The Snow Leopard: September 2012

The three stages of SF, as represented by Clarke, Dick and Gibson. I don't know what the current state of Science Fiction is, although I've read a few. Mostly China Mieville. And Mieville, apart from one or two exceptions, doesn't write what some would call Pure SF. Which I think is what it has come to, really: SF has become, to use a very science fictiony term, a gestalt consciousness: a little of this, a little of that, but far greater than the sum of its parts. A hive mind of sorts, if you will. Speculative Fiction today is a very strange beast, with many heads and many eyes, and I think that's very liberating. In fact, the entire history of SF is extremely intriguing in how, slowly but surely, it shed its inhibitions regarding what can be done with the genre or what should be done, and came into its own as a powerful medium to express social and environmental concerns. Or just to play around with philosophical conundrums.

SF however, is a misnomer. I remember a Brian Aldiss quote at the back of a Penguin omnibus, which went: "Science fiction is no more written for scientists than ghost stories are written for ghosts." I think that summarises my stance towards the field succinctly. If you told a SF fan prior to the 60s that science fiction is not really about the science, you'd have had to deal with one very angry fan. Not so much today, when American Gods by Gaiman is often labelled a work of Science Fiction, and Hugos are being given out to Fantasy titles as well.

I think the single greatest decade for SF was the mid 60s to early 70s. And Philip K Dick was its champion, as was Le Guin. Characterization prevailed, and without good characters, SF is difficult to appreciate by someone not associated with it in the first place. And herein lies the dilemma that is at the heart of SF everywhere: It is a form of literature very much influenced by Modernism in its suspicion of the importance of the individual in the face of an inexplicably purposeless cosmos. But every good SF novel returns, at the end of the day, to the individual. Its an intriguing balancing act, and Olaf Stapledon's The Star Maker is a brilliant example. It gives me goosebumps everytime I read it: it starts off with the protagonist, an everyman, asking himself "What's the use of it all?" and then going on a head expanding journey through the cosmos to help put everything into perspective. And throughout there is that palpable sense of wonder towards nature, the workings of the universe so very grand in its indifference towards personal opinions and choices and arguments. Its overwhelming and if you think too much into it, you're liable to go a little mad. But what's wonderful is how our attempt at making some sense of it all is perhaps, in its own way, a valiant effort. And its importance lies in the attempt, in the need. I think SF during the heydey of Philip K Dick and Robert Silverberg and Ursula Le Guin got at the heart of this paradox. It wasn't about the avant-garde experimental prose, although there was a lot of that too. It was an infusion of humanism into a genre that was growing up, and reaching out beyond its adolescence. As J G Ballard put it, the Earth itself suddenly became the alien world, the human mind a far more complicated terrain than a planet in a galaxy far far away. The authors realized that like all great literature, SF could benefit from a deeper, more thoughtful use of its abundant trove of metaphors. Once reflected against them, the study of human nature (if there is any such thing) is enriched beyond the scope of realistic fiction.