Quote:
Originally Posted by Penforhire
I take issue with "SF" nomenclature though. It does not provide the context "Sci-Fi" does. Walk up to strangers and ask, "do you read SF?" You'll get more blank stares than you will for, "do you read Sci-Fi?" SF makes sense, to me, in communication only after the context is established.
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Also, how many long series were like Perry Rhodan, tossed back and forth by so many authors? The American issues were childhood favorites of mine. Too bad it contracted to German since I don't speak or read Deutsch.
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Oddly, there's a connection between these two.
"SciFi" was coined by Forrest J. Ackerman (a/k/a 4E and 4SJ), a long time SF fan, collector, anthologist, editor, and agent. (Forry edited Famous Monsters of Filmland and Spacemen in the 60's and early 70's, and his home, the Ackermansion, housed the world's largest SF and fantasy collection.)
Forry originated it as a contraction of "Scientifiction", the term Hugo Gernsbach coined to describe what he printed in Amazing Stories, the first pulp magazine devoted to SF.
It's a term over which much virtual blood has been spilled. Long time SF fans despise it. From where they sit, SciFi connotes cheesy B movies, lurid covers, and hack writing that give the genre a bad name. From their perspective, SF is vastly preferable, though you'll find disagreement on whether SF stands for Science Fiction or Speculative Fiction. (The late Judith Merrill, SF writer, editor, and anthologist, once suggested with tongue in cheek that it might stand for Space Fish.)
Unfortunately, we're probably stuck with SciFi as the abbreviation that everyone recognizes.
Since the term SciFi tends to be applied most often to media efforts, I sometimes say "I
read SF. I
watch SciFi."
The connection with Perry Rhodan is through Forry. The series is German in origin. The US versions were largely translations from the German edited by Forry and done by Forry's wife Wendayne. (And unfortunately, a lot of Perry Rhodan falls into the "hack writing that gives SF a bad name" category.)
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Dennis