The Profession of Science Fiction

Abstract

To begin, it is no profession. If the truth were known, there are only two real professions: law and medicine. In a profession (I am told) one sits in one’s offices behind a brass plate, waiting for someone to insult one with money. Sherlock Holmes, perhaps, began as a professional, but even he soon found he had to go out into the streets and work, though he advertised himself as the world’s one and only consulting detective. I have been most of the other things that are sometimes said — mostly by their practitioners — to be professions. I have been a soldier (“the profession of arms”). I have been a teacher and an engineer and a journalist. All these are jobs.