Seen in TV Tropes entry for the New Wave

[james_davis_nicoll]

Joe Haldeman's The Forever War was a bizarre deconstruction of military SF, full of surreal imagery and borderline existentialism, inspired by the author's real-life experiences in the Vietnam war.

What book did they read? Not The Forever War.

Comments

[sean o'hara (from livejournal.com)]

I'm guessing they mean the novelizations of Robotech.

[mindstalk.livejournal.com]

A Cantata on Protoculture and the Triumph of Homosexuality

[sean o'hara (from livejournal.com)]

You're not that far off. The books are full of Dune-style epigrams at the start of every chapter, including feminist writers analyzing the social structures of the SDF-1, new age gurus babbling about the deeper cosmic meaning of protoculture, and war memoirs by various characters. The last are the most interesting because one of the authors (Brian Daley) was a Vietnam vet who snuck in some incisive commentary on the reality of war as opposed to how it's portrayed in fiction.

And then there are the passages where the writers demonstrate that they know the science makes no sense but try to justify it anyway (for instance, they spend several paragraphs handwaving how the water around Macross Island could freeze into a perfect hemisphere instead of boiling into the vacuum).

[mindstalk.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I read a bunch of them in a college bookstore in high school.

handwaving

Was there anything more than "a wizard Protoculture did it"?

[peterm99.livejournal.com]

I have to admit I've never really felt I understood what "existentialism" is, but if The Forever War counts then I'm even more clueless than I thought.

I might have to give them surreal, though. The spherical force field that's so high tech you can only use javelins and spears was cool but ridiculous. Not that the book was "full of" that sort of thing, granted.

[nelc.livejournal.com]

I think the someone may be unfamiliar with literary SF. The phrase "surreal imagery" sounds like something mainstream critics emit when they encounter the genre for the first time.

[bruce munro (from livejournal.com)]

Perhaps they were thinking of Lucius Shepard's Life During Wartime?

[philrm.livejournal.com]

That was my first reaction.

[ritaxis.livejournal.com]

While I don't see The Forever War like that, I can see where someone unfamiliar with certain common SF tropes might respond that way. Like if they came to it from a different genre altogether?

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

I don't know. The fight against the teddy bears who shoot bubbles that take the top of your head off? That's pretty surreal.

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

And the notion of an individual trapped in an insane world of which they have no control is definitely existentialist.

I can see it.

[poeticalpanther.livejournal.com]

+1 on this and "new to genre". Psychic teddy bears, no less.

I did enjoy the space combat sections, and the "life on Charon" sections. The future Earth where everyone is gay and all the men are therefore effeminate...*near-fatal eyeroll*