A literary genre whose necessary and sufficient conditions are
the presence and interaction of estrangement and cognition, and
whose main formal device is an imaginative framework alternative
to the author's empirical environment (Online 4).
While either of these is a solid idea of what SF is, there are many who, frustrated with society's inability to properly label the genre, have come up with more sarcastic connotations. A good example is this: "Science fiction is a label applied to a publishing category and it's application is subject to the whims of editors and publishers" (Clute and Nichols, Online 4). Even this holds some amount of truth. But, while all of these quotes are sufficient, none are satisfactory. Throughout the centuries, scholars and fans alike have attempted to accurately define science fiction, however no single definition could ever truly exist because the genre has been forced to adapt to keep pace with a swiftly evolving world.
This is more of a problem than it might seem at first because without an agreed-upon definition how can one recognize when the genre of SF began? The answer is, you can't. This date had been argued by scholars for quite some time, but there is one thing that most agree on, science fiction, whenever it began, was preceded by a genre termed Proto SF. John Clute says in his book, Science Fiction: The Illustrated Encyclopedia, that "a text is Proto SF when its fantastic and realistic elements are described as though they are part of the same overall reality" (34). He also says that "Proto SF has to embody a sense [. . .] that the marvels it depicts can be argued for, if necessary by example and analogy from the existing world" (35).
One of the first examples of this can be seen in The True History of Lucian of Samosata which was written c. 175 C.E. Lucian was aware of the beginnings of true astronomy, which had, with reasonable accuracy, determined the Moon's diameter and its distance from the Earth. He used all known science of the time to write his book, but did not know that air wasn't present for most of the way between the two heavenly bodies, therefore "his device of having a ship lifted by a waterspout and carried to the Moon on a whirlwind seemed quite possible to him" (Del Rey 13). Proto SF is a vast genre containing many well-known and not so well-known texts. Among these can be found Shakespeare's Othello and Swift's Gulliver's Travels as well as Baron Ludvig Holberg's Journey of Niels Klim to the World Underground, just to name a few.
Many scholars agree that the birth of science fiction came about in 1818 with the publication of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. Shelley wrote in the popular style of the time, which lead many to believe her novel more Gothic than SF, but the creation of the monster and the questions that arose from that creation are wholly science fiction. Although Shelley had no real scientific background, and thus no terrific amount of process description in her novel, the scientific ideas behind it can be found scattered throughout, including here: "It was on a dreary night of November, that I beheld the accomplishment of my toils. With an anxiety that almost amounted to agony, I collected the instruments of life around me, that I might infuse a spark of being into the lifeless thing that lay at my feet" (45). At the time this novel was written, science was a relatively new field. Society had no way of knowing how fast or how far such studies would go in the future. To them, the story of Frankenstein was an all too real possibility, much the way human cloning is today. Shelley forced her readers to look towards the future with not just anticipation, but trepidation as well. She provided "a pattern for asking questions about the new future, for expressing hopes, fears, and speculations [. . .]" (Clute 108) which SF authors would use extensively in the decades to come.
Many other famous SF authors came to light in the 19th century as well. Jules Verne redefined old topics with such stories as Journey to the Center of the Earth and From the Earth to the Moon. Robert Louis Stevenson contributed with The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and even Mark Twain jumped on the invisible bandwagon with A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court. H.G. Wells, although he wrote most of his work during the 20th century, also contributed three of his most well-known tales, The Time Machine, The Island of Dr. Moreau, and The War of the Worlds, during this time.
Despite all of the amazing work that come out of the 19th century SF still hadn't developed it's own genre, but with the creation of a pulp magazine entitled Amazing Stories all that changed. Magazines had, of course, been publishing SF stories long before that, but it was Hugo Gernsback's ‘magazine of scientifiction' that pulled everything together (Clute 98). Gernsback had originally planned to call the magazine Scientifiction, but due to discouraging polls he was forced to go with a catchier title. For the first two years or so most of the publications in his magazine were reprints of already famous stories. There were many reasons for this, such as lack of funds to pay new authors and the fear of not being able to keep the printings on schedule, but the most important was that by using well-known stories he could attract readers who couldn't afford to buy books (Del Rey 43,44).
It was also during this time that most of SF's stereotypes were created. One could easily see, plastered to the front of every SF pulp magazine on the rack, the hero, with bulging muscles and a ray gun, bravely defending and/or rescuing the scantily-clad heroine from a BEM, or bug-eyed monster. Even today, with such a marvelous plethora of SF stories, these stereotypes exist, especially in the minds of those who push science fiction aside as something meant for children and the under-educated. However, despite what critics would have you believe, pulp wasn't the only creation of the Golden Age of SF. Aldous Huxley wrote his brilliant masterpiece, A Brave New World during this time, and only a short time later George Orwell wrote his first, and last, science fiction novel, 1984, which, among other things, coined the well-known paranoid phrase, ‘Big Brother is Watching You.'
By the end of World War II, the Golden Age of SF was decidedly over and for a time all was quite, but a bright new age was swiftly encroaching and science fiction was ready to take on ‘the new mantle of optimism" (Clute 130). What can be found during the 1950's is a little bit of everything, ranging from deep introspection to outrageous humor. With the Cold War as a prominent piece of American life, many SF authors took great pleasure in the destruction of dictatorships from every corner of the galaxy (Clute 131). Also, the SF triumph of the American Dream swiftly procured science fiction as an almost solely American genre. We see Isaac Asimov emerge, changing the genre forever with his Laws of Robotics, which are as follows:
1. A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.
2. A robot must obey the orders given it by human beings except where those orders would conflict with the First Law.
3. A robot must protect its own existence except where such protection would conflict with the First and Second Law (Asimov 459).
Ray Bradbury also began publishing during this time, and although he claims that SF was never his intent, the genre has taken him anyway, claiming such wonderful books as Fahrenheit 451 and The Martian Chronicles, for the realm of science fiction.
The 1960's saw a drastic change in how science fiction was viewed by the public. It was, in a sense, the beginning of the end. The Russians had launched Sputnik and that idea, as well as those that sprung from it, were slowly starting to sink in. The authors of SF could sense a change in the air, and knew the adolescence was over; the genre had finally grown up and now it intended to change the world. But this task was easier thought of than done, the space race was now in full flight and the implications thereof were astounding to consider.
[ . . . ] the future could no longer be imagined as an easy jump away: the
future was right here and now, and it was not easy, it was a great deal
more difficult than expected. [. . . ] now that near-space was a part of
history - it was going to be a great deal harder to convince the reader
that the radiant future could be simply leaped into (Clute 155).
However, science fiction adapted to society's need for change and gave the public something new. Philip K. Dick gave us such titles as the novel, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep and the short story, ‘We Can Remember it for You Wholesale', both of which became movies, one in the mid-eighties and the other in the early nineties. Although each met with a lukewarm reception at the box office, they soon developed cult status among the truly devoted. Another classic to emerge from the mid-sixties was Frank Herbert's Dune, also a soon-to-be box office bomb, but an encompassing and fascinating read. Harlan Ellison also broke into the field and made a name for himself almost entirely off of short stories. John Clute best sums Ellison's writing with these words: "At his best Ellison's work is full of a rage for authenticity, an urgency about being human and real in a world of deranging impersonality and evil" (165). His short story, "‘Repent Harlequin!' Said the Ticktockman" perhaps embodies this quote the most accurately.
The 60's contained a veritable explosion of authors from all over the world, including Poland, Italy, and Germany, just to name a few. The world of SF was changing, not only to please society, but to break through the barriers which had been set by a previous generation. Post-apocalyptic worlds flooded the market, as well as ideas on the horror of over-population. Society took it all in and begged for more. However, time was wearing on, and by the 1970's Sputnik and the moon landing were old news. Many authors began to fear that SF itself was quickly becoming nothing more than a monument to the future that had already come to pass. Some still believe this to be true, while others steadily argue that as long as science keeps inventing, science fiction will be there to invent it first.
The culture of the 80's opened up whole new venues for SF to travel down, not the least of which was the idea of ‘Cyberpunk.' It was hot, fresh, and, like most fads, quickly forgotten. That's not to say that SF authors stopped writing it, that would be false, but it was absorbed into the science fiction genre so quickly that what was being written may or may not have been deemed Cyberpunk. This in itself, the process of SF blending and merging with the fiction around it, of broadening (or diluting) the spectrum, became a common occurrence. Science Fiction began to accept new approaches, styles and scenarios that would have been ignored in decades past. Non-SF writers were writing SF novels and visa versa. More science fiction books were being written than during any other time, but authors felt that the genre was disappearing because "everything else is looking more like SF, and SF is looking more like everything else" (Clute 195).
Within the 90's, SF things that, before, had seemed like just any other grand adventure, turned into things more like necessity. For example, instead of ‘boldly going where no one has gone before' the idea of traveling out into the solar system became, to scientists, more of an evolutionary step, than a fanciful ideal. The prospects of cloning were no longer just wild tales, but factual science which was causing as much controversy as the idea of abortion. Stepping into the future one can only begin to guess what fascinating ideas SF will come up with next to take the place of the science fiction which is quickly becoming science fact.
A quote from Tom Shippey sums this paper up nicely: "Science fiction is hard to define because it is the literature of change and it changes while you are trying to define it" (Online 4). And he's right. SF is constantly changing, floating unsteadily across the cultural waves of society, always in limbo, until the next phase of ideas comes along to disrupt the beginning monotony. But no matter how hard we try, or how much we argue, a true definition will never be found, because that would mean the stagnation of society, and the death of us all. We can only wonder where science fiction will take us in the future; one can only wonder and perhaps. . . dream.
Asimov, Isaac. "The Law of Humanics." Robot Visions. Comp. Isaac Asimov. New York: Penguin Books, 1990. 458-462.
Clute, John. Science Fiction: The Illustrated Encyclopedia. New York: Dorling Kindersley, 1995.
Del Rey, Lester. The World of Science Fiction, 1926-1976. New York: Garland Publishing, Inc., 1980.
"If You Like This." Ultimate Science Fiction Web Guide. March 2000. Magic Dragon Multimedia. 8 April 2000 <http://www.magicdragon.com/UltimateSF/thisthat.html>.
Merriam-Webster, Inc. The Merriam-Webster Dictionary. Springfield, MA: Merriam-Webster, Inc, 1994.
Shelley, Mary W. Frankenstein. Philadelphia: Running Press, 1990.
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