"That's serious fandom. Aimed at work that - like Animal Farm or the Well-Tempered Clavier - is merely excellent, without an aspect of monumental badness to defend."
The history of the Vance Integral Edition is full of flamewars and intensely stupid quarrels, not to mention some off-the-wall exegesis of Vance's work that would make Charles Kinbote blush. I think the most ridiculous aspects of Vance fandom are not well known because it is a much smaller cult, compared to other fandoms. (And yet the VIE project was reasonably successful.)
"If Jack Vance had been so clever as to keep all the poetic phrasing and alien societies, but now and then have his characters make crazy political speeches - if he had deliberately introduced an aspect of monumental badness - would he now be worshiped, instead of just loved?"
Well, there are some obnoxious political speeches in Vance's work, only not in his best regarded or better known works. See for example the regrettable "The Gray Prince".
About Jack Vance:
"That's serious fandom. Aimed at work that - like Animal Farm or the Well-Tempered Clavier - is merely excellent, without an aspect of monumental badness to defend."
The history of the Vance Integral Edition is full of flamewars and intensely stupid quarrels, not to mention some off-the-wall exegesis of Vance's work that would make Charles Kinbote blush. I think the most ridiculous aspects of Vance fandom are not well known because it is a much smaller cult, compared to other fandoms. (And yet the VIE project was reasonably successful.)
"If Jack Vance had been so clever as to keep all the poetic phrasing and alien societies, but now and then have his characters make crazy political speeches - if he had deliberately introduced an aspect of monumental badness - would he now be worshiped, instead of just loved?"
Well, there are some obnoxious political speeches in Vance's work, only not in his best regarded or better known works. See for example the regrettable "The Gray Prince".