The Production of Canon: A Pointless Argument?
An amusing discussion took place last week in one of my classes (the SF/utopia one). We were talking about Tom Moylan’s Scrapes of Untainted Sky and Luckhurst’s Science Fiction and how Luckhurst’s one-page claim about the awful practice of canon production in key theoretical texts (Suvin’s Metamorphoses of Science Fiction, Carl Freedman’s Critical Theory and Science Fiction, and Moylan’s book) sets itself up as a contradiction. For Luckhurst (and this is based on reading one page from his book), the aforementioned authors are participating in political games: Suvin in a game of the literary elite; Freedman in an equally problematic project; and Moylan in utopian readings of SF. He views these authors as having agendas that “reflect back the ‘reader-critic’s cherished political dispositions’” (9) and argues that SF studies needs to be open to examinations and discussions of Pulp Era and Golden Age SF. Since even Luckhurst is participating in canon production–even though he is attempting to open up the critical framework of SF studies to more texts than Suvin and others have been willing to address–the contradiction should be readily apparent. Luckhurst’s solution is a good one (in my opinion). Since I’ve already written about the inside vs. the outside in SF criticism, it seems prudent to point out that political agendas play a crucial role in forming theoretical and critical texts. It also seems prudent to suggest that one can’t escape from political readings. But can one escape from the project of canon production? That is the question that I am concerned with here (and one that I was concerned with during class). Part of our discussion centered on the problem of canon production and the naive assumption made by Luckhurst that his personal vision of SF criticism was somehow apolitical (or at least non-ideological in a canonical sense). The problem, obviously, is that Luckhurst isn’t removing himself from the system of canon production. Instead, he’s as much a part of it as everyone else. All critical texts, thus, are participating in the canonical system, even if the author’s intent is to do otherwise. When you select texts, you are producing a canon, since no matter what you do, you are excluding some texts for one reason or another. Even if you acknowledge that space prevents you from talking about everything, you’re still making a decision on which texts you’ll talk about, and, thus, an assessment of their quality. The inescapability of canon production, however, is where I suddenly find myself asking “why.” Why are we talking about canon production at all if nothing you do can be anti-canon in a purist sense? Nothing a critic produces can be outside of the system, which suggests to me that talking about how an author is participating in it is similar to talking about how your neighbor breathes every day–they’re both natural features of a system of existence (one tied to life and one tied to the literary critical form). It seems to me that the only relevant time to talk about the production of canon is when one is personally invested in an ideological/political project related to canon, such as might be said of someone like Harold Bloom or the detestable E. D. Hirsch (whose “cultural literacy” is one of the most problematic canonical forms next to the literary canon). Beyond those figures, however, talking about canon is, as I just said, like talking about breathing; if your next door neighbor is breathing special gas to become a super mutant to take over the world, then maybe you should pay attention and have a discussion–most likely, however, your neighbor is just suffering from lung cancer. To put it another way: unless canon is being used to exclude for political, rather than critical, reasons (i.e. SF isn’t in my canon because it’s not real literature), we shouldn’t be talking about it. Argue about the exclusions, but don’t bother talking about how the production of canon is a problem that needs to be addressed. Sometimes talking about canon is pointless (read: without purpose or meaning). We need to move beyond canon and start asking why we make the selections we make, why others make them, and what the rationale behind all forms of inclusion and exclusion offer us. Sometimes we select texts to talk about because there is a relationship we want others to see, and as the “others,” we should be willing to set aside the pointless discussions and engage the material (critical or otherwise) on its own terms (just, as I said yesterday, as we should do when producing critical works on SF). But what do you think about canon production? Do you agree with me here or do you disagree? Let me know in the comments.
Science Fiction Criticism: Inside vs. Outside
One of my colleagues recently asked me what I thought about the academic texts on science fiction we had been reading over the semester. Specifically, she was curious about my opinion on the inside and the outside, and who, more or less, has the “right” to comment upon the genre. Before I get into that, I need to explain what I mean by the inside and the outside. There are two kinds of science fiction critics (or maybe more than two, but I’m only dealing with two for this post): the critic who grew up in the “community” and transitioned into academia (the inside) and the non-fan who, by some twist of fate, perhaps, came to the genre having never had much interest in it before (the outside). The latter group might be comprised of fans, or it might not, but the first group most definitely is a fan-based critical circle, since the impetus for shifting to academia as a “science fiction critic” has everything to do with their experience with the genre. In principle, I have no problem with the outside. They are just as capable of talking about the genre as anyone else, and their opinions and knowledge may add something new to science fiction studies. Likewise, I have no problem with the inside, since having an intimate connection with the genre lends a kind of unflinching passion to academic life (as an academic, I can attest to the fact that many academics seem to lack passion for their field, or at least seem to lack that passion). But neither group is without flaws, and it’s when the flaws become noticeable in the critical product that I start to have a big problem. You see, sometimes those who are on the inside are often incapable of thinking on the outside. They have become so “obsessed” with the field in which they have extended themselves academically that they are largely incapable of dealing with the genre within its own terms and within the theoretical frameworks that exist outside of genre entirely. These are the folks who write about how much they love SF rather than about what SF does. These are also folks who should probably remain fans, since being an academic (within the academic world, obviously, since one should be able to separate the two) requires (or should require) a certain level of objectivity and intellectual breadth. For me, this has always been a problem, because waxing lyrical about my favorite science fiction texts means very little in the academic world (we care about “why” more than we care about “thought”). I’ve had to separate my fan side from my academic side enough so that the two only overlap in a very small space (as in a Venn diagram, for example). Some people can’t do this, though, and they need to understand that they’re doing the genre no favors by flooding the academic world with love that, inevitably, has very little meaning in terms of its substance and what it actually offers academics and the field in general (remember that academics, who may be fans, are still different beasts altogether). However, things become even more complicated when one starts to talk about the outside. In the last few years, there has been (or seems to have been) a surge of academics working on SF who have never done so before. Some of them have simply felt it was time to shift things over to other things they enjoy, but a good portion of them are individuals who have come to the genre without even understanding it as a genre and as a fan-element (i.e. as popular culture). This latter group is the problem group. These are the folks who treat books like Cormac McCarthy’s The Road as though it is a remarkably original post-apocalyptic novel, intentionally ignoring that The Road essentially lifts every cliche and plot from the sea of post-apocalyptic novels that preceded it. These are the individuals who treat everything but a very small handful of SF texts with derision, isolating their work entirely from the critical framework of science fiction studies. They proclaim by action that they are “the outside,” proudly and with flare. They’re not interested in learning about the genre (except, perhaps, cursorily) nor about what makes SF texts function (which is essential to any academic project on an SF text). Now you might say that the outsider group I have just described is comprised of lazy academics. Perhaps they are, but that doesn’t change the fact that some of them get a lot of respect for talking about SF in an obviously lip-service sort of way. What they’re really interested in are the texts they happened to like (maybe they didn’t even know they were reading SF until it was too late or someone pointed it out to them). And these folks I have a huge problem with. It’s a territorial thing. I don’t care if outsiders come to SF, learn it, and write articles/books about it. They’re adding something valuable to the discussion. But I do care about people who come to SF with a clear unwillingness to address the genre on its own terms. That would be akin to a non-canon (genre-fiction only) reader waltzing over to Charles Dickens and claiming it as their own without looking at the historical and critical framework set up by Dickensian scholars. To me, that’s a slap in the face. To put it another way: if you have no intention of being a fan, then don’t write about texts within my genre. Outsiders can be fans. They might not like some of the stuff in the SF world (hell, even I don’t), but they are still willing to see the value in the genre and find their niche within it. They can become fans (perhaps not obsessive ones, but that doesn’t seem necessary). SF deserves passion from its academics. But when academics come to the field without embedding themselves into the field (even slightly), they