Other founders of the "Golden Age" of Sicience Fiction

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by HarryT

I thought I was pretty well up on "golden age" SF, but I can honestly say that the only people in this list that I've heard of are Moore and Brackett!

Judith Merrill is another great (female) author from the 40's and 50's. Best remembered for her classic THAT ONLY A MOTHER. She co-wrote seversl novels with Cyril Kornbluth, a few more on her own. She did a fair amount of anthologies and one of her aborted projects from the early 60's inspired Harlan Ellison to do Dangerous Visions.

Henderson's stories of THE PEOPLE were adapted to a 1972 TV movie. William Shatner and Kim Darby. I saw it while at college. Managed to VCR it. Almost impossible to find. A lot of what is billed as young adult SF follows her footsteps.

Russ was part of the new wave/dangerous visions era who most famously wrote the strongly feminist THE FEMALE MAN in 1970. Took her five years to find a publisher. Its an... interesting read. Lots of followers, especially in the 80's...

Have you looked at this?

http://www.womeninsciencefiction.com/?p=31

Good anthology.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Verne's an interesting one. Although he's widely considered today to be one of the "fathers of SF", what he basically wrote were books about travel. Those of his works we consider "science fiction" were simply travel to unusual places, or by unusual methods, as in "From the Earth to the Moon" or "20,000 Leagues under the Seas". The overwhelming majority of the 54 novels that comprise his "Voyages extraordinaires", or "Extraordinary Journeys", have no SF elements to them. In the words of Verne's editor, the purpose of his books was "to outline all the geographical, geological, physical, and astronomical knowledge amassed by modern science and to recount, in an entertaining and picturesque format, the history of the universe."

Verne --->Weinbaum ---> Smith/Nowlan/Balmer ---> everything, up to Star Trek

[pwalker8]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

Murray Leinster - Sidewise in Time: Alternate reality stories
First Contact - as the title says

Gordon Dixon - Dorsai cycle: Starship Troopers birthed the modern military SF subgenre but Dorsai molded it

...
Lots of goodies in the realms of SF backlist.

Gordon R Dickson, author of the Dorsai or Childe Cycle was one of my favorite authors. He's mostly from 1960 onward, so I would put him more in the post golden age writers, but I'm not really sure there is such a thing as Golden Age. One can point to a steady progression from the early 1800's onward.

I might break them out into time periods rather than anything else, but it's all a matter of personal preference.

[pwalker8]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Verne's an interesting one. Although he's widely considered today to be one of the "fathers of SF", what he basically wrote were books about travel. Those of his works we consider "science fiction" were simply travel to unusual places, or by unusual methods, as in "From the Earth to the Moon" or "20,000 Leagues under the Seas". The overwhelming majority of the 54 novels that comprise his "Voyages extraordinaires", or "Extraordinary Journeys", have no SF elements to them. In the words of Verne's editor, the purpose of his books was "to outline all the geographical, geological, physical, and astronomical knowledge amassed by modern science and to recount, in an entertaining and picturesque format, the history of the universe."

True enough, though 20,000 Leagues did have a machine that was very much like a nuclear sub in it. I read one article about SF a long time ago which basically said that in the best SF stories, the SF elements were purely secondary and could have just as easily been a western, or sailing ship story.

[crich70]

I don't know if he's been mentioned yet but John W. Campbell. He was a sci fi writer and the editor of Analog where many other authors got their start.

[crich70]

Originally Posted by meeera

C.L. Moore, Zenna Henderson, Leigh Brackett, Joanna Russ, L. Taylor Hansen

Don't forget Edmund Hamilton. He was Leigh Brackett's husband and a good sci fi writer in his own right.

[Greg Anos]

Originally Posted by pwalker8

True enough, though 20,000 Leagues did have a machine that was very much like a nuclear sub in it. I read one article about SF a long time ago which basically said that in the best SF stories, the SF elements were purely secondary and could have just as easily been a western, or sailing ship story.

I tend to disagree with that, IMO the best science fiction stories are good stories that literally could not exist as stories, without the science fiction element.

I'll give a couple of Clarke examples. The Nine Billion Names of God and Childhood's End

[Greg Anos]

Originally Posted by HarryT

I didn't realise Lieber was the author of that! As you say, a classic.

Harry, here are some other classics of Fritz Lieber.

Try And Change The Past
Catch That Zepplin!
(Both from the Change Wind series)

Spacetime For Springers
Coming Attraction
and
The Man Who Never Grew Young

[Alpha o]

Gentry Lee - he worked on the Rama series. He's also an engineer at JPL. Came across his name while reading books on the Mars Rovers.

H. Beam Piper - The 4 Day Planet

Brian Aldiss

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by Ralph Sir Edward

I tend to disagree with that, IMO the best science fiction stories are good stories that literally could not exist as stories, without the science fiction element.

I'll give a couple of Clarke examples. The Nine Billion Names of God and Childhood's End

Indeed.

The generally accepted guideline is that if the scientific/technological element is removed and the story falls apart, it is Science Fiction. If the SF elements are removed and the core story survives then they are just props, decoration, or a setting and it isn't SF.

In the romance field there is an entire subgenre dedicated to stories set in SF (and fantasy) settings; future cities, spaceships, lost colonies, whatever. The stories are correctly flagged as paranormal romance because the story is about the relationships, not the SF elements.

The same applies to mysteries in SF settings.
Crossovers can happen but they are rare. And hard to really pull off.

[Greg Anos]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

Indeed.

The generally accepted guideline is that if the scientific/technological element is removed and the story falls apart, it is Science Fiction. If the SF elements are removed and the core story survives then they are just props, decoration, or a setting and it isn't SF.

In the romance field there is an entire subgenre dedicated to stories set in SF (and fantasy) settings; future cities, spaceships, lost colonies, whatever. The stories are correctly flagged as paranormal romance because the story is about the relationships, not the SF elements.

The same applies to mysteries in SF settings.
Crossovers can happen but they are rare. And hard to really pull off.

How would you classify Asimov's Caves Of Steel?

[barryem]

Originally Posted by MikeB1972

Anyone mentioned A E Van Vogt yet?

I've never quite known what to think of A E Van Vogt. His stories are so odd that even though you can't avoid calling them SF they're not like any other SF. He wrote some really, really good stuff and much of it is very weird.

I've always wondered if he didn't have his own genre.

Barry

[barryem]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

The generally accepted guideline is that if the scientific/technological element is removed and the story falls apart, it is Science Fiction. If the SF elements are removed and the core story survives then they are just props, decoration, or a setting and it isn't SF.

While I can't disagree with your idea here I certainly disagree that there is any generally accepted means of deciding what is and what isn't science fiction. There really aren't any reliable boundaries.

I've seen this topic discussed many times on internet forums, sometimes at great length by very intelligent people and without exception any dividing line that is proposed is always invalidated by some mutually agreed upon example.

There were some threads on rec.arts.books that went on for years on the topic of what was and what wasn't science fiction, often with established SF writers participating, and there was never any kind of general agreement.

Science fiction just is. I doubt anyone will ever agree on just what it is. I suspect that's true of most genres.

Barry

[Greg Anos]

It is a continuum. There is black and white, but mostly shades of gray.

As to Van Vogt. He is better at shorter length. He was reputed to add a new idea every 800 words, which might work at short length, but becomes a disaster at novel length.

I have a NESFA short story omnibus, highly recommended, (even if it is only in paper).

For those who have not read any of Van Vogt, I can recommend:

The Monster
The Village
The Sound
Dear Pen Pal

(And fans will list another dozen - these are just off the top of my head.)

Doggone it, I just finished re-reading Harrison's Technicolor Time Machine, I now want to read some Van Vogt. . .

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by Ralph Sir Edward

How would you classify Asimov's Caves Of Steel?

SF mystery.
It has the outward form of a mystery but the story is all about the Earth society and its attitudes towards automation.
Take out the city culture and what remains? A non-SF mystery.

Similarly NAKED SUN isn't about the murder mystery but rather about Solaria which bookends CAVES OF STEEL.

In both cases the mystery is a mechanism to move our POV character through the subject society.