In case you weren’t aware of it, DragonCon is a hugely popular annual SFF/book/movie/comics/gaming convention held every year in Atlanta. It’s become big enough to push the World Science Fiction Convention (“Worldcon“) away from its traditional home on Labor Day weekend. And now it’s starting its own line of awards, called, appropriately if rather unimaginatively, the Dragons.
“Another trophy,” you say, possibly enthusiastically, perhaps dismissively, maybe with a touch of boredom. Or maybe you say it with an appraising tone, as do we authors who think, “Hey, there’s another award I can aspire to (and probably never win)…” Regardless of your personal reaction, the awards are here and presumably they’re going to stick around a while. (America’s thirst for awards ceremonies is almost as impossible to slake as its thirst for reality shows, or sleazy political drama. If it ain’t a competition, we’re not interested.)
All of these reactions are quite understandable. What I don’t understand is those who believe that this development somehow spells trouble for the Hugo Awards given out every year by the aforementioned Worldcon. One would assume that those who espouse this view are associated with the Sad Puppies, but I have no evidence thereof. (Like Donald Trump, I could say the Sad Puppies are involved, but I don’t have any proof, so I won’t say “the Sad Puppies are involved.”)
Anyway, the idea that the SFF field isn’t big enough for two awards seems, well, as rampant as support for a candidate with no experience, no platform, and a slight tendency toward passive-aggressive campaigning against his competition, the press, and anyone who is not demonstrably American. I mean, have the Hugos been supplanted by the Locus Awards, the World Fantasy Award, the Tiptree, the Arthur C. Clarke, the Philip K. Dick, the Sturgeon, the Heinlein, the Saturn, the Skylark, the Parsec…? Heck, no.
These folks seem to think that the Hugos are dead because only Worldcon members can vote for them; a more widely-sourced award would render them meaningless. The problem with this concept is obvious: The awards are not mutually exclusive. You could win a Hugo and a Dragon. And even if you only win one or the other, both can have value to the reader, which is all that counts.
It is true that Dragoncon could supplant Worldcon, because it’s so much bigger. People who prefer Worldcon often do for that very reason: an 80,000-person convention is a nightmare. Comic-con is a nightmare, and that’s only 50,000 people per day. On the other hand, Dragoncon pays its guests, which Worldcons simply cannot do. It might be that if the Dragon becomes a widely-recognized arbiter of quality, nominated authors will find it incumbent upon themselves to make the journey to Atlanta to be seen.
There are, of course, problems with that, and only time will tell if they can be resolved. But Worldcons would still continue; they are world-wide, after all, and not everyone can or will go to Atlanta in September. It’s very possible, though, that this would result in more international Worldcons (i.e., outside of the United States). That in turn could make attending authors more visible in other countries, which have burgeoning SFF communities hungry to meet their idols, making its own marketing opportunities.
So maybe this is all a good and necessary thing. One thing that it is not, is a competition. And please don’t let it become one. Being a writer is hard enough as it is.
#SFWApro
[…] K. Lowe posted about “The Dragon Awards” at Graffiti on the Walls of […]
It’s certainly not everybody, but a lot of folks seem happy about this for the wrong reasons.
I must say I do find the cheering of the exclusion of short fiction disconcerting.