I breathed a massive sigh of relief listening to this episode. I had a lot concerns while reading the story and you raised pretty much all of them either in the recap or the discussion. Like Glenn, I was excited to read this because it sounded like exactly my sort of thing, but it fell completely flat in the delivery. I was worried that I was just taking a comic story way too seriously (and I'm willing to concede that there's an element of that), but you're right that the world has moved on a lot since this was published (and again like Glenn I would have lapped it up at the time).
That said, I think (and hope) there's still room in the world for alternate history stories, albeit they need to be constructed more carefully now, in a way that respects the reality of events. As Brandon pointed out, more ridiculous concepts and obviously "not real history" stories are probably going to work better. "Ancient Aliens" is a concept I have a lot of issues with as a historian, but fiction seems like an acceptable place to explore the idea. Maybe that's just a youth spent watching Stargate SG-1 talking though.
For me, that's the root of the problem with this story. Not just that it trivializes genuine historical tragedies (both personal and large-scale), but that the alternative "facts" presented are themselved fairly trivial for the most part. Again, this is something you brought up in the episode: where are all the aliens? Where are the medical conditions that need to be covered up because the truth would be too horrific for people to accept? Conditions caused by bugs we've never heard of are, to be frank, kind of lame. To take the point a little further: there's absolutely no reason this guide (if it was real) wouldn't be accepted and used by every medical professional and organization in the world, and no reason these "facts" wouldn't be publicized. I guess you could argue that there's an implied undercurrent of some kind of conspiracy to cover up these events, but why? This "obscure medical history of the twentieth century" is nowhere near weird enough to justify its supposed obscurity.
Not much else to say really. I'm just about intrigued enough to read some of the other entries in the collection, but with far lower expectations than I had going into this one.
I agree with Karanthir.
The fragments in this mockumentary-like text were not weird or funny enough for me (apart from some exceptions about which I really had to laugh). The distance between reality and strangeness was just too narrow or vague, and there wasn't a real, strong political statement or something that could clarify it.
On the back the book promises to be half 'Monty python', but it doesn't do that here (maybe in the other sections of the book).
At least the discussion about this text was interesting; it contained nice little discussions about history facts that I didn't know that well.
Apart from all this: I wouldn't call this text 'weird fiction', although it sets me thinking if there exists a weird style 'mockumentary' at all. Maybe that is a paradox, because weird fiction, I think, has to have a serious undertone since it deals with fear of the unknown on some level.
That said, weird fiction and this text share the use of paranoia as a motive.
Seriousness in weird fiction is definitely something worth discussing more (maybe a subject for another special epidsode
I'm not sure all weird fiction has to be about fear of the unknown (although that's certainly Lovecraft's thing), but there ought to be a certain seriousness to a weird story in order for it to be immersive.
Maybe humorous weird fiction could work (when dealing with this genre it's best not to rule out any possibilities, after all), but I remain to be convinced.
Looking forward to giving Jonathan L. Howard a chance anyway.
Ha, well, I think that China Mieville story "Reports of Certain Events in London" is a kind of mockumentary.
Miévilles story was a very interesting and fun one to read and discuss. when rereading the discussion on that tale in this forum, I see there were also some doubts about what Miéville wanted with this story.
I wrote: "There is enough to speculate, but I think Miéville used the streets symbolical, as the podcast suggests, as well as weird. Whatever the moral of the story (...), the weird elements certainly works for me."
So, I certainly thought that tale was weird. There were certainly 'morals' in the story, but I can't see it as a mockumentary myself. I think it's something personally: I look at mockumentaries as a sort of (crictical) comedy, and I don't see Miévilles tale as such.
I agree with
I think that's fair. But I also think the inherent idea was so absurd and the people involved felt like a weird-fiction version of The Office, that I sensed some mockery -- or at least some snark.
Now I go back to my comments on that story I see I described it as reading like a farce or a spoof of weird fiction, but with the material presented straight. So maybe you're right. On the other hand, the criticism is aimed at bureaucracy rather than weirdness, so if it's an Office-style mockumentary (which seems like a fair comparison), it's a bureaucracy mockumentary set within a weird tale, rather than a weird tale mockumentary (if such a distinction makes sense).
And for what it's worth, I'd say Mieville was giving us a healthy dose of British sarcasm rather than mockery or snark as such (although there are elements of both underlying the sarcasm).
Yeah, that's fair -- those subtle differences in styles of humor around the Anglophone world.
I like this discussion about weird/mock :-)
Personally I still find myself in
"if it's [Miéville] an Office-style mockumentary (which seems like a fair comparison), it's a bureaucracy mockumentary set within a weird tale, rather than a weird tale mockumentary (if such a distinction makes sense)."
I think it does make sense. Miéville's weird tale could be used as setting for his personal sarcasm - that's something different than a mockumentary (with criticism as main goal) with weird elements. Although I don't know how Miéville meant it. On personal level I read it as a weird tale.
My family think of Adams and Pratchett as something great. I haven't read Adams (yet), but I did read some Pratchetts and was a bit disappointed, although there are some nice things in it. (I only saw Doctor Who when I was too young, but my interest was aroused when I learned that Neil Gaiman wrote some episodes - but then, he also wrote Good Omens with Pratchett, which was not really my cup of whiskey). I do like Monty Python and Little Britain though, but that's 'something completely different', serious.
Check back with me in ten years when Brent has made me read Good Omens for our Neil Gaiman podcast. It was part of the bargain we struck!