science fiction

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1452091471_63098.doc science fiction plan: 1. general background. 2. real and fake science. 3. topics and times. "north american english-language science-fiction stories from i960 to 1990"—no problem with english-language north america. no problem with 1960-1990. not much problem with stories. but what do we mean by science fiction? an anthology, by what it contains and omits, is an implicit definition. as editors, we remained in the implicit zone, avoiding definitional discussions, until we felt the question forced on us, is this story science fiction or not? we answered that question editorially; and the editor owes the reader some attempt to be explicit. what is science fiction? why are all the answers to that question either brisk evasions or labored partialities? i think of the statues at the tar pits in los angeles: a mammoth, sinking in the dreadful ooze, lifts her trunk in a vain and perpetual bellow, while all around …

d not evaluatively but descriptively. authors and readers of any genre form a community, with certain shared interests and expectations. modern poetry is a good example of genre as community. so is science fiction. professor thomas roberts, author of the aesthetics of funk fiction, * makes this parallel, pointing out that people who read poetry "follow "(athens, ga: university of georgia press, 1968). these quotations are from an interview by marcia biederman: "genre writing" in poets and writers (january-february 1992). poetry rather than poems"—that is, they read the genre, not only certain authors, because the body of work is at least as important as the individual writers. excellence within a genre is seen not as a miraculous anomaly of "genius," but as a high point in a tradition. the artist is not expected to reinvent the wheel—only to use it well. genre writers and readers share a common stock of …

e atlantic that science fiction "is for children," thus exhibiting his superiority both to science fiction and to children. others earnestly proclaim it to be "the mythology of the modern world," which sounds fine, but generally begs the question of what myth is and does. damon knight says science fiction is what he's pointing at when he points at it, and i agree; but it isn't very useful unless you can see where he's pointing. i will not try to summarize the efforts of scholars to define science fiction; serious, complicated, and various, they are outside the scope both of my expertise and of this introduction. those interested should obtain brian attebery's teaching guide to this volume. they will find there an excellent summary of critical opinion. they will not find a nice, neat, final definition of "what science fiction is." indeed i wonder: is the non-definability of science fiction …

s robots mutants parapsychology mad scientists the common reader who has actually read science fiction might add complex non-formulaic patterns, such as: alternative history, alternate or parallel worlds thought experiments in physiology, psychology, physics, etc. experimental models of society elements of the first list may occur both in formula/commodity science fiction and genre/literary science fiction. they may serve as dead items to be manipulated as in a game, or living patterns to be used in the work of art. they are infinitely reusable until (probably) finally exhausted or outmoded. professor gary k. wolfe calls them "icons," a useful word.* looking at the tremendous vitality of some of them, such as the robot, the spaceship, the alien, which long ago escaped from fiction to become common elements of our entire culture, i would incline to call them archetypes, in much the sense in which jung used the word: mind-forms, iconic modes …

n and manipulation: such fundamental assumptions of various sciences or of the engineering mind underlie and inform the imagery and the discourse of science fiction. the content may be not scientific but scientistic, when science and technology are presented as deity (or negatively as demon). science is all-powerful: it can create anything (destroy everything). science will save us (destroy us). it can solve any problem (it is the problem). it is the essence of the human (it creates monsters). the scientist is superhuman (subhuman). science is a purely rational process (the scientist is mad). it is objective, excluding all emotional consideration; hence its judgment is unappealable. science is gendered (male). it is inherently virtuous (immoral). science is the sum of knowledge: hence it predicts or prescribes the future. science progresses inevitably "forward" or "upward": hence technological advance and civilization are synonymous. science disproves and replaces religion. that is the mythos …

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1452091471_63098.doc science fiction plan: 1. general background. 2. real and fake science. 3. topics and times. "north american english-language science-fiction stories from i960 to 1990"—no problem with english-language north america. no problem with 1960-1990. not much problem with stories. but what do we mean by science fiction? an anthology, by what it contains and omits, is an implicit definition. as editors, we remained in the implicit zone, avoiding definitional discussions, until we felt the question forced on us, is this story science fiction or not? we answered that question editorially; and the editor owes the reader some attempt to be explicit. what is science fiction? why are all the answers to that question either brisk evasions or labored partialities? i …

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