FutureTense

Several famous writers in the field have attempted to explain away the decline of SF and the rise of fantasy as the natural reaction to an uncertain, increasingly dismal future. Depressing futures lead to depressing stories and thus, to depressed readers who turn away from SF toward the comfort of the known, the formulaic and the irrelevant.

That’s what the pundits of the SF field would have us believe. Personally, I take exception to the generalization that Fantasy is comforting, formulaic and irrelevant. Personally, I also believe that another word for “depressing” is “dangerous.” Those dangerous futures can produce — perhaps even require — SF works of insight, imagination and invigorating peril.

With that spirit, I was delighted to chance upon John Brunner’s definition of Science Fiction among Neyir Cenk Gökçe’s collection.

As its best, SF is the medium in which our miserable certainty that tomorrow will be different from today in ways we cant predict, can be transmuted to a sense of excitement and anticipation, occasionally evolving into awe. Poised between intransigent skepticism and uncritical credulity, it is par excellence the literature of the open mind.

Best regards,
Alan

The dominating presence of male authors in the Hugo awards (and by implication, both major awards) came up in the BroadUniverse discussion forum as only one work written by a woman was nominated this year.

Since Kelly Link did OK last year (2005) sweeping both Hugo and Nebulas and Bujold has done quite well, historically, with 3 Hugos to her credit, I was curious.

Looking at just the awards — not the nominees — for novel, novella, novelette and short story since 2000 (a completely arbitrary cutoff point):

2006 Nebs: 1 / 3.

2005 Nebs: 3 / 1.

2004 Nebs went mostly to women: 3 / 1.

2003 Nebs 2 / 2.

2002 Nebs 1 / 3.

2001 Nebs: 3 women, 1 man.

2005 Hugos: 2 to 2

2004 Hugos: 1 woman, 3 men.

2003 Hugos: 0 / 4

2002 Hugos: 0 / 4

2001 Hugos: 2 / 2.

I don’t see a bias in the Nebs at the award level. Haven’t had time to look at the nominations, which can be more important economically — a lot more people get to say “Nominated for a Nebula Award” than get to say received same.

There’s a page about the history of the Nebs that shows a clear gender bias, historically. I don’t know if there are enough data points for the results to be statistically meaningful, but it looks like the bias is at the nomination step. For example, 21% of the nominees are women, but 26% of the winners are women. I don’t know if his data has been corrected for the gender of the writer as opposed to the gender of the name on the work. In earlier days of SF, many women published under a male name. It was enlightening and entertaining to attend the retroactive Tiptree Award and find out how strong a presence women writers have had through out the history of SF, as the panelists went through the list of proposed candidates going “he’s not a he, he’s a she.”

Appears to be a gender bias in the Hugos at the award level. I can’t, from this information, figure out where the bias is. You have to get published, nominated and have sufficient recognition among the members to get the votes necessary to win. Could be at any of those steps. For example, many members of BroadUniverse publish in smaller, less well known outlets that are often online. Even without gender bias, it would be hard to accumulate the votes needed to win.

It is interesting that the fantasy bias in the Hugo is fading. A fantasy novel has won every other year since J. K. Rowling won for Harry Potter.

Best regards,
Alan

Terrible news. Fred Saberhagen passed away Saturday afternoon, June 29, 2007.

A prince among men, author of pages of books, creator of the Berserker universe,

In lieu of flowers donations would be appreciated to any of the following - Doctors without Borders. Catholic Relief, SFWA Emergency Medical Fund, John 23rd Catholic Church in Albuquerque.

Best regards,
Alan