Fantasy of Manners Community

ex_greythist387 @ 10:36pm: Woodbury?
I recently finished reading Francine Woodbury's Shade and Shadow, which Ethan Merritt once suggested might qualify as a fantasy of manners. I've posted some thoughts (mostly on the book, not the genre question) at my lj. There are links to Merritt's remarks there.

Since this community has been so quiet, I thought I'd ask here whether others have read Woodbury's novel and what their thoughts on it might be....

movingfinger @ 1:23pm: Fine distinctions
How amusing that Madeleine Robbins said:

"MR took this up, saying that a certain kind of historical romance drives her nuts, where the protagonist gets away with being a 1990s girl in an 1810 setting. [...]"

When I was just gritting my teeth over exactly that. But I think this is the province of good writing in general, and not of Fantasy of Manners.

and her reported remark goes on:

"She's interested in the way that FoM can allow a writer to feed in modern attitudes, as long as the story is anchored in the historical time; FoM is about ways that characters can subvert the system to their very small ends, in a very mannered way that makes it look like they're acting within society's rules. The weapons are always social and verbal."

This brings Cabell to mind, of course.

I must disagree with Ellen Kushner on the invention question and look at Fletcher Pratt (The Blue Star).

I have not yet seen anything that makes me think Fantasy of Manners is anything but, concisely, a subclass of Comedy of Manners, with fantastic elements. It appears to meet every criterion for the first and the second is obvious.

movingfinger @ 11:34am: Click click clickety click click click
I have not found either (1) a web transcript of Donald G. Keller's Fantasy of Manners article (1991, NYRoSF # 32) or (2) Mr. Keller (where are you, Don?) or (3) the GEnie archives. Websites are transient things.

Accordingly, I am now (1) transcribing the article and (2) in the process of putting together a website where the article and other past, present, and future information about past Fantasy of Manners discussions can be easily archived and found by people interested in the subject. I envision it as a simple text storehouse. (I feel the article is probably too long to dump here, and I am unsure of the etiquette of doing so.)

So, please be patient; I will post something here when I have finished all of this---I hope to be able to do this over the holiday weekend.

In the meantimme, tea (Nilgiri) and Russian tea-cakes are served to our patient guests.