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9. Technodemons of the Digital SelfMEPHISTOPHELES.I’ll show you arts and joys, I’ll give you moreThan any mortal eye has seen before.[…]FAUST. If I be quieted with a bed of ease,Then let that moment be the end of me![…]If to the fleeting hour I say‘Remain, so fair thou art, remain!’Then bind me with your fatal chain,For I will perish that day.– J.W. von Goethe, Faust I 1THE MAGIC OF MACHINESScience fiction (SF) has traditionally been connected with reason, technologicalinnovations and the scientific advancement of human civilisation. Insuch a role as an optimistic inheritor of the Enlightenment it is not immediatelyassociated with the tradition concerning demons. Yet, any reader whois familiar with the genre will know that the irrational – even demonic – hasits important share in the dynamism of this abundantly productive field.This chapter studies the tempting and anxious relationship men (humanityin general, but here also specifically the male characters) have had with machinesin science fiction, and the way “technodemons” eventually figure inthis relationship.Academic research of science fiction has often had problems with the“romantic” or irrational aspects of its subject; the genre is defined in such away that most published science fiction is excluded from the small group of“real” SF works. Darko Suvin’s pioneering theory is a typical example: accordingto him, “SF is distinguished by the narrative dominance or hegemonyof a fictional ‘novum’ (novelty, innovation) validated by cognitive logic.” 2 Furthermore,it isa literary genre whose necessary and sufficient conditions are the presence andinteraction of estrangement and cognition, and whose main formal device is1 Goethe 1808/1949, 86-87.2Suvin 1979, 63. Italics in the original.
206Demonic Texts and Textual Demonsan imaginative framework alternative to the author’s empirical environment[…]. 3Suvin aims to take SF seriously, and in doing so, he makes it an emphaticallycognitocentric genre, and positions “cognition” as something opposedto myth or metaphysical dimension. 4 The reality does not correspondto the definition, and so Suvin is forced to discard ninety percent of thegenre as “sheer confectionery” (as both intellectually and politically trivial). 5The weight put on the factual and intellectual aspects of science fiction hasplayed an important role in the self-definition of SF; claims of plausibility,scientific “thought-experiment” and extrapolation have figured in the writingsof proponents (the declarations by Hugo Gernsback and John W.Campbell, Jr., central “pulp” editors, are characteristic examples). 6 The needfor separating science fiction from its “other” – the irrational, dreamy “fantasies”with nothing but entertainment value – is obvious, even if in practicemany SF writers and readers deal continuously with fantasy as well as withscience fiction. Furthermore, it could be argued that a reading of SF thatdoes not take into account its symbolic and mythical dimensions is fundamentallyinadequate.The Faustian subtext is often very strong in science fiction; in his dealingswith forbidden knowledge, the typical SF innovator becomes a deeplyambivalent figure. The demonic connotations of scientific enterprise surfaceearly in the genre, and gain new forms and interpretations in “cyberpunk”and other contemporary SF. The commercial success of modern science fictionwas preceded by the popularity of two important predecessors, JulesVerne and H.G. Wells. Verne captured the imagination and fascination ofhis audience with the prospects of modern technology, whereas Wells developedsweeping visions of an (often threatening) future. Well’s War of theWorlds (1898) with its blood-sucking Martians provided a formula for numerouspopular SF stories. The monstrosity of space aliens became a given,the amount of self-awareness and self-reflection in this connection a variable.Already in 1956 film, Forbidden Planet (directed by Fred M. Wilcox)the terrors of outer space are produced by the human mind, as the “monstersfrom the id,” creations of subconscious mind and alien technology,start attacking the expedition. The majority of pulp SF had, nevertheless,more concrete and external sources for evil.Rosemary Jackson’s theory of progressive “internalisation” of fears asgenerated by self has its validity in science fiction as in fantasy. This processis not, however, a linear development; as seen above, in the context of horror,Blatty’s The Exorcist, among many others, resists the internalisation of3Ibid., 7-8. Italics in the original.4 Ibid., 4-7. To Suvin, the “real” SF is dismantling myths, and operating as a criticaland political analogy of the possibilities and threats inherent in a writer’s own time andsociety (ibid., 75-6).5 Ibid., 36.6See, e.g. Broderick 1995, 4-8.
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TAMPERE STUDIES INLITERATURE AND TE
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Tampere Studies in Literature and T
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ments, and also such further lines
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IllustrationsCover: “Possessed Re
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The BeginningsAnd Jesus asked him,
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The Beginnings 3mons form an import
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The Beginnings 5negative, demonic a
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The Beginnings 7chapter four), but
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The Beginnings 11that is produced o
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The Beginnings 13The History of the
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The Beginnings 15emphasised that su
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1. The Ancestry of the DemonicÑH.
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The Ancestry of the Demonic 37The f
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The Ancestry of the Demonic 43Chris
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The Ancestry of the Demonic 51tween
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2. The Demonic in the SelfBut ancie
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The Demonic in the Self 61A number
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The Demonic in the Self 67sciousnes
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The Demonic in the Self 69influence
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The Demonic in the Self 71LEADER:Yo
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The Demonic in the Self 73Particula
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The Demonic in the Self 75NIETZSCHE
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The Demonic in the Self 77ing into
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The Demonic in the Self 79Nietzsche
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3. Unravelling the Demonic TextThe
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PART II
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114Demonic Texts and Textual Demons
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The EpilogueIf there are answers to
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BibliographyA note on this bibliogr
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Index2001: A Space Odyssey; 207abje
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