Alternative history (fiction)

Alternative history or alternate history is fiction that is set in a world in which history has diverged from history as it is generally known; more simply put, alternate history asks the question, "What If history had developed differently?" Most works that employ this rubric are set in factful historical contexts, yet feature several social, geopolitical or industrial circumstances that developed differently or at a different pace from our own, sometimes as a result of progress in technological or social paradigms that were accomplished via the understanding already present in the given zeitgeist. While to some extent all fiction can be described as alternative history, the genre proper comprises fiction in which a change happens that causes history to diverge from our own. For a variety of reasons, alternate history is generally classified as a subcategory of speculative fiction. Secret history, which gives an account of history at odds with our general understanding, presenting its own account as having been lost or forgotten, is not alternate history.

Points of divergence

The key change between our history and the alternative history is known as the "Point of divergence" (POD). In Philip K. Dick's "The Man in the High Castle", the POD is the attempted assassination of Franklin D. Roosevelt in Miami in 1933. In our reality, this attempt failed. In Robert Harris's Fatherland, the POD occurs when a German attack into the Caucasus succeeds in the Nazis seizing vital oil and cutting off supplies to the Red Army. This forces the USSR to surrender, enabling the Axis Powers to bring the remaining Allies to the peace table, one by one. Some variants of the theory of the multiverse posit that PODs occur every instant, springing off parallel universes for each instance. Even mainstream science fiction stories are known to have points of divergence - the Star Trek franchise, for example, diverts from ours in that several key space disasters never occurred, resulting in a much faster and smoother development of rocketry than in our timeline.

Related Topics:
Point of divergence - Philip K. Dick - The Man in the High Castle - Franklin D. Roosevelt - Miami - 1933 - Fatherland - Caucasus - Red Army - Multiverse - Parallel universe - Science fiction - Star Trek - Space disaster

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