Science Fantasy

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by SimonKJones

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by SimonKJones

Defining genres, let alone sub-genres, is the fastest route to an argument. 'Science fantasy' risks being the most divisive of all, being a deliberate mix of science fiction and fantasy, to the point where it almost seems to be a play on words rather than a carefully delineated category. Is it necessary to first understand both of those parent genres before 'science fantasy' makes sense?

It holds at its centre an inherent contradiction. Science is, by its non-fictional definition, based in rationality and the careful analysis of measurable data. Fantasy, meanwhile, celebrates the flights of fancy possible only in the mind's imagination, with the realities of the mundane world a distant lower priority. These two are not as incompatible as they might first appear, as a scientist will get nowhere without an over-active imagination and fantasy is often at its most dramatically satisfying when it is rooted in the systems and limitations of a mundane world - or, at least, juxtaposed against them.

How you regard science fantasy will depend on whether you approach it from the science or the fantasy end. Star Wars has a veneer of verisimilitude and science in its visuals and the practical appearance of its machinery and worlds but it veers heavily towards fantasy, not only through the conceit of the Force but also in the way its spaceships actually behave: it has its own internal logic which has very little to do with the universe's actual physics (this, in fact, describes almost all movie and TV science fiction). Reversing the weighting towards fantasy leads towards the likes of Magician and The Name of the Wind, books which are overtly fantastical and magical but with particular care and detail given to their fantastical elements. They show magic as understood via scientific methods.

What of Julian May's Saga of the Exiles, in which a science fiction justification is provided for the ensuing fantastical adventure? The story's framing device is pure science fiction, while the story itself revels in upending and exploring fantas...

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What of Julian May's Saga of the Exiles, in which a science fiction justification is provided for the ensuing fantastical adventure? The story's framing device is pure science fiction, while the story itself revels in upending and exploring fantasy tropes. In some ways, it is an example of giving hard science fiction readers a way in to discover fantasy: an excuse to orbit a little wider in their tastes and habits.

Consider Brian K Vaughan's Saga, a deliberately genre-hopping and intensively self-aware comic which refuses to settle into any kind of easy categorisation. It veers violently between science fiction and fantasy, disrupting both in the process, and stubbornly refuses to explain its wilder concepts. Sentient robots with old-style CRT televisions for heads are considered entirely normal despite their anachronistic portrayal, with the book fully embracing Arthur C Clarke's proclamation that "any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."

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