Is SF becoming ashamed of itself?

[ray gower]

I wonder if the claim of S/F is hard to write is becoming an excuse for generally poor stories and writing?

No other genre of writing seems to be suffering quite so badly.

[Dave]

I read this on 'Hailing Frequencies #310'. It is another example of what I mean.

from SCIFI Wire

Don't Call Surface Sci Fi

Jay R. Ferguson, who co-stars in NBC's new SF series Surface, told SCI FI Wire that the show has fantastic elements, but that he doesn't think of it as true science fiction. "To me, sci-fi is Star Trek or Star Wars," Ferguson said in an interview. "This is almost like something that could be real. You think of a new species popping up in the ocean, and if you saw that in the headlines of today's paper, you wouldn't be that shocked. It's very, very likely, in fact, that there are several species and several animals that we have yet to see that are in the deep depths of the ocean."

When describing the show, Ferguson feels the term "speculative fiction" is more appropriate than science fiction. "To me, even as a sci-fi fan, speculative fiction sounds so much more interesting," he said. "That gets me more excited, because to me, I think the so-called sci-fi movies that I have enjoyed so much have been the ones that have really made me wonder, 'Wow, that could actually happen.' Those are the ones that I love the most. So for this sci-fi fan, speculative fiction sounds much more exciting."

In Surface, Ferguson plays an expert diver who believes his brother's death was caused by a mysterious sea creature. His storyline makes up one-third of the series, which also stars Lake Bell and Carter Jenkins. "I suppose that while you have Lake's character, that's the brain, and Carter's character, who's kind of the heart, my character is kind of the muscle," Ferguson said. "Everyone in the story is affected in a different way, driven by their own set of circumstances. And my set of circumstances are grown out of, or birthed out of, a hatred and a kind of need for truth and closure from the result of my brother being taken. And that is certainly what drives me to find out what's going on and what, if any, truth there is to be found."

Surface premieres Sept. 19 and will air Mondays at 8 p.m. ET/PT. NBC is owned by NBC Universal, which also owns SCIFI.COM.

"To me, sci-fi is Star Trek or Star Wars," Ferguson said in an interview. "This is almost like something that could be real."

Hailing Frequencies says:

"Science-fiction," the same genre that has brought us 1984, The Handmaid's Tale, Solaris, Lathe of Heaven, 2001, and Lost, isn't good enough for his show...
Dude. "Like something that could be real" is sci-fi.

I totally agree, except isn't 'The Handmaid's Tale' another one of Margaret Attwood's Speculative Fictions? :blush:

[ray gower]

Perhaps we ought to look at the problem from a slightly different angle?

Like it or not, Science Fiction of any flavour is synonymous with names like Asimov, Heinlein, Clarke and the topic of space. Though if most people had read those authors they would find less than half of their works had a space theme.

Now it strikes me that most modern writers are struggling to write a story that is even halfway to achieve both any degree of serious study of morals and humanity while maintaining an entertaining read. So in my humble opinion they can call them anything they like except Science Fiction.

With regard to space, it has to be recognised that it is just not a popular subject any longer, I would go so far as to suggest it isn't a subject at all with most of the population.
As far as manned exploration of space is concerned, man has achieved nothing since the early seventies and the last moon landing. Despite great plans for moonbases and Mars colonies, if anything, we have gone backwards since and shuttles go up and down with all the interest of the corporation omnibus.

Without something to inspire the much dulled public imagination should we be surprised that writers, good, bad and average are trying to find something different to describe their works. Though we might well be doing them a service if we remind them that all the Sci/Fi writers wrote far better and more appropriate 'Speculative Fiction' covering real world concerns in the fifties and sixties and were proud to describe them as Sci/fi?

[Dave]

Originally posted by ray gower
...should we be surprised that writers, good, bad and average are trying to find something different to describe their works. Though we might well be doing them a service if we remind them that all the Sci/Fi writers wrote far better and more appropriate 'Speculative Fiction' covering real world concerns in the fifties and sixties and were proud to describe them as Sci/fi?

I've been making a issue of this precisely because this is the kind of SF I like best. I have always been curious of the future and intersted in future predictions. So, I like those stories that take some fashion or new technology, and then extrapolate the effects upon future technologies and society structures.

Such SF authors predicted spare part surgery and organ stealing, satellite communications, a dysfunctional youth society, robots replacing manpower and making workers redundant, spy cameras, videophones, cloning, human/animal chimeras and genetic engineering, cybernetics and computer/brain interfaces, personal cloaking devices, nanotechnology and much more, all before any of them were technically feasible or credible.

(And maybe SciFi is the wrong word, SF is a much older term. SciFi as a term was only coined in the 1950's and is much more associated with space travel and bug-eyed monsters.) And 'Star Wars' being really 'swords and sorcery' in space is better described by SciFi than SF. I'd disagree on 'Star Trek' and 'Stargate' though.

I do think that there has been an overlapping of genres recently with fantasy being introduced into SF stories. Generally though, when that happens there is a scientific explanation, like a man-made virus causing people to become Zombie/Vampires, or Gods as ancient astronaunts. Sometimes those 'scientific explanations' are a little too wild though and play a little too loose.

There has also been a stream of Superhero movies recently, which are always termed SciFi, but are a completely different genre entirely.

I noticed that Hailing Frequencies used 'Lost' as an example of SF. I've been watching this and to me it is pure Fantasy with a capital 'F'.The Paraplegic can walk again, Guitars appear in trees, Polar bears in the jungleI have my own theory on 'Lost', but maybe there is a final explanation of everything that is SF and not Fantasy.

[ray gower]

To freely re-interpret, re-write and re-invent Genesis:-

1) In the beginning there was the word and that word was Gods and the truth.
2) But many words were written, and many of those were not the Truth. 3) And “Fiction” was begotten to tell the difference between the Truth and non-Truth and Jane Austin could live with Jules Verne in un-Truthful bliss.

4) Yet man created more Fiction and it came to pass that man was confused over his choice of Fiction. 5) And did not Verne have designs on topics above the belt and Austin did not. 6) And Science Fiction was begotten to tell the difference between Fictions and their higher morals.

7) But man was industrious creating words and some Science Fiction was popular and some was less so. 8) And to tell the difference the term SciFi was created to identify the inferior popular Science Fiction from the superior Science Fiction.

9) And man, seeing there was now more space for words, was yet more fruitful bringing forth words. 10) And it was seen that the words must be divided again, for where not some Science Fiction words more truthful than other Science Fiction words?
11) And were not many of these truthfull words being lost behind the great weight of less truthfull words?

12) And it came to pass that “Speculative Fiction” was begotten. 13) And issuers of some words could show that their words were more truthful than other Science Fiction.

And the moral of the chapter?

Well we do rather make a habit of dividing and categorising books (everything else too for that matter). It saves us the trouble of blundering into something that opens the mind further than neccessary.

That the writers have decided to use the term Speculative Fiction rather than Speculative Science Fiction is a cynical three-fold marketing ploy.

First. It divorces it from a generally unpopular adult market- Only weirdos and pimply youths read Science Fiction.

Second. Speculative Science Fiction is too long a term to fall off the tongue in modern parlance. Besides I don't think it would fit in that little square they use on the back of the book for categorising.

And last- Writers want to try and make us think that they are writing something with a whole lot more worldly worth than anything in the Science Fiction range.

As I genre I fear it will catch on, through author repetition if nothing else, so what are they going to call the spin-off from Speculative Fiction?

[Dave]

I take your point about teminology, what's in a name?

- SF, Sci Fi, Sci/Fi, Science Fiction, Speculative Fiction, Space Opera, Swords and Sorcery, Fantasy -

Sometimes people try to hard to pigeon-hole things and it doesn't matter what it is called, as long as it is good. Often, cross-genre strories are better, simply because they do break down these glass barriers and break new ground. Something like 'Reign of Fire' where dragons take over the world in the future is a case in point. Dragons are Fantasy, but 'Reign of Fire' is Scifi.

But the difference between SF and Scifi is a hotly disputed one among an older generation (even older than us Ray). I read about it once.

However, the terminology is not my main point in this thread, that's just a symptom of the malaise:

1) Take the SCIFI tv CHANNEL - it even has SciFi in it's title - but what does it show - for years now (I don't get it now, but even when I did) it has shown more and more horror - and the kind of "Zombie Flesh-eater horror" and "Full-Moon Horror" and "Halloween Teenage Slasher Horror" that is clearly not SciFi.

On any given night the programming is full of items that are not SciFi but just wacky conspiracy theory bumf. When they axed 'Farscape' because it no longer fitted in with their line-up fans were obviously confused. What exactly was the kind of programming one should expect on a channel called SciFi?

I guess that rescuing 'Sliders' and 'Stargate SG-1' from the axe should be a plus on their side, and they do have 'Stargate Atlantis' but just look what they did to them. I rest my case.

2) Take some of the books and films that are now to be found classified as SciFi - things that are really historical novels. 'Eaters of the Dead' by Michael Crichton, filmed as the 'The 13th Warrior'.

I can almost accept that one, but 'Braveheart'!! - well they wear strange make-up and use swords and stuff, it must be that wacky scifi genre! Or, is it set in an alternative universe where scottish crofters have perfect teeth and health!

And there is more - 'Name of the Rose', 'Da Vinci Code'. We at ASciFi.com are as guilty as anyone else. Our Film and Book forums are full of non-scifi films and books, though we don't profess that they are.

3) Astrology is now classified as Science Fiction!

Please tell me where the science is in Astrology? Most of the predictions are made up by junior reporters who have advanced from making the tea!

I accept the influence of the Moon on us. You only have to see the tide come in on a beach, and realise that the land is also being pulled up and down twice a day too. There are plenty of lunar cycles in the natural world, and anyone who lives with a woman can attest to it's effects. But the moon is much nearer to us.

What possible effect can Uranus have on my financial prospects?

End of Rant...

Maybe there is nothing new in this though. Many authors who start out writing for magazines and go on to become great literary geniuses would wish to hide or cloud their more meagre origins.

This is probably relevant too: The Geek Hierarchy

Writing is not necessarily something to be ashamed of, but do it in private and wash your hands afterwards.
-- Robert Heinlein

[ray gower]

Have to admit I never considered my position on the Geek-o-meter before, or where what I read lays on it either!

But that could be part of my problem?
What I look for in a book means I rarely have to consider which pigeon hole the book I am reading sits- So a book with a science theme is Science Fiction, one with swords and wizards is fantasy, Caedfael is a historic novel etc. and I guess the same holds true for that ancient generation that argues about the difference between Science Fiction and Scifi- They have read all types and cannot see a real difference to make a division?

But there are a lot of people for whom the 'classification' is important and we have had a goodly number of those pass through Ascifi too. Those who will not read anything but Fantasy, or 'Steampunk' or whatever is in their 'limited' interest.

The Geek-o-meter is also of importance to writers and science fiction is only saved from the bottom rung by erotic fiction.

So while the likes of Micheal Crichton or Alexander Kent may have have spent years studying the background of science or history to write their novels, very few science fiction writers find need to do so. Instead they rely upon the force of their story to carry their view of the world and when all else fails they turn out and say "Well it works in my Universe!" which is a poor excuse for not explaining properly in the first place.

As to what gets dumped on with the title of SciFi, I don't honestly know what the excuses are.

Whoever describes Braveheart as SciFi needs his bumps felt, but there are others where confusion might be understandable. Jurrasic Park is one which I have never been able to comfortably rank as Science Fiction, though I have no problems with Day of the Triffids, which ostensibly is a very similar story or Jules Verne where science has largely caught up with and sometimes exceeded.

SCIFI TV perhaps has the excuse that fantasy and horror has always found a sympathetic home under the Science Fiction banner and it can wave a hand in the direction of defunct story magazines like Science and Fantasy for justification.

As for Astrology, I can think of no means where it could become the subject of a book, let alone be classed Science Fiction!

[Dave]

Without beginning to bore anyone on this subject, or having a rating on the 'Geek-o-meter', this is just a corollary on the SF vs Scifi subject:

This entry from The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction (2nd edn, 1993), ed. Clute and Nicholls explains it:

SCI FI Pronounced 'sky fi' or 'si fi', an abbreviation for 'science fiction', said to have been introduced by Forrest J. Ackerman, a prominent fan fond of wordplay, in the 1950s, when the term 'hi-fi' was becoming popular. Never much used within the sf community, the term became very popular with journalists and media people generally, until by the 1970s it was the most common abbreviation used by non-readers of sf to refer to the genre, often with an implied sneer. Some critics within the genre, Terry Carr and Damon Knight among them, decided that, since the term was derogatory, it might be critically useful in distinguishing sf hackwork - particularly ill written, lurid adventure stories - from sf of a more intellectually demanding kind. Around 1978 the critic Susan Wood and others began pronouncing the term 'skiffy'. In 1980s-90s usage 'skiffy', which sounds friendlier than 'sci fi', has perhaps for that reason come to be less condemnatory. Skiffy is colourful, sometimes entertaining, junk. Star Wars is skiffy.

And this is from the Ackermuseum website: The Origin of Sci-Fi

by the late Forrest J Ackerman

Some of you younger generation may not realize that "sci-fi" hasn't ALWAYS been a part of the American language. That we haven't always been on the Moon, that we haven't always had television and tape recorders. You probably remember the advent of faxes, VCRs and computers but-- I'm amazed when, during one of my open houses chez Ackermansion, some fan casually mentions "sci-fi" and I ask them, "Do you know who coined that term?" Neither they nor any other fans present do. "In 1954, that word was first heard in this world,” and I go on to explain:

I was riding around in my car with the radio on and some mention was made of "hi-fi." Since "science fiction" had been on the tip of my tongue since Hugo Gernsback introduced it in 1929 (in his sf mag "Science Wonder Stories"), I looked in the rear-view mirror, stuck out my tongue and there, tattooed on the end of it was . . . SCI-FI! I thought fans who had embraced the portmanteau word "scientifiction" and its abbreviation "stf" (pronounced "stef") would be the first to latch onto sci-fi.

Indeed many automatically did. But a loud voice (which shall remain nameless, (to protect the guilty), was heard throughout the land, denouncing my innocent little term. A close friend of his then took up the cry, ranting and raving that to call science fiction "sci-fi" was tantamount to using racial slurs!

Nevertheless, some fans throughout the ImagiNation (Dave Kyle, Bjo Trimble, Rick Sneary, and authors such as Isaac Asimov, Marion Zimmer Bradley and Ben Bova) announced their displeasure in the use of the term.

This, mind you, was over four decades ago. In the meantime Kyle has for years sported a Sci-Fi license plate and Bjo publishes a news sheet known as "Byo Trimble's Sci-Fi Spotlight." If you get Ray Bradbury's ansaphone you're likely to hear a greeting, "This is the sci-fi guy." Playboy has announced sci-fi stories, by world-famous sf authors, on its cover three times. And, of course, there's the Sci-Fi Channel on TV.

Some years ago, a certain author (who claims he doesn't even write science fiction) had the attention of a captive audience eager to learn all about science fiction (in the Ackerman auditorium at UCLA). Practically the first words out of his mouth were, "You must never ... ever ... under any circumstances, use the abominable! The nauseous! The ugly! Sci-fooey fi-fooey term! What is it? It's UGLY! It's the sound of two crickets ********!!!" Shortly thereafter I ran into a fan at the World Science Fiction Convention, down under in Australia, who was proudly wearing a home-made button:

I LOVE ********** CRICKETS! I've often wondered who that perceptive person was. If, by any chance, he reads this please contact me for a hefty handshake. I hereby authorize you to be the Guest of Honor during Be Kind to Crickets Week. And Mr. Weatherman, I authorize you to rain on the Anti-Sci-Fi-ite's Parade. Sci-fooey on you diehard insurgents!

Sacred Heinlein used the term 7 years before I did, in a positive fashion in a private letter to his legendary agent.

PS. 'Jurassic Park', in the book rather than the film, plays more on the 'DNA from the blood inside the mosquito preserved in the Amber used to genetically engineer dinosaurs from frog DNA'. That is why it is Science Fiction.

[ray gower]

Isn't a Skiffy a brand of padded envelope?

Perhaps something to wrap the children in to protect them from the hard dull reality of life because their brains have been turned into mush on a diet of frivolous and imaginative Scifi?

Can think of far more depriving things to put into one of those bags to protect kids- Educationalists who think that imagination and competition is harmful to children, perhaps?
-----------------------------------------

Posted by Dave
PS. 'Jurassic Park', in the book rather than the film, plays more on the 'DNA from the blood inside the mosquito preserved in the Amber used to genetically engineer dinosaurs from frog DNA'. That is why it is Science Fiction.

I'm sure there was more to it than that!
I mean frogs were mentioned at least 4 times. And Chaos theory was explained (nearly two paragraphs, in passing) too!

[imported_EdOtt]

when ever i hear people say that science fiction or that most science fiction is bad i remember back to univercity and my creative writing teacher told us.

don't worry if what you write is ****, go to any book store and 90% of the books they are selling are ****. just cause you cannot write should not stop you from having a carrear

and this was a guy with quite a few published books.

oh excuse the typos and mispelled words my spell check is off and my wife is at her aunt's tonite.

[Stargod]

To me, Science Fiction is this....

Fiction contains everything that most of us read nowadays and consider "science fiction" or fantasy. You might even go so far as to say that science fantasy is the same as magical/medieval fantasy, except one seems or feels more modern, and another feels more medievil. Not that the two can't coexist....for instance take the Wheel of Time series, pre-breaking of the world. It's obvious there was an existing "science" at one time, and they are in the midst of rediscovering it. However, I wouldn't call this "science fiction" or "magical/medieval fiction" in the strict sense, it's more Fantasy (broader in it's content coverage). A book which deals more with science and scientific details, akin to the level of military detail one would expect from a Tom Clancy novel, is more science fiction, and the story is just a cataiyst. I do think one could even say that proper science fiction tends to bridge the gap between fiction and non-fiction.

[Dave]

Originally posted by Stargod
You might even go so far as to say that science fantasy is the same as magical/medieval fantasy, except one seems or feels more modern, and another feels more medievil.

Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.
Arthur C. Clarke, "Profiles of The Future", 1961.

Many novels of historical fiction with a science fiction bent use this idea where the characters think something is magic, but we the readers know that it is science fact and therefore completely possible. (So that we are a party to an inside joke.) 'Steampunk' also thrives upon it.

Another question though: Does there have to be any science in it for it to be Science Fiction?

I recently read a definition of Science Fiction that claimed that Science Fiction is simply a kind of Historical Fiction set in the Future. They then added that it could also be set in an Alternative Present day too, if there was a clear path to that point from some divergent point in the past.

Myself, I would have to add that it could be set in an Alternative Past too, otherwise how do you include 'Steampunk' as Science Fiction, which it clearly is.

Those definitions exclude the kind of Science Fiction with Fantasy elements; those set in a 'Galaxy, Far, Far Away'.

I found this from a website on Dystopian futures, but it holds true for this kind of science fiction:

Often, the most valuable thing we can get from [Science Fiction] is not a view of what’s going to happen, but of what we fear will happen, fears we don’t always express clearly or examine as much as we should. These stories can make us think about why we fear certain things in our own culture and others, and whether those fears are valid or are in themselves destructive and dangerous.