Science fiction#As serious literature

{{Main|Definitions of science fiction}}

According to Isaac Asimov, "Science fiction can be defined as that branch of literature which deals with the reaction of human beings to changes in science and technology."{{Cite journal |title=How Easy to See the Future! |journal=Natural History |last=Asimov |first=Isaac |date=April 1975|issue=4 |volume=84 |pages=92 |via=Internet Archive |publisher=American Museum of Natural History |location=New York |issn=0028-0712 |url=https://archive.org/details/naturalhistory84newy/page/n379/mode/1up?view=theater}}

Robert A. Heinlein wrote that "A handy short definition of almost all science fiction might read: realistic speculation about possible future events, based solidly on adequate knowledge of the real world, past and present, and on a thorough understanding of the nature and significance of the scientific method."

American science fiction author and editor Lester del Rey wrote, "Even the devoted aficionado or fan—has a hard time trying to explain what science fiction is," and the lack of a "full satisfactory definition" is because "there are no easily delineated limits to science fiction."

Another definition comes from The Literature Book by DK and is, "scenarios that are at the time of writing technologically impossible, extrapolating from present-day science...[,]...or that deal with some form of speculative science-based conceit, such as a society (on Earth or another planet) that has developed in wholly different ways from our own."{{Cite book |last1=Canton |first1=James |title=The Literature Book |last2=Cleary |first2=Helen |last3=Kramer |first3=Ann |last4=Laxby |first4=Robin |last5=Loxley |first5=Diana |last6=Ripley |first6=Esther |last7=Todd |first7=Megan |last8=Shaghar |first8=Hila |last9=Valente |first9=Alex |publisher=DK |year=2016 |isbn=978-1-4654-2988-9 |location=New York |page=343}}

There is a tendency among science fiction enthusiasts as their own arbiter in deciding what exactly constitutes science fiction.{{Cite journal|last1=Menadue|first1=Christopher Benjamin|last2=Giselsson|first2=Kristi|last3=Guez|first3=David|date=1 October 2020|title=An Empirical Revision of the Definition of Science Fiction: It Is All in the Techne . . .|journal=SAGE Open|language=en|volume=10|issue=4|page=2158244020963057|doi=10.1177/2158244020963057|s2cid=226192105|issn=2158-2440|doi-access=free}} David Seed says it may be more useful to talk about science fiction as the intersection of other more concrete subgenres.{{Cite book|last=Seed|first=David|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=zUOFPjeUcF8C&q=hard+soft+science+fiction&pg=PP1|title=Science Fiction: A Very Short Introduction|date=23 June 2011|publisher=OUP Oxford|isbn=978-0-19-955745-5|language=en}} Damon Knight summed up the difficulty, saying "Science fiction is what we point to when we say it."

{{Further|Skiffy}}

Forrest J Ackerman has been credited with first using the term "sci-fi" (analogous to the then-trendy "hi-fi") in about 1954.{{cite news |date=7 December 2008 |title=Forrest J Ackerman, 92; Coined the Term 'Sci-Fi' |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/12/06/AR2008120602021.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171022130847/http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/12/06/AR2008120602021.html |archive-date=22 October 2017 |access-date=17 December 2015 |newspaper=The Washington Post}} The first known use in print was a description of Donovan's Brain by movie critic Jesse Zunser in January 1954.{{cite web |title=sci-fi n. |url=https://sfdictionary.com/view/210/sci-fi |website=Historical Dictionary of Science Fiction |access-date=31 March 2022}} As science fiction entered popular culture, writers and fans active in the field came to associate the term with low-budget, low-tech "B-movies" and with low-quality pulp science fiction.{{cite book |title=Neo-Fan's Guidebook |year=1987 |last=Whittier |first=Terry }}{{full citation needed|date=December 2019}}{{cite book|url=http://www.scalzi.com/whatever/003672.html|last=Scalzi|first=John|title=The Rough Guide to Sci-Fi Movies|year=2005|isbn=978-1-84353-520-1|publisher=Rough Guides|access-date=17 January 2007|archive-date=2 April 2009|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090402140935/http://scalzi.com/whatever/003672.html|url-status=live}}{{cite web | last = Ellison | first = Harlan | year = 1998 | url = http://harlanellison.com/text/parcon.txt | title = Harlan Ellison's responses to online fan questions at ParCon | access-date = 26 April 2006 | archive-date = 22 May 2015 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20150522223829/http://harlanellison.com/text/parcon.txt | url-status = live }} By the 1970s, critics within the field, such as Damon Knight and Terry Carr, were using "sci fi" to distinguish hack-work from serious science fiction.

Peter Nicholls writes that "SF" (or "sf") is "the preferred abbreviation within the community of sf writers and readers."

Robert Heinlein found even "science fiction" insufficient for certain types of works in this genre, and suggested the term speculative fiction to be used instead for those that are more "serious" or "thoughtful".{{cite web|url=http://www.openculture.com/2016/09/sci-fi-icon-robert-heinlein-lists-5-essential-rules-for-making-a-living-as-a-writer.html|title=Sci-Fi Icon Robert Heinlein Lists 5 Essential Rules for Making a Living as a Writer|date=29 September 2016|website=Open Culture|language=en-US|access-date=30 March 2019|archive-date=30 March 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190330082035/http://www.openculture.com/2016/09/sci-fi-icon-robert-heinlein-lists-5-essential-rules-for-making-a-living-as-a-writer.html|url-status=live}}

{{Main|History of science fiction|Timeline of science fiction}}

File:Bacon 1628 New Atlantis title page wpreview.png by Francis Bacon|upright=1.2]]

Some scholars assert that science fiction had its beginnings in ancient times, when the line between myth and fact was blurred.{{Cite web|url=https://www.news.gatech.edu/features/out-world|title=Out of This World|website=www.news.gatech.edu|access-date=4 April 2019|archive-date=4 April 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190404030543/https://www.news.gatech.edu/features/out-world|url-status=live}} Written in the 2nd century CE by the satirist Lucian, A True Story contains many themes and tropes characteristic of modern science fiction, including travel to other worlds, extraterrestrial lifeforms, interplanetary warfare, and artificial life. Some consider it the first science fiction novel.{{Cite web|title=S.C. Fredericks- Lucian's True History as SF|url=https://www.depauw.edu/sfs/backissues/8/fredericks8art.htm|access-date=29 December 2022|website=www.depauw.edu}} Some of the stories from The Arabian Nights, along with the 10th-century The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter and Ibn al-Nafis's 13th-century Theologus Autodidactus, are also argued to contain elements of science fiction.

Several books written during the Scientific Revolution and later the Age of Enlightenment are considered true works of science-fantasy. Francis Bacon's New Atlantis (1627), Johannes Kepler's Somnium (1634), Athanasius Kircher's Itinerarium extaticum (1656),{{cite journal|author=Jacqueline Glomski|title=Science Fiction in the Seventeenth Century: The Neo-Latin Somnium and its Relationship with the Vernacular|journal=Der Neulateinische Roman Als Medium Seiner Zeit|editor1=Stefan Walser|editor2=Isabella Tilg|publisher=BoD|year=2013|isbn=978-3-8233-6792-5|page=37|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=VdP6AAAAQBAJ&pg=PA37|access-date=4 June 2020|archive-date=15 April 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210415223242/https://books.google.com/books?id=VdP6AAAAQBAJ&pg=PA37|url-status=live}} Cyrano de Bergerac's Comical History of the States and Empires of the Moon (1657) and The States and Empires of the Sun (1662), Margaret Cavendish's "The Blazing World" (1666),{{cite journal|last=White|first=William|title=Science, Factions, and the Persistent Specter of War: Margaret Cavendish's Blazing World|journal=Intersect: The Stanford Journal of Science, Technology and Society|volume=2|issue=1|pages=40–51|date=September 2009|url=http://ojs.stanford.edu/ojs/index.php/intersect/article/view/53|access-date=7 March 2014|archive-date=27 December 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131227215240/http://ojs.stanford.edu/ojs/index.php/intersect/article/view/53|url-status=live}}{{cite book|first=Michael|last=Murphy|title=A Description of the Blazing World|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=SLDFLYFi8LYC|year=2011|publisher=Broadview Press|isbn=978-1-77048-035-3|access-date=7 November 2015|archive-date=6 May 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160506051153/https://books.google.com/books?id=SLDFLYFi8LYC|url-status=live}}{{cite web |url=http://skullsinthestars.com/2011/01/02/margaret-cavendishs-the-blazing-world-1666/ |title=Margaret Cavendish's The Blazing World (1666) |publisher=Skulls in the Stars |date=2 January 2011 |access-date=17 December 2015 |archive-date=12 December 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151212132331/http://skullsinthestars.com/2011/01/02/margaret-cavendishs-the-blazing-world-1666/ |url-status=live }}{{cite book|author=Robin Anne Reid|author-link=Robin Anne Reid|title=Women in Science Fiction and Fantasy: Overviews|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=jKr0jWY8FLkC&pg=RA1-PA59|year=2009|publisher=ABC-CLIO|isbn=978-0-313-33591-4|page=59}}{{Dead link|date=August 2023 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }} Jonathan Swift's Gulliver's Travels (1726), Ludvig Holberg's Nicolai Klimii Iter Subterraneum (1741) and Voltaire's Micromégas (1752).Khanna, Lee Cullen. "The Subject of Utopia: Margaret Cavendish and Her Blazing-World". Utopian and Science Fiction by Women: World of Difference. Syracuse: Syracuse UP, 1994. 15–34.

Isaac Asimov and Carl Sagan considered Johannes Kepler's Somnium the first science fiction story; it depicts a journey to the Moon and how the Earth's motion is seen from there.{{cite web |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lAVeTFin0mU |title=Carl Sagan on Johannes Kepler's persecution |date=21 February 2008 |publisher=YouTube |access-date=24 July 2010 |archive-date=29 November 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111129015805/http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lAVeTFin0mU&gl=US&hl=en |url-status=live }}{{Cite book|title=The Beginning and the End | first=Isaac| last=Asimov | publisher=Doubleday | location=New York | year=1977 | isbn=978-0-385-13088-2}} Kepler has been called the "father of science fiction".{{Cite web|url=https://www.bbvaopenmind.com/en/science/leading-figures/kepler-the-father-of-science-fiction/|title=Kepler, the Father of Science Fiction|date=16 November 2015|website=bbvaopenmind.com}}{{cite web|url=https://www.themarginalian.org/2019/12/26/katharina-kepler-witchcraft-dream/|title=How Kepler Invented Science Fiction and Defended His Mother in a Witchcraft Trial While Revolutionizing Our Understanding of the Universe|first=Maria|last=Popova|website=themarginalian.org|date=27 December 2019 }}

Following the 17th-century development of the novel as a literary form, Mary Shelley's Frankenstein (1818) and The Last Man (1826) helped define the form of the science fiction novel. Brian Aldiss has argued that Frankenstein was the first work of science fiction.{{cite encyclopedia |url=http://www.sfhomeworld.org/exhibits/homeworld/scifi_hof.asp?articleID=62 |title=Mary W. Shelley |encyclopedia=Encyclopedia of Science Fiction |first1=John |last1=Clute |first2=Peter |last2=Nicholls |name-list-style=amp |publisher=Orbit/Time Warner Book Group UK |year=1993 |access-date=17 January 2007 |archive-date=16 November 2006 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20061116075255/http://www.sfhomeworld.org/exhibits/homeworld/scifi_hof.asp?articleID=62 |url-status=live }}{{Cite book|title=Billion Year Spree: The History of Science Fiction (1973) Revised and expanded as Trillion Year Spree (with David Wingrove)(1986) |first=Aldriss|last=Wingrove|publisher=House of Stratus|location=New York|year= 2001 |isbn=978-0-7551-0068-2}} Edgar Allan Poe wrote several stories considered to be science fiction, including "The Unparalleled Adventure of One Hans Pfaall" (1835), which featured a trip to the Moon.Tresch, John (2002). "Extra! Extra! Poe invents science fiction". In Hayes, Kevin J. The Cambridge Companion to Edgar Allan Poe. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. pp. 113–132. {{ISBN|978-0-521-79326-1}}.

Jules Verne was noted for his attention to detail and scientific accuracy, especially in Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Seas (1870).{{citation|last=Roberts |first= Adam |isbn =978-0-415-19205-7|title= Science Fiction|publisher=Routledge|location=London |year= 2000|page=48}}{{citation|first=Maurice|last=Renard|url=http://www.depauw.edu/sfs/documents/renard.htm|title=On the Scientific-Marvelous Novel and Its Influence on the Understanding of Progress|journal=Science Fiction Studies|volume=21|issue=64|date=November 1994|pages=397–405 |doi=10.1525/sfs.21.3.0397 |access-date=25 January 2016|archive-date=12 November 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201112033252/https://www.depauw.edu/sfs/documents/renard.htm|url-status=live}}{{Cite magazine |last=Thomas |first=Theodore L. |date=December 1961 |title=The Watery Wonders of Captain Nemo |url=https://archive.org/stream/Galaxy_v20n02_1961-12_modified#page/n42/mode/1up |magazine=Galaxy Science Fiction |pages=168–177 }}{{cite web |url=http://www.newstatesman.com/2014/04/submarine-dreams |title=Submarine dreams: Jules Verne's Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Seas |work=New Statesman |author=Margaret Drabble |date=8 May 2014 |access-date=9 May 2014 |author-link=Margaret Drabble |archive-date=11 May 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140511122753/http://www.newstatesman.com/2014/04/submarine-dreams |url-status=live }} In 1887, the novel El anacronópete by Spanish author Enrique Gaspar y Rimbau introduced the first time machine.La obra narrativa de Enrique Gaspar: El Anacronópete (1887), María de los Ángeles Ayala, Universidad de Alicante. Del Romanticismo al Realismo : Actas del I Coloquio de la S. L. E. S. XIX, Barcelona, 24–26 October 1996 / edited by Luis F. Díaz Larios, Enrique Miralles.El anacronópete, English translation (2014), www.storypilot.com, Michael Main, accessed 13 April 2016 An early French/Belgian science fiction writer was J.-H. Rosny aîné (1856–1940). Rosny's masterpiece is Les Navigateurs de l'Infini (The Navigators of Infinity) (1925) in which the word astronaut, "astronautique", was used for the first time.{{Cite web|last1=Suffolk|first1=Alex|date=28 February 2012|title=Professor explores the work of a science fiction pioneer|url=https://www.highlandernews.org/2016/professor-explores-the-work-of-a-science-fiction-pioneer/|access-date=25 January 2023|website=Highlander|language=en-US}}Arthur B. Evans (1988). [https://scholarship.depauw.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1014&context=mlang_facpubs Science Fiction vs. Scientific Fiction in France: From Jules Verne to J.-H. Rosny Aîné (La science-fiction contre la fiction scientifique en France; De Jules Verne à J.-H. Rosny aìné)] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221228155211/https://scholarship.depauw.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1014&context=mlang_facpubs |date=28 December 2022 }}. In: Science fiction studies, vol. 15, no. 1, p. 1-11.

File:The War of the Worlds by Henrique Alvim Corrêa, original graphic 15.jpg featured in H. G. Wells' 1897 novel The War of the Worlds, as illustrated by Henrique Alvim Corrêa.]]

Many critics consider H. G. Wells one of science fiction's most important authors,{{cite book | last= Siegel| first= Mark Richard| year=1988 | title=Hugo Gernsback, Father of Modern Science Fiction: With Essays on Frank Herbert and Bram Stoker | publisher=Borgo Pr | isbn=978-0-89370-174-1}} or even "the Shakespeare of science fiction".{{cite book|last1=Wagar|first1=W. Warren |title=H.G. Wells: Traversing Time|date=2004|publisher=Wesleyan University Press|page=7}} His works include The Time Machine (1895), The Island of Doctor Moreau (1896), The Invisible Man (1897), and The War of the Worlds (1898). His science fiction imagined alien invasion, biological engineering, invisibility, and time travel. In his non-fiction futurologist works he predicted the advent of airplanes, military tanks, nuclear weapons, satellite television, space travel, and something resembling the World Wide Web.{{cite news|title=HG Wells: A visionary who should be remembered for his social predictions, not just his scientific ones|url=https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/hg-wells-a-visionary-who-should-be-remembered-for-his-social-predictions-not-just-his-scientific-a7320486.html|newspaper=The Independent|date=8 October 2017|access-date=2 February 2018|archive-date=18 March 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200318183227/https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/hg-wells-a-visionary-who-should-be-remembered-for-his-social-predictions-not-just-his-scientific-a7320486.html|url-status=live}}

Edgar Rice Burroughs's A Princess of Mars, published in 1912, was the first of his three-decade-long planetary romance series of Barsoom novels, which were set on Mars and featured John Carter as the hero.Porges, Irwin (1975). Edgar Rice Burroughs. Provo, Utah: Brigham Young University Press. {{ISBN|0-8425-0079-0}}. These novels were predecessors to YA novels, and drew inspiration from European science fiction and American Western novels.{{Cite web |title=Science fiction |url=https://www.britannica.com/art/science-fiction |access-date=24 April 2023 |publisher=Encyclopedia Britannica |language=en}}

In 1924, We by Russian writer Yevgeny Zamyatin, one of the first dystopian novels, was published.Brown, p. xi, citing Shane, gives 1921. Russell, p. 3, dates the first draft to 1919. It describes a world of harmony and conformity within a united totalitarian state. It influenced the emergence of dystopia as a literary genre.{{cite journal |last1=Orwell |first1=George |title=Review of WE by E. I. Zamyatin |journal=Tribune |date=4 January 1946 |location=London |url=https://www.orwell.ru/library/reviews/zamyatin/english/ |via=Orwell.ru}}

In 1926, Hugo Gernsback published the first American science fiction magazine, Amazing Stories. In its first issue he wrote:

{{bquote|By 'scientifiction' I mean the Jules Verne, H. G. Wells and Edgar Allan Poe type of story—a charming romance intermingled with scientific fact and prophetic vision... Not only do these amazing tales make tremendously interesting reading—they are always instructive. They supply knowledge... in a very palatable form... New adventures pictured for us in the scientifiction of today are not at all impossible of realization tomorrow... Many great science stories destined to be of historical interest are still to be written... Posterity will point to them as having blazed a new trail, not only in literature and fiction, but progress as well.Originally published in the April 1926 issue of Amazing StoriesQuoted in [1993] in: {{cite encyclopedia|last=Stableford|first=Brian|author-link=Brian Stableford|author2=Clute, John |author3-link=Peter Nicholls (writer)|author3=Nicholls, Peter|year=1993|title=Definitions of SF|encyclopedia=Encyclopedia of Science Fiction|pages= 311–314|editor=Clute, John |editor2=Nicholls, Peter|publisher=Orbit/Little, Brown and Company|location= London|isbn=978-1-85723-124-3|author2-link=John Clute}}Edwards, Malcolm J.; Nicholls, Peter (1995). "SF Magazines". In John Clute and Peter Nicholls. The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction (Updated ed.). New York: St Martin's Griffin. p. 1066. {{ISBN|0-312-09618-6}}.}}

In 1928, E. E. "Doc" Smith's first published work, The Skylark of Space, written in collaboration with Lee Hawkins Garby, appeared in Amazing Stories. It is often called the first great space opera.{{cite book|last1=Dozois|first1=Gardner|author-link=Gardner Dozois|last2=Strahan|first2=Jonathan|author-link2=Jonathan Strahan|title=The New Space Opera|date=2007|publisher=Eos|location=New York|isbn=978-0-06-084675-6|edition=1st|page=[https://archive.org/details/newspaceopera2al00gard/page/2 2]|title-link=The New Space Opera}} The same year, Philip Francis Nowlan's original Buck Rogers story, Armageddon 2419, also appeared in Amazing Stories. This was followed by a Buck Rogers comic strip, the first serious science fiction comic.{{Cite encyclopedia|author=Roberts, Garyn G. |year=2001 |title=Buck Rogers |editor=Browne, Ray B. |editor2=Browne, Pat |encyclopedia=The Guide To United States Popular Culture |location=Bowling Green, Ohio |publisher=Bowling Green State University Popular Press |page=120 |isbn=978-0-87972-821-2}}

Last and First Men: A Story of the Near and Far Future is a "future history" science fiction novel written in 1930 by the British author Olaf Stapledon. A work of unprecedented scale in the genre, it describes the history of humanity from the present onwards across two billion years.{{cite web|url=http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/books/last-and-first-man-of-vision/161949.article|title=Last and first man of vision|publisher=Times Higher Education|date=23 January 1995|access-date=1 October 2014}}

In 1937, John W. Campbell became editor of Astounding Science Fiction, an event that is sometimes considered the beginning of the Golden Age of Science Fiction, which was characterized by stories celebrating scientific achievement and progress.{{cite web |last1=Nichols |first1=Peter |last2=Ashley |first2=Mike |title=Golden Age of SF |url=https://sf-encyclopedia.com/entry/golden_age_of_sf |access-date=17 November 2022 |date=23 June 2021 |publisher=The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction}} The "Golden Age" is often said to have ended in 1946, but sometimes the late 1940s and the 1950s are included.Nicholls, Peter (1981) The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction, Granada, p. 258

In 1942, Isaac Asimov started his Foundation series, which chronicles the rise and fall of galactic empires and introduced psychohistory.{{cite book|last1=Codex|first1=Regius|title=From Robots to Foundations |publisher=CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform |date=2014|location=Wiesbaden/Ljubljana|isbn=978-1-4995-6982-7}}{{cite book|title= In Joy Still Felt: The Autobiography of Isaac Asimov, 1954–1978|last= Asimov|first= Isaac|date= 1980|publisher= Doubleday|location= Garden City, New York|isbn= 978-0-385-15544-1|at= [https://archive.org/details/injoystillfelt00isaa/page/ chapter 24]|url= https://archive.org/details/injoystillfelt00isaa/page/}} The series was later awarded a one-time Hugo Award for "Best All-Time Series".{{cite web| url=http://www.thehugoawards.org/hugo-history/1966-hugo-awards/| title=1966 Hugo Awards| publisher=Hugo Award| website=thehugoawards.org| date=26 July 2007| access-date=28 July 2017| archive-date=7 May 2011| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110507072919/http://www.thehugoawards.org/hugo-history/1966-hugo-awards/| url-status=live}}{{cite web| url=http://www.nesfa.org/data/LL/Hugos/hugos1966.html| title=The Long List of Hugo Awards, 1966| access-date=28 July 2017| publisher=New England Science Fiction Association| archive-date=3 April 2016| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160403182439/http://www.nesfa.org/data/LL/Hugos/hugos1966.html| url-status=live}} Theodore Sturgeon's More Than Human (1953) explored possible future human evolution."Time and Space", Hartford Courant, 7 February 1954, p.SM19{{Cite web|title=Reviews: November 1975|url=https://www.depauw.edu/sfs/birs/bir7.htm|access-date=29 December 2022|website=www.depauw.edu}}Aldiss & Wingrove, Trillion Year Spree, Victor Gollancz, 1986, p.237 In 1957, Andromeda: A Space-Age Tale by the Russian writer and paleontologist Ivan Yefremov presented a view of a future interstellar communist civilization and is considered one of the most important Soviet science fiction novels.{{cite web |website=Serg's Home Page |url=http://www.astro.spbu.ru/staff/serg/interests/literature/efremov/list.html |title=Ivan Efremov's works |access-date=8 September 2006 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20030429172915/http://www.astro.spbu.ru/staff/serg/interests/literature/efremov/list.html |archive-date=29 April 2003 }}{{cite web|url=http://rusf.ru/abs/int0099.htm|title=OFF-LINE интервью с Борисом Стругацким|date=December 2006|publisher=Russian Science Fiction & Fantasy|access-date=29 February 2016|language=ru|trans-title=OFF-LINE interview with Boris Strugatsky|archive-date=4 March 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304032338/http://www.rusf.ru/abs/int0099.htm|url-status=live}}

In 1959, Robert A. Heinlein's Starship Troopers marked a departure from his earlier juvenile stories and novels.{{Cite magazine |last=Gale |first=Floyd C. |date=October 1960 |title=Galaxy's 5 Star Shelf |url=https://archive.org/stream/Galaxy_v19n01_1960-10#page/n71/mode/1up |magazine=Galaxy Science Fiction |pages=142–146}} It is one of the first and most influential examples of military science fiction,{{cite news|last1=McMillan|first1=Graeme|title=Why 'Starship Troopers' May Be Too Controversial to Adapt Faithfully|url=https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/heat-vision/starship-troopers-may-be-controversial-adapt-faithfully-944083|access-date=8 May 2017|work=Hollywood Reporter|date=3 November 2016|archive-date=10 May 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170510151832/http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/heat-vision/starship-troopers-may-be-controversial-adapt-faithfully-944083|url-status=live}}{{cite news|last1=Liptak|first1=Andrew|title=Four things that we want to see in the Starship Troopers reboot|url=https://www.theverge.com/2016/11/3/13511716/starship-troopers-reboot-things-we-want-to-see|access-date=9 May 2017|work=The Verge|date=3 November 2016|archive-date=8 March 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210308213929/https://www.theverge.com/2016/11/3/13511716/starship-troopers-reboot-things-we-want-to-see|url-status=live}} and introduced the concept of powered armor exoskeletons.{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Zao2IFNhvQkC|title=Intersections: Fantasy and Science Fiction Alternatives|date=1987|publisher=Southern Illinois University Press|isbn=978-0-8093-1374-7|location=Carbondale, Illinois|pages=210–220|last1=Slusser|first1=George E.|access-date=3 February 2018|archive-date=22 March 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190322195108/https://books.google.com/books?id=Zao2IFNhvQkC|url-status=live}}{{cite journal|last1=Mikołajewska|first1=Emilia|last2=Mikołajewski|first2=Dariusz|date=May 2013|title=Exoskeletons in Neurological Diseases – Current and Potential Future Applications|url=https://www.researchgate.net/publication/229012056|journal=Advances in Clinical and Experimental Medicine|volume=20|issue=2|pages=228 Fig. 2|access-date=3 February 2018|archive-date=3 April 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200403142703/https://www.researchgate.net/publication/229012056_Exoskeletons_in_Neurological_Diseases-Current_and_Potential_Future_Applications|url-status=live}}{{cite web| url=http://www.sciencenews.org/articles/20010630/bob8.asp| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060116201552/http://www.sciencenews.org/articles/20010630/bob8.asp| archive-date=16 January 2006| title=Dances with Robots| publisher=Science News Online| access-date=4 March 2006| first=Peter| last=Weiss}} The German space opera series Perry Rhodan, written by various authors, started in 1961 with an account of the first Moon landing{{cite web|url=https://www.perrypedia.proc.org/wiki/Unternehmen_Stardust|title=Unternehmen Stardust – Perrypedia|website=www.perrypedia.proc.org|language=de|access-date=30 March 2019|archive-date=30 March 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190330062254/https://www.perrypedia.proc.org/wiki/Unternehmen_Stardust|url-status=live}} and has since expanded in space to multiple universes, and in time by billions of years.{{cite web|url=https://www.perrypedia.proc.org/wiki/Der_Unsterbliche|title=Der Unsterbliche – Perrypedia|website=www.perrypedia.proc.org|language=de|access-date=30 March 2019|archive-date=30 March 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190330062247/https://www.perrypedia.proc.org/wiki/Der_Unsterbliche|url-status=live}} It has become the most popular science fiction book series of all time.Mike Ashley (14 May 2007). Gateways to Forever: The Story of the Science-Fiction Magazines from 1970–1980. Liverpool University Press. p. 218. {{ISBN|978-1-84631-003-4}}.

In the 1960s and 1970s, New Wave science fiction was known for its embrace of a high degree of experimentation, both in form and in content, and a highbrow and self-consciously "literary" or "artistic" sensibility.{{cite book|title=Fiction 2000|first=Carol|last=McGuirk|section=The 'New' Romancers|editor1-first=George Edgar|editor1-last=Slusser|editor2-first=T. A.|editor2-last=Shippey|publisher=University of Georgia Press|year=1992|isbn=978-0-8203-1449-5|pages=[https://archive.org/details/fiction2000cyber0000unse/page/109 109–125]|url=https://archive.org/details/fiction2000cyber0000unse/page/109}}{{cite book|title=The Generation Starship in Science Fiction|first=Simone|last=Caroti |publisher= McFarland|year=2011|isbn=978-0-7864-8576-5|page=156}}

In 1961, Solaris by Stanisław Lem was published in Poland.Peter Swirski (ed), The Art and Science of Stanislaw Lem, McGill-Queen's University Press, 2008, {{ISBN |0-7735-3047-9}} The novel dealt with the theme of human limitations as its characters attempted to study a seemingly intelligent ocean on a newly discovered planet.Stanislaw Lem, Fantastyka i Futuriologia, Wedawnictwo Literackie, 1989, vol. 2, p. 365Benét's Reader's Encyclopedia, fourth edition (1996), p. 590. Lem's work anticipated the creation of microrobots and micromachinery, nanotechnology, smartdust, virtual reality, and artificial intelligence (including swarm intelligence), as well as developing the ideas of "necroevolution" and the creation of artificial worlds.{{cite web|url=http://solaris.lem.pl/o-lemie/artykuly/60-artykuly/232-artykul-fialkowski|title=Stanisław Lem czyli życie spełnione|first=Tomasz|last=Fiałkowski|publisher=Lem.pl|website=solaris.lem.pl|language=pl|access-date=2024-09-28|archive-date=29 April 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150429165334/http://solaris.lem.pl/o-lemie/artykuly/60-artykuly/232-artykul-fialkowski|url-status=live}}{{cite book|last=Oramus|first=Marek|author-link=Marek Oramus|date=2006|title=Bogowie Lema|location=Przeźmierowo|publisher=Wydawnictwo Kurpisz|isbn=9788389738929}}{{cite web|url=https://solaris.lem.pl/ksiazki/beletrystyka/niezwyciezony/96-poslowie-niezwyciezony|title=Cały ten złom|first=Jerzy|last=Jarzębski|publisher=Lem.pl|website=solaris.lem.pl|language=pl|access-date=2024-09-28}}{{cite web|url=https://www.polityka.pl/tygodnikpolityka/kultura/1655752,1,fantomowe-wszechswiaty-lema-staja-sie-rzeczywistoscia.read|title=Fantomowe wszechświaty Lema stają się rzeczywistością|first=Olaf|last=Szewczyk|publisher=Polityka|website=polityka.pl|language=pl|access-date=2024-09-28|date=2016-03-29}}

In 1965, Dune by Frank Herbert featured a much more complex and detailed imagined future society than had previously in most science fiction.{{cite book |last=Roberts |first=Adam |title=Science Fiction |location= New York |publisher=Routledge |date=2000 |pages=85–90 |isbn=978-0-415-19204-0}} In 1967 Anne McCaffrey began her Dragonriders of Pern science fantasy series.Dragonriders of Pern, ISFDB. Two of the novellas included in the first novel, Dragonflight, made McCaffrey the first woman to win a Hugo or Nebula Award.Publishers Weekly review of Robin Roberts, Anne McCaffrey: A Life with Dragons (2007). [https://www.amazon.com/dp/157806998X Quoted by Amazon.com] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210601043508/https://www.amazon.com/dp/157806998X |date=1 June 2021 }}. Retrieved 16 July 2011.

In 1968, Philip K. Dick's Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? was published. It is the literary source of the Blade Runner movie franchise.Sammon, Paul M. (1996). Future Noir: the Making of Blade Runner. London: Orion Media. p. 49. {{ISBN|0-06-105314-7}}.{{cite web|url=https://www.chicagotribune.com/lifestyles/books/ct-books-blade-runner-2049-philip-k-dick-20171019-story.html|title='Blade Runner 2049': How does Philip K. Dick's vision hold up?|last=Wolfe|first=Gary K.|website=chicagotribune.com|date=23 October 2017 |language=en-US|access-date=30 March 2019|archive-date=30 March 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190330062247/https://www.chicagotribune.com/lifestyles/books/ct-books-blade-runner-2049-philip-k-dick-20171019-story.html|url-status=live}} In 1969, The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin was set on a planet in which the inhabitants have no fixed gender. It is one of the most influential examples of social science fiction, feminist science fiction, and anthropological science fiction.Stover, Leon E. "Anthropology and Science Fiction" Current Anthropology, Vol. 14, No. 4 (Oct. 1973)Reid, Suzanne Elizabeth (1997). Presenting Ursula Le Guin. New York, New York, USA: Twayne. {{ISBN|978-0-8057-4609-9}}, pp=9, 120Spivack, Charlotte (1984). Ursula K. Le Guin (1st ed.). Boston, Massachusetts, USA: Twayne Publishers. {{ISBN|978-0-8057-7393-4}}., pp=44–50

In 1979, Science Fiction World began publication in the People's Republic of China.{{Cite web|url=http://www.china.org.cn/english/culture/40079.htm|title=Brave New World of Chinese Science Fiction|website=www.china.org.cn|access-date=26 April 2018|archive-date=21 June 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180621155325/http://www.china.org.cn/english/culture/40079.htm|url-status=live}} It dominates the Chinese science fiction magazine market, at one time claiming a circulation of 300,000 copies per issue and an estimated 3–5 readers per copy (giving it a total estimated readership of at least 1 million), making it the world's most popular science fiction periodical.{{cite web|url=http://www.concatenation.org/articles/sf~china.html|title=Science Fiction, Globalization, and the People's Republic of China|website=www.concatenation.org|access-date=26 April 2018|archive-date=27 April 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180427005238/http://www.concatenation.org/articles/sf~china.html|url-status=live}}

In 1984, William Gibson's first novel, Neuromancer, helped popularize cyberpunk and the word "cyberspace", a term he originally coined in his 1982 short story Burning Chrome.Fitting, Peter (July 1991). "The Lessons of Cyberpunk". In Penley, C.; Ross, A. Technoculture. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. pp. 295–315{{cite magazine |last=Schactman |first=Noah |magazine=Wired |title=26 Years After Gibson, Pentagon Defines 'Cyberspace' |url=http://blog.wired.com/defense/2008/05/pentagon-define.html |date=23 May 2008 |access-date=28 February 2018 |archive-date=14 September 2008 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080914151043/http://blog.wired.com/defense/2008/05/pentagon-define.html |url-status=live }} In the same year, Octavia Butler's short story "Speech Sounds" won the Hugo Award for Short Story. She went on to explore in her work of racial injustice, global warming, women's rights, and political conflict.Pfeiffer, John R. "Butler, Octavia Estelle (b. 1947)." in Richard Bleiler (ed.), Science Fiction Writers: Critical Studies of the Major Authors from the Early Nineteenth Century to the Present Day, 2nd edn. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1999. 147–158. In 1995, she became the first science-fiction author to receive a MacArthur Fellowship.{{Cite web |title=Octavia Butler |url=https://www.macfound.org/fellows/class-of-1995/octavia-butler |access-date=2024-12-06 |website=www.macfound.org |language=en}} In 1986, Shards of Honor by Lois McMaster Bujold began her Vorkosigan Saga.{{cite web |url=http://www.tor.com/blogs/2009/03/weeping-for-her-enemies-lois-mcmaster-bujolds-shards-of-honor |title=Weeping for her enemies: Lois McMaster Bujold's Shards of Honor |first=Jo |last=Walton |author-link=Jo Walton |website=Tor.com |date=31 March 2009 |access-date=9 September 2014 |archive-date=11 September 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140911001835/http://www.tor.com/blogs/2009/03/weeping-for-her-enemies-lois-mcmaster-bujolds-shards-of-honor |url-status=live }}{{Cite web|title=Loud Achievements: Lois McMaster Bujold's Science Fiction|url=http://www.dendarii.com/reviews/kelso.html|access-date=29 December 2022|website=www.dendarii.com}} 1992's Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson predicted immense social upheaval due to the information revolution.{{cite web |url=http://www.barnesandnoble.com/review/neal-stephenson-anathem/ |quote=I'd had a similar reaction to yours when I'd first read The Origin of Consciousness and the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind, and that, combined with the desire to use IT, were two elements from which Snow Crash grew. |title=Interviews – Neal Stephenson: Anathem – A Conversation with James Mustich, Editor-in-Chief of the Barnes & Noble Review |first=James |last=Mustich |date=13 October 2008 |access-date=6 August 2014 |publisher=barnesandnoble.com |archive-date=11 August 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140811203104/http://www.barnesandnoble.com/review/neal-stephenson-anathem/ |url-status=live }}

In 2007, Liu Cixin's novel, The Three-Body Problem, was published in China. It was translated into English by Ken Liu and published by Tor Books in 2014,{{cite web|url=https://kenliu.name/translations/three-body/|title=Three Body|date=23 January 2015|website=Ken Liu, Writer|language=en-US|access-date=30 March 2019|archive-date=30 March 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190330064637/https://kenliu.name/translations/three-body/|url-status=live}} and won the 2015 Hugo Award for Best Novel,{{cite web|url=http://www.thehugoawards.org/hugo-history/2015-hugo-awards/|title=2015 Hugo Awards|first=Ed|last=Benson|date=31 March 2015|access-date=26 April 2018|archive-date=9 May 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200509050008/http://www.thehugoawards.org/hugo-history/2015-hugo-awards/|url-status=live}} making Liu the first Asian writer to win the award.{{Cite web|date=24 August 2015|title=Out of this world: Chinese sci-fi author Liu Cixin is Asia's first writer to win Hugo award for best novel|url=https://www.scmp.com/news/china/society/article/1851952/out-world-chinese-sci-fi-author-liu-cixin-asias-first-writer-win|access-date=29 December 2022|website=South China Morning Post|language=en}}

Emerging themes in late 20th and early 21st century science fiction include environmental issues, the implications of the Internet and the expanding information universe, questions about biotechnology, nanotechnology, and post-scarcity societies.{{cite web|url=https://io9.gizmodo.com/10-recent-science-fiction-books-that-are-about-big-idea-5929436|title=10 Recent Science Fiction Books That Are About Big Ideas|last=Anders|first=Charlie Jane|website=io9|date=27 July 2012 |language=en-US|access-date=30 March 2019|archive-date=30 March 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190330064638/https://io9.gizmodo.com/10-recent-science-fiction-books-that-are-about-big-idea-5929436|url-status=live}}{{cite web|url=https://www.studienet.dk/science-fiction/21st-century|title=Science fiction in the 21st century|website=www.studienet.dk|access-date=30 March 2019|archive-date=30 March 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190330064635/https://www.studienet.dk/science-fiction/21st-century|url-status=live}} Recent trends and subgenres include steampunk,{{cite news|last=Bebergal|first=Peter|date=26 August 2007|title=The age of steampunk:Nostalgia meets the future, joined carefully with brass screws|work=The Boston Globe|url=https://www.boston.com/news/globe/ideas/articles/2007/08/26/the_age_of_steampunk/?page=full|access-date=20 February 2020|archive-date=5 March 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160305071134/http://www.boston.com/news/globe/ideas/articles/2007/08/26/the_age_of_steampunk/?page=full|url-status=live}} biopunk,{{cite book| author = Pulver, David L. | title = GURPS Bio-Tech| publisher=Steve Jackson Games | year=1998 | isbn=978-1-55634-336-0| author-link= David L. Pulver| title-link = GURPS Bio-Tech}}{{cite journal|url=http://journal.media-culture.org.au/0006/biopunk.php|title=Fleshing Out the Maelstrom: Biopunk and the Violence of Information|author=Paul Taylor|journal=M/C Journal|date=June 2000|volume=3|issue=3|publisher=Journal of Media and Culture|doi=10.5204/mcj.1853|access-date=28 February 2018|archive-date=17 June 2005|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20050617065150/http://journal.media-culture.org.au/0006/biopunk.php|url-status=live|doi-access=free| issn = 1441-2616}} and mundane science fiction.{{cite news | title=How sci-fi moves with the times | url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/sci/tech/7948058.stm | date=18 March 2009 | newspaper=BBC News | access-date=28 February 2018 | archive-date=28 February 2018 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180228164140/http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/sci/tech/7948058.stm | url-status=live }}{{cite news |last=Walter |first=Damien |date=2 May 2008 |title=The really exciting science fiction is boring |url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2008/may/02/thereallyexcitingsciencefi |newspaper=The Guardian |access-date=28 February 2018 |archive-date=27 January 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180127143301/https://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2008/may/02/thereallyexcitingsciencefi |url-status=live }}

{{Main|Science fiction film|Lists of science fiction films}}

File:Maria from the film Metropolis, on display at the Robot Hall of Fame.jpg from Metropolis]]

The first, or at least one of the first, recorded science fiction film is 1902's A Trip to the Moon, directed by French filmmaker Georges Méliès.{{citation|last1=Dixon|first1=Wheeler Winston|last2=Foster|first2=Gwendolyn Audrey|title=A Short History of Film|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=FP9w48VwwVUC&pg=PA12|year=2008|publisher=Rutgers University Press|isbn=978-0-8135-4475-5|page=12|access-date=19 December 2017|archive-date=22 March 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190322195116/https://books.google.com/books?id=FP9w48VwwVUC&pg=PA12|url-status=live}} It was influential on later filmmakers, bringing a different kind of creativity and fantasy.{{cite web|url=http://moviessilently.com/2015/03/29/a-trip-to-the-moon-1902-a-silent-film-review/|title=A Trip to the Moon (1902) A Silent Film Review|last=Kramer|first=Fritzi|date=29 March 2015|website=Movies Silently|language=en|access-date=30 March 2019|archive-date=30 March 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190330070347/http://moviessilently.com/2015/03/29/a-trip-to-the-moon-1902-a-silent-film-review/|url-status=live}}{{cite web|url=https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/a-trip-to-the-moon-as-youve-never-seen-it-before-68360402/|title=A Trip to the Moon as You've Never Seen it Before|last=Eagan|first=Daniel|website=Smithsonian|language=en|access-date=30 March 2019|archive-date=30 March 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190330070344/https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/a-trip-to-the-moon-as-youve-never-seen-it-before-68360402/|url-status=live}} Méliès's innovative editing and special effects techniques were widely imitated and became important elements of the cinematic medium.{{citation|last=Schneider|first=Steven Jay|title=1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die 2012|date=1 October 2012|publisher=Octopus Publishing Group|isbn=978-1-84403-733-9|page=20}}{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=FP9w48VwwVUC&pg=PA13|title=A Short History of Film|last1=Dixon|first1=Wheeler Winston|last2=Foster|first2=Gwendolyn Audrey|date=1 March 2008|publisher=Rutgers University Press|isbn=978-0-8135-4475-5|language=en|access-date=28 October 2020|archive-date=15 April 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210415235100/https://books.google.com/books?id=FP9w48VwwVUC&pg=PA13|url-status=live}}

1927's Metropolis, directed by Fritz Lang, is the first feature-length science fiction film.[http://www.scififilmhistory.com/index.php?pageID=metro SciFi Film History – Metropolis (1927)] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171010074916/http://www.scififilmhistory.com/index.php?pageID=metro |date=10 October 2017 }} – Though most agree that the first science fiction film was Georges Méliès' A Trip to the Moon (1902), Metropolis (1926) is the first feature length outing of the genre. (scififilmhistory.com, retrieved 15 May 2013) Though not well received in its time,{{cite web|url=https://www.tcm.com/this-month/article/25817|title=Metropolis|website=Turner Classic Movies|access-date=30 March 2019|archive-date=16 March 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140316012144/http://www.tcm.com/this-month/article/25817%7C0/Metropolis.html|url-status=live}} it is now considered a great and influential film.{{cite web|title =The 100 Best Films of World Cinema|url = https://www.empireonline.com/movies/features/100-greatest-world-cinema-films/ | publisher=empireonline.com |access-date =17 February 2016|archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20151123004145/http://www.empireonline.com/movies/features/100-greatest-world-cinema-films/ |archive-date=23 November 2015|date = 11 June 2010 }}{{cite web|title =The Top 100 Silent Era Films|url = http://www.silentera.com/info/top100.html | publisher=silentera.com |access-date =17 February 2016|archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20000823024001/http://www.silentera.com/info/top100.html |archive-date=23 August 2000}}{{cite web| url= http://www.bfi.org.uk/news/50-greatest-films-all-time| title= The Top 50 Greatest Films of All Time| date= 1 August 2012| work= Sight & Sound September 2012 issue| publisher= British Film Institute| access-date= 19 December 2012| archive-date= 1 March 2017| archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20170301135739/http://www.bfi.org.uk/news/50-greatest-films-all-time}}

In 1954, Godzilla, directed by Ishirō Honda, began the kaiju subgenre of science fiction film, which feature large creatures of any form, usually attacking a major city or engaging other monsters in battle.{{cite web|url=http://dic.pixiv.net/a/%E6%80%AA%E7%8D%A3|title=Introduction to Kaiju [in Japanese]|publisher=dic-pixiv|access-date=9 March 2017|archive-date=18 February 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170218180925/http://dic.pixiv.net/a/%E6%80%AA%E7%8D%A3|url-status=live}}{{cite journal|url=http://ci.nii.ac.jp/naid/110007480367|title=A Study of Chinese monster culture – Mysterious animals that proliferates in present age media [in Japanese]|journal=北海学園大学学園論集|volume=141|pages=91–121|publisher=Hokkai-Gakuen University|date=September 2009|access-date=9 March 2017|last1=中根|first1=研一|archive-date=12 March 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170312035449/http://ci.nii.ac.jp/naid/110007480367|url-status=live}}

1968's 2001: A Space Odyssey, directed by Stanley Kubrick and based on the work of Arthur C. Clarke, rose above the mostly B-movie offerings up to that time both in scope and quality, and influenced later science fiction films.{{cite web |last=Kazan |first=Casey |url=http://www.dailygalaxy.com/my_weblog/2009/07/ridley-scott-science-fiction-is-dead.html |title=Ridley Scott: "After 2001 -A Space Odyssey, Science Fiction is Dead" |publisher=Dailygalaxy.com |date=10 July 2009 |access-date= 22 August 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110321121445/http://www.dailygalaxy.com/my_weblog/2009/07/ridley-scott-science-fiction-is-dead.html |archive-date= 21 March 2011 }}In Focus on the Science Fiction Film, edited by William Johnson. Englewood Cliff, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1972.{{cite web|first = George D.|last = DeMet|url = http://www.palantir.net/2001/meanings/essay09.html|title = 2001: A Space Odyssey Internet Resource Archive: The Search for Meaning in 2001|work = Palantir.net (originally an undergrad honors thesis)|access-date = 22 August 2010|archive-date = 26 April 2011|archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20110426050647/http://www.palantir.net/2001/meanings/essay09.html|url-status = live}}{{cite web |url=http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/sciencenotfiction/2009/04/02/this-day-in-science-fiction-history-2001-a-space-odyssey/ |title=This Day in Science Fiction History – 2001: A Space Odyssey |website=Discover Magazine |date=2 April 2009 |first=Stephen |last=Cass |access-date=19 December 2017 |archive-date=28 March 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100328142257/http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/sciencenotfiction/2009/04/02/this-day-in-science-fiction-history-2001-a-space-odyssey/ |url-status=live }}

That same year, Planet of the Apes (the original), directed by Franklin J. Schaffner and based on the 1963 French novel La Planète des Singes by Pierre Boulle, was released to popular and critical acclaim, its vivid depiction of a post-apocalyptic world in which intelligent apes dominate humans.Russo, Joe; Landsman, Larry; Gross, Edward (2001). Planet of the Apes Revisited: The Behind-The Scenes Story of the Classic Science Fiction Saga (1st ed.). New York: Thomas Dunne Books/St. Martin's Griffin. {{ISBN|0-312-25239-0}}.

In 1977, George Lucas began the Star Wars film series with the film now identified as "Star Wars: Episode IV – A New Hope."{{Citation|title=Star Wars: Episode IV – A New Hope (1977) – IMDb|url=http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0076759/faq|access-date=30 March 2019|archive-date=9 April 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190409004826/https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0076759/faq|url-status=live}} The series, often called a space opera,{{Cite web|url=https://www.ign.com/articles/2018/04/24/the-best-space-operas-that-arent-star-wars|title=The Best Space Operas (That Aren't Star Wars)|last=Bibbiani|first=William|date=24 April 2018|website=IGN|language=en-US|access-date=5 April 2019|archive-date=13 August 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190813213353/https://www.ign.com/articles/2018/04/24/the-best-space-operas-that-arent-star-wars|url-status=live}} went on to become a worldwide popular culture phenomenon,{{cite web | url = https://www.the-numbers.com/movies/series/StarWars.php | title = Star Wars – Box Office History | publisher = The Numbers | access-date = 17 June 2010 | archive-date = 22 August 2013 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20130822054739/http://www.the-numbers.com/movies/franchise/Star-Wars | url-status = live }}{{cite web|url=https://www.lucasfilm.com/productions/episode-iv/|title=Star Wars Episode 4: A New Hope {{!}} Lucasfilm.com|website=Lucasfilm|language=en-US|access-date=30 March 2019|archive-date=30 March 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190330072220/https://www.lucasfilm.com/productions/episode-iv/|url-status=live}} and the third-highest-grossing film series of all time.{{cite web|url=https://www.boxofficemojo.com/franchises/?view=Franchise&sort=sumgross&order=DESC&p=.htm|title=Movie Franchises and Brands Index|website=www.boxofficemojo.com|access-date=30 March 2019|archive-date=20 July 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130720054339/http://www.boxofficemojo.com/franchises/?view=Franchise&sort=sumgross&order=DESC&p=.htm|url-status=live}}

Since the 1980s, science fiction films, along with fantasy, horror, and superhero films, have dominated Hollywood's big-budget productions.

Escape Velocity: American Science Fiction Film, 1950–1982, Bradley Schauer, Wesleyan University Press, 3 January 2017, page 7 Science fiction films often "cross-over" with other genres, including film noir (Blade Runner - 1982), family film (E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial - 1982), war film (Enemy Mine - 1985), comedy (Spaceballs - 1987, Galaxy Quest - 1999), animation (WALL-E – 2008, Big Hero 6 – 2014), Western (Serenity – 2005), action (Edge of Tomorrow – 2014, The Matrix – 1999), adventure (Jupiter Ascending – 2015, Interstellar – 2014), mystery (Minority Report – 2002), thriller (Ex Machina – 2014), drama (Melancholia – 2011, Predestination – 2014), and romance (Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind – 2004, Her – 2013).Science Fiction Film: A Critical Introduction, Keith M. Johnston, Berg, 9 May 2013, pages 24–25. Some of the examples are given by this book.

{{Main|Science fiction on television|List of science fiction television programs}}

File:Al Hodge Don Hastings Captain Video.JPG|left]]

Science fiction and television have consistently been in a close relationship. Television or television-like technologies frequently appeared in science fiction long before television itself became widely available in the late 1940s and early 1950s.

Science Fiction TV, J. P. Telotte, Routledge, 26 March 2014, pages 112, 179

The first known science fiction television program was a thirty-five-minute adapted excerpt of the play RUR, written by the Czech playwright Karel Čapek, broadcast live from the BBC's Alexandra Palace studios on 11 February 1938.{{cite book |last=Telotte |first=J. P. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=cFQicvXd5bwC&q=RUR+BBC+first+television+science+fiction&pg=PA210 |title=The essential science fiction television reader |publisher=University Press of Kentucky |year=2008 |isbn=978-0-8131-2492-6 |page=210 |author-link=Jay Telotte |access-date=28 October 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210601043522/https://books.google.com/books?id=cFQicvXd5bwC&q=RUR+BBC+first+television+science+fiction&pg=PA210 |archive-date=1 June 2021 |url-status=live}} The first popular science fiction program on American television was the children's adventure serial Captain Video and His Video Rangers, which ran from June 1949 to April 1955.{{cite web

|url=http://www.museum.tv/archives/etv/C/htmlC/captainvideo/captainvideo.htm

|title=Captain Video and His Video Rangers

|publisher=The Museum of Broadcast Communications

|author=Suzanne Williams-Rautiolla

|date=2 April 2005

|access-date=17 January 2007

|archive-date=30 March 2009

|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090330104139/http://www.museum.tv/archives/etv/C/htmlC/captainvideo/captainvideo.htm

|url-status=live

}}

The Twilight Zone (the original series), produced and narrated by Rod Serling, who also wrote or co-wrote most of the episodes, ran from 1959 to 1964. It featured fantasy, suspense, and horror as well as science fiction, with each episode being a complete story.{{cite web|url=https://www.allmovie.com/movie/the-twilight-zone-tv-series-1959-1964-v133223|title=The Twilight Zone [TV Series] [1959–1964]|work=AllMovie|access-date=19 November 2012|archive-date=20 June 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180620180846/https://www.allmovie.com/movie/the-twilight-zone-tv-series-1959-1964-v133223|url-status=live}}{{cite book|last1=Stanyard|first1=Stewart T.|title=Dimensions Behind the Twilight Zone: A Backstage Tribute to Television's Groundbreaking Series|date=2007|publisher=ECW press|location=Toronto|isbn=978-1-55022-744-4|page=18|edition=[Online-Ausg.]}} Critics have ranked it as one of the best TV programs of any genre.{{cite web|url=https://www.cbsnews.com/news/tv-guide-names-top-50-shows/|title=TV Guide Names Top 50 Shows|work=CBS News|publisher=CBS Interactive|date=26 April 2002|access-date=13 April 2016|archive-date=4 September 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120904061715/http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/04/26/entertainment/main507388.shtml|url-status=live}}{{cite web|url=http://wga.org/content/default.aspx?id=4925|title=101 Best Written TV Series List|access-date=13 April 2016|archive-date=7 June 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130607080758/http://www.wga.org/content/default.aspx?id=5246}}

The animated series The Jetsons, while intended as comedy and only running for one season (1962–1963), predicted many inventions now in common use: flat-screen televisions, newspapers on a computer-like screen, computer viruses, video chat, tanning beds, home treadmills, and more.{{Cite episode |title=21st Century Brands |url=http://www.cbc.ca/undertheinfluence/season-3/2014/05/24/21st-century-brands-1/ |access-date=7 June 2014 |series=Under the Influence |series-link=Under the Influence (radio documentary series) |first=Terry |last=O'Reilly |network=CBC Radio One |date=24 May 2014 |season=3 |number=21 |time=time 2:07 |transcript=Transcript of the original source |transcript-url=http://www.cbc.ca/undertheinfluence/season-3/2014/05/24/21st-century-brands-1/ |quote=The series had lots of interesting devices that marveled us back in the 1960s. In episode one, we see wife Jane doing exercises in front of a flatscreen television. In another episode, we see George Jetson reading the newspaper on a screen. Can anyone say tablet? In another, Boss Spacely tells George to fix something called a "computer virus". Everyone on the show uses video chat, foreshadowing Skype and Face Time. There is a robot vacuum cleaner, foretelling the 2002 arrival of the iRobot Roomba vacuum. There was also a tanning bed used in an episode, a product that wasn't introduced to North America until 1979. And while flying space cars that have yet to land in our lives, the Jetsons show had moving sidewalks like we now have in airports, treadmills that didn't hit the consumer market until 1969, and they had a repairman who had a piece of technology called... Mac. |archive-date=8 June 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140608190711/http://www.cbc.ca/undertheinfluence/season-3/2014/05/24/21st-century-brands-1/ |url-status=live }}

In 1963, the time travel-themed Doctor Who premiered on BBC Television.{{cite web|url= http://www.bbc.co.uk/doctorwho/classic/episodeguide/unearthlychild/detail.shtml|website= BBC|title= Doctor Who Classic Episode Guide – An Unearthly Child – Details|access-date= 30 March 2019|archive-date= 25 October 2016|archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20161025112652/http://www.bbc.co.uk/doctorwho/classic/episodeguide/unearthlychild/detail.shtml|url-status= live}} The original series ran until 1989 and was revived in 2005.{{Cite news|url=https://www.theguardian.com/media/2005/jun/21/broadcasting.bbc|title=Doctor Who finally makes the Grade|last=Deans|first=Jason|date=21 June 2005|work=The Guardian|language=en-GB|issn=0261-3077|access-date=30 March 2019|archive-date=30 March 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190330075434/https://www.theguardian.com/media/2005/jun/21/broadcasting.bbc|url-status=live}} It has been extremely popular worldwide and has greatly influenced later TV science fiction.{{cite news |date=14 September 2006 |title=The end of Olde Englande: A lament for Blighty |newspaper=The Economist |url=http://www.economist.com/world/britain/displaystory.cfm?story_id=7912946 |access-date=18 September 2006 |archive-date=17 June 2009 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090617180057/http://www.economist.com/world/britain/displaystory.cfm?story_id=7912946 |url-status=live }}{{cite web|title=ICONS. A Portrait of England |url=http://www.icons.org.uk/theicons/collection/doctor-who |access-date=10 November 2007 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071103085551/http://www.icons.org.uk/theicons/collection/doctor-who |archive-date=3 November 2007 }}{{cite news|first=Caitlin|last=Moran|author-link=Caitlin Moran|title=Doctor Who is simply masterful|url=http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/tv_and_radio/article1989181.ece|work=The Times|location=London|date=30 June 2007|access-date=1 July 2007|quote=[Doctor Who] is as thrilling and as loved as Jolene, or bread and cheese, or honeysuckle, or Friday. It's quintessential to being British.|archive-date=17 June 2011|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110617002012/http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/tv_and_radio/article1989181.ece|url-status=dead}}

Other programs in the 1960s included The Outer Limits (1963–1965),{{cite journal|year=1997|title=Special Collectors' Issue: 100 Greatest Episodes of All Time|journal=TV Guide|issue=28 June – 4 July}} Lost in Space (1965–1968), and The Prisoner (1967).British Science Fiction Television: A Hitchhiker's Guide, John R. Cook, Peter Wright, I.B.Tauris, 6 January 2006, page 9Gowran, Clay. "Nielsen Ratings Are Dim on New Shows". Chicago Tribune. 11 October 1966: B10.Gould, Jack. "How Does Your Favorite Rate? Maybe Higher Than You Think." New York Times. 16 October 1966: 129.

Star Trek (the original series), created by Gene Roddenberry, premiered in 1966 on NBC Television and ran for three seasons.{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=lhmw637JRgUC&pg=PA209|title=NBC: America's Network|last1=Hilmes|first1=Michele|last2=Henry|first2=Michael Lowell|date=1 August 2007|publisher=University of California Press|isbn=978-0-520-25079-6|language=en|access-date=28 October 2020|archive-date=4 July 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160704184438/https://books.google.com/books?id=lhmw637JRgUC&pg=PA209|url-status=live}} It combined elements of space opera and Space Western.{{Cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1986/07/22/arts/a-first-showing-for-star-trek-pilot.html|title=A First Showing for 'Star Trek' Pilot|date=22 July 1986|work=The New York Times|access-date=30 March 2019|language=en-US|issn=0362-4331|archive-date=27 March 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140327185925/http://www.nytimes.com/1986/07/22/arts/a-first-showing-for-star-trek-pilot.html|url-status=live}} Only mildly successful at first, the series gained popularity through syndication and extraordinary fan interest. It became a very popular and influential franchise with many films, television shows, novels, and other works and products.Roddenberry, Gene (11 March 1964). [http://leethomson.myzen.co.uk/Star_Trek/1_Original_Series/Star_Trek_Pitch.pdf Star Trek Pitch] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160512162509/http://leethomson.myzen.co.uk/Star_Trek/1_Original_Series/Star_Trek_Pitch.pdf |date=12 May 2016 }}, first draft. Accessed at LeeThomson.myzen.co.uk.{{cite web |url=http://www.startrek.com/custom/include/feature/intro/timeline_future.html |title=STARTREK.COM: Universe Timeline |publisher=Startrek.com |access-date=14 July 2009 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090703073608/http://www.startrek.com/custom/include/feature/intro/timeline_future.html |archive-date=3 July 2009}}{{cite book |title=Star Trek Chronology: The History of the Future |last1=Okada |first1=Michael |author-link1=Michael Okuda |first2=Denise|last2=Okadu|author-link2=Denise Okuda|date=1 November 1996 |publisher=Pocket Books |isbn=978-0-671-53610-7}}{{cite web|url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=rx0eAAAAIBAJ&dq=star-trek%20syndication%20%7C%20rerun&pg=6303,2206524|title=The Milwaukee Journal - Google News Archive Search|website=news.google.com|access-date=30 March 2019}}{{Dead link|date=August 2023 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }} Star Trek: The Next Generation (1987–1994) led to six additional live action Star Trek shows: Deep Space Nine (1993–1999), Voyager (1995–2001), Enterprise (2001–2005), Discovery (2017–2024), Picard (2020–2023), and Strange New Worlds (2022–present), with more in some form of development.{{Citation|title=Star Trek: The Next Generation|date=26 September 1987|url=http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0092455/|access-date=30 March 2019|archive-date=25 March 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210325034605/https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0092455/|url-status=live}}{{cite web|url=https://www.newsweek.com/star-trek-picard-series-release-date-discovery-season-2-tng-next-generation-1245510|title='Star Trek' Picard series won't premiere until late 2019, after 'Discovery' Season 2|first=Andrew |last=Whalen|date=5 December 2018|website=Newsweek|language=en|access-date=30 March 2019|archive-date=30 March 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190330093825/https://www.newsweek.com/star-trek-picard-series-release-date-discovery-season-2-tng-next-generation-1245510|url-status=live}}{{cite web|url=https://www.startrek.com/article/new-trek-animated-series-announced|title=New Trek Animated Series Announced|website=www.startrek.com|language=en|access-date=30 March 2019|archive-date=30 March 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190330084323/https://www.startrek.com/article/new-trek-animated-series-announced|url-status=live}}{{cite web|url=https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/live-feed/patrick-stewart-reprise-star-trek-role-new-cbs-all-access-series-1132262|title=Patrick Stewart to Reprise 'Star Trek' Role in New CBS All Access Series|website=The Hollywood Reporter|date=4 August 2018|language=en|access-date=30 March 2019|archive-date=4 August 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180804224352/https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/live-feed/patrick-stewart-reprise-star-trek-role-new-cbs-all-access-series-1132262|url-status=live}}

The miniseries V premiered in 1983 on NBC.Bedell, Sally (4 May 1983). "'V' SERIES AN NBC HIT". The New York Times. p. 27 It depicted an attempted takeover of Earth by reptilian aliens.{{cite magazine|url=https://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,1073590_6,00.html|title=Mini Splendored Things|last=Susman|first=Gary|date=17 November 2005|magazine=Entertainment Weekly|publisher=EW.com|access-date=7 January 2010|archive-date=25 February 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140225052201/http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,1073590_6,00.html|url-status=dead}} Red Dwarf, a comic science fiction series aired on BBC Two between 1988 and 1999, and on Dave since 2009.{{cite web |url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/pressoffice/bbcworldwide/worldwidestories/pressreleases/2002/10_october/reddwarf.shtml |title=Worldwide Press Office – Red Dwarf on DVD |publisher=BBC |access-date=28 November 2009 |archive-date=27 February 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100227022348/http://www.bbc.co.uk/pressoffice/bbcworldwide/worldwidestories/pressreleases/2002/10_october/reddwarf.shtml |url-status=live }} The X-Files, which featured UFOs and conspiracy theories, was created by Chris Carter and broadcast by Fox Broadcasting Company from 1993 to 2002,{{cite journal|title=Opening the X-Files: Behind the Scenes of TV's Hottest Show|first=David|last=Bischoff|date=December 1994|journal=Omni|volume=17|issue=3}}{{cite news | author=Goodman, Tim | url=http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2002/01/18/DD209382.DTL&type=printable | title='X-Files' Creator Ends Fox Series | newspaper=San Francisco Chronicle | date=18 January 2002 | access-date=27 July 2009 | archive-date=15 June 2011 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110615061412/http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=%2Fc%2Fa%2F2002%2F01%2F18%2FDD209382.DTL&type=printable | url-status=live }} and again from 2016 to 2018.{{cite web|url=https://www.tvguide.com/news/gillian-anderson-confirms-the-x-files-exit/|title=Gillian Anderson Confirms She's Leaving The X-Files {{!}} TV Guide|date=10 January 2018|website=TVGuide.com|language=en|access-date=30 March 2019|archive-date=30 April 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200430215457/https://www.tvguide.com/news/gillian-anderson-confirms-the-x-files-exit/|url-status=live}}{{cite web|url=https://deadline.com/2015/03/x-files-returns-fox-event-series-david-duchovny-gillian-anderson-chris-carter-1201397721/|title='The X-Files' Returns As Fox Event Series With Creator Chris Carter And Stars David Duchovny & Gillian Anderson|last1=Andreeva|first1=Nellie|date=24 March 2015|website=Deadline|language=en|access-date=30 March 2019|archive-date=30 March 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190330075436/https://deadline.com/2015/03/x-files-returns-fox-event-series-david-duchovny-gillian-anderson-chris-carter-1201397721/|url-status=live}}

Stargate, a film about ancient astronauts and interstellar teleportation, was released in 1994. Stargate SG-1 premiered in 1997 and ran for 10 seasons (1997–2007). Spin-off series included Stargate Infinity (2002–2003), Stargate Atlantis (2004–2009), and Stargate Universe (2009–2011).{{cite news |first=Darren |last=Sumner |url=http://www.gateworld.net/news/2011/05/smallville-bows-this-week-with-stargates-world-record/ |title=Smallville bows this week – with Stargate{{'}}s world record |publisher=GateWorld |date=10 May 2011 |access-date=23 February 2014 |archive-date=1 March 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140301025644/http://www.gateworld.net/news/2011/05/smallville-bows-this-week-with-stargates-world-record/ |url-status=live }}

Other 1990s series included Quantum Leap (1989–1993) and Babylon 5 (1994–1999).{{Cite web|title=CultT797.html|url=http://www.maestravida.com/weinwalk/CultT797.html|access-date=29 December 2022|website=www.maestravida.com|archive-date=28 September 2007|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070928181155/http://www.maestravida.com/weinwalk/CultT797.html}} Syfy, launched in 1992 as The Sci-Fi Channel,{{cite web|url=https://www.pastemagazine.com/articles/2018/03/the-best-syfy-tv-shows-of-all-time.html|title=The 20 Best SyFy TV Shows of All Time|website=pastemagazine.com|language=en|access-date=30 March 2019|date=9 March 2018|archive-date=30 March 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190330082034/https://www.pastemagazine.com/articles/2018/03/the-best-syfy-tv-shows-of-all-time.html|url-status=live}} specializes in science fiction, supernatural horror, and fantasy.{{cite web|url=https://www.syfy.com/contributors|title=About Us|website=SYFY|language=en|access-date=30 March 2019|archive-date=30 March 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190330095407/https://www.syfy.com/contributors|url-status=live}}{{cite web|url=http://www.today.com/news/so-long-nerds-syfy-doesn-t-need-you-wbna36698985|title=So long, nerds! Syfy doesn't need you|website=TODAY.com|language=en|first=Ree|last=Hines|date=27 April 2010|access-date=30 March 2019|archive-date=27 March 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190327123001/https://www.today.com/news/so-long-nerds-syfy-doesn-t-need-you-wbna36698985|url-status=live}}

The space-Western series Firefly premiered in 2002 on Fox. It is set in the year 2517, after the arrival of humans in a new star system, and follows the adventures of the renegade crew of Serenity, a "Firefly-class" spaceship.{{Cite web |url=http://jam.canoe.ca/Television/TV_Shows/F/Firefly/2002/07/22/734323.html |title=Firefly series ready for liftoff |last=Brioux |first=Bill |publisher=jam.canoe.ca |url-status=usurped |archive-url=https://archive.today/20120715154524/http://jam.canoe.ca/Television/TV_Shows/F/Firefly/2002/07/22/734323.html |archive-date=15 July 2012 |access-date=10 December 2006 }} Orphan Black began its five-season run in 2013, about a woman who assumes the identity of one of her several genetically identical human clones. In late 2015, Syfy premiered The Expanse to great critical acclaim, an American TV series about humanity's colonization of the Solar System. Its later seasons would then be aired through Amazon Prime Video.

File:Imagination 195808.jpg was predicted in August 1958 by the science fiction magazine Imagination.]]

Science fiction's rapid rise in popularity during the first half of the 20th century was closely tied to the popular respect paid to science at that time, as well as the rapid pace of technological innovation and new inventions.Astounding Wonder: Imagining Science and Science Fiction in Interwar America, John Cheng, University of Pennsylvania Press, 19 March 2012 pages 1–12. Science fiction has often predicted scientific and technological progress.{{Cite web|url=https://www.escapistmagazine.com/v2/2018/11/01/patenting-the-spectacular-when-science-fiction-predicts-the-future/|title=When Science Fiction Predicts the Future|date=1 November 2018|website=Escapist Magazine|language=en-US|access-date=4 April 2019|archive-date=4 April 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190404020220/https://www.escapistmagazine.com/v2/2018/11/01/patenting-the-spectacular-when-science-fiction-predicts-the-future/|url-status=live}}{{Cite web|url=https://www.businessinsider.com/fictional-predictions-about-the-future-that-came-true-2019-1|title=15 wild fictional predictions about future technology that came true|last=Kotecki|first=Peter|website=Business Insider|access-date=4 April 2019|archive-date=4 April 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190404020218/https://www.businessinsider.com/fictional-predictions-about-the-future-that-came-true-2019-1|url-status=live}} Some works predict that new inventions and progress will tend to improve life and society, for instance the stories of Arthur C. Clarke and Star Trek.{{Cite web|url=https://sanvada.com/2017/10/23/eight-ground-breaking-inventions-that-science-fiction-predicted/|title=Eight Ground-Breaking Inventions That Science Fiction Predicted|last=Munene|first=Alvin|date=23 October 2017|website=Sanvada|access-date=3 April 2019|archive-date=4 April 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190404020224/https://sanvada.com/2017/10/23/eight-ground-breaking-inventions-that-science-fiction-predicted/|url-status=live}} Others, such as H.G. Wells's The Time Machine and Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, warn about possible negative consequences.The Greenwood Encyclopedia of Science Fiction and Fantasy: Themes, Works, and Wonders, Volume 2, Gary Westfahl, Greenwood Publishing Group, 2005{{Cite web|url=https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/many-futuristic-predictions-hg-wells-came-true-180960546/|title=The Many Futuristic Predictions of H.G. Wells That Came True|last=Handwerk|first=Brian|website=Smithsonian|language=en|access-date=4 April 2019|archive-date=4 April 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190404020218/https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/many-futuristic-predictions-hg-wells-came-true-180960546/|url-status=live}}

In 2001 the National Science Foundation conducted a survey on "Public Attitudes and Public Understanding: Science Fiction and Pseudoscience". It found that people who read or prefer science fiction may think about or relate to science differently than other people. They also tend to support the space program and the idea of contacting extraterrestrial civilizations.{{cite book|last=Bainbridge|first=William Sims|chapter=The Impact of Science Fiction on Attitudes Toward Technology|editor-last=Emme|editor-first=Eugene Morlock|editor-link=Eugene M. Emme|title=Science fiction and space futures: past and present|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=MvpoAAAAIAAJ|year=1982|publisher=Univelt|isbn=978-0-87703-173-4|access-date=7 November 2015|archive-date=1 January 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160101123522/https://books.google.com/books?id=MvpoAAAAIAAJ|url-status=live}} Carl Sagan wrote: "Many scientists deeply involved in the exploration of the solar system (myself among them) were first turned in that direction by science fiction."{{Cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1978/05/28/archives/growing-up-with.html|title=Growing up with Science Fiction|last=Sagan|first=Carl|date=28 May 1978|work=The New York Times|access-date=4 April 2019|language=en-US|issn=0362-4331|archive-date=11 December 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181211180058/https://www.nytimes.com/1978/05/28/archives/growing-up-with.html|url-status=live}}

Science fiction has predicted several existing inventions, such as the atomic bomb,{{cite web | url =https://www.businessinsider.com/books-predicted-future-sci-fi-2018-11 |title=These 15 sci-fi books actually predicted the future|work=Business Insider| date=8 November 2018| access-date =20 July 2022}} robots,{{cite web | url =https://www.micron.com/insight/future-shock-11-real-life-technologies-that-science-fiction-predicted|title=Future Shock: 11 Real-Life Technologies That Science Fiction Predicted|publisher=Micron| date=| access-date =20 July 2022}} and borazon.{{cite web | url =https://biography.wikireading.ru/44625|title=Предвидения и предсказания|work=Иван Ефремов|author=Ерёмина Ольга Александровна| language=Russian| access-date =20 July 2022}} In the 2020 series Away astronauts use a Mars rover called InSight to listen intently for a landing on Mars. In 2022 scientists used InSight to listen for the landing of a spacecraft.{{Cite journal |last1=Fernando |first1=Benjamin |last2=Wójcicka |first2=Natalia |last3=Marouchka |first3=Froment |last4=Maguire |first4=Ross |last5=Stähler |first5=Simon |last6=Rolland |first6=Lucie] |last7=Collins |first7= Gareth |last8=Karatekin |first8=Ozgur |last9=Larmat |first9=Carene |last10=Sansom |first10=Eleanor |last11=Teanby |first11=Nicholas |last12=Spiga |first12=Aymeric |last13=Karakostas |first13=Foivos |last14=Leng |first14=Kuangdai |last15=Nissen-Meyer |first15= Tarje |last16=Kawamura |first16=Taichi |last17=Giardini |first17=Domenico |last18=Lognonné |first18=Philippe |last19=Banerdt |first19=Bruce |last20=Daubar |first20=Ingrid |date=April 2021 |title= Listening for the landing: Seismic detections of Perseverance's arrival at Mars with InSight |journal=Earth and Space Science |language=en |volume=8 |issue=4 |doi=10.1029/2020EA001585 |bibcode=2021E&SS....801585F |s2cid=233672783 |issn=2333-5084|doi-access=free |hdl=20.500.11937/90005 |hdl-access=free }}

Science fiction can act as a vehicle to analyze and recognize a society's past, present, and potential future social relationships with the other. Science fiction offers a medium and representation of alterity and differences in social identity.{{Cite journal |last=Kilgore |first=De Witt Douglas |date=March 2010 |title=Difference Engine: Aliens, Robots, and Other Racial Matters in the History of Science Fiction |journal=Science Fiction Studies |volume=37 |issue=1 |pages=16–22 |doi=10.1525/sfs.37.1.0016 |jstor=40649582 }} Brian Aldiss described science fiction as "cultural wallpaper".{{Cite book|title=Trillion Year Spree|last1=Aldiss|first1=Brian|last2=Wingrove|first2=David|publisher=Victor Gollancz|year=1986|isbn=978-0-575-03943-8|location=London|page=14}} This widespread influence can be found in trends for writers to employ science fiction as a tool for advocacy and generating cultural insights, as well as for educators when teaching across a range of academic disciplines not limited to the natural sciences.{{Cite journal|last1=Menadue|first1=Christopher Benjamin|last2=Cheer|first2=Karen Diane|date=2017|title=Human Culture and Science Fiction: A Review of the Literature, 1980–2016|journal=SAGE Open|language=en|volume=7|issue=3|page=215824401772369|doi=10.1177/2158244017723690|s2cid=149043845|issn=2158-2440|url=https://researchonline.jcu.edu.au/49764/1/2158244017723690.pdf|doi-access=free|access-date=3 September 2019|archive-date=21 July 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180721043605/https://researchonline.jcu.edu.au/49764/1/2158244017723690.pdf|url-status=live}}

Scholar and science fiction critic George Edgar Slusser said that science fiction "is the one real international literary form we have today, and as such has branched out to visual media, interactive media and on to whatever new media the world will invent in the 21st century. Crossover issues between the sciences and the humanities are crucial for the century to come."{{Cite web|url=https://ucrtoday.ucr.edu/25704|title=George Slusser, Co-founder of Renowned Eaton Collection, Dies|date=6 November 2014|first=Bettye|last=Miller|website=UCR Today|language=en-US|access-date=4 April 2019|archive-date=4 April 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190404025026/https://ucrtoday.ucr.edu/25704|url-status=live}}

{{Further|Social novel|}}

File:Feliz 1984.JPG's Nineteen Eighty-Four, on a standing piece of the Berlin Wall (sometime after 1998)]]

Science fiction has sometimes been used as a means of social protest. George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949) is an important work of dystopian science fiction.{{Cite book|title=Benét's reader's encyclopedia|last=Murphy|first=Bruce|date=1996|publisher=Harper Collins|isbn=978-0-06-181088-6|location=New York|language=en|page=734|oclc = 35572906}}{{cite news|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-21337504|title=1984: George Orwell's road to dystopia|last=Aaronovitch|first=David|date=8 February 2013|work=BBC News|access-date=8 February 2013|language=en-GB|archive-date=24 January 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180124202714/http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-21337504|url-status=live}} It is often invoked in protests against governments and leaders who are seen as totalitarian.{{Cite web|url=https://www.latimes.com/entertainment/movies/la-et-mn-1984-protest-screenings-20170326-story.html|title=As a Trump protest, theaters worldwide will screen the film version of Orwell's '1984'|last=Kelley|first=Sonaiya|website=Los Angeles Times|access-date=4 April 2019|date=28 March 2017|archive-date=4 April 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190404034529/https://www.latimes.com/entertainment/movies/la-et-mn-1984-protest-screenings-20170326-story.html|url-status=live}}{{Cite web|url=https://www.bl.uk/20th-century-literature/articles/nineteen-eighty-four-and-the-politics-of-dystopia|title=Nineteen Eighty-Four and the politics of dystopia|website=The British Library|access-date=4 April 2019|archive-date=8 March 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210308004754/https://www.bl.uk/20th-century-literature/articles/nineteen-eighty-four-and-the-politics-of-dystopia|url-status=live}} James Cameron's 2009 film Avatar was intended as a protest against imperialism, and specifically the European colonization of the Americas.{{cite web|url=https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=123810319|last=Gross|first=Terry|date=18 February 2010|title=James Cameron: Pushing the limits of imagination|access-date=27 February 2010|work=National Public Radio|archive-date=21 February 2010|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100221092225/http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=123810319|url-status=live}} Science fiction in Latin America and Spain explore the concept of authoritarianism.{{cite journal |last1=Dziubinskyj |first1=Aaron |date=November 2004 |title=Review: Science Fiction in Latin America and Spain |journal=Science Fiction Studies |volume=31 |issue=3 Soviet Science Fiction: The Thaw and After |doi=10.1525/sfs.31.3.428 |jstor=4241289}}

Robots, artificial humans, human clones, intelligent computers, and their possible conflicts with human society have all been major themes of science fiction since, at least, the publication of Shelly's Frankenstein. Some critics have seen this as reflecting authors' concerns over the social alienation seen in modern society.Androids, Humanoids, and Other Science Fiction Monsters: Science and Soul in Science Fiction Films, Per Schelde, NYU Press, 1994, pages 1–10

Feminist science fiction poses questions about social issues such as how society constructs gender roles, the role reproduction plays in defining gender, and the inequitable political or personal power of one gender over others. Some works have illustrated these themes using utopias to explore a society in which gender differences or gender power imbalances do not exist, or dystopias to explore worlds in which gender inequalities are intensified, thus asserting a need for feminist work to continue.{{Cite book|title=The Palgrave handbook of posthumanism in film and television |publisher=Palgrave Macmillan |isbn=978-1-137-43032-8|location=Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire|oclc=918873873|last1 = Hauskeller|first1 = Michael|last2 = Carbonell|first2 = Curtis D.|last3 = Philbeck|first3 = Thomas D.|date = 13 January 2016}}

Climate fiction, or "cli-fi", deals with issues concerning climate change and global warming.{{Cite web|date=31 May 2013|title=Global warning: the rise of 'cli-fi'|url=http://www.theguardian.com/books/2013/may/31/global-warning-rise-cli-fi|access-date=29 December 2022|website=the Guardian|language=en}}{{cite news|last1=Bloom|first1=Dan|title='Cli-Fi' Reaches into Literature Classrooms Worldwide|url=http://www.ipsnews.net/2015/03/cli-fi-reaches-into-literature-classrooms-worldwide/|work=Inter Press Service News Agency|date=10 March 2015|access-date=23 March 2015|archive-date=17 March 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150317030221/http://www.ipsnews.net/2015/03/cli-fi-reaches-into-literature-classrooms-worldwide/|url-status=live}} University courses on literature and environmental issues may include climate change fiction in their syllabi,{{cite news|last1=Pérez-Peña|first1=Richard|title=College Classes Use Arts to Brace for Climate Change|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/01/education/using-the-arts-to-teach-how-to-prepare-for-climate-crisis.html|access-date=31 March 2015|work=The New York Times|date=31 March 2014 |issue=1 April 2014 pg A12|archive-date=13 April 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150413230931/http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/01/education/using-the-arts-to-teach-how-to-prepare-for-climate-crisis.html|url-status=live}} and it is often discussed by other media outside of science fiction fandom.{{cite news|last1=Tuhus-Dubrow|first1=Rebecca|title=Cli-Fi: Birth of a Genre|url=http://www.dissentmagazine.org/article/cli-fi-birth-of-a-genre|access-date=23 March 2015|work=Dissent|date=Summer 2013|archive-date=22 March 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150322021514/http://www.dissentmagazine.org/article/cli-fi-birth-of-a-genre|url-status=live}}

Libertarian science fiction focuses on the politics and social order implied by right libertarian philosophies with an emphasis on individualism and private property, and in some cases anti-statism.{{cite web

|title=A Political History of SF

|last=Raymond

|first=Eric

|url=http://www.catb.org/~esr/writings/sf-history.html

|access-date=4 December 2007

|archive-date=20 December 2015

|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151220012359/http://www.catb.org/~esr/writings/sf-history.html

|url-status=live

}} Robert A. Heinlein is one of the most popular authors of this subgenre, including The Moon is a Harsh Mistress and Stranger in a Strange Land.{{Cite web |date=July 4, 2000 |title=OUT OF THIS WORLD: A BIOGRAPHY OF ROBERT HEINLEIN |url=https://www.libertarianism.org/publications/essays/out-world-biography-robert-heinlein |access-date=2024-06-26 |website=www.libertarianism.org}}

Science fiction comedy often satirizes and criticizes present-day society, and sometimes makes fun of the conventions and clichés of more serious science fiction.The Animal Fable in Science Fiction and Fantasy, Bruce Shaw, McFarland, 2010, page 19{{cite web |url=https://sfbook.com/comedy-science-fiction.htm |title=Comedy Science Fiction |publisher=Sfbook.com |access-date=2 March 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304105108/https://sfbook.com/comedy-science-fiction.htm |archive-date=4 March 2016}}

{{Main|Sense of wonder}}

{{Further|Wonder (emotion)}}

File:William Strang spider battle in 1894 True History.jpg for Lucian's A True Story |upright=0.75]]

Science fiction is often said to inspire a "sense of wonder". Science fiction editor, publisher and critic David Hartwell wrote:Hartwell, David. Age of Wonders (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1985, page 42)

{{Quote|text=Science fiction's appeal lies in combination of the rational, the believable, with the miraculous. It is an appeal to the sense of wonder.|author=|title=|source=}}

Carl Sagan said:

{{quote|One of the great benefits of science fiction is that it can convey bits and pieces, hints, and phrases, of knowledge unknown or inaccessible to the reader . . . works you ponder over as the water is running out of the bathtub or as you walk through the woods in an early winter snowfall.}}

In 1967, Isaac Asimov commented on the changes then occurring in the science fiction community:Asimov, Isaac. 'Forward 1 – The Second Revolution' in Ellison, Harlan (ed.). Dangerous Visions (London: Victor Gollancz, 1987)

{{quote|And because today's real life so resembles day-before-yesterday's fantasy, the old-time fans are restless. Deep within, whether they admit it or not, is a feeling of disappointment and even outrage that the outer world has invaded their private domain. They feel the loss of a 'sense of wonder' because what was once truly confined to 'wonder' has now become prosaic and mundane.}}

{{Main|Science fiction studies}}

File:Victoria Building, University of Liverpool 2019.jpg, as a science fiction degree-granting program.]]

The science fiction studies is the critical assessment interpretation, and discussion of science fiction literature, film, TV shows, new media, fandom, and fan fiction.{{Cite web|url=https://christopher-mckitterick.com/SF-LitCrit/SF-litcrit.htm|title=Critical Approaches to Science Fiction|website=christopher-mckitterick.com/|access-date=22 April 2023}} Science fiction scholars study science fiction to better understand it and its relationship to science, technology, politics, other genres, and culture-at-large.{{Cite web|url=https://hieroglyph.asu.edu/2016/04/what-is-the-purpose-of-science-fiction-stories/|title=What Is The Purpose of Science Fiction Stories? {{!}} Project Hieroglyph|website=hieroglyph.asu.edu|access-date=4 April 2019|archive-date=4 April 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190404025032/https://hieroglyph.asu.edu/2016/04/what-is-the-purpose-of-science-fiction-stories/|url-status=live}}

Science fiction studies began around the turn of the 20th century, but it was not until later that science fiction studies solidified as a discipline with the publication of the academic journals Extrapolation (1959), Foundation: The International Review of Science Fiction (1972), and Science Fiction Studies (1973),{{Cite web|url=https://www.depauw.edu/sfs/index.htm|title=Index|website=www.depauw.edu|access-date=4 April 2019|archive-date=24 March 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190324161713/https://www.depauw.edu/sfs/index.htm|url-status=live}}{{Cite web|url=https://www.jstor.org/journal/sciefictstud|title=Science Fiction Studies on JSTOR|language=en|access-date=4 April 2019|archive-date=4 April 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190404044515/https://www.jstor.org/journal/sciefictstud|url-status=live}} and the establishment of the oldest organizations devoted to the study of science fiction in 1970, the Science Fiction Research Association and the Science Fiction Foundation.{{Cite web|url=http://www.sfra.org/about|title=Science Fiction Research Association – About|website=www.sfra.org|access-date=4 April 2019|archive-date=4 April 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190404025040/http://www.sfra.org/about|url-status=live}}{{Cite web|url=https://sf-foundation.org/about/index.html|title=About: Science Fiction Foundation|website=Science Fiction Foundation|access-date=3 April 2019|archive-date=24 October 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181024032919/http://www.sf-foundation.org/about/index.html|url-status=live}} The field has grown considerably since the 1970s with the establishment of more journals, organizations, and conferences, as well as science fiction degree-granting programs such as those offered by the University of Liverpool.{{Cite web|url=https://www.liverpool.ac.uk/study/postgraduate-taught/taught/sfs-english-ma/overview/|title=English: Science Fiction Studies MA – Overview – Postgraduate Taught Courses – University of Liverpool|website=www.liverpool.ac.uk|access-date=4 April 2019|archive-date=4 April 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190404025029/https://www.liverpool.ac.uk/study/postgraduate-taught/taught/sfs-english-ma/overview/|url-status=live}}

{{Further|Hard science fiction|Soft science fiction}}

Science fiction has historically been sub-divided between hard science fiction and soft science fiction, with the division centering on the feasibility of the science.{{cite web | url=https://www.bcls.lib.nj.us/genre-science-fiction | title=BCLS: Hard Versus Soft Science Fiction | access-date=23 August 2018 | archive-date=23 August 2018 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180823210402/https://www.bcls.lib.nj.us/genre-science-fiction | url-status=live }} However, this distinction has come under increasing scrutiny in the 21st century. Some authors, such as Tade Thompson and Jeff VanderMeer, have pointed out that stories that focus explicitly on physics, astronomy, mathematics, and engineering tend to be considered "hard" science fiction, while stories that focus on botany, mycology, zoology, and the social sciences tend to be categorized as "soft", regardless of the relative rigor of the science.{{cite web| url=https://www.tor.com/2017/02/20/ten-authors-on-the-hard-vs-soft-science-fiction-debate/| title=Ten Authors on the 'Hard' vs. 'Soft' Science Fiction Debate| date=20 February 2017| access-date=23 August 2018| archive-date=29 December 2018| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181229124015/https://www.tor.com/2017/02/20/ten-authors-on-the-hard-vs-soft-science-fiction-debate/| url-status=live}}

Max Gladstone defined "hard" science fiction as stories "where the math works", but pointed out that this ends up with stories that often seem "weirdly dated", as scientific paradigms shift over time.{{Cite web|url=https://www.tor.com/2016/01/21/how-do-you-like-your-science-fiction-ten-authors-weigh-in-on-hard-vs-soft-sf/|title=How Do You Like Your Science Fiction? Ten Authors Weigh In On 'Hard' vs. 'Soft' SF|last=Wilde|first=Fran|date=21 January 2016|website=Tor.com|language=en-US|access-date=4 April 2019|archive-date=4 April 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190404025029/https://www.tor.com/2016/01/21/how-do-you-like-your-science-fiction-ten-authors-weigh-in-on-hard-vs-soft-sf/|url-status=live}} Michael Swanwick dismissed the traditional definition of "hard" SF altogether, instead saying that it was defined by characters striving to solve problems "in the right way–with determination, a touch of stoicism, and the consciousness that the universe is not on his or her side."

Ursula K. Le Guin also criticized the more traditional view on the difference between "hard" and "soft" SF: "The 'hard' science fiction writers dismiss everything except, well, physics, astronomy, and maybe chemistry. Biology, sociology, anthropology—that's not science to them, that's soft stuff. They're not that interested in what human beings do, really. But I am. I draw on the social sciences a great deal."{{cite web| url=https://www.popularmechanics.com/culture/a15871082/ursula-k-le-guin-life/| title=Ursula K. Le Guin Proved That Sci-Fi is for Everyone| date=24 January 2018| access-date=23 August 2018| archive-date=23 August 2018| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180823210602/https://www.popularmechanics.com/culture/a15871082/ursula-k-le-guin-life/| url-status=live}}

{{Further|Literature|Literary fiction}}

File:Frontispiece to Frankenstein 1831.jpg for 1831 edition of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein{{cite ODNB |last=Browne |first=Max |title=Holst, Theodor Richard Edward von (1810–1844) |id=28353}}]]

Many critics remain skeptical of the literary value of science fiction and other forms of genre fiction, though some accepted authors have written works argued by opponents to constitute science fiction. Mary Shelley wrote a number of scientific romance novels in the Gothic literature tradition, including Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus (1818). Kurt Vonnegut was a highly respected American author whose works have been argued by some to contain science fiction premises or themes.{{cite book|last1=Allen|first1=William R.|title=Understanding Kurt Vonnegut|url=https://archive.org/details/understandingkur0000alle|url-access=registration|publisher=University of South Carolina Press|isbn=978-0-87249-722-1|year=1991}}{{cite news|last1=Banach|first1=Je|title=Laughing in the Face of Death: A Vonnegut Roundtable|url=http://www.theparisreview.org/blog/2013/04/11/laughing-in-the-face-of-death-a-vonnegut-roundtable/|work=The Paris Review|date=11 April 2013|access-date=13 August 2015|archive-date=3 September 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150903042710/http://www.theparisreview.org/blog/2013/04/11/laughing-in-the-face-of-death-a-vonnegut-roundtable/|url-status=live}}

Other science fiction authors whose works are widely considered to be "serious" literature include Ray Bradbury (including, especially, Fahrenheit 451 (1953) and The Martian Chronicles (1951)),{{cite news|last=Jonas|first=Gerald|title=Ray Bradbury, Master of Science Fiction, Dies at 91|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/07/books/ray-bradbury-popularizer-of-science-fiction-dies-at-91.html|date=6 June 2012|work=The New York Times|access-date=5 June 2012|archive-date=5 April 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190405014134/https://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/07/books/ray-bradbury-popularizer-of-science-fiction-dies-at-91.html|url-status=live}} Arthur C. Clarke (especially for Childhood's End),Barlowe, Wayne Douglas (1987). Barlowe's Guide to Extraterrestrials. Workman Publishing Company. {{ISBN|0-89480-500-2}}.Baxter, John (1997). "Kubrick Beyond the Infinite". Stanley Kubrick: A Biography. Basic Books. pp. 199–230. {{ISBN|0-7867-0485-3}}. and Paul Myron Anthony Linebarger, writing under the name Cordwainer Smith.Gary K. Wolfe and Carol T. Williams, "The Majesty of Kindness: The Dialectic of Cordwainer Smith", Voices for the Future: Essays on Major Science Fiction Writers, Volume 3, Thomas D. Clareson editor, Popular Press, 1983, pages 53–72. Doris Lessing, who was later awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature, wrote a series of five SF novels, Canopus in Argos: Archives (1979–1983), which depict the efforts of more advanced species and civilizations to influence those less advanced, including humans on Earth.{{cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/books/99/01/10/specials/lessing-space.html?_r=1 |title=Doris Lessing on Feminism, Communism and 'Space Fiction' |work=The New York Times |first=Lesley |last=Hazelton |author-link=Lesley Hazleton |date=25 July 1982 |access-date=25 March 2011 |archive-date=23 November 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131123172701/http://www.nytimes.com/books/99/01/10/specials/lessing-space.html?_r=1 |url-status=live }}{{cite book | last = Galin | first = Müge | title = Between East and West: Sufism in the Novels of Doris Lessing | publisher = State University of New York Press | year = 1997 | location = Albany, New York | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=EbHys4CzN0YC&pg=PP1 | page = 21 | isbn = 978-0-7914-3383-6 | access-date = 28 October 2020 | archive-date = 23 November 2020 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20201123214754/https://books.google.com/books?id=EbHys4CzN0YC&pg=PP1 | url-status = live }}{{cite book | last = Lessing | first = Doris | author-link = Doris Lessing | title = The Sirian Experiments | year = 1994 | orig-date = 1980 | publisher = Flamingo | location = London | isbn = 978-0-00-654721-1 |chapter= Preface | page= 11}}{{cite news | last = Donoghue | first = Denis | author-link = Denis Donoghue (academic) | title = Alice, The Radical Homemaker | work = The New York Times | date = 22 September 1985 | url = https://www.nytimes.com/books/99/01/10/specials/lessing-terrorist.html | access-date = 4 July 2014 | archive-date = 15 July 2014 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20140715175028/http://www.nytimes.com/books/99/01/10/specials/lessing-terrorist.html | url-status = live }}

David Barnett has pointed out that there are books such as The Road (2006) by Cormac McCarthy, Cloud Atlas (2004) by David Mitchell, The Gone-Away World (2008) by Nick Harkaway, The Stone Gods (2007) by Jeanette Winterson, and Oryx and Crake (2003) by Margaret Atwood, which use recognizable science fiction tropes, but which are not classified by their authors and publishers as science fiction. Atwood in particular argued against the categorization of works like the Handmaid's Tale as science fiction, labeling it, Oryx, and the Testaments as speculative fiction{{cite web|url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2003/apr/26/fiction.margaretatwood|title=Light in the wilderness|last=Potts|first=Robert|date=26 April 2003|work=The Guardian|access-date=30 May 2013|archive-date=5 October 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131005061502/http://www.theguardian.com/books/2003/apr/26/fiction.margaretatwood|url-status=live}} and deriding science fiction as "talking squids in outer space."Langford, David, [http://www.ansible.co.uk/sfx/sfx107.html "Bits and Pieces"], SFX magazine No. 107, August 2003. {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090820072020/http://www.ansible.co.uk/sfx/sfx107.html |date=20 August 2009 }}

In his book "The Western Canon", literary critic Harold Bloom includes Brave New World, Stanisław Lem's Solaris, Kurt Vonnegut's Cat's Cradle, and The Left Hand of Darkness as culturally and aesthetically significant works of western literature, though Lem actively spurned the Western label of "science fiction".{{cite web |url=http://www.sfwa.org/faq/lem.htm |title=Lem and SFWA |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080111142618/http://www.sfwa.org/faq/lem.htm |archive-date=11 January 2008}} in Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America FAQ, "paraphrasing Jerry Pournelle" who was SFWA President 1973–74

In her 1976 essay "Science Fiction and Mrs Brown", Ursula K. Le Guin was asked: "Can a science fiction writer write a novel?" She answered: "I believe that all novels ... deal with character... The great novelists have brought us to see whatever they wish us to see through some character. Otherwise, they would not be novelists, but poets, historians, or pamphleteers."

Orson Scott Card, best known for his 1985 science fiction novel Ender's Game, has postulated that in science fiction the message and intellectual significance of the work are contained within the story itself and, therefore, does not require accepted literary devices and techniques he instead characterized as gimmicks or literary games.{{Cite web|url=https://us.macmillan.com/author/|title=Orson Scott Card {{!}} Authors {{!}} Macmillan|website=US Macmillan|language=en-US|access-date=4 April 2019|archive-date=5 January 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210105025352/https://us.macmillan.com/author/|url-status=live}}

Jonathan Lethem, in a 1998 essay in the Village Voice entitled "Close Encounters: The Squandered Promise of Science Fiction", suggested that the point in 1973 when Thomas Pynchon's Gravity's Rainbow was nominated for the Nebula Award and was passed over in favor of Clarke's Rendezvous with Rama, stands as "a hidden tombstone marking the death of the hope that SF was about to merge with the mainstream." In the same year science fiction author and physicist Gregory Benford wrote: "SF is perhaps the defining genre of the twentieth century, although its conquering armies are still camped outside the Rome of the literary citadels."

{{See also|List of science fiction authors}}

Science fiction has been written by diverse authors from around the world. According to 2013 statistics by the science fiction publisher Tor Books, men outnumber women by 78% to 22% among submissions to the publisher.{{cite web|last1=Crisp|first1=Julie|title=Sexism in Genre Publishing: A Publisher's Perspective|url=http://www.torbooks.co.uk/blog/2013/07/10/sexism-in-genre-publishing-a-publishers-perspective|website=Tor Books|date=10 July 2013|access-date=29 April 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150430072612/http://www.torbooks.co.uk/blog/2013/07/10/sexism-in-genre-publishing-a-publishers-perspective|archive-date=30 April 2015}} (See full statistics) A controversy about voting slates in the 2015 Hugo Awards highlighted tensions in the science fiction community between a trend of increasingly diverse works and authors being honored by awards, and reaction by groups of authors and fans who preferred what they considered more "traditional" science fiction.{{cite web |last=McCown |first=Alex |title=This year's Hugo Award nominees are a messy political controversy |url=http://www.avclub.com/article/years-hugo-award-nominees-are-messy-political-cont-217574 |access-date=11 April 2015 |work=The A.V. Club |publisher=The Onion |date=6 April 2015 |archive-date=10 April 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150410075152/http://www.avclub.com/article/years-hugo-award-nominees-are-messy-political-cont-217574 |url-status=bot: unknown }}

{{Main|List of science fiction awards}}

Among the most significant and well-known awards for science fiction are the Hugo Award for literature, presented by the World Science Fiction Society at Worldcon, and voted on by fans;{{Cite web|url=http://www.wsfs.org/awards/|title=Awards|date=10 May 2016|website=The World Science Fiction Society|language=en-US|access-date=4 April 2019}} the Nebula Award for literature, presented by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, and voted on by the community of authors;{{Cite web|url=https://www.fantasticfiction.com/awards/nebula.htm|title=Nebula Awards|website=www.fantasticfiction.com|access-date=4 April 2019|archive-date=31 May 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200531161944/https://www.fantasticfiction.com/awards/nebula.htm|url-status=live}} the John W. Campbell Memorial Award for Best Science Fiction Novel, presented by a jury of writers;{{Cite web|url=https://sfcenter.ku.edu/about|title=The John W. Campbell Award}} and the Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award for short fiction, presented by a jury.{{Cite web|url=http://www.sfcenter.ku.edu/sturgeon.htm|title=The Theodore Sturgeon Award|access-date=18 March 2023|archive-date=1 October 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121001134242/http://www.sfcenter.ku.edu/sturgeon.htm}} One notable award for science fiction films and TV programs is the Saturn Award, which is presented annually by The Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror Films.{{Cite web|url=http://www.saturnawards.org/|title=The Academy of Science Fiction Fantasy and Horror Films|website=www.saturnawards.org|access-date=4 April 2019|archive-date=25 August 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120825193629/http://www.saturnawards.org/|url-status=live}}

There are other national awards, like Canada's Prix Aurora Awards,{{Cite web|url=https://prixaurorawards.ca/|title=Aurora Awards {{!}} Canadian Science Fiction and Fantasy Association|language=en|access-date=4 April 2019|archive-date=4 April 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190404033950/https://prixaurorawards.ca/|url-status=live}} regional awards, like the Endeavour Award presented at Orycon for works from the U.S. Pacific Northwest,{{Cite web|url=https://osfci.org/endeavour/|title=The Endeavour Award Home Page|website=osfci.org|access-date=4 April 2019|archive-date=30 March 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190330174626/https://osfci.org/endeavour/|url-status=live}} and special interest or subgenre awards such as the Chesley Award for art, presented by the Association of Science Fiction & Fantasy Artists,{{Cite web|url=http://www.asfa-art.org/?page=chesley|title=ASFA|website=www.asfa-art.org|access-date=4 April 2019|archive-date=4 April 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190404072516/http://www.asfa-art.org/?page=chesley|url-status=live}} or the World Fantasy Award for fantasy.{{Cite web|url=http://www.worldfantasy.org/awards/|title=Awards {{!}} World Fantasy Convention|language=en-US|access-date=4 April 2019|archive-date=27 October 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121027005155/http://www.worldfantasy.org/awards/|url-status=live}} Magazines may organize reader polls, notably the Locus Award.{{Cite web|url=https://locusmag.com/category/news/awards/|title=Awards – Locus Online|language=en-US|access-date=4 April 2019|archive-date=4 April 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190404033301/http://locusmag.com/category/news/awards/|url-status=live}}

File:Sfcon-reading-ddb.jpg reading at the Minneapolis convention known as Minicon in 2006|upright=1.25]]

{{Main|Science fiction convention}}

Conventions (in fandom, often shortened as "cons", such as "comic-con") are held in cities around the world, catering to a local, regional, national, or international membership.{{Cite web|url=https://locusmag.com/conventions/|title=Conventions|date=29 August 2017|website=Locus Online|language=en-US|access-date=5 April 2019|archive-date=30 March 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190330195143/https://locusmag.com/conventions/|url-status=live}}{{Cite web|url=https://io9.gizmodo.com/a-history-of-the-science-fiction-convention-359238|title=A History Of The Science Fiction Convention|last=Kelly|first=Kevin|website=io9|date=21 February 2008 |language=en-US|access-date=5 April 2019|archive-date=3 June 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200603154840/https://io9.gizmodo.com/a-history-of-the-science-fiction-convention-359238|url-status=live}} General-interest conventions cover all aspects of science fiction, while others focus on a particular interest like media fandom, filking, and others.{{Cite web|url=http://www.scificonventions.com/html/aboutcons.php|title=ScifiConventions.com – Worldwide SciFi and Fantasy Conventions Directory – About Cons|website=www.scificonventions.com|access-date=5 April 2019|archive-date=8 April 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190408045937/http://www.scificonventions.com/html/aboutcons.php|url-status=live}}{{Cite web|url=http://www.fencon.org/|title=FenCon XVI – September 20–22, 2019 {{!}}|website=www.fencon.org|language=en|access-date=5 April 2019|archive-date=2 April 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190402110559/http://www.fencon.org/|url-status=live}} Most science fiction conventions are organized by volunteers in non-profit groups, though most media-oriented events are organized by commercial promoters.Mark A. Mandel (7–9 January 2010). [https://www.ldc.upenn.edu/sites/www.ldc.upenn.edu/files/ads2010-conomastics.pdf Conomastics: The Naming of Science Fiction Conventions]. {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180413160549/https://www.ldc.upenn.edu/sites/www.ldc.upenn.edu/files/ads2010-conomastics.pdf |date=13 April 2018 }}

{{Main|Science fiction fandom|Science-fiction fanzine}}

Science fiction fandom emerged from the letters column in Amazing Stories magazine. Soon fans began writing letters to each other, and then grouping their comments together in informal publications that became known as fanzines. Once in regular contact, fans wanted to meet each other and organized local clubs. In the 1930s, the first science fiction conventions gathered fans from a wider area.

The earliest organized online fandom was the SF Lovers Community, originally a mailing list in the late 1970s with a text archive file that was updated regularly. In the 1980s, Usenet groups greatly expanded the circle of fans online.{{Cite web|url=http://www.dcinthe80s.com/2016/03/usenet-fandom-crisis-on-infinite-earths.html|title=Usenet Fandom – Crisis on Infinite Earths|access-date=5 April 2019|archive-date=25 October 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191025092801/http://www.dcinthe80s.com/2016/03/usenet-fandom-crisis-on-infinite-earths.html|url-status=live}} In the 1990s, the development of the World-Wide Web increased the community of online fandom by of websites devoted to science fiction and related genres for all media.{{not in source|date=January 2025}}

The first science fiction fanzine, The Comet, was published in 1930 by the Science Correspondence Club in Chicago, Illinois.{{Citation|last1=Latham|first1=Rob|title=Fandom|date=1 November 2014|work=The Oxford Handbook of Science Fiction|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0-19-983884-4|last2=Mendlesohn|first2=Farah|doi=10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199838844.013.0006}} One of the best known fanzines today is Ansible, edited by David Langford, winner of numerous Hugo awards.{{Cite web|url=https://news.ansible.uk/|title=Ansible Home/Links|website=news.ansible.uk|access-date=5 April 2019|archive-date=29 March 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190329164219/https://news.ansible.uk/|url-status=live}}{{Cite web|url=http://www.sf-encyclopedia.com/entry/fanzine|title=Culture : Fanzine : SFE: Science Fiction Encyclopedia|website=www.sf-encyclopedia.com|access-date=5 April 2019|archive-date=26 March 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190326213435/http://www.sf-encyclopedia.com/entry/fanzine|url-status=live}} Other notable fanzines to win one or more Hugo awards include File 770, Mimosa, and Plokta.{{Cite web|url=http://www.thehugoawards.org/hugo-history/|title=Hugo Awards by Year|date=19 July 2007|website=The Hugo Awards|language=en-US|access-date=5 April 2019|archive-date=2 April 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190402221314/http://www.thehugoawards.org/hugo-history/|url-status=live}} Artists working for fanzines have frequently risen to prominence in the field, including Brad W. Foster, Teddy Harvia, and Joe Mayhew; the Hugos include a category for Best Fan Artists.{{clear}}

File:Future_Birthplace_of_Captain_James_T_Kirk.jpg, to honor the "future birth" of Star Trek{{'}}s James T. Kirk]]

Science fiction elements can include, among others:

• Temporal settings in the future, or in alternative histories;{{cite journal|first=Martin |last=Bunzl |author-link=Martin Bunzl |title=Counterfactual History: A User's Guide |url=http://www.historycooperative.org/journals/ahr/109.3/bunzl.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20041013011910/http://www.historycooperative.org/journals/ahr/109.3/bunzl.html |archive-date=13 October 2004 |journal=American Historical Review |date=June 2004 |volume=109 |issue=3 |pages=845–858 |doi=10.1086/530560 |access-date=2 June 2009 }}
• Predicted or speculative technology such as brain-computer interface, bio-engineering, superintelligent computers, robots, ray guns, and other advanced weapons;
• Space travel, settings in outer space, on other worlds, in subterranean earth,{{Cite book |title=The Sherlock Holmes Book |publisher=DK |year=2015 |isbn=978-1-4654-3849-2 |editor-last=Davies |editor-first=David Stuart |editor-link=David Stuart Davies |edition=First American |location=New York |page=259 |editor-last2=Forshaw |editor-first2=Barry |editor-link2=Barry Forshaw}} or in parallel universes;
• Fictional concepts in biology such as aliens, mutants, and enhanced humans;{{cite book |last= Westfahl |first= Gary |author-link= Gary Westfahl |chapter= Aliens in Space |title= The Greenwood Encyclopedia of Science Fiction and Fantasy: Themes, Works, and Wonders |editor= Gary Westfahl |location= Westport, Conn. |publisher= Greenwood Press |year= 2005 |volume=1 |pages= 14–16 |isbn= 978-0-313-32951-7}}{{cite book |last1=Parker |first1=Helen N. |title=Biological Themes in Modern Science Fiction |date=1977 |publisher=UMI Research Press}}
• Undiscovered scientific possibilities such as teleportation, time travel, and faster-than-light travel or communication;{{citation|title=The Cambridge Companion to Utopian Literature|chapter=Utopia, dystopia, and science fiction|author=Peter Fitting|editor=Gregory Claeys|publisher=Cambridge University Press|year=2010|pages=138–139}}
• New and different political and social systems and situations, including utopian, dystopian, post-apocalyptic, or post-scarcity;{{cite book | last = Hartwell | first = David G. | title = Age of Wonders: Exploring the World of Science Fiction| publisher = Tor Books | year =1996 | pages = 109–131 | isbn = 978-0-312-86235-0 }}
• Future history and speculative evolution of humans on Earth or on other planets;Ashley, M. (April 1989). The Immortal Professor, Astro Adventures No.7, p.6.
• Paranormal abilities such as mind control, telepathy, and telekinesis.{{cite book|author=H. G. Stratmann|title=Using Medicine in Science Fiction: The SF Writer's Guide to Human Biology|page=227|publisher=Springer, 2015|isbn=978-3-319-16015-3|date=14 September 2015}}

{{columns-list|colwidth=22em|

• Africanfuturism
• Australian science fiction
• Bengali science fiction
• Brazilian science fiction
• Canadian science fiction
• Chinese science fiction
• Croatian science fiction
• Czech science fiction and fantasy
• French science fiction
• Japanese science fiction
• Norwegian science fiction
• Science fiction in Poland
• Romanian science fiction
• Russian science fiction and fantasy
• Serbian science fiction
• Spanish science fiction
• Yugoslav science fiction}}

{{For outline|Outline of science fiction}}

{{columns-list|colwidth=22em|

• Afrofuturism
• Anthropological science fiction
• Apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction
• Biopunk
• Black science fiction
• Christian science fiction
• Climate fiction
• Comic science fiction
• Cyberpunk
• Dieselpunk
• Dying Earth
• Far future in fiction
• Feminist science fiction
• Gothic science fiction
• Indigenous Futurism
• Libertarian science fiction
• Military science fiction
• Mundane science fiction
• Planetary romance
• Social science fiction
• Solarpunk
• Space opera
• Space Western
• Steampunk

}}

{{main|Speculative fiction}}

{{columns-list|colwidth=22em|

• Alternate history
• Fantasy
• Historical fiction
• Horror fiction
• Mystery fiction
• Science fantasy
• Space horror
• Spy fiction
• Spy-fi
• Superhero fiction
• Supernatural fiction
• Utopian and dystopian fiction

}}

{{portal|Science fiction}}

{{Div col |colwidth=22em}}

• Outline of science fiction
• History of science fiction
• Timeline of science fiction
• The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction
• Extrasolar planets in fiction
• Fantastic art
• Fictional worlds
• Futures studies
• Hard science fiction
• List of comic science fiction
• List of fictional robots and androids
• List of science fiction and fantasy artists
• List of science fiction authors
• List of science fiction films
• List of science fiction literature with Messiah figures
• List of science fiction novels
• List of science fiction television programs
• List of science fiction themes
• List of science fiction universes
• Retrofuturism
• Science fiction comics
• Science fiction libraries and museums
• Science in science fiction
• Soft science fiction
• Time travel in fiction
• Transhumanism

{{div col end}}

{{Reflist|refs=

{{cite encyclopedia|last = Sterling|first = Bruce|title = Science Fiction|encyclopedia = Encyclopædia Britannica|date = 17 January 2019|url = https://www.britannica.com/art/science-fiction|access-date = 5 April 2019|archive-date = 29 January 2012|archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20120129110126/http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/528857/science-fiction/235713/The-evolution-of-science-fiction|url-status = live}}

Lethem, Jonathan (1998), "Close Encounters: The Squandered Promise of Science Fiction", Village Voice, June. Also reprinted in a slightly expanded version under the title "Why Can't We All Live Together?: A Vision of Genre Paradise Lost" in the New York Review of Science Fiction, September 1998, Number 121, Vol 11, No. 1.

Elyce Rae Helford, in Westfahl, Gary. The Greenwood Encyclopedia of Science Fiction and Fantasy: Greenwood Press, 2005: 289–290.

{{cite journal |title=Is Your Club Dead Yet? |first=Mike |last=Glyer |journal=File 770 |date=November 1998 |url=https://file770.com/is-your-club-dead-yet/ }}

{{cite web |url=http://fanac.org/Fannish_Reference_Works/Fancyclopedia/Fancyclopedia_I/c.html |title=Fancyclopedia I: C – Cosmic Circle |publisher=fanac.org |date=12 August 1999 |access-date=17 January 2007 |archive-date=12 September 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150912074341/http://www.fanac.org/Fannish_Reference_Works/Fancyclopedia/Fancyclopedia_I/c.html |url-status=live }}

{{cite book |last=Wertham |first=Fredric|author-link=Fredric Wertham |title=The World of Fanzines |publisher=Carbondale & Evanston: Southern Illinois University Press |year=1973 }}

{{cite web |url=http://www.fiawol.demon.co.uk/biblio/ |title=British Fanzine Bibliography |first=Rob |last=Hansen |date=13 August 2003 |access-date=17 January 2007 |archive-date=22 March 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150322132834/http://www.fiawol.demon.co.uk/biblio/ |url-status=live }}

{{cite book |url=http://www.stanford.edu/class/history34q/readings/Cyberspace/HaywardSituatingCyberspace.html |title=Future Visions: New Technologies of the Screen |first=Philip |last=Hayward |pages=180–204 |publisher=British Film Institute |year=1993 |access-date=17 January 2007 |archive-date=21 February 2007 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070221203216/http://www.stanford.edu/class/history34q/readings/Cyberspace/HaywardSituatingCyberspace.html |url-status=live }}

{{cite book|last = Card|first = O.|title = Ender's Game|chapter-url = https://books.google.com/books?id=Z5QtUpmbcDwC&pg=PR11|chapter = Introduction|publisher = Macmillan|date = 2006|isbn = 978-0-7653-1738-4|url-access = registration|url = https://archive.org/details/endersgame00card}}

{{cite web|last = Barnett|first = David|url = https://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2009/jan/28/science-fiction-genre|title = Science fiction: the genre that dare not speak its name|work = The Guardian|location = London|date = 28 January 2009|access-date = 13 December 2016|archive-date = 12 August 2016|archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20160812022313/https://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2009/jan/28/science-fiction-genre|url-status = live}}

Le Guin, Ursula K. (1976) "Science Fiction and Mrs Brown", in The Language of the Night: Essays on Fantasy and Science Fiction, Perennial HarperCollins, Revised edition 1993; in Science Fiction at Large (ed. Peter Nicholls), Gollancz, London, 1976; in Explorations of the Marvellous (ed. Peter Nicholls), Fontana, London, 1978; in Speculations on Speculation. Theories of Science Fiction (eds. James Gunn and Matthew Candelaria), The Scarecrow Press, Inc. Maryland, 2005.

{{cite conference |chapter=Science Fiction: Its Nature, Faults and Virtues |book-title=The Science Fiction Novel: Imagination and Social Criticism |publisher=Advent Publishers |last=Heinlein |first=Robert A. |author2=Cyril Kornbluth |author3=Alfred Bester |author4=Robert Bloch |year=1959 |location=University of Chicago }}

{{cite book | last = Card | first = Orson Scott | title = How to Write Science Fiction and Fantasy | publisher = Writer's Digest Books | year = 1990 | page = [https://archive.org/details/howtowritescienc00card/page/17 17] | isbn = 978-0-89879-416-8 | url = https://archive.org/details/howtowritescienc00card/page/17 }}

{{cite book | last = Knight | first =Damon Francis | title = In Search of Wonder: Essays on Modern Science Fiction | url = https://archive.org/details/insearchofwonder00knig | url-access = registration | publisher = Advent Publishing | year =1967 | page = xiii | isbn = 978-0-911682-31-1 }}

Bennett, An Introduction, ix–xi, 120–21; Schor, Introduction to Cambridge Companion, 1–5; Seymour, 548–61.

{{cite encyclopedia |title="SF" (article by Peter Nicholls) |encyclopedia=Encyclopedia of Science Fiction |first=John | last=Clute | editor=Nicholls, Peter |publisher=Orbit/Time Warner Book Group UK |year=1993}}

{{cite report|publisher=National Science Foundation, Division of Science Resources Statistics |chapter-url=https://www.nsf.gov/statistics/seind02/c7/c7s5.htm |chapter=Science and Technology: Public Attitudes and Public Understanding. Science Fiction and Pseudoscience |title=Science and Engineering Indicators–2002 |location=Arlington, VA |id=NSB 02-01 |date=April 2002 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160616181809/http://www.nsf.gov/statistics/seind02/c7/c7s5.htm |archive-date=16 June 2016 }}

{{cite book |url=http://www.worldwideschool.org/library/books/lit/horror/TheWorksofEdgarAllenPoeVolume1/chap3.html |last=Poe |first=Edgar Allan |title=The Works of Edgar Allan Poe, Volume 1, "The Unparalleled Adventures of One Hans Pfaal" |access-date=17 January 2007 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060627190020/http://www.worldwideschool.org/library/books/lit/horror/TheWorksofEdgarAllenPoeVolume1/chap3.html |archive-date=27 June 2006}}

{{Cite book|title=The Halstead Treasury of Ancient Science Fiction|first=Matthew|last=Richardson|publisher=Halstead Press|location=Rushcutters Bay, New South Wales|year=2001|isbn=978-1-875684-64-9}} (cf. {{Cite journal|title=Once Upon a Time|journal=Emerald City|issue=85|date=September 2002|url=http://www.emcit.com/emcit085.shtml#Once|access-date=17 September 2008|archive-date=11 September 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190911095946/http://www.emcit.com/emcit085.shtml#Once|url-status=live}})

{{Cite web|date=6 February 2008|title=Islamset-Muslim Scientists-Ibn Al Nafis as a Philosopher|url=http://www.islamset.com/isc/nafis/drroubi.html|access-date=29 December 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080206072116/http://www.islamset.com/isc/nafis/drroubi.html |archive-date=6 February 2008 }}

Benford, Gregory (1998) "Meaning-Stuffed Dreams:Thomas Disch and the future of SF", New York Review of Science Fiction, September, Number 121, Vol. 11, No. 1

{{cite web |url=http://www.nvcc.edu/home/ataormina/scifi/history/ |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20040326191128/http://nvcc.edu/home/ataormina/scifi/history/ |archive-date=26 March 2004 |title=A History of Science Fiction |first=Agatha |last=Taormina |publisher=Northern Virginia Community College |date=19 January 2005 |access-date=16 January 2007 }}

{{cite web |url=http://keithlynch.net/history.net.html |title=History of the Net is Important |first=Keith |last=Lynch |date=14 July 1994 |access-date=17 January 2007 |archive-date=14 August 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150814084811/http://keithlynch.net/history.net.html |url-status=live }}

{{Cite book|title=The Arabian Nights: A Companion|first=Robert|last=Irwin|publisher=Tauris Parke Paperbacks|year=2003|isbn=978-1-86064-983-7|pages=209–13}}

{{cite episode|title=The Harmony of the Worlds|episode-link=Cosmos: A Personal Voyage#Episodes|series=Cosmos: A Personal Voyage|series-link=Cosmos: A Personal Voyage|credits=Creator and presenter: Carl Sagan|network=PBS|air-date=12 October 1980}}

{{cite book |title=The World of Science Fiction 1926–1976 |year=1980 |last=Del Rey |first=Lester |publisher=Ballantine Books |isbn=978-0-345-25452-8 |url=https://archive.org/details/worldofsciencefi00delr }}

{{cite encyclopedia |title="Sci fi" (article by Peter Nicholls) |encyclopedia=Encyclopedia of Science Fiction |first=John | last=Clute | editor=Nicholls, Peter |publisher=Orbit/Time Warner Book Group UK |year=1993}}

}}

{{Div col}}

• Aldiss, Brian. Billion Year Spree: The True History of Science Fiction, 1973.
• Aldiss, Brian, and Wingrove, David. Trillion Year Spree: The History of Science Fiction, revised and updated edition, 1986.
• Amis, Kingsley. New Maps of Hell: A Survey of Science Fiction, 1958.
• Barron, Neil, ed. Anatomy of Wonder: A Critical Guide to Science Fiction (5th ed.). Westport, Conn.: Libraries Unlimited, 2004. {{ISBN|1-59158-171-0}}.
• Broderick, Damien. Reading by Starlight: Postmodern Science Fiction. London: Routledge, 1995. Print.
• Clute, John Science Fiction: The Illustrated Encyclopedia. London: Dorling Kindersley, 1995. {{ISBN|0-7513-0202-3}}.
• Clute, John and Peter Nicholls, eds., The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction. St Albans, Herts, UK: Granada Publishing, 1979. {{ISBN|0-586-05380-8}}.
• Clute, John and Peter Nicholls, eds., The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction. New York: St Martin's Press, 1995. {{ISBN|0-312-13486-X}}.
• Disch, Thomas M. The Dreams Our Stuff Is Made Of. New York: The Free Press, 1998. {{ISBN|978-0-684-82405-5}}.
• Jameson, Fredric. Archaeologies of the Future: This Desire Called Utopia and Other Science Fictions. London and New York: Verso, 2005.
• Milner, Andrew. Locating Science Fiction. Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2012.
• Raja, Masood Ashraf, Jason W. Ellis and Swaralipi Nandi. eds., The Postnational Fantasy: Essays on Postcolonialism, Cosmopolitics and Science Fiction. McFarland 2011. {{ISBN|978-0-7864-6141-7}}.
• Reginald, Robert. Science Fiction and Fantasy Literature, 1975–1991. Detroit, MI/Washington, D.C./London: Gale Research, 1992. {{ISBN|0-8103-1825-3}}.
• Roy, Pinaki. "Science Fiction: Some Reflections". Shodh Sanchar Bulletin, 10.39 (July–September 2020): 138–42.
• {{cite book|last1=Scholes|first1=Robert E.|author-link1=Robert Scholes|last2=Rabkin|first2=Eric S.|title=Science fiction: history, science, vision|url=https://archive.org/details/sciencefictionhi00scho|url-access=registration|year=1977|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0-19-502174-5}}
• Suvin, Darko. Metamorphoses of Science Fiction: on the Poetics and History of a Literary Genre, New Haven : Yale University Press, 1979.
• Weldes, Jutta, ed. To Seek Out New Worlds: Exploring Links between Science Fiction and World Politics. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003. {{ISBN|0-312-29557-X}}.
• Westfahl, Gary, ed. The Greenwood Encyclopedia of Science Fiction and Fantasy: Themes, Works, and Wonders (three volumes). Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 2005.
• Wolfe, Gary K. Critical Terms for Science Fiction and Fantasy: A Glossary and Guide to Scholarship. New York: Greenwood Press, 1986. {{ISBN|0-313-22981-3}}.

{{div col end}}

{{Sister project links|s=Category:Science fiction|voy=Science-fiction tourism}}

{{Library resources box|by=no|onlinebooks=no|about=yes|wikititle=science fiction}}

• [https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/bookshelf/68 Science Fiction Bookshelf] at Project Gutenberg
• [https://efanzines.com Science fiction fanzines (current and historical) online]
• [https://www.sfwa.org/forum/reading/1-novel/ SFWA "Suggested Reading" list]
• [https://standardebooks.org/ebooks?tags%5B%5D=science+fiction Science fiction at standardebooks.org]
• [https://sfra.org Science Fiction Research Association]
• [http://www.bl.uk/romantics-and-victorians/themes/visions-of-the-future A selection of articles written by Mike Ashley, Iain Sinclair and others, exploring 19th-century visions of the future.] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230618115843/http://www.bl.uk/romantics-and-victorians/themes/visions-of-the-future |date=18 June 2023 }} from the British Library's Discovering Literature website.
• [https://www.torontopubliclibrary.ca/merril/ Merril Collection of Science Fiction, Speculation and Fantasy] at Toronto Public Library
• [https://www.depauw.edu/sfs/biblio.htm Science Fiction Studies' Chronological Bibliography of Science Fiction History, Theory, and Criticism]
• [https://www.esquire.com/entertainment/books/g39358054/best-sci-fi-books/ Best 50 sci-fi novels of all time] (Esquire; 21 March 2022)

{{Science fiction}}

{{Speculative fiction all}}

{{Narrative}}

{{Authority control}}

Speculative fiction