Adam Roberts Interviewd on SFRevu

Gradisil author Adam Roberts is interviewed on SFRevu. Adam is a great interview - in fact, he first came to my attention some years ago when he was being interviewed about his novel, On. I was impressed enough with his thoughts that I knew I wanted to work with him and invited him into my anthology, Live Without a Net. We've worked together several times since then, including in the anthology FutureShocks. I consider Adam to be one of the most stunningly smart people I know. Please go read the whole interview, but here's a taste:

People love SF and Fantasy—on screen. And I think this has changed the logic of the genre. The most culturally ubiquitous SF has been visual SF, and almost always worked through by a ‘visual spectacularism’ predicated upon special effects, the creation of visually impressive alternate worlds, the realisation of events and beings liable to amaze. In part because of this, I think, SF has become less centrally a 'literature of ideas' and become much more to do with images: I'm talking about both conventional poetic or literary images, but more strikingly potent visual imagery that penetrates culture more generally. It is in the nature of images that they cannot be parsed, explicated and rationalised in the way 'ideas' can. Accordingly there is something oblique about the workings of the best SF of the later century; something allusive and affective that can be difficult exactly to pin down. My favourite SF films are not necessarily the most mind-expanding, but they are the most beautiful: 2001.