Cowboys are, I suspect, astute critics of Westerns. And young scientists, I have discovered, having taught them at Caltech, are perceptive readers of science fiction.
Caltech is not thought of as a bookish place. You don't gain entrance by being well read. Near-genius proficiency in mathematics helps, as does a willingness to work 10 hours a day, seven days a week.
But Caltech undergraduates -- a.k.a. Techers -- do consume science fiction, lots of it. And what is the Techers' favorite text? Orson Scott Card's "Ender's Game." In a pre-course questionnaire last year, more than half of the students in my English class came up with that title as best ever. Google "Caltech + Ender's" and you'll get nearly 400 hits from student blogs and the mind-bending games that Techers relax with.
One doesn't need Freud to work out why Card's novel is popular. "Ender's Game" tells the story of an infant prodigy, Andrew Wiggin (nicknamed Ender), who is torn from the bosom of his family at 6 to be trained in "Battle School." Earth is under threat from aliens -- the Buggers. Future war is waged as a computer game. And who are the virtuosos of the game console? Kids. Who are the best de-Buggers? Not Donald Rumsfeld's generation.
To gain entrance to Caltech, two things are necessary. You must be gifted. And you must sacrifice much of what makes childhood fun in the service of that gift. Moreover, you must compete -- ferociously -- to get to the top. Excellence is a harsh mistress.
On the admissions website is a revealing statement by Robin Deis (class of 2004), describing the school for prospective entrants: "Have you read/seen Harry Potter? Have you seen X-Men? That's what Caltech is -- a school of (mentally) superpowered mutants." This, believe it or not, is posted to attract, not repel, would-be Techers.
Harry Potter, the bespectacled nerd with Merlin powers, and the supernaturally endowed X-Men (who should really be called X-Kids) can never quite join the human race out of which they evolved. Why? Because they are too different. With great power, to paraphrase another sad super-mutant, comes great loneliness.
Would Harry, for all the wonderful abracadabra of Hogwarts, not yearn to be a normal child? Would the X-Kids, for all their ability to hurl thunderbolts, not rather throw baseballs, watch bad TV and hang out at the Galleria? Card's novel is to Caltech students what "Catcher in the Rye" and "Huckleberry Finn" are in other establishments. It articulates the stress of coming of age in a world where you don't fit -- not because you are lacking in something but because God gave you too much of it.
