Tag Archive for philosophical

To be or not to be didactic

The Marghdeen Learning Centre’s latest course on Iqbal is exploring the philosopher’s take on art (with a focus on literature). Though he was born in the period when l’art pour l’art was developing as a new movement, Iqbal didn’t believe in art for art’s sake. In fact, he took a dim view of it. In one of his articles published in July 1917, he wrote:

“[Art for art’s sake] appeals more to imagination than to will, and on the whole acts as a narcotic on the mind of the reader. … the good in art is not necessarily identical with the good in life; it is possible for a poet to write fine poetry, and yet lead his society to Hell. The poet is essentially a seducer; woe to his people, if instead of making the trials of life look beautiful and attractive he embellishes decadence with all the glories of health and power, and seduces his people to extinction.”

(I should add that in this article Iqbal was talking specifically about poets but his views applied to art in general.)

Edgar Allan Poe - public domain image

19th century author Edgar Allan Poe famously called didactic poetry ‘heresy’, but he was also an early pioneer of modern sci-fi

The late sci-fi author and academic Joanna Russ suggested in 1975 that all science fiction is didactic in the vein of medieval fiction. The word ‘didactic’ itself originally meant art with educational or informative content. It was only from the 19th century onwards that it was redefined to mean something ‘burdened’ with this content. It seems that this negative definition of didactic fiction coincides with the onset of modern materialism (as the outcome of the Enlightenment period).

I wonder what Iqbal would have made of visionary fiction. Part of its appeal – for me, at least – is that it isn’t art for the sake of art. And yet funnily enough, over at the Visionary Fiction Goodreads group we all recently agreed that visionary fiction isn’t overtly ‘preachy’. Is this a contradiction? Not really. We can liken it to how non-fiction deals with facts. Whilst non-fiction writers present their facts as they see them and obviously have an opinion of their own, they don’t necessarily claim to having the final word on a subject – at least, not if they’re honest.

Visionary fiction is didactic in the former sense, rather than the latter.  In fact, I’ve always felt that all fiction has something to teach us, whether or not that is the author’s conscious intent. It all has a value. The real question is whether that value is ‘good’ or ‘bad’, that is, constructive or destructive. Iqbal believed the most destructive form of art is pessimistic, nihilistic, and amoral, even if it uses beautiful imagery. It glorifies death. True constructive art, in Iqbal’s view, is optimistic, life-affirming, and encourages us to face life’s challenges – large and small – with courage and dignity.

“The highest art is that which awakens our dormant will-force, and nerves us to face the trials of life manfully.”

In other words, Iqbal believed that art doesn’t just reflect human psychology (collective and individual). It can actually have a hand in shaping our destinies. A huge claim, but it resonates with those who value the power of ‘story’.

Introducing the Visionary Fiction Ring

Recently I wrote a post about the difficulty I was having with defining the genre of Systems. Though I found the elusive ‘metaphysics’ category at Amazon (and no, I haven’t got round to re-classifying Systems there yet), I still felt that it would be good if the novel could be classified in a way that didn’t make it sound like it belonged to a tiny or specialist niche (or conversely placed it in too broad a category such as sci-fi).

Since then I’ve met Jodine Turner and Shannan Sinclair at a Goodreads group dedicated to visionary fiction. We’ve all agreed that since our type of fiction needs a brand awareness campaign, we’re going to make an attempt to do just that ourselves. And so, we’ve started a web-ring for visionary fiction (see the new menu on the right-hand side of this page containing links to Jodine and Shannan’s sites) and we’re brainstorming some other ideas at the moment. I’ve also created a new category at this blog especially for Visionary fiction.

So, what is visionary fiction? In one way it could be described as similar to inspirational fiction; it’s often inspired by a search for a higher truth, but it isn’t always about or aimed at readers of a particular faith. It can be metaphysical, or esoteric, or spiritual in tone. It often involves the paranormal. Of course this means that visionary fiction is most likely to also fall under fantasy, as does Jodine’s Carry on the Flame series. But this is not always the case. Systems (as sci-fi) is a case in point. So is Shannan’s Dream Walker, which she describes as ‘Quantum fiction’ because it explores quantum and string theories.

But what all visionary fiction has in common is that it takes its inspiration from that fascinating creature called humanity and explores its limitless potential. A pioneer of the term ‘visionary’, Michael Gurian, describes it as “fiction in which the expansion of the human mind drives the plot“.

Interested in knowing more? Watch this space for updates. Soon Jodine and Shannan will be dropping in to give us their insights on visionary fiction and its relevance in today’s world.

If you have written a novel and think it might fit into what I’ve described here, say hello here or at Goodreads. We’re looking for more authors to join this ring.

 

What genre is your novel?

I wasn’t planning to post anything at all this week after having posted five entries last week – but this one’s been on my mind since even before I published Systems. How do you classify a novel that for some reason or other can’t fit into one specific – and known – category?

Whilst it seems as though there are a lot of genres for fiction, for novels like mine there are starkly few genres to choose from. I popped over to Amazon and reminded myself of the options I had to choose from when it came to classifying Systems. They included:

  • Literary
  • Mystery, Thriller & Suspense
  • Science Fiction and Fantasy
  • Religion & Spirituality (though this would encompass both fiction and non-fiction)

And in my case, that was about it. There are scores of categories on Amazon, and almost 20 of them are under ‘Literature & Fiction’ but only these come close. (Actually, I had a similar problem with SJ2. But it was still easier than Systems).

I didn’t want to pick Literary because my fiction is really styled more commercially.  Mystery, Thriller & Suspense was reasonably accurate, but the sci-fi element is louder. And as for Religion and Spirituality … that, I felt, gave off the wrong vibe. I prefer the unofficial genre ‘Visionary’ or ‘Metaphysical’, maybe even ‘Philosophical’, but these options just weren’t there. And ‘Speculative’ (again, not there) … isn’t that another way of saying ‘science fiction’?

So, for now I’ve stuck with classifying it as science fiction, albeit reluctantly. At various sites – depending on whom I’m addressing – I’ve also referred to it as ‘Islamic science fiction’ – though that’s a technicality and in reality the fiction is neither overtly religious nor does it aim at a specific faith, even if it is inspired by the Islamic worldview in philosophical terms.

But, there is an upside to this conundrum. I’m beginning to run into other authors who are calling for a genre to include ‘visionary’ elements without lumping them under either science fiction or fantasy. So, at least I’m finding some new fiction to read.

Have you self-published a novel? How did you decide what category it best fits into ?

Update: Five minutes after posting this, I found the Metaphysical category on Amazon, as a subsection of ‘Genre Fiction’. Go figure.