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But that then begs the question… isn’t Margaret Atwood already the first SF author to win the Booker Prize? Making Harrison second?

by rsynnott6 hours ago|

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There's been a few scifi authors who've won the Booker Prize for non-scifi; at least Atwood and Ishiguro. And both the Handmaid's Tale and Never Let Me Go were shortlisted for the Booker. But they didn't actually win it.

EDIT: Oh, actually, missed that Atwood won it for The Testaments! Yeah, I mean that is clearly scifi.

by codeulike11 hours ago|

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That's a good point.

by SideburnsOfDoom11 hours ago|

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Margaret Atwood did not win the Booker Prize for Oryx and Crake and sequels, the "arguably SF" ones mentioned above, but for other novels. IDK if "The Testaments" qualifies though.

This might make MJH the first Sci-Fi author to win a Booker prize for a Sci-Fi novel.

by swiftcoder8 hours ago|

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> IDK if "The Testaments" qualifies though

I would have a hard time countenancing an argument that The Handmaids Tale (and by extension, The Testaments) is not sci-fi, in a world where Heinlein's "If This Goes On—" is widely regarded to be sci-fi.

On the other hand, if Atwood doesn't wish to be regarded as a sci-fi author, so be it

by lproven5 hours ago|

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> Atwood doesn't wish to be regarded as a sci-fi author

She's repeatedly said she doesn't. Indeed her dismissive remark that "SF is that 'squids in space' stuff, isn't it?" is what inspired the great Ken Macleod to write his "Engines of Light" trilogy which starts with Cosmonaut Keep.

Due to her attitude I've never even tried to read any fiction of hers. Macleod is a genius nearly on a level with his close friend Iain Banks.

I am with the other commenter in this thread: I've read quite a few (usually very highly-regarded) alleged SF novels by literary authors who say they don't write SF. I have hated pretty much every such book.

by swiftcoder4 hours ago|

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As one of very few women in the field, and one of even fewer who writes primarily about women, I tend to think a lot of this attitude is a reflection of the extent to which sci-fi has been an "old boys club" for most of Atwood's career, more than it is about the genre itself

by tialaramex4 hours ago|

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All of literature can be regarded as an "old boys club" if you squint, but it's not like she'd have been unique. "The Left Hand of Darkness" was published before I was born, but I was old enough to read "The Handmaid's Tale" by the time that was published, albeit not quite old enough to properly understand it.

In fact I don't think "The Handmaid's Tale" really makes sense without the context of the AP feminists. Gilead comes about, as I understand it, because the AP feminists think they can use the Religious Right to achieve their goals and unsurprisingly that goes badly for them. AP feminism doesn't even exist when "Left Hand" was published.

by ballmerpoint2 hours ago|

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I saw her talk once and I thought this statement was more about her being glib. If I recall what she said correctly, it was “I don’t consider what I write to be science fiction, because something like it has already happened.”

But maybe that’s just post-hoc rationalization for a reactionary stance, idk.

by I-M-S1 hours ago|

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Margaret Atwood likes to position herself as a champion of values such as equity, justice, and progress, while using her clout to oppose a multi-family condo development close to her multi-million dollar mansion [1]

Needless to say, I will also never read any of her work.

[1] https://globalnews.ca/news/3707723/margaret-atwood-condo-con...

by SideburnsOfDoom7 hours ago|

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I would say that Atwood's "The Handmaids Tale" is as much Sci-Fi as similar low-tech dystopias, e.g. "Parable of the Sower" (Octavia Butler), "A Canticle for Leibowitz" (Walter Miller).

But the difference is that Atwood was, when she wrote "The Handmaids Tale" an author but not a Sci-Fi author. Whereas Butler and Miller were Sci-Fi authors.

And yes, "is this book sci-fi?" is a fuzzy category, and of no great importance.

I respect Margaret Atwood's opinion here but I don't quite hold it myself. More so about Oryx and Crake and sequels.

By "IDK if "The Testaments" qualifies though" I mean that I have not read it, just "The Handmaids Tale" so I'm not going to opine on something that I don't know about.

by ballmerpoint2 hours ago|

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If it helps, The Testaments is firmly in the same genre as The Handmaid’s Tale, whichever genre one wishes to assign to either.

by tialaramex11 hours ago|

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It doesn't beg the question, "begging the question" is a type of fallacy in which we insist upon presuming X and then rely on that to prove X which is a waste of everybody's time. But yes, it is reasonable if we notice that Atwood's "The Handmaid's Tale" is Science Fiction to expect that awarding a Booker to its sequel "The Testaments" would constitute a Booker for Science Fiction.

I would imagine the distinction attempted here is that despite writing those novels, Atwood doesn't consider herself to be an SF author, perhaps Harrison says he is an SF author. Atwood also won for "The Blind Assassin" which very much is not Science Fiction, it's historical fiction, it's not history but all the stuff happening in the background was real.

This shades over somewhere. If your story features an England ruled by literal Nazis it's Science Fiction (alternate history is a type of SF, "What if the Nazis won?" is a fairly popular theme) but if your England just has some Nazi sympathizers and your story is set in the 1930s it might just be historical fiction.

by SideburnsOfDoom11 hours ago|

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For Oryx and Crake and sequels, it's hard to argue that "a novel with no robots or spaceships ... but a whole lot of genetic engineering" isn't actually SF.

It doesn't pass the test that e.g. a novel set on the actually existing International Space Station does. It does contain a core fictional scientific "what-if" extrapolation.

I respect the author's opinion here and I hold a different opinion, for that reason.