Genre Wars
Mar. 19th, 2011 12:07 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
matrilToday's rant...er, post...isn't as personal as the last, though I tend to take it personally, like most things I care about. (Because I'm insane, you see.) This one was triggered a few days ago during my break at work, when I was taking advantage of my meager fifteen minutes to read a little as well as scarf down my sandwich. The other person in the break room asked what sort of book I was reading, with the preface that his other job is at a bookstore. (Because otherwise, why would he care, right?) "Young Adult Fantasy," I answered. "Oh, Science Fiction." "No, fantasy." "Okay, Science Fiction."
ARGH. I know that at the bottom of it all, they're just words, and how it's categorized doesn't affect my enjoyment. I also know that for someone who doesn't care for either genre, as this fellow obviously doesn't, the distinction is irrelevant. Bookstores tend to lump them together under "Science Fiction" or maybe, if you're lucky "Science Fiction/Fantasy." I'd like see someone use the broader, more accurate term of "Speculative Fiction," but that's probably asking too much. *Sighs at the memory of the ALL Science Fiction/Fantasy bookstore that used to be in Harvard Square, and is alas no more*
So why does it matter to me? There's a couple of reasons. First of, lumping them all together tends to be done with the implication of "they're all less valid than realism/literary fiction/whatever genre they consider superior." It's all about stuff that couldn't really happen, whether it's magic or super-advanced technology or aliens or elves or whatever. (This criticism tends to be heaviest on fantasy, since magic could never happen, while some science fiction scenarios could hypothetically happen perhaps someday maybe...as if it were ever a science fiction writer's job or aspiration to accurately predict the future!)To that I say, All fiction is fabrication. None of it happened. It's all equally non-real. Oh, sure, some of it is inspired by real events, based on something in history, drawn from personal experience - so what? All of it requires the use of imagination, the willful suspension of disbelief - and honestly, I've found that when you know it's entirely fabricated, it's easier to accept the story rather than getting caught in details and wondering "but did this part really happen? Is this plausible?" (Non-fiction is another matter entirely; it serves different purposes and should be judged by different parameters.)
Yes, I prefer speculative fiction to other genres. I like metaphor; I like layers of meaning. And I feel there's more freedom for that when you're not constricted by having to create a reasonable facsimile of our reality. A reality, yes, definitely. Just not the one we know. And that's what makes it great. It's not just a high-minded preference, I admit. There's the simple enjoyment of pure escapism. But I've found the really thoughtful speculative fiction can have both a broader and a deeper scope than the average realist fiction. Upon a re-read of one of my favorite fantasy series(es?), I found I was identifying with the heroine's loss of something she valued as a metaphor for how I was dealing with Luke's diagnosis of autism. I'm pretty darn sure the author hadn't anything like that in mind when she wrote it (though she does, interestingly enough, have an autistic son herself) but it worked for me, because the potential for varied interpretations was inherent there. I know it doesn't work for everyone; I know that plenty of speculative fiction is just that, escapist fluff, but it's always been my favorite literary place to visit.
Now, as for the distinction between science fiction and fantasy - why does it matter? Well, why don't we see it with other genres? Why don't people regularly conflate horror and fantasy, or science fiction and paranormal? And why does the lumping always seem to indicate that fantasy is kind of the deformed, less-valid cousin of science fiction? Genre lines can be blurred, of course, and it's always fun to see a clever blending of two genres, but the blending and blurring is only interesting because those distinctions exist in the first place. They aren't the same thing. And the differences between them affect the sort of roles they play. Science fiction, in its projected view of future technology, societies, governments or explorations, is a great vehicle for social commentary, for examining relationships between people, between people and technology/science, for exploring the pursuit of knowledge or societal improvement, and the dark sides of such pursuits. Fantasy, meanwhile, with its focus on magic and the mystical, tends to have a more moral/religious bent. The abundance of prophecies, heroes and gods allows us to explore issues of free will versus destiny, the role of humans in the universe, the nature of good and evil. And that's why, much as I love both genres, I lean heavily toward fantasy. It's always sticky to examine morality and religion in a real world context, but once you move it to a secondary world, well, just about anything goes.
So, though I didn't want to waste my breath and time on an explanation to the man in the break room, no, I'm not reading science fiction. There's magic and gods and sword-fights and castles. It's fantasy, and it's awesome.
ARGH. I know that at the bottom of it all, they're just words, and how it's categorized doesn't affect my enjoyment. I also know that for someone who doesn't care for either genre, as this fellow obviously doesn't, the distinction is irrelevant. Bookstores tend to lump them together under "Science Fiction" or maybe, if you're lucky "Science Fiction/Fantasy." I'd like see someone use the broader, more accurate term of "Speculative Fiction," but that's probably asking too much. *Sighs at the memory of the ALL Science Fiction/Fantasy bookstore that used to be in Harvard Square, and is alas no more*
So why does it matter to me? There's a couple of reasons. First of, lumping them all together tends to be done with the implication of "they're all less valid than realism/literary fiction/whatever genre they consider superior." It's all about stuff that couldn't really happen, whether it's magic or super-advanced technology or aliens or elves or whatever. (This criticism tends to be heaviest on fantasy, since magic could never happen, while some science fiction scenarios could hypothetically happen perhaps someday maybe...as if it were ever a science fiction writer's job or aspiration to accurately predict the future!)To that I say, All fiction is fabrication. None of it happened. It's all equally non-real. Oh, sure, some of it is inspired by real events, based on something in history, drawn from personal experience - so what? All of it requires the use of imagination, the willful suspension of disbelief - and honestly, I've found that when you know it's entirely fabricated, it's easier to accept the story rather than getting caught in details and wondering "but did this part really happen? Is this plausible?" (Non-fiction is another matter entirely; it serves different purposes and should be judged by different parameters.)
Yes, I prefer speculative fiction to other genres. I like metaphor; I like layers of meaning. And I feel there's more freedom for that when you're not constricted by having to create a reasonable facsimile of our reality. A reality, yes, definitely. Just not the one we know. And that's what makes it great. It's not just a high-minded preference, I admit. There's the simple enjoyment of pure escapism. But I've found the really thoughtful speculative fiction can have both a broader and a deeper scope than the average realist fiction. Upon a re-read of one of my favorite fantasy series(es?), I found I was identifying with the heroine's loss of something she valued as a metaphor for how I was dealing with Luke's diagnosis of autism. I'm pretty darn sure the author hadn't anything like that in mind when she wrote it (though she does, interestingly enough, have an autistic son herself) but it worked for me, because the potential for varied interpretations was inherent there. I know it doesn't work for everyone; I know that plenty of speculative fiction is just that, escapist fluff, but it's always been my favorite literary place to visit.
Now, as for the distinction between science fiction and fantasy - why does it matter? Well, why don't we see it with other genres? Why don't people regularly conflate horror and fantasy, or science fiction and paranormal? And why does the lumping always seem to indicate that fantasy is kind of the deformed, less-valid cousin of science fiction? Genre lines can be blurred, of course, and it's always fun to see a clever blending of two genres, but the blending and blurring is only interesting because those distinctions exist in the first place. They aren't the same thing. And the differences between them affect the sort of roles they play. Science fiction, in its projected view of future technology, societies, governments or explorations, is a great vehicle for social commentary, for examining relationships between people, between people and technology/science, for exploring the pursuit of knowledge or societal improvement, and the dark sides of such pursuits. Fantasy, meanwhile, with its focus on magic and the mystical, tends to have a more moral/religious bent. The abundance of prophecies, heroes and gods allows us to explore issues of free will versus destiny, the role of humans in the universe, the nature of good and evil. And that's why, much as I love both genres, I lean heavily toward fantasy. It's always sticky to examine morality and religion in a real world context, but once you move it to a secondary world, well, just about anything goes.
So, though I didn't want to waste my breath and time on an explanation to the man in the break room, no, I'm not reading science fiction. There's magic and gods and sword-fights and castles. It's fantasy, and it's awesome.
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no subject
Date: 2011-03-19 10:33 pm (UTC)A part of me does want to identify with science fiction more than fantasy, but that just might be a matter of not wanting to live without electric lighting and indoor plumbing. At the same time, I think I've realigned myself over the years to viewing Star Wars in particular from a more "moral/religious bent," as you put it; I have the suspicion that the kind of machinery-focused approach I viewed it with in the 1990s might help feed dissatisfaction with the core of the story.
no subject
Date: 2011-03-20 12:41 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-20 12:16 am (UTC)As for why they're classified separately from "literary" fiction, God knows. I'm sure originally it was just so people could find more of the same quicker, but I think unfortunately it's created a sort of browsing gap (my God, that sounds pretentious!) where someone browsing lit fic won't accidentally pick up and get intrigued by an SF book, and vice versa. At least, not by one that's classified as such - there's plenty of literary fiction that has fantasy or SF elements, but somehow it gets classified as literary all the same. Maybe you have to have that workshop writing style to be really literary :). I admit I've sometimes wondered what would happen if you marketed, say, Robert Jordan with a Deep Serious Literary Cover (you know, desaturated cover photo of someone's eye with perhaps a bit of green veiling fluttering nearby) and, let's say, Borges with a mass-market fantasy paperback, complete with irrelevant-to-the-story blonde on the cover. I wonder how many people might end up enjoying something they might not have touched otherwise :).
no subject
Date: 2011-03-20 12:49 am (UTC)Exactly! Do people really imagine that science fiction is immune to the inconsistencies and lousy world-building that crop up so much in fantasy? Lousy world-building can show up in the most mundane of genres, and the most wildly speculative worlds can be intricately, almost flawlessly delineated as well as any real world scenario. It's all about the author's commitment to consistency. And if they're inventing something entirely from scratch, they deserve that much more credit. (Myself...well, my muse seems determined to point me toward adapting fairy tales, one after another. So much for stories built from scratch. ;)
Genre divisions can be quite helpful - after all, I know where to go in a bookstore for my preferred reading, and it's not the "literature" section. But it is a bit of shame that such divisions prevent the serendipitous finds outside of one's usual genres. And book covers...oh, I could go on and on about book covers. Like those reissued classics done up to look like a certain YA paranormal romance series....Can such changes really carry a reader through the entire book, or do they realize early on that they've been duped and this is not the book they were expecting? Heh. I'd like to see someone do a study on that.