西方思辨小说发展历程

Development of Speculative Fiction in Western Countries

思辨小说虽历史渊源深厚,却在20世纪下半叶焕发新生。很多思辨小说含有科幻元素,但更多关注社会和文化因素,其魅力在于将虚构的世界与现实紧密联系。纵观其发展历程,思辨小说的内涵经历了广义-狭义-广义的变化:思辨小说最先被用来统称一切虚构小说,但在20世纪六七十年代该术语特指"内空间"科幻小说,随着当代科幻小说、奇幻小说、恐怖小说等类型小说的边界不断模糊,难以清晰定义,思辨小说又被用来总称这些以描写"异世界"为特色的小说。正是由于思辨小说内涵的不断变化,才引起了围绕该术语的很多争议。文章梳理西方思辨小说的历史与现状、定义与存在问题等,并在此基础上区分"狭义思辨小说"和"广义思辨小说"。

Speculative fiction, a genre with profound history, embraces a completely new life in the second half of 20 th century. The charm of speculative fiction lies in its close association of the fictional world with the reality since many speculative fictions highlight social or cultural phenomenon rather than science and technology,which are the integral elements of science fiction. Throughout its development, the connotation of speculative fiction experienced dramatic change. Originally, the term speculative fiction was used in reference to all fictional novels but in 1960 s and 1970 s, the term specifically referred to science fictions focusing on "inner space", then currently, for the boundary blurring of genres such as science fiction, fantasy and horror, the term develops into a super category that houses all non-mimetic genres characterized by the depiction of "other world". Because constant changes of the connotation generates the perplexing ambiguity and controversy on speculative fiction, this paper reviews its origin and development, definitions and problems and then distinguishes two terms, namely, speculative fiction in broad and narrow sense.