Yes. I hope Chomsky is watching his legacy die with the pure lucidity of true punishment. May he die with full knowledge of his own bottomless perfidy. One of the worst hypocrites exposed.

Cool! Good pretext to talk soon :)

If I knew how to turn them off I surely would!

Should be Jarry, I bet you got that

Amazing! Harry’s spirit surely blesses you (he would award you some kind of strange medal)

I see a Nathan Ballingrud motif (the guy with the cage on his head)

So that’s the 2026 @strangehorizons.bsky.social Criticism Special. Themes were legion: the interface with politics, the shadows of history, the lines between traditions.

Hope you found thoughts to chew on.Thanks to our writers for sharing them.

Shout out to the SH proofreaders:
heroes every year.

The theme of this essay is politics and aesthetics, and how the balance between them can play out differently in varied contexts. Very rich seam.

“‘Preachiness’,” Alexander argues, “is not a function of political messaging, but one of aesthetic integrity.”

Really hope this sparks further chat.

Wednesday! Today’s Criticism Special essay is from @dickowalexander.bsky.social on francophone SF.

Note this is not a piece on SF in translation - a lot of the works in this essay are available only in French. If like me you don’t have the language … well, a whole tradition is opened up here.

The occasional info dump, when artfully performed, is pleasurable.

The pleasure is mine!

It’s not just that. There’s no one to bear witness because people are being silenced by media refusing to cover their stories. Many media outlets are complicit.

Yep. And some of em are fucking Dems. And all of em are scum.

I’ve heard 23