First, a disclaimer: I have never won a Major Award for my writing. Or a Minor One. Or, say, an award of any kind. I am not bitter about this. Plenty of genius goes unrecognized in this sad world, and I have the warm comfort of booze to get me through the lonely nights in my office that is completely devoid of awards. Fuck it. I am not bitter.
Of course, they just announced The Hugo Awards (quick scan . . . nopes, not there) which is what makes me think of this topic. Would I like to win a Hugo? Sure. But here’s the curious thing: I look back on the list of Hugo Award-winning books, and I find I haven’t read quite a number of them. And, for a surprising number of those titles, frankly have no desire to (“The Wanderer” by Fritz Leiber comes to mind). It isn’t just Hugos, either – I once read through a list of movies that won Best Picture Oscars, and the same situation was apparent: I hadn’t seen a large proportion of the films, and I had zero desire to rectify that situation.
Now, I am but one slimly talented and somewhat endrunkened author, so my personal failing to absorb my own culture is not proof of anything. Hell, man, my existence is not proof of anything. All I know is, just about every single list of major awards is pretty much a snoozefest for me, and usually the further back you go, the less interested in the winners I become. This doesn’t have anything to do with time; the last two books I read were published in 1931 and 1972. I think it’s just perspective: The movie that won Best Picture last year still has that unvarnished sheen of Proven Quality to it, whereas something from a bit further back – say, Gladiator – has had that sheen scraped off and stands there shivering and alone like a drunk coed waiting for a bus after a Frat Party: Not nearly as attractive as it appeared earlier. I’ve seen it on TV too many times and I know all the seams, all the terrible line readings, all the logic problems with the plot.
You see, the simple fact is I don’t think these awards are really very good at sussing out what’s really good. Now, if I ever win a Major Award I will remove this post and burn down my own house to remove any evidence that I ever said that, because if I win a Major Award you are going to hear about it. I’ll have T-Shirts made, I’ll call you up every five minutes to remind you, and I will make sure that every cover of my books is emblazoned with the words WINNER OF THAT MAJOR AWARD so unsuspecting fools can buy copies based solely on that recommendation. And my official line will be that Major Awards are mankind’s best and most scientific way to determine art’s value. But deep in my heart I will still know that awards are generally bullshit.
Awards are useful, sure. It’s just remarkable how little use I have for them in my reading and viewing choices. This is either because I am a shallow jackass, or because Awards are kind of random and often poorly administered, or simply because something that seems really cool when it first comes out turns out to be a shallow, bloated monstrosity filled with faux importance and cheap manipulation when you’ve had some years to get past the hype. And of course people vote for things for really dubious reasons, sometimes. Now if someone would please nominate me for a Hugo for Best unresearched Blog Post, I’d appreciate it. Thankee.
FWIW, I agree with you about awards. None of the movies that have won Oscars seem tempting to me and my favorite movies are ones that never won anything. I watched Chariots of Fire once because it was an Oscar winner (and because I do love the music) and it bored me to tears. Ditto with books.
I’ve always enjoyed children’s books, mystery, fantasy, and science fiction. I remember when I was in college deliberately setting them aside and reading things like Nabokov and Tolstoy because I thought I should be more grown-up and sophisticated. I finally decided that it’s more mature to like whatever you like and not put on airs.
But I think that the people handing out the awards are still trying to be sophisticated. It’s a false standard, highly subjective and with each judge having his or her own set of criteria. That’s why the compiled lists of winners tend to be haphazard and, I think, less than compelling.
Loretta, I did the same thing for a while, purposefully reading books considered classic because I wanted to see what the fuss was about. Now I’m back to largely reading entertaining trash! Well, and history. My classics experiment was a mixed bag, which I think all ventures of that nature must be.
I have to admit that I was hoping to get a nomination for “Best Related Work” for Greasing the Pan, but that’s because of what I planned for my acceptance speech. I was planning to make a blatant theft from my childhood role model Johnny Rotten and ask the crowd “Ever get the feeling you’ve been cheated?” The fact that I didn’t means that I don’t have to pay for a trip to Australia I really can’t afford.
Now, the real note of my worth? For years, I had specific orders to be cremated upon my death, and to have my ashes dumped into a ventilation fan at the next Worldcon. The image of Gardner Dozois and Kristine Kathryn Rusch pulling chunks of me out of their neckbeards and cursing my name for years is better than any award, with the exception of an Ig Nobel.
Paul, I have a similar plan for my remains – my ashes will be baked into the spread at my wake.
Jeff, I’m totally with you re: awards. I think a lot of awards are given on the assumption that the work being awarded has lasting merit, but I think high literary culture has been allowed to control what exactly that means, and throughout my lifetime it has meant dry, often directionless character study. Speculative fiction has a better chance than most other schools of literature to reclaim that, so hopefully they will while we’re all still alive.
Give Fritz Leiber a try, though. The Silver Eggheads was a good, if laughably dated, read.
Paul, I have standing orders that I be frozen until they cure death. I am totally serious. Spread the word. If there is any talk of burial or cremation when I die, steal my body and get it frozen pronto.
DK, Dated I can forgive, and often do – you can’t fight Time, though it is also remarkable how many older novels still stand up after 50, 60, 70 years. If I come across a Lieber in a used book store I’ll pick it up and give it a go, though.
Jeff, start with small doses with Leiber. His short stories are usually much better than his novels, and considering that I’m an unrepentant fan of even such silliness as The Sinful Ones (and the publishing of that book was a story in itself), that’s saying something. A collection of his best short stories came out in 1984 as The Ghost Light: if you can’t find it, let me know, and I’ll send you a spare copy.