Science Fiction as Literature

[Rufus T. Firefly]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker


bad analogy. Pluto's planethood was a completely arbitrary decision either way.

No, bad use of the word "arbitrary." Pluto's classification wasn't arbitrary; it was based on a specific set of criteria. Now, the criteria may have been arbitrary -- though I doubt it -- or it may have been controversial and not universally accepted -- which I don't doubt -- but it wasn't "arbitrary."

[Perfection]

So anyways, who wants to read my Wookiee FanFic?

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by Rufus T. Firefly
No, bad use of the word "arbitrary." Pluto's classification wasn't arbitrary; it was based on a specific set of criteria. Now, the criteria may have been arbitrary -- though I doubt it -- or it may have been controversial and not universally accepted -- which I don't doubt -- but it wasn't "arbitrary."

A decision based on arbitrary criteria is arbitrary...

[Perfection]

Well, then everything is arbitrary.

The decision to reclassify Pluto was based on such principles as the need for a word that describes bodies that have the required gravitational oomph to clear the neighborhood, and the desire to have a consistant definition.

I wouldn't consider those arbitrary.

[Aeson]

Originally posted by Rufus T. Firefly

No, bad use of the word "arbitrary." Pluto's classification wasn't arbitrary; it was based on a specific set of criteria. Now, the criteria may have been arbitrary -- though I doubt it -- or it may have been controversial and not universally accepted -- which I don't doubt -- but it wasn't "arbitrary."

I'm going to arbitrarily create a classification called "crap"... and file away the above reasoning as such.

[Ben Kenobi]

I've read most of it at one time or another, starting with Asimov's foundation, and then moving into Arthur C Clarke and ending with Heinlein. Did it mostly by author, but if you start when you are 10, you can get through quite a few books in 10 years.

Anyways, I would say the big three should get three books each, and then another 6 books by other authors for 15 as well as 5 short stories/ novellas.

Here's my list.

(THE BIG THREE)

1. The Moon is a Harsh Mistress (Heinlein)
2. Stranger in a Strange Land (Heinlein)
3. End of Eternity (Asimov)
4. Caves of Steel (Asimov)
5. Rendezvous with Rama (Clarke)
6. Foundation and Empire (Asimov)
7. 2001 a Space Odyssey (Clarke)
8. Hammer of God (Clarke)
9. Glory Road (Heinlein)

(OTHERS)

1. Frank Herbert - Dune.
2. HG Wells - War of the World
3. Kim Stanley Robinson - Red Mars
4. Edgar Rice Burroughs - Princess of Mars
5. Frederick Pohl - Gateway
6. Jim Haldeman - The Forever War

SHORT STORIES:

1. Canticle for Liebowitz (Walter M Miller)
2. Harrison Bergeron (Kurt Vonnegut)
3. Flowers for Algernon (Daniel Keyes)
4. Enders Game (Orson Scott Card)
5. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep (Philip K Dick)

[Jon Miller]

Niven being on your list as Literature invalidates your opinion. He is a terrible writer (Although he had some good ideas).

JM

[Ben Kenobi]

Are Hyperion and Neuromancer really that good? I've never heard of either!

[Ben Kenobi]

Fine. Just for that you get Burroughs.

Any other books you think are weak.

I really don't want to put in Huxley's Brave New World, since that is pretty much already considered literature, and many of the other singles I've not read myself, so I can't comment on them.

[Rufus T. Firefly]

Just curious, Ben: both "Canticle for Liebowitz" and "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep" are novels. What are they doing on your short-story list?

[Koyaanisqatsi]

Originally posted by Rufus T. Firefly
Nope. There's a whole body of literature out there on how "genre" works -- most of it indebted to structuralist literary criticism of the 60s and 70s -- and there's no way, following that blueprint, that "Midnight's Chidlren" could ever be considered part of the same "genre" as "Lord of the Rings." The assertion is simply unsupportable from the point of view of genre theory.

Now, you can instead make at least two other arguments:

1) Who cares? We're talking about what people think of as fantasy, not some area of academic expertise. This is a fine argument, but then we have nothing to talk about.

Well no, there's still something to talk about there: the disconnect between the two and how that changes what is read (and how it is read). I'm a big proponent of using SF&F as a mirror onto our own culture, but when it is dismissed as genre fiction that shouldn't be taken seriously that becomes a lot harder to do. The inherent bias of starting out from that position means that anything filed under "science fiction" at Border's isn't going to be read in the same way by the same people as the new bit of slice of life straight fiction dreck that's about to be christened the Next Big Thing. And then when science fiction does produce something noteworthy, you pull out the argument above and say it isn't science fiction at all so the genre can never be elevated out of its place in the hierarchy...it's kind of like when Sandman won the World Fantasy Award and they changed the rules the next day so that no comic book (an even lower form of expression than fantasy, fit only for amoeba and the occasional slime mold) could never win it again.

Then again, I don't really believe in capital-L-Literature as a concept, so what do I know.

[onodera]

Originally posted by Rufus T. Firefly
Just curious, Ben: both "Canticle for Liebowitz" and "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep" are novels. What are they doing on your short-story list?

He's a very fast reader.

[Rufus T. Firefly]

Originally posted by Koyaanisqatsi


Well no, there's still something to talk about there: the disconnect between the two and how that changes what is read (and how it is read). I'm a big proponent of using SF&F as a mirror onto our own culture, but when it is dismissed as genre fiction that shouldn't be taken seriously that becomes a lot harder to do. The inherent bias of starting out from that position means that anything filed under "science fiction" at Border's isn't going to be read in the same way by the same people as the new bit of slice of life straight fiction dreck that's about to be christened the Next Big Thing. And then when science fiction does produce something noteworthy, you pull out the argument above and say it isn't science fiction at all so the genre can never be elevated out of its place in the hierarchy...it's kind of like when Sandman won the World Fantasy Award and they changed the rules the next day so that no comic book (an even lower form of expression than fantasy, fit only for amoeba and the occasional slime mold) could never win it again.

Then again, I don't really believe in capital-L-Literature as a concept, so what do I know.

Excellent post. FWIW, when I said "we have nothing to talk about," I meant Imran and me in the context of that specific dicussion. There's lots to talk about here, as you demonstrate.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Originally posted by Rufus T. Firefly
Nope. There's a whole body of literature out there on how "genre" works -- most of it indebted to structuralist literary criticism of the 60s and 70s -- and there's no way, following that blueprint, that "Midnight's Chidlren" could ever be considered part of the same "genre" as "Lord of the Rings." The assertion is simply unsupportable from the point of view of genre theory.

Now, you can instead make at least two other arguments:

1) Who cares? We're talking about what people think of as fantasy, not some area of academic expertise. This is a fine argument, but then we have nothing to talk about.
2) Well, maybe fantasy actually isn't a genre. This is actually very interesting argument, but it's not the discussion we're having.

But, strictly speaking, asserting that "Midnight's Children" is part of the fantasy genre is like asserting that Pluto is a planet -- lots of people might agree with you, for all sorts of reasons, but at the level where these definitions actually get hashed out in a rigorous scholarly fashion, it ain't so.

As Koyaanisqatsi points out (which makes it very amusing that you say we have nothing to talk about, but Koy brings up interesting points), these works get taken OUT of fantasy or science-fiction because of the inherant biases against those "genres". When you have already demeaned a certain type of writing, of course there can't be any redeemable works coming from them. If there is something with literary merit, it can't be fantasy or sci-fi... it's just fiction.

Genre theory is really just trying to keep certain types of work in the mire, really. To narrowly define it in such a way that a more apt name for, say, sci-fi for those people would be something like "crap involving spaceships".

Forgetting "Midnight's Children" (which I believe is quite obvious fantasy), what about the Pulitzer Prize winning novel by Cormac McCarthy, "The Road"?

It's a book about a father and son trying to make their way to the coast after nuclear armeggedon. It involves their struggles to stay safe and find food. It has been taken out of the area of "science fiction" and classified as just "fiction". Why? Because even though it is quite clearly sci-fi territory, it is written too well and, of course, science fiction can't be allowed to produce anything of literary worth.

Of course when talking about classification into genre:

"There, that is the whole of it, it is only what 'I,' so that say, here kneeling at the edge of literature, can see. In sum, the law. The law summoning: what 'I' can sight and what 'I' can say that I sight in this site of a recitation where I/we is"
- Jacques Derrida

[rah]

When I was in college I had two English Lit classes that I enjoyed.

Fantasy in Literature. (main focus was Lord of the Rings)

SF in Literature.
Some of the books used....
Farenheit 451
Stranger in a strange land
Brave new world
Foundation
River World (which I think was only included because Farmer lived down the street from campus and would come and be a guest speaker)

So not every institution is biased against them. It was great to take classes where you had already read all the books. Easy way to pad the GPA