{"id":1406,"date":"2011-08-01T12:20:24","date_gmt":"2011-08-01T12:20:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.mmcgrath.co.uk\/?p=1406"},"modified":"2014-06-26T23:47:32","modified_gmt":"2014-06-26T22:47:32","slug":"against-utopia-arthur-c-clarke-and-the-heterotopian-impulse","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.mmcgrath.co.uk\/?p=1406","title":{"rendered":"AGAINST UTOPIA: ARTHUR C CLARKE AND THE HETEROTOPIAN IMPULSE"},"content":{"rendered":"

ABSTRACT<\/em>
\nIn this essay I briefly set out the Marxist theories of utopianism espoused by the influential German philosopher Ernst Bloch and contrast the closing down of future possibilities inherent in Bloch’s notion of a realisable “concrete utopia” with the rejection of such perfected society by the SF writer Arthur C Clarke. In arguing that Clarke’s writing does not seek to provide the consolations of utopianism I offer an alternative source for the continued power of his visions of the future, drawing parallels between Clarke’s imaginary worlds and the of oases of possibilities that are identified by Michel Foucault as “heterotopian” spaces within our social structures.<\/p>\n

In The Principle of Hope<\/em>, Ernst Bloch charts \u201cthe steady and often imperceptible tending of human history towards utopia\u201d[i]<\/a> in a journey that encompasses daydreaming, culture, religion, philosophy and politics. Bloch\u2019s work identifies both how the unrealized dreams of the past and the unfulfilled potentials of the here-and-now create a utopian impulse that drives the urge to build a better future. He sees in the \u201cwishful images of the fulfilled moment\u201d hope for consolation and fleeting glimpses of emancipation for those who are restrained by their existing social, economic and cultural conditions.<\/p>\n

In relation to science fiction, Bloch\u2019s work has been the source of a potent strain of literary analysis.[ii]<\/a> It is from Bloch that Darko Suvin refined the idea of the Novum<\/em> as providing \u201cthe overriding narrative logic\u201d[iii]<\/a> in science fiction. Bloch\u2019s utopian impulse is the origin of that \u201cdesire called utopia\u201d[iv]<\/a> in Frederic Jameson\u2019s work and Bloch\u2019s idea of \u201cideological surplus\u201d \u2013 the potential that artefacts contain to transcend the ideology of the era in which they are constructed \u2013 provides a starting point for some of Jameson\u2019s work in cultural studies. It is Bloch\u2019s assertion that even \u201ca cultural product whose social function is that of distracting us can only realize that aim by fastening and harnessing our attention and our imagination in some positive way\u201d[v]<\/a> that Jameson adopts as the basis for a \u201cUtopian analysis<\/em> or method<\/em>\u201d[vi]<\/a> that challenges the common Marxist assumption that popular culture is straightforwardly a means of infecting the masses with the ideology of the dominant class. Tom Moylan, introducing a collection of essays on Bloch\u2019s legacy, recognises that his own study of utopianism and science fiction has consistently returned \u201cto Bloch\u2019s insistence on a utopian standpoint, a utopian epistemology\u201d[vii]<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Bloch\u2019s philosophy of hope has, therefore, important resonances for the literature of the fantastic more broadly and for science fiction in particular. Taken as a whole, Bloch\u2019s work might be seen to provide a coherent and robust explanation of the continuing psychological and social appeal of fictions that look beyond the boundaries of the now and imagine better futures.<\/p>\n

If we place this philosophical approach alongside the work of Arthur C Clarke, it is possible to see clear areas of common ground. Clarke could have enthusiastically endorsed Bloch\u2019s conviction that it is only when humanity looks up from the present to imagine the future that we can begin the process of creating a better world. The two shared a similar faith in progress and the potential for the improvement in the human condition. There is, in the work of both writers, a recurring sense of the value of the mystical and an invocation of the sacred. Moylan, who has written widely on science fiction, utopias and dystopias, might as easily be talking about Clarke when he summarises Bloch\u2019s view that:<\/p>\n

\u201cPresent time is provincial and empty. If humanity becomes too much taken with the present, we lose the possibility of imagining a radically other future. We lose the ability to hope. We lose what Bloch identifies as the Novum<\/em>: the unexpectedly new, that which pushes humanity out of the present toward the not yet realized future\u201d[viii]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

And Bloch would have found little to argue with in Clarke\u2019s sentiment:<\/p>\n

\u201cBy mapping out possible futures, as well as a good many improbable ones, the science fiction writer does a great service to the community. He encourages in his readers flexibility of mind, readiness to accept and even welcome change\u201d[ix]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

But Clarke and Bloch would have disagreed about the merits of utopia. For all the value of Bloch\u2019s work it is his attachment to an achievable, desirable utopia that reveals the great weakness in his analysis.[x]<\/a> Bloch seems unable to imagine a desire for things to be better that does not ultimately lead to Heimat<\/em> (the home-land) in which all human potential is realised and Marx\u2019s dreams are made real. Bloch\u2019s work contains an ongoing struggle between his belief that history has a goal \u2013 a final moment of homecoming <\/em>to a Marxist utopia \u2013 and his desire not to close off the future. Bloch, as Vincent Geoghegan concedes in his largely sympathetic study of the philosopher\u2019s life and work, is not always successful in escaping authoritarian utopianism, the desire to \u201cdiscipline\u201d the utopian impulse in order to serve a political agenda:<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u201c…he cannot resist draping his own speculations in the purple of objectivity. Bloch seems to be quite clear as to what the broad outlines of his concrete utopia will be, and is quite prepared to use this vision as an \u2018objective\u2019 critique of mere \u2018subjective\u2019 visions. The openness of Bloch\u2019s sensitive portrayal of human dreaming thus narrows into a one-way street.\u201d[xi]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

At the end of this \u201cone-way street\u201d what becomes of the dreams that Bloch identifies as the fundamental force behind the utopian impulse? Such dreaming wouldn\u2019t be treasonous (as it was under Stalin) or even superfluous \u2013 it would be impossible. In a utopia that meets all human needs and allows everyone to realise their potential, what is there to dream about? The fundamental force driving Bloch\u2019s vision of a better future evaporates and the sterile stability of a \u201cconcrete utopia\u201d becomes inevitable. Humanity must abandon the future to live in the perfected present.<\/p>\n

It is this sterility that Clarke found repellent. Clarke, through his science fiction novels, sought to construct an idea of better societies and an improvement of the human condition – seeing us become better as a species, casting off old prejudices, coming closer to achieving our full potentials – while, at the same time, specifically rejecting utopia as a dead end.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

CLARKE AND UTOPIA<\/strong><\/p>\n

Across the wide body of Clarke\u2019s fiction, his use of utopian (or dystopian) tropes is rare. However, where they do appear, Clarke\u2019s critique of utopianism is unwavering. In three key novels \u2013 The City and The Stars<\/em> (TCATS<\/em>), The Songs of Distant Earth<\/em> (TSODE<\/em>) and 3001: The Final Odyssey<\/em> \u2013 Clarke places his characters in societies that, by most definitions, would be classed as utopian.\u00a0 Though published some forty years apart these novels share a number of key features and display a remarkable thematic consistency[xii]<\/a>.<\/p>\n

In all three novels, humans have built stable, safe societies in which all their immediate physical, social and psychological needs have been met.\u00a0 Conflicts created by sexual jealousy, racial, tribal or national identity, religion and ideology have been left behind. These are humane and rational places in which each person is able to contribute (or not) based on their ability and interests. Their institutions are built around an idealised form of the American constitution \u2013 in TSODE<\/em> Thalassans live under the \u201cJefferson Mark 3 Constitution \u2013 someone once called it utopia in two megabytes\u201d[xiii]<\/a> which by 3001<\/em> has been refined so that the utopian society operates under a \u201cDemosocracy, frequently defined as ‘individual greed, moderated by an efficient but not too zealous government’.\u201d[xiv]<\/a><\/p>\n

And yet for all the thought Clarke has obviously devoted to the design of these \u201cperfect\u201d societies \u2013 and for all that they are the logical extension of his own humane rationalism \u2013 it is clear that they do not appeal to him.<\/p>\n

In the city of Diaspar, on the spaceship Magellan and in Africa Tower the inhabitants have access machines that can control, more-or-less, every aspect of their environment, but understanding of how that technology works is fading away. Physical comfort, unlimited entertainment and reliance on technology are eroding humanity\u2019s curiosity and spirit of adventure.\u00a0 In each case Clarke has male characters who find this stagnation intolerable. This is most obvious in TCATS<\/em>, where Alvin\u2019s discontent drives him out of the confines of Diaspar and overthrows an aeons-long status quo. In TSODE<\/em> the discontented mutineers, led by Owen Fletcher, attempt a doomed revolt but even the loyal Lieutenant Commander Loren Lorenson finds himself tempted by Thalassan charms. In 3001<\/em> the resurrected Frank Poole seeks out the wilder frontiers of the solar system, relishing the \u201cchallenge \u2013 a sense of purpose, if you like \u2013 that I seldom found on Earth\u201d[xv]<\/a><\/p>\n

In both TCATS<\/em> and TSODE<\/em> technological utopias interact with agrarian utopias in which humans live close to nature and within the limits of ecological systems (the villages of Lys or the island community of Thalassa). Lys is stable and relaxed and its people have developed impressive mental powers, but their caution and fear of the outside world makes them as sterile as Diaspar. That Thalassa has stagnated, producing little great art, standing outside history, is obvious and it is brought into even sharper relief in \u201cThe Songs of Distant Earth\u201d[xvi]<\/a> (on which the later novel is based), which ends with a melancholy Lora watching the starship Magellan<\/em> disappear from Thalassa\u2019s sky and pondering the contrast between the arduous but ultimately glorious destiny awaiting the ship\u2019s crew and settlers and her own people\u2019s pleasant, comfortable but essentially empty future. The final chapters of TSODE<\/em> reveal another potential weakness of agrarian utopias. Where resources are limited there remains an inherent potential for conflict. So, in TSODE<\/em>, the Thalassan people destroy a fledgling alien civilisation to protect their own interests. Neither Lys nor Thalassa possess societies robust enough to cope with dramatic change nor capable of great deeds. They have both settled into a comfortable but pointless stasis.<\/p>\n

Some of Clarke\u2019s short stories can also offer a revealing insight into his attitude towards utopia. In \u201cNemesis\u201d Clarke creates a future where humanity is wise and has lived in peace and prosperity for aeons. Yet, even here, Clarke can\u2019t imagine that dissatisfaction will entirely disappear or that the human urge for new knowledge and new frontiers won\u2019t reassert itself. In \u201cThe Lion of Commarre\u201d humanity has advanced to a point where: \u201cEverything had been discovered. One by one all the great dreams of the past had become reality\u201d[xvii]<\/a> but the city which is the site of their great triumph has become a trap that humanity must escape.<\/p>\n

Clarke\u2019s fiction is driven by his faith in human progress \u2013 both social and technical \u2013 but Clarke repeatedly balks at the idea that such progress might create a perfect society. Where he follows his own ideas to their logical conclusion he comes to the realisation that such societies would be fundamentally flawed. For Clarke, humanity needs to be constantly striving to go further \u2013 requiring the physical and mental demands of exploration and discovery \u2013 if it is to reach its full potential. Decadence is the ultimate threat to human progress. In analysing a number of Clarke\u2019s novels Robin Anne Reid concludes that Clarke is optimistic but:<\/p>\n

\u201cThis optimism is reserved for continuing development, not some final end, some perfect state that can be achieved through technology or any other means…\u00a0 Apparently, Clarke is not interested in the idea of a static perfection for humanity, as opposed to continued exploration and development.\u201d[xviii]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

But, if the Clarke\u2019s futures don\u2019t offer us the consolations of utopia, which Bloch insists are crucial to providing cultural artefacts with their appeal in a capitalist society, then what is the source of the continued power of his visions of the future?<\/p>\n

A BRIEF HETEROTOPOLOGY<\/strong><\/h3>\n

In The Order of Things<\/em>, French post-structuralist philosopher Michel Foucault introduced the concept of heterotopias. He begins by considering a passage from Borges\u2019 essay \u201cJohn Wilkins, Analytical Language\u201d in which the author sets out a wild taxonomy supposedly derived from a Chinese encyclopaedia. Foucault is much taken with the power of this brief essay, noting the<\/p>\n

\u201cdisconcerting effect of the proximity of extremes, or, quite simply with the vicinity of things that have no relation to each other; the mere act of enumeration that heaps them all together has a power of enchantment all its own.\u201d[xix]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Foucault is amused by this taxonomy but also disturbed. He describes how the incongruous disorder of this classification acts to make the every item heteroclite, dislocating them from their everyday position and making it impossible to \u201cdefine a common locus<\/em> beneath them all.\u201d From this starting point Foucault goes on to define the idea of a heterotopia,<\/em> which Merlin Coverley describes in his introduction to the idea of Utopia as his \u201cplace outside or between the categories of the physical or mental whose otherness challenges our everyday understanding of time and place.\u201d[xx]<\/a><\/p>\n

Foucault returned to the idea of heterotopias in a short article, \u201cOf Other Spaces\u201d, in which he contrasts heterotopias with utopias. Utopias are sites with no real place, they \u201cpresent society itself in a perfected form, or else society turned upside down, but in any case these utopias are fundamentally unreal spaces\u201d[xxi]<\/a> whereas heterotopias are fundamentally real spaces that bring together elements of a society in a way that upsets our expectations or makes us question their interrelationship. Foucault then outlines the form of a number of different types of heterotopias; for the purposes of this article the most interesting are:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. \u201cCrisis heterotopias\u201d are created by the earliest forms of society. They are sacred spaces created to house individuals in moments of \u201ccrisis\u201d \u2013 adolescents, menstruating women, pregnant women, the elderly \u2013 but in modern society they are gradually replaced by \u201cheterotopias of deviation\u201d (prisons, psychiatric hospitals, rest homes for the elderly) where we place people whose behaviour does not conform to the societal norm.<\/li>\n
  2. Heterotopias capable of \u201cjuxtaposing in a single real space several spaces, several sites that are themselves incompatible.\u201d [xxii]<\/a> Cinemas and theatres bring together unrelated spaces in a single room but the oldest form of this heterotopia is the garden. \u201cThe traditional garden of the Persians was a sacred space that was supposed to bring together inside its rectangle four parts representing the four parts of the world, with… The garden is the smallest parcel of the world and then it is the totality of the world.\u201d[xxiii]<\/a><\/li>\n
  3. There are heterotopias of \u201cindefinitely accumulating time\u201d such as museums and libraries, which express the \u201cwill to enclose in one space all times, all epochs, all forms, all tastes, the idea of constituting a place of all times that is itself outside of time, and inaccessible to its ravages…\u201d[xxiv]<\/a><\/li>\n
  4. Finally, there are heterotopias that create \u201canother real space, as perfect, as meticulous, as well arranged as ours is messy, ill constructed, and jumbled.\u201d These heterotopias of order are illustrated by the attempts to create communities in the religiously-inspired colonies of the New World.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    In \u201cOf Other Spaces\u201d Foucault\u2019s heterotopology describes physical sites but, just as Foucault\u2019s idea of heterotopia has its genesis in the reading of Borges\u2019 strange taxonomy, so heterotopian elements can be found in other texts. And just as Borges\u2019 menagerie shocked, excited and disturbed Foucault, so these heterotopian elements can have a forceful impact on other readers.\u00a0 Clarke was no post-structuralist but, it is Foucault\u2019s idea of heterotopias (not Bloch\u2019s utopian impulse) that better describes the power of Clarke\u2019s work.<\/p>\n

     <\/p>\n

    CLARKE\u2019S HETEROTOPIAS<\/strong><\/h3>\n

    Clarke\u2019s work is often associated with a \u201csense of wonder\u201d \u2013 moments when, through his writing, Clarke appears to open up grand vistas and rearrange our sense of our place in the universe. This section explores how Clarke\u2019s heterotopian impulse<\/em> contributes to our sense of wonder.<\/p>\n

    Heterotopias of deviation<\/em>
    \nSamuel Delany\u2019s novel Triton<\/em> carries the subtitle \u201cAn Ambiguous Heterotopia\u201d. Delany deliberately engages with Foucault\u2019s theories to deconstruct what he has called the \u201cterribly limiting argument\u201d    [xxv]<\/a> of utopian and dystopian fiction. Delany creates a complex world but his heterotopia is primarily a space that gives freedom to alternative lifestyles. Triton is an anarchic space that allows individuals to express themselves and, in particular, their sexuality in a wide variety of forms without judgement. Clarke\u2019s fiction does not engage with the notion of heterotopia in the same conscious way. Nor is Clarke as aggressive in addressing the idea of sexual freedom as Delany. Yet Clarke\u2019s novels, especially his later novels, do expect that future societies will be more accepting of the full range of human sexuality. As Reid notes:<\/p>\n

    \u201cSuch relationships as group marriages and multiple marriages for people working in space occur regularly. Bisexuality is offered as a healthy norm, with any individual who is exclusively homo- or heterosexual being perceived as being a bit strange and in the minority.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

    Women tend to play minor roles in Clarke\u2019s novels[xxvi]<\/a> and male\/male relationships dominate. These relationships are not usually overtly sexual[xxvii]<\/a> \u00a0<\/em>but his male characters frequently have a history of having difficulty forming relationships with women.[xxviii]<\/a> Close male bonding is common[xxix]<\/a> but the relationships are usually asexual. A number of minor characters in Clarke\u2019s novels are involved in same sex relationships that are accepted with equanimity[xxx]<\/a> and Clarke presupposes the general acceptance of bisexuality as the orientation of \u201cnormal\u201d humans in future societies.<\/p>\n

    Clarke becomes more explicit in his expression of sexual freedom in his later novels, stating explicitly what was only hinted at in his earlier works. So TCATS<\/em>, first published in 1956, coyly contains references to discovering \u201call the possibilities\u201d of love[xxxi]<\/a> and the chaste relationship between Alvin and Hilvar while the plot of Imperial Earth<\/em>, published twenty years later, is driven by a relationship between two male characters that was, at least for a period, unambiguously sexual[xxxii]<\/a>. A decade later, in TSODE, Clarke has two male characters casually discussing what proportion of their character was \u201chetero\u201d and concluding that those who limited themselves to one gender of sexual partner were \u201cso rare that they were classed as pathological\u201d[xxxiii]<\/a>.<\/p>\n

    Clarke does not explore in detail the causes or consequences of sexual liberation in the way that Delany sets out to do in Triton<\/em>. Clarke assumes that prejudices around sexual orientation (and others such as racism and sexism) will fade away in the face of humanity\u2019s growing maturity. In a much quieter way than Delany, many of the worlds Clarke creates are also heterotopias of deviation.<\/p>\n

    Heterotopias of space<\/em>
    \nThe Persian gardens that symbolise Foucault\u2019s heterotopias of space enclose the entire world in miniature, placing the exotic next to the ordinary and combining physical reality with a mystical element.\u00a0 Clarke\u2019s writing encompasses the entire universe, juxtaposing humanity and the alien, and seeking to stir our sense of the sublime in a similar way. Artefacts like Rama    [xxxiv]<\/a> and the monolith place human protagonists next to objects that confuse our sense of perspective, remove us from the centre of our universe and stimulate those parts of the mind that respond to the arcane.<\/p>\n

    [Shortly after this essay was originally published I discovered that there is an Arabic proverb that describes a book as being “like a garden you carry in your pocket” – this seems particularly apt in this context.]<\/p>\n

    Clarke\u2019s aliens are often intrinsically unknowable, their motives, psychology and ambitions beyond the ability of the human mind to grasp, though that doesn\u2019t prevent Clarke\u2019s protagonists from trying. But even without the intervention of the alien or the understated shattering of the universe in a story like \u201cThe Nine Billion Names of God\u201d, Clarke is able to bring together the exotic and the human to confound our expectations. Sometimes the exotic is a fruit of humanity\u2019s labour \u2013 technology sufficiently advanced to appear magical \u2013 such as the space elevator or the city of Diaspar. Often, however, it is simply Clarke\u2019s inextinguishable pleasure in gathering together the marvels of the universe and presenting them to the reader. In 2010<\/em> Jupiter and its moons are every bit as mysterious and awe-inspiring as the great monolith that orbits with them. 2061<\/em> devotes as much time to the wonders of an excursion on Halley\u2019s Comet as it does to the mysterious events on Europa. In novels like The Deep Range<\/em> and The Ghost from The Grand Banks<\/em> the wonders are revealed beneath Earth\u2019s oceans. In The Ghost from The Grand Banks<\/em>, Ada, a ten-year-old girl, quotes Einstein:<\/p>\n

    \u201cThe most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand wrapt in awe is as good as dead.\u201d[xxxv]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

    Clarke\u2019s heterotopias of space are gardens sown with the mysterious and the mystical. His books provide a space where the mundane and the inexplicable are brought together to force the reader to consider their relationships with that which they have taken for granted. In a universe that is vast, cold and forensically indifferent to creatures as insignificant as humanity, Clarke is still able to fill his works with beauty, wonder and even hope.<\/p>\n

     <\/p>\n

    Heterotopias of time<\/em>
    \nThe Scottish Enlightenment mathematician John Playfair, contemplating the implications of the then-new science of geology, said: \u201cthe mind seemed to grow giddy by looking so far into the abyss of time.\u201d    [xxxvi]<\/a> Arthur C Clarke frequently uses the technique of referencing deep time<\/em> to create the same sense of giddiness in his readers. Clarke\u2019s heterotopias of time gather together far more than the mere epochs of human history imagined in Foucault\u2019s museums, his works can encompass the whole lifespan of the universe.<\/p>\n

    The most famous example of Clarke\u2019s use of deep time does not appear in any of his books but in the film 2001: A Space Odyssey<\/em>, co-written with Stanley Kubrick. When the proto-human warrior\u2019s bone club is tossed into the air and we switch, jarringly, to the gently rotating space station, all human history is swept up in an instant. This image may owe more to Kubrick than to Clarke, but it encapsulates a theme that runs through Clarke\u2019s work. In \u201cThe Sentinel\u201d, the short story that provided some of the inspiration for 2001<\/em>, the geologist narrator contemplates the vast age of the moon\u2019s \u201clost oceans\u201d as his party travel towards the site of an alien artefact. In \u201cNemesis\u201d the passage of vast aeons of time are described as mankind fades from the planet Earth and in \u201cTranscience\u201d and \u201cThe Possessed\u201d the evolution of all life on Earth is compressed into a few thousand words. In The Fountains of Paradise<\/em> Clarke plays with the distant past and the near future before placing them both in context in a far-future set epilogue that conflates them into a single moment. Other cities may have lasted millennia before time \u201cswept away even their names\u201d but Diaspar in TCATS <\/em>\u201cchallenged Eternity itself\u201d:<\/p>\n

    \u201cSince the city was built, the oceans of Earth had passed away and the desert had encompassed all the globe. The last mountains had been ground to dust by the winds and the rain, and the world was too weary to bring forth more… they had lived in the same city, had walked the same miraculously unchanging streets, while more than a thousand million years had worn away.\u201d[xxxvii]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

    Clarke\u2019s writing brings together the human and the near eternal but he is not just contrasting our own brief moments of consciousness against a background so deep that it can barely be conceived. Clarke\u2019s heterotopias of time may leave us teetering on the brink of that bleak abyss but his faith in the ingenuity of the human species and in the eventual triumph of our better natures can transform giddy fear into a sense of elation.<\/p>\n

    Heterotopias of order<\/em>
    \nMost of Clarke\u2019s writing was done during the period between the Second World War and the fall of the Berlin Wall. While many of his contemporaries \u2013 not just science fiction writers \u2013 were imagining futures that demonised the \u201cother\u201d and entrenched contemporary divisions, Clarke was imagining worlds where humanity had cast off the burdens of past prejudices. In Clarke\u2019s writing, the full blossoming of Enlightenment reason brings societies that are wealthy, wise and free from the frustrations and jealousies that have prevented us from achieving our full potential. As mentioned, Clarke imagines worlds where ancient tensions caused by sex, race, nation and ideology have been dissipated but he devotes particular attention to the passing of religion.<\/p>\n

    In a number of Clarke\u2019s works religions play an active role in blocking progress or threatening the future of humanity.[xxxviii]<\/a> More common, however, is the general assumption that the messy and illogical demands of religion have prevented humanity from reaching its full potential.\u00a0 In TSODE<\/em> Moses Kaldor muses on the humane and rational society the Thalassans have built \u201cfree from the threat of supernatural restraints\u201d and notes:<\/p>\n

    \u201cThe Thalassans were never poisoned by the decay products of dead religions, and in seven hundred years no prophet has arisen here to preach a new faith. The very word ‘God’ has almost vanished from their language, and they’re quite surprised – or amused – when we happen to use it.\u201d[xxxix]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

    In 3001<\/em> all religions have been discredited, \u201cGod\u201d is literally a dirty word and Clarke embarks on a number of withering attacks on the barbarities conducted under the rubric of religion. One of his most famous short stories, \u201cThe Star\u201d, deals with the moment of crisis for a Jesuit scientist who discovers that the bright star that heralded the birth of Jesus was the death-knell for a complex and advanced civilisation.<\/p>\n

    Clarke\u2019s heterotopias of order force us to confront the mess and jumble of our existing beliefs but offer the compensation that redemption is possible. Like the Jesuit \u201cIndian reductions\u201d in Brazil and Paraguay, the Quaker communities in Pennsylvania\u00a0 and the Puritan commonwealths of New England, Clarke\u2019s books seek to show that a better world awaits if we follow the right path to a state of grace. The fundamental difference, of course, is that Clarke rejects faith in god and inserts a faith in human reason.<\/p>\n

     <\/p>\n

    CONCLUSION<\/strong><\/h3>\n

    Foucault, like Clarke, dismisses the notion that grand programmes of change can deliver perfected societies. But this rejection of concrete utopia does not imply that either author has given up on the possibility of change \u2013 or even that they believe that society cannot be made better. Both would share Foucault\u2019s belief that specific change can be achieved to improve society while still rejecting the idea of concrete utopias that might spring from wholesale, programmatic, revolutions.<\/p>\n

    \u201cI prefer the very specific transformations that have proved to be possible in the last twenty years in a certain number of areas that concern our ways of being and thinking, relations to authority, relations between the sexes, the way in which we perceive insanity or illness; I prefer even these partial transformations that have been made… to the programs for a new man that the worst political systems have repeated throughout the twentieth century.\u201d[xl]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

    Clarke remains an optimist \u2013 far more confident than Foucault that humanity will reach \u201cmature adulthood\u201d and certainly more convinced of the ability of science and reason to lead us to that maturity. While Foucault recoils from the notion of progress, Clarke\u2019s faith remained unshaken. His fiction, in setting out a vision of scientific and social advance, creates within its pages a series of walled gardens in which we can experience recognisable elements of our own society made unfamiliar by being set against the exotic and the strange.<\/p>\n

    Clarke\u2019s construction of heterotopias of deviation, of space, of time and of order, disturbs our sense of certainty, it destroys syntax \u201cand not only the syntax with which we construct sentences but also that less apparent syntax which causes words and things (next to and also opposite one another) to hold together.\u201d[xli]<\/a> When those things that we took for granted always held together suddenly fly apart we are exposed to the previously unknown or the fundamentally unknowable. Language, the tool we use to interpret and make sense of our universe, fails us, the categories we construct to understand our environment become obsolete and intimate structures of belief are shattered. Thus we are left with that most characteristic reaction to Clarke\u2019s work \u2013 a \u201csense of wonder\u201d in which we find ourselves momentarily adrift, made giddy and inarticulate, forced to reconceptualise relationships that we previously considered fixed, reliable and permanent. It is the moment when we hover above an abyss of space and time and see the universe, rearranged, below.<\/p>\n

    CITED WORKS<\/strong><\/h3>\n

    Clarke novels<\/strong>
    \n2001: A Space Odyssey <\/em>(1968). New American Library, New York.
    \n2010: Odyssey Two <\/em>(1982). Granada Publishing Ltd, St Albans.
    \n2061: Odyssey Three <\/em>(1988). Grafton Books, London.
    \n3001: The Final Odyssey<\/em> (1997). Voyager, London.
    \nChildhood\u2019s End <\/em>(1953). Ballantine Books, New York.
    \nImperial Earth <\/em>(1975). Gollancz, London.
    \nRendezvous with Rama <\/em>(1973). Gollancz, London.
    \nThe City and The Stars <\/em>(2001). Gollancz, London. (First published 1956)
    \nThe Fountains of Paradise <\/em>(1979). Gollancz, London.
    \nThe Ghost from The Grand Banks <\/em>(1990). Gollancz, London.
    \nThe Hammer of the Gods <\/em>(1993). Gollancz, London.
    \nThe Sands of Mars<\/em> in The Space Trilogy <\/em>(2001). Gollancz, London. (First published 1951)
    \nThe Songs of Distant Earth <\/em>(1986). Grafton Books, London.<\/p>\n

    With Gentry Lee<\/strong>
    \nCradle <\/em>(1988). Warner Books, New York.
    \nThe Garden of Rama<\/em>, (1991). Gollancz, London.<\/p>\n

    Short Stories<\/strong>
    \nArthur C. Clarke: The Collected Short<\/em> Stories (2000). Gollancz, London.<\/p>\n

    \u201cNemesis\u201d (1950) pp. 191-202
    \n\u201cThe Lion of Commarre\u201d (1949) pp. 119-154
    \n\u201cThe Nine Billion Names of God\u201d (1953) pp. 417-422
    \n\u201cThe Possessed\u201d (1953) pp. 423-427
    \n\u201cThe Sentinel\u201d (1951) pp. 301-308
    \n\u201cThe Songs of Distant Earth\u201d (1958) pp. 664-686
    \n\u201cThe Star\u201d (1955) pp. 517-521<\/p>\n

    \u201cAgainst the Fall of Night\u201d (1948), Startling Stories<\/em> (November, 1948).<\/p>\n

    Other works<\/strong>
    \nBloch, E. (1986). The Principles of Hope<\/em>. Blackwell, Oxford.
    \nBorges, J.L. (1999). \u201cJohn Wilkins, Analytical Language,\u201d The Total Library: Non Fiction 1922-1986, <\/em>Penguin, London, pp. 229-232.
    \nCoverley, M. (2010). Utopia<\/em>, Pocket Essentials, London.
    \nDelany, S.R. (1996). Trouble on Triton: An Ambiguous Heterotopia<\/em>, Wesleyan University Press, Middletown, CT.
    \nDaniel, J.O. & Moylan, T. (eds) (1997). Why Not: Reconsidering Ernst Bloch<\/em>, Verso, London.
    \nFoucault, M. (1984). \u201cWhat is Enlightenment\u201d, The Foucault Reader<\/em>, Penguin, London, pp. 32-50
    \nFoucault, M. (1986) \u201cOf Other Spaces\u201d, Diacritics<\/em>, Vol. 16 No. 1 (Spring, 1986), pp. 22-27.
    \nFoucault, M. (2002). The Order of Things<\/em>, Routledge, London.
    \nGeoghegan, V. (1996). Ernst Bloch<\/em>, Routledge, London.
    \nJameson, F. (2005) Archaeologies of the Future: A Desire Called Utopia and Other Science Fictions<\/em>, Verso, London.
    \nJameson, F. (2004) \u201cMarxism and Utopian Thought\u201d, The Jameson Reader<\/em>, Blackwell Publishing, Oxford.
    \nMoylan, T. (1986). Demand the Impossible: Science Fiction and the Utopian Imagination<\/em>, Methuen, New York.
    \nReid, R.A. (1997). Arthur C. Clarke: A Critical Companion<\/em>, Greenwood Press, West Port, CT.
    \nSuvin, D. (1979). Metamorphoses of Science Fiction<\/em>, Yale University Press, New Haven.<\/p>\n


    <\/p>\n
    \n
    \n

    [i]<\/a> Moylan, 1986, p. 20
    \n[ii]<\/a> Though science fiction is one of the few elements of popular culture that Bloch never engaged with, he was dismissive of all \u201cpurely technological utopias\u201d.
    \n[iii]<\/a> Suvin, 1979, p. 70
    \n[iv]<\/a> Jameson, 2005
    \n[v]<\/a> Jameson, 2004, p.366
    \n[vi]<\/a> Jameson, 2004, p. 364
    \n[vii]<\/a> Daniel & Moylan, 1997, p. viii
    \n[viii]<\/a> Moylan, 1986, p. 22
    \n[ix]<\/a> Clarke, 2000, p. x
    \n[x]<\/a> Bloch\u2019s belief in the notion of an actual, realisable, utopia did more than lead his philosophical theories astray \u2013 it made him an enthusiastic advocate for Stalin and Stalinism from the 1930s to the 1950s. While his philosophical writing never wholly abandoned the libertarian, utopian, Hegelian-Marx-inspired socialist thread that runs through his whole work, his support for the Soviet regime through the worst of the purges does him little credit.\u00a0 The politest thing one can say about this period in Bloch\u2019s life is that his politics and philosophy fell out of sync \u2013 he was hardly alone in embracing Stalin when faced with the reality of the rise of fascism but his allegiance continued for longer than others in the face of evidence of the system\u2019s cruelty. One reason for this must be his attachment to the idea of utopia as an actual, realisable goal for which horrific acts could be justified as a price worth paying. When he did, finally, recant his Stalinist beliefs, he paid a high price. He was forced into retirement in 1957 by the East German regime and felt the full force of the state\u2019s disapproval before finding himself on the Western side of Berlin when the wall went up in 1961 and deciding to stay there. He would go on to become a fierce left-wing critic of the failures of the Eastern European dictatorships.
    \n[xi]<\/a> Geoghegan, 1996, p. 152
    \n[xii]<\/a> Since The City and The Stars<\/em> is based on the novella Against The Fall of Night,<\/em> first published in the November 1948 issue of Startling Stories,<\/em> the thematic consistency might be said to stretch across practically the whole of Clarke\u2019s career as a professional writer.
    \n[xiii]<\/a> Clarke, 1987, p. 71
    \n[xiv]<\/a> Clarke, 1997, p. 228. In the same passage Clarke dismisses Communism for its utopianism: \u201cIt was generally agreed that Communism was the most perfect form of government; unfortunately it had been demonstrated \u2013 at the cost of some hundreds of millions of lives \u2013 that it was only applicable to social insects, Robots Class II, and similar restricted families.\u201d \u201cDemosocracy\u201d is to be preferred for \u201cimperfect human beings\u201d.
    \n[xv]<\/a> Clarke 1997, p. 138
    \n[xvi]<\/a> Clarke, 2000, p. 664-686
    \n[xvii]<\/a> Clarke, 2000, p. 119
    \n[xviii]<\/a> Reid, 1997, p. 124
    \n[xix]<\/a> Foucault, 2002, p. xix
    \n[xx]<\/a> Coverley, 2010, p. 10
    \n[xxi]<\/a> Foucault, 1986, p. 24
    \n[xxii]<\/a> Foucault, 1986, p. 25
    \n[xxiii]<\/a> Foucault, 1986, p. 25-26
    \n[xxiv]<\/a> Foucault, 1986, p. 26
    \n[xxv]<\/a> Moylan, 1985, p. 158
    \n[xxvi]<\/a> There are major female viewpoint characters in the later novels in the Rama<\/em> series and Cradle<\/em>, which Clarke co-wrote with Gentry Lee and The Time Odyssey series co-written with Stephen Baxter. While women tend to be background characters, Clarke does often place them in positions of authority \u2013 such as Captain Orlova in 2010<\/em> and the sexually liberated Mayor Waldon in TSODE<\/em>.
    \n[xxvii]<\/a> Duncan\u2019s homosexual relationship with Karl in Imperial Earth<\/em> is a notable exception. Duncan is also black, a fact the novel doesn\u2019t mention until more than half way through.
    \n[xxviii]<\/a> Martin Gibson in The Sands of Mars<\/em>, Alvin in TCATS <\/em>and Heywood Floyd in 2010<\/em>\/2061,<\/em> for example.
    \n[xxix]<\/a> Loren and Kumar in TSODE<\/em>, Alvin and Hilvar in TCATS.<\/em>
    \n[xxx]<\/a> For example, George and Jerry, two minor characters in 2061<\/em>, are an open and happily married gay couple. In The Ghost From The Grand Banks <\/em>Evelyn, Donald\u2019s partner, leaves him for her nurse, Dolores. Clarke goes out of his way to have the doctor who breaks this news express his surprise that anyone would be shocked at such a relationship and dismiss objections to the free expression of the diversity of sexual drives as a \u201cPuritan aberration\u201d.
    \n[xxxi]<\/a> Clarke, 2001, p. 48
    \n[xxxii]<\/a> Clarke, 1975, p. 49
    \n[xxxiii]<\/a> Clarke, 1986, p. 148
    \n[xxxiv]<\/a> The great space-born oasis of Rama can itself be envisaged as a garden bringing together exotic flora and fauna from across the universe \u2013 the only Raman artefact that the crew return to Earth is a flower. Carefully tended green spaces are a minor but recurring theme in Clarke\u2019s works. The vast park at the heart of TCATS<\/em>\u2019s Diaspar, a vast garden in the Africa Tower in 3001<\/em>, Earth Park on Thalassa in TSODE<\/em> are just some examples. The exotic blooming of life in the depths of Europa\u2019s oceans in 2010 might also be placed in this category.
    \n[xxxv]<\/a> Clarke, 1990, p. 129
    \n[xxxvi]<\/a> Biographical Account of the Late Dr James Hutton, F.R.S. Edin.’ (read 1803), Transactions of the Royal Society of Edinburgh<\/em> (1805), 5, pp. 71-3
    \n[xxxvii]<\/a> Clarke, 2001, p.1
    \n[xxxviii]<\/a> Buddhist monks in The Fountains of Paradise<\/em> or \u201cChrislam\u201d fundamentalists in The Hammer of the Gods<\/em>, for example.
    \n[xxxix]<\/a> Clarke, 1987, p. 55
    \n[xl]<\/a> Foucault, 1984, pp. 46-47
    \n[xli]<\/a> Foucault, 2002, p. xix<\/p>\n

    This essay was originally published in Vector<\/em> 267.<\/h5>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    ABSTRACT In this essay I briefly set out the Marxist theories of utopianism espoused by the influential German philosopher Ernst Bloch and contrast the closing down of future possibilities inherent in Bloch’s notion of a realisable “concrete utopia” with the rejection of such perfected society by the SF writer Arthur C Clarke. In arguing that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[21],"tags":[57,56,46,58],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p27AP7-mG","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.mmcgrath.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1406"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.mmcgrath.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.mmcgrath.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.mmcgrath.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.mmcgrath.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1406"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"http:\/\/www.mmcgrath.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1406\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1436,"href":"http:\/\/www.mmcgrath.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1406\/revisions\/1436"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.mmcgrath.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1406"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.mmcgrath.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1406"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.mmcgrath.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1406"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}