I’m not sure where the stylistic lines are drawn for science fiction, and wonder where these two books/movies are, relative to said lines. Both were set in the (then) future and arguably involve advanced scientific concepts. But Nevil Shute’s On the Beach seems of a piece with WWII stories like The Caine Mutiny, not **Forbidden Planet **or anything like that. And while Anthony Burgess’s A Clockwork Orange gets shown a lot at SF conventions, it’s kind of in a genre of its own, owing more to psychology than to the physical sciences. It doesn’t even seem al that closely related to 2001, thematically.
Also, the authors are not primarily science fiction writers. Shute is probably better known for A Town Like Alice these days and Burgess mostly wrote things that were a lot less genre-specific (like The Worm and the Ring and Earthly Powers, although part of The End of the World News was SF).
Am I overthinking this? Are both of these stories generally considered science fiction?
I think you may just be stereotyping the genre. Some people feel science fiction is zap guns and bug-eyed monsters. Sure, that kind of pulp sci-fi exists but it’s not the whole genre. There are plenty of great works of literature in science fiction as well.
Both of those stories are absolutely, 100% science fiction. Neither one is very similar to Forbidden Planet, but that just means that there are many different kinds of science fiction. Although, it’s interesting that that’s your example, given that the main gimmick of Forbidden Planet also drew from the psychological sciences.
Absolutely science fiction. The best science fiction has always been a way to explore social and psychological themes. Science fiction doesn’t have to have anything to do with physical sciences.
I think I’d call them Speculative Fiction, in that the situations are possible within their timeframes rather than being possible through technological developments that haven’t happened yet. If On The Beach is Science Fiction, is The Bedford Incident Science Fiction as well? Or Fail Safe?
Having said that, much Speculative Fiction contains an element or two of Science Fiction and you never hear anyone talking about ‘SpecFic’. So I think by default it is grouped with Science Fiction.
As I understand it, one of the reasons the abbreviation “SF” is so popular is that it can stand for either “science fiction” or “speculative fiction”; so you can say that a book is SF without committing yourself to which you mean.
I believe (but do not know) that the publishing industry classified a novel to be science fiction if the author has established a reputation for science fiction and is typically classified as such.
Absolutely science fiction. If On the Beach is not, then what do you call Judith Merrill’s Shadows on the Hearth, also an after the war story. There are of course hundreds of examples.
Clockwork Orange is even more science fiction - not only is it set in the future, but it studies the effects of a piece of technology.
I don’t know why you’d think the movie would be similar to 2001? Just because both were directed by Kubrick, coming from very different sources. You might as well wonder about it not being like Lolita.
Well, in the case of A Clockwork Orange, there ought to be no doubt by even the most exacting standards: it is “science fiction” in that the main plot point is driven by extrapolation of the impact of a particular science - that of behavioral conditioning: the “Ludovico technique” in the movie and book.
It is what I would call “hard” science fiction, in that it has basically no elements of technology-as-magic or fantasy-swords-and sorcery-set-in-space: it is a serious extrapolation of the potential impact of this branch of science on humanity.
Yes, “Beach” is fairly standard post-apocalypse stuff, like “Alas, Babylon” and “Earth Abides”. “Clockwork” is, but seems to be becoming less so day by day.
I’ve never read either novel, but in terms of the films I’d say A Clockwork Orange is definitely science fiction in the sub-genre of dystopian future (and just being a Kubrick film nearly makes it a sub-genre unto itself).
The film On the Beach however I find less science fiction and more just a straight drama. The only real ‘science fiction-y’ scene is the creepy footage of a lone sailor in a hazmat suit walking thru an abandoned San Diego at the end. The rest of the film takes place in normal, everyday locations. Even the sub is not made to look futuristic at all (because it isn’t necessary for the story). And while an already occurred WWIII is the underlying fact, the drama is still simply about relationships, life, death etc. In fact the film is dated enough that some scenes even trend towards melodrama.
And “speculative fiction” is an umbrella term that encompasses several different genres, most notably science fiction, fantasy, and alternate history. So, yes, it’s certainly correct to call On the Beach speculative fiction, but what kind of speculative fiction? Science fiction is the only one that really fits.
I have heard from many sources, which of course I cannot cite, that one of the biggest mistakes is to call Science Fiction a genre in the first place. SciFi is a setting. You can have any genre of book played out in a SciFi setting. A Clockwork Orange is a Psychological Thriller, with a SciFi (Near-Future) setting. I have never read or seen On the Beach, but here are some more examples: Alien is a horror movie, Aliens is a War Movie, Star Wars (IV) is a Buddy Adventure, Wall-E is a Love Story. They are all in a SciFi setting. As kunilou points out, *Forbidden Planet * is Shakespeare’s The Tempest in a SciFi setting.
I have to disagree: Sci-Fi is a gazillion different settings. All you’re doing is kicking the can down the road: what is (or is not) a sci-fi setting?
Science fiction is a genre. It’s just an amazingly broad one, and thus easily broken down into sub-genres.
It’s also a fuzzy set with indistinct borders. In a very limited way, The Bedford Incident (mentioned above) is “science fiction” because it’s about the breakdown of a highly technological military system – the Destroyer’s command and launch mechanisms – under human stress. Failsafe goes there too: it looks at our technology and its human interface, and shows us a speculative breakdown model.
I am confused. I can come up with the same exact story set a century and a half earlier. In a Napoleanic Era warship (which is a technological machine in it’s own right), you can also have a breakdown in the chain of command, crushing isolation that drives men insane, or disease that wipes out half the crew. Why is The Bedford Incident Sci-Fi? The presence of a telephone?
Okay, try this: On the Beach is science fiction, but the thematically similar film Crimson Tide isn’t. Why the difference? (Or were all those Silver Surfer references a breadcrumb in a trail of them?)