Science Fiction, Science Fact: Alternative Views of the Future
Scientific discoveries stimulate the imagination whereas science fiction gauges the preoccupations of society at a particular time. Although Jules Verne is widely accepted to be the founding father of science fiction, earlier writers—Lucian, Cyrano de Bergerac, Johannes Kepler, Voltaire and Jonathan Swift—wrote about other worlds or satirized trends in human affairs by creating fictitious societies based on the science of their times. Swift was inspired by Newton’s work on gravitation, Mary Shelley's Frankenstein by Galvani's experiments with electricity and H.G. Wells with the effect on mankind of the misuse of science and technology.
After World War II, a resurgence of science fiction occurred through authors such as Isaac Asimov, A.E. van Vogt, Arthur C. Clarke, John Wyndham, Robert Henlein, Poul Anderson, Wilmar H. Shiras and many others. These writers, many of them with a background in the sciences, explored the scientific, technological and sociological concerns of their day—be it totalitarianism, computer technology, nuclear war and its aftermath or the dwindling of natural resources. In films, too, science fiction has shaped society's vision of the future and the way it is discussed.
Field Trips
Visits include the Museum of the History of Science in Oxford and others to be arranged.
Reading List
- Aldiss, Brian Wilson. A Science Fiction Omnibus. Penguin, 2007.
- Ashley, Michael. Out of This World: Science Fiction but Not as You Know It. British Library, 2011.
- James, Edward and Mendlesohn, Farah. The Cambridge Companion to Science Fiction. Cambridge University Press, 2003.
- Moylan, Tom. Scraps of the Untainted Sky: Science Fiction, Utopia, Dystopia. Westview Press, 2000.
Tutor Biography
Willem D. Hackmann, M.A., D.Phil., is emeritus senior assistant keeper, Museum of the History of Science; reader at the University of Oxford; and fellow of Linacre College, Oxford.
Credit and Enrollment Information
X463.4 • 3 semester units in English
EDP 284166
