OPINION
NATURE|Vol 465|3 June 2010
More lab in the library
Number of novels
For novels set in the world of science, 2010
FICTION STARRING SCIENTISTS
looks to be a bumper year. Best-selling
author Ian McEwan probes the pressures on a
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climatologist in Solar (Jonathan Cape), while
By scientists
Rajendra Pachauri, head of the Intergovern8
By non-scientists
mental Panel on Climate Change, indulges in
a semi-biographical romp in Return To Almora
6
(Rupa). Distinguished American entomologist
E. O. Wilson explores the workings of insect
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and human societies in his debut novel, Anthill
(W. W. Norton). And Michael Byers will offer
2
a fictionalized account of the discovery of
Pluto in Percival’s Planet (Henry Holt), later
this summer.
0
Is this increased attention to science in
1930
1940
1950
1960
1970
1980
1990
2000
2010
fiction a recent phenomenon and, if so, what
is driving it? Across the tens of thousands of
novels published each year, it is difficult to Carl Djerassi — I couldn’t find anything else reflecting society’s hopes and fears about
measure how often science crops up as a theme. like it in the bookshops. I didn’t know it then, technology as science fiction does, lab lit tends
A subgenre is easier to track, namely ‘lab lit’. but I was witnessing the end of a protracted to focus on the intricacies of scientific work and
I coined the term in 2001 to describe realistic literary drought.
scientists as people. Writers might be respondnovels that contain scientists as central charWho is writing these novels? In my data set, ing to social trends that have made science
acters plying their trade (see Nature 439, 269; I categorized authors as trained ‘scientists’ if and technology more palatable, encouraged
2006). It is distinct from science fiction, in which they had completed a doctorate in science or by a ‘geek chic’ movement and the attention
the action takes place in speculative worlds and mathematics, even if they hadn’t stayed in the devoted to sci–art collaborations. Or, a critimay not involve scientist characters.
profession. Both before and after the 1980s cal mass of well-known authors penning lab
After years of personal research, along with upturn, just under half of the books were writ- lit might have inspired others to try. Around
reader nominations at my website LabLit.com, ten by scientists. This high fraction and its the time of the upturn, established literary figI have identified 118 lab-lit novels published by persistence surprised me, as did the fact that ures such as William Boyd, Neal Stephenson,
traditional imprints since 1900, and two self- the recent growth in lab-lit novels could not Richard Powers, Jonathan Lethem and Simon
published novels that attracted
be attributed to either of the Mawer published novels about scientists for the
mainstream press attention.
authorship camps.
first time, which may have influenced other
“Lab lit tends to focus
Compared with crime ficThe diversity of lab-lit authors and publishers.
on the intricacies of
tion, which generates about
books suggests that the novels
Recent best-sellers might have signalled
600 new books per year in the
are grounded in curios- to publishers that lab lit is an area ripe for
scientific work and
United Kingdom alone, lab lit
ity rather than in scientific financial exploitation. Readers who are
scientists as people.”
is still rare. My list, although
topicality. A range of set- increasingly interested in science create more
not comprehensive and
tings — from fisheries and demand, thereby feeding a virtuous publishbiased towards English-language publications, meteorology to moth development, black ing cycle. The rise of electronic publishing
nevertheless represents a good starting point holes and artificial intelligence — underpins and online communities may further fuel the
for trend seeking.
human stories that trace classic themes of love, growth in lab-lit fiction by bringing the genre
The number of lab-lit books has risen dra- loss, redemption, comedy and tragedy. Many to the attention of more readers and allowmatically in the past two decades (see ‘Fiction books focus on historical fiction about real-life ing potential writers to bypass traditional
starring scientists’). A few were published scientists (especially Albert Einstein, Charles publishers.
sporadically over the past century — such as Darwin and Marie Curie) or significant sciWe don’t know if the trend will continue, but
Sinclair Lewis’s Arrowsmith (P. F. Collier, 1925), entific sites, such as Los Alamos National if these factors continue to raise the profile of
C. P. Snow’s The Search (Gollancz, 1934) and Laboratory in New Mexico; Bletchley Park, lab-based literature, then supply will surely folWilliam Cooper’s The Struggles of Albert Woods UK; or Darwin’s ship HMS Beagle. Even tak- low. Unscientifically, I’m keeping my fingers
(Doubleday, 1953). But since the late 1980s, ing into account the long gestation period, crossed.
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there has been a surge in activity, reaching there was no flurry of books responding to the Jennifer Rohn is a cell biologist at University
some 5–10 books per year. The timing of this recombinant DNA revolution in the 1980s, for College London, London WC1E 6BT, UK. Her
upturn would explain why, after reading my example, or the launch of the Human Genome second novel, The Honest Look, will be published
first lab-lit novel in graduate school in the early Project in 1990.
later this year.
1990s — Cantor’s Dilemma (Penguin, 1991) by
So why the lab-lit surge? Rather than e-mail: [email protected]
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© 2010 Macmillan Publishers Limited. All rights reserved
soURCE: J. Rohn & R. o’hARA
Jennifer Rohn, editor of the webzine LabLit.com, asks why so many novels with scientists as
central characters have been published this year.