When?

In the 70's, when Niven & Pournelle collaborations were being published, up until Cyperpunk. I also really love some of the books that came out in the 50's.
 
Hm. Toughie, because I've not read much sci-fi.
I'd have to go with before 1950, because that was when Sci-Fi was getting its grounding in popular fiction through authors such as H.G. Wells and H.P. Lovecraft. You had Frankenstein and other Gothic Horror along with Jules Verne, but I think those earlier writers really kicked it off.
 
I don't know about the best books, but the 60s and 70s definitely had the best covers. Even the bad SF novels had covers that conjured up a palpable air of mystery, awe and otherworldiness.
 
Lime said:
1959 - 1979.
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That would be roughly my view, too, which probably stems from doing most of my s.f. reading during the '70s, both new works and catching up on older works being republished. If there was a real advantage to coming to the genre then, it was that there was a lot of older work being reissued in mass market paperback.


Randy M.
 
Lime said:
1959 - 1979.
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I have been reading stuff from Project Gutenberg.

I think I would extend that from 1949 to 1979.

Scientific and technological occurrences in the real world affected science fiction. The atomic bomb and electronic computers turning up in 1945 impacted the thinking of lots of SF writers since then. Robert Heinlein moved to Colorado because of what he regarded as the threat of nuclear war. Most of the stuff from the 30s is rather pathetic though some is very funny.

But I would put the peak in the late 60s or early 70s before the colleges started teaching science fiction. Then we get too many "EXPERTS" telling everybody what science fiction is supposed to be. The success of 2001 and Star Trek attracted people who had previously paid no attention to sci-fi and Star Wars amplified the effect.

psik
 
psikeyhackr said:
I have been reading stuff from Project Gutenberg.

I think I would extend that from 1949 to 1979.
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I was tempted to say something similar when I responded earlier, and probably should have. 1949/50 (maybe as late as '51) saw the start of Galaxy and The Magazine of Science Fiction and Fantasy, which signaled the next growth spurt in commercial s.f. after Campbell's take over of Astounding. As I understand, Campbell was bleeding writers by then, several leaving the profession or moving on to the higher paying slicks, and Galaxy and F&SF offered an opportunity for writers to extend beyond Campbell's relatively rigid requirements for stories.

But I would put the peak in the late 60s or early 70s before the colleges started teaching science fiction. Then we get too many "EXPERTS" telling everybody what science fiction is supposed to be. The success of 2001 and Star Trek attracted people who had previously paid no attention to sci-fi and Star Wars amplified the effect.

psik
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I'm a bit surprised. The major writers of the 1960s -- Ballard, Aldiss, Zelazny, Delany, Le Guin, Disch, Spinrad -- were not writers of SCIENCE fiction. They were the first generation of college educated s.f. writers, and many were predisposed toward the social sciences rather than the hard sciences. For them, exploring science was not so much their aim; they tended to use science as a generator of metaphor for discussing the issues of the time.


Randy M.
 
Randy M. said:
I'm a bit surprised. The major writers of the 1960s -- Ballard, Aldiss, Zelazny, Delany, Le Guin, Disch, Spinrad -- were not writers of SCIENCE fiction. They were the first generation of college educated s.f. writers, and many were predisposed toward the social sciences rather than the hard sciences. For them, exploring science was not so much their aim; they tended to use science as a generator of metaphor for discussing the issues of the time.
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Yeah, at that point you're talking about the New Wave. Asimov was in quasi-retirement for most of the 1960s and 1970s, Clarke's output was dropping and these newer guys were taking over.

In fact, I've seen 'serious' science fans applauding the return to prominence of 'real' technology-focused SF in the 1980s through cyberpunk (to a certain extent) and authors like the Killer Bs after a lengthy period when it was more on the back burner (though authors like Niven were doing their bit for it).
 
Each decade has its gems and dogs... but i can't really think of anything in the 1965 to 1979 era that i read and DIDN'T like.
I love some of the older stuff from the 50's and before, but a few works in particular don't hold up well, in my opinion, dispite being award winning at the time.
There are lots of good books published in the past decade as well, dispite what a lot of people like to think.
 
Randy M. said:
I'm a bit surprised. The major writers of the 1960s -- Ballard, Aldiss, Zelazny, Delany, Le Guin, Disch, Spinrad -- were not writers of SCIENCE fiction. They were the first generation of college educated s.f. writers, and many were predisposed toward the social sciences rather than the hard sciences. For them, exploring science was not so much their aim; they tended to use science as a generator of metaphor for discussing the issues of the time.
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I have been thinking lately that I might classify SF on a spectrum from STRONG to WEAK rather than Hard to Soft.

I did a little review of Rite of Passage

http://www.lunch.com/forbidden_plan...0-21748-Rite_of_Passage_by_Alexi_Panshin.html

I would call that a strong science fiction story but it is not a HARD SF story.

The background story shows the effects of technology or lack there on societies while the foreground story shows how the thoughts and actions of the characters affect their future conditions. It is a thought experiment like KatG says.

But all of us in the real world have to make decisions that affect our ongoing experiments and affect the real future. We, as a society, have to decide how to apply the technologies the boffins come up with. Here is an example:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RcXuKU_kfww

Science and technology affect everybody not just the people who know a lot about the stuff. But the level of science knowledge of the general population needs to be increased even though they don't become techs. How are we supposed come up with policies to resolve problems like Global Warming when Harvard graduates can't explain what causes winter and summer. And yet they are generally regarded as well educated.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p0wk4qG2mIg

My first reaction to that was to laugh my ass off. But thinking about that probably applies to the majority of "lesser schools" all around the country fills me with dread.

psik
 
psikeyhackr said:
But all of us in the real world have to make decisions that affect our ongoing experiments and affect the real future. We, as a society, have to decide how to apply the technologies the boffins come up with. Here is an example:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RcXuKU_kfww

Science and technology affect everybody not just the people who know a lot about the stuff. But the level of science knowledge of the general population needs to be increased even though they don't become techs. How are we supposed come up with policies to resolve problems like Global Warming when Harvard graduates can't explain what causes winter and summer. And yet they are generally regarded as well educated.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p0wk4qG2mIg

My first reaction to that was to laugh my ass off. But thinking about that probably applies to the majority of "lesser schools" all around the country fills me with dread.

psik
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I think there is probably a greater force at work when we concern ourselves with education and our response to the things you mention like Global Warming, and it's a bit more difficult to quantify... where does religion fall into this.

Many Christian fundamentalists feel that concern for the future of our planet is irrelevant, because it has no future. They believe we are living in the End Time, when the son of God will return, the righteous will enter heaven, and sinners will be condemned to eternal hellfire. They may also believe, along with millions of other Christians, that environmental destruction is not only to be disregarded but actually welcomed -- even hastened -- as a sign of the coming Apocalypse.

Do you recall James Watt, Ronald Reagan's first Secretary of the Interior... Mr.Watt told the US Congress that protecting natural resources was unimportant in light of the imminent return of Jesus Christ.

"God gave us these things to use. After the last tree is felled, Christ will come back," Watt said in public testimony that helped get him fired.
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Just as troubling are those who have some understanding of science and technology and believe that it will save us from ourselves.
 
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