The Collapsing Frontier x Jonathan Lethem (DRC)

176 pages.

First published March 19, 2024 (PM Press)

Mixed anthology.

Fun fact: I’d never read Jonathan Lethem before, although I’ve always wanted to. He’s a writer I’ve always admired from a distance, but somehow I’ve never been able to devote the time. So I jumped at the chance to read him in a series I truly love: PM Press’s Outspoken Authors is always EXCELLENT, and a great way to get into the intellect(s) of some of SF’s best writers. The Collapsing Frontier does not disappoint.

Lethem is very smart and very wry, and yes, very intellectual. I didn’t always know while reading this what he was talking about—which, rather obtusely on my part, is my very favourite thing: because it encourages me to read more widely and deeply, and thereby to indulge my natural and very lively curiosity. In this book, which collects some of his previous writings, he covers subjects like David Bowman (I don’t know him) and Edward Snowden (I read his book, and now Lethem has me thinking about privacy again—but also, more interestingly, about Snowden the man, and how he became a whistleblower); about Turner’s frontier thesis again (ugh); and, delightfully, about Stanisław Lem, his life and work, how he did not suffer “phools”—gladly or otherwise, and how he was kicked out of SFWA in 1976. Also about Calvino’s Lightness (that’s the one that mostly went over my head, being as it is, a philosophical treatise); and, finally, In Mugwump Four, which is where we all are if we’re not/until we are in Mugwump Five, innit.

All of which to say: this is the kind of collection I love, and once again, thanks to an Outspoken Authors book, I feel like I’ve spent time in class (or over wine, or both) with an intellectual giant. Many thanks to PM Press and to Edelweiss for early access.

Support independent bookshops and my writing by ordering it from Bookshop here.