Interesting Links for 07-09-2025

[andrewducker]

1. This is why we don't read the Golden Age of science fiction any more.

(tags:scifi history society )

2. Ghost sharks grow forehead teeth to help them have sex

(tags:sharks teeth sex headline )

3. The tax-evading Princes Street shops costing Edinburgh taxpayers thousands

(tags:tax Edinburgh fraud shops OhForFucksSake )

Comments

Golden age SF

[wildeabandon]

I agree with the general thrust of that article, but suggesting Le Guin (and at least arguably Butler) as someone to read /instead/ of Golden Age authors doesn't sit quite right with me. It also seems a shame that Delany didn't get a mention.

Re: Golden age SF

[andrewducker]

They defined The Golden Age as the 30s to the 60s*. Le Guin starts right at the end of that, and I'd feel more comfortable putting her as part of the New Wave. Which is where Wikipedia puts her and Delany. And is where I'd think you'd start if you were looking for old-timey SF with an interest in society as well as rocket ships.


*Wikipedia says 30s-50s.

Re: Golden age SF

[calimac]

If you define the Golden Age that way, you're combining at least two different cohorts: the scientific advocates of the '40s generation, like Asimov, Clarke, and Heinlein; and writers of the '50s who are not about science at all but are social satirists, like Philip K. Dick, Robert Sheckley, and (though he started earlier) Frederik Pohl. Le Guin wasn't a New Age author by any means, but she did start at that time (her first story was 1962); Delany, though much younger, started publishing at the same time. Butler is younger still, and didn't publish until the 1970s, which makes her post-New Wave, and I can't imagine lumping her with the Golden Age at all.

It seems to me that what the author is complaining about seems to have overlaps with what C.S. Lewis called scientism, which is to be distinguished from science by a quasi-religious faith in scientific philosophy.