Two weeks ago I noted that G.K. Chesterton had written a novel that is, as it were, the limit case of sf. A futuristic exploration of the hypothesis that nothing much will change, scientifically. I just noticed that, in What’s Wrong With The World (1910), he offers a bit of theory on the subject.
The modern man no longer presents the memoirs of his great grandfather; but is engaged in writing a detailed and authoritative biography of his great-grandson. Instead of trembling before the specters of the dead, we shudder abjectly under the shadow of the babe unborn. This spirit is apparent everywhere, even to the creation of a form of futurist romance. Sir Walter Scott stands at the dawn of the nineteenth century for the novel of the past; Mr. H. G. Wells stands at the dawn of the twentieth century for the novel of the future. The old story, we know, was supposed to begin: “Late on a winter’s evening two horsemen might have been seen—.” The new story has to begin: “Late on a winter’s evening two aviators will be seen—.” The movement is not without its elements of charm; there is something spirited, if eccentric, in the sight of so many people fighting over again the fights that have not yet happened; of people still glowing with the memory of tomorrow morning. A man in advance of the age is a familiar phrase enough. An age in advance of the age is really rather odd.
It is amusing to imagine all sf novels written in the future tense, as if their authors were squabbling prophets.
{ 19 comments }
Adam Roberts 12.22.10 at 8:32 am
That’s a great quotation: new to me.
I wrote a novel in the future tense, once. Not sure it entirely worked.
John Quiggin 12.22.10 at 8:53 am
I will have written one, which will certainly have worked.
The Creator 12.22.10 at 11:08 am
Michael Frayn’s A Very Private Life is written entirely in the future tense. It begins “Once upon a time there will be a little girl called Uncumber . . .”
Daniel 12.22.10 at 11:09 am
Neither will I.
Timothy Scriven 12.22.10 at 1:44 pm
As someone who currently does work in this area, I’m constantly amazed by what the field shows. We know nothing, almost literally nothing, about the future.
Matt McIrvin 12.22.10 at 1:54 pm
When I was four or five years old it was the fashion among my circle of friends to remember things about our adulthood. “When I was big I had a gun that I could shoot and I could drive a car.” My daughter sometimes does it now.
Straightwood 12.22.10 at 3:04 pm
We mustn’t forget that the age of the universe permits us to assume that there are many species that have been there and done that. Our future is likely to be a variant of the past of countless intelligent life forms. It is comforting to know that problems like global warming, resource depletion, and intellectual complacency have all been solved many times, elsewhere, a long, long time ago. Our likely future has a glorious unknown history.
chris y 12.22.10 at 3:23 pm
It is comforting to know that problems like global warming, resource depletion, and intellectual complacency have all been solved many times, elsewhere, a long, long time ago.
Have they? Or is the fact that they haven’t the reason why we haven’t heard anything from out there.
Straightwood 12.22.10 at 4:20 pm
the reason why we haven’t heard anything from out there
The most likely reason we haven’t heard anything is that a highly advanced civilization exists in infinite logical space (a la Matrix) and thus has no need or desire to make contact with relatively primitive life forms that it can simulate arbitrarily. The notion that electromagnetic communication is a durable feature of high-technology civilizations is our mistake. It is much too slow for effective communication across the distances in question.
John Quiggin 12.22.10 at 7:31 pm
It would have been nice of them to set up a radio beacon to broadcast the solution before they sublimed.
But you’re right about electromagnetic communication and a fortiori about interstellar space travel (necessarily, at speeds far below that of light). So, every civilization is stuck with its own home planet and its finite resources. If there is a way out, it’s into logical space.
John Holbo 12.23.10 at 5:06 am
Hey Adam – and everyone else, too, of course. But especially Adam: for, one scholar of the history of sf to another, I am gratified to add a fresh quotation to the limited stock of early 20th Century sf criticism.
nnyhav 12.23.10 at 6:09 am
The utopian ones preceding them will have been written in the future perfect, then.
Hermenauta 12.23.10 at 7:45 am
“So, every civilization is stuck with its own home planet and its finite resources. If there is a way out, it’s into logical space.”
What makes me think of the ortodox received wisdom about Mankind as the zenith of this planet´s lifeforms. Somewhat odd programs like “Life After People” shows the efemerity of human enterprise, but also, the likely efemerity of all enterprise. So maybe early sentient lifeforms before we humans could conceivably have risen, thrive, and “sublimed in logical space” leaving no physical signs of their existence. So be respectful when encountering oddly shaped crystals or black monolites. :)
Adam Roberts 12.23.10 at 12:06 pm
Hi John. From another scholar of the history of sf to one, it’s odd but weird moments of anticipatory Sf have been popping out of my reading in the nineteenth-cenutry lately, and in the least expected spaces: here, for example, or here. Not so useful as yours, though.
chris y 12.23.10 at 1:11 pm
Adam Roberts @ 14, a URL in your first anchor tag would be appreciated.
Straightwood 12.23.10 at 2:52 pm
My personal favorite musing on the future, from “The Education of Henry Adams”
The three friends had begun life together; and the last of the three had no motive,—no attraction—to carry it on after the others had gone. Education had ended for all three, and only beyond some remoter horizon could its values be fixed or renewed. Perhaps some day—say 1938, their centenary,—they might be allowed to return together for a holiday, to see the mistakes of their own lives made clear in the light of the mistakes of their successors; and perhaps then, for the first time since man began his education among the carnivores, they would find a world that sensitive and timid natures could regard without a shudder.
Adam Roberts 12.24.10 at 10:23 am
Chris @15: sorry. Here.
nat 12.26.10 at 9:52 pm
“…infinite logical space (a la Matrix) and thus has no need or desire to make contact with relatively primitive life forms that it can simulate arbitrarily.”
Granting the (obviously false) premise that we can access all of logical space with finite resources, the appeal of living there instead of in the real world is like the appeal of living in Borges’ library of Babel over a real library.
Ray Davis 12.29.10 at 2:03 am
I also often fall asleep and wake up shuddering and fall to sleep again thinking of that one last time Henry Adams decided to try to play optimistic. But hey! Adam, do you know this one?
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