DOCUMENT RESUME

ED 034 797 TE 500 479

AUTHOR Madsen, Alan L. TITLE That Starlit Corridor. INSTITUTION National Council of Teachers of English, Champaign, Ill. PUP DATE Sep 64 NOTE 8p. JOURNAL CIT The English Journal; v53 n6 p405-412 Sep 1964

EDRS PRICE EDRS Price MF-$0.25 HC-$0.50 DESCPIPTORS Concept Teaching, Creative Activities, Educational Objectives, *English Instruction, English Literature, Evaluation Techniques, Experimental Programs, *Fiction, Grade 9, Instructional Materials, Literary Analysis, *Literature Appreciation, Rating Scales, Reading Material Selection, *Scientific Concepts, Scientific Principles, *Secondary School Students, Space, Units of Study (Subject Fields)

ABSTRACT A unit on space designed for secondary schools is described and advocated in this article. This experimental program, presented to 9th grade students at University Hiah School, State University of Iowa, provides a highly imaginative experience in literature while raising unique philosophical and moral problems not found in other categories of literature. The author presents a detailed program with specific course objectives. Major goals include an understanding of science fiction literary techniques and a comprehension of scientific concepts. A list of science fiction books rated for their merit is included with a discussion of criteria used in their selection. Reference to other genres of science fiction material is also made. (RL) C'TheENGLISH JOURNAL Vol. 53 September 1964 No. 6

"That StarlitCorridor" Alan L. Madsen

Science fiction is prose worthy ofserious study, declares this writer. Mr.Madsen, who teaches English at UniversityHigh School, State University ofIowa, writes of his ninth graders'venture into "that starlit corridor" andrates the books they read on a scale ofpoor to outstanding.

What makes us rove that starlit corridor May be the impulse tomeet face to face Our vice and folly shaped intoa thing, And so at last ourselves; what luresus there Is simpler versions of disaster; A web confounding time andspace, A world of ocean without shore, A sentence to perpetual journeying, And simplest, flapping down the poisoned air, A ten-clawed .'

WHAT LURES in him the starlit corri-creative imaginationsto erect a world of dor of scienct; &don? Perhapsforthe twenty-firstcentury, surpassing the the oldsters it iss desire to come face toworld of their parents and grandparents, CN. face with projections ofour vice andalways a world better thanthey now folly. Butyoungsters are compelled byknow. other motives. They want excitement, If Kingsley Amis is right,most readers adventure, idealistic quests, and a chanceof science fictionrange in age from 16 to to exercise creative imaginations. 28. The appeal of science fictionthere- Adolescents are dreamers. Theyreadfore is not confinedto adolescents. More- to find out about themselves as they mightover, science fiction readers are atan age I')be, in a world as it may be, shaped, inat which, according to psychologists,man part, by themselves as they would be.does his most creative thinking.This fact Adolescents are imaginative,much morealone might justify the studyof science so than adults conditioned topatterns andfiction in junior and seniorhigh English tkihabits of their daily routine.Adolescentsclasses. But it neednot. have not lost the zest for exploration and How many English teachers discovery. They have have ob- yet to use theirserved, in free reading periodsfor ex- 'From New Maps of , 0 1960,by Kingsley ample, thatmany brighter youngsters Amis. Reprinted by permission ofHarcourt, Brace habitually read science fictionwith some- & World, Inc. thing approximating religiouszeal? And 405

THIS DOCUMENT HAS U.S. DEPARTMENT KEN REPRODUCED OF HEALTH, EDUCATION EXACTLY AS RECkViF, it WELFARE FROM THE PERSON OR ORGANIZATION OFFICE OF EDUCATION ORIGINATING IT. POINTS OF VIEW Ox.14INIONS STATED DO NOT NECESSARILY REPRESENT OFFICIAL OFFICE OF EDUCATION POSITION OR POLICY. 406 THE ENGLISH JOURNAL how many of us have dismissed scienceis saturated with assumptions and specu- fiction as trash without really knowinglations which teachers of the humanities anything about it or, on the other hand,have neglected to treat in high school: have shrunk away from it mumbling, "Ithe relationship of science, technology, don't know anything about science"?and space travel to human values. Mr. Science fiction has been for the most partBradbury states the importance of study- a pejorative term, a wastebasket classifi-ing the ideas contained in science fiction cation for any bad fiction writing lardedaccordingly: with scientific jargon. Arno Jewett's current assessment of Using dramatic and suspenseful frame- works, the writers can put forward, in the genre probably reflects the dominant symbolic terms, some of their best think- thinking of high school English teachers: ing on a philosophical-political-sociologi- My experience with books on science cal-psychological level.It is indeed, I fiction has been that most of the plots repeat, the only, the best, the greatest are contrived, the characters stereotyped, FICTION OF IDEAS. And since we and the content badly written. Frankly live in a Society of Ideas on the loose, I have my. doubts about the literary value running wild in our machineries, it is of most science fiction and the useful- time we paid attention to 180 million ness of it in high school literature courses. men and women dominated or shaped in one way or another by these s-f devices.3 Most of it is in the same class as mediocre westerns and murder mysteries.2 Still, Mr. Jewett's previous estimate is Mr. Jewett's observation is valid fora good one and suggests a responsibility much science fiction being written today.English teachers should accept for help- But it applies most accurately to scienceing students develop critical standards. fiction of a dozen or more yearsago.It is unthinkable in this space age that Today we have a steadily growing bodymany of us in English refuse to learn of substantial and literary science fictionsomething about science, refuse to find and a core of talented science fictionout how science fiction writers go about writers: e.g., , Arthur C.their work, and refuse to learn what sci- Clarke, , ,ence fiction writers have to say about the Robert Heinlein, , Clif-future and mankind's place in it. Letme invoke Mr. Amis on this point of view: ford Simak, and . IC .There is at present a discreditable provincialism of thought and too much Greatest Fiction of Ideas nervous or complacent reluctance to in- These men consistently open corridorsvoke ordinary critical standards. Science to the imagination where , myth,fiction is not tomfool sensationalism, but utopia, and anti-utopia converge, overlap,neither is it a massive body of serious art and disjoin again into distinct and indi-destined at any moment to engulf the vidual types. On an idea level, the genrewhole of Anglo-American writing." Where does a teacher start on such a 'Letter to the author, Dec. 10, 1963. In a subse- quent letter, dated Feb. 3, 1964, Mr. Jewett suggests unit? One method is the approach I took that the following statement, coupled with the in developing a space science fiction unit paragraph above, gives a more accurate reflection of his views: "The best fiction by Arthur C. Clarke, for ninth grade students in University Ray Bradbury, Robert:Heinlein, anda High School at the State University of few others are well worth reading for entertain- Iowa. ment. And certainly Gore Vidal's play Visit to a Small Planet is excellent for use in high school letter to the author, Dec. 1, 1963. literature courses." 4Amis, op. cit., p. 10. 1

"THAT STARLIT CORRIDOR" 407 Variety Is Keynote to the main stream of literature. Isaac I began by sampling a wide range ofAsimov and Arthur C. Clarke are repre- science fiction and short stories.sented in this volume. Another collection by science fiction writers is The Science They vary stylistically among themselves as much as other types of literature. It isFiction (Advent Publishers, 1959). interesting to compare, for example, RayThese essays (by writers such as Robert Bradbury's sentimentality with FrederikA. Heinlein and ) were first Pohl's cynicism, or Theodore Sturgeon'sdelivered as lectures at the University of unusual styling with the "square as SearsChicago and later collected as a volume and Roebuck" styling of Robert Hein-in memorium to C. M. Kornbluth. lein. In subject matter these writers run I now felt ready to formulate my goals the spectrum from colonization of otherand objectives for the unit.In general, planets to studies in telepathy; from athe purposes of the unit were to distin- treatment of symbiosis to legal problemsguish science fiction from other forms of of planet ownership; from twenty-secondliterature, to build standards for evaluat- century crusades to technicalities of spaceing well-written and poorly written sci- navigation. No one could catalogue theence fiction, and to determine the value variety of ingenuity displayed. of the contents of science fiction for con- temporary adolescent readers. Next, I turned to historical-critical More specifically, the goals which I es- studies. There are many more of thesetablished for the unit were the following: available than I would have guessed. To mention a few (all of which are listed in 1. To understand and apply present the 1964 edition of Books In Print):5 concepts of time and space to sci- ence fiction in order to read criti- 1.Kingsley Amis, New Maps of Hell cally and intelligently. (New York: Harcourt, Brace and World, 2. 1'o understand that any science fic- 1960; also a Ballantine paperback). tion work is based on and, circum- 2. G. D. Doherty, ed. Aspects of Sci- scribed by, one or more scientific ence Fiction, (New York: Transatlantic hypotheses. Arts, Inc.) 3. To learn to recognize conventions 3. Roger Lanclyn Green, Into Other native to science fiction and to Worlds (New York: Abe lard-Schuman, judge whether or not these conven- Ltd., 1958). tions are justified. 4. , Explorers of the 4. To understand the uses of extrapo- Infinite, Shapers of Science Fiction, lation to predict, warn, or provide (Cleveland, World Publishing Co., 1963). a colorful setting. 5. To recognize that all authors make Other readable studies include a few certain sociological, political, eco- which are no longer in print. Modern nomic, psychological, moral, and Science Fiction (1953, Coward-McCann, religious assumptions about life and Inc.)edited by , al- to note some of the major assump- though a somewhat dated work, is a col- tions of this kind current in science lection of essays by writers and critics fiction writing such as: who explore several facets of science fic- a. Individualism will be extin- tion: movies, social science, morals and guished and future societies will religion, and science fiction as it relates be governed by totalitarian 51 am indebted to Robert Goetzman, fellow- states. teacher at University High School, for much of the b. Man's basic nature can be bibliographical information for this paper. changed for the better if he is 408 THE ENGLISHJOURNAL placed in a superior scientific- c. Does the setting merely provide technological environment of a place of from problems the future (the inverse is also which appear to be unsolved on prevalent in science fiction). earth? c.Colonization on other planets Final Estimate constitutes an extension of the American frontier, a a. Does the author sacrifice people second chance, or a new begin- and ideas in favor of events and things? ning. b. Does he appear to offer a reader 6. To learn to ask certain criticalques- cheap thrills and panaceas in tions about plot, character, setting, place of genuine creative imagi- in order to makea final estimate of nation and thought-provoking the work: ideas? Plot c. What are his assumptions about a.Is the plot hackneyedor con- life and the nature of mankind? trived? Is it merely "soap opera" Are they valid? Or are they or western but set on a different based on stock values and atti- planet? tudes which are convenient for b. Does the plot followas a natu- his present purpose? ral consequence from a realistic In formulating objectives of this kind hypothetical base, extrapolatedand in selecting the materialto accom- from a tendency in the present?plish these ends, a teacher may encounter c. Does the plot have an organicseveral problems: (1) how to distinguish relationshipto character andscience fiction from fantasy, myth,uto- setting? pian, and anti-utopian literature; (2) what ideas and assumptions contained in Character science fiction merit most careful exami- a.Are the characters mechanicallynation; (3) what critical standardsto produced types, or are they in-bring to bear on science fictionconven- dividuals exhibiting genuinetions and stylistic devices; and (4) how emotions and feelings whose ac-to choose a common reading as a basis tions and thoughts are consistentof departure for the unit. with the demands of plot and I had written to a number of science setting? fiction writers and to two critics of the b. Is character the focal pointorgenre, soliciting their opinions on the does character tend to be sub-above problems. Theirresponses were ordinate to plot and settingorinformative as well as encouraging. Mr. disappear in favor of marvelousBradbury outlinedsome excellent sources scientific inventions and melo-of information and provideda great dramatic events? many insights into science fiction. Setting Common reading texts suggested by a. Does the setting provide a func-these authors included The tional relationship to other ele-Chronicles, and Golden ments? Apples of the Sun by Ray Bradbury; The b. Does it demand the suspensionCaves of Steel by Isaac Asimov; The of the reader's judgment againstDeep Range and Childhood's End by the incredible, suchas mechani-Arthur C. Clarke; The Winds of Time cal and biological-by Chad Oliver; Door into Summer, anthropological throwbacks? , and I

"THAT STARLIT CORRIDOR" 409 others by Robert Heinlein. Although allinverts cherished values, and he reverses of these contain much to recommendcliches ( believe there is too them, each teacher will have his favorite;much oxygen on Earth to sustain life) to consequently, Iselected The Martianachieve his aims.Moreover, he attacks Chronicles. everything from racial prejudice to com- mercialism, from bureaucracy to tech- Criteria for Selection nology, and from fratricide to the stifling My criteria for selecting this novelof creative imagination. And throughout were five:(1) Bradbury's sensibility is ahe raises important philosophical ques- romantic one, highly appealing to ado-tions, e.g., "What is sanity?" lescents; (2) the novel is one of the most For those who wish to unearth them, literary representatives of that class ofthere is an abundance of literary nuggets. science fiction which treats the effects ofFirst, there is Bradbury's style, which is man's interaction with inhabitants ofalternately as journalistic in homely de- other planets; (3) the novel requires atail as Defoe's and as symbolical-allegori- great deal of active, imaginative partici-cal as Hawthorne's. Second, there is the pation on the part of the reader, for hesensitivity Bradbury displays to sense ex- has to supply events for time gaps, he hasperience which manifests itself best in ( to follow a thematicalmost musicalcolor imagery: blues and greens, - development rather than a standard plotlight, fire, , and silver. Third, Brad- line, and he has ample opportunity tobury uses mythical themes and arche- speculate about the future and is invitedtypal figures(the Johnny Appleseed to measure himself against the standardsfigure, the creation theme in "Usher II," of the book; (4) it provides an excellentthe exodus theme in which Negroes mi- place of departure for extensive individ-gratein mass from earth to ). ual reading in related sciencefiction,Fourth, there are the structural and the- i:f myth, fantasy, and utopian literature;matic means by which Bradbury unifies III (5) the book, in one sense a series ofthe novel: a cycle of in which short stories, is such that any reader ofthere is a muted hope for the junior or senior high may enter into it atrising again, the mounting of themes for his own level of experience and ability.a cumulative view of the destructive The Chronicles record, episodically,element in man, and the interweaving of man's colonizations of Mars from 1999"other worldly"motifs suchasthe to 2026, the time at which both the civili-do ppelganger. zations of Mars and Earth have been de- Bradbury's novel was the focal point stroyed. At the end of the novel onlyof the common reading in the unit, and two earth families, who become the "lastit was the means by which students were Martians," remain, Adam and Eve-like,introduced to extensive individual read- to begin civilization anew. While earth-ing in science fiction. Students were di- men disappear in an atomic , Martiansvided into groups to examine other works ironically become infected with chicken-from the points of view with which we pox, a disease unknown on Mars. had examined Bradbury's novel: content, Although Bradbury uses standard sci-imagination, and literary quality. At a ence fiction devices of mental telepathy,later date the groups reported their find- mass hypnosis, and the like, these devicesings to the class. function for his moral probings and his humanistic ends, The focus is alivays onA "Ladder" of Suggestions humanity, not gadgetry. He counter- Iprovided students with the following i points human and Martian attitudes, hesample "reading ladder" and asked that 410 THE ENGLISH JOURNAL all groups include in their reading one orH. G. Wells Time Machine more science fiction novels of poorer War of the Worlds quality. The list below is a modificationRobert Heinlein of the reading ladders for adolescents, Stranger in a Strange long advocated by Dora V. Smith. Based Land on the criteria of the experience of theEdwin Balmer andWhen Worlds reader and the literary value of the book, Collide the scale ranges from works of high liter- After Worlds ary meritVdown to those of cp.3 astion- able valueI. This list was created for Collide ninth-graders. For older or youngerRay Bradbury Golden Apples of readers, changes in the ladder would be the Sun necessary. Some teachers will undoubt- Gather, Darkness! edly question the wisdom of my classifi- III cations, and I confess to an extremely subjective point of view in making theIsaac Asimov Foundation Trilogy selections. The best single guide to lit- Foundation Foundation and terary quality of a book is still the author's name. Empire Second Founda- SAMPLE READING LADDER tion I, V The Caves of Steel George Orwell 1984 Robert A. HeinleinRevolt in 2100 Brave New World H. F. Heard Doppelgangers Jack London The Scarlet Plague C. S. Lewis Perelandra Trilogy Madeline L'EngleA Wrinkle in Time Out of the SilentJames Blish A Case of Con- Planet science Perelandra Arthur C. Clarke Sands of Mars That Hideous Strength II Ray Bradbury Fahrenheit 451 . Robert A. Heinlein Starman Jones Dandelion Summer Farmer in the Sky Walter M. MillerA Canticle for Leibowitz (and a number of Arthur C. ClarkeChildhood's End others) Olaf Stapledon First and Last Men Talents, Inc.. The Star Maker The High Crusade Theodore SturgeonMore Than HumanArthur C. Clarke Dolpl4n Island IV I Jules Verne The Mysterious In general, the work of the following Island writers: Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea Hugh Walters The Island of Dr. Ellen MacGregor Moreau Thomas Galt

S.. ( "THAT STARLITCORRIDOR" 411 Harry Stine extrapolate in theway that fiction does, Alan Nourse explore man's reactionto contemporary scienceboth his hopes and his fears.The Besides Bradbury's novel, in-classprosesecond volume isa delightfully humorous reading included short stories byAlfredcollection ofverses employing figures Bester and Arthur C. Clarkeas well as a(and verse form) from MotherGoose. long essay, "When Time Began,"inThe charactersare depicted in terms of which Fred Hoyle explains inrelativelycontemporary scientific concepts and simple terms the threecurrent theorieswith appropriate terminology.The fol- of the universe. I selected thelatter tolowing is typical of Windsor'sbook: provide a scientific foundation forsome Probable-Possible, my black hen, of the problems whichoccur in science She lays eggs in the Relative When. fiction .° If a readeraccepts the premise She doesn't lay eggs in the PositiveNow that one can travel inspace, he is obli- Because she's unable to Postulate How. gated to test the internal logicof the novel which produces subsequentevents. I might add parentheticallythat a great That is to say, in additionto the literarymany of the selections in this volumeare criteria one ordinarily bringsto a novel,much too difficultexcept for the most science fiction requires that thereaderscientifically sophisticated reader,even test the nature of the logic of the scien-though the book containsa glossary of tific hypotheses involved. If, forexample,scientific terms. a novelist "tesseracts" his charactersto The radio broadcast and thetwo plays another planet,or if the characters getmight be consideredas a sub-unit within there through "hyperdrive,"or if theythe science fiction unit. Of chiefconcern must make a "transition" inspace, whathere was dramaas it embodied many of does this imply about the author'sunder-the same techniques,concepts, and ideas standing of his material?For a greatfound in science fiction. Discussionand many science fiction novelists, thesetermsexamination of dramatic techniqueitself are merely excuses for not providingancame into consideration onlyas it seemed acceptable scientific raisond'etre. revelant or peculiarto a special means of Though science fiction,as the secondpresentation: radio, television,movie, or of these terms indicates, isa prose me- stag.:.. dium, I also incorporatedpoetry, a radio We listenedto Orson 'Welles'1938 broadcast, and two plays intothe unit. broadcast basedon H. G. Wells' novel, The only two volumes ofpoetry toWar of the Worlds, in whichaliens from treat science are Imagination'sOtherMars invade earth. We alsoread Karel Place, Poems of Scienceand Mathe-Capek's play R. U. R.(Rossum's Univer- matics (New York: ThomasY. Crowellsal ),as well as Gore Vidal's play Co., 1955) edited by HelenPlotz, andVisit to a Small Planet. The Space Child's Mother Goose (New The radio broadcast,some twenty-five York: Simon and Schuster,Inc., 1956;years later, has lost much of its dramatic also, Fssandes Paperback)by Frederickpunch for adolescentsconditioned to a Windsor and Marian Parry. space age, but the broadcast The first of these includes can be highly a numbereffective for presenting earlyideas about of poems which,though they donotscience fiction.Of course, the BEM This is contrary to Peter Lamb'sbelief that (bug-eyed monster) of Wells'novel be- knowledge of science isunnecessary. See Lamb's came the prototype for almost three dec- article "Race to the Moon," EnglishJournal, 46 ades of science fiction.Students were (November 1957),pp. 503-5. quick to note in the broadcastthe heavy 412 THE ENGLISH JOURNAL emphasis upon the sensationalaspects oflem was this: Ifwe accept as true Brad- science fiction. bury's generalizationor assumption, what I selected R. U. R., whichdepicts ro-will happen if we push itto its logical bots in revolt from theircreators, toconclusion in concrete form? This, of show students early conceptions ofrobotscourse, allows a great deal of latitude for (Capek coined theterm "robot") fromindividual interpretation. which are deriveda great many present- One boy did an admirable jobof ex- day notions of robots and robotry.7Moretending a Chronicle in whichNegroes important than this, however, isthe factare preparing for a mass exodus to Mars. that R. U. F. providesa good connectingBradbury does not showus what hap- link between science fictionand utopianpened after the Negroes arrived;the literature, since the playtreats themesstudent does. Some of the beststories found in science fiction anda great manycame from students who workedon an utopian novels. In particularwe notedidea or problem implicit butnot explicit Capek's concern with thedehumaniza-in the Chronicles. For example,one boy tion of man through scienceand tech-wrote an ingenious story in whicha Mar- nology. Our discussions provokedsome tian is tried accordingto the civil laws of students to read such utopian novelsas earth for an act which doesnot violate Ereuhon, News From Nowhere,andMartian legal or moral codes. Walden Two. Not only does this kind of writing Reading Vidal's play, Visitto a Smallafford adolescentsa chance to be imagina- Planet, was one of themost enjoyabletive, but it provides inexperiencedwriters experiences in the unit. It presentedanwith a basic structure from whichto important aspect of much good sciencewrite, since studentswere asked to follow fiction: humoroustreatment of seriousBradbury's Martian setting, hisconcept themes. Vidal givesus his genial satireof a Martian, and other fixedelements. through the character ofKreton, theThose who chose to be imaginativein all visitor from a future timezone who hasrespectsby not writing withinthe for his hobbyour own particular, "primi-framework of Bradbury'snovelpro- tive" time period. duced the least successful stories. A teacher of humanities rarelyhas at Imaginative Writing his disposal a strictly empiricalmeans by Ascience fiction unitmay lend itselfwhich to evaluate the results of histeach- to a great variety of writing activities,ing. He may examine studentsfor the but my concernwas with giving studentsextent to which they have assimilated the an opportunity to express themselvesfacts and concepts he haspresented to creatively. Consequently, I asked studentsthem; but his best indexto results is the to write a story based on an incident,degree to which he has motivatedstu- assumption, situation,or idea containeddents to seek imaginativeexperiences in . with literature and acquaintedthem with Since a greatmany of Bradbury's indi-new instruments for cognition. vidual Chroniclesare not developed be- Though I makeno plea that science yond a generalization (suchas "The oldfiction replace the classics ofliterature in people were the lastto come to Mars."),high school Englishcourses, I do claim some students chose to particularize thethat science fiction providesa unique generalization. Their fundamentalprob-kind of imaginative mediumwhich raises philosophical problemsman has always faced, as wellas problems peculiar to 'See IsaacAsirnov's novels of robots inparticular. man in a space age.

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