What Is Genre?

". . . I think that as soon as a genre is given a name, or once it's identified and becomes recursive or self-aware, once those things happen, it dies. . . . Encased in genre we become what's expected . . .

"We use the word [genre], I think, to refer to a certain familiarity, or pre-conceived set of expectations - something the reader brings to the text. What the writer does from there, how they manipulate those expectations, is the fun part."

- David Peak and Ben Spivey, editors of Blue Square Press, interviewed by Joyelle McSweeney at Montevidayo.