>Kamikasee wrote :
>I agree that this is difficult to pull off (or at least to pull off well) but
>why is that? The stories that come to mind immediately are Heinlein's
>_Waldos_ and _Magic, Inc._ . In both of these stories, magic and fantasy
>creatures coexist with technology (though admitedly not *advanced*
>technology). While I'm not saying these are good, they are still examples of
>this.
>
>Does anyone else have a theory about why these two don't mix well? I would
>tend to think that they point to different times; that is, fantasy concerns
>itself (mostly) with times past while sf concerns itself (mostly) with times
>future. Can anyone else think of other books or stories?
>
Perhaps because in a world with science and technology, we would expect to
be able to "explain" magic - which would be difficult. If we could explain
it as, say, using the "Kamikasee field" to freeze time, we wouldn't be
using magic, we'd be using the "Kamikasee field". Likewise, an ogre in a
science fiction story is less likely to be accepted as an ogre, but would
be "explained" as an alien that looks like we'd imagine an ogre to look.
I guess that what I'm trying to say is that our (or possibly just my)
preconceptions of what those genres are is inherently contradictory, making
a mixture difficult to do well. Christopher Stasheff (I _think_ I spelled
it correctly) wrote a series of books (The Warlock Enraged, The Warlock
Wandering, Warlock in Spite of Himself, etc.) where there was magic on one
planet, but not elsewhere. I think that it was explained in terms of esper
abilities, and a genetic breeding program or something, but it's been
awhile. At anyrate, the magic and science-fiction aspects of the story
were seperate, not really well integrated. Come to think of it, the planet
was pretty much in the "past" with no castles and kings and stuff.
I begin to blather now.
H.
<Geology Troll>
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