itself. I’m talking about climate fiction where what is possible is already distorted by racism and sexism and other structural inequalities, so distorted that only a present breakdown of reality might help prepare us to survive what it is currently impossible to story.

Matthew Salesses, The Possibilities of Climate Fiction. [emphasis added]

#writing #readings #words #samuel r delany #matthew salesses #mine #climate violence

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quasi-normalcy · 1 year

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#samuel r delany #robert heinlein #science fiction

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j-ayne · 10 months

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Trying to make my day off a calm one because I've been stressed recently. Put together a couple of bags of books to take to the local book swap. Loving Samuel R. Delany.

#books #booklr #bookblr #books and reading #samuel r delany #currently reading

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polarboiyeahz · 5 months

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What's your favorite book man

Hello Mr. Madeline 🥛🌙

My favorite book is probably Dhalgren by Samuel R. Delany, a sci-fi, transgressive fiction novel that I believe is just an all-around allegory for low income LGBT neighborhoods & community in 70s New York as a lot of the events seem oddly reminiscent of such.

It’s about 896 pages (in my edition the pages are compressed to 801, if I remember correctly as it’s to save for more pages) & it’s just about this character who randomly steps into a burning city and lots of ppl are black for some reason & everyone’s living under bridges and shit, all they do is try to ease living in the sci-fi ghettos & fight overpowered assholes with bloodlust referred to as ‘scorpions,’ among the people in the city, who use odd energy shields to transform into large animals (ex: chickens, dogs, dragons and actual scorpions)

Over time you kinda realize the main character is not a good person but that’s literally at around page 200 so you’re just stuck going through the book knowing he’s weird as fuck. The character doesn’t know their own name so they go by: Kidd; there’s also a journal that’s found at the beginning of the book and people try to find the author of it.

Reasons I like it:

1) The writing is honestly the best writing I’ve ever seen. Starting off with the book you might be confused but you actually get the hang of it (depending on who you are & your understanding of possibly poetry) as the writing feels almost cryptic at times but the cogs shift and you realize: oh wow, this is actually insane

1.5) The writing feels as if it left a residue on my writing altogether. Samuel R. Delany is probably one of the best writers living today & I find myself resorting to his work at times to figure out unanswered questions in my head about writing in general. I don’t copy him nor “borrow” anything from him as my work focuses a lot on internal monologue & consciousness as a whole but he practically helped me realize what writing can be.

2) The parallels to my actual life. This one is more personal & exclusive to me (and maybe anyone else?) but things in the book began to transpire at the same time similar events happened in my life. (ex: the main character becomes a poet around the time I was already writing poetry & he goes on this spiral about trying to publish his work around the same time I have)

3) The aura behind reading a large book. Reading a Bible-sized novel is honestly something I’ve never been able to do but wanted to since I was 7. I remember picking up Eragon (the books with the funky looking dragons sprawled on the cover) & taking it home trying to read it but my ADHD wouldn’t allow me to continue after 10 pages. A large book to me is like an exercise and a temporary change in life. You wake up with a book to read; it’s practically a part of your life—and due to its length—it is; the book has made itself a focal point & something you need to tend to (not in a weird obsessive manner).

4) Samuel R. Delany essentially making it a book that “drones on” without “reaching any point.” I didn’t know it droned on without reaching much climax but it doesn’t bother me. Not all books exactly need one and I didn’t know it was a thing until Dhalgren was mine; just like in point 1), Samuel R. Delany is showing the reader just what a novel can be and how extreme one can stray from general literary norms & still sell millions of copies regardless of this big part of it. As much as this can be a turn off: I see it as just experiencing the world around the characters and seeing how they live, how they think, what their society is like & all in all just a study of the people in ‘Bellona.’

5) The opening line is one of the most iconic lines in all of literature; it’s a fragment of a presumed poem that tends to kick in randomly throughout the book.

6) I expected Sci-fi and it overall became probably the most randomly profound erotic novel I’ve ever heard of—and I don’t know how I feel about that part but it’s definitely a wide shift from the norm (Which is why it’s considered transgressive fiction).

7) Near the end is a chapter (I haven’t reached yet) in which the text is split into what would be considered “hypertext” and there’s just text resting in horizontal rows & columns, some in bold and others in italics, some in boxes & some in basic horizontal paragraph & I really want to know why

• • •

Long ass explanation but I love to write

Thank you, I love & appreciate you

#Dhalgren #poetry #author #samuel r delany #books and reading #books #novel #sci fi and fantasy #sci fi

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have-you-read-this-short-fiction · 3 months

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#short story collection #short story collections #aye gomorrah and other stories #samuel r delany #21st century literature #english language literature #african american literature #black literature #american literature #have you read this short fiction?#book polls #completed polls

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2dcloud · 1 year

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new site

new books

new newsletter (drawing by angela fanche)

+ a 30-70% OFF sale. last 2 days...

stephen can you re-tumbl?

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sivavakkiyar · 8 months

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Samuel R Delany, The Einstein Intersection

#Samuel r delany

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waywordsstudio · 1 month

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3 Word Review: “Babel-17” by Samuel R. Delany -

Fascinating sf yarn from a master world-builder on how our language might be manipulated against us.

#bookworm #literature #book reviews #read read read #books #3 words #samuel r delany #babel 17 #science fiction #sapir whorf hypothesis #language #scifi #black literature #lgbtqia

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bookandcantina · 1 year

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JOMP Book Photo Challenge // Feb 3 // Black Pride

From top-left down, Stars In My Pockets Like Grains of Sand by Samuel R. Delaney / Walking With The Wind by Senator John Lewis / Born A Crime by Trevor Noah / Room Full of Mirrors: A Biography of Jimi Hendrix by Charles R. Cross / Black History In Its Own Words (quotes by various black leaders and luminaries, illustrations by Ronald Wimberly)

#Black History #Samuel R Delany #John Lewis #Trevor Noah #Jimi Hendrix #books #justonemorepage #jompbpc

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haveyoureadthisbook-poll · 2 months

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#babel-17 #samuel r delany #science fiction #book poll #have you read this book poll #polls

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tygerland · 2 months

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Samuel R. Delany - Philadelphia 2019 - by Tom Kneller.

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mental-about-you-too · 7 months

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Every time I read a book by Samuel R. Delany (or another good book that makes me go "what."), I wish there was a fandom for it the way there's a fandom for Good Omens. Give me 1000-word metas about all the symbolism I missed; give me essays on cultural context; give me master posts cataloguing minutia and speculating about meaning (literary analysis. what I want is crowdsourced literary analysis). I love having access to this community that thinks a lot about storytelling and particular pieces of media, and I guess now I'm so spoiled by having people to share an obsession with that going back to being alone in my reflections feels rough.

#the einstein intersection #Samuel R Delany #good omens

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fffartonceaweek · 8 months

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Sean McTiernan's SF podcast (is great) :

SFUltra is a show about a guy who hated science fiction until 2022 convincing himself he actually loves it, one book at a time. It is going pretty well so far. It gets published every two weeks.

Apple Podcasts

Spotify

RSS

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SFULTRA #10 - Ice - Anna Kavan

special 2 eps: Motorman / The Age Of Sinatra - David Ohle

SFULTRA #9 - We Who Are About To… - Joanna Russ

SFULTRA #8 - I, Vampire - Jody Scott

SFULTRA #7 - Babel-17 - Samuel R Delany

SFULTRA #6 - The Dispossessed - Ursula K Le Guin

SFULTRA #5 - Camp Concentration - Thomas M Disch

SFULTRA #4 - Rogue Moon - Algis Budrys

SFULTRA #3 - Electric Forest - Tanith Lee

SFULTRA #2 - Doloriad - Missouri Williams

SFULTRA #1 - High Rise - JG Ballard

SFULTRA #0 - Why Science Fiction?

Patreon :

Perfect Taste Forever is a recommendation podcast about everything that isn't science fiction. It often features miniseries on a specific topic, such as:

Decoy Octopus - the concept of roleplaying

Fuck You - underrated gay novelists

Murder House Sold - true crime

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His previous shows have included lengthy examinations of horror (Hundreds Of Dead Bodies), thrillers (All Units), found footage horror (Hundreds of Pixelated Dead Bodies), whatever I felt like (The Wonder Of It All and Calling All Units) and even old time radio (Kiss Your Ass Goodbye).

As co-host : Live At The Death Factory (Scum Cinema), Bodega Box Office (rap movies) and Self Pity (self pity).

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All Units feed :

#sf #scifi #science fiction #literature #funny #experimental fiction #books #jg ballard #joanna russ #david ohle #anna kavan #jody scott #samuel r delany #ursula k le guin #thomas m disch #tanith lee #missouri williams #the doloriad #motorman

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j-ayne · 11 months

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currently stressing all my friends out with how many books I read at the same time

#cixin liu #hernan diaz #samuel r delany #jorge luis borges #peter frankopan #booklr #bookblr #currently reading #book aesthetic

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