> ephraim mallery <[log in to unmask]> wrote
>
>I recently read some early essays by Joanna Russ, where she said
>(basically) that writing can be divided up in subjunctive terms. Fantasy
>comprises ideas that "could not have happened." Sci-fi are those things
>that "have not happened." Most other things were grouped under naturalistic
>writing (a term used by Delany) which "could have happened." It seems, that
>under these terms, fantasy and scifi can never mix.

Thank you - that is an excellent insight into the differences between SF and
fantasy. I am sure that's what I meant to say earlier - no, really, I did,
trust me.

>It seems, that
>under these terms, fantasy and scifi can never mix.

Not strictly true given the definitions above. The easiest way to see this
is to draw a diagram -  divide a blank bit of paper into two areas: on one
side is everything that can happen (ie naturalistic writing), the other is
everything than cannot (ie fantasy). SF crosses into both sides because it
is things that haven't happened (either because they can't, or because they
could, but it just hasn't happened yet). You could have an SF story (about
things which haven't happened) which is also fantasy (because they could
never happen).

In fact a lot of SF probably ends up becoming fantasy: as scientific
knowledge grows things which were thought possible 50 years ago are "known"
to be impossible now. On the other hand, there is no clear boundary between
fantasy and everything else, because we can never know what can and can't
happen....