Barriers to entry

Only certain ideas lend themselves to the kind of historical writing I like to do. For me a winning idea has to meet four criteria: First, of course, the subject at hand has to be interesting to me—interesting enough to occupy me for about four years of my life. Second, it has to have a built-in narrative arc or engine, meaning there has to be something about the subject that will drive the story along and compel readers to keep reading. Third, it has to be supported by a deep, rich base of archival materials, such as telegrams, letters, testimony, and the like, because in writing this kind of history you have to have as rich a palette of real, true material as possible. You can’t fake it. Fourth, the idea should be complex enough to allow me to proceed with a reasonable assurance that no one else is doing the same book. It needs what business folk refer to as “barriers to entry.” This may sound un-American, but I hate competition.

—Erik Larson, on Lithub

Quote of the Day

Don’t romanticize science fiction. One of the questions I have been asked so many times I’ve forgotten what my stock answer to it is, “Since science fiction is a marginal form of writing, do you think it makes it easier to deal with marginal people?” Which—no! Why should it be any easier? Dealing with the marginal is always a matter of dealing with the marginal. If anything, science fiction as a marginal genre is more rigid, far more rigid than literature. There are more examples of gay writing in literature than there are in science fiction.

—Samuel R. Delany, in an interview with Adam Fitzgerald on Lithub