Exposition Across Genres

As you know, Bob, clumsy exposition, particularly in the form of lengthy “infodump” sequences in which large quantities of information are blasted toward the reader in the manner of a shotgun or a firehose, is often held to be one of the hallmarks (or, perhaps, banes) of the SF genre (where “SF” means “speculative fiction,” encompassing both “science fiction” and “fantasy”), which is why I was amused to discover the Little Professor (the nom de net of Miriam Burstein) discussing infodumps in Victorian literature, in response to a more general discussion of infodumping by Matthew Cheney, exploring the phenomenon and reader attitudes toward infodumping in various contexts and genres, and providing a nice reminder that the problems of SF vis a vis infodumping are not unique to that specific genre.