When Genres Collide

“The Last Night” as Science Fiction

Abstract

Norman Mailer’s first treatment of science fiction, “The Last Night,” appeared at an important point in the development of modern speculative fiction, and in many ways demonstrates both the early condition of the genre and how a great author may combine traditional literature’s considerations of the human heart with the cosmic implications of science fiction authors such as Arthur C. Clarke, Robert A. Heinlein, and Andre Norton, producing a medium of revelation and prophecy. “The Last Night” helps to merge science fiction with mainstream literature, two genres colliding in Campbell’s era, into a single form capable of informing a technological culture. The motifs of the generational starship carrying passengers from a dying earth may have developed in the mid-century science fiction context, but Mailer excels in using the conventions of the genre to present a prescient recognition of mankind’s essential misjudgment and treachery, against his fellows and ultimately against the planet that gave us birth. The suspect science of Mailer’s treatment, along with the indeterminant time of the story’s setting, contributes to the aura of myth and heroism that transforms the work into a document of prophecy.