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Back in 1941, Robert A. Heinlein proposed the initials “SF,” which at the time was a common abbreviation for “science fiction.” But he had another idea. He felt it should stand for the broader term “speculative fiction.” To this day, there are passionate debates about which term to use.

Is is all semantics? Here’s what I think.

Science fiction is a subset of speculative fiction, which also includes fantasy, magic realism and sometimes even horror. Speculative fiction encompasses all fiction that speculates on something that isn’t accepted as fact today (an outpost on Mars, sorcery, magical coincidence, ghosts, etc.) and treats it as a fact within the story.

Science fiction is more specific. It is a fiction that speculates on scientific concepts and theories, or at least pretends to. There is a fuzzy line there. The Barsoom novels are kind of science fiction, but are also purely fantasy (I mean really, a placental human successfully mates with a monotreme Martian?).

Now, just to let you know where I’m coming from, I tend to be a very tolerant, easy going person. I don’t like fighting and tend to find common ground when I can. Maybe that’s why I just don’t see what all the fuss over “science fiction” vs. “speculative fiction” is all about. I think they can coexist peacefully. What do you think?

Once upon a time — it was 1866 — Jules Verne wrote an adventure story in which a group of Americans build a large cannon to shoot the first men to the Moon.

Later, Sir Isaac Newton developed a thought experiment that placed a cannon on a very high mountain that, with the right amount of gun powder, was able to shoot a canon into orbit.

To some degree, this is how we launch space vehicles. But not really.

Now, according to Bart Leahy, a group of graduate students and academics hopes to launch low-cost satellites into orbit using a concept similar to that of Verne.

Read more in The Space Review.

Science fiction, unlike so many other genres of literature, has a unique culture. And so, it is not difficult to find opinion pieces and essays about the state of the genre. Once recent example is “The future of futurism” by Amy Biancolli of the Houston Chronicle. Read more »

In The Road to Science Fiction: From Gilgamesh to Wells, James Gunn put forth the idea that the Industrial Revolution sparked the change that needed to happen before science fiction could become a true genre. He wrote that people

“had to adopt an open mind about the nature of the universe — its beginning and its end — and the fate of man …. People also had to discover the future. As long as the future was merely the place where today’s activities went on in some eternal cycle, perhaps even spiraling downward from some earlier golden age, a fiction about the future was meaningless.” (pg. 3)

Read more »

John Joseph Adams of Sci Fi Weekly recently reported that Paizo Publishing has launched a new imprint, Planet Stories, to bring classic fantasy and science fiction adventure stories to a new generation of readers.

“Essays on the history of the genre are filled with references to people like Leigh Brackett, C.L. Moore and Henry Kuttner,” Erik Mona of Paizo Publishing told Adams, “but finding their work in print is virtually impossible, and it’s got nothing to do with the quality of the stories themselves.” Read more »

This essay was an assignment for my “Science Fiction and American Culture” class.

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Science and technology are mirrors in which humankind can see who they are, what they want to be and what they are afraid of. In novels, movies and on television, popular culture explores these possibilities through works of fiction and horror. Sherry Turkle, in her book The Second Self, said, “We search for a link between who we are and what we have made, between who we are and what we might create, between who we are and what, through our intimacy with our own creations, we might become.” Science fiction films and novels explore the possibilities and implications that our science and technology may have for us.In the 1800’s, Mary Shelly told the tale of a scientist who created life from death and then in fear and revulsion of his creation fled. The monster he created, a child of Dr. Frankenstein’s intellect, used all manners of persuasion to gain parental attention. Frankenstein is a story about what humankind is as seen through the eyes of a human creation.

Other works have explored this same idea. With the passing of time and the increase in our technology’s capabilities the “Frankenstein’s monsters” of today have become more machine than human. In the movie Demon Seed, a computer takes control over a woman’s life in order to reproduce. In The Lawnmower Man, a machine distorts a man’s mind until he becomes one with the machine. In the Terminator movies, a computer takes over the world and attempts to eradicate humankind altogether.

Many works of science fiction explore how, in our quest, to be free of the mundane things in life, we might bring our own downfall. In 1964, a Twilight Zone episode told the tale of a factory that transferred control over to a computer (”The Brain Center at Whipple’s”). It illustrated how science and technology can dehumanize life.

In the movie War Games, directed by John Badham, a similar scenario is played out. Professor Faulken creates a computer that can learn from its mistakes. The computer is childlike. In a way, this echoes Frankenstein.

When Lightman, the main character, contacts it by using Dr. Faulken’s code, it responds with what seems like happiness at talking with its father. When asked, “Is this a game or is this real?” it answers, “What is the difference?” It hasn’t learned the difference. The climax of the movie centers on the computer’s struggle to learn. If it does not learn the futility of global thermonuclear war, humankind will die at its “hands.”

In less technological times, the fear of the future was manifested in literature as the coming of the antichrist, the monster with seven heads or other terrible creatures. Now we have the computer and the implications for its use.

Today our monsters are robots from the future, our own willingness to relinquish control to a machine, and the dangers of the environments that our technology can take us to. Popular culture manifests our hopes and fears of the future in literature, film and television. Visions of the future can be hopeful (Star Trek), wary (War Games) or Armageddon (The Terminator), although it has been my experience that the negative visions out number the positive ones.

Fear is a common reaction to something new. Science and technology are bringing in new things at such a pace that it can be overwhelming. I think this is the reason that there are more visions of what we fear in science and technology than there are of what we can be and what we can accomplish.

The following essay was a paper I wrote for a class I took called “Science Fiction and American Culture.” It compares Harry Bates’ short story “Farewell to the Master” to the movie based on it, The Day the Earth Stood Still.

“Farewell to the Master” first appeared in the October 1940 issue of Astounding Stories. You can find a copy of it online at The Nostalgia League’s website.

The Day the Earth Stood Still was directed by Robert Wise and released in 1951, starring Michael Rennie and Patricia Neal. You can find more information at IMDB. If you would like to purchase a copy of this movie on DVD, click here to go to Amazon.com.

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Translating the printed word into a visual medium is not always easy. Oftentimes, films based on short stories or novels turn out pretty bad, especially in comparison to the original work (Clan of the Cave Bear and Dune are two that come to mind.) Often what can be written down and be exciting to read becomes boring and dull when placed on the silver screen. Changes have to be made for the story to be entertaining visually. I think The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951) was a succesful translation of Harry Bates short story, “Farewell to the Master.” What follows is my reasoning.For me the key points in both the movie and the film were: the robot, the spaceship, and Washington, DC.

The Robot

The robot played a much more important role in the short story than it did in the film. In both the short story and the film it was a symbol of raw, unadulterated, and incomprehensible power. In an effort to render Gnut harmless, the scientists in the short story “sent electrical currents of tremendous voltages and amperages through him. They applied terrific heat to all parts of his metal shell. They immersed him for days in gases and acids and strongly corroding solutions, and they … bombarded him with every known kind of ray.” In the movie this wasn’t done, but in both, the robot was encased in a clear block of solid plastic or glass-like material. And in both the short story and the film, the robot broke free of this prison.

The robot’s name changed from story to film, I think, was a good move. When I read the word “Gnut” I get a different image than if I just heard it. In the movie, “Gnut” would have sounded more like “newt,” which doesn’t imply the same sense of the unknown. “Gort” was appropriate because there is not a common word, “gort,” that means something in English. It sounds alien.

The Spaceship

The spaceship in the film was much how I imagined it when I read the story. It was smooth and sleek. It looked like flying saucers are purported to look. “No slightest break or crack marred the perfect smoothness of the ship’s curving ovoid surface,” wrote Bates. The spaceship in the movie was similar, as Sobchack (1987) describes, “treated as a thing of beauty, the … flying saucer … is so pure in line, so ascetically designed … that it concretizes the Platonic virtues of clarity, sanity, reason — virtues sadly lacking in the Washington, D.C., mise en scene in which the saucer comes to rest.” (p. 77.)

Washington, D.C.

The mise en scene, so to speak, for the short story was more the Smithsonian museum than Washington, D.C. However, in both versions, the importance of the place is not necessarily as important as what those places represent. Washington, D.C. is a place where the primary government of a major world power rests. It is a town that is relatively easy to get around in, it has a lair where the primary government of a major world power rests. It seems a logical place for an alien to land. It also has a large press population, and can be considered the seat of American patriotism.

In the story, these aspects of locale took more of a back seat than in the film. In the film, Arlington Cemetery was an important symbol of humankind’s petty wars. The “great words” of Lincoln served as a catalyst to spur Klaatu on to his next contact, Dr. Bernhardt. It would be difficult to find such commonly known symbols in any other town.

What the Printed Word Can Do that Film Can’t

“Bates’ story is a hoary piece of work when read today and Edmund H. North’s screenplay was a great improvement on it.” (Brosnan, 1978, p. 85.) I disagree with this statement. I found the story to be quite riveting and tense. I wanted to keep reading. I felt the fear that Cliff felt, as well as his curiosity. However, I also agree that the screenplay was an improvement for the screen. Bates’ story, as written, would have been a boring movie. The tension was more psychological than visual. It would have been very difficult to get the same emotional impact on screen as there was in the written story.

What Film Can Do that the Printed Word Can’t

I also disagree with Brosnan’s comment about the interior of the ship: “though its interior was a disappointment and showing it destroyed the essential mystery of the craft.” (p. 84.) I thought the use of lighting (compounded by the moody music by Bernard Herman) was quite effective. It adequately gave the impression of sterile science, of the frightening unknown, and of mysterious, alien origin.

Sound is an added effect available to film that the printed work cannot imitate. The music track for this movie was very effective — if not a bit too loud at times. It set the mood of the movie as a whole, as well as for each scene. It made benign images seem terrifying.

Conclusion

What impressed me the most about both the story and the movie was the concept of the robot. In the short story, Gnut was another race. He was another form of life incomprehensible to people with carbon-based biases. He was the “master” in the sense that he was more technologically, and maybe even emotionally, evolved than Klaatu. The story implied, for me, that Klaatu was like a beloved pet. Gnut’s efforts to bring Klaatu back were reminiscent of those many times when I rushed my pet rat to the veterinarian because she was ill. My pet was a life dependent on me and I felt responsible for her. I imagine that Gnut felt the same way about Klaatu, that Gnut felt guilty of putting Klaatu in a situation where he was unable to protect him.

I disagree that this story, and the film as well, was pessimistic; that it portrayed a “brave new world run by robots,” as Healy and McComas (1945) suggested. Brosnan (1978) said that “the idea of placing our basic human rights in the custody of a machine, or any ’superior force’, is not only an admission of defeat but also one which smacks of totalitarianism.” (p. 84.) I think they missed the point. In the story, Gnut was another form of life. Nowhere in the story does Klaatu say that Gnut was manufactured. However, in the movie, Klaatu does say that Gort was made — but to free them. To say that relegating police authority to robots is like acquiescing to totalitarianism is like saying the mechanization of production is also that. Humanity has always sought for easier and faster ways to do things, thus freeing up more time for leisure. Since crime threatens leisure time, as well as other things, it makes sense to mechanize a method for preventing it as well.