You must log in or register to comment.
That’s a perspective on Mary Shelley that I hadn’t considered. But she was reasonably well-adjusted and popular. And yes I do consider Frankenstein to be the first English science fiction.
But she was reasonably well-adjusted
Bruh…
She kept her dead husbands heart and would carry it around with her
If keeping body parts is a sign of neurodivergence then lots of religious people are neurodivergent. Having body parts (finger, bones, organs) from holy people or saints as relics is extremely common.
That’s not neurodivergent that’s just goth bro.
Victorian goth no less.
Reasonably well-adjusted not perfectly well-adjusted.
Weird but also romantic. At least it was her deceased husband’s heart, and not her living husband’s?
She would have had to be Frankenstein if she somehow had her living husband’s heart. Taking out the heart does tend to have the property of leading to death
Reasonable
I don’t refer to mary shelly. I do not distinguish her as the “inventor” of science fiction either. Rendering strange ideas in terms of esoteric disciplines for the metaphorical augmentation or whatever is as old as humanity.
Okay. So what’s the first work of science fiction to you?
If the authors believed magic and the gods to be real, would ancient works like The Epic of Gilgamesh or The Iliad count as science fiction?
Good question! Typically they get listed as fantasy because the magic isn’t manmade. Most definitions of science fiction require a human to have created the unrealistic element - or an extraterrestrial lifeform who is roughly analogous to a person. It’s not just that magic is present, but that it was derived from supernatural sources and not by human actions.
It’s something I haven’t delved into enough to arrive at a definitive conclusion, actually. The subject delivers little thrill for me.
Then I suggest you accept the common interpretation that “Frankenstein, or The Modern Prometheus”, is at least the first modern work of sci-fi.
I can tell this means a lot to you. I suppose it’s a matter of taste.
In what way does taste determine the genre of a work of fiction?
You misunderstand. I offered that what “means a lot to you” is a matter of taste.
Fair enough as a term, but it was one of my minors in college. Authors use both.
I don’t understand. Which authors are you referring to that created the genre and are neurodivergant?
Great question. I’m not OP. But a bunch come to mind.
Disclaimer: Even in recent classic eras of science fiction, it wouldn’t have been safe for authors (who need publisher trust to buy food) to get diagnosed as neurodivergent, so I feel like we’re left with wether neurodivergent individuals embrace their work, rather than if the author ever acknowledged any personal neurodivergence.
Disclaimer: I’m not neurodivergent. I don’t feel safe seeking a diagnosis. And things aren’t binary, so what the hell. I do acknowledge it’s interesting that I relate strongly with a bunch of these characters, and can bring them to memory quickly as some of my favorites…
With that disclaimed:
- “The November People” by Ray Bradbury comes to mind. It explores how classic Hollywood “monsters” would handle themselves as roommates, mostly through exploring their mental diversity rooted in their physical/cultural differences.
- Asimov’s robot detective stories (start with The Caves of Steel) have protagonists whose planets effectively make them neordivergent anytime they visit another planet than their birth world.
- “Stranger in a Strange Land”, by Heinlein, is about a neurodivergent (for Earth) young man who grew up as the sole human citizen of Mars.
- Philip K Dick’s detective protagonist from “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep” (aka Blade Runner) is clearly neurodivergent, as is his wife.
Edit: As others have mentioned, Mary Shelly’s Frankenstein, of course!
Man, you very clearly don’t know what neurodivergent means.
This comment is useless. Why don’t you start a discussion by giving some reason why you think none of the examples given are neurodivergent?
Because commenter thinks neurodivergence is an excuse to be rude.
Removed by mod
Lol, said the guy that thinks neurodivergent is when from a different culture or ignorant.
i dunno, ok, but that’s like saying the theory of relativity, or the mona lisa, was created by a neurodivergent and co-opted by normies. some of us are artists, and some of us work the fields. without either we all starve.
Removed by mod
Removed by mod
Removed by mod
Removed by mod
Removed by mod
Removed by mod
It is funny. There are so many things in modern day that would be a dream come true to young me but it all goes dystopia and all the fantasy and scifi is one of those things. I thought I would love so much but so much is not done well. I sorta feel for gay people because being into scifi was a subculture but it going mainstream has greatly diminished the subculture as it sorta becomes unnecessary but I miss that small group feeling.
That’s not entirely true. There’s still good sci-fi being made. Look at the expanse, dark, altered carbon.
I dont know much about newer books, but I m sure there’s good scifi writers out there still. What comes to mind is ready player one, red rising, pines, although these are all 10 years old by now. It illustrates that it’s not just the era of Heinlein and Asimov that counts.
Yeah its not so much good sci-fi is not being made as there is such innundation that its more of a diamond in the rough kind of thing and Im talking more media than literature.
Greg Egan, Iain Banks and Sam Hughes are good stuff, if you haven’t.
Also, there’s this amazing new genre, “LitRpg”. Basically fantasy where an rpg type videogame became real.
Most of it is the usual dreck but some of it goes hard sf, delving into the existential stuff.
A couple of the rationalists have even taken a swing.
Try
Mother of Learning
Death after death
Friendship is optimal
So ya, real development is still alive.
LitRpg
I don’t think this is new; The Sleeping Dragon by Joel Rosenberg was published in 1983 where players in a tabletop RPG get whooshed into the game world at the beginning of the book. Fun series.
Also, jumanji
Sounds like isekai.
Modern sci-fi was created by an extremely depressed widow that only thought about the social and scientific repercussions of bringing her husband back from the dead and put it in the form of literature. And appreciation for Sci Fi has been around for a very long time. Nosferatur, The Haunting, House on Haunted Hill, The Blob, The Day The Earth Stood Still, War Of The World’s, etc…
No, modern sci-fi evolved over time like all the other complex stuff tends to.
Modern sci-fi is created by every fellow with a strange idea. Who thinks maybe I could get my idea across better if I framed it as a narrative and put it in scientific terms. because science is such a lovely language for talking about strange ideas.
Mary Shelley’s Frankentstein is noted to be the future sci-fi story. Mary at the time was dealing with grief of the death of her husband. That’s all I’m saying
No she wasn’t. Frankenstein was published in 1818, Percy Shelley died in 1822. She did have multiple stillborn children, the first of which was within the year prior to the initial first draft of the story, plus she blamed herself for the postpartum death of her own mother. Percy helped edit Frankenstein, he wasn’t dead yet.
You know, you’re both right.
modern sci-fi is indeed a collective thing that has evolved from its roots. The seed that grew into sci-fi was indeed Mary Shelley.
However, that depends on the term modern meaning something different from sci-fi as a whole, and when you cut off the start point of modern. If you count all science based fiction as modern, then Shelley is the defining origin.
Sometimes an asshole is just an asshole.
Ah, you’ve read Heinlein and Lovecraft.
The worm criticizes the hawk for crawling improperly.
I don’t really think so, unless you have a very broad definition of neurodivergence. In which case, yeah sure most all art is made by people who are not balanced happy individuals, now too. If you don’t have that black hole of need inside you, you don’t need to fill it.
HG Wells
Jules Verne
Mary Shelley
L Frank Baum
Heinlein
They seem like regular minded people just brilliant. I don’t think of anyone as a “normie” though, my definition of normal is either it has to be broad enough to encompass a majority of the population, or it’s meaningless because nobody is identical to anyone else, all broken in our own way and strong in our own way.
Sure, “neurovanilla” people
Black hole of need?
How about just different shapes of people, with differing tastes. Some obsess over money. Others over art.
Sure, but happy satisfied people aren’t usually the ones who progress humanity forward in art or sport. I wouldn’t describe it as neurodivergence, but do think it’s the people who have a need that most of us don’t.
Much like all other creative endeavors
being so acoustic about languages you make a book that is a global hit
No, it was invented by poverty ridden meth addicts…
It’s not ancient history
Meth was first discoved in 1898, Mary Shelly published Frankenstein in 1818.
If we count Frankenstein as scifi…
Then stuff centuries earlier also count as scifi, and she’s out of the discussion again.
If we count stuff earlier than 1898 your statement is false from the jump.
Also there are other authors that published what is considered sci-fi before 1898 as well.
If we count stuff earlier than 1898 your statement is false from the jump
I never said we should…
I view the begining of scif as the 60s maybe late 50s.
My point was if you’re taking it back to Shelly, by the same logic we’d have to take it back further. Which you apparently agree with?
What about War of the Worlds? That was published in 1898. Are you saying the book where aliens invade from Mars and then die because of their inability to tolerate our microbial biome isn’t science fiction?
EDIT: or what about 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea? That’s 1870.
EDIT: shit, what about The Last Man?
The Last Man is an apocalyptic, dystopian science fiction novel by Mary Shelley, first published in 1826. The narrative concerns Europe in the late 21st century, ravaged by the rise of a bubonic plague pandemic that rapidly sweeps across the entire globe, ultimately resulting in the near-extinction of humanity.
that’s the most sci-fi sounding gd thing tho
In the 2nd century some guy wrote about travelling to the moon…
Where he found Moon people who were at war with the sun people.
By your definition, isn’t that also SciFi?
Kinda! I wouldn’t say that it is exactly science fiction since our modern understanding of the scientific method didn’t really exist back then, but it’s fiction using extrapolations of what might be possible based upon the natural rules of the world. Those extrapolations are used to justify and explain the things that would otherwise be impossible, which is the core of what science fiction is to me. It probably doesn’t vibe like modern sci-fi, but science fiction is not based on vibes.
Like, don’t get me wrong, I fucking love 50s and 60s sci-fi. I read Rendezvous with Rama (EDIT: 70s, not 60s! I’m surprised, I thought Rama came out before 2001) when I was 8 and the novelization of 2001 right afterwards and that had a tremendous impact on my life. I just don’t think Arthur C. Clarke or Heinlein or Asimov created science fiction. They pioneered new subgenres and ideas that have been hugely influential for everything that came afterwards.
Sounds like it.
Maybe the popular era of sci-fi futurism, but if Frankenstein isn’t sci-fi then nothing I’ve seen labeled as sci-fi is.
but if Frankenstein isn’t sci-fi then nothing I’ve seen labeled as sci-fi is.
And my point is if Frankenstein is scifi, then so is earlier stuff…
It’s all where you draw the line, some people draw that line where electricity is involved, because electricity was a pretty big deal.
Earlier stories have more primitive science, later stories have more futuristic science.
I view the begining of scif as the 60s maybe late 50s.
If you’re making a point about pulp sci fi, the golden era of sci fi was in the early 40s, and there was plenty of pulp sci fi in the decades before then.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_Age_of_Science_Fiction
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_US_science_fiction_and_fantasy_magazines_to_1950
I’m not sure I’d count Frankenstein, tbh. I think it’s more horror than sci-fi.
The addition of electricity is the only reason anyone calls it scifi
Biology is science. Medical science is science. The lack of robots and computers does not disqualify it as sci-fi.
It’s a piece of speculative fiction asking “what if these medical advances (plus a few new fictional breakthroughs by a genius) led to the creation of a new life?” That’s science fiction.
I doubt it, but ok
