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The Dreams Our Stuff Is Made Of
from the not-*those*-dreams-you-fool! dept.
| The Dreams Our Stuff Is Made Of | |
| author | Thomas M. Disch |
| pages | 255 |
| publisher | Touchstone |
| rating | 8.5 |
| reviewer | Duncan Lawie |
| ISBN | 0684859785 |
| summary | Pyrotechnics and solid research build a thoroughly readable and opinionated book. |
Thomas M. Disch was raised in Minnesota and started publishing science fiction in the early 1960s. His close involvement with the New Wave meant much of his early work was more closely associated with the UK than with the country of his birth. From the mid-1970s, he has been as well known for his poetry. Though he has not ceased to write, his increasingly large sphere of interest has reduced his science fictional output considerably, though he clearly remains in close contact with the authors and trends of the genre. His literate, intelligent approach is apparent in all he does.
The Dreams Our Stuff Is Made Of sets out to present a critical history of science fiction but is perhaps more interesting instead as a critical view of the American psyche. Disch's thesis is built on twin foundations -- that science fiction is an American form and that Americans believe they have a "right to lie." The first pillar is not thoroughly investigated -- at least, the argument is unlikely to convince non-Americans. The second idea is approached from almost every angle; its corollary -- and the reason for Disch's subtitle -- is that people want to believe. Disch's exploration of science fiction can decide that Edgar Allen Poe is "our embarrassing ancestor" because he has already reached the decision that SF is itself an American form. He dismisses Mary Shelley's Frankenstein as a progenitor because her science is "fast talking and stage props" which serves to set the stage for classic melodrama, rather than as the real core of the book. Against this, Poe is set up as a prototypical American hoaxer and that his 'science fiction' is defined by a genuine desire to convince readers that what he writes is not mere fiction. It is thanks to this root stock that Disch feels able to discuss science fiction beyond its existence as a literary and visual form.
The book is primarily structured as a series of thematic essays, without much emphasis on timeline. Disch assumes a reasonably well-read audience, while making considerable room for those unfamiliar with his more obscure subjects. This is, of course, a necessary approach as it is often through early authors (with works unavailable to the general public) that Disch builds his background. Nevertheless, he does not rely on them to provide him with sacrificial victims; he would far rather tear pieces off the big names we are already familiar with. There is no shortage of diatribe in these pages. The invective is principally concentrated on those who have come to use the form for their own propaganda and those who present their fictions as fact. In the first camp, his principle targets are famous names who have spent the latter parts of their career attempting to reshape their work or the history of the field itself. Heinlein is an obvious target; Disch provides a good serving on this author's long march from Radical Socialist to Radical Libertarian. He has even less good to say for the "military strategist" members of Heinlein's circle and very little to the benefit of Ursula Le Guin. His concerns with Le Guin are based on her apparent attempt to mould not just science fictional histories and futures to her own ends but the history and future of science fiction. According to Disch, Le Guin has gained vertiginous regard in academic circles and is using this position to influence the manner in which SF is taught academically. A particularly tasty element of his case against Le Guin involves his Aunt Cecilia's recipe for lemon pudding -- you too can cook a footnote.
Disch prefers to see the blemishes of the field he loves than to remake it in his own image but he retains his greatest scorn for those who attempt to remake the world in the image of their own fictions. This is where SF is indeed in danger of conquering the world. The principal natures of this particular megalomania are the UFOlogists and the home-made religions. Readers familiar with Disch will know of his long-standing disgust at Whitley Strieber and can enjoy the thorough dismantling of Strieber's alien encounters. Disch returns again and again to the UFOlogists and their increasing hold on the American mind: he compares the nature of these tales with the stories of science fiction itself, he discusses the increasing complexity of the scam which constitutes the average abduction tale, he considers the place of such beliefs alongside other modern manias for recovered memory. The ability of the human mind to "entertain" belief is a vital element for the success of these alien tales. The desire to actually believe is essential to the success of the 'science fiction religions' and, Disch suggests, the most successful of these in the late twentieth century is Scientology. Like Strieber, he recalls, L. Ron Hubbard started out as a science fiction writer. Like Strieber, Hubbard wanted more. Unlike Strieber, though, Hubbard was supported -- at first -- by the SF community from which he came. His first public presentation of Dianetics was in Astounding Science Fiction, after Hubbard had apparently already suggested that "if a man really wanted to make a million dollars, the best way to do it would be start his own religion." Disch's final position is that, amongst the many deluded minds, there are those who have realized that the best way to make money from fiction is to present it as fact, and the fiction that people most want to believe in our era are fictions of a better future -- science fiction.
The Dreams Our Stuff Is Made Of offers hugely entertaining detail and such incisive insight that it earns forgiveness for its inevitable moments of contrariness.
You can purchase this book at ThinkGeek, and you may want to check out Thomas M. Disch's website as well. Me:
Hardback edition (Score:3)
Disclaimer: No, I am not one of the people selling this book there. I just happen to really like half.com.
Nice review (Score:3)
Perhaps it will start a trend
On the American right to lie, I think it's a good point - Americans do think they have a right to lie.
But this isn't necessarily a bad thing. It's through the American arrogance that such a great nation has been built.
You don't make the greatest country on Earth by being nice to everyone.
Also, even though lieing is a positive thing from a success point of view, I think in many respects Americans have a right to lie - as human beings (the most successful animal), we have dominion over the animals, and as the most successful nation, I think America should be allowed a little leeway.
Re:Frankenstein first? (Score:3)
It would have phases, but not rise and set in the usual sense of the words -- the Earth stays in place as seen from the Moon, because the Moon keeps the same face to Earth at all times (a fact known to anybody with normal eyesight who pays attention for a few weeks).
(Because the Moon's orbit is a bit elliptical, it does "wobble" back and forth a bit relative to Earth, so Earth would oscillate from just above the horizon to just below the horizon as seen from areas near the limb of the Moon.)
/.
Heinlein the ex-socialist (Score:4)
Heinlein certainly takes a strong stance against any kind of interference in markets in his later books, but the positions of EPIC were diametrically opposed to those he espoused in Expanded Universe. They were interventionist, they demanded government action against the Depression and they had nothing but contempt for California's wealthy industrialists and land owners who did nothing in the face of such vast public misery.
Certainly, Heinlein's politics changed a lot between 1938 and 1980. Frankly, I liked the younger Heinlein a lot more. The authoritarian, Chicago-school, Reaganite Heinlein of the 70's and 80's was half the writter of the witty, liberal, socially and culturally conscious Heinlein of the 40's and 50's.
The late Heinlein was a far cry from any anarcho-syndicalist that I know of, although the young one had his moments. He takes a near Randian position on the virtues of the market in all his books after Time Enough for Love (for example, his utopian portrayal of Hell in Job), while taking a truly unlibertarian position on the importance of a powerful central state in Friday. The later Heinlein appears to place little value in democracy and collective action (which are perhaps the most central values of traditional anarcho-syndicalism) and advocates a sort of minimalist dictatorship as the ideal form of government, or at least he does in all of the Lazarus Long books.
Perhaps those weren't his "true" politcal feelings. I have no way to know, authors are allowed to play with ideas. But at the very least, the opinions he lays out in Expanded Universe, a polemic by his own admission, are quite remote from anarcho-syndicalism and even more remote from his political roots.
Well what else did you expect? (Score:4)
Which means that Mary Shelley got it right. The best Science Fiction has never been about the technology, but about people. The technology merely serves as a backdrop to get the people into an interesting situation, or presents new obstacles or opportunities for the characters.
Re:Dismissing frankenstein? (Score:3)
I like the Bujold quote because it captures a popular sentiment among many SF fans about Crichton and SF in general. Namely that stories about the evils of technology aren't what attracted us to the genre.
In fact, I suspect Bujold isn't trying to define the genre so much as to distinguish the sorts of stories Crichton writes from the main current of the genre. She didn't say Crichton wasn't SF she said is wasn't REAL SF -- which I took as more of a normative judgement rather than a formal definition of the genre.
Rob
Re:Well what else did you expect? (Score:3)
I agree. Actually, the "hard core" stuff did appeal to me when I was a schoolboy, but after a decade or so I started getting tired of reading about "widgets" and "telltales" and convoluted explanations of why some plot prop should work, and even more bored with 'stories' whose entire raison d'être was to show off some semi-plausible technology that the author had cooked up.
Give me a story that works as a story.
My longstanding favorite SF author is Jack Vance. That's partly because his whimsy appeals to me, but also very much because the people in his stories take their technology just as much for granted as we do, and don't go around explaining it to each other for page after page. If people need to go somewhere, they just hop into the aircar and get along with the plot, without a lot of "Gee, whiz! An aircar!" and "Yeah, superconductivity makes it all possible."
When I want to read about technology for technology's sake, I read Scientific American. When I want to read a story, I expect the technology to merge into the background so that literary qualities can have center stage.
--
Yeah, like language... (Score:5)
The reality of life in America seems to escape non-Americans. Most people I went to school with learned another language(for example, ich kann deutsch). However, unlike people in other countries, it's quite far/expensive for us to travel someplace where English is not the primary language. Thus, we're unable to practice and maintain any form of fluency.
I'd spoken with a German about this once in the late 80's(he used to use the internet to get to a modem in Houston to call my BBS). He had mentioned the "language arrogance" so I asked him how long it took to him to travel to another country where German was not the language - a mear 3 hour drive, and another 3 hours on top of that to get to where a 3rd language was required.
Contrast that to America. I live in Houston. To drive to Mexico would take about 7 hours. To drive to Canada would take close to 30 hours. Going west to San Francisco would take 32 hours, and going East to New York would take 27 hours. English is the primary language everywhere within this driving range.
Dismissing frankenstein? (Score:3)
I don't buy it. "fast talking and stage props" describes half of the sci fi tech out there, and how else would you describe the motivating force of the entire story except as the core of the book.
Frankenstein actually sort of reminds me of some of Criton's (sp?) work, like congo. Sort of a "twenty minutes in the future"* idea that reaches seemingly just a little farther than the advances of the day and discovers something totally other.
Sounds a little like he formed an opinion then interpreted the evidence to support it.
* gold star (but no Karma) for identifying the line.
Kahuna Burger
Gordon R. Dickson, RIP (Score:3)
Edgar Allan Poe (Score:5)
I don't believe this argument, however; it presumes that science fiction is fundamentally intellectual, which it isn't, or at least, not in the same way that detective stories are. Science fiction is not, in the main, an intellectual exercise for the author, except in those dreadful Asimov and Clarke outings where he tries to deduce sixty semi-amusing implications of one piece of speculative science.
A lot of science fiction is slap bang in the Mary Shelley tradition, and to pretend otherwise by saying that her "science" wasn't central enough is to completely ignore one of the main features of the genre -- its relationship to fantasy and thence to the gothic tradition. He certainly needs to come up with some explanation of the proximity of the fantasy and science fiction sections of most bookshops in order to defend this idea.
And anyone who can pretend that science fiction is essentially American ought to be introduced to HG Wells or his descendants. It has its roots in Whiggish extrapolation of modern technology, which started off as a British trait, and moved to America along with global technological hegemony, about the end of the First World War. American science fiction is essentially American; British science fiction isn't, or doesn't have to be.
Of course, the author also screws up by failing to note the most important thing to know about science fiction -- that as literature, most of it is abysmal.
So basically... (Score:3)
Now I realize that isn't what he actually says but its what I got from this...
Minor points based on the review
In my analysis, I'd say he's trying to make money off his jealousy towards SciFi authors. Though I have to admit I'm surprised to see that the reviewer didn't mention Harlan Ellison in the laundry list of authors that Disch seems to have a grudge against.
I just want my air car (Score:4)
Let's get on the ball here, people.
Don Negro