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Fantasy Commentator, v. 1, issue 7, Summer 1945
Page 147
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FANTASY COMMENTATOR 147 By-Products by Malcolm Jameson Before putting my oar into the controversy of whether science-fiction is recreational or educational, I want to make it plain at the outset that my views are strictly personal ones and that some of them are by no means original. Frankly, I side wholeheartedly with most fantasy authors in thinking that science-fiction is escapist literature and is written primarily to entertain. I also endorse their denial that it is basically educational, for along with sound scientific facts it also includes a vast quantity of distortions of misinformation. And to separate fact from fantasy presupposes a considerable technical education and a discriminating mind. On the other hand, some fantasy fans, in sticking to their belief that science-fiction is educational (if they indeed mean what I think they do) are right also---but in another sense. My reason for qualifying that agreement is that they seem to me to flounder a bit in their arguments, and to say things they don't truly mean. For example, to quote a fan's opinion I chanced upon in print a while ago: ...there never has been a good science-fiction story written but what the author thought the idea was probable... Probable is a fairly strong word. That lets out Wells' Food of the Gods, The Invisible Man, The Time Machine, "The New Accelerator"---virtually all of them, as I don't for a moment believe that Wells thought those stunts were even possible, let alone probable. He was simply playing with free fancy, based on a big "if," and the fascinating quality of those stories lies in the thoughtful and logical treatment of the implications growing out of an "if" turned into an "is". However, it is not my purpose to quibble over any possibly ambiguous statements. Nor have I any desire to demolish this fan's position, for in the main I think it sound. I have the feeling that he regards these stories much as do I; and since I know how I regard them, I'll go ahead and talk from that point of view. We needn't waste words discussing why science-fiction is written. I believe it to be generally conceded that it is written to entertain, and certainly it is read for that purpose. Who would read fiction that didn't entertain? I think it's also accepted that no important research or inventions have sprung from it. But, some have asserted that since it is science-fiction, each story is necessarily based on a sound scientific fact, and that therein lies its educational value. Well, let's look at some of those "scientific" ideas. The bulk of them consist of deliberate perversions of some known law of nature---such as the themes of the Wellsian tales referred to---or else they are unwarranted extrapolations of a curve which frequently lead to absurdity. Many stories start off with a cockeyed state of affairs, intriguing and mystifying, and after awhile the writer explains and justifies it all by a more or less plausible mumbo-jumbo of quasi-scientific reasoning. Or often---far too often---he simply gestures carelessly toward "a bewildering array of apparatus, bathed in coruscating, lambent flame" and lets it go at that. Can the frenzied fan or any non-psychotic reproduce that apparatus? He cannot. Not now or ever. The chances are that the main tube is powered by a most delightful chemical element found only in the thymus gland of the rare Tuxajarkus---which is the scourge of the fifth planet of Sirius, and got to Earth by the laborious process of warping itself through a couple of higher dimensions.
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FANTASY COMMENTATOR 147 By-Products by Malcolm Jameson Before putting my oar into the controversy of whether science-fiction is recreational or educational, I want to make it plain at the outset that my views are strictly personal ones and that some of them are by no means original. Frankly, I side wholeheartedly with most fantasy authors in thinking that science-fiction is escapist literature and is written primarily to entertain. I also endorse their denial that it is basically educational, for along with sound scientific facts it also includes a vast quantity of distortions of misinformation. And to separate fact from fantasy presupposes a considerable technical education and a discriminating mind. On the other hand, some fantasy fans, in sticking to their belief that science-fiction is educational (if they indeed mean what I think they do) are right also---but in another sense. My reason for qualifying that agreement is that they seem to me to flounder a bit in their arguments, and to say things they don't truly mean. For example, to quote a fan's opinion I chanced upon in print a while ago: ...there never has been a good science-fiction story written but what the author thought the idea was probable... Probable is a fairly strong word. That lets out Wells' Food of the Gods, The Invisible Man, The Time Machine, "The New Accelerator"---virtually all of them, as I don't for a moment believe that Wells thought those stunts were even possible, let alone probable. He was simply playing with free fancy, based on a big "if," and the fascinating quality of those stories lies in the thoughtful and logical treatment of the implications growing out of an "if" turned into an "is". However, it is not my purpose to quibble over any possibly ambiguous statements. Nor have I any desire to demolish this fan's position, for in the main I think it sound. I have the feeling that he regards these stories much as do I; and since I know how I regard them, I'll go ahead and talk from that point of view. We needn't waste words discussing why science-fiction is written. I believe it to be generally conceded that it is written to entertain, and certainly it is read for that purpose. Who would read fiction that didn't entertain? I think it's also accepted that no important research or inventions have sprung from it. But, some have asserted that since it is science-fiction, each story is necessarily based on a sound scientific fact, and that therein lies its educational value. Well, let's look at some of those "scientific" ideas. The bulk of them consist of deliberate perversions of some known law of nature---such as the themes of the Wellsian tales referred to---or else they are unwarranted extrapolations of a curve which frequently lead to absurdity. Many stories start off with a cockeyed state of affairs, intriguing and mystifying, and after awhile the writer explains and justifies it all by a more or less plausible mumbo-jumbo of quasi-scientific reasoning. Or often---far too often---he simply gestures carelessly toward "a bewildering array of apparatus, bathed in coruscating, lambent flame" and lets it go at that. Can the frenzied fan or any non-psychotic reproduce that apparatus? He cannot. Not now or ever. The chances are that the main tube is powered by a most delightful chemical element found only in the thymus gland of the rare Tuxajarkus---which is the scourge of the fifth planet of Sirius, and got to Earth by the laborious process of warping itself through a couple of higher dimensions.
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