Do You Hate Science Fiction?

Do you hate science fiction?

Do you hate science fiction or think it’s all trash? Or do you love it, and read virtually nothing else?  What exactly is science fiction, and why does it inflame such passions?

It’s a hard genre to pin down. For example, Rod Sterling, TV producer of The Twilight Zone, said "Fantasy is the impossible made probable. Science Fiction is the improbable made possible."

And multiple-award-winning SF author Robert Heinlein had a 5-point list of attributes that he said defined an SF story:

1. The conditions must be, in some respect, different from here-and-now, although the difference may lie only in an invention made in the course of the story.

2. The new conditions must be an essential part of the story.

3. The problem itself—the "plot"—must be a human problem.

4. The human problem must be one which is created by, or indispensably affected by, the new conditions.

5. And lastly…it may be far-fetched, it may seem fantastic, but it must not be at variance with observed facts.

Mary Doria Russell, whom the San Francisco Chronicle Times described as an “outstanding natural storyteller”, said "What we now call science fiction is actually one of the oldest forms of storytelling. As Stanley Schmidt once observed, we have always speculated about alien beings, but in the past we called them centaurs and nymphs, elves and goblins, angels and demons.”

On a lighter note, Frederick Pohl, award-winning author of Gateway and dozens of other works, said "Someone once said that a good science-fiction story should be able to predict not the automobile but the traffic jam.”

The SF section at the Worcester Public Library has thousands of diverse books, and among the best of these are Dune by Frank Herbert, The Moon is a Harsh Mistress by Robert Heinlein, The Sparrow by Mary Doria Russell, The Gods Themselves by Isaac Asimov, 1984 by George Orwell, Accelerando by Charles Stross, The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula LeGuin, Frankenstein by Mary Shelley, Larry Niven’s Ringworld, Kurt Vonnegut’s Cat’s Cradle, Robert J. Sawyer’s Hugo Award-winning Hominids, The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms by N.K. Jemison, recently-made-into-a-TV-series The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood, and a myriad other mind-expanding examples of great literature.

Some take place in space, but some are Earth-based. Some take us adventuring to the far future, while others are contemporary. Some are stories of galactic empires and alien civilizations – but others explore what it means to be human in a changing universe.

So I think the best definition of science fiction is that expressed by the writer and critic Norman Spinrad in 1974:  "Science fiction is anything published as science fiction." 

Are you intrigued? If these deep-thinkers made you re-think SF, our staff can help you choose some great reads. You might also consider joining our Science Fiction Book Club, which meets the 3^rd Tuesday of every month.

#Read  #ScienceFiction #SpaceOpera #AdventureAwaits #TheFutureIsNow