Quote:
Originally Posted by Andrew H.
I'm kind of skeptical of some of these. AFAICT, Asimov, Heinlein, and Clarke are already not nearly as popular as they were when I started reading SF in the 70's. Bradbury might still be read, though - we read Fahrenheit 451 in school. I can see Vonnegut, too.
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I think we should keep in mind that even the most popular books tend to be read less after the author has died than while he is still alive. Think about it, when an author is alive, they can get books on the best seller list, which likely gets some readers who never picked up a work of that author to give it a go... if they like it, then they will be more likely to pick up works from the author's back list.
Once the author is dead, there is generally far fewer sales, but the classics tend to keep selling at a slow but steady rate (not counting sales to college lit classes
).
That being said, I think a lot of science fiction (and I am a fan of it) does not necessarily age very well. Only 70 years after the Foundation Stories, set tens of thousands of years into the future, and we have computers that make much of the wonders that Asimov wrote about look positively pedestrian.
I imagine that some of the stories will find a place similar to what the stories of H.G. Wells or Jules Verne have... but they probably won't attract the main stream S.F. reader like they did when the authors were still alive.
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Bill