The Poetics of Science Fiction

Peter Stockwell

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2014
• Print ISBN: 9781138152557
• eBook ISBN: 9781317878179
• Topic: Languages & Linguistics
• Subtopic: Linguistics
• Index: Languages & Linguistics

The Poetics of Science Fiction uniquely uses the science of linguistics to explore the literary universe of science fiction. Developing arguments about specific texts and movements throughout the twentieth-century, the book is a readable discussion of this most popular of genres. It also uses the extreme conditions offered by science fiction to develop new insights into the language of the literary context. The discussion ranges from a detailed investigation of new words and metaphors, to the exploration of new worlds, from pulp science fiction to the genre's literary masterpieces, its special effects and poetic expression. Speculations and extrapolations throughout the book engage the reader in thought-experiments and discussion points, with selected further reading making it a useful source book for classroom and seminar.

CHAPTER 1

DEPARTURES: ORIENTATION AND MAPS

COUNTDOWN: 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, zero. The numerical countdown is now regarded as the symbol of century 20, representing that era’s obsession with the future, ‘forecasting’ and the tangible passage of time. One of the common beliefs of the age was in the idea of ‘progress’, and human society was perceived in terms of evolution or development from primitive to sophisticated, simple to complex. The countdown was developed by rocket technicians in the former Unistates of America in order to add presentational drama to the launch of localspace vehicles (old Soviet Union rocket launches did not countdown to lift-off, but merely initiated the ignition at the appointed time). More significantly, the countdown was a sign of the measurement of the future, with the point of anticipation located by calibration in terms of seconds. It must have seemed, to the 20ers, that here was a symbol of their control of the future.

(Encyclopedia Galactica, 44th edition, 2009)

1.1 Preview

Time travel begins here. You are about to read the first chapter of The Poetics of Science Fiction. Perhaps you will read the subsequent chapters in their numerical sequence. You might jump backwards to the contents page now and again; you will in all likelihood travel forward to the references and index at the end. You might skip a chapter altogether, or dip into the stream of words at a variety of different points. Sometimes you will skim over the text; sometimes you might read each part very carefully. You might spend an hour in the book, or a few minutes scattered throughout the rest of your life. You probably won’t read it through like a novel. That is not what it is. You think this first chapter was written first? You’d be wrong. Of course, you are the book’s engine: when you close it, it cannot go on without you. The words require a reader. Above all, ‘a book is a machine to think with’ (Richards 1924: i).

In the end, the history of your reading of the book is likely to be chaotic, but if it is to be of any use, your experience of the book will need to be organised in some way. Why are you reading it in the first place? That is your business. What is it for? That is the point of this chapter.

1.2 Poetics and Science Fiction

Firstly, science fiction. This is the most singly-identifiably popular genre of literature in the Western world: 10 per cent of all fiction sold in Britain is science fiction (Davies 1990: 2); 25 per cent of all the novels published in the US are science fiction (Pohl 1989: 53). It is largely a paperback phenomenon, which puts it into the hands of the literate masses. On the basis of box-office receipts, more people go to watch science fiction at the cinema than any other sort of film. Science fiction scenarios create a psychological reality for the flashing lights and sound-effects of most computer games. Modern design and architecture over the past forty years have been informed by science fictional speculation about the future. Its influence can be seen in children’s television programmes, games, toys and playground culture, in the corporate imagery of large companies, and in advertising and commercials for everything from cars to jeans, chocolate bars to toothpaste. Science fiction, since overtaking poetry in the 1930s, has been the most fruitful source of any area of writing in adding new words to the Oxford English Dictionary (Delany 1977: 142), and thus to the English language.

So science fiction matters because it is popular and it is influential. It is the language of science fiction that forms the object of study of this book. By this I mean the entire system of communication that underlies the experience of reading science fiction. The organisation and processing of language is central to an understanding of science fiction, whether it is being studied as part of literary criticism, cultural history, popular culture, social psychology, or futurology. It is inconceivable to me that anyone could write about literature without knowing about language. Though the writing is an artistic enterprise, the study of it is a modern science, and the science of linguistics is the best tool for the job.

In the dim distance you might be able to hear instant objections to these statements. Listen to them, since I would not like you to read this book unquestioningly. But here are some more assertions. Science is not the discovery of truths but the search for satisfactory provisional explanations and understanding. Many literary critics are ignorant of the natural workings of language, and behave as if criticism were an art form rather than a science. Modern linguistics is the systematic study of language, with sub-disciplines dealing with, among other things, language in context, language in the mind, literary organisation, and interpretation. A scientific poetics of literature, informed by modern linguistics, can do everything that literary criticism can do, with the advantage that it is rigorously analytical, differentiates between producing interpretations and reflecting on them, and is open to informed debate. Only some literary criticism is able to do all this.

There is no space or time here for a full defence of literary linguistics or cognitive poetics. These have been elegantly constructed by, for example, Leech and Short (1981), McCarthy and Carter (1994), Carter and Simpson (1989), Short (1989, 1996), Weber (1996) and Simpson (1997). This book is concerned with the reading of science fiction. This involves many different aspects and dimensions, each of which requires different approaches. Different chapters take a theme within the overall poetics of science fiction and pursue it in the discussion. The same piece of science fiction can look quite different depending on which level of analysis is applied to it. This is because a thorough poetics is not about accounting for the text on its own and fixing a description of it; it is about finding and exercising different fruitful ways of understanding how science fiction works as a reading experience. Literary linguistics is not dissection; it is yoga (Jeffries 1993: 2).

The book is a poetics of science fiction (rather than, say, ‘the language of science fiction’) because it is also about the reading experience. This term needs some definition here. By ‘poetics’ I mean the linguistic and cognitive organisation of the genre. Both of these levels are inextricably linked, though in the chapters of this book the focus moves from one to the other for analytical convenience. There are some stylistic analyses of particular passages from science fiction texts. But a thorough poetics must also account for what happens when readers encounter such texts, and this involves a discussion of cognition and interpretation. The interpretations presented in the book are, of course, my own, and different readers will produce different readings. The point of a systematic account of poetics, however, is that the linguistic and cognitive patterns and processes that lead to these different readings can all be specified and discussed explicitly.

The book is concerned with the textual organisation of particular science fictional works and their effects and interpretations. In order to be a work of general poetics rather than a series of anecdotes about dozens of individual readings, the aim in every discussion is to relate the specific things science fiction does to the generic things it is able to do. I also wanted to use ‘poetics’ in the title in order to suggest the everyday meaning of‘poetic’. Although this is not a term which is usually found close to the words ‘science fiction’, poetic expression within science fictional prose is certainly a feature of the genre that I have tried to exemplify throughout the book.

1.3 How To Read This Book

In its main emphasis, this is not an introductory book to either language study or literary linguistics. There are many excellent introductions available (including Haynes 1989; Short 1996; Kuiper and Allan 1996; Jackson and Stockwell 1996; Simpson 1997; and Toolan 1998). However, I have tried to explain uses of linguistic and technical terminology as they appear in the discussion. The index can also work as a glossary: it will take you to the places a term is used, and there you will find it used in context. In my teaching of students I have found this is the best way to introduce and understand new concepts, rather than filling out a detailed but decontextualised glossary.

The chapters of the book are arranged to reflect the different levels of analysis involved in the poetics of science fiction. Analysis at the ‘micro’ level is sometimes required to illustrate the precise detailed workings of texts. Then analysis at the ‘macro’ level is needed to demonstrate connections and show how the genre works in context, in history, and as a whole. These levels are only separated for analytical convenience, and as they are mutually and interactively dependent on each other, they are threaded through each other in the course of the book. There are two macrological chapters and one micrological chapter in the first half of the book, reflecting the emphasis on history, context and sub-genres. The second half of the book focuses more on the detailed cognitive mechanics of science fictional poetics, and so there is an emphasis on the micrological. Throughout the book, however, I try to make the connections between the different levels of analysis, in order to show that the distinction is an artifice and each involves the other. Cross- referencing is included to make this even more apparent, and I have not avoided repeating myself where I think this is more useful than making you jump back to previous discussions.

Some chapters have science fiction as the focus, with linguistics as the informing background. Others are concerned to develop an argument about an aspect of language, using science fiction to do so. Science fiction is particularly useful in this respect, since it is a type of literature that stretches linguistic frameworks which are usually developed in a natural language context. However, I have tried to include an element of both of these dimensions in every chapter. I intend this both as a linguistics book and as a contribution to literary criticism.

Without trying to be all things to all readers, I have tried to provide something of interest both for established researchers in the field of science fiction study and linguistics, as well as for students interested in science fiction and language, those for whom both science fiction and linguistics are new experiences, and the general reader. As a research tool for verification of my arguments, for further study, or simply for your own intellectual entertainment, each chapter includes sections entitled Speculations and Explorations.

In the spirit of science fiction, Speculations take some of the ideas under discussion and suggest lines of thought away from the direct focus at hand. Some of these speculations might be highly implausible or utterly wild, or might indicate paths that linguistic investigation could take if it did not have to be so rigorous. The purpose of these sections is simply to provoke your further thought. However, you could discuss these ideas and develop them into whole different areas which I have not foreseen. Since linguistics is being treated as a science in these pages, it is only appropriate that science fictional speculation is applied to it. Practice in this sort of experimental thinking is the first step in forming new ideas and insights, which can be verified by further study.

Explorations present points for discussion or thought, and activities to do or think about doing. They represent practice in the analysis of science fictional language, and take a more practically-based view of the thought-experiments used in Speculations. If you are using this book as part of a course or discussion-group, these sections will be useful starting points for debate, and every one of them has been used successfully in my own explorations of science fiction with students taking my seminars. They should not be treated, though, as mechanical exercises. Some of them would take years to answer comprehensively. The Explorations are guides to practical thinking, which you should take in whatever direction or detail you find interesting. All the bibliographical references for every text cited in the discussion or in the Explorations are collected together in Further Reading.

1.4 Prototypes of Science Fiction

Science fiction does not suffer from a lack of definitions. It is perhaps a manifestation of the scientific background of its writers, readers and critics that so many have felt the need to categorise it and pin it down with definitive statements. These have been descriptive, prescriptive, philosophical and logical, flippant and fatuous, detailed and circular. Science fiction has been called: a literary genre dealing with scientific discovery, superior or simply other than that known to exist (from the Encyclopedia Britannica in Jakubowski and Edwards 1983: 258); ‘the search for a definition of man and his status in the universe’ that is characteristically gothic (Aldiss and Wingrove 1986: 30); has been said to be based on ‘cognitive estrangement’ or the projection of literary defamiliarisation (Suvin 1979: 4). Writer Norman Spinrad defines it as ‘anything published as science fiction’ and Frederick Pohl as the ‘thing that people who understand science fiction point to when they point to something and say “That’s science fiction!” ’ (Jakubowski and Edwards 1983: 258). There are many other definitions.

The problem, of course, is that science fiction itself is very varied, and has changed over the 20th century. The more fundamental problem is that genre itself is not a thing which can be easily defined. ‘A “genre definition” is a wholly imaginary object of the same onto- logical status as unicorns’ (Delany 1989: 6, 9). Broderick (1995) has termed it a ‘mode’, borrowed by other genres. Recently, the discipline of cognitive linguistics has demonstrated that human categorisation itself does not seem to work on the classical pattern of discrete and uniquely identifiable groups. The notion of ‘prototype effects’ (Lakoff 1987; Rosch and Lloyd 1978) was developed to account for the vagueness at the edges of people’s category boundaries. It seems, for example, that rather than having a mental set of ‘fruit’, to which certain objects belong or not, our mental representations are in the form of a radial structure, determined largely by cultural conventions and language- dependent. Central to the ‘fruit’ domain are objects like ‘apple’, ‘orange’, ‘pear’, ‘banana’. Not so central are ‘plums’, ‘nectarines’, ‘mangoes’, for example. Peripheral fruit, for me at least, include ‘star-fruit’, ‘tomatoes’, and ‘dates’.

This means that there are good and bad, better and worse, examples of fruit (or any other domain: dogs, pieces of furniture, things to drink, shades of red, literature). It also follows that objects like ‘potato’, or ‘hazelnut’, or ‘rose’, or ‘chair’, or ‘spaceship’ are not simply ‘not-fruit’, but are just very bad examples of fruit. (You can test this by putting these last few objects in order of ‘fruitness’.)

This basic insight has obvious relevance for a genre definition. There are two points to note: determining the prototypical domain for a category is a matter of the perception of individuals; objects vary in their membership of categories along with differences across cultural groups. What this means for a definition of science fiction is that different readers will have different ideas of which texts count as science fiction. They will have different ideas of what criteria are more and less important in that decision. And their decisions will depend on how much experience they have of reading science fiction.

This can be demonstrated very easily by a small experiment I tried on a group of my own students. They were about to begin my science fiction course and I wanted to find out what they had been reading. I first asked them to score themselves out of 5, on a scale from reading nothing but science fiction to having read no science fiction at all. The distribution for this across the group was normal, with lots of 3s, fewer 2s and 4s, and a small number of Is and 5s. I then gave the students a sheet with fifty names of authors and books on (including Brian Aldiss, Superman, Stephen King, George Orwell, Enid Blyton, Dracula, H.G. Wells, and so on), and asked them to indicate which they associated with science fiction, which not, and which they didn’t know.

There were no ‘correct’ answers of course; I could have made an argument for every single one of the names on the list. What was most interesting was that a simple correlation emerged: the more science fiction the individual had read, the higher the number of items ticked as science fictional. In other words, the more you read science fiction, the more you are likely to read as science fiction. (Broderick (1995) claims that reading more makes you a better reader of science fiction. I would simply say that it mak...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Textual Explorations
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• Acknowledgements
• Chapter 1: Departures: Orientation and Maps
• Chapter 2: Macrological: Old Futures
• Chapter 3: Micrological: Futureplay
• Chapter 4: Macrological: Outer Space
• Chapter 5: Centrepoint: Retrospective/Prospective
• Chapter 6: Micrological: New Words
• Chapter 7: Macrological: New Worlds
• Chapter 8: Micrological: Poetic Planes
• Chapter 9: Arrivals: The Ends of the Earth
• References
• Index