Science Fiction And The Alternate History

Seeing it was being discussed recently and having just finished The Yiddish Policeman's Union, I had a question I thought I'd pose to all you long-time SF fans.

I've only been into the genre (SF) a lot, in the last 6 years or so, getting into the game rather late. And for most of that time I was only reading a select few authors (Stephen Baxter, Card, a couple of others). In the last two years though, I have been reading many more and loving every minute of it. So in effort to expand my reading even further, I'm working my way now through the major novel award winners. The Hugo's, BSFA's, Nebula's, AC Clarke's, Locus', and the PK Dicks. Starting with the more current stuff and working back.

So, to make an already long story short; I just finished Chabon's latest win. Decent enough story, although I can see most people's complaints. Pacing and cultural references, what not. But I like a good mystery from time to time, so I was not overly disappointed.

My question is this, though: What's the deal with Alternate Histories being classified as SFF? Who thought that one up? Yeah, if time travel is involved or the history is so alternate as to contain faeries and dragons, sure. But straight up alternate history? Shouldn't that most likely be considered Historical Fiction, since... I don't know... It takes place in the past and isn't true?

Any of you out there have thoughts on this one?

P.S. - Not trying to be snarky or anything. I'm just genuinely curious.

I wonder if to some degree it's because some of these alternate histories are written by writers who have also written other types of SFF. Or some of the alternate histories that they've written have involved time-travel or quantum multiverses as the plot device to create the alternate history. As a result, alternate histories by such authors that wouldn't otherwise necessarily be classified as SFF wind up being pigeon-holed into the SFF genre simply because of the coincidence of authorship.

On the other hand, there's Fatherland, which is most obviously an alternate history but which I wouldn't by any means classify as SFF (although I note that someone has tagged it on LT with both "science fiction" and "sf"). Generally, I don't all that much care for alternate histories (although I think Fatherland is excellent), so I'm not sure how many other non-SFF works like Fatherland there are out there, but that's one example.

So, I think some of it probably has something to do with the coincidence of authorship, where someone's written works that could otherwise fit into SFF and then comes along and writes a non-SFF alternate history which gets lumped into SFF because of the coincidence of authorship.

I'm not overly fond of labels for books, but my thoughts are that historical fiction refers to books set in the past that, while using fictional characters and situations, still stick with the way things were, as in trying to be as historically accurate. A good example is Caleb Carr's The Alienist.

Alternate histories traditionally take a moment in history and play the What if? game, so what results is a departure from the historical record and can be considered speculative fiction which usually is lumped with science fiction. That much of alternate history has been written by SF authors helps seal that connection.

Yes, I agree with #2 in that there is a big overlap in the people writing them, but also alternate histories have always been considered as part of SF in the large. The Sidewise Award is considered a SF award even though it sometimes goes to books outside recognised SF (like Stephen Fry's Making History *). Alternate history stories have made the Hugo shortlists a number of times in the past (although not on a particularly frequent basis).

* Note that this trait isn't particular to the Sidewise Award, the Arthur C. Clarke Award has been awarded to a book from outside the genre before.

I would have to say that the difference being is that once an Alternate History changes the past, it really isn't historical anymore. The Man In the High Castle by Philip K. Dick is a good one. Another more popular right now is the Dies the Fire trilogy by S.M. Stirling, which I've enjoyed. The Yiddish Policeman's Union is still on my TBR list. I'm a fan of Chabon's work already, so I'm not worried about not liking it.
I think a lot of the classification comes down to what the author has written in the past, like Dick and Sterling. I think it's a good thing to say that The Yiddish Policeman's Union is SFF as it brings more people into the genre. The same could be said for Jonathan Lethem, Jim Crace, Cormac McCarthy, David Mitchell, and many others.

One argument that I can remember being put forward was that its expansion of the genre into "speculative fiction". Since it involves the break with actual history.

#3 that's pretty much exactly the defn. i use. So i think of the yiddish policeman's union as AF/SFF and his Gentlemen of the Road more as historical fiction (tho that's likely because i know so little about the time and place that it could easily be either). Perez-Revete's Alatriste series would be HF (in my mind). Of course i'd put Furst/LeCarre etc under "spy" though they certainly invest heavily in "real" history.

Have you read Jack Dann's The Rebel. That is a very hard one to categorise. Written by a SF writer and reviewed on SFSite (amongst others) yet absolutely devoid of of SFnal conceits apart from James Dean living. What is more he has written a collection of short fiction (called Promised Land) which is published by a SF publisher. Kim Stanley Robinson wrote the introduction for Promised Land and entitled it "Writing Straight Fiction in an Alternate Universe".

All worthy points, my friends. Thanks for the input. The ever-growing lists of sub and sub-sub (and sub-sub-sub) genres can be a bit of a tangle sometimes.

#8 have not read The Rebel, might add it to my TBR. I have not read any of "his" work before. Just anthologies he has edited. I love short stories, so I may check out Promised Land as well.

Promised Land is very much straight(ish) short stories in the Alternate History vein. You will find it very hard to find at a reasonable cost as it is published by a British small press in limited numbers (even the cheap edition costs £25.00)

> 1, 2

I'd say that alternate histories are classified as (and shelved with!) whatever genre the author is most closely associated with. When it's done by Harry Turtledove (Agent of Byzantium), Kim Stanley Robinson (Years of Rice and Salt), or Stephen Baxter (Voyage) . . . it's SF. When it's done by Philip Roth (The Plot Against America) or Michael Chabon (The Yiddish Policeman's Union) . . . it's literary fiction. When it's done by Robert Harris (Fatherland), Len Deighton (SS-GB), or Brendan DuBois (Resurrection Day) . . . it's mystery/thriller. When it's written by somebody with no track record, like Leo Rutman (Clash of Eagles) or Robert Conroy (1901), my experience is that it's shelved by default in general fiction.

If it's *perceived* as being a sub-genre of SF, I'd put it down to the fact that very, very few non-SF writers have ever written more than one alternate history story (I can't think of even one who has, actually), whereas some SF writers (Harry Harrison) have done strings of them, and at least one (Turtledove) has essentially built a career on it.

The category of "speculative" fiction seems tailormade for those books that fail to fall into either "science fiction" or "fantasy". Similar to alternate history is the genre of the novel of the future. This may have no real "science" element at all, and can be so straightforwardly realist that "fantasy" really isn't a good term for it either. I've just finished Floodland by Marcus Sedgwick. This is a YA novel set in England after the sea level has begun to rise dramatically through climate change. Apart from the future setting, it is entirely straight fiction. Like alternate history, this kind of book also gets classified by author rather than genre: as far as content is concerned there is precious little to distinguish Brian Aldiss's Greybeard from P. D. James's Children of Men, but James is known mainly as a crime writer, so her "SF" novel gets shelved as mainstream.
ETA: Interestingly, the "speculative" future/post-apocalyptic novel A Song of Stone was published as written by Iain Banks, and not by his SF alter ego Iain M. Banks. This seems appropriate, given that his SF is definitely SF, and his non-SF veers towards the weird; but if someone else had written "A Song of Stone", it might possibly have been labelled as SF.

What about a alternate story novel written before things happened? I do recall Katherine Burdekin, Swastika night set in a future after the germans conquered all of europe.. And this was written in 1936.

13>

That's not alternate history, that's SF that got overtaken by history. Retconning it to call it alternate history is not useful.

>>> 12

Do you really consider The Children of Men "alternate history"? It seems more like "futuristic dystopia" to me.

14 > ok, I was in thinking myself that when I posted... but because I've read it in the 80s... if I didn't knew when it was written (got my drift?) anyway, you're right.

>15 CurrerBell:: No, I don't think "Children of Men" is alternate history: I did kind of morph the subject at the beginning of my post, which concerned the similar genre-busting category of "novel of the future".

There should be a term of SF overtaken by history (but I can't think of one at the moment). It is not the necessary fate of all SF some escape, some become outdated but some are still classics that become 'might have beens' instaed of 'what ifs'. 1984 comes to mind.

This interesting conversation is beinging to remind of a shirt I saw that was was made by the creator of a webcomic I read...

The Historical Preenactment Society

Quite a fun idea if you ask me!

#18 Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? is set in... 1992.

>#20 I've been reading Minority Report, much of which is set in the far future: i.e. the 1980s and 1990s.

And then there's that classic British novel of distant futurity, set in the dystopic year 1984. I refer, of course, to G.K. Chesterton's The Napoleon of Notting Hill (1904)...

I'm not familiar with the Chesterton. Is it as weird as The Man Who Was Thursday ?

I've just started Farthing for the group read and unless something changes in it soon, I'm going to have questions about how SF and Alternate History have become conflated.

Yes, The Napoleon of Notting Hill is as weird as The Man who was Thursday, but not in quite the same way. It's not so surreal.

I just finished Farthing and am mystified. How is this book even remotely SF? It is set in an alternate historical setting, but the story is pure whodunnit mystery.

Someone, please, 'splain to me how this is SF. It's not even fantasy.

Oh, I see. It must be SF or fantasy, it's published by TOR.

If labels don't convey meaning then they are useless. I would never tell someone to read this because it is either SF or fantasy, they would surely get the wrong idea, I know I did. Even the alternate history hook is just a way of recruiting bad guys. It's background. This is no more SF or fantasy then The Manchurian Candidate. Probably less so.

That said, I did enjoy the book quite a bit and would recommend it to anyone as a political murder mystery.

26: then why was it up for the Campbell and Nebula? Like it or not it's been embraced as science fiction at least by the elites.

Jo Walton self-identifies as a sf writer. Does that help?

Actually, just because science fiction has the word "science" in it, it's not a prerequisite. The label is historical; what has become identified as the mode of fiction is not.

>26 geneg: Have you read it?

"then why was it up for the Campbell and Nebula?"

Because they needed to nominate something?

Jo Walton can self identify as whatever she likes, this book is not SF.

Has SF decided to raid other genres in order to find writers with whom they can be comfortable giving prizes? Just because WWII turns out differently does not make this SF.

I wondered if maybe it was fantasy until I decided all fiction is fantasy to one degree or another and this one is as much fantasy as The Murder of Roger Ackroyd or And Then There Were None. This particular novel isn't even dystopian.

I don't know. I will never be convinced.

Has SF lost itself in the weeds?

Alternate history is Speculative becuse it's not set in our history, so it's what if, Science fiction and Speculative fiction have become almost synonomous (apart from Science Fiction doesn't include fantasy, whereas Speculative does). Therefore it's under Science Fiction.

You can't put it on Fiction shelves because people would get confused about the background details, as straight Fiction is always fictional characters in the real world, since it is not in the real world with real world history it is not Fiction, and what other genre can accomodate it better than SF?

The difference between Speculative Fiction and Fiction is that a background always has to presented and learned wheras in Fiction the background is always assumed to be identical to ours in real life.

Besides Alternate history has been in the genre since before The Man in the High Castle in 1962

The alternate history aspect of Farthing is so deep in the background as to be practically non-existent. This very same book could have been written without resorting to the alternate history background. Anti-Semitism is not restricted to alternative history, nor are attempted right wing coups. Which brings up another point, did SF appropriate The Plot Against America? Same speculative history, even more in the foreground than in Farthing, but I don't recall SF laying claim to it. What about Atlas Shrugged? It had real science fiction in it. Does SF claim that for itself? I think there is something going on beneath the covers of SF driving this expansion of the genre into territory covered by other genres. Is it being driven by a lack of imagination coupled with quality writing in true SF? I'm going to say something terribly cynical here, but I don't think it can be avoided: is it possible that good writers such as Jo Walton appears to be, who would find themselves in the middle of the pack if they classified their works as mystery, reach for SF because they can get better buzz and greater props? Farthing is a fun, but rather pedestrian mystery, but as SF it's a major prize winner. Why aren't Preston/Child considered SF? Their stuff is riddled with science bleeding into SF. No, there is something screwy here.

All fiction is speculative. That's what makes it fiction.

Were I a librarian faced with classifying this novel it would have gone in the mystery section.

I'm quite happy the science fiction genre has never claimed Atlas Shrugged.

#31

Plenty considered The Plot Against America to be SF. It was on the finalists list for the Campbells in 2005, it won the Sidewise and placed highly in the Locus Poll for that year. Many were disappointed it didn't make the Clarke shortlist. So it actually won an award unlike Farthing.

As to Farthing not depicting a dystopia - well, as someone living in England I would have to respectfully disagree.

As to SF recognising out-of-genre books, this goes back a long way. Pynchon's Gravity's Rainbow was up for the Nebula in '74.

#32

I think many in the SF genre have tried to claim Atlas Shrugged. It is certainly a work that splits the audience.

33:Atlas Shrugged has been tagged as Science Fiction 37 times on LT. The Plot Against America, science fiction(11) speculative fiction(8).

Why isn't Atlas Shrugged considered to be SF?

That's a good question. It certainly seems to have more than its share of fictional fantastical science and is pure fantasy from start to finish. why isn't it considered SF?

Because sf fans will only claim good books published as mainstream - 1984, A Clockwork Orange, for example - for the genre.

Ian, there are plenty of Americans (and American SF fans) who think that Atlas Shrugged is a good book.

Admittedly I've only read The Fountainhead, but if it's anything like that then they're clearly deluded and in need of medication.

Doesn't speak very highly of Americans. Contrived plot, preachy, preachy, preachy, never heard of show, don't tell. Atlas Shrugged is a philosophical/political treatise packaged as a rather juvenile, poorly constructed novel extolling the virtue of not playing well with others. There's a reason why most people read this during their angsty teen years. If you wait until adulthood it's more likely to come across as a structurally incompetent fantasy that takes itself way too seriously.

What's that about more people read, but fewer know how?

Awrrr, c'mon iansales. The Fountainhead is nowhere near as bad as Atlas Shrugged! ;->

Actually, though, Anthem really wasn't at all bad (even if it was a bit of a rip-off of Zamyatin's We). And my recollection (though my memory is 40+ years old) is that We the Living was fairly decent too.

#37

So we have managed to debase the meaning of SF down to our personal preferences?

EDIT: What I mean to say is that we should be able to say whether a piece of media is SF or not (even using that what I point at is SF definition) and this should not be coloured by our opinion of the media in question.

# 41 The Fountainhead is better than Atlas Shrugged? In that case, people who think the latter is a good book are in need of electro-convulsive therapy, not medication.

26>

It's SF because alternate history is generally considered to be a subgenre of SF. Not all SF needs to be set in the future (from when it was written), nor does alternate history need a SFnal device to produce the alternate timeline for it to be considered alternate history.

Alternatively, it's SF because Walton is an SF writer.

Some people define SF loosely as the "what-if" genre: what if we colonized Mars? What if humans could teleport? What if a nuclear holocaust actually happened?

If you're thinking in those terms, then alternate history naturally falls into the SF genre: what if the South won the American Civil War? What if the plague killed 90% of the European population, instead of 40%? Even if the events took place in some alternate past, there is still that speculative, "what-if" aspect.