Last week, one of the great pioneers of science-fiction literature, Ray Bradbury, passed away during a rare transit of Venus. Bradbury should be considered as one of the three A-B-C leaders of science fiction, along with Isaac Asimov and Arthur C. Clarke. Ray Bradbury had been the last of the three to survive.
Science fiction as we know it today is far different from the stories of Asimov, Bradbury, and Clarke, who were writing from under the shadow of the newly-split atom. Their fiction was about possibilities and predictions. Bradbury in particular, I would classify as a social science fiction author. His work often detailed the humanistic side of science and technology, the effect that our science has on our social structure. This is different from the so-called "hard" science fiction of Asimov's clank-clunk robot stories, or the cold, distant strangeness of outer space as envisioned by Clarke.
The death of Ray Bradbury signals the end of science fiction. What we are left with is a shambling computer-enhanced mass of rebooted superhero legends, self-referential zombie tales, ultra-predictable space opera, and above all else product placement. Instead of championing ideas, science fiction has become just another mass-media market driver. Instead of envisioneering new ideas for society to consider, science fiction simply polls the readership and supplies whatever is in greatest demand, usually with some kind of commercial tie-in to a new smart phone, computer pad, or other flavour-of-the-week electronic device.
Yes, science fiction has to be commercial to make a decent profit. Ridley Scott made great efforts to tie Prometheus (2012) to his Alien (1979) movie mythos, but only because he knew that would fill theatre seats with patrons. Did the tie-in help the storytelling, or just the bottom line? Does science fiction need a Blade Runner (1982) sequel, or does the movie studio?
Another difference is that science fiction fans now have money, and that they have become the resource that drives the industry. Fans mean more to publishers, distributors, and developers than talent. If you can generate a fan base, then your idea is sellable regardless of any real merit. Of course, I can make this claim quite freely. I get to publish whatever I want on JSVB, but I only have five followers and I almost never get paid. Naturally, I consider my own stuff to have tons of merit because I haven't sold out... yet.
Not long before he died, Ray Bradbury and a reporter annoyed one another with an exchange that went something like this:
REPORTER: Mr. Bradbury, in your work you predicted the cel phone, big-screen 3D TV, medical scanners, hand-held computers, and the Internet. You must be very proud of that.
RB: You don't understand. I wasn't trying to predict the future, I was trying to prevent it!
Bradbury, coming from an impoverished background, felt very keenly about the dehumanizing role of technology in post-modern society. In his most celebrated novel, Fahrenheit 451 (1953), books are burned because their information conflicts with the rule of the State, who consider their population easier to control through television and other electronic social media. At the conclusion, the protagonist discovers an enclave who have survived the violent purges of the totalitarian government. It's a human library, where each individual has memorized a book, and "becomes" it. It's a last-ditch effort to preserve human ideals from the crucible of social oligarchy, and from the dehumanizing force of electronic standardization.
Interesting, then, that today Fahrenheit 451 is the only book in the entire Simon & Schuster publications catalogue that can be freely downloaded onto an e-book by library patrons. I checked: S&S has currently 12,481 e-books. A mere 0.08th of 1% of those e-books are free for you to loan at your local library. Way to understand irony, S&S!
"I wasn't trying to predict the future, I was trying to prevent it!"
(photo by Alan Light, used by permission under Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic License)
Posts
