thought experiment

[katster]

grr, parents, making me miss my one morning pleasure. So yeah, Mal, that's why I wasn't around. It wasn't because I was procrastinating on my paper, it was because I was getting donuts for my *mother*. :P

But besides that, here's the ponderance I've got for y'all to ponder. Let's pick the hypothethical. You're asked to teach a course on science fiction. Which books and short stories would you have your class read? Bonus points for why. :)

Comments

[fairoriana.livejournal.com]

I actually took a 300 level course on Sci-fi/fantasy. I talked the Prof into offering a 200 level course on it, and he was rather surprised by the 55 students who signed up for it, so five of us who were really hard-core had a 300 level "independent study" with him on the topic.

It was a great course!

[beandelphiki.livejournal.com]

I don't know how obvious this choice might seem, especially coming from someone with my username. But Ender's Gaem would have to be one. Because it's more modern (not all good sci-fi was written decades ago), and it shows the range the genre can have.

Of course, if someone is signing up for a course on science fiction, one would assume that they probably don't have a "it's all ships shooting lasers" bias, anyway. So that might not be a large advantage. But I'd want to give an idea of how far science fiction can stretch, from the very "hard" end to Card's end - very character-driven, without lots of jargon or research involved.

No science fiction course would be complete without some of Bradbury's Martian stories, of course. And Heinlein, obviously, although I couldn't begin to decide where to start with that.

I'm an awfully scattered reader, so I haven't read a ton from any one genre. But were I teaching a course on this, I'd want to show the way science fiction has developed over time, possibly consider some of its impact on our culture, and - most importantly - impress upon my students that fresh novels and stories are always being written. Great science fiction ideas have not been "used up." I've always felt that science fiction was the genre that pushed boudaries more than any other, and that's not possible to "use up."

/long-winded

[beandelphiki.livejournal.com]

*mumbles* And lj didn't let me spellcheck or preview, so that's "game," obviously.

[koyote.livejournal.com]

okay, let's start with some classic authors who have had impact, either in broader society, or within the field very specifically.

start with Asimov, Bradbury, Leiber, Dick, Zelazny, Zimmer-Bradley, Drake, Flint, Niven-Pournelle... uhm, none of this is good for 'one week studying a short story' type of stuff. Term paper stuff, sure. PK Dick may be the most cinematized SF author of all time, Asimov shaped fendom to a startling degree, N&P brought a lot of the very material and cynical side of scientism to the masses, Marion virtually created half of modern fantasy (as well as a large part of the feminist fantasy movement, and had a lot of fights with other feminists), Flint is bringing participatory fandom to a really amazing new level, Drake has spawned at least as much military SF as Heinlein...

Well. Individual novels.

Friday- the search for humanity. (yes, most people claim it's just about having gratuitous sex, but have you really read it with an eye to the central question?)

Starship Troopers, (which is REALLY different from the movie version) - exploring government, citizenship, duty, and the idea of an objective moral philosophical science being possible. (is it? really?) It is also generally accepted as *the* genesis of modern military SF

Octavia Butler's parable series (parable of the sower and parable of the talents) - it is almost a 'current events' tie in, but read it and judge for yourself.

Kurt Vonnegut Jr's Reichian short "Unready to Wear" I think is the title. the 'amphibian' story.

Harlan Ellison is a very important, though personally often disagreeable person, but that's part of what makes him important. I think "A boy and his dog" is pretty important, and easy to use as you can do story and film :)


Not even 30% of my list, but enough to get me flamed soundly!

[primis.livejournal.com]

My sci-fi fu isn't as strong as most of you, and I also don't do well explaining/reviewing literature:

Terry Bisson - Bears Discover Fire.
(Very odd and strange right at first. However, well-written in an interesting model. Bisson paints a picture for the reader and convinces you that something quite ludicrous is not only possible, but even probable.)

Arthur C. Clarke - A Walk in the Dark.
(Suspense/Drama/Horror/Mystery all rolled into one really. A classic, and a basically How-To on writing a sci-fi short story

Gaiman/Pratchett - Good Omens.
(The best marriage of comedy and actual storyline I think I've ever read. Stuff like Adams is great, but the story sometimes suffers at the expense of the funny. Good Omens, on the other hand, doesn't lik to ignore the storyline which in and of itself is intriguing even if you ignore the comedy aspect of it all.)

John Steakley - Armor.
(Because everyone needs to read the book if for no other reason than to see how even a confusing, poorly-editied story can still really rock as long as you have a good core story. Bonus points if it's assigned immediately after reading Starship Troopers as a Compare/Contrast.)

Orson Scott Card - Ender's Game.
(Everyone could give tons of reasons, but the fact is Card is very good at explaining the thought processes of his characters, and the ideas and concepts behind things. He's very thorough [almost too thorough] and if you're paying attention it's very difficult to lose you as the reader. Too many writers can't pull that off.).


-- Primis.

[spitgirl.livejournal.com]

I'm a bit of a classicist myself... I'd probably take the tack of "Science Fiction and Fantasy as Literature." There are a lot of novels out there that I wouldn't consider literature, per se, but they're a lot of fun to read... but I'd probably choose books that were groundbreaking in some way, but especially talking about creating *systems* of government, magic, existence, etc.

Please recall that I'm coming from the perspective of a current English teacher. :)

J.R.R. Tolkein - The Lord of the Rings
C.S. Lewis - Perelandra series
Isaac Asimov - Foundation OR I, Robot (collection of short stories)
Orson Scott Card - Ender's Game (this book is actually on the "young classics" list)
Anne McCaffrey - something from her dragonrider series
Douglas Adams - The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (I almost left this one out, but it's so insane that it'd be a fun kind of read at the end of the year)

To complement this material, I would use movie/film clips of the progression of science fiction - perhaps Dr. Who? Star Trek? Babylon 5? Matrix? - to demonstrate our culture's fixation on the future and the imaging technology that makes it possible.