donn (09/05/82)
Re: Arlan Andrews (inuxd.13[567]), mike knudsen (ihnss.138)
This blather reminds me of my undergraduate days. I used to tease one poor
fellow who was an ardent 'hard' SF fan. He worked at a computer installation
on campus, and as a CS student who was constantly working at one terminal or
another I managed to tangle with him quite frequently. Unfortunately he was a
caricature science undergraduate, characterized by white short-sleeved shirts,
dark slacks, white undershirt, black plastic-rimmed glasses, pocket full of
pens, pimples etc. (At one point in life this would have characterized me
too, but I had already begun the slow metamorphosis to stereotype California
hacker. Now I only have the pimples.) The temptation to rile him was irresis-
tible, especially since he was implacably serious on the subject of SF. Hein-
lein, he would insist; Heinlein is the foundation of the field. How silly, I
would reply: clearly Philip Dick is kilometers ahead of all other SF writers
and always has been. I could see the blood in his eye as he throttled his
impatience and tried to explain just why Heinlein had improved the lives of
generations while Dick was drugged-out, insignificant trash. This kind of
debate could proceed for hours until I got tired of it. The clincher of
course came when I asked him what Heinlein he enjoyed: Is your favorite
STRANGER IN A STRANGE LAND? No? How about I WILL FEAR NO EVIL? THE MOON IS
A HARSH MISTRESS? Maybe. THE PAST THROUGH TOMORROW? GLORY ROAD? Well...
STARSHIP TROOPERS? Oh, liked that one! But those first few probably sold
more than everything else of his put together. How can you like Heinlein and
not like his most popular works? -- Well, everybody knows Heinlein has pub-
lished nothing but crap since 1960...
What a revelation!
The notion that any of the material written by Larry Niven or Niven/Pournelle
(Nivelle?) has by itself spurred children on to careers in science is so silly
it doesn't really bear consideration. There is very little real science in
most of it, and not infrequently what there is in it is wrong -- I believe
Carl Sagan said once that the latter was the reason why he never reads science
fiction unless it's forced on him; NEUTRON STAR in particular quite disap-
pointed him. (I'm afraid Carl takes the science in SF much too seriously if
this is really why he dislikes it.) (I'm also afraid Carl was spitting on the
sidewalk when he made his complaint: he apparently has a very lucrative con-
tract for a new SF novel.) The SF Larry writes maps so easily to fantasy that
I wasn't at all surprised that he has done well at the latter recently.
Now lest it appear that what I have been saying about Heinlein, Niven, and
Pournelle is criticism and that I despise these writers, I admit quite
forthrightly that I enjoy them immensely and read just about everything they
write (although I haven't felt up to THE NUMBER OF THE BEAST yet -- sorry,
gang). But I don't read them for their science; I read them because I enjoy
them. As I enjoy Dick, Tolkien and lots of other writers, both F & SF types.
[May I interject with a pet peeve here? Thank you. Some people seem to be
under the misconception that Tolkien was "anti-intelectual" [sic?] and was
associated with those crazy drugged-up, long-haired anti-nuke hippies. Noth-
ing could be further than the truth, for Tolkien was a professor of linguis-
tics and medieval literature and an incredible pedant whose principal vice was
the writing of fantasy. THE LORD OF THE RINGS was in fact completed in the
50s, long before there were any hippies, and Tolkien was writing the stuff as
far back as 1918 while on duty in the Great War. Where was Heinlein in 1918?]
But if I don't read SF for the science, what the heck do I read it for, you
may ask. I have come to the conclusion that it must be because of the imagi-
nation. I hate drab prose, but I hate drab thinking even more, and there's
just so much of it in "mainstream" literature that for me it's godawful boring
way too often. On the other hand, if there's "too much" imagination then I
can't understand it and it's boring again. This last circumstance is much
rarer than the first, of course. The "science" frequently helps because I can
imagine the situations much more vividly, and also I get loads more fun out of
trying to unravel novel scientific dilemmas than unravelling familiar politi-
cal or romantic dilemmas. But I don't (usually) make the mistake of treating
the "science" as the real thing. It's the exercise of the imagination on a
broad and grand scale that appeals to me. I can't believe I entered science
because of science fiction; the reverse seems much more likely, and now that
I'm here I must say I like both of them. Sigh. End of flame.
Donn Seeley UCSD Chemistry Dept. RRCF ucbvax!sdcsvax!sdchema!donn