The New Weird - Ann VanderMeer [171]
Are these writers creating, based on a common set of predecessors? To some extent, yes.
Personally, I like to think that Mervyn Peake is The Predecessor. Gormenghast, that brilliant baroque fantasy, combines the Weird from Weird Tales with absolute mastery of the language. One could argue about the importance of the original Weird Tales ― authors like Lovecraft and the lot, or David Lindsay and Lord Dunsany ― but to me the first among equals is Peake. He combines everything I see as New Weird in Gormenghast, especially with the first two parts. In a better world, Peake would be just as strong a fantasy-father in terms of sales as Tolkien.
As for the impact of New Weird, no one can say for certain, but I hope it has had an impact in the sense that it has brought more visibility to the writers labelled as such, preferably in a positive way. I think it has also had some level of influence on, for example, book design, with weirder and more original art replacing standard science fiction/ fantasy images. I may be totally wrong here, but also I have this feeling that there hasn't been truly a proper appreciation for more literary fantasy before, other than with the exceptional works of the field. Would it be wrong to say that New Weird has changed the profile of fantasy? Could New Weird be used as a vehicle for marketing this Really Good Fantasy? Should one dismiss New Weird as a subgenre and just use it as a marketing tool for this Really Good Stuff?
In Finland, the impact has been moderate in terms of author popularity. Looking back for the past few years, nearly everything in genre fiction that could be described as New Weird has come from the small presses, including my own part of the "revolution": Jeff VanderMeer, Jonathan Carroll, Stepan Chapman, M. John Harrison, you're small press here, baby! (This seems to parallel the trend in the United States, in terms of the most innovative work coming from independent publishers like Small Beer, Subterranean, Ministry of Whimsy, Prime, through venues such as Leviathan, Lady Churchill's Rosebud Wristlet, Electric Velocipede and Fantasy, just to name a few.)
However, in terms of an explosion of "New Weirdish" Finnish writing, a lot of the Finnish adult fantasy could well be described as New Weird:
Leena Krohn, Johanna Sinisalo, Pasi I. Jaaskelainen, Anne Leinonen and so on. There is a definite commonality of authors willing to break those shackling borderlines, and use the abundant possibilities of our own language in as varied and as rich a way as possible while seeking out new ideas, new taboos, and new territory. The same can be also said about writers for children and young adults, like Jukka Laajarinne and Sari Peltoniemi among others, who are constantly breaking the mould and creating something new and ― well, again ― weird.
Interestingly, a local literary movement rather like NewWeird is being used as a label for works that aren't "really" SF and fantasy, but realism-fantasy ("reaalifantasia"). This doesn't translate well at all, as realism-fantasy definitely isn't about being Real Fantasy, but more about (and I'm paraphrasing here): "genre-free writing, that flows between mimesis and fantasy; only the ratio of how much mimesis or fantasy there is, varies." A bit like New Weird, I think, since they add: "Realism-fantasy operates strongly in the everyday reality, but is not afraid to use all those methods that are unfamiliar