Do the Grand Masters Matter Anymore?

[jeriendhal]

Just got to thinking about this while reading a post about Isaac Asimov on OpenSalon. The author was waxing enthusiastically about the potential for turning more Asimov stories into films, but I politely disagreed with him, pointing out that Asimov was better at putting forth ideas than creating three dimensional characters that a viewer in a theater might connect with.

It got me to thinking about whether any of the big three, Heinlein, Asimov, Clarke and their contemporaries who started the Golden Age of Science Fiction are relevant today. I'm not going to argue whether they were important back then. That's undisputed. It was their efforts that pulled sci fi out o the ghetto of rayguns and tentacled monsters threatening buxom blondes on the cover of digest mags to the "Literature of Ideas" that we cherish today. But a hundred years from now will we still be reading them or studying them, like we do Shakespeare? Or will we have put them aside to be ignored, like so many of Shakespeare's contemporaries?

Because let's face it, characterization is not their strong suit. Heinlien tends to come on out ahead, despite an obsession with polyamorous redheads certain quirks. But Clarke tends to fall back on a menagerie of stoic, sexless engineers or (in his more humorous works) flat characters that wouldn't look out of place in an Ealing comedy.[1] Asimov almost always left me cold, despite the intriguing nature of his puzzle stories. His later Foundation/Robot epics were just too painful for me to try to finish.

Ultimately characterization is what I read for. Someone I can connect to and admire, as they struggle with some strange new problem never seen before in our world. That's what made Shakespeare's works as relevant today as they did in his time, human nature never really changing. Can we say the same about the worlds of Asimov, Clarke and Heinlein, when all they have are ideas that have been superseded by today's technology, examined by characters we no longer can connect to?

[1] And god, some of his early works, particularly his Sands of Mars, seem intent on re-creating the British Empire IN SPACE. Complete with loyal natives to help their new white human masters.

Comments

[stoutfellow.livejournal.com]

Not everything they wrote has gone obsolescent; "Nightfall" and "The City and the Stars" haven't, and I don't think they will. Of course, the dialog in "Nightfall" is pretty bad ("you double-crossing rat!"), but those two in particular will, I think, continue to pack enough sensawunda to be readable for some time to come.

Other than those, and maybe a few others? Yeah, you're probably right.

[countrycousin.livejournal.com]

Good points. I just downsized and have left the Asimovs, pretty much for the reasons you state. (I jolly well kept the Heinleins. AND the Clements, although characterization wasn't his forte either.)

And I suppose the ideas, important then, are old hat now. Our horizon seems smaller, even as the deep field probes range farther, because of our realization of fundamental limitations. No wonder a lot of us have taken up more fantasy. :-}

But Heinlein had, before the surfeit of redheads, an actor as a major head of state, making contact with a head of state via spouse's fortune teller (although I suppose that had happened before, too - but it happened after).

I would think Citizen of the Galaxy would make a good mini-series. But I suppose potential makers want a built-in audience that I'm not sure would exist, now.

[jeriendhal.livejournal.com]

I think defining factor for Asimov and Clarke for me is that for Asimov, the characters of his I could name off the top of my head were Susan Calvin and R. Daneel, and I couldn't name anyone from Clarke that weren't in the 2001 or 2010 films.

Citizen of the Glaxy would make an excellent mini-series. The Star Beast and Have Spacesuit Will Travel were optioned by disney at one point, though I don't know if that's expired.

[chewipaka.livejournal.com]

Bradbury is still well read,and I think some of Heinlein's books are still relevant. Probably Starship Troopers is the only one I can think of that's sort of timeless, because he's the least sexist in that. Because there are no female characters that he tries to equalize. Because my major issue with Heinlein is how hard he tried to be a feminist, and how hard he fails by modern standards. He gets points for attempting feminism though.

But we all saw the movie they made off of Starship Troopers. And it made everyone cry.

[jeriendhal.livejournal.com]

I left Bradbury out because I regarded him as more of fantasist than a "hard" sci fi writer. He wasn't the sort to worry about calculating orbits or worrying about nuclear physics.

And yeah, at least RAH was trying.

[chewipaka.livejournal.com]

And, y'know, looking at RAH from a 1950's perspective: Holy shit, women were commanding (and piloting!) Battle Ships of doom; women were having consensual sex for funsies without marriage and weren't punished for it later in the story; women were just plain kickass fighters.

And this is the 1950's where Rosie the Riveter was great and all, but the menfolk are home now so you wimmen can get back in the kitchen and make sandwiches.

Crap, what was the original post? I forgot with all my feminism :-P

[chewipaka.livejournal.com]

Okay, back to the point: I think that, even if not all of Asimov's or Heinlein's or Clarke's works will be read in a 100 years, I think a select few will survive as an example of how freakin' innovative human thought was back then and as an example to continue striving for innovation in writing. And, okay, I've never read Clarke, and I've only read one Asimov book, I have devoured Heinlein because like you, I read for the characterization in stories, not for the ideas.

But here's the thing: I know who they are and what they wrote, and teenagers of today even know who they are and what they wrote, even if they haven't read that much. So they won't vanish, but they probably won't be mainstream.

Who knows, maybe at least one of them will survive to become the next Jules Verne.

[elusivetiger.livejournal.com]

If you haven't yet, check out Stanley Weinbaum. He was amazing, and taken from us far too soon. His work predated all three and is astonishing.

[jeriendhal.livejournal.com]

Raises eyebrow I'll have to look for him. What are some titles to search for?

[elusivetiger.livejournal.com]

Mostly you'll find collections of his short works, which are mostly threaded together a bit like Heinlein's much later Future History/Past Through Tomorrow, as he died very young and didn't get a lot published.

I highly recommend these two:

http://www.amazon.com/Interplanetary-Odysseys-Adventure-Including-Complete/dp/1846770602

http://www.amazon.com/STRANGE-GENIUS-Including-Complete-Manderpootz/dp/1846770483

The first contains A Martian Odyssey in it, which introduces what is arguably the first truly alien thinker; it was an inspiration for many and is highly entertaining.

The second contains The New Adam, which is... VERY intense, heavy, dark, depressing, and not at all like most of his other work, though it is absolutely brilliant.

His characterizations are far better IMO than the three you listed, and he dares to have strong women. He also has a bit of a lightness in his writing, an ebullience, enthusiasm for the future, that is wonderful. I've devoured everything by him and I only wish he had lived to a ripe old age to write more.

[jeriendhal.livejournal.com]

Thank you. I'll hunt for them at the library next chance I get.

[scarfman]

A good story well told is a good story well told, outdated tech and merely craftmanslike chacterization aside. I've just reread Time Enough for Love off the shelf, picked at random, but (my books being in no searchable order) it's inspired me to plan a trip to the library for Number of the Beast, The Cat Who Walks Through Walls and To Sail Beyond the Sunset. And maybe Mistress and Stranger. I tend to reread the Foundation books and the space odysseys at least decadely too. (Ringworld novels also, for the record, though you're not singling out anyone alive.)

[chaypeta.livejournal.com]

I read a lot of Asimov (Foundation, all of the Robot collected stories and Bradbury as a teen. I tried Clarke, I really did, but left him for the same reason stated in your post: too much dry tech and world building and not enough characterisation. I really do think having fully rounded characters that you can care about what happens to them is the main reason that compells a person to finish a book. It's probably why I hit space opera's more then anything else. Although I still cringe at cross species offspring and other such things that are just wrong.

[chewipaka.livejournal.com]

Just because a human and an iguana* can't have a child is no reason for a human and (insert random alien from something, anything, here) to not have one!



*Somebody else made a point with this example about how improbable it is for aliens to be able to mate with humans.

[secoh.livejournal.com]

thanks for adding me btw!

I think they are still relevant, in the same way Beethoven is relevant to rock and roll. Without the conceptual foundations nothing would have progressed, and eventually the modern works diverge so much that the originals eventually stand clear once again.

Where they did excel was in concepts. The whole "What if" and "What Would Happen" scenarios. What if we met an alien? What if man made it to the stars? What if we could make a ringworld? What would happen then?

I found Heinlein unreadable, and so never read his works - so it is unfair for me to comment specifically about his work.
I thoroughly enjoyed Asimov's short stories and Robot books. Foundation I thought was as boring as batshit, though I forced myself to read them all. The characters were politically focused and to my young mind at the time this was the least interesting topic in the history of Stuff.

But the propositions put forward by these authors is what makes their work worth keeping separate. What to do with a created sentience or self aware machine is a topic that is still being explored and still has not been satisfactorily answered by modern society.

[mmegaera.livejournal.com]

Lack of good characterization is why I've had a hard time branching out from Bujold into the broader world of SF (I came to Bujold from the romance end of things). I would love some recommendations of SF (besides the Liaden stories, which leave me dead cold) that puts its primary focus on good, interesting characters.