[SFRA-L] SFRA-L Digest, Vol 13, Issue 24

Mon Aug 29 16:03:15 EDT 2011

To get a little off the original question, but how do you like the way that
Octavia Butler creates her ambiguity in what might be considered her
retelling of CE -- the Xenogenesis trilogy?

Here some humans are allowed to remain behind (on Mars) while Earth is
destroyed to provide for evolved/genetically manipulated humanity to go to
the stars. And, of course, the aliens are both the teachers and the vehicles
through which such manipulation/evolution occurs.

N

On Mon, Aug 29, 2011 at 3:05 PM, Gunn, James E <jgunn at ku.edu> wrote:

>  The pedagogic value of the ending is its ambiguity.   It is easy to feel
> a swell of pride that humanity is among the Elect while at the same time
> despising the inhumanity of the children, who destroy the Earth and everyone
> on it to serve as fuel for their transition, all of it apparently compulsory
> and without (perhaps obviously) definition.   And to leave behind the
> Overlords, who display the best of humanity’s virtues (a scientific mind and
> the curiosity to go with it, as well as an indomitable will to pursue their
> own vision).   I think Arthur identified with the Overlords more than he did
> the Children, if the poetry of the last page (“And in that service they
> would not lose their souls,” or something much like that) is allowed to
> persuade us.   Jim****
>
> ** **
>
> *From:* sfra-l-bounces at wiz.cath.vt.edu [mailto:
> sfra-l-bounces at wiz.cath.vt.edu] *On Behalf Of *Rabkin, Eric
> *Sent:* Monday, August 29, 2011 12:55 PM
>
> *To:* sfra-l at wiz.cath.vt.edu
> *Subject:* Re: [SFRA-L] SFRA-L Digest, Vol 13, Issue 24****
>
>  ** **
>
> Dear Betty,****
>
>  ****
>
> I agree completely that the ending of CE shows the sense of loss of not
> being part of a greater whole.  I think that ACC’s intention and his
> production are not identical.  Total Breakthrough is total loss of self;
> despite what ACC has written about his debt to Stapledon, there is no
> individuality in the community in CE, as opposed to *Last and First Men*or
> *Star Maker*, where the “symbiosis” of the arachnoids and ichthyoids is
> the moral exemplum for the universe.  The Overlords, who claim to worship
> the Overmind--but ancient Hawaiians also saw a god in a volcano; that
> doesn’t demonstrate that god’s existence--really are in this
> helping-humanity business for themselves.  In one sense they are the devil
> because they usher in the end of humanity.  Maybe humanity as we know it
> isn’t such a wonderful thing, maybe it is only the childhood of something
> else; however, deep down, I don’t believe that and I think ACC did only, if
> at all, desperately.  When children “mature” and become “mature” they enter
> the world of “adult content.”  In CE, puberty prevents Total Breakthrough.
> Whatever H. sapiens becomes at the end of CE, it is not an adult form that
> engages in sexual—or any other kind of individual—intercourse.  When that
> pillar of fire withdraws (shrivels?) from the consumed Mother Earth, not
> only is childhood gone but human joy is over.  ACC may have intended this as
> wonderful, like a Tīrthaṅkara joining with the cosmic spirit, but in the
> context of the Christian West that CE presents, we are now consumed
> eternally in the fire.  And that, of course, is loss of a quite different
> kind.****
>
>  ****
>
> Best to you as always,****
>
>  ****
>
> Eric****
>
>  ****
>
> -------------------------------------------------------****
>
> Eric S. Rabkin****
>
> Arthur F. Thurnau Professor and****
>
>   Professor of English Language and Literature****
>
> Univ of Michigan****
>
> Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1003****
>
> www.umich.edu/~esrabkin ****
>
>  ****
>
> *From:* Elizabeth Hull [mailto:ehull at harpercollege.edu]
> *Sent:* Monday, August 29, 2011 12:06 PM
> *To:* Rabkin, Eric; sfra-l at wiz.cath.vt.edu
> *Subject:* RE: [SFRA-L] SFRA-L Digest, Vol 13, Issue 24****
>
>  ****
>
> I have frequently used the question of whether the ending of *CE *is happy
> or not as a final exam question, stressing that there isn't a right or wrong
> answer, but that the student would be judged on his/her arguments and
> evidence in support of the chosen position.  I also warn students that don't
> allow for mugwumps!  I've gotten good answers defending both positions.***
> *
>
>  ****
>
> Myself, I think the reason Clarke focused at the end on the Overlords is
> that they are stuck evolution-wise with their own isolation, being able to
> see greater-ness, but not achieve it, which seems to be an essential part of
> the human condition.  For although we may yet evolve into something greater
> than ourselves and we may yet join in a union with others to form a greater
> being, in our very short lifetimes we are born alone and die alone and
> always yearn for union, like the corporate polyp in * The City and the
> Stars *and the aliens species of "Rescue Party,"  who figure out how to
> save the spaceship and its varied species crew.  It is a position very much
> opposed to American individuality, but it is in the traditions of American
> history which show that Bradford's colonists would not have survived without
> mutual support from each other and from the indigenous people.  ****
>
>  ****
>
> Betty Hull****
>
>  ****
>  ------------------------------
>
> *From:* sfra-l-bounces at wiz.cath.vt.edu on behalf of Rabkin, Eric
> *Sent:* Sun 8/28/2011 5:22 PM
> *To:* sfra-l at wiz.cath.vt.edu
> *Subject:* Re: [SFRA-L] SFRA-L Digest, Vol 13, Issue 24****
>
> IMO most of Clarke's works indulge a magical homocentrism. *Childhood's
> End*--WE can wonderfully evolve but the Overlords just can't--exemplifies
> this.  This humanity-is-the-best-and-essential-no-matter-what attitude can
> be very appealing to readers, especially the young.   But it leads ACC, one
> of the "deans of hard SF" and a person well and truly educated in modern
> science, to scientifically preposterous positions, as exemplified by his
> know-nothing "Additional Note" to *Imperial Earth* in which he borrows
> what he calls the "Bradbury Defense" against someone who points out a basic
> scientific error (in IE, utterly ignoring modern genetics): "So I hit him."
> ****
>
>  ****
>
> To my mind, then, *Rendezvours with Rama*, with in its comparative
> omission of magical homocentricism, is the least typical of ACC, yet his
> best book.  The hard SF produces awe and the fact that the universe ignores
> *homo sapiens* is as sobering as the visit to 30,000,000 in *The Time
> Machine*.****
>
>  ****
>
> Nonetheless, in my SF course, which takes an historical approach, I use CE
> because it is captivating, provocative, and typical of this crucial writer
> when he was making his mark on the field.  Also, it's always fun to wonder
> if ACC did or didn't intend the ending to be "happy," whether or not it is
> "happy," and what difference our sense of authorial intention makes in our
> reading.****
>
>  ****
>
> In short, the book (even with the new opening) seems to work well for the
> course and for my students.****
>
>  ****
>
> "'Enjoy them while you may….'"****
>
>  ****
>
> Eric****
>
>  ****
>
> -------------------------------------------------------****
>
> Eric S. Rabkin****
>
> Arthur F. Thurnau Professor and****
>
>   Professor of English Language and Literature****
>
> Univ of Michigan****
>
> Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1003****
>
> www.umich.edu/~esrabkin ****
>
>  ****
>
>  ****
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: sfra-l-bounces at wiz.cath.vt.edu [
> mailto:sfra-l-bounces at wiz.cath.vt.edu <sfra-l-bounces at wiz.cath.vt.edu>] On
> Behalf Of sfra-l-request at wiz.cath.vt.edu
> Sent: Sunday, August 28, 2011 12:00 PM
> To: sfra-l at wiz.cath.vt.edu
> Subject: SFRA-L Digest, Vol 13, Issue 24****
>
>  ****
>
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-- 
Nolan Belk

"Since my house burned down,
I now own a better view
Of the rising moon"

"once we begin to feel deeply all the aspects of our lives, we begin to
demand from ourselves and from our life-pursuits that they feel in
accordance with that joy which we know ourselves to be capable of. Our
erotic knowledge empowers us, becomes a lens through which we scrutinize all
aspects of our existence, forcing us to evaluate those aspects honestly in
terms of their relative meaning within our lives. And this is a grave
responsibility, projected from within each of us, not to settle for the
convenient, the shoddy, the conventionally expected, nor the merely safe."

"Don't trust your head, Samwise, it is not the best part of you."
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