lah%ucbmiro@Berkeley (07/19/85)
From: lah%ucbmiro@Berkeley (1st Lt. RYN Leigh Ann Hussey) Maybe I need to clarify myself. When I spoke of the obvious absence of the arts in SF, I was thinking specifically of the classic "Joe American has a problem with aliens (or whatever) and uses something that only humans can appreciate (only occasionally intelligence, more often intuition or emotion, or some other particularly human quality) to thwart his enemy and/or solve his problem." Whatever folks may say about the SF elements of Pern, the Harper Hall trilogy has never seemed like SF to me. Granted, some stories really are borderline, but I draw a line nonetheless between SF and Fantasy. I was speaking of this subject with a friend of mine, and he said, "But if it has music (or whatever) in it, it's not HARD Science." Hm. It's possible that because there seem to be no strict scientific elements in the arts (or so one might perceive), there can be no hard SF stories having the arts as significant elements. But what about the physics of sound in music? Kinetic energy in dance? Other suggestions? (I've already had it suggested to me that since I'm both an author and a musician *I* should write the kind of story I'd like to see, so no repeats thereof are necessary. Perhaps I will...) Since my last posting, I've read a story that comes close to my idea. It's reassuring anyway. It's called "Tin Ear", in Spider Robinson's Antimony. Judging from all the notice he's been getting in the letters on this subject, it seems like he's seen the lack also and is doing something about it... Leigh Ann