Sense of Wonder: A Century of Science Fiction (148 page)

“Ah, you’ve just been out in space too long,” Rioz said.

* * * *

“Nightfall” Copyright © 1941 by Street & Smith Publications, Inc.

“The Martian Way” Copyright © 1952 by Galaxy Publishing Corp.

When Isaac Asimov wrote the first stories of his original
Foundation Trilogy
(1942–1950), he describes a group of “thirty thousand men with their wives and children” (29), the men being scientists and mathematicians. With this odd beginning, he offers a universe of men striving to rule the Empire or salvage it from destruction through an alternative “Foundation.” It is not surprising, then, that in the second novel we encounter Bayta, a new bride whose first action (after a moment of teasing her groom) is to step into the galley of their little spaceship and begin preparing food while her husband Toran “adjusted the controls unnecessarily and decided to relax” (82). So it is quite a shift by the end of the novel when Bayta thwarts a mindreading mutant in pursuit of ruling the galaxy. Her strong will and sharp intellect enable her to discover the mutant’s identity and keep him out of her mind long enough to prevent his discovering a vital secret. She even has the strength of will to shoot a friend about to blurt out that secret. How disappointing, then, when we realize that Bayta’s power over the mutant derives entirely from his attraction to her, and his appreciation of her warm maternal feelings toward him.

At this point it is tempting to observe that Asimov began writing at a time when science fiction was a male genre, filled with strong men rescuing damsels in distress from dragons and demons and aliens of various descriptions. Certainly a romp through any period of science fiction will offer a range of gender images and a delightful array of otherness. But the truth about science fiction is more complex: the role of gender images in interpreting the text cannot be generalized so easily. To suggest that mid-twentieth century science fiction was all about physically or intellectually powerful heroes challenging dangerous or misunderstood aliens is a simplification at best. Of course the genre reflects the questions and ideas of its period and its writers. Thus, the ways in which writers treat gender vary widely, drawing upon the metaphors of otherness to explore concerns of our times.

By the 1960s, for example, gender itself was emerging as a topic worthy of exploration through the lens of the alien. In 1963 Robert Heinlein published
Glory Road
, in which Oscar the hero is a down-and-out soldier employed by the gorgeous Starr to go on an adventure, fight evil, and earn untold wealth. In the process of fighting their way from planet to planet, he falls in love with his employer, persuades her to marry him, helps her achieve her goal, and is rewarded with full access to the wealth of the twenty known universes ruled by this Empress he has innocently married. Replete with gender stereotypes, role reversals, Oscar’s sexist assumptions, and his inability to move beyond the “hero” role to the refined pursuits of a highly sophisticated culture, the novel challenges and satirizes perceptions of gendered relations.

Just six years later (1969), Ursula K. LeGuin posed a more complicated examination of gender in
The Left Hand of Darkness
, winner of both the Hugo and Nebula Awards. Here Genly Ai of planet Earth visits the planet Gethen as a representative of the idealistic Ekumen, an organization of planets which exists for “Material profit. Increase of knowledge. The augmentation of the complexity and intensity of the field of intelligent life. The enrichment of harmony and the greater glory of God. Curiosity. Adventure. Delight” (34). But the Gethenians are androgynous, with far-reaching implications for the design of their cultures, given the expectations that any individual may become a mother—or a father—at any given sexual cycle. Sexuality is accorded a special place in Gethenian societies, and the assumption that most individuals are equal is based on the realities of parenting and the lack of distinct gender differences. Genly’s failure to recognize his own bias complicates his efforts to build an alliance with the population the Ekumen hopes to attract. He appears unable to identify or grapple with a deep level of sexism. Thus, any Gethenian who appears to be devious, talkative, or prone to practical rather than abstract knowledge, he impatiently deems to be “womanly.” Even Estraven, the brilliant Prime Minister who fully accepts Genly’s ideas, is repeatedly misinterpreted. When they finally reach an understanding, they begin to explore the alien space between them. In one notable conversation Genly Ai tries to answer Estraven’s question regarding the difference between men and women:

I suppose …the heaviest single factor in one’s life, is whether one’s born male or female. In most societies it determines one’s expectations, activities, outlook, ethics, manners – almost everything. Vocabulary. Semiotic usages. Clothing. Even food. Women . . . women tend to eat less…It’s extremely hard to separate the innate differences from the learned ones. Even where women participate equally with men in the society, they still after all do all the childbearing, and so most of the child-rearing.… (234)

This halting response leads Estraven to ask, “Are they mentally inferior?” When Ai remarks that women seldom “turn up” as mathematicians or composers or inventors, he adds that they’re not stupid, then suddenly realizes that he has never thought about what women are like. “In a sense,” he concludes “women are more alien to me than you are” (235). Before the end of the novel, as he comes to understand Estraven’s commitment to his own cause, he realizes, “I had not wanted to give my trust, my friendship to a man who was a woman, a woman who was a man” (248). In short, Genly Ai’s journey enables the reader to be inside the assumptions of a biased (though likeable) man and a deeply perplexed androgen, both learning to question assumptions about gender.

LeGuin has become an enduring influence on writers who follow her in science fiction gendered depictions. As Melissa Scott remarked in an interview, “I remember reading The Left Hand of Darkness for the first time, and realizing that it was possible to imagine a world with changeable gender” (“Melissa and Her Friends”). Scott herself is noted for a host of GLBT characters integrated into novels on a range of subjects. Most notable, perhaps, is Shadow Man (1995), in which Scott imagines a universe of multiple genders. The novel’s protagonist, Warreven, was born a “herm,” possessing the ability to live as either a man or woman (he chooses the former). His struggles with gender identity, as well as his planet’s unwillingness to move beyond traditional definitions propel much of the plot; they also allow Scott to set up an allegory for the GLBT civil rights movement. Warreven’s reluctance to become a spokesperson for alternative gender identities is one of the most compelling aspects of Shadow Man, and Scott’s unwillingness to satisfactorily conclude the novel’s conflicts reveals the continued complications of gender in our society.

Another affirmation of varied sexuality arises as Samuel Delany explores the human yearning for sexuality with a category of humans known as “Spacers” in his short story, “Aye and Gomorrah” (
Dangerous Visions
, 1967). Here individuals are selected in early puberty for a low level of sexuality, then surgically altered, their sexual capacities removed to allow them to work in the radiation of outer space. Attracted to the Spacers are “Frelks,” whose sexual drive tends to be stirred only by the inaccessible. Here readers must consider how sexuality centers us, and how it will be handled as technological advances offer new, even horrifying, options.

A different exploration of the ways technology may offer physical alterations or transform our understanding of what is human occurs in Anne McCaffrey’s
The
Ship Who Sang
(1970), the story of Helva, whose severe physical disabilities are resolved by her transformation into a “shell person” sealed into a titanium container. Supplied with a ship to operate and a “brawn” (a physically adept partner), these shell people wander the universe on their jobs for Central Worlds. After their huge debts for alteration, therapy, and training are paid off (if ever), shell people may work for themselves. The distinction of this novel is the ways in which Helva and her various male and female brawns interact with each other. As Helva grows up and learns to manage her own emotions, she also falls in love. McCaffrey’s vision of gender enables us to consider the implications of romance between a huge ship and a tiny man. Is it possible to experience the ecstasy of love without the physical capacity to enact it? How do the power plays of gender expectations work themselves out for the physically disabled? In examining these questions, we come to understand once again how the metaphors of science fiction allow us to consider the humane questions of our age. While some critics argue that McCaffrey depicts disability in a negative light and condemns the disabled to a life of separation, other readers note her celebration of the human spirit, her examination of human frailty in other characters, and her delight in creating a wide band of human possibility.

Thus, what science fiction offers many readers are new options for thinking through the concerns of their own age, metaphors which help to provide distance, and opportunities to redefine their own perceptions. So broad a concept as gender, then, opens a host of possibilities to writers. In the
Xenogenesis Trilogy
(1987–89, republished in 2000 as
Lilith’s Brood
), Octavia Butler posits a three-gendered race (the Oankali) rescuing planet Earth from the devastation of intercontinental ballistic weapons. Biological merchants, the Oankali exchange genes with aliens through a highly seductive sexual process. The downside of accepting the salvation of the Oankali is its consequences for human reproduction, the intimacy of the sex act, and the resulting hybrid children. For readers, the concept of a third gender interacting with the male and female during copulation is both curious and troubling.

Another complicated exploration of sexuality occurs in
Up the Walls of the World
(1978), in which James Tiptree Jr. (nee Alice Sheldon) creates a giant gas planet where the inhabitants float on the winds high above. Males become the highly respected “Fathers,” whose tenderness with the children they both give birth to and rear is balanced by their grumbling that women get to be adventurous and have all the fun. The airy process of passing the egg back and forth up in the high winds during copulation is a delightful scene not to be missed. The text also provides a sobering exploration of how the birth parent’s role defines his/her life. Tiptree has been recognized for her contributions to gender images in science fiction, as well as her choice of a pseudonym that produced significant speculation and reflection on the supposed differences in science fiction written by men or by women. The James Tiptree, Jr. Award was founded in 1991 as “an annual literary prize for science fiction or fantasy that expands or explores our understanding of gender” (James Tiptree, Jr. Literary Award Council).

More disturbing yet are the gendered understandings in Sheri Tepper’s
Beauty
(1991), which explores the Sleeping Beauty legend, the land of Faery, the source of good and evil, and the horrors Beauty discovers when she is transported to the twenty-first century, escapes to the twentieth, is raped, and discovers pornography, sadism, and the ways in which sex is separated from the tenderness of love she believes occurred in her own century. In a different timeline Tepper creates a war-torn culture,
The Gate to Women’s Country
(1988), where women have created safe havens within their gates and warriors live in garrisons outside. Having discovered the reality of a gene for violence, the novel’s women have created a system to prevent impregnation by the warrior class, thus gradually removing the source of aggression from the world.

But while images of gender may be elicited to explore untold visions of otherness and our need to accept the realities of difference in our cultures, they may also offer opportunities to consider our own interactions as gendered human beings. Connie Willis complicates this problem in her brief novel, Uncharted Territory (1994), in which the partners Carson and Findriddy explore the planet Boohte for rich resources needed back on Earth, secretly hiding their finds in an effort to preserve the planet for an indigenous species of indeterminate gender. Through skillful use of language Willis manages to avoid defining the genders of the main characters for much of the text, though this does not prevent us from making our own assumptions. Subplots and lesser characters gradually model a range of typical human gendered behaviors and power struggles. As the novel progresses, the behaviors of animals, particularly the bowerbird, are explored and compared to human activity. By the end of the novel, when we have discovered the gender identities of Carson and Findriddy, we also observe the unfolding of their connections to each other and the power of an unsuspected love.

In all of these texts, the experimental ways in which gender and sexuality are explored offer us opportunities to examine tough questions and rethink our own perceptions. Given its wide array of approaches to gender questions, issues of power, and understandings of human need, science fiction can help us to understand our own ways of being. As science fiction moves into the twenty-first century, gender images continue to evolve, often following the conventions of sub-genres within the field. Two examples of this trend are found in the first novels of Alastair Reynolds and Richard K. Morgan. Reynolds’s Revelation Space (2000) is firmly rooted in the space opera tradition, and to many, Reynolds has redefined it for a new generation of science fiction readers. Morgan’s debut novel Altered Carbon (2002)—winner of the 2003 Philip K. Dick Award—successfully combines elements of the hard-boiled detective novel with science fiction. The commercial success of both novels indicates their characterizations of men and women have met with popular approval, and a more thorough reading of each text might suggest one of the ways in which the genre will approach gender in the future.