It's a Story: Storytelling, Science, and Reader Expectation
Tuesday, September 21st, 2004 10:07 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rolanniI've been doing this space opera thing for a good while now. When ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
kinzel and I were first plotting out the Liaden books, back in nineteen-aught-eighty-three, we made some deliberate worldbuilding choices.
First, that the stories would be fun. That would be, fun for us to write and fun for our -- hopeful, at that point -- audience to read.
Second, that love, companionship, and partnership are more often than not survival traits. Without a reason to hang on one moment longer; or to make the last, desperate, gamble, most people will fail. (N.B. the crew of a US plane that crashed on the wrong side of the line during the Cold War, and were in exposed conditions (weather, as well as military) for some days before they were rescued. Many had already perished of their experience. Every single man that lived -- was married.)
Third, that the Liaden Universe(R) would be an Equal Opportunity Universe, bearing in mind that not all people are equally talented at all things.
Fourth, that the worldbuilding would be as tight as we could make it, and that we would not contravene the rules of our universe as stated.
******
Digression:
We were slightly ahead of the curve with the whole "romantic SF" thing, our publisher at the time killed the series after three books, and we slid into obscurity for ten years, during which time an entire generation of "romantic SF/F" writers grew up, some of whom like to think that they created the whole sub-genre single-handedly, and without chipping their nail polish. They didn't -- and neither did we. Look thou to Doc Smith, to C.L. Moore, to Katherine MacLean, Ursula LeGuin, C.J. Cherryh, Vonda N. McIntyre... As readers, we are what we've read. As writers, we are what we make of what we've read. Each generation builds upon the works of the generation preceding.
******
Back to the point:
Since we returned from the dead, we've had the opportunity to talk with -- and listen to -- quite a number of readers. Sometimes, we're asked questions, like:
1. How did "we" get to the conditions described in the Liaden Universe(R) from the conditions extant in our world today?
2. Why isn't there any mention of nanotech in the Liaden Universe? Surely a civilization so evolved would have worked out the overheating problems!
3. Whyever do the Liadens adhere to their outmoded breeding customs? Surely a civilization so evolved would realize the benefits of vat-grown children!
4. And so on...
These questions are interesting for the assumptions they make. For instance, there appears to be a touching belief extant among even very sophisticated readers that it is the job of science fiction to predict the future.
In fact, it is not the job of science fiction to predict the future. Science fiction has two responsibilities, as a literary form. First and foremost, science fiction is the literary form that asks the question
WHAT IF?
WHAT IF it were possible to have a star-spanning civilization?
WHAT IF the aliens aren't bug-eyed monsters, but people who look pretty much like everybody else?
WHAT IF the danger-points in alien contact after all aren't different biologies, but slightly different cultural assumptions and mores?
WHAT IF that cataclysmic event that spawned this universe wasn't an act of "Nature" at all?
The second responsibility science fiction has as a literary form is extrapolation. Science fiction is the form that says:
IF THIS GOES ON...
IF WE CONTINUE to rape the resources of our planet...
IF THE POLAR ICE CONTINUES to melt at an accelerated pace...
IF CLONING BECOMES commonplace...
IF. THIS. GOES. ON...
...what might the universe possibly look like? What are the possible ramifications of these events and/or actions? What possible solutions/defenses might be mounted? What possible repercussions might such solutions create? What change might possibly occur and might that be a good thing, a bad thing, or a null-value?
Science fiction is a literature of exploration, not prediction. And while it's an amusing game to point out all the times science fiction has been "right" -- Jules Verne's positing of Florida as the best location for a rocket launch to the moon, for instance -- the fact is that science fiction's prognostication batting average is pretty dismal.
More later...
kinzel and I were first plotting out the Liaden books, back in nineteen-aught-eighty-three, we made some deliberate worldbuilding choices.First, that the stories would be fun. That would be, fun for us to write and fun for our -- hopeful, at that point -- audience to read.
Second, that love, companionship, and partnership are more often than not survival traits. Without a reason to hang on one moment longer; or to make the last, desperate, gamble, most people will fail. (N.B. the crew of a US plane that crashed on the wrong side of the line during the Cold War, and were in exposed conditions (weather, as well as military) for some days before they were rescued. Many had already perished of their experience. Every single man that lived -- was married.)
Third, that the Liaden Universe(R) would be an Equal Opportunity Universe, bearing in mind that not all people are equally talented at all things.
Fourth, that the worldbuilding would be as tight as we could make it, and that we would not contravene the rules of our universe as stated.
Digression:
We were slightly ahead of the curve with the whole "romantic SF" thing, our publisher at the time killed the series after three books, and we slid into obscurity for ten years, during which time an entire generation of "romantic SF/F" writers grew up, some of whom like to think that they created the whole sub-genre single-handedly, and without chipping their nail polish. They didn't -- and neither did we. Look thou to Doc Smith, to C.L. Moore, to Katherine MacLean, Ursula LeGuin, C.J. Cherryh, Vonda N. McIntyre... As readers, we are what we've read. As writers, we are what we make of what we've read. Each generation builds upon the works of the generation preceding.
Back to the point:
Since we returned from the dead, we've had the opportunity to talk with -- and listen to -- quite a number of readers. Sometimes, we're asked questions, like:
1. How did "we" get to the conditions described in the Liaden Universe(R) from the conditions extant in our world today?
2. Why isn't there any mention of nanotech in the Liaden Universe? Surely a civilization so evolved would have worked out the overheating problems!
3. Whyever do the Liadens adhere to their outmoded breeding customs? Surely a civilization so evolved would realize the benefits of vat-grown children!
4. And so on...
These questions are interesting for the assumptions they make. For instance, there appears to be a touching belief extant among even very sophisticated readers that it is the job of science fiction to predict the future.
In fact, it is not the job of science fiction to predict the future. Science fiction has two responsibilities, as a literary form. First and foremost, science fiction is the literary form that asks the question
WHAT IF it were possible to have a star-spanning civilization?
WHAT IF the aliens aren't bug-eyed monsters, but people who look pretty much like everybody else?
WHAT IF the danger-points in alien contact after all aren't different biologies, but slightly different cultural assumptions and mores?
WHAT IF that cataclysmic event that spawned this universe wasn't an act of "Nature" at all?
The second responsibility science fiction has as a literary form is extrapolation. Science fiction is the form that says:
IF WE CONTINUE to rape the resources of our planet...
IF THE POLAR ICE CONTINUES to melt at an accelerated pace...
IF CLONING BECOMES commonplace...
IF. THIS. GOES. ON...
...what might the universe possibly look like? What are the possible ramifications of these events and/or actions? What possible solutions/defenses might be mounted? What possible repercussions might such solutions create? What change might possibly occur and might that be a good thing, a bad thing, or a null-value?
Science fiction is a literature of exploration, not prediction. And while it's an amusing game to point out all the times science fiction has been "right" -- Jules Verne's positing of Florida as the best location for a rocket launch to the moon, for instance -- the fact is that science fiction's prognostication batting average is pretty dismal.
More later...
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no subject
Date: 2004-09-21 10:18 am (UTC)Add to the general confusion the fact that the meaning of the categories keeps changing, and you've got a Right Mess. Listen to Dave Hartwell, and you'll discover that the Liaden books aren't Space Opera at all, though what they then exactly are is left as an exercise for the student. Since the intent of the authors is to write Space Opera, that's what we persist in calling them (insert genteel auctorial raspberry here).
I once had the ...humbling experience... of listening to a young man at a convention tell his friend that said friend had to read Conflict of Honors. When the friend -- reasonably enough -- wanted a Little More Information, the first young man hesitated for a moment, obviously flipping through his available cubbyholes and finally came up with:
"It's Military SF."
I don't think that cutting up the genre into yet more sub-genres is the way to go. On the other hand, I don't really think that a push to redefining SF as the Mythology of the Future, or some such, is going to fly, either...
no subject
Date: 2004-09-21 01:37 pm (UTC)I've always thought of the Liaden books as straight space opera, but I suppose space opera belongs more to the huge Good versus Evil conflicts of things like Star Wars. What you seem to write (and I do, as well) is Science Fiction Romances... not in the marketing sense, but in the literary definitional sense: "works with extravagant characters, remote and exotic places, highly exciting and heroic events, passionate love or mysterious and supernatural experiences." (From my copy of A Handbook to Literature). In particular, the definition includes: "A work relatively free of the more restrictive aspects of realistic verisimilitude."
If you take the traditional view of science fiction as being hard, crunchy extrapolations of what might happen based on what actually could happen, then books like the Liaden series that seem to float above that would seem to qualify as a hybrid thing, a science fiction romance that uses some of the tropes and settings of science fiction without dwelling on the verisimilitude.
My view, anyway. I like romances, of the literary variety. People reading my stories hoping for the hard and crunchy will be sorely disappointed, but my stories aren't fantasies as marketing defines the term.