Week eight - Man in the High Castle

After my first attempt at this blog i found that i still didn't really understand what speculative fiction was so i did some more research and found that there are still many different arguments about the definition of speculative fiction compared to science fiction. One definition that i found is that science fiction is usually based on science and technology of the future and is frequently set in a different world such as space, or in the future (Read, write, think, 2005). I understood this because i had heard of the science fiction genre before. I then found another definition that stated Speculative fiction is a term that covers all forms of science fiction, and has an umbrella effect across many genres such as science fiction, fantasy and horror (Lost books, 2011). I was confused by this becuase if science fiction, fantasy and horror already each have a genre definition then why use speculative fiction?

I found that speculative fiction also embraces work that doesn't fit neatly into genres that already exist such as horror, fantasy and science fiction. Stories that have been labelled weird, adventure or both horror and fantasy can be placed under speculative fiction (Lilly, 2002). Speculative fiction can also embrace alternate history which is a dominant theme throughout The Man in the High Castle.

I believe that The Man in the High Castle falls under speculative fiction as it does not use traditional science fiction and has other themes such as alternate history and a story within a story present in the book. Philip K Dick uses alternative history throughout the book by exploring what would have happened to the world of Japan and Germany had won the Second World War. Dick creates a different history and outcome of the world that we would live in.

After revisiting this blog and looking further into the definition of speculative fiction vs science fiction i feel that i have a greater understanding of it now and how it works throughout The Man in the High Castle.

Lost Books. (2011). What is Speculative Fiction? Retrieved from http://www.lostbooks.org

N. E. Lilly. (2002). What is Speculative Fiction? Retrieved from http://www.greententacles.com/articles/5/26/

Read, Write, Think. (2005). Definition of Science Fiction. Retrieved from

http://www.google.co.nz/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=5&ved=0CEcQFjAE&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.readwritethink.org%2Ffiles%2Fresources%2Flesson_images%2Flesson927%2FSciFiDefinition.pdf&ei=Be5XUMjVLIaOiAenloHYAw&usg=AFQjCNFpMZA-IjM2XQpHQtDJib52r8D60Q&sig2=e7sikgHNHWKCTYM0AuWxkw

Week nine- Cult TV

What role does Hills (2004) suggest the fans play in the construction of cult TV? How is new media central to this?

Hill suggests that Cult TV is combined by the text itself, inter-textuality and fan base. Before Hill's reading I wasn't really sure on what Cult TV was all about but felt a bit more at ease when he defined it as "a group of texts, often hailing from the genres of science fiction, fantasy and horror" (p 509). When I think of Cult TV I think of fans and their practice of fandom. Hill states that when intense fandom exists, a show can become important to a persons life and their identity. I was pleased to read this as I do this often with the show 'The Vampire Diaries' and 'TrueBlood'. I also have a Vampire Diaries T-Shirt and all the seasons on DVD (just to show how much of a fan I really am). 

Cult TV watches are not of a passive audience, they like to get involved and express how they feel about the show. Some involve themselves even more by attending social gatherings about certain shows e.g the Vampire Diaries Club on Facebook and contribute to online fan-fiction sites. With the development of new technology such as blogs and social media sites fans of Cult TV can blog and discuss with others their love about characters, situations and experiences on the show. The Internet has made it easier for "fans to contact other like-minded devotees" As Hills states "cult status arises, ultimately, through an audiences passion for a TV show" (p.510). The fans who are the audience for these show are generally more avid and higher in participatory. Hills believes the benefit of Cult TV allows fans to write fan fiction as there is a big enough gap in the narrative as it is based around "format-defining and an endless narrative" unlike in soap operas. 

In conclusion Hills agrees with the idea that "fans arguably create cult status in a number of ways" (p518) and with new media fans are able to really involve themselves emotionally into the show. 

Hills, M. (2004) Defining Cult TV; Texts, Inter-Texts, and Fan Audiences, The Television Studies Reader. In R.C. Allen and A Hill. London and New York. Routledge. 

Week 9: Wilcox and Lavery (2002) identify 9 defining characteristics of ‘quality TV’ – can you apply any of these to other television series that you have viewed recently? Are there any other characteristics that you could add to their list?

The defining characteristics of ‘quality TV’ are:

1. Quality TV usually has a quality pedigree
2. Desirable demographics notwithstanding, quality shows must often undergo a noble struggle against profit-mongering networks and non-appreciative audiences.
3. Quality TV tends to have a large ensemble cast:

Grey’s Anatomy is a great example of this. There are 14 actors in the main cast, 7 in the recurring cast and an additional 17 with guest starring roles.

4. Quality TV has a memory.

True Blood is an example of this. As the series goes on the characters remember incidents that happen in previous episodes and even previous seasons. For example in Season One the murder of Sookie’s grandmother is mentioned throughout the subsequent seasons and becomes a part of her character almost, as she is struck by sadness at the thought of it every time. Also, Jason (Sookie’s brother) goes through a number of traumatic events which change and shape his character in the following seasons and episodes. A string of deaths, for example his grandmother, a few towns’ people and also his girlfriend cause Jason to change from a small town bachelor to wanting more from life.

5. Quality TV creates a new genre my mixing old ones.

The Vampire Diaries is similar in this sense to Buffy as it also adheres to and mixes up the same genres as Buffy. For example as Wilcox and Lavery (2002) mentions some genres such as “day-time soaps” (the drama of the plot in VD fulfils this), “gothic romances” (love-triangle between Stefan, Elana and Damon), “Grade-B horror flicks and supernatural fantasies” (this comes into play with the supernatural themes in VD and also the action scenes that are present).

6. Quality TV tends to be literary and writer based.

Eastenders is a well known British TV series going since the mid-eighties and is one of the highest rated programmes in the country. An example of this characteristic is shown in one of their successful writers for the show, Keith Brumpton, who is also an author. Brumpton has written over 35 humorous children’s books.

7. Quality TV is self-conscious.
8. The subject matter of quality TV tends toward the controversial.

Dexter is a good example of inhibiting this characteristic as there are many controversial themes in this series. Lying, cheating and the most obvious one is that the lead character (usually a likeable character in most TV shows) moonlights as a serial killer and still manages to sympathise with his cause.

9. Quality TV aspires towards ‘realism’.

 

References:

 Wilcox, R. & Lavery, D. (2002). Introduction, in R. Wilcox & D. Lavery (eds) Fighting the forces: what’s at stake in Buffy the vampire slayer. Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield.

Defining 'Quality TV.'

Wilcox and Lavery (2002) identify 9 defining characteristics of ‘quality TV’ – can you apply any of these to other television series that you have viewed recently? Are there any other characteristics that you could add to their list?

I should warn, I don't own a television, because I have a teeny tiny apartment, so the only time I watch tv is when I go home during holidays, and when I watch the limited number of shows I follow religiously online. So sorry if I can't answer all the questions.

• Quality TV usually has a quality pedigree. 

-

• Desirable demographics notwithstanding, quality shows must often undergo a noble struggle against profit-mongering networks and non-appreciative audiences. 

For this, the only show that really comes to mind is my all time favourite, South Park. It’s roots are pretty humble, Trey Parker and Matt Stone originally began making the short animations with crate paper which would eventuate into the show it is today. It really goes without saying that South Park has seen it’s fair share of non-appreciative audiences, due to style, the fact it is an adult cartoon, content, violence, and social commentary taken to extreme and ridiculous lengths, the show has a tendency to give voice to unpopular opinions and shed light on stigma, leading it to negative backlash, death threats, lawsuits, and threats of cancelation. Parker and Stone originally had the choice of the show being produced by MTV or by Comedy Central. They figured that MTV would censor it to the point of the target audience becoming children, so instead signed to Comedy Central. The show is now so popular, that it has resulted in the channel’s major world-wide success, the opposite of a struggle against profit-mongering networks, I suppose.

• Quality TV tends to have a large ensemble cast. 

I this is kind of interesting, because in my opinion, there are plenty of soap opera shows/drama shows which have huge casts of main characters, and are absolute rubbish, but I enjoy shows with few main characters, and a huge number of minor (ensemble) characters which add to the story. Again, the only true example I can think of is South Park. There are four main characters- Kyle, Stan, Cartman, Kenny – as well as them, each has their parents, who play a role in almost every story, Stan’s father Randy is a predominant character who has episodes based around him. There are children in the boy’s class at school, their friends, for the most part, Butters, who features in most every episode, having quite a few (usually at least one per season) “Butters Episodes” as Parker and Stone call them. There is the boys teacher, Mr./Mrs/Mr. (again) Garrison, the school counsellor, other teachers, the principal, and other staff. The boy’s extended family, other child’s parents, and other towns folk. South Park has a cast of over 300 characters, and only 4 main characters. Each character is unique, and memorable, even if they only appear in one episode to aid the story. The number of characters enriches the story, rather than being detrimental to it.

• Quality TV has a memory. 

Truth. Nothing is more annoying than when TV shows ignore things that have previously happened; it becomes episodic and frustrating. I also found that in the X-Files with Scully’s constant scepticism, which ended up being pretty unfounded after, you know, 9 seasons. And example would be the show Dexter, the main character provides voice over of his thoughts periodically, and he is often referencing prior events, struggles, murders and murderers. The past events are often linked to the present even if not directly, but often take an important psychological toll on the character/s.

• Quality TV creates a new genre my mixing old ones.

-

• Quality TV tends to be literary and writer based. 

This seems often to be true, in my experience. Take for example Dexter as mentioned above, which is based on a series of books by Jeff Lindsay. Another is the fantasy series Game of Thrones, which is amazing, is based on George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Fire and Ice series, and remains, at least for the first season, fairly true to the books. Many of crime novelist Agatha Christie’s works have been dramatized, such as the Miss Marple series, and the Poirot series, as well as over 50 other adaptations of her novels. The long-running Midsummer Murders is based on books by Caroline Graham. The murder-mystery series Wire in the Blood, is also based on a series of books by Val McDermid. Also the series Pillars of the Earth is based on the novel of the same name by Ken Follet.

• Quality TV is self-conscious. 

-

• The subject matter of quality TV tends toward the controversial. 

Again, see South Park and it's commentary on socio-political issues.

• Quality TV aspires towards ‘realism’. 

The only thing I can think of that is really fitting, is the 2005 series Rome. If you haven’t seen it, you should. It’s incredible. While it does have a few shortcomings in terms of historical accuracy , such as the death of Mark Antony, etc, but it’s so perfect in it’s representation of ancient Roman culture, environment, religion, politics, war, and attitude towards woman, class, family, state, sex, and honour. The characters are based on historical figures – Julius Caesar, Pompei Magnus, Gaius Octavian, Cleopatra, Mark Antony, etc. Even the other main characters, such as Atia and Servillia of the Julii were genuine people in history. I would certainly say the show aspires toward and achieves realism.

References:

Wilcox, R. & Lavery, D. (2002). Introduction, in R. Wilcox & D. Lavery

Fighting the forces: what’s at stake in Buffy the vampire slayer. Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield.

South Park Studios Webpage.

http://www.southparkstudios.com/

Week Eight: PK Dick: More Than Just An Author

According to Brown (2001), Dick's early novels conformed to the genre of science fiction; "he used the popular leitmotifs of SF - alien worlds, precognition, ray-guns, but employed them to his own agenda." However, Brown (2001) cites that Dick used science fiction to "explore his obsession with metaphysics, the nature of perceived reality, good and evil, and the abuse of power.  He was obsessed with the idea that the universe was only apparently real, an illusion behind which the truth might dwell."

A dominant theme of Dick's works is that of changing the reader's perception of reality.  As Brown (2001) identifies, Juliana Frink in The Man in the High Castle, "makes a discovery that changes her perception of reality - always a dominant theme in Dick's work - as she learns how Grasshopper came to be written".   Even in Scanner Darkly the main character Bob Arctor scrambles from one identity to another in his role as undercover cop and friend to a junky.

As Brown (2001) cites "in opposition to Nazi ideology, Dick posits the philosophy of Tao, which offers a means of examining the universe through the principals of interconnectedness - or Jungian Synchronicity - at odds with Western ideas of a universe that functions on the mechanistic basis of cause and effect".  That is to say, that whilst drawing on the themes of Nazism/Facism, Dick was heavily influenced by the I Ching, the ancient Chinese book of divination or fortune telling, and challenged traditional Western thinking in his writing.  According to Mountfort (2006), "Dick regarded the I Ching itself as having in a sense written High Castle".  However, in A Scanner Darkly, Dick "had come to feel that the I Ching had deliberately misled and betrayed him".

The Man in the High Castle was written in the Sixties when World War II was still relatively recent in society's mind.  PK Dick wrote at a time when ideals of culture, religion, anti-semitism, racism, fascism, socialism, capitalism and civil rights were being questioned, and the way society lived was simply out for debate.   According to Brown (2001), Dick was "a visionary whose manic novels of fractured realities presented a future that, like all good science fiction, was less prescriptive of what was to come than descriptive of the present".

Man in the High Castle is so much more than the separate characters the book portrays:  an American, a Jew, an Italian, a woman, a Japanese officer, a Japanese married couple, then a Swede (with an English name, Baynes) who turns out to be a German, each with their own identity or unidentity.  It appears to be almost a collection of short stories each with Dick's own point of view.  All the short stories are tied together by a fictitious alternative history ie: that World War II was won by the Germans and the Japanese, and the world as we know it is mapped out completely differently.  There is a narrative bow around all the characters, and that is the theme of the real history, that Germany and Japan actually lost the war.   This is portrayed in the novel within the novel by the character in the high castle (Abendsen) who writes about our real truth about WWII in The Grasshopper Lies Heavy.

The information on P K Dick has been swirling around my head for several weeks now.  In retrospect I think that was Dick's intention as a writer.  After viewing the movie,"Scanner Darkly", then reading the book "The Man in the High Castle", my belief is that it was Dick 's intention to make the reader think, really think, about the world we live in and how we live it, our own reality and our own irreality, to find Chung Fu, or Inner Truth.  In essence he wanted us to turn what we find familiar upside down and inside out and rethink what we believe is true to us and our own world.  Both Scanner Darkly and Man in the High Castle warrant viewing/reading more than once to fully understand their intricacies.

References: 

Dick, P.K. (2001; 1962). The Man in the High Castle. London: Penguin.

Linklater, R. (Director). (2006). A Scanner Darkly.

Brown, E. (2001). Introduction. In Dick, .K., The Man in the High Castle (p.v-xii). London: Penguin.

Mountfort, P. (2006). Oracle-text/Cybertext in Philip K. Dick's The Man in the High Castle. Conference paper, Popular Culture Association/American Culture Association annual joint conference, Atlanta 2006.

Week Eight: What is the difference in emphasis between the terms science fiction and speculative fiction? Which is the Man in the High Castle?

Speculative fiction is a term that covers all forms of science fiction. Many subgenres fit under the term speculative fiction in including alternative history, fantasy, horror, cyberpunk, dystopia and many more (Lost books, 2011). Although science fiction falls under speculative fiction it is usually based on science and technology of the future. If science fiction becomes too unrealistic is can cross over to another subgenre of speculative fiction called fantasy. Science fiction texts are frequently set in a different world such as space, or in the future (Read, write, think, 2005). Apart from only exploring science, technology and the future the speculative fiction genre has a wider boundary and looks at philosophy, language and history. I believe that The Man in the High Castle predominantly falls under speculative fictions specifically under the subgenre of alternative history, however it also has some forms of science fiction through using different worlds such as outer space. Philip K Dick uses alternative history throughout the novel The Man in the High Castle and questions what would have happened to the world of Japan and Germany had won the Second World War. Dick creates a different history and outcome of the world that we would live in if the war had been won by the opposite side. He also shows how it would be run and brings in forms of racism to show how different cultures feel about one another in the alternate history of the world.  Even though the book is mainly based on alternative history and speculative fiction, science fiction begins to appear when spaceships take over parts of the solar system in the story, the books moves into an outer space setting and elements of science fiction develop. I believe that The Man in the High Castle falls under speculative fiction as is it mainly based on an alternative history and science fiction only plays a small part in the book.

Lost Books. (2011). What is Speculative Fiction? Retrieved from http://www.lostbooks.org

Read, Write, Think. (2005). Definition of Science Fiction. Retrieved from

http://www.google.co.nz/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=5&ved=0CEcQFjAE&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.readwritethink.org%2Ffiles%2Fresources%2Flesson_images%2Flesson927%2FSciFiDefinition.pdf&ei=Be5XUMjVLIaOiAenloHYAw&usg=AFQjCNFpMZA-IjM2XQpHQtDJib52r8D60Q&sig2=e7sikgHNHWKCTYM0AuWxkw

Man in the High Castle

What is the difference in emphasis between the terms science fiction and speculative fiction? Which is in Man in the High Castle? 

Before reading the Man in the High Castle I had never heard of the term 'speculative fiction'. I had no idea what it meant or how it was different from science fiction. But while reading the book I did some research on what this kind of 'fiction' was all about.

Before doing some research I thought why do we need yet another genre description? I mean we already have science fiction, fantasy and horror and so on. But I found that speculative fiction can encompass literature ranging from hard science to epic fantasy. It can demonstrate a whole range of different genres while keeping the storyline strange and intense. And it can also introduce alternate history. Which is main plot in Man in the High Castle.

I believe Man in the High Castle is speculative fiction because it takes a different path from usual science fiction. The story is set in an alternate history world, where Nazi Germany and Japan win WW2.

Man in the High Castle represents a rare theme where there is a 'story with a story'. The novel within the book is The Grasshopper Lies Heavy by Hawthorn Abensden. The book within a book shows an alternative universe where the Axis lost WW2 to the allies, following a sequence of events. By having two false realities the idea of false and true reality becomes inaccurate, because more than two realities exist. 

Even though Man in the High Castle is speculative fiction both genres are capable of pushing the boundaries of our imaginations. Both genres often borrow inspiration of real-life events or experiences.

References:
Dick, P. K. (2001; 1962) The Man in the High Castle. London: Penguin
N.A. The Man in the High Castle Themes. Retrieved from http://www.bookrags.com