Robert A. Heinlein, L. Sprague de Camp, Isaac Asimov at Philadelphia Navy Yard, 1944 ReFuture at Troynovant:
Reflections on the History of Science Fiction
and the Progress of Fantasy;
listed by Title

Our concept of the History of Science Fiction will not perhaps match closely to anyone else's view. We do want especially to convey that it is a rich and complex history, a self-conscious creation of the modern, creative, pro-individual, technological and forward-looking West. And that science fiction is precisely the literature which helps us to look forward and to manage our potential futures.

Our related concept of the Progress of Fantasy is that works of myth and fancy and dream which are most thoughtful and noblest in intention, must inherently and inevitably seek — through evocation of the timeless — to shape the real futures before us.
  


  
Amazing Stories, 1926-1995
  An Obituary, with an Aside on Buck Rogers
DL Franson
Argonauts of the Air, The H. G. Wells RW Franson
Atlas Shrugged as Science Fiction
  Two Reviews in Astounding, 1958
RW Franson

Carl Barks and the Art of the Comic Book Michael Barrier RW Franson
Charles Fort:
  Prophet of the Unexplained
Damon Knight RW Franson

Explorers of the Infinite
  Shapers of Science Fiction
Sam Moskowitz RW Franson

Federation of the Hub, The
  Self-Maintaining Science Fiction Universe
JH Schmitz
Finding Serenity
  Anti-Heroes, Lost Shepherds and Space Hookers
  in Joss Whedon's Firefly
Jane Espenson RW Franson
For Us, the Living Robert A. Heinlein RW Franson
For Us, the Living Robert A. Heinlein WH Stoddard
Future History series Robert A. Heinlein RW Franson

Goldfish Bowl Robert A. Heinlein RW Franson
Harlan Ellison's Watching Harlan Ellison RW Franson
Heinlein's Missed Bestsellers RW Franson
Hobbyist Eric Frank Russell RW Franson
Horatius at Khazad-dum WH Stoddard

Immortal Storm, The
  A History of Science Fiction Fandom
Sam Moskowitz RW Franson
In Search of Wonder
  Essays on Modern Science Fiction
Damon Knight RW Franson
Is Atlas Shrugging? Ayn Rand RW Franson

Let There Be Light Robert A. Heinlein RW Franson

Martian Odyssey, A Stanley G. Weinbaum  RW Franson

Pictorial History of Science Fiction David Kyle RW Franson

Robert A. Heinlein
  A Reader's Companion
James Gifford RW Franson
Robert Heinlein Interview, The
  and Other Heinleiniana
J. Neil Schulman RW Franson
Rocket Belts' Slow Liftoff RW Franson

Science Fiction Ideas & Dreams David Kyle RW Franson
Serenity Joss Whedon WH Stoddard
Sinister Barrier Eric Frank Russell RW Franson

Tolkien and the Great War
  The Threshold of Middle Earth
John Garth WH Stoddard

Variable Star Robert A. Heinlein
  & Spider Robinson
WH Stoddard
  

  
[Inverness, Macbeth's castle.]

Lady Macbeth {to Macbeth}:

Thy letters have transported me beyond
This ignorant present, and I feel now
The future in the instant.

William Shakespeare
Macbeth, 1.5.54-56

  


  
Photo of Robert A. Heinlein,
L. Sprague de Camp, & Isaac Asimov
at the Philadelphia Navy Yard, 1944

The oldest national science-fiction club,
founded by Damon Knight in 1941:
National Fantasy Fan Federation
(NFFF, or more familiarly, N3F)
  

  
LitCrit at Troynovant
critiques in and around literary criticism

Aerospace at Troynovant
air & space travel & development

Science fiction & fantasy series
  


  
Yesterday's science fiction is today's headlines. What does this mean, particularly to writers?

First, it means the reading public has been shocked into awareness of outer space. Americans are interested now in its possibilities. They no longer scoff at moon probes or expeditions to Mars. Pulps covered with pictures of bug-eyed-monsters or of sweater girls in the strong arms of Rube Goldberg machines, have suddenly become respectable — even worthy of veneration. They have printed the outpourings of prophets. ...

This indicates that science fiction is the thing to write, if you can do it. At this point many writers, anxious to cash in on trends, will stifle cries of despair. ...

To these people I come with a bright message of hope. Science fiction can at present be written without benefit of advanced mathematics, or of charts giving the chemical composition of planetary atmospheres. For current events have caught up with physicists' conceptions. Rockets to explore space are on actual launching pads. The science fictioneer, whose profession is to keep one jump ahead, has to think of something else again, something as new as space rockets were in the forties.

One excellent way of writing science fiction — or s.f. as it is called in the trade — is to follow the scientists' own rule of working from the known to the unknown. ...

Doris Pitkin Buck
"Put Your Story on the Moon"
Author & Journalist, February 1959


 

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