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Science Fiction

Science fiction includes such a wide range of themes and sub-genres that it is notoriously difficult to define. This is a list of definitions that have been offered by authors, editors, critics and fans over the years since science fiction became clearly separate from other genres. Definitions of related terms such as "science fantasy",...more »

Science fiction includes such a wide range of themes and sub-genres that it is notoriously difficult to define. This is a list of definitions that have been offered by authors, editors, critics and fans over the years since science fiction became clearly separate from other genres. Definitions of related terms such as "science fantasy", "speculative fiction", and "fabulation" are included where they are intended as definitions of aspects of science fiction or because they illuminate related definitions — see e.g. Robert Scholes's definitions of "fabulation" and "structural fabulation" below. Some definitions of sub-types of science fiction are included, too; for example see David Ketterer's definition of "philosophically oriented science fiction". In addition, some definitions are included that define, for example, a science fiction story, rather than science fiction itself, since these also illuminate an underlying definition of science fiction.

The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction, edited by John Clute and Peter Nicholls, contains an extensive discussion of the problem of definition, under the heading "Definitions of SF". The authors regard Darko Suvin's definition as having been most useful in catalysing academic debate, though they consider disagreements to be inevitable as science fiction is not homogeneous. Suvin's cited definition, dating from 1972, is: "a literary genre whose necessary and sufficient conditions are the presence and interaction of estrangement and cognition, and whose main formal device is an imaginative framework alternative to the author's empirical environment." The authors of the Encyclopedia article - Brian Stableford, Clute, and Nicholls - explain that, by "cognition", Suvin refers to the seeking of rational understanding, while his concept of estrangement is similar to the idea of alienation developed by Bertolt Brecht, that is, a means of making the subject matter recognizable while also seeming unfamiliar.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Definitions_of_science_fiction#In_chronological_order « less

Category: Genres | Started February 2007

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Help me if you recognise this plot (please!)

I am really interested in learning the author and/or title of a book I read too many years ago to even understand it fully. I would love to read it again. Here is what I remember of it:

people measure their ages in miles instead of years.
they seem to be living in a large structure which moves on tracks. I don't think there are family groups, I think it's more like community care, big day cares instead of nuclear families.
some people are tasked with going outside to the end of the track behind the structure to pick up the track section and bring it to the front of the structure to lay it down again.
If I remember correctly, the further away they walk when laying track distorts their reality... in one direction, everything gets short and wide - including each other, and in the other direction, everything they see appears tall and thin. And the sun is always disctorted into a strange shape as well.
At some point, the main character (who ended up laying track naturally) encounters a stranger who is very interested in the distortions in reality he experiences.
I think that the ending is a discovery that some huge drug experiment has affected them.

If you know of a book that fills one of two of those themes, please let me know. I am not clear on the details so don't reject a possible match based on the veracity of my description. I will have lots of fun tracking down whatever suggestions I get.

... I encountered this problem with The Gods Themselves (Asimov) until I actually encountered it again entirely by accident. I was so happy to find it because the second time I got a lot more out of it! I get in these predicaments because I was reading sci fi when I way to young to understand the message. THe book I describe here has been bugging me for years... I would love to re-read it and understand it.

Carmel R started this discussion 3 weeks ago. ( reply )

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Archmage

"Inverted World" by Christopher Priest
Another moving city series is "Mortal Engines" and it sequels by Philip Reeve about Cities on catapiller tracks feeding off smaller cities for parts.

posted 3 weeks ago. ( reply )
Carmel R

Inverted World sounds like the one I am thinking of. I found a Stephen Wu review of it in which he says of the ending:
"Priest suddenly decides to abandon his premise three-quarters of the way through the book. My guess is that he simply couldn't find a way to make his idea "realistic": that is, he couldn't find a way to make his idea consistent with our own world, as we know it today. (And I don't blame him: it would take quite some doing to explain how we moved from this world to the inverted world.) But, to make up for this, Priest introduces perhaps the most hastily crafted, deeply unsatisfying explanations I have experienced recently. Fortunately (unlike in the similarly ill-ended Darwinia) Priest moves over his explanation hastily and then closes the book on one of his traditionally ambiguous notes."
I will track down a copy and maybe Mortal Engines as well, thanks for your help.

posted 3 weeks ago. ( reply )
Stephen P

Thanks Carmel for asking and Archmage for answering. I thought about this a few months ago and I forgot to ask anyone if they knew it. It was an interesting story. I guess if you wait long enough someone else will look for the book you wanted to remember the title of. This is the third time this has happened to me.

posted 3 weeks ago. ( reply )
Archmage

Glad to be of help :)

posted 3 weeks ago. ( reply )
Travis C

I've heard good things about "Inverted World" - someone at work recommended it to me, but couldn't find it at home.

posted 3 weeks ago. ( reply )
Carmel R

I finished it yesterday. Now I know why it stuck with me so long even though I couldn't remember title or author. It's very cool. The copy I got has an afterword by John Clute which is also cool. Thanks again Archmage.

posted 3 weeks ago. ( reply )
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