I was reading a post on an indie author
I must admit
that I haven't read enough sci-fi to
make a firm judgement on that statement, although I will agree that the
majority of protagonists in the books that I have read are white
males. Is this a reflection on the writers, the society they inhabit (or
inhabited as the majority of sci-fi I
read seems to be from before the 70's) or the publishers? I have no idea,
and it's too damn complicated to go into here.
Well, I'll go
into it a bit, and I'll start by looking at my own work.
Of the
sci-fi novels I have written (The Binary Man, The Real Thing and Just One
Day), all have had white male protagonists, although The Binary Man does
effectively have three main characters, with the other two being a woman (Alice
Howe) and Japanese by birth (Toshihiro Sato). Looking back on the story I can't
recall race ever coming up as anything other than a brief initial description
to add a bit of narrative juice (I chose Japan for his birthplace as I have
visited the country a few times so can describe it with more confidence than
most places, USA included), and Alice's gender only really came to the fore
during a couple of minor plot points with Yannick and Mickey, before becoming
irrelevant again. It was certainly never a hindrance, although she did
require the clichéd "saving" by Yannick (but then again everyone
did!). I must admit that my default protagonist always seems to be me before branching out (partly because so many of my ideas
come from dreams, where I'm me, natch).
I have never
considered race to be worth mentioning as a point of difference with regards to
characters, and if any of my sci-fi had taken place further into the future
then skin colour and
birthplace would have been irrelevant anyway. If someone is born on Ganymede would they really have
an issue with someone from a certain region of Earth? What if there were
generational changes to bodies based on the location of human colonies, such as
squat, hairy bodies from high gravity/low temperature worlds, or long gangly
hairless bodies from the opposite conditions? Would that cause issues over and
above other less drastic racial differences?
Are all races going to mix in the future
to create a single skin colour ? Maybe, or maybe not, but I would hope that in
the face of a six legged insectoid silicon-based millipede, they would consider
the human next to them as kin. My children are mixed race and trying to
pigeonhole them is pointless (they’re just wonderful people). They play with
kids of every culture and race with equal joy, and hopefully they will never
learn the idiocy of prejudice.
I hope I’m expressing the point I’m
trying to make well enough. Let me use an example: Red Dwarf had two black main
characters in Lister and Cat, and it was never mentioned, either positively or
negatively. Class was, and economic standing, and these are the things that
will most likely endure (as great a shame as that is, and despite Star Trek’s
moneyless wishing). Rimmer was born on Titan, which was mentioned, and Lister
was born in Liverpool, which was mentioned, but skin colour wasn’t. Craig Charles
(Lister) mentions this on the documentary accompanying the episode Dimension
Jump.
“It’s a top rated BBC sitcom where two
of its leading participants are of colour, and the colour of their skin is
never mentioned, race is never an issue. It kind of says that in the future,
where once we came from Africa one day we’ll come from everywhere. It’s all
just a melting pot, and race won’t be an issue in the future.”
I tend to write dystopia, but having no
racial issues is a utopian ideal that I happily put into my books.
With that in mind, I’d like to approach
the idea of a protagonist’s gender in the same way, which is why the
protagonist in my next sci-fi story is a woman. She is a woman, and this fact is irrelevant. Let me explain,
or try to.
The premise of the story is a human one
(I won’t go into more details as the plot is still in flux), not a gender
specific one, so it makes no difference to make the protagonist a woman. Why do
it then? It is most certainly not due to any notion of tokenism, but rather to
make me less lazy in my writing. The character was initially a male early
forties bodyguard with a beer gut, a colourful vocabulary and cybernetic eyes.
None of this needs to change if the protagonist is a woman, but it adds
something extra. It’s more interesting, and it’s less stereotypical from both
perspectives. I’ve always hated stick-thin big-boobed sex fantasy heroines as
much as square jawed ‘complicated’ heroes. How many heroines have you read with
a saggy belly? Why would a woman who had been trained for as long as a man be
any less capable of being a bodyguard? Ripley from Alien – come on now, she’s
mighty, and not a ‘weak-at-the-knees’ romantic sub plot in sight (apart from a
few glances between her and Hicks). Proof that going outside of the mould can
produce some great results.
So yeah, after all of that rambling I’m
no closer to knowing whether there truly is an issue or whether it is a trend,
or coincidence, but I’m going to mix it up for its own joy anyway.
Introducing Verna Walden, bodyguard and
badass, and heroine of (one of my) WIP. Enjoy!
PS – I know this is a contentious topic,
and comments are welcome. Please note that any flippancy is not malicious, and
I just love you all.
