University and college courses have proliferated in recent decades—and no wonder. From H.G. Wells to H.P. Lovecraft, from Philip K. Dick and Ray Bradbury to Isaac Asimov and Ray Bradbury, and from Ursula Le Guin and Octavia Butler to N.K. Jemison, the genre offers a rich lode of literary material that engages readers’ attention, provokes deep reflection, and prompts lively discussion. Understandably enough, most such courses focus primarily on novels and short stories from the past one hundred years. Beyond, perhaps, a glance at Frankenstein and Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, there is rarely time in a single course to explore, for example, seventeenth- and eighteenth-century works of proto-science fiction. Nor is it usually possible to explore many works that fall into gray areas—works from many eras that might be described as science fiction, but that might also be described, depending on the particular work, as fantasy novels, or as adventure stories, or as lost world narratives, or as horror stories, or as philosophical fiction.
This site is designed to facilitate an exploration of just those areas. Of the selections here, only the H.G. Wells, the Clare Winger Harris, and the AI-authored story are works of fiction that almost anyone would unequivocally declare to be works of science fiction, pure and simple. The rest are works of proto science fiction, or mixed-genre works, or works that might arguably be described as speculative fiction or utopian fiction rather than science fiction.
If we are mapping the genre of science fiction, how far should we mark its borders as extending? How broadly can we (or should we) define the genre? This website aims to facilitate such discussion. In addition to twelve works of fiction, the site includes a full listing of Broadview Editions that can be considered as science fiction, and a list of links to other relevant online resources.
The final fiction selection may also prompt questions about the future edges of science fiction writing, in what is rapidly becoming an AI world.
