‘I’m not a boy scout!’

People have asked me what genre I write, and I’ve often been introduced at events as a science fiction author. It’s not how I see myself, but who’s to say that they’re wrong? The boundary between ‘literary’ fiction (which I think I write) and science fiction is so blurred it may not be a proper boundary at all. And while I like to think of myself as a literary writer I have a horrible feeling this may just be simple snobbishness.

The ‘establishment’ argument for the supremacy of literary fiction over other types of expression is that the former is simply better written; it’s more closely concerned with style. Champions of literary genre also argue this form is less likely to be circumscribed by convention, it’s the genre where anything goes.

But even though literary fiction happens to be my favourite genre as a reader, I think this is a false argument for many reasons. Other genres’ lesser concern for language may mean they’re more capable of examining the real world and use their tropes to be more adventurous; crime fiction has shown itself capable of examining power structures and corruption. Science fiction can anticipate scientific developments and their impact on society.

Our desire to categorise writing into genres and sub-genres is a human tendency. It happens elsewhere in life too. I’ve just received an email from a reader who has pointed out a mistake in my novel, and as this reader points out, this sort of mistake would only be made by an astrophysicist trying to pass herself as a ‘proper’ astronomer, i.e. someone who actually knows the night sky and the names of the stars and constellations in it (this tends to be truer of amateur astronomers than professional ones because they spend more time actually looking at the sky).

There’s the apocryphal story of a famous astrophysicist out for a walk one night with a friend who pointed up at the sky and asked ‘What’s the name of that star?’ ‘How should I know?’ Prof answered, ‘I’m an astrophysicist, not a boy scout!’

Posts created 145

One thought on “‘I’m not a boy scout!’

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Related Posts

Begin typing your search term above and press enter to search. Press ESC to cancel.

Back To Top