Board of Regents of the University of Oklahoma

Review: Istvan Csicsery-Ronay Jr.'s The Seven Beauties of Science Fiction

Author(s): Paul Kincaid
Review by: Paul Kincaid
Source: World Literature Today, Vol. 84, No. 3 (MAY/JUNE 2010), pp. 44-47
Published by: Board of Regents of the University of Oklahoma
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/27871085
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SCIENCE FICTION

Istvan Csicsery-Ronay Jr.'s

The Seven Beauties of Science Fiction

Paul Kincoid

The commonly accepted academic definition of science fictionwas

formulated by Darko Suvin in the 1970s, but now there is a much
needed revisionofhis ideas.Butdoes itgo farenough?

Istvan Csicsery-Ronay Jr.The

[
his isprobably one of thebest and most sig scientific guidelines, and has oftenwandered off
Seven Beauties of Science nificantworks of science-fictioncriticism to into very different territory.The view of science
Fiction. Middletown, Conn. have appeared so far this century. This is fiction espoused by Suvin was vital in provid
t:
Wesleyan University Press. not to say that Istvan Csicsery-Ronay Jr. is always ing academic authority for the study of science
2008. 336 pages. $35. isbn
right and that I always agree with him: he isn't fiction, but the strictures were
quite
narrow and

978-0-8195-6889-2 and I don't. But my disagreements are mostly in rigid and bear but a passing relationship to the
theway of the continuing dialogue thathe calls for. ever-changing shape of science fiction today.
What makes this book significant is that it Hence the need for this relaxation of Suvin's
marks a necessary, if belated, corrective to the views; the only question is whether Csicsery
orthodox Marxist view of science fiction thathas Ronay has gone far
enough.
been the more or less default academic response to At the core of Suvin's characterization of
the genre since at least thework of Darko Suvin. science fiction is the notion of cognitive estrange
As such, The Seven Beauties ofScienceFiction is likely ment, adapted from the Russian formalists, and
to become the central text of SF criticism for some the idea of the novum, adapted from thework of
time to come. the Marxist philosopher Ernst Bloch. Csicsery
It is easy to understand why science fiction in Ronay retains the notion of cognitive estrange

particular has an
appeal
to Marxist theorists. The ment but downplays its significance as a defining
Western myth of science, ever since the days of characteristic of science fiction. I remain
skep
Francis Bacon, has been that science an tical about on several
represents cognitive estrangement
inevitable advance toward truth and material well fronts.Estrangement is that literary effectwhich
being. This makes it a very good fitwith Marxist makes us stop and see things afresh; the cogni
ideas ofhistorical inevitability.And as a proponent tive element applies this freshness both to the
of, and channel for,much of thatWestern myth of exercise of our imagination and the product of
science, science fictionseems tomatch very closely that imagination. I am not clear that all forms
the ideals for how fiction should work. What of literary estrangement are not in some degree
makes me uneasy about theMarxist approach is cognitive. This in turn leads to further concerns:
theweight itplaces on the science in science fiction. I am unconvinced that cognitive estrangement as
Let's face it, science fiction bears as much relation such applies to everythingwe would characterize
to the scientific as realist fiction does to the real. as science fiction,or that it applies exclusively to

They are at best approximations, at worst gross what we term science fiction. Indeed, too rigid
distortions ofwhat is there,more as an aspiration an application of Suvin's ideas has, as Csicsery
for the fiction than as itsdefining characteristic. Ronay notes in passing, prompted some academ
What's more, wherever we
place the origins ics to exclude from the genre works thatmost
of the genre, itshistory has been one of constant people uncontentiously identifyas science fiction.
change. The literaturehas rarely stayed close to its Even more problematic is the fact that unques

441World Literature Today

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 REVIEW
on the ludic or
playful qualities of science fiction.
Sometimes we are not just stopping theworld to
look at it differently; sometimes we are
playing
with the differentways it can be perceived. This
is thatmost rare and wonderful thing, a work of
academic criticism that insists that science fiction
should be fun.
But Csicsery-Ronay is more radical in his
treatment of the novum. For Suvin, thiswas the
one point ofmaterial
change in theworld of the
fiction that initiated our estrangement and hence
made the work science fiction. In other words,
without a novum a cannot be science fic
story
tion; conversely, ifa story is science fiction itmust
contain a novum. And Suvin's novum is
always
singular.

Csicsery-Ronay challenges thismost signifi

cantly by proposing that the novum may be
plural. In a work such as Kim Stanley Robinson's
Mars trilogy, for instance, is the novum the colo
nization ofMars, the technology of
terra-forming
that fits theplanet tohumankind, or the
longevity
treatment thatmakes all this possible within the
lifetimesof his characters? In fact all of these, and
to an extent other features of the books, could be
characterized as novums. In that this
recognizing
situation is common across science fiction (is the
novum of William Gibson's Neuromancer
cyber
space or the economic transformation of America
that has created the Sprawl?),
Csicsery-Ronay is
not just opening up a more subtle understand
ing of what constitutes science fiction,he is also
allowing more subtle readings of science fictions.
tioned classics of science fiction that But he goes further than this by suggesting
employ
scientific ideas which have since been superseded that the novum not be an essential
may actually
might suddenly find themselves ejected from element of science fiction.A jonbar point in the
the genre. A definition of genre that identifies a
prehistory of an alternate history storymay well
novel as science fictionone day and thevery next not be thematerial change
normally understood
day, due to extraliterary developments such as as a novum, but alternate histories still fallwithin
a chance scientific
discovery, is equally insistent our understanding of science fiction.There is, for
that it is not science fiction, seems tome to serve instance, no single jonbar point, and no material
no critically useful purpose. novum, that operates within Christopher Priest's
Although he does not dispense with cog The Separation, yet themoral and
psychological
nitive estrangement, Csicsery-Ronay softens its
changes explored within the differentworlds of
more rigorous aspects. In part he does this by thatnovel mark it inescapably as science fiction.
employing Carl Freedman's idea of the "cogni The demotion of the novum within the criti
tion effect/' theway inwhich scientific cal
language iconography ofMarxist responses to science
can be employed to give a consistent illusion fiction is illustrated by the fact that the novum is
of scientific validity within the fiction. I'm not the second of "beauties."
only Csicsery-Ronay's
sure that this isn't It is one among several ways of
philosophical hand-waving, exploring the
and there are But the shift in perspective thus marked
that
suggestions Csicsery-Ronay genre.
isn't convinced Freedman's I believe, a far more useful and reveal
entirely by argu presents,
ment, but itdoes offer a less rigid approach than ing approach to theunderstanding of how science
Suvin. More insists fiction works.
interestingly, Csicsery-Ronay

May-June 2010 i45

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 SCIENCE FICTION
The factof therebeing seven beauties in itself have already noted that Suzette Haden Elgin's
represents
a more relaxed approach
to the genre. Native Tongue gets no mention in this chapter
As
Csicsery-Ronay says, "Rather than a program where it so clearly belongs (though it is referred
like set of exclusive rules and required devices, to in a brief section on feminist literature later
thismode is a constellation of diverse intellectual in the book). This is unfortunate not because it
and emotional interests and responses that are
represents any particular prejudice on the part of
particularly
active in an age of restless techno
Csicsery-Ronay (it doesn't) but because it limits
transformation. I consider seven such the discussion.
logical

categories to be the most attractive and forma

Throughout this book the examples are well
tive of science-fictionality." Although one might chosen, but they are few (particularly in compari
question the concomitant characterization of sci son to the number of theorists quoted), and they
ence fiction as a literature of "an age of restless do come from a narrow and fairly predictable
technological transformation," the sense one
gets band (Solaris by Stanislaw Lern, and the films
here that science fiction isnot a single entitybut a 2001: A Space Odyssey, Alien and its sequels, and
variety,
a "constellation," of different approaches
TheMatrix crop up with alarming regularity).On
and devices, seems more
fitting
to the genre as we
language, for instance, in addition to the Elgin it
now know it. would have been nice to see some discussion of

The beauties he has chosen, therefore, are Gene Wolfe's use of genuine but archaic terms in
representative but not exhaustive of science fic The Book of theNew Sun, Robert Silverberg's exci
tion's characteristics. There could be (indeed, sion of "I" inA Time ofChanges, and possibly even
there almost certainly are) more than seven. None Brian Aldiss's playful alien vocabularies in stories
takes priority over any of the others, and none is such as "Confluence."

essential. A science-fiction storymight have any The second grouping deals with the content
combination of these characteristics, or none of of science fiction and consists of the next three
them, and still be science fiction. These are, he beauties: fictive novums,future history,and imagi
says, "formative" in the creation of science fiction, nary science. Typically, Csicsery-Ronay begins
but at no point does he say they are definitive. The each chapter with a discussion of the theoretical
relativistic approach suggested here doesn't quite position, gradually moving on to apply those
extend through the rest of the book, but bearing positions specifically to science fiction,and even
it inmind does help as we work throughwhat tually applying the ideas to a handful of specific
follows.
examples. But in these three chapters there is rath
In fact, seven beauties are er more than because it is in these
although presented theory example,
to us, they can be gathered into four loose group three chapters that the core of his argument is to
ings. The firstgrouping deals with how science be found. I've already looked at his treatment of
fiction iswritten, and consists of the firstbeauty: the novum, and the chapter on
imaginary science,

neology (Csicsery-Ronay extends this beyond the which incorporates his discussion of Freedman's

creation of new words, neologisms,

to cover the cognition effects,doesn't really add much to the
differentways SF uses language, including, for familiar debate about what actually is the role of
instance, an interestingdiscussion of the debased science in science fiction.

language ofRussell Hoban's RiddleyWalker). Lan However, the thirdbeauty, futurehistory, is

guage is vital to theway science fictionworks, interesting because of the persuasive argument
both establishing and explaining theways of the that all science fictionhas a historical dimension.
fictionalworld, and it is encouraging to see it Simply because change is such a fundamental
get this level of critical attention. But though the part ofwhat science fictiondoes, even a story set
Paul Kincaid is the recipient
argument here extends to such things as theuse of in thehere and now about a wonderful invention
of the SFRA's Thomas Arabic words in Frank Herbert's Dune, I still feel has a deep history represented by the way the
D. Clareson Award for there are gaps in the
story. Science-fictional lan idea reaches into the future even if the story does
Distinguished Service for guage comes across in an almost wholly positive not. Of course, presenting history in thisway also
2006. His collection of essays
light, and itmight have been worthwhile to look provides further demonstration of why science
and reviews, What It IsWe Do also at the negatives, such as theway language fiction is so amenable toMarxist theorizing.
When We Read Science Fiction can close off science-fiction books to readers not The third grouping deals with the effect
(2008),was publishedby familiarwith thegenre. There is also an issuewith of science fiction and consists of the fifth and
Beccon Publications. the examples explored here; other commentators sixth beauties, the science-fictionalsublime and the

461World Literature Today

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 REVIEW
grotesque, though tobe honest I am
science-fictional the use of the computer to call up all the names,
not convinced that these two are differ whereas, of course, the sense of wonder lies
actually really
ent. Just as
Utopia and dystopia
are mirror
images in that romantic last line about the stars going out.
of each other dealt with by the same theoretical Finally,
we have the character of the science

equipment, so the sublime and the grotesque fiction story in the seventh beauty, towhich he
seem to be mirrors of each other. Both correspond gives the name techno-logiade. In a book notable
to feelings of awe generated within us, though the for the many ugly ways in which words have
sublime manifests that awe as wonder while the been crammed together into new forms, this is a
grotesque manifests it as horror.
particularly dispiriting coinage. It is even more
sublime, which takes us back to the
The dispiriting to discover that what he means by
Romantic philosophy of Immanuel Kant and this is a conflation of space opera and robinsonade
Edmund Burke, is
usually taken as a realiza that he presents as the distinctive form of sci
tion of the smallness of humankind against the ence fiction. This doesn't really work; the
only
immensity of nature. It is a notion that has been way that he can extend this new hybrid to even
seized upon by science fiction,where it tends to half ofwhat we would normally consider science
be known as sense of wonder (a term that seems fiction is to expand its component parts to the
to be
returning
to common usage after a
period point where they become fuzzy and imprecise.
during which itwas rarely heard). In particular Nevertheless, the discussion in particular of
it suits space opera, where the vastness of space the constituents of the robinsonade, or modern
and the strangeness of other worlds is such an adventure story?and how these features are

important part of the thrill of the stories; and it translated and transformed into science fiction?
suits hard SF, where the typical story arc concerns is absolutely fascinating and might have been
the smallness of humankind brought up against worth expanding into a book in its own right.
the immense and laws of nature. We have, then, a book that offers an essen
impersonal
But science fictionmoves beyond the traditional tial corrective to Suvin's dominant
previously
Romantic view by proposing that the same awe view of science fiction.Whether, to go back to
might be instilled by theworks ofman. Csicsery my earlier question, Csicsery-Ronay goes far
Ronay, who makes great play of "techno-culture,"
enough in his radical reworking ofMarxist criti
"techno-society," and the like throughout this cal theory I somehow doubt. But in the absence
book, seems to think that such a technological of anyone else being even this radical, I suspect
sublime is the most common form in science fic thatwe will be arguing with this book formany
tion,but I remain to be convinced of that. In one years to come.

curious moment, for instance, he seems to suggest

that the sense ofwonder generated by Arthur C. Folkestone, Kent
Clarke's "The Nine Billion Names of God" lies in ? 2009 byPaul Kincaid
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