Sense of Wonder: A Century of Science Fiction

by Leigh Grossman

  Many of the contemporary Canadian science fiction writers exhibit an apprehension of environmental destruction. They create pessimistic worlds, restrictive, totalitarian futuristic societies, and societies unable to control scientific experiments such as mutated viruses released into the atmosphere by negligent scientists or corporations. Such dystopic novels have been published in the last two decades by William Gibson and Robert Charles Wilson. The dystopic novel has attracted the attention of mainstream Canadian writer Margaret Atwood (1939– ), who creates an alternative version of the future in The Handmaid’s Tale (1985). The novel, which won the Arthur C .Clarke Award in 1987 and was made into a movie in 1990, depicts a world in which some women are reduced to the status of breeders and are denied the most basic human rights, a prophecy that became true not so much in the West, where Atwood’s novel is set, but in countries like Afghanistan under the Taliban. If this novel is a warning about an anti-feminist backlash, Oryx and Crake (2003) is about another set of dangers facing the human race. It cautions against developments in science and technology such as genetic engineering and xenotransplantation, detailing the disturbing social and ethical consequences of such experimentation.

  One of the most influential novels of dystopian science fiction in the cyberpunk genre is Neuromancer, a novel by William Gibson (1948– ), published in 1984, which won the Hugo, Nebula, and the Philip K. Dick awards. Gibson was born in the US, immigrating to Canada in 1968 to escape the draft during the Vietnam War. He later became a Canadian citizen. Gibson has been credited with coining the term “cyberspace,” and is been seen as the writer who predicted the growth of virtual environments and the Internet. By employing neural implants, cowboys in this novel, such as Case, the protagonist, attempt to pirate information by “jacking” or plugging themselves into the matrix, which is a virtual world simulated by a globally linked computer database. The novel examines the relationship between humans and technology, and reveals a futuristic world where humans rely on computer programs for their very existence. The two other books in the Neuromancer trilogy are Count Zero (1986) and Mona Lisa Overdrive (1988). Though Gibson has written numerous other novels and stories, it is Neuromancer that has propelled him to fame.

  Like William Gibson and Margaret Atwood, Robert Charles Wilson (1953– ) also creates dystopic worlds in his fiction. Born in the US, he has lived in Canada since 1962. He began publishing science fiction and fantasy stories in Astounding Science Fiction in 1974. His first novel, A Hidden Place (1986), is a work of fantasy which deals with an alternate world, as does his The Memory Wire (1987), and Darwinia (1998). He won two Aurora awards for Darwinia and Blind Lake (2003) and a Hugo award for his novel Spin (2005), the first book of his trilogy that continues with Axis (2007) and concludes with Vortex (2011). Blind Lake is a science fiction novel that takes place in a government laboratory where scientists observe sapient life on a planet fifty-one light years away, using telescopes powered by quantum computers that have advanced beyond human understanding. A sudden and unexplained facility lockdown extends into a long-term quarantine which leads to unexpected results for the protagonist and her daughter. Spin is a science fiction thriller and an ecological warning, but it is also a deeply moving book about the capacity of humans for faith and hope. In Axis, humans are colonizing a new world, and exploiting its rescouce, large deposits of oil, which makes it a familiar story today.

  James Alan Gardner (1955– ) is a contemporary of Robert Charles Wilson and Robert Sawyer, and also raised in Ontario. Author of numerous short stories, he has won several awards. In 1989 he was awarded the Grand Prize in the Writers of the Future contest for “Children of Creche,” set in a futurist vacation world. He earned an Aurora Award for “Three Hearings on the Existence of Snakes in the Human Bloodstream” (1997); it was also nominated for both the Nebula and Hugo awards. He has written a series of satirical novels set in the benevolent League of Peoples universe where life is sacred and there are no wars and few criminal activities. The first, Expendable (1997), introduces female protagonist Festina Ramos of the Technocracy Explorer Corps, a component of the League responsible for investigating planets and contacting new life forms. In this universe, murderers are considered as lacking in sapience, and are killed off if they try to leave their solar system. Gardner is currently working on a new novel, Fire and Dust.

  Perhaps the most well-known, prolific, and highly respected science fiction writer in Canada today is Robert J Sawyer (1960– ), the “dean of Canadian science fiction,” as the Ottawa Citizen (1999) has dubbed him. Sawyer is one of only eight writers, and the only Canadian, to win all three of the world’s most prestigious science fiction awards for best novel of the year: The Hugo, the Nebula, and the John W. Campbell Memorial Award. He has also won many international awards and honorary degrees. His first novel, Golden Fleece (1988), is a murder mystery which takes place aboard the spaceship Argo. The ship is manned by the quantum computer JASON, who is in charge of all the humans aboard, and who narrates the story. He is one of the most well-rounded, intriguing, non-human characters in science fiction. Sawyer has stated that the creation of JASON is his way of paying tribute to Arthur C. Clarke’s Hal in Space Odyssey 2001. To date, Sawyer has published nineteen novels and two short story collections. In many of his novels, Sawyer explores the impact of science and technology on humans, dealing with such subjects as the possibility of uploading one’s consciousness into an artificial body (Mindscan, 2005), the challenges of aging and the possibility of rejuvenation (Rollback, 2007), and the evolution of man in the Neanderthal Parallax trilogy: Hominids (2003), Humans (2003) and Hybrids (2003). In Hominids, which won the Hugo award for best novel, a bridge opens to reveal a parallel Earth where Neanderthals survived to the present day but humans in the contemporary world did not. Sawyer’s novel FlashForward (1999) in which the consciousness of all of mankind experiences two minutes of the future is an exploration of fate versus free will and a philosophical look at the behavior of humans when faced with mysterious circumstances. This book was made into a mini-series by ABC television in 2010. Sawyer’s latest trilogy on the importance of the world-wide web and the way it impacts us as humans includes the novels WWW: Wake (2009), WWW:Watch (2010), and WWW: Wonder (2011). He and his wife, Carolyn Clink, edited the influential anthology Tesseracts 6 in 1997. Sawyer now has his own eponymous imprint at Red Deer Press in Alberta. In March 2008, Quill & Quire named Sawyer as one of thirty of “the most influential, innovative, and just plain powerful people in Canadian publishing.” Sawyer’s philosophy on science fiction matches that of Margaret Sommerville, who in her book The Ethical Canary states that “science seems to be moving ahead ever more swiftly, leaving ethics seemingly further and further behind. Is it time to slow down the clock and let ethics catch up?” (2) Sawyer himself has echoed similar sentiments in many of his classroom and public lectures over the years. In spite of his caution regarding scientific advances today, Sawyer remains optimistic about the ability of humans to create a better society for themselves. In an interview with Gary Butler, he states “Science fiction is a literature of ideas” embracing “science, philosophy, history, and ethics” (3). Sawyer continues to write, to lecture, and to be an active participant in literary, social, and philosophical discussions in Canada and around the world.

  Canadian science fiction writing shows no evidence of waning. Though this genre is relatively recent in Canada, it has a widening readership and has media attention in both English and French Canada. It is hard to believe that just two decades ago, no Canadian publisher was interested in publishing David Ketterer’s study Canadian Science Fiction and Fantasy. He eventually had it published in the US in 1992. With the ever-increasing number of Canadian writers living and working in Canada today, and the easy accessibility of their work through the Internet, anthologies, paperback books, and e-books, these writers are reaching Canadian and international readers, and their works are being translated into many different languages. Moreover, the recent profusion of
Science Fiction and Fantasy courses in Canadian universities and colleges (and universities and colleges around the world) is earning the genre greater appreciation, respectability, and mainstream status.

  Works Cited

  Atwood, Margaret. The Handmaid’s Tale. Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1985.

  ——. Oryx and Crake. Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 2003.

  Butler, Gary. Author Profile: Robert J. Sawyer. “Nothing but Blue Skies” Quill & Quire May 2007: 1–3.

  “Can Lit 30”. Quill & Quire March 2008.

  Clute, John and Peter Nicholls, eds. Encyclopedia of Science Fiction. London: Orbit, 1999.

  Clute, John. “Fables of Transcendence: The Challenge of Canadian Science Fiction.” Out of This World: Canadian Science Fiction and fantasy Literature. Ed. Andrea Paradis. Ottawa: Quarry, 1995: 21–27.

  Colombo, John Robert, ed. Other Canadas: An Anthology of Science Fiction and Fantasy. Toronto: Mc-Graw-Hill Ryerson, 1979.

  De Mille, James. A Strange Manuscript Found in a Copper Cylinder. 1888. Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1965.

  Dorsey, Candas Jane. Machine Sex & Other Stories. Victoria BC: Porcepic Books, 1988.

  Gardner, James Alan. Expendable (League of Peoples Book I). New York: AvoNova, 1997.

  Gotlieb, Phyllis. A Judgment of Dragons. New York: Berkley Publishers, 1982.

  ——. Son of the Morning and Other Stories New York: Ace, 1983.

  ——. Sunburst. New York: Fawcett, 1964.

  Grove, Frederick Philip. Consider Her Ways. 1948. Toronto: Bakka, 2001.

  Gibson, William. Count Zero. New York: Ace, 1986.

  ——. Mona Lisa Overdrive. New York: Ace, 1988.

  ——. Neuromancer. New York: Ace, 1984.

  Hopkinson, Nalo. Brown Girl In a Ring New York: Warner Books, 1998.

  ——. Midnight Robber. New York: Warner Books, 2000.

  ——. Skin Folk. New York: Warner Books, 2001.

  ——. The Salt Roads. New York: Warner Books, 2003.

  ——. The New Moon’s Arms. New York: Warner Books, 2007.

  Hopkinson, Nalo, and Geoff Ryman, eds. Tesseracts 9. Victoria, BC: Press Porcepic, 2006.

  Jameson. Fredric. “The Space of Science fiction: Narrative in van Vogt” in Archaeolgies of the Future: The Desire Called Utopia and Other Fictions. New York: Verso, 2005.

  Ketterer, David. Canadian Science Fiction and Fantasy. Bloomington, IN: Indiana UP, 1992.

  Leacock, Stephen. “The Man in the Asbestos Suit.” Nonsense Novels. 1911. Whitefish MO: Kessinger, 2004.

  ——. The Iron Man and the Tin Woman with Other Such Futurities. New York: Macmillan, 1929

  ——. Afternoons in Utopia. New York: Macmillan, 1932

  Merril, Judith. Daughters of Earth: Three Novels. New York, Doubleday, 1969

  ——. “That Only a Mother.” Astounding Science Fiction. 1948.

  Merril, Judith, ed. Tesseracts 1. Victoria, BC: Press Porcepic, 1985

  ——. Shot in the Dark New York: Bantam, 1950.

  Paradis, Andrea, ed. Out Of This World: Canadian Science Fiction and Fantasy Literature. Ottawa: Quarry, 1995.

  Pratt, E. J. “The Great Feud.” Titans and Other Epics of the Pilocene. 1926. Collected Poems. Toronto: U of Toronto P, 1958

  Roberts, Charles G. D. In the Morning of Time. London: Hutchinson, 1919.

  Sawyer, Robert J. FlashForward. New York: Tor Books, 1999.

  ——. Golden Fleece. New York, Tor Books, 1988.

  ——. Hominids. New York, Tor Books, 2003.

  ——. Humans. New York: Tor Books, 2003.

  ——. Hybrids. New York: Tor Books, 2003.

  ——. Mindscan. New York: Tor Books, 2005

  ——. WWW: Wake. Toronto: Penguin, 2009

  ——. WWW: Watch. Toronto: Penguin, 2010.

  ——. WWW: Wonder. Toronto: Penguin. (forthcoming in 2011)

  Somerville, Margaret A. The Ethical Canary: Science, Society and the Human Spirit. Toronto: Viking/Penguin, 2000.

  Tesseracts. Vol. 1. Ed. Judith Merril. Victoria, BC: Press Porcepic, 1985

  Van Vogt, A. E. Slan. Astounding Science Fiction 1940.

  Wilson, Robert Charles. Blind Lake. New York: Tor Books, 2003.

  ——. Darwinia. New York: Tor Books, 1998.

  ——. Spin. New York: Tor Books, 2005

  ——. Axis. New York: Tor Books, 2007

  * * * *

  Ruby S. Ramraj teaches in the department of English at the University of Calgary. She has written articles on Isaac Asimov, Robert Sawyer, Amitav Ghosh, and Nalo Hopkinson in such journals as Foundation and such collections as Canebrakes and A Sense of Wonder (2011).

  DARRELL SCHWEITZER

  (1952– )

  Although Darrell is better known for his fantasy, his expertise on a variety of topics related to genre fiction, and his editorship of Weird Tales, he does many other things as well, not the least of which is write SF poetry.

  I’ve known Darrell since the mid 1980s, when I was an undergraduate and he was (as he still remains) a major figure in Philadelphia-area fandom. We were reacquainted when I broke into publishing, and I see Darrell and his wife Mattie at virtually any conference I attend. We’ve sat on panels together, and the breadth of his knowledge is startling, whether the topic is Tolkien or T. H. White or Byzantine history. In addition to writing and editing he’s a literary agent and small press publisher; when he’s not speaking on panels he’s in the dealer’s room selling books and ancient coins. (Like the Ancient Mariner, “he stoppeth one in three” and talks to people until they buy a book from him. Darrell jokes that unsigned copies of his books sell for more than signed ones…because they’re rarer.)

  One of Darrell’s talents is an ability to mix scholarship with a keen sense of the humor and absurdity inherent in both history and literature. (It flows through his own work as well, as in “Social Lapses”: A slime-beast from Fomulhaut-Five / quite drunk in an old spaceport dive / proposed to nine men, six cats and a hen / and barely escaped there alive.) The poems here capture that mix of seriousness and absurdity. In “Alternate Histories” Darrell “sums up the whole alternate history genre in 18 lines,” while “Scientific Romance” wistfully echoes the mostly forgotten Vernean view of SF. “At the Conclusion of an Interstellar War” is just as wistful on the subject of bug-eyed monsters.

  ALTERNATE HISTORIES, by Darrell Schweitzer

  First published in Starline, 2003

  Even as Napoleon, Hitler, and Philip the Second

  marched triumphantly into London,

  as Caesar escaped assassination

  and conquered the whole East,

  and Grant died of tetanus

  after stepping on a nail at Vicksburg,

  while time-travelers gave Frederick Barbarossa

  an AK-47 and a life-jacket,

  the stranger who might have been my friend,

  whose colored coat I could not see clearly

  in the mud and darkness,

  lay beside me in a little hollow of ground,

  coughing up blood, babbling of green fields,

  and calling out some woman’s name.

  The light on the horizon

  might have been a burning city,

  or the sunrise, which for him,

  at least, never came.

  SCIENTIFIC ROMANCE, by Darrell Schweitzer

  First published in Starline, November 2005

  When we were master and mistress of the world,

  when our airships soared like apocalyptic visions

  above the helpless navies,

  we could have erased whole cities,

  even continents, at the touch of a lever,

  with our bombs, gas, and radium rays,

  forcing mankind to yield to our demands.

  But, lacking any messianic agenda,

  or the desire to slaughter anonymous strangers,

  we merely voyaged on, admiring

  the Alps and Himalayas gleaming like icy teeth,<
br />
  and the brilliant moonlight on the clouds below.

  I steered the great vessel; you held my hand steady,

  while kings and kaisers trembled

  at the thunder of our engines.

  In the end, we dismissed all our minions

  on good pensions, detonated the secret island base,

  and in our old age, sat side by side

  on cold winter’s nights,

  feeding plans and blueprints into the fire,

  reminiscing about the times we had,

  very much aware of what might happen

  if such knowledge ever fell

  into irresponsible hands.

  AT THE CONCLUSION OF AN INTERSTELLAR WAR, by Darrell Schweitzer

  First published in Dreams & Nightmares, 2003

  Of course we won.