“You don’t expect a benefit”

From Ian Benke’s Authority Magazine interview with James Kennedy, author most recently of Dare to Know:

There is no benefit to reading science fiction. Or at least, I hope there isn’t. And if there is, I hope nobody finds out what it is.

The worst thing that can happen to art is for it to become respectable, to be considered as something that is “good for you.” Science fiction had its golden age when literary people considered the genre to be juvenile, unserious, and embarrassing. Now that science fiction has become more respectable, is it really as exciting? Vital, unruly punk energy resists being enlisted for causes, it rightfully doesn’t want to help you, it goes its own swinging way and if you’re lucky, maybe it’ll let you tag along.

The adventure of art is that you submit to it. You let it take you somewhere. You don’t expect a benefit, you don’t even want one. Maybe you’ll get hurt, maybe you won’t, maybe it’ll be a good experience, maybe bad, but for me, the whole thrill is surrendering myself to it, without any expectation of earning some new virtue or snagging some nugget of information. I just want to be overwhelmed, thrilled, transported.