The SF Signal Podcast (Episode 009) – Sex in Science Fiction + Interview with Brent Weeks

In the ninth episode of the SF Signal Podcast, Patrick Hester is joined by Jeff Patterson, Matthew Sanborn Smith, Jay Garmon and John DeNardo to discuss:
What is the role of sex in science fiction?
Authors Philip José Farmer, Robert Heinlein and Ursula K. Le Guin, to name just a few, have all had sex and sexuality in their stories in one way or another. Science fiction and fantasy is full of examples of blurred gender roles, cross-species sex, virtual sex – are these legitimate points to move the story forward or are they simply there to sensationalize the prose? What are some examples of sex in science fiction that, good or bad, still stick in your mind? What are some examples where you felt it was completely out of place?
Later, Patrick Hester sits down to chat with New York Times bestselling author Brent Weeks. His Night Angel Trilogy consists of The Way of Shadows, Shadow’s Edge and Beyond the Shadows. His new series, Lightbringer, has launched with the new novel: The Black Prism.
Links:
- Jeff Patterson
- Matthew Sanborn Smith
- Jay Garmon
- Philip Jose Farmer
- Robert Heinlein
- Ursula K. Le Guin
- Brent Weeks:
- Podcast features original music by John Anealio.
Great conversation, guys. I’m sorry that I couldn’t take part as originally planned. I’m posing this same question over at the SFR Brigade shortly to keep the conversation going.
A couple thoughts I had while listening to the show:
I’ll post a link shortly once I get the SFR Brigade article written. Great show!
Here’s the link to the SFR Brigade post on the same topic.
Interesting topic. Too bad there were no women on the panel. Maybe that could be remedied in a future episode. Samuel R. Delany would be a good guest for this. A list of all the books mentioned in the show would be nice. People need to get over their sex hangups in America. Laurell K. Hamilton says America thinks her books have too much sex, and Europe thinks they have too much violence. I’ve learned to ignore book covers completely.
Great show. Very interesting topic that could be expanded upon in a longer format and could also bring in some more people to get a larger spectrium of responses. The interview with Brent Weeks was fun as well. Keep up the great work guys.
Great podcast, and I’d like to contribute my own two cents.
First, what Lisa Paitz Spindler said.
Re: SF films with gratuitous sex scenes: I’d argue that not only the sex scenes but the *romance* in some of those films are gratuitous and meant to draw in female viewers. Hollywood marketing at its self-serving best. Being female myself, when it’s gratuitous it grates on my nerves, but when it’s not, I’m all for including it because I love a good romance/hot sex scene with my SF.
Speaking of, I’m hoping that the upcoming film “The Adjustment Bureau” (which is being advertised as “science fiction romance”) will demonstrate how love scenes can be integrated into an SF film without feeling gratuitous.
Regarding sex in SF targeting a specific demograhic:
Despite the gratuitous/mechanical sex scenes, was/is sex a possible SF code for “romance” or “relationship”, at least in some stories? Perhaps a way to acknowledge that sex exists in the context of a relationship, and particularly in a romantic one? I’m having a difficult time imagining a discussion of sex in SF without addressing the relationship aspect. I think the two go hand in hand.
Further regarding demographics, lots of early Spock fan fiction was Spock-in-love stories. These stories were written by women (but not necessarily *just* for women) and they fed the desire for SF-romance hybrids that mainstream SF didn’t, er, satisfy. Given the underground nature and size of the audience for such fan fiction, I’m also wondering how successfully sex in SF was targeting anybody, least of all female fans of SF.
Luckily, today we have subgenres like science fiction romance that targets readers who enjoy blends of SF and romance, of varying heat level–even if publishers don’t call it that.
I agree with the panelist that discussed Tanith Lee’s SILVER METAL LOVER. The political and romance elements in that story were well integrated.
Regarding gender of protagonist: I think that done well, readers will relate to the sexual experiences of either gender (although reader subjectivity ultimately plays the final role).
As a romance and an SF reader, my experience is that in subgenres like science fiction romance, both the hero and the heroine are the protags. With dual POV so prevalent in this subgenre, readers can engage with the character arcs of both, as well as the romance/sex experiences of both. A win-win if you ask me.
Lisa – great stuff, all valid points. Wish you could’ve joined us but I understand – family comes first! 🙂
Tam – yeah, we had several of the female contributors set to be on but then various real life things stepped in to squash our plans. See Lisa’s comment above for her take on the subject.
8Bitdad – Scott!!! Nice to see you over here on sfsignal! I really enjoyed the interview with Brent and I’m glad you did too – he’s an awesome guy.
This is an interesting topic and I’m sure this isn’t the end. Even if we don’t revisit it on the podcast, a mind meld or something would be fantastic. *looks at JohnD*
Heather – wow, excellent comment. I think that scifi is constantly evolving. Where it used to be that the publishers were marketing to guys or young guys, I think now the readership is very diverse and they recognize that, they market for that and it’s a good thing – hell, it’s a great thing.
~P
@atfmb
About skype breaking up after an hour, it’s a certain chip in usb headphones. It happens on TWIT all the time.
Tam – interesting! of course, I don’t use USB headphones… 🙂
It’s always been that way though. In the early days of just me & John A recording, we’d have tons of Skype issues – 99% of those were solved when I ran Cat5 instead of WiFi. I know Skype does some strange caching in the way it handles VoIP and, add to that the fact that I am running the Mac verion, which doesn’t get a lot of love from dev and you just get weird things, me thinks.
~P
@atfmb
Gentlemen,
I’ve been following your show for the past two months and have been inspired by what you set out to do. This episode, however, was lacking if not down right insulting.
One: you absolutely needed at least one female for some semblance of balance if not better dynamics.
Two: consider having a gay or lesbian SF author next time you talk about gay SF sex unless your goal is to alienate gay SF listeners.
Really… was the Brokeback Mountain joke necessary?
there was a Star Trek: Enterprise Episode that used a third gender the cogenitor… and thats the name of the episode as well