Walter Grünzweig

Science-in-Fiction: Science as Tribal Culture

in the Novels of Carl Djerassi

I.

In 2002, the Innsbruck based Haymon Publishing House re-is­sued the German translations of the first two novels of Carl Djerassi’s Science-in-Fiction tetralogy under a new title, Stammesgeheimnisse (“Tribal Secrets”). This title was designed to generate new interest in Djerassi’s two most successful nov­els, Cantor’s Dilemma (1989; German translation 1991) and Bourbaki’s Gambit (1994; German 1993, one year before the original version in English), which had previously been pub­lished in German by another publisher.[1] But the title Stammesgeheimnisse also provides an interpretive insight into Carl Djerassi’s fictional inquiry into the cultures of modern sci­ence which he deals with in both his novels and his plays. In the preface to this new edition, he refers to scientists, especially those “at the harder edges of chemistry and physics,” as “mem­bers of a tribal culture, whose idiosyncratic ways of behavior are not only foreign to outsiders but frequently not even recognized by the members of the tribes themselves.”[2] This knowledge is transmitted from teacher to student in the course of a long, tra­ditional relationship likened by Djerassi to an “osmotic pro­cess.”

Like the many anthropologists who have dealt with tribal cultures in the past two centuries, Djerassi attempts an explora­tion of the “cultural practices” of this tribe which he terms eso­teric. The anthropological approach implied in his fictional pro­ceedings are rather traditional. To describe contemporary West­ern society, French sociologist Michel Maffesoli has defined a new kind of postmodern tribalism of small, very temporary communities, very unstable tribes, which human beings con­stantly enter and leave again.[3] Djerassi’s scientific tribe has little that is postmodern in this sense. At least at the outset it is her­metically sealed off and rather static, thereby resembling tradi­tional tribal definitions. In contradistinction to anthropological methods, however, his method of exploration is fictional and it is easy to see why. Djerassi was – and in many ways still is – a member of that tribe. Thus, given his own experience in this little known culture, he promises not only an analysis of tribal behavior, but also a revelation of its “secrets.” Unlike most an­thropologists and ethnographers, for whom a radical distance between their own biographical, social, familial, and educational contexts and their target cultures is a methodological must, he requires a medium which makes possible a heightened degree of self-reflexivity. Science-in-fiction, Djerassi claims, is autobiog­raphy,[4] and it is precisely the lack of self-reflexivity which he criticizes in natural scientists and which led him, in his early sixties, to exchange his laboratory coat for the writer’s pen.

What the reader of Djerassi’s novels gets is a kind of fictional cultural anthropology, a novelistic, and later drama-based, envi­ronment where Djerassi fictionally constructs the very worlds which are at the same time the objects of his literary scrutiny – and all this in one and the same fictional discourse without any formal differentiation between one and the other. From the point of view of modern science, this is not as paradoxical as it may seem, as it acknowledges the fact that researchers are always in some ways not only directly implicated in their research, but that their very scientific intervention actually co-determines the out­come of their investigations. Anthropology, especially, would seem to be amenable to such an approach. We have not only experienced a pervasive “anthropological turn” in literary stud­ies, but also a, maybe less vehement, “literary turn” in anthro­pology which acknowledges the narrative and narratological qualities of its research.

It seems justified, therefore, to use the occasion of Carl Djer­assi’s prominently placed anthropological reference to evaluate his science-in-fiction, and in particular the first of the novels subsumed under the title Stammesgeheimnisse, in the context of tribal discourses. I will argue that in this way, he both critiques the culture of the “hard” sciences and opens up a dialogue be­tween the natural sciences and literature (the humanities) as part of his pedagogical attempt to raise the scientific literacy of our society to higher levels.

II.

In Routledge’s Encyclopedia of Social and Cultural Anthropol­ogy published in 1996, one will not find “tribe,” “tribal” or “tri­balism” as a main entry. However, it does appear in the fine-print glossary at the end of the book where it says: “The terms ‘tribe’ and ‘tribal’ [...] have a variety of meanings, some of which are taboo in modern anthropology.”[5] Apart from the fact that I find it amusing, and maybe also an indication of post-modern self-reflexive humor, that an anthropological reference work uses the term “taboo” for the description of its own disci­plinary developments, this indication of a forbidden subject strongly points to the significance this category will have for the analysis of Djerassi’s works.

Whereas according to the Encyclopedia, the category is ac­ceptable for the designation of a “political unit larger than a clan and smaller than a nation or people, especially when indigenous populations themselves use the term” – something that clearly has not been the case among natural scientists before Djerassi – it is “less politically correct in some quarters,” and indeed is “generally discouraged” when referring to “aspects of culture other than politics.”

It is precisely this taboo territory that Djerassi’s science-in-fiction addresses. The lack of political correctness has to do with the evolutionist approaches in anthropology and the attendant value judgments, which would define some forms of social and cultural organization as superior to others, with “tribal” cultures of course occupying a position pretty much at the bottom of the list. Such a value judgment is a result of our white, male, euro­centric and in any case self-proclaimed position of superiority which must be abolished both for reasons of scientific objectiv­ity and – political correctness.

Djerassi’s tribe, however, represents, with some exceptions, a white, predominantly male, and eurocentric group – at least in terms of its rationalist, efficiency-oriented direction which is under scrutiny in his novels. Whereas Marxist anthropologists have described the conception of the “tribe” as a colonialist con­struct provided by anthropologists to validate and vindicate co­lonialist exploitation,[6] in the case of the tribe called “Natural Science,” this critique is turned against itself. The paradoxical situation is that, evolutionarily speaking, the “Natural Sciences” tribe is one of the youngest, and in some way, the most devel­oped. Yet, in spite of this, members of that tribe retain many qualities of the tribes located at the other end of the evolutionary spectrum, in the “infancy” of humanity.

The critical – and ironic, often delightfully comical – poten­tial of Djerassi’s novels is located precisely in that seeming paradox. Cantor’s Dilemma, published in 1989, is still Djer­assi’s single most famous literary work and it will be my pri­mary focus in this essay. In the afterword, the author explains that “Science is both a disinterested pursuit of truth and a com­munity, with its own customs, its own social contract.”[7] Charac­terized by rationalism and an emphasis on thinking and logic, scientists should not be expected to display the naiveté of tribal cultures. Yet, in spite of this, and possibly because of it, scien­tists behave in the “primitive manner” of tribal societies.

But how exactly is the tribal conception used in Djerassi’s works and which insight does it provide? In an Americanist context, is it an American tribe? Functionally, how does the in­terpretation of the culture of the natural sciences as tribal reflect on that area of scientific inquiry? And, finally, can the tribal model, as a sort of annex to the widely branched-out field of literary anthropology, contribute to our understanding of the construction of the sciences in fiction?

III.

There are as many characterizations of what tribal cultures are and represent as there are studies of tribes and cultural anthro­pologists or ethnographers investigating them. Still, there are some constants which recur in most studies no matter in which part of the world they have been undertaken. In addition to summary expositions of the subject, my conceptional sources are “traditional” studies such as those of African and Austral­asian cultures.[8] Also, I have consulted a very helpful recent investigation of the patriarchal family of the Balkans, especially Albania, the Kosovo, Macedonia, and various regions of Ser­bia.[9]

As an overall conception, the comparison seems faulty at first, because tribes lived or live in relatively self-sufficient iso­lation. Scientists, on the other hand, are part of a society with an extremely high division of labor and thus closely interlock with all other parts of the social system. Given their central position for society, one would expect their location in it to be similarly in the middle. However: it is not. In Djerassi’s novels, especially in Cantor’s Dilemma, natural scientists live far away from the “real world” with which they have an uneasy relationship. When central protagonist Professor Isidore Cantor, in short I.C., wants to have something of a private life every few weeks, he drives hours from his large midwestern university to Chicago, where he owns a fancy condominium with a magnificent view. There, the internationally famous organic chemist turned cell biologist meets up with three friends and they engage in something like Hausmusik. But neither his graduate students nor his colleagues know anything about his private life – it took years until his fa­vorite graduate student finally set foot into the door of Cantor’s private home – and such a private life barely exists for this workoholic, at least until he meets the sophisticated woman of his dreams.

Another basic question which would have to be asked at the outset is whether scientists all belong to one tribe or whether there are different tribes competing with each other. The answer to this question is uncertain, in part because of the different definitions of tribes, in part because of the uncertainties written into Djerassi’s texts. To the extent that they share similar myths, also myths of origin, which are central to anthropological defi­nitions of tribes, they are members of one and the same tribe. To the degree that a tribe is defined territorially, they would, given their different disciplines and their different geographical loca­tions, be members of different, competing, albeit also in some ways related, tribes.

Because these are fictional works playing with these con­cepts, it is advisable not to be overly narrow in the comparison between tribal existence and scientists’ lives, nor to place too much emphasis on anthropological consistency. It is not critical that the “Natural Science” tribe meet all characteristics tradi­tionally ascribed to tribes by anthropologists. It is much more important to explore the different, at times contradictory, models of tribal behavior among Djerassi’s scientists. The brutal com­petition among scientists, for example, could be either inter­preted as intratribal feuds or intertribal warfare. In their rites, certainly, they seem all very similar, thus appearing to be mem­bers of one tribe, or at least of several closely related tribes.

Territoriality, a central concept in the definition of tribes, is in two ways an important aspect also of the tribal quality of Djerassi’s scientists. It is, of course, not the territoriality of modern statehood, but, rather, territory directly connected to the working environment. Although Harvard is referred to as an Empire in Cantor’s Dilemma, it is really much more a tribal territory with a chief, the “big man,” in Cantor’s line of re­search. The novel mentions quite a few other tribal territories, located mostly on the East or the West Coast, but also, like Cantor’s, in the Midwest. Loyalty is clearly owed, though by no means always paid, to one’s territorially defined tribe. When Jeremy Stafford, Cantor’s student, decides to change sides and moves from the Midwest to Harvard, his boss considers this treason and lack of solidarity which are inacceptable in any tribal society. Among Djerassis tribes, one can be accused of tribal infidelity for much smaller infractions. Earlier in the novel, even a visit to Jeremy’s supposedly sick grandfather has Cantor complain: “‘Where’s the man’s loyalty,’ he grumbled, to his grandfather or to the lab?” (86)

The second, and more important, version of territoriality, is the field itself which is defined, measured, defended, and con­tested. More than even geographical territoriality and in many ways interlocked with it, it defines tribal limits. Interdisciplinar­ity, then, can be either viewed as large-scale tribal feuding or as inter-tribal alliances designed to bring about something new – such as the cooperation between four elder scientists from dif­ferent fields in The Bourbaki Gambit which brings about PCR (polymerase chain reaction), a collaboration which ends in great difficulties because of disciplinary differences and an overly competitive spirit.

The territoriality principle in tribal life is counteracted by an­other principle central to tribal organization, namely the taboo of inbreeding. In traditional tribal society, this obviously does not apply to the tribe as a whole, but to smaller segments such as families. There are very complex systems designed to avoid in­cest and in some ways, scientists, especially in their formative years, follow that pattern. The move from one institution to the next results in a productive intellectual mix which helps to avoid the negative effects of an inbred research community. That, in Cantor’s Dilemma, seems to be the main task of the large state universities and other second-rank institutions – namely to pro­vide new blood for the institutions of, as it says several times in that book, the academic superstars. Tribal researchers have pointed to exogamy as a strategy to enlarge one’s network of relatives, and thus one’s power. In Cantor’s Dilemma, it says explicitly that one reason for moving from one territory to the next is to establish an “old boy’s network” of mentors who will be supportive in one’s career.

Tribal research consistently points to the question of lineage in tribal society, i.e., a generally believed myth of descendance from a particular mythical forefather. Natural scientists form such a lineage which is important for their identity. Carl Djer­assi’s novels and plays are replete with references to the history of science(s). Even in his own autobiographies, Djerassi always explains his most important achievements in terms of the tradi­tion in which they stand.[10] In his play Oxygen (2001), he intro­duces the idea of a “retro” nobel prize in order to celebrate sci­entists’ past achievement. In Cantor’s Dilemma, problems or questions are frequently solved by consulting predecessors: “[...] in preparation for their trip to Stockholm, many Nobel laureates have studied the records of their predecessors: what words they voiced here; what their experiences were in subsequent years.” (189)

In most cases, lineage implies a patriarchical system of soci­ety with the present chief claiming identity with, or at least proximity to, the mythical forefather. Patriarchal, Djerassi’s sci­entific tribe certainly is, though increasingly challenged by en­ergetic young females who, however, are forced to adapt to the prevalent models of behavior and relationship. The novel speaks of “scientific machismo” (86) and this manifests itself nowhere more clearly than in the relationship between mentor and young researcher. The “picking of a Ph.D. mentor is probably the sin­gle most important decision they [graduate students] make when they start their graduate work. It’s really like an orphan picking a new father.” (24) However, the mentor resembles more a god­father, whose function, according to tribal researchers, is to en­ter into a mental, or even intellectual, relationship with his god­child.

Trust and cooperation between mentor and Ph.D. student are a central characteristic of Djerassi’s scientific tribes. The favo­rite – often said to be the most intelligent or advanced – student, carries an especially large burden. If that relationship, as in the case of Cantor and Stafford, is uneasy or even disturbed, the life of the tribe is in danger. The man on top is then unable to ope­rate effectively, scientific development comes to a standstill.

Djerassi’s fiction is justly famous for a number of female re­searchers and scientists who are true role models for their peers in the extrafictional terrain. In volume four of the trilogy, NO (1998), a woman from India is introduced who makes it in the American corporate as well as scientific world. Yet, these ad­vances are only successful if women are willing to become members of the tribe on its terms. Ethnographic research has shown that under certain conditions it is possible to join tribes, but the requirements for acceptance are often complex and in­tense.

In Cantor’s Dilemma, the best example is one Celestine Price who seems to have almost been born a control freak. When she decides that it is time to lose her virginity, she throws a towel at her swimming team trainer and commands him to lay her. Whether she is conscious of it or not, she picks her males ac­cording to her academic and career needs, getting, as her housemate, a deconstructionist graduate student of English, ob­serves, “access to [a man’s] knowledge through [her] sexuality” (119).

Just as among her successful male counterparts, the sciences determine Celestine’s behavior; in fact, it can hardly be sepa­rated from them. For her, sex is at times “an experiment rather than a romantic interlude,” and it is maybe not surprising, that, as a record of that experiment, she has learned to become a ver­bal lover who insists on an oral protocol of the act. Her rigidity in choosing sex life and partners is astounding. She is not alone: many characters in Djerassi’s books find that the combination of sex and the lab, sex in science, is irresistible and the connection of work and sexuality is often made explicit.

Sex is not restricted by many taboos in this tribe, although the central character of Cantor’s Dilemma, Isidore Cantor, has been sexually abstinent for over a decade. Another professor’s habit of not pursuing his female students until he has handed in their grades and not before they have turned 21 has a legalistic con­notation, though it reminds one of initiation ceremonies. But the real rituals take place in the lab, in the lecture hall, and at con­ferences. A pervasively oral culture rules life in these territories. Even though one would think that in the natural sciences it is not important how a message is delivered but what is said, the re­sults, the polished rhetoric and the etiquette-ridden way of ask­ing and answering questions are obviously of prime importance for success or failure. In Kurt Krauss’ famed noon seminars at Harvard, successful presenting is at least as important as the scientific argument. Other examples of oral communication also abound: there are “rumors” (5) emerging from the lab, and alto­gether, a “lore” (10) develops which goes far beyond the indi­vidual members of research groups of graduate students and attaches itself to a particular chairholder or even the chair itself.

In Cantor’s Dilemma, this hierarchy is prominently reflected in the question of the order of the authors. Should all authors of a research group be listed alphabetically, or should the tribal chief always receive first place? One clever female professor, realizing that she will not have much of a chance with a name like Yardley, starting with a “Y,” goes to the court house, pays a small fee, and becomes “Ardley,” thus putting herself into aca­demic pole position. It is the Ph.D. student in English literature, an ardent Bakhtinian and deconstructionist and obviously mem­ber of a very different tribe of scientists, who gets to ask Prof. Ardley why a professor, not having done any of the lab work, should be listed on the publications of their staff at all? Whereas the deconstructionist argues in political terms, the natural sci­ence establishment defends itself in tribal language, namely that it is a group effort and that all members of a team deserve to be on it. Implicitly, of course, the point is that the head of the tribe is responsible for what is going on in his group and, logically, shares in all its achievements.

Djerassi’s natural scientists are a very American tribe, but it seems as though their American tribal origins have been ex­panded to all members of that tribe globally or that they exist independently of their American existence. Thus, the pervasive competitiveness rules not only the lives of American scientists but of scientists world-wide. One of Djerassi’s most important conceptions, discussed in virtually all of his novels and plays, is priority. By this is meant scientists’ peculiar preoccupation with making a particular discovery first. If one researcher makes a discovery but is only one day later in the publication of his re­sults than his colleague who has happened to have the same in­sight, years of work will be useless. Even simultaneous discov­ery, should it occur and be established as such, will take away much of the researcher’s triumph. This explains the aura of se­crecy which surrounds the labs in Djerassi’s novels and the long discussions over how, where and when to publish particular findings. Whereas this competitiveness may strike us as very American, it is, of course, also part of the tradition of tribal feuds. It is interesting that in spite of the intensity of these feuds, also in Djerassi’s novels, there is a sense of egalitarianism be­tween the different segments of the one tribe or between the different tribes, however one wants to interpret Djerassi’s scien­tists. The various groups around the country, which are very similarly structured, accept each other. It is a kind of competi­tive collegiality with an awareness that all parts of the system need each other. Paradoxically, the striving for hegemony does not invalidate this egalitarianism.

Although success manifests itself in original discoveries and publications, the ultimate dream of any natural scientist in Djer­assi’s tribal world is the Nobel Prize. Nobel lust is the main subject of Cantor’s Dilemma and no scientist is immune to it. The recognition it provides, nationally and internationally, the rites one goes through when receiving it in Stockholm, are the supreme fantasies in the life of a scientist. It is not the consider­able sum of money connected with the prize that these scientists are after. It is the distinction – and the Nobel lecture the prize winner gets to give – which is important, because it will make a scientist immortal. It is easy to see that through the Nobel dis­tinction, scientists are able to partake in the defining myth of their tribe and are raised to the status of those who give meaning and significance to it.

A prerequisite for a smooth functioning of tribal life as I have described it so far is trust. It is a concept which goes beyond the solidarity and loyalty often reported as characteristic of tribal life and yet it is the central characteristic of Djerassi’s tribe. In order for scientists to succeed, they must be able to trust each others’ results and research methods. However, this ability to depend on the results of a scientist colleague is threatened by the very human qualities of the researcher. Cantor himself points to a “dissociative” personality of scientists:

[...] on one side, the rigorous believer in the experimental method, with its set of rules and its ultimate objective of advancing knowledge; on the other, the fallible human being with all the accompanying emotional foi­bles. [...] A scientist’s drive, his self-esteem, are really based on a very simple desire: recognition by one’s peers, the Krausses of this world. (113)

Cantor here points to a basic incompatibility which is poten­tially destructive for the whole life of the tribe. Cantor’s grand design for a model explaining the formation of tumors, an “in­tellectual tour de force,” as the novel repeatedly says, is threat­ened by the sloppiness of his favorite student, Stafford, in exe­cuting the experiment which would prove the theory. His own credibility is threatened, exposing himself to Schadenfreude, as it says in the English text, the gloating over the failure of other, less successful scientists. Instead of breaking the vicious circle and talking to Stafford about his failings, Cantor now starts hiding things from him, thereby expressing his own distrust in his collaborator – who, in turn, hurt by this lack of trust and rec­ognition of his mentor, takes his leave and starts to work for the competition.

Even though the novel goes further than that – Harvard chief Kurt Krauss, the villain of the book, even dares to blackmail Cantor – the novel basically deals with such “gray issues” (229) of science. In the afterword, Djerassi asks what “harm is caused to its [the natural scientists‘] culture when the elite displays such occupational deviance” (229). Even though he does not provide an explicit answer there, I believe the text itself, as well as his other texts, provides it.

Finally, to this list of tribal characteristics with predomi­nantly negative implications, a positive dimension of the meta­phor should be added. For certain schools of postcolonial thinking, tribes have positive connotations because they are largely or even completely independent from the centralized state and its government and live a self-sufficient, self-sustain­able life style. Both of these aspects form a positive counter­argument to the charge of isolationism. When scientists link up politically in a peace organization in order to bring about disar­mament and global peace as presented in volume 3 of the series, Menachem’s Seed (1997), or when they collaborate clandes­tinely against senseless bureaucratic rules such as the age limits for professors, there is a positive sense of networking against centralist administrative coercion which is rather hopeful.

IV.

More importantly even than an understanding of the specific ritual, mythical, or sexual characteristics of the Scientists’ tribe, Djerassi’s anthropological fiction presents the world of natural scientists as constituting a specific culture of its own. Thus, the project of the natural sciences, which is often said to be consti­tuted by objectivity and rationality and thus set into opposition with the humanities, is rendered as relative, preliminary, ritual­istic. The rhetoric of necessity, of Sachlogik and Sachzwang, is subverted and replaced by a relativistic perspective where dif­ferent discourses compete with each other.

This does not mean that the “pursuit of truth,” the ideal of objectivity in the natural sciences, is destroyed. We do not get a characterization of science as a version of magic in the sense of Lévi-Strauss who has pointed to the role magic has played in the progress of science. We also do not get the feminist, “deep-ecologist” criticism of science as a version of an unacknowl­edged, repressive myth.[11] Instead of setting the natural sciences against a world of “soft” cultural relativity, it dissolves the false dichotomy of culture and (natural) science by showing the lat­ter’s own cultural quality. By integrating, or rather re-integrat­ing, scientists into the scientific project, rather than abstracting from them, the sciences can be evaluated on a new cultural level.

Of course there have been many novels and plays about the ethical responsibility of scientists for what they are doing. They, too, have included the scientist into the context of his work. In Menachem’s Seed, a number of scientists, including nuclear sci­entists, are shown as participating in what amounts to the fic­tional version of a Pugwash meeting, and they display precisely that spirit of responsibility and concern.

However, what we get through Djerassi’s anthropological perspective on natural scientists is something else; namely a look at the individuals in their own working environment and together with their working environment. It is, after all, science-in-fiction and not only scientists in fiction and that permits us to view the interaction between the two.

The point is not so much that the scientists in Djerassi’s nov­els are less than pleasant. Of course they are oftentimes dis­gusting. Their sexist, authoritarian, often slave driver-like be­havior, their clumsy ways, their success-driven obsessions, their inability to talk to each other and their tendency to hide behind ritualistic forms – all of that makes them frequently very un­pleasant characters. But then, so are most other characters, in a variety of similar, but also different ways. What is remarkable is that Djerassi’s fiction places the scientists, who are oftentime considered to exist outside of society, squarely in it. They, just like everybody else, have a specific culture, a specific way of relating, specific modes of behavior, which can be compared to those of everybody else. Paradoxically, by pointing to lovable or less lovable cultural specfics, Djerassi is destroying the myth of exotic otherness of scientists and also the isolation his characters find themselves in.

The breakthrough which some of his scientists make towards members of other tribes – such as artists, historians, or business people and, the male ones among them, towards smart and sexy women – suggests that. But even if they do not connect to the outside world, the anthropologial look at scientists as tribal es­tablishes a communicative avenue between scientists and non-scientists. In this way, his promise of a dialogue (dialogue for Djerassi being central to literature as opposed to the monologi­cal sciences[12]) between the two cultures is fulfilled, at least incipiently. Unlike C.P. Snow’s two cultures, which remain strangely separate and isolated from each other and whose breach can only be bridged by knowledge, Djerassi’s science-in-fiction has opened up a dialogue between the cultures and be­tween the texts and their readers. In view of the prominence of that dialogue, which we find repeated in his other novels in many different ways, it is not surprising that Djerassi has switched to theater as an even more congenial genre for com­munication.

Unlike Carl Djerassi who insists on the critical significance of the scientific knowledge imparted by his novels, I believe strongly that one can understand and appreciate his work also without a profound knowledge of the scientific principles in­volved. This does not belittle his pedagogical abilities in ex­plaining processes in the natural science, but they may, unfortu­nately, be lost on some readers. A strong focus should be placed on the qualities in his fiction which facilitate communication and which go beyond the pedagogical impetus. It is there, where Djerassi’s greatness lies.

Carl Djerassi’s literary works have opened up an avenue to­wards an understanding of the cultural basis, and thus also rela­tivity, of the natural sciences and, in part, also of the technical sciences. The existence of such a specific culture is often not recognized or acknowledged by scientists themselves. One next step might be to investigate more closely whether these cultures are diversified nationally and ethnically. In many ways, the members of Djerassi’s science tribe are international and univer­salized, part, not of a Gelehrtenrepublik, but of a Gelehrten­stamm. But could it not be that these cultures are different ac­cording to national and ethnic origin? This might explode the tribal metaphor – but certainly not Carl Djerassi’s achievement of having formulated these questions.

 

(From “Science, Technology, and the Humanities in Recent American Fiction,” (ed. P. Freese & C.B. Harris), Verlag Die Blaue Eule, Essen, 2004) by permission of the author and editors)