Science fiction, fantasy, and faith: Part 7

(Part 6 is here.)

I said last time that I would mention some speculative works which view religion in a negative light. However, it turns out that I've already partly dealt with that topic in this post about Philip Pullman. And many of these books have been mentioned here by Speculative Catholic. So I'll be brief.

Many famous authors (such as H.G. Wells, Isaac Asimov, Robert Heinlein, or Jack Vance) generally assumed that the claims of the religions were false, but they didn't bother spending much time on attacking them, either. Most sf and fantasy falls somewhere 'in between' when it comes to religion. However, there are certainly stories that are sympathetic to religion, and there are also, unsurprisingly, works that are openly driven by anti-religious views. Here are some of the more famous ones:

Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials fantasy trilogy are currently the most popular of these books. I understand that the third volume, The Amber Spyglass, is the most explicit in being anti-theistic and anti-church, though with an element of naturalistic mysticism. (Pullman was born in 1946.)

James Morrow (1947-) is well known for his militantly anti-theistic works, such as Towing Jehovah (about the death of God) and Only Begotten Daughter.

Popular fantasy author George R. R. Martin's story "The Way of Cross and Dragon" is an incisive attack on the Catholic Church and the historicity of the Gospels. (Martin was born in 1948.)

Terry Pratchett's secularist beliefs come across in a number of his Discworld fantasy books. Though he's humourous author, it's always seemed to me that his comedy gets a little strained and preachy when he dwells on religion - more so than his predecessor, Douglas Adams, who was also an atheist but who had a lighter touch. (Pratchett was born in 1948.)

Golden Age author and editor Lester Del Rey (1915-) wrote quite a number of stories with anti-theistic themes, such as "For I Am A Jealous People" and "Evensong."

I've already mentioned Arthur C. Clarke's disturbing story "The Star." Clarke is generally hostile to the established religions, though he seems to be partial to deistic ideas.

I think I'll leave it there. If you're really interested, works which depict the Christian church, or fundamentalists (or whatever religion a particular author was raised in) as being oppressive and evil are fairly common and can be easily found.

Now for something different:

I feel a bit guilty for thus far ignoring Golden Age author Clifford D. Simak (1904-1988). My personal ignorance is to blame, as I haven't read much of his work. (I intend to rectify that.) Simak was a Catholic who lived in the American Midwest, and wrote what has been called 'pastoral science fiction,' meaning it was calm, gentle, and often set in rural locales. He was the third person to be voted 'Grand Master' by the Science Fiction Writer's Association. Apparently his best work was done in the 1950s and 60s, though his 1935 story "The Creator" is notable as an early example of religion in sf.

Jorge Luis Borges (1899-1986) lived in Argentina and had impeccable literary style. He has proved to be enormously influential and was one of the fathers of "magic realism," which Gene Wolfe defines as fantasy written by people who spoke Spanish. His 1944 story collection Ficciones is essential reading for literati and for fantasy fans alike. (I would also recommend Dreamtigers.) Borges was a Catholic for part of his life, though he later lost his faith and subscribed to Schopenhaeur's philosophy of pessimism. He enjoyed arcane theological speculation and found obscure heresies fascinating. His story "Tlon, Uqbar and Orbis Tertius" is a profound meditation on fantasy, imagination, and idolatry. And consider his wonderfully strange Argumentum Ornithologicum:

I close my eyes and see a flock of birds. The vision lasts a second or perhaps less; I am not sure how many birds I saw. Was the number of birds definite or indefinite? The problem involves the existence of God. If God exists, the number is definite, because God knows how many birds I saw. If God does not exist, the number is indefinite, because no one can have counted. In this case I saw fewer than ten birds (let us say) and more than one, but did not see nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three or two birds. I saw a number between ten and one, which was not nine , eight, seven, six, five, etc. That integer - not-nine, not-eight, not-seven, not-six, not-five, etc. - is inconceivable. Ergo, God exists.

Muriel Spark (1918-2006) died on Good Friday of this year. A Catholic, she was most famous for The Prime Of Miss Jean Brodie. Her dark and often funny books are highly esteemed as 'literature,' and I've included her here because of the magic realist elements that kept turning up in her stories. A great starting place would be her collected ghost stories, which are bizarre and electrifying. (These two obituaries explore the Catholic elements of her work.)

P. D. James (1920-), a devout Anglican, is a very popular writer of mysteries (such as Death In Holy Orders). However, her 1992 novel The Children of Men can be best described as science fiction. Set in a bleak future where the human race has suddenly and mysteriously gone sterile, flagellants rave that God's judgement has come, while an urbane professor tries to ignore his own despair. The religious symbolism is subtle but unmistakable.

Walter Wangerin, Jr. (1944-), a Lutheran pastor, won the National Book Award for Science Fiction in 1980, for his fantasy The Book of the Dun Cow. It's very loosely based on an ancient Irish legend, and is a barnyard fable about a heroic rooster and his role in the battle against a Satanic Wyrm. (Think Animal Farm meets The Lord of the Rings, or Narnia.) Parts of it strike me as highly inventive and profound; other parts seem cheesy. Either way, it is memorable.

That's it for now. For the time being, check out the Scattered Crumbs, and the ever-growing list of my sf/f/f book reviews.

[Updated to add: You may want to read these posts next- A Speculative Tradition, SF/F Atonement, and Great SF/F/F Short Stories]