quote:
My thesis, in short, is that the reiteration of vacancy—voids that themselves contain gaps, hollows yielding pockets of emptiness—is everywhere in science fiction and fantasy, indeed is peculiar to it.
from The Hole in a Hole
A Theory of Science Fiction and Fantasy
By Gregory Feeley
http://www.sfwa.org/bulletin/articles/feeley.htm
I'm not sure quite what to think of this. Any other opinions? Or is it just over-clever writing?
The article basically just uses a few examples to try to prove what the author wants, and yet the author never really says what he actually means by "A hole within a hole."
And in the end the title is misleading. What he is trying to say is that there are two types of fiction. Those with holes and those without. Important thing to think about, "Does it matter?"
And there you have it. Whether a work deals with the rather existencial question of whether a void actually exists in its own right has nothing at all to do with whether that work is SF, indeed, has little enough to do with anything other than whether the work belongs to the post-existential body of literature. And since Feeley is willing to admit as much, it is hard to understand why it is subtitled as it has been.
Of course, it is an amusing play that this non-theory of a "hole within a hole" should be assigned to fill the vacancy which he asserts to exist where a coherent theory of SF ought to be. The essay itself is a nothing that is placed on a larger "nothing" which only exists in the heads of those that don't accept the simple truth. SF is fiction which deals with what we believe to be possible through science. "As the term 'ninja' implies, a ninja is someone that uses ninjitsu."
quote:
Maybe in order to understand mankind we have to look at that word itself. MANKIND. Basically, it's made up of two separate words: "mank" and "ind." What do these words mean? It's a mystery and that's why so is mankind.
To me, the article made just about as much sense as that.
[This message has been edited by EricJamesStone (edited October 14, 2004).]
As for defining SF, I couldn't help thinking of a quote from Louis Armstrong when someone asked him to define jazz. He replied, "Man, if you gotta ask, you'll never know."
Just for kicks, here's another quote from Louis Armstrong about music that I think applies just as well to writing.
quote:
My life has always been my music, it's always come first, but the music ain't worth nothing if you can't lay it on the public.
Manky, of course, means dirty-looking[1]. It is obviously a reference to manks, so manks must be something that look dirty most of the time.
--
[1]: Possibly this isn't so obvious. Dictionary.com doesn't have a proper definition for the word, only one from 'wordnet,' which I don't consider authoritative. The COED does have a definition, though, which is "1. bad, inferior, defective. 2. dirty".