Science fiction

Science fiction is a form of speculative fiction principally dealing with the impact of imagined science and technology upon society and persons as individuals. In common with most fiction, science fiction is written mainly to entertain people. The borders of this genre are not well defined, and the dividing lines between its sub-genres are often fluid. (In Strong Opinions, Vladimir Nabokov half-seriously argues that, if we were truly rigorous with our definitions, Shakespeare's play The Tempest would have to be termed science fiction.)

Media

Early science fiction was published in books and in general circulation magazines. The science fiction magazine began in 1926 with the publication of Amazing Stories edited by Hugo Gernsback. Most science fiction written between 1926 and the early 1950s appeared in science fiction magazines. Since then, there has been a huge increase in the amount of written science fiction published, and now most written science fiction appears in either hardback or paperback books, though there is still significant science fiction published in magazines and now on-line.

Related Topics:
Science fiction magazine - Amazing Stories - Hugo Gernsback

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Beginning early in the history of silent film, the science fiction film established a genre of its own, generally more sensational and less scientific than written science fiction. It has often been said that film SF lags about fifty years behind written SF, with a film such as Star Wars resembling the pulp science fiction in Planet Stories. Many of the movie serials of the 1940s and 1950s were science fiction, and they led into early science fiction television which produced such programs as Tom Corbett -- Space Cadet and Captain Video.

Related Topics:
Science fiction film - Star Wars - Pulp - Planet Stories - Serial - Science fiction television - Tom Corbett - Space Cadet - Captain Video

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Science fiction entered the comic strip medium in 1929 with Buck Rogers, followed in 1934 by Flash Gordon. The majority of Americans, before the 1950s, never encountered any science fiction other than in the "funny papers", and assumed all SF was just like comic strip science fiction, thus the phrase, used as an insult but later fondly adopted by some fans, "that crazy Buck Rogers stuff". Radio science fiction began by adapting Buck and Flash stories for radio, but later brought some of the best magazine science fiction to a larger audience with Dimension X and X Minus One, which adapted stories by Heinlein, Asimov, Leiber, and other major writers for radio. The comic book began by reprinting comic strips, and Buck and Flash both had their own comic book reprints. As soon as original comic books began to appear, science fiction was there. Planet Stories had a comic book companion. Hugo Gernsback published Wonderworld with art by pulp artist Frank R. Paul. Later EC Comics published the much beloved Weird Science and Weird Fantasy which first stole and later actually paid to adapt stories by Ray Bradbury. D.C. comics published Strange Adventures and Mystery in Space, edited by Julius Schwartz.

Related Topics:
Comic strip - Buck Rogers - Flash Gordon - Fan - Dimension X - X Minus One - Comic book - Wonderworld - Frank R. Paul - EC Comics - Weird Science - Weird Fantasy - Ray Bradbury - D.C. - Strange Adventures - Mystery in Space - Julius Schwartz

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There have been a few science fiction stage plays, notably some Los Angeles theater adaptations of some of Bradbury's stories. There have been science fiction View-Master reels, notably "Sam Sawyer's Trip to the Moon". There have been original science fiction CD's, such as Jeff Wayne's Musical Version of The War of the Worlds and The Firesign Theatre's "Don't Crush that Dwarf, Hand me the Pliers". There is also a small but growing number of science-fiction operas. In fact, science fiction has appeared in just about every medium conceived by the mind of man.

Related Topics:
View-Master - Jeff Wayne's Musical Version of The War of the Worlds - The Firesign Theatre - Science-fiction operas

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