"Agberg Ideology, The" - читать интересную книгу автора (Sterling Bruce)

departure from known reality to impinge on the
universe as we know it.
2. An awareness by the writer of the structural
underpinnings (the "body of scientific knowledge") of
our known reality, as it is currently understood, so
that the speculative aspects of the story are founded
on conscious and thoughtful departures from those
underpinnings rather than on blithe ignorance.
3. Imposition by the writer of a sense of
limitations somewhere in the assumptions of the story
. . .
4. A subliminal knowledge of the feel and
texture of true science fiction, as defined in a
circular and subjective way from long acquaintance
with it.

SF is notoriously hard to define, and this
attempt seems about as good as anyone else's, so far.
Hard thinking went into it, and it deserves attention.
Yet point four is pure tautology. It is the Damon
Knight dictum of "SF is what I point at when I say
`SF,'" which is very true indeed. But this can't
conceal deep conceptual difficulties.
Here is Silverberg defining a "Story." "A story
is a machine that enlightens: a little ticking
contrivance . . . It is a pocket universe . . . It is
an exercise in vicarious experience . . . It is a
ritual of exorcism and purgation. It is a set of
patterns and formulas. It is a verbal object, an
incantation made up of rhythms and sounds."
Very fluent, very nice. But: "A science fiction
story is all those things at once, and something
more." Oh? What is this "something more?" And why does
it take second billing to the standard functions of a
generalized "stor

y?"
How can we be certain that "SF" is not, in fact,
something basically alien to "Story-telling?" "Science
fiction is a branch of fantasy," Silverberg asserts,
finding us a cozy spot under the sheltering tree of
Literature. Yet how do we really know that SF is a
"branch" at all?
The alternative would be to state that science
fiction is not a true kind of "fiction" at all, but
something genuinely monstrous. Something that limps
and heaves and convulses, without real antecedents, in
a conceptual no-man's land. Silverberg would not like
to think this; but he never genuinely refutes it.
Yet there is striking evidence of it, even in