Is Science Fiction "Literature"?

Over at FirstThings.com, Joseph Bottum wonders whether or not lawyers are intellectuals (as opposed to very smart), and then remarks:

The Volokh Conspiracy, one of the legal blogs I read regularly, provides a good example. The legal and economic analysis is generally libertarian, but the contributors also show a curiosity about history, jazz, etymology—a smart, fun, interested discussion of whatever comes to hand. An intellectuals’ sort of blog, yes?

But then there’s the discussion prompted by this recent post: “A well-crafted sci-fi book can be a fun read, but are there many modern science fiction works that would qualify as ‘literature’? Any science fiction books that would qualify as literary masterpieces?”

There exists an intellectual defense of science fiction, but what’s interesting is that the query produced a hundred comments and, as near as I can tell, not one of them attempts the intellectual defense. What they pursue, instead, is a systematic assault on the notion of literature.

You can’t discount the American horror of appearing to be snob: Ordinary readers like science fiction, and we’re all just regular folk, after all. But what’s curious is the deployment of postmodern tropes: Some years ago, literature professors (of the MLA persuasion, anyway) turned against the whole idea of literature, the Volokh Conspiracy commenters note. So if even trained literary critics are unable to say what qualifies as literature, why can’t science fiction be literature?

Mark Brumley, unable to access Typepad at the moment, sends along these remarks:

Does any science fiction qualify as literature, if we use Bottum's criteria? I think yes. But are we supposed to think no? I'm not sure. In any case, does any contemporary genre of fiction qualify as producing literature, if Bottum's criteria yields a no for sci-fi? It would seem not.

How does contemporary literature compare to Shakespeare and Dante and Homer, etc.?

On the other hand, if contemporary fiction can qualify as literature under Bottum's criteria it would seem some sci fi can as well. To be sure, we should agree that literature exists and that things produced by notables such as Homer and Dante and Shakespeare qualify as literature. Should we, though, in order to settle the question of whether sci fi is or can be literature begin by wondering whether any sci fi "stands near" such examplars? If the answer is yes, then of course sci fi can be literature if what Shakespeare et al. produced is literature. But if no, does the fact that sci fi has yet to produce a work "standing near" the greatest geniuses of literature mean sci fi has been disqualified as literature?

What think ye?

Comments

[Sandra Miesel]

I second the mention of Tim Powers' DECLARE, which also happens to be a fine Catholic novel.

Jody Bottum is restricting the label "literature" to the very greatest writing rather than to writing of artistic merit. This is an unfair criterion.I would be curious as to how much he knows about the sf field, which has its own home-grown critics. Does he distinguish between science fiction and fantasy (which seems to have less trouble getting taken seriously)? Because if he a priori rules out sf as "literature" that would mean that Kipling, an absolute master of the short story, was writing "literature" except for his fantasy and science fiction efforts.

[Ed Peters]

Science fiction is BY FAR my least favorite genre, but I have no doubt that some of it has risen not just to the level of "literature", but to that of great literature indeed.

[Brian John Schuettler]

I agree with Sandra's comment that Bottum appears to be referring to a notion of "great literature" as his standard of comparison. I ask: Is Asimov's The Fountation Trilogy literature? The works of Heinlein and Clark? Tim Powers? I would say that science fiction is indeed a genre of literature in that an author puts to pen and paper, or now keyboard, his or her creative thoughts for the reading enjoyment of the general public. If we are to deny that si fi is literature then what of the other genres do we include in the official canon? Who, may I ask, decides what is or is not literature? The Literature Commissar perhaps? We have these gifts of the mind and we are also free to call them literature.

[Celestial SeraphiMan]

Let's not forget that Mary Shelly's Frankenstein has risen above the horror genre to become a literary classic in itself. Dante's masterworks is fantasy, in the broad sense of the fantastical. Anyway...I myself harbor doubts whether science fiction is inherently pulpish. Horror seems to focus on the real dangers of the soul and the supernatural. Fantasy seems to focus on the wonders. Science fiction seems tailor-made to the age of soulless scientism. Then again, I could be just rambling. I'm just a maybe-gifted amateur. I was thinking that my dream of "seraphic literature" (basically along the lines of Michel D. O'Briens's work) would be not so much a genre as an aesthetic ethos. Please pardon me if I'm still rambling.

[Jeff Grace]

Well, I have to weigh in on this one!  If we're looking for examples of science fiction that could be called literature, I think Ray Bradbury clearly produced a lot of that.  Also, and I know LEM angered many US fans, but his work is Pulitzer Prize level as far as I'm concerned... The Investigation, The Cyberiad, Tales of Pirx the Pilot, Memoirs Found in a Bathtub, The Futurological Congress... and my favorite, His Master's Voice. These are but a few of his books and this is only one writer.  There's also the Strugatsky Brothers, who wrote Snail on the Slope as well as Roadside Picnic. 

I've already mentioned Ray Bradury, but other US authors would have to include Robert Heinlein, Arthur C. Clarke, Isaac Asimov, Harlan Ellison, Ursula K. le Guin... then the French Jules Verne and the Brit H.G. Wells.

Yeesh!  Foregone conclusion!  And this is just scratching the surface! Pull out the freakin' laurels already!

[Cristina A. Montes]

In the Dappled Forums (a discussion board accompanying the "Dappled Things" literary magazine), I began a thread where I pointed out that there are a lot of similarities between "Star WArs" and the great classics: http://dappledforums.proboards28.com/index.cgi?board=arts&action=display&thread=1158550630

In fact, there may be more similarities than differences between them.

I also recommend reading H.G. Wells' "War of the Worlds". Believe me, the book is far, far better than the Tom Cruise movie.

[Bottoms Up]

A Canticle for Leibowitz by Walter M. Miller, Jr.

The defense rests.

[Mark Brumley]

Bottoms Up: Rather than "the defense rests", I would say with respect to Canticle, "case closed".

[David Deavel]

Um, I think all of you missed the main argument. Bottum was making the point that Volokh et al, instead of making the arguments you are attempting to, that some sci-fi is literature--and while I think CANTICLE is, if not Dante, still literature, it doesn't strike me as science fiction--attempted to deconstruct literature. The main question was whether lawyers are intellectual, remember?
I don't think Bottum thinks that no sci-fi could ever count as literature in a restrictive sense of the word, but I also think he's right to think sci-fi is perhaps a lower version of literature.

[Mark Brumley]

I don't think that point about the attempt to deconstruct literature was missed. It's just that other points raised by Bottum were deemed more interesting to discuss here--such as how we are to consider whether sci fi is literature (by comparison with the greatest works of literature, as Bottum suggests?).

[Gabriel Austin]

Shakespeare wrote popular dramas: history, comedy, tragedy. Ben Jonson was rather condescending about them.
Perhaps we should let the future worry about the problem. Suppose SciFi is not literature [whatever that is]. Should we stop reading it?

[padraighh]

The real issue in my mind is not the form but the use of the form.

Walker Percy's 'Thanatos Syndrome' uses science fiction themes but for a special purpose.

Another great Percy novel 'Love among the Ruins' turns out be be prophetic in view of the tragedy in New Orleans.

[Robert]

Managed Hosting, Colocation and Data Center Services by victoryushchenkonashpresudent ...

[Robert]

Managed Hosting, Colocation and Data Center Services by victoryushchenkonashpresudent ...

[Ben Dover]

Science Fiction is fucking gay! There is no way it is a type of literature or a genre. The main topics of sci-fi literature are about robots and taking over the world. i mean come on that shit is never going to happen! What kind people right about this shit! i'll tell you who-crackers! crazy people that have no life and just right about shit to make money. its a scam. a mother fucking scam.. anybody that reads sci-fi literature is wasting their time.