Though writers and scholars disagree on the precise boundaries of the Golden Age of science fiction and the New Wave, both are associated with the years after World War II. In his anthology Before the Golden Age, Isaac Asimov dates science fiction’s Golden Age as beginning in 1938, when John Campbell became editor of Astounding Stories, to 1950, when magazines such as Galaxy and The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction entered the field. In his anthology Modern Science Fiction, Norman Spinrad dates the Golden Age from 1966 to 1970, with the rise of the New Wave.
Until 1950 fans could read every science-fiction magazine and book and still have time to publish their reactions in fanzines. Authors could keep up with one another’s work. This was a period not only of flowering but of consensus. Readers and writers knew what science fiction was: it was what appeared in the pulp magazine Astounding Stories. Through the 1940s, Astounding Stories dominated the genre, and John W. Campbell dominated Astounding Stories. As editor from 1938 to 1971, Campbell made the magazine in his own image and captured readers’ imaginations and beliefs. Many other magazines were published, some of them claiming circulations considerably larger than that of Astounding Stories—Ziff Davis’s Amazing Stories, for example—but the stories that defined science fiction appeared in Campbell’s magazine.
Through the 1940s magazines were the major—and sometimes only—publishing medium for science fiction. Even when anthologies began to be published in book form, they were largely made up of stories from the magazines, and science-fiction novels were reprinted serials. But even beyond the centralizing fact of the magazines, 1940s science fiction displayed a unification of diverse influences, a developing consensus. Campbell shaped that consensus and talked about it in his controversial editorials. Writers got large doses of theory in conversation, in long letters, and in rejection slips. (“Amusing,” he might write, “but it ain’t science fiction.”) In 1952 he defined science fiction in an article for Modern Science Fiction: “Fiction is only dreams written out; science fiction consists of the hopes and dreams and fears (for some dreams are nightmares) of a technically based society.” Campbell’s authors included Asimov, Arthur C. Clarke, L. Sprague de Camp, Robert A. Heinlein, L. Ron Hubbard, Henry Kuttner and C. L. Moore (individually and as a team writing under pseudonyms), Lester del Rey, Eric Frank Russell, Clifford Simak, Theodore Sturgeon, A. E. van Vogt, Jack Williamson, and many others.
Campbell and his writers satisfied, almost as a by-product of their activities, the third criterion for the existence of science fiction: they freed themselves from old concepts about the nature of the universe—cultural and religious—and began an extended debate about the beginning and the end of things, and the fate of humanity, which resulted in a kind of consensus within science fiction. Heinlein expressed this by revealing that what had attracted him to science fiction was a quality called “time-binding,” a term invented by Alfred Korzybski to describe how the human animal lives not only in the present but in the past and in the future. Most people, Heinlein said, live from day to day or plan ahead for a year or two. He went on to say that science fiction readers “differ from most of the rest of the race by thinking in terms of racial magnitudes—not even centuries but thousands of years.”
The fictional debate resulted in a consensus future history that Donald Wollheim summed up in The Universe Makers. Although Heinlein was the first to base his stories and novels on a consistent future history, the consensus drew on Asimov’s Foundation stories and works from earlier authors such as E. E. “Doc” Smith, Edmond Hamilton, and Olaf Stapledon. Later additions and refinements were made by such authors as Poul Anderson, James Blish, Larry Niven, and Ursula K. Le Guin.
Other directions emerged around 1950 with the appearance of The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction (F&SF) edited by Anthony Boucher and J. Francis McComas, and of Galaxy Science Fiction, edited by H. L. Gold. They looked at science fiction from other viewpoints, and the consensus, though it still had influence, began to fragment. F&SF reunited the streams of fantasy and science fiction in a turbulent bed. It produced a tolerance for anything written well, encouraging established writers to attempt stories that previously would have been unpublishable within the genre, and attracted into the field new writers, such as Ray Bradbury, who found Campbell’s requirements incompatible or uninspiring. Galaxy specialized in social satire, and a generation of writers who had been working on the fringes of Campbell’s world found a home for their darker visions. Much of what F&SF published was difficult to categorize. Galaxy, on the other hand, established its own rigor. Gold wanted science fiction written to his tastes. His view of life was ironic. He wanted fiction not about scientists and engineers but entertaining works about average citizens caught up in worlds not of their making who find ways not to cure but to endure.
Isaac Asimov
The 1950s also brought a boom for new magazines. Between three and fourteen new science-fiction magazines a year started publication between 1949 and 1953; many died quickly, and in 1953 more magazines were killed than born. Publishers overestimated the influence of the atom bomb and rocketry on the magazine-buying public; although people lived in a science-fiction world, they had not yet recognized it. Nevertheless, dozens of science-fiction magazines were available, encouraging new writers.
Prior to World War II, book publishers had virtually ignored science fiction, but soon after the war anthologies and novels began to appear. Magazine readers read them avidly, but rather than alter tastes, book publication reinforced them, for they mined twenty years of magazines for treasure: short stories for anthologies and serials for novels. As Ace Books began to publish original science fiction, the opportunity to publish without regard for the magazines and their requirements became a significant alternative. In 1951 this freedom was applied to short stories as well with the publication of Raymond J. Healy’s anthology of original fiction, New Tales of Space and Time. In 1952 Frederik Pohl began editing Star Science Fiction, a series of original anthologies for Ballantine. These provided new markets, less restricted by editorial requirements than magazines and often better paying. These original anthologies and novels encouraged individual expression over conformity, diffusing the genre.
Between 1940 and 1965, world events shaped science: World War II illustrated the increasing impact of technology on civilization. Atom bombs and a hundred other laboratory products for war demonstrated the need for scientists and engineers, as well as educated citizens who could understand what was going on and control the direction of society. Money poured into research and education, inevitably accelerating technological change. With the launch of Sputnik in 1957, the shock of Soviet primacy in space reinforced the notion that the world had changed. Technologies such as the nuclear fission reactor and the hydrogen bomb were perfected.
All this seemed to affirm what Campbellian science fiction said: atom bombs and rockets symbolized science fiction’s prophetic power and authenticated its concern for the future. What the prewar authors wrote was coming to pass; the issues they raised pressed upon humanity. We lived, as Asimov put it, in a science-fiction world, but not everybody liked it. The horrors of total war brought disillusionment with the science and technology that had put power into the hands of madmen; for many people the world moved too fast, and they felt powerless to affect their fates. And the future held the prospect of World War III, the nuclear war that could eliminate humanity.
During the same time revelations came to light about atrocities committed under the Third Reich in Germany and Joseph Stalin in the USSR. The Korean War broke out. The Cold War heated up. Joseph McCarthy symbolized an era of hysteria, blacklists, investigations, and purges. Space exploration began, and President John F. Kennedy launched a competition to be first on the moon. France exited Indochina, and the Vietnam War escalated to massive American involvement. Increasing power over nature, traumatizing world events, and accelerating change meant, for many, increasing frustration. How should power be used? How should change be directed? Should both be rejected? Students questioned how to organize society and rank its values. Led by veterans of civil-rights battles, fueled by sentiment against the Vietnam War, these questions escalated into a near-revolution over fundamental issues that discouraged one president from running for a second term and embittered the tenure of another, while undermining confidence in higher education. The most vocal young people questioned the value of knowledge and learning, and elevated feeling into a philosophic position.
In this period a new group of writers emerged. Michael Moorcock began his tenure over New Worlds in 1964, and Damon Knight launched his influential series of original anthologies, Orbit, in 1966. These forces led to what later would be called the “New Wave,” and these new editors attracted young writers more interested in literature than in science and disposed to disregard, resent, or react against earlier science fiction. But this revolutionary period neither began as abruptly as it seemed nor was as unified as it appeared.
Moorcock encouraged the most extreme expressions of morality and writing style. His model was J. G. Ballard. In Ballard’s wake came Brian Aldiss, John Brunner, Charles Platt, Thomas Disch, John Sladek, Pamela Zoline, Norman Spinrad, and James Sallis. New Worlds lost distribution and perhaps some readers, but it managed to thrive with the help of grants from the British Arts Council. Roger Zelazny and Gene Wolfe began to appear in its pages.
A veteran from the Campbell era, writer-editor Judith Merril had been editing the most influential and, for a time, the only best-of-the-year anthology. Captivated by New Worlds, she began a personal campaign to spread it from the United Kingdom to the United States, first naming the movement the “New Wave,” then including examples of it in her anthologies, culminating in England Swings Science Fiction (1968). Her campaign inspired Harlan Ellison to announce that he would publish Dangerous Visions (1967), an anthology of taboo-breaking stories that could not be published in the magazines.
The New Wave writers reinterpreted science fiction in personal terms. They moved from an objective universe to a subjective one; their writing resembled fantasy in its abandonment of the world of shared experience for the world of subjective interpretation. Their intensely personal viewpoints tended to challenge the established order and even the traditional way of perceiving reality. Their stylistically experimental methods emphasized the personal over the general.
Over time, the revolution ended. Much of what the rebels wanted is now accepted, and the urge to shock and break taboos has diminished to occasional youthful exuberance. Even traditional science-fiction writers enjoy the new freedom and broader audience that the New Wave attracted.
Topics for Discussion and Research
- Science fiction is the literature of evolution and change, both technological and biological.
It is about transcendence. The best science fiction dismantles comfortable familiarity and asks us to consider alternatives. Science fiction does not concern itself with restoring order but with understanding and planning for change. This central theme suggests many directions for research. Students might compare the perspective on social and cultural change apparent in science fiction with that of mainstream literature, citing relevant works from both camps that exhibit contrasting attitudes. They might compare a work of science fiction with a work of fantasy or a pastoral work. Students could discuss how science fiction inoculates its readers against the stresses of change and prepares them for a future that not only is different from what is expected but from what we can expect. Use Alexei Panshin and Cory Panshin’s The World beyond the Hill (1989) as a guide to help frame your questions. - Science fiction is also the literature of other perspectives and alienation, exploring what it means to be human through stories about aliens as well as alien perspectives on our species.
It explores alien worlds, times, and ideas, suggesting that our ways of thinking are not the only ways, our structures of morals and values and culture are arbitrary or environmental. It reinforces the notion that we also change, and that resisting alienation leads to stagnation. Find a few short science-fiction stories that exemplify this theme and discuss how the authors use alienation and to what effect. James E. Gunn’s Inside Science Fiction (2006) offers insights and direction, and his definitive four-volume anthology The Road to Science Fiction (1977–1982) includes appropriate stories in chronological context. - Combining elements of space opera, metaphysics, religion, politics, and ecology, Frank Herbert’s Dune (1965) transcended the boundaries between early science fiction, the Golden Age, and the New Wave, and had a profound effect on the genre.
Some argue that it is more a work of fantasy than science fiction. Many other works similarly defy categorization and altered the course of the field. Students might discuss how definitions affect readings of a particular work. Several works listed below will guide your research, including Kingsley Amis’s New Maps of Hell (1960). - Very early, science-fiction readers and authors built a community that grew out of letters to the magazines and evolved into “fandom,” with its unique subcultures and multitude of conventions.
In 1934 Hugo Gernsback (editor of Amazing Stories, the first science-fiction magazine, established in 1926), founded the Science Fiction League, which later spun off other fan groups, notably the Futurians, which counted as members some of the most-influential personalities of the Golden Age. Research the evolution of fandom in relation to science fiction and discuss how it has affected the field. Of particular interest is David Hartwell’s Age of Wonders: Exploring the World of Science Fiction (1996). - Because most science fiction from the Golden Age was published in magazines, the genre was characterized by the literary tastes of only a few editors,
including Anthony Boucher, John Campbell, Harlan Ellison, H. L. Gold, Judith Merril, Michael Moorcock, and Frederik Pohl. Using a variety of the suggested sources, analyze how the genre evolved with the advent of original anthologies and novels.
Resources
Primary Work
- John Clute and Peter Nicholls, eds., The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction (New York: St. Martin’s Griffin, 1999).
A vast and comprehensive work covering 4,300 entries, including 2,900 authors.
Criticism
- Brian Aldiss and David Hargrove, Trillion Year Spree: The History of Science Fiction (New York: Atheneum, 1986).
An essential work that traces the history of science fiction from Mary Shelley through the movements discussed here. - Kingsley Amis, New Maps of Hell (New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1960).
British mainstream literary writer’s history and examination of the field that helped the literary world accept the serious study of science fiction. - Colin Greenland, The Entropy Exhibition: Michael Moorcock and the British “New Wave” in Science Fiction (London & Boston: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1983).
Examines the New Wave through the lens of Moorcock’s tenure at New Worlds. - James E. Gunn, Inside Science Fiction, second edition (Lanham, Md.: Scarecrow Press, 2006).
Through two dozen short essays, shares what it was like growing up with science fiction from its roots through modern work; what it is and how it evolved; and how to read, write, and teach science fiction. - David G. Hartwell, Age of Wonders: Exploring the World of Science Fiction (New York: Tor, 1996).
By one of the field’s most prominent editors, reveals the inner workings of science-fiction subculture (“fandom”), spawned during this period. - Damon Knight, In Search of Wonder: Essays on Modern Science Fiction, third edition (Chicago: Advent, 1996).
Incisive essays about the genre by one of the first science-fiction scholars and critics. - Sam Moskowitz, Explorers of the Infinite: Shapers of Science Fiction (Westport, Conn.: Hyperion Press, 1974).
Excellent collection of early author profiles by one of the genre’s leading editors and critics who specialized in science fiction’s pulp origins. - Sam Moskowitz, Seekers of Tomorrow (Westport, Conn.: Hyperion Press, 1974).
Complements Moskowitz’s collection of early author profiles with those of modern writers. - Alexei Panshin and Cory Panshin, The World beyond the Hill: Science Fiction and the Quest for Transcendence (Los Angeles: J. P. Tarcher, 1989).
A comprehensive history of science fiction that discusses how the genre reaches into the mythic imagination and shapes society. - Robert Scholes and Eric S. Rabkin, Science Fiction: History, Science, Vision (New York: Oxford University Press, 1977).
An influential work that examines the history of science fiction and science. - Darko Suvin, Metamorphoses of Science Fiction: On the Poetics and History of a Literary Genre (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1979).
Explores cognitive estrangement, utopia in science fiction, alternative history, and much more. Suvin is an important scholar of Russian science fiction. - Donald A. Wollheim, The Universe Makers: Science Fiction Today (New York: Harper & Row, 1971).
Traces the history of science fiction from Jules Verne and H. G. Wells through the Golden Age, examining themes and outlining the consensus future-history as envisioned.
Categories: Literature, Novel Analysis, Science
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