#WritersCoffeeClub Feb 9. Do you subscribe to 'show, don't tell?' Why, or why not?
Yes and no.
I write SF/F, traditionally a genre VERY heavy on tell. It went through a long-overdue corrective in the 1980s/90s that coincided with cyberpunk and the mainstreaming of SF tropes in visual media, making lengthy descriptions less necessary to reader comprehension, so I used "show don't tell" a lot, until I realized …
Entertaining infodumps are an art form in their own right! (And one unique to SF.)
@cstross when it comes to your stock in trade, show don't tell is for coward (actually there's another level where it should happen a bit, but I don't have to explain sff writing to you)
> Entertaining infodumps are an art form in their own right! (And one unique to SF.)
And to autism?
@martinvermeer Before media SF went mainstream (post Star Wars/Star Trek—broadly, from the early 1990s) SF fandom was an autism-friendly social environment, and many authors started out as fans. (Me, for instance.) This goes right back to the Gernsback era, roughly 1919 onwards.
@martinvermeer @cstross
Sheldon Cooper is one heck of an example!
@cstross fictional theoretical physicist in an American TV sitcom. According to Wikipedia the show creator didn't intend him to be autistic, but many (including the actor playing him) find his behaviour consistent with autism. Also obsessive compulsive. Not crazy, his mother had him tested.
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