Pirates of the Gorm - an initial response leading to a rambling thought

Pirates of the Gorm by Nat Schachner sees a detective/agent go on a dangerous mission, fall (literally) into an enemy stronghold, beat overwhelming odds and win the girl who has no logical reason for being there in the first place. In short, it gave the pulp readers of the time what they wanted. The tropes Schachner employs are really the genre dressing and the method of delivery; the heart of the story is the pseudoscientific concept he wanted to show off – the Gorm.

The Gorm is a beam which can manipulate gravity, allowing interplanetary cruise liners to be captured and pulled in safely and for people to ‘fall’ through space in a direct line without gaining velocity etc. By today’s standards it’s not much of a concept but as the beam was in the hands of alien pirates it made for a fairly exciting story for its time I imagine.

Looking at it like this now though, it raises an intriguing observation. Much of the pulp fiction I read is very similar – be it science fiction, fantasy or horror. It uses a selection of tropes relative to its field to create a story around a ‘concept’. The concept might be a future technology, a fantastic being or a mysterious thing that terrifies and confounds, but it is always an intriguing concept. The hero, the girl – occasionally one in the same but not often – even the plot itself are secondary to this concept.

I think this is where criticism of pulp fiction, at least in Speculative Fiction, goes awry. It looks at the plots and the characters and shows how ridiculous, two-dimensional, clichéd etc they can be. It points out the overuse of tropes, it finds flaws in the literary style, it points out the bleedingly obvious. But it doesn’t consider the ‘concepts’.

Yes, this fiction had to appeal to its audience and at the time they made certain demands we now call ‘juvenile’ and many of them are indeed chauvinist. The stories also suffer from the prejudices of the age – ie if race is involved they’re disgustingly ignorant and racist. That last point can be hard to deal with at times and I know I say that from the position of white privilege. I can’t imagine how anyone of any other ethnicity could deal with some of the stuff these stories say.

I’ve become sidetracked there – but it is a truth that needs to be acknowledged. Fortunately, not all the stories feature such bigotry, although the ones that don’t also don’t feature anyone not white so I guess it amounts to the same. The sad truth is, in being like this the stories simply reflect the general attitudes of the day. Which doesn’t really cut it I know, but as formative elements in today's SF can we just ignore them? I hate the history of our treatment of each other, it really shouldn't be an issue and the stories shouldn't have this problem.

But, back to my point, I think looking at the pulp stories in light of presenting concepts through generic storytelling methods and tropes could explain their appeal and how they went on to forge the SF genre of today. And that is my newest Masters research idea.

Fahrenheit 91

I wrote this a couple of days ago but I’m finally putting it up.

I wasn’t sure whether to write a blog about the passing of Ray Bradbury but the Sydney Morning Herald online tipped my hand. Bradbury was without a doubt a master storyteller and a prolific one. He created worlds and ideas with clarity and precision. It’s not stretching anything to say he was one of the greats of SF – by which I mean Speculative Fiction, not just science fiction.

What drives me to write this however is not simple memoriam but an element of disgust with SMH for its reporting of Bradbury’s death; a brief paragraph followed by a reprint of an opinion piece arguing that Bradbury was not a ‘literary’ SF author but the king of ‘pulp’. A simple short obituary would’ve sufficed but to spare the effort they rerun something that ends by saying “The king of pulp [Bradbury] lives.” I ask you, is that appropriate?

Now, the piece was not disparaging of Bradbury overall but it did seem to argue against his skills in writing while explaining how brilliant a writer he was. Regardless, it was not a way to report the death of a writer, pulp or otherwise.

This brings me to the other thing this piece made me want to write about, the whole premise of ‘literary’ and ‘pulp’ as opposite ends of some sort of spectrum. It seems to be a polemic SF is cursed to suffer from for all eternity. Even within the genre there are levels of snobbery demarcating the ‘escapist pulp’ with the ‘heavy’ or ‘literary’ works. Applying such things to Ray Bradbury just seems wrong and, if anything, the piece SMH has deigned to run on the day of his death simply shows that the polemic is an artificial construct – one Bradbury broke.

A piece of fiction should be judged primarily on its own terms. Yes, it needs to be well written. Beyond that it could serve any purpose the author and reader agree between them. For me, the main thing is for there to be a good story told well. My experience of ‘literary’ fiction is of no or limited banal story told with overdone language. My experience of ‘pulp’ or ‘escapist’ stories is stories where things happen. Not all are well told and not all are good – but that will depend on who’s reading them. Bradbury told good stories and told them excellently. So the ‘literary’ side claimed him and the ‘pulp’ side did too. He was neither, they don’t exist. He was Bradbury, the storyteller. Let’s remember that and read the stories and enjoy them. That’s what really matters.

Keep dreaming!