Sense of Wonder: A Century of Science Fiction

by Leigh Grossman

  Starting in 2003, Johnson began teaching a new Science Fiction & Fantasy Novel Writers Workshop during the two weeks of the short-fiction Writing Workshop. She has since added a follow-up “Repeat Offenders” workshop, which runs during the first week of the Institute.

  In 2006, Gunn and McKitterick teamed with Philip Baringer (Professor of Physics) and other KU professors to create a cross-curriculum course entitled, “Science, Technology, and Society: Examining the Future Through a Science-Fiction Lens.” This course is offered every spring semester at KU.

  Throughout the year, Gunn and McKitterick both serve as undergraduate and graduate SF thesis advisors, and McKitterick offers directed-study opportunities for SF scholars and writers. Other professors occasionally offer courses suitable for scholars wishing to expand their understanding of the genre.

  Since 2005, the Center for the Study of Science Fiction offers a writing prize to the author of an outstanding SF story written for an English class. The James E. Gunn Award for Science Fiction Writing is named in honor of the man who has worked tirelessly to establish KU as a locus for SF education.

  Finally, starting in 2009, the Center offers a substantial scholarship for studying or writing SF at KU. The Scholarship in Science Fiction Studies is given by a KU alumnae friendly to the Center and the English Department.

  During the summer, a serious student of science fiction could participate in three different writing workshops, the Campbell Conference, and the Intensive SF Institute for a month of total immersion in the genre. Remaining in Lawrence, this same student could continue SF studies every semester, possibly supported by scholarship.

  The Center for the Study of Science Fiction

  As a focus for the growing diversity of SF-related programs and activities at KU, Gunn founded the Center for the Study of Science Fiction in 1982, which he serves as Founding Director. In 1991, Dr. Richard W. Gunn, a retired physician in Kansas City and James Gunn’s brother, created an endowment for the Center, and it was renamed the J. Wayne and Elsie M. Gunn Center for the Study of Science Fiction in honor of their parents. This initial gift was followed by half of the residue of his estate.

  The other half endowed the Richard W. Gunn Memorial Lecture series. This annual lecture has sponsored speakers including scholar Fredric Jameson, the William A. Lane Professor at Duke University; Bill Brown, the Edgar Carson Waller Professor at the University of Chicago; China Miéville, the British author who launched the “New Weird” genre; and Shakespeare scholar and author James Shapiro.

  When Johnson and McKitterick moved to Lawrence in 2002 to work with Gunn, he named them the Center’s Associate Directors. Johnson serves on the Sturgeon Award jury, McKitterick (now Center Director) on the Campbell Award jury, and Gunn chairs both juries.

  About SF

  In 2005, the Center established AboutSF, a resource center designed to coordinate volunteer activities promoting reading, teaching, and understanding science fiction. It is supported by donations used to fund two half-time students: the AboutSF Coordinator whose mission focuses on educational outreach, and the Web Developer/Designer responsible for developing the website () and promoting AboutSF’s mission.

  AboutSF is a joint project of the Center, SFWA, and SFRA, with generous support from Tor Books, The Heinlein Prize Trust, Kansas City’s ConQuesT convention, and several individual donors.

  Projects include resources and workshops to help educators learn more about teaching SF at all levels, a speaker search to help educators find authors and thinkers willing to present on speculative literature, and tools for facilitating literature donations to libraries and youth centers as well as coordinating volunteer efforts across the field - especially to increase SF readership among young people.

  AboutSF’s mission continues to grow, with new audio, video, and other materials appearing on the website almost every week.

  CSSF Library Collections

  Since 1970, KU’s Spencer Research Library has served as the North American repository for World SF, SFRA, SFWA, and the Science Fiction Oral History Association. Since then SF has become the fastest-growing special collection at Spencer Research Library, mostly through gifts. Spencer now houses more than 200 linear feet of manuscripts and papers from Brian W. Aldiss, Lloyd Biggle, Algis Budrys, Thomas Easton, James Gunn, Hunter Holly, Lee Killough, P. Schuyler Miller, T.L. Sherred, Cordwainer Smith, Theodore Sturgeon, A.E. van Vogt, Donald A. Wollheim, the Robert Mills Agency and the Richard Curtis Agency, and SFRA. Spencer also houses approximately 20,000 SF-related books, including fiction, reference works, and critical volumes. Other print holdings include more than 120 separate magazine titles going back to the first issues of Astounding, a large collection of fanzines and convention literature, and official papers from the SFWA presidencies of James Gunn, Frederik Pohl, and Jack Williamson. In addition to print materials, the collection holds at least 500 audio recordings and original films, as well as miscellaneous items such as buttons, posters, prospectuses, and a Nebula award statuette. Current efforts are focused on acquiring manuscripts, papers, award-winning volumes, and pre-1950 books and magazines. Parts of the collection may be browsed via the library website at .

  In 2007 when Spencer narrowed its acquisition efforts, the Center moved for the first time to a physical space at KU. In 2009 it opened a comprehensive lending library of SF books and magazines that is now in process of being catalogued. Here SF scholars visiting campus also have access to materials and work space, including a private desk and computer, across the street from Spencer. The CSSF collection began with donations from its directors and grew by some 8000 books thanks to a 2009 donation by Anna England in honor of John H. Beyer Jr., who had built the collection. This donation expanded the available magazine collection to many thousands of issues, ranging from the 1940s through today. The Center’s library also holds many years of audio and video recordings from the Campbell Conference and Awards Banquet, author-interview DVDs, a collection of photographs from the files of Science Fiction Chronicle contributed by Andrew I. Porter, miscellaneous papers, photos, art, and more.

  The Center’s space also displays the permanent John W. Campbell Memorial Award and Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award trophies as well as samples of the trophies that the winners take home.

  KU’s Watson Library is the main campus library, and its collection circulates. Watson houses thousands of SF-related books and magazines, including a nearly complete collection of Astounding/Analog, Galaxy, The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, and more, dating from the 1940s through the present. Like most major lending libraries, Watson can acquire almost any volume within 24 hours. Watson also makes a diversity of materials digitally available to users with appropriate access. All holdings are searchable via the library‘s website (www.lib.ku.edu/).

  Grand Master James Gunn

  In recognition of Gunn’s wide and ever-growing influence on SF, SFWA honored him as Damon Knight Memorial Grand Master during the 2007 Nebula Awards Weekend. This is the highest honor in the field, given for lifetime achievement.

  Gunn’s prior awards include the 1976 Pilgrim Award given by SFRA for lifetime achievement in SF scholarship; the 1976 World SF Convention Special Award for his book, Alternate Worlds; the 1983 Hugo Award for Isaac Asimov: The Foundations of Science Fiction; and the 1992 Eaton Award for lifetime achievement as an SF scholar.

  During the 2007 Nebula Awards ceremony, SFWA then-President Robin Wayne Bailey asked the audience of SF authors and other professionals how many were former students of Gunn. A significant percentage of the room stood.

  In his comments during that ceremony, John Kessel noted that Gunn’s “career has represented, in some ways, the main thread of the development of science fiction. As a boy, he shook hands with H. G. Wells. In the late 1940s he sold fiction to John W. Campbell, and throughout the 1950s he was a regular in Horace Gold’s Galaxy, becoming a mainstay of the movement toward ‘sociological SF.‘ He was one o
f the first people ever to study SF in the academy, writing an M.A. thesis on SF.“

  Gunn’s course on SF literature was also one of the first ever offered at a university.

  Saving the World Through Science Fiction

  In recent years, Gunn has signed his correspondence with the phrase, “Let‘s save the world through science fiction.“ He explained this in his Grand Master acceptance speech:

  It’s hyperbole, of course: I’m not sure the world is in danger of destruction, though it may be, and if it is I’m not sure anyone or anything can save it. But I think we need to try, not in any specific way but in the spreading of SF’s capabilities as far as we can. From my earliest contacts with SF I recognized qualities that I did not find in other kinds of fiction: a realization of the continuity of existence from the remote past to the distant future, the relationship of present decisions and actions to the futures we and our descendants will inhabit, a recognition of mutual humanity that emphasizes species concerns above those of individuals or tribes or nations, a willingness to work together for a better world, and general good will. H.G. Wells said that the world was in a race between education and catastrophe, and called for an “open conspiracy“ of people of good will to create a better world. I think SF is a major part of that education, and we all can help by introducing more people into its charms and values, particularly young people.

  He went on to say:

  I think we all have the responsibility to care and to act upon our caring, because of what science fiction has done for us and because of the power science fiction shares with us, to give back to the culture that gave us birth, to share what we have with others, particularly the young who are most capable of being transformed, to save the world if we can. Not to pay back, but to pay forward, as Heinlein urged. I‘m not sure we can do it. I‘m not sure the world is capable of being saved, and I‘m not sure we are the ones to save it. But I think we should try.

  In large part because of James Gunn, SF is now a legitimate field of study, and his tireless work at KU in building the Center’s programs ensures that future generations will reap the rewards of his efforts.

  Pay it forward.

  * * * *

  Christopher McKitterick’s short work has appeared in Analog, Artemis, Captain Proton, Extrapolation, Mythic Circle, Ruins: Extraterrestrial, Sentinels: In Honor of Arthur C. Clarke, Synergy SF, Tomorrow SF, Visual Journeys, and elsewhere, and he was honored to edit the special science fiction issue of World Literature Today. Chris recently finished a far-future novel, Empire Ship, and his first novel, Transcendence, was published in November by Hadley Rille Books. He is Associate Director of the Center for the Study of Science Fiction (http://www2.ku.edu/~sfcenter) and lives in Lawrence, Kansas, where he teaches writing and SF, restores old vehicles, and watches the sky.

  ELIZABETH MOON

  (1945– )

  A major part of the military SF resurgence of the 1980s and 1990s, Elizabeth Moon draws heavily on her own military experiences (as a Marine officer in Vietnam, at a time when women were a rarity in the military) as well as her experience as a rider, fencer, and photographer in her work. While military themes are common in her writing, the tone of her work varies a lot, from the somber story here to the lighthearted (though with serious undertones) romp of the foxhunting-in-space of Hunting Party (1993) and its sequels. She’s probably best known for her Paksenarrion series, and for the Planet Pirates series she co-wrote with Anne McCaffrey.

  A Texas native, Moon earned degrees in history and biology from Rice University before joining the Marines in 1968, where she worked on early computers. She married Richard Sloan Moon, a former classmate who was serving in the Army, and they moved back to a small town in Texas after finishing their enlistments. Moon’s first paid writing was a county newspaper column in the early 1980s. She made her first fiction sale in 1986—”ABCs in Zero-G,” to Analog—and her first novel, The Sheepfarmer’s Daughter, came out the next year. Since then she’s written prolifically, primarily in long form (although a collection of shorter work, Lunar Activity, came out in 1990). The Speed of Dark (2003) won a Nebula for best novel, and Moon was awarded the 2007 Robert A. Heinlein Award.

  Moon is one of several SF writers who are trained in emergency medical services. She and her husband live in Texas with their son.

  HAND TO HAND, by Elizabeth Moon

  First published in Women at War, December 1995

  Ereza stood in the shadows at the back of the concert hall. She had promised to be silent, to be motionless; interrupting the final rehearsal would, she had been told, cause untold damage.

  Damage. She had survived the bombing of her barracks; she had survived being buried in the rubble for two days, the amputation of an arm, the loss of friends and all her gear, and they thought interrupting a rehearsal caused damage? Had it not been her twin onstage, she might have said something. But for Arlashi, she would ignore such narrow-minded silliness, and do as she was told.

  She had seen concerts, of course; she had even attended the first one in which Arlashi soloed. This was somewhat different. From the clear central dome the muted light of a rainy day lay over the rows of seats, dulling the rich colors of the upholstery. The stage, by contrast, looked almost garish under its warm-toned lights. Musicians out of uniform wore all sorts of odd clothes; it looked as if someone had collected rabble from a street fair and handed them instruments. Ereza had expected them to wear the kinds of things Arlashi wore, casual but elegant; here, Arlashi looked almost too formal in purple jersey and gray slacks. Instead of attentive silence before the music, she could hear scuffing feet, coughs and cleared throats, vague mutters. The conductor leaned down, pointing out something to Arlashi on the music; she pointed back; their heads finally moved in unison.

  The conductor moved back to his podium, and tapped it with his baton. “From measure 60,” he said. Pages rustled, though most of the musicians seemed to be on the right one. Silence, then a last throat-clearing, then silence again. Ereza shifted her weight to the other leg. Her stump ached savagely for a moment, then eased. Arla, she could see, was poised, her eyes on the conductor.

  His hand moved; music began. Ereza listened for the bits she knew, from having heard Arla practice them at home. Arla had tried to explain, but it made no sense, not like real things. Music was either pretty or not; it either made her feel like laughing, or crying, or jumping around. You couldn’t say, as with artillery, what would work and what wouldn’t. This wasn’t one she knew without a program. It sounded pretty enough, serene as a spring evening in the garden. Arla’s right arm moved back and forth, the fingers of her left hand shifting up and down. Ereza watched her, relaxing into the sweetness of the music. This was the new cello, one of only four wooden cellos on the planet, made of wood from Scavel, part of the reparations payment imposed after the Third Insurrection. Cravor’s World, rich in military capacity, had far too few trees to waste one on a musical instrument. Ereza couldn’t hear the difference between it and the others Arla had played, but she knew Arla thought it important.

  Her reverie shattered as something went drastically wrong with the music. She couldn’t tell what, but Arla’s red face and the conductor’s posture suggested who had caused the problem. Other instruments had straggled to a halt gracelessly, leaving silence for the conductor’s comment.

  “Miss Fennaris!” Ereza was glad he wasn’t her commanding officer; she’d heard that tone, and felt a pang of sympathy for Arla. Somehow she’d thought musicians were more lenient than soldiers.

  “So sorry,” Arla said. Her voice wavered; Ereza could tell she was fighting back tears. Poor dear; she hadn’t ever learned toughness. Behind her twin, two others leaned together, murmuring. Across the stage, someone standing behind a group of drums leaned forward and fiddled with something on the side of one of them.

  “From measure 82,” said the conductor, this time not looking at Arla. Arla had the stubborn, withdrawn expression that Ereza knew well; she wasn’t going to adm
it anything was wrong, or share what was bothering her. Well, musicians were different, like all artists. It would go into her art, that’s what everyone said.

  Ereza had no idea what measure 82 was, but she did recognize the honeyed sweetness of the opening phrase. Quickly, it became less sweet, brooding, as summer afternoons could thicken into menacing storms. She felt breathless, and did not know why. Arla’s face gave no clue, her expression almost sullen. Her fingers flickered up and down the neck of the cello, and reminded Ereza of the last time she’d played “Flight-test” with her twin, last leave. Before the reopening of hostilities, before some long-buried agent put a bomb in the barracks and cost her her arm. Arla had won, she remembered, those quick fingers as nimble on the controls as on her instrument.

  Suddenly the impending storm broke; the orchestra was off at full speed and volume, Arla’s cello nearly drowned in a tumult of sound. Ereza watched, wondering why it didn’t sound pretty any more. Surely you could make something stormy that was also good to listen to. Besides, she wanted to hear Arla, not all these other people. Arla was leaning into her bowing; Ereza knew what that would mean at home. But the cello couldn’t dominate this group, not by sheer volume. The chaos grew and grew, very much like a summer storm, and exploded in a series of crashes; the man with the drums was banging away on them.