own anthology, FutureShocks.
Wilson consistently articulates what makes SF unique in ways I can't help but quote. Here, he explains why "core" science fiction is valuable in itself, without partitioning it off (like some of the Mundane SF folks) or denigrating other forms of speculation."By 'core SF I mean science fiction that recognizes the long and interesting history of the genre, and is written from within that tradition or at least in a knowledgeable response to it. Modern science fiction (meaning SF since H. G. Wells) does something that seems to me unique: it brings the sensibility of literary realism to the subject matter of fantasy. It opens the window of the imagination without slamming the door on rationality, in other words. That constitutes a sort of 'artistic restraint,' I suppose, but any art form is created within such restraints and sometimes created by them. (We wouldn't have haiku if we did away with that pesky 17-syllable rule, for instance.) Wells-and all his heirs-invented a way to imaginatively explore the vast range of human questions that the scientific worldview invites, and they devised a rather clever set of tools for doing that. I don't hold any brief against fantasy, slipstream, quasi-mainstream, peripheral SF, or any other style or means of writing fiction-in fact I don't believe in any literary manifesto that extends beyond the reach of the writer's own pen. All I'm saying is that we've inherited something unique, valuable, and maybe even slightly fragile in the collective entity "modern science fiction" -and we ought to acknowledge it and treasure it."
7 comments:
Thanks for posting this quote. I do think Wilson really makes a lot of important points. I especially like this: "a way to imaginatively explore the vast range of human questions that the scientific worldview invites"
I get very uncomfortable when SF is spoken of in terms of prediction, or even in terms what real science is contained in it. That "vast range of human questions" sounds much more like the body of literature that I love so much.
--Damian
It's a damn site better than the "human condition" that gets bandied about. That being said, SF can be both predictive and a catalyst for real scientific innovation, it just doesn't have to be nor is this the sum total of its value.
My favorite line - "It opens the window of the imagination without slamming the door on rationality."
"scientific worldview" "window of the imagination" "rationality" bring it all together for me.--D
Well, I have quoted elsewhere Gardner Dozois describing the importance of SF thusly:
"The battle of science against superstition is still going on, as is the battle to not have to think only what somebody else thinks is okay for you to think. In fact, in a society where more people believe in angels than believe in evolution, that battle may be more critical than ever. One of the major battlefields of that war is science fiction, one of the few forms of literature where rationality, skepticism, the knowledge of the inevitability of change, and the idea that wide-ranging freedom of thought and unfettered imagination and curiosity are good things are the default positions, taken for granted by most of its authors."
A stonger battle cry attesting to the power of science fiction. I don't know if this follows, but sometimes I think that, growing out of a scientific worldview, is a science fictional worldview.-damian
Completely. There is a reason folks from JPL kept coming by the set of Babylon 5 when I was working there.
Interesting, thanks for that.
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