Father of Science Fiction: H. G. Wells

H. G. rise is the True Father of acquisition Fiction At the very end of the Victorian Era, there emerged a cosmos of literature the likes of which the world had never before seen. Some fill out him best as an English saucyist, though close to of his pees were not sassys. Some call him a political and hearty commentator, due to the didactical accounts in more of his blends. Due to inclusion of the social and natural attainments in his whole kit and caboodle, he is besides cognize as a popularizer of apprehension.His cultism to the evolvement and entrapment of hereafter studies as a acquisition approximately certainly garnered him the written report as an early futurist. His pervasive influence in the development of the comprehension assembly literary genre is indisputable. However it was his masterful distort together of futurism and speculative prevarication into a single body of work dedicated to the in store(predicate) day of mankind that earns H. G. swell the title of The Father of cognizance Fiction. Herbert George surface was born in Bromely, Kent, England in September of 1866, the countersign of a maid and a professional cricketer.When he was eight over-the-hill age old surface broke his leg and began immortaliseing library ledgers to turn over the season, stimulating his desire to spell. He attended a number of schools throughout his early life, acquiring an xtensive background in physics, astronomy, and chemistry. He even hire biology under Thomas Henry Huxley at the Royal College of Science, acquiring extensive knowledge in the theories of evolution. Joining the school Debating social club nurtured his engage toward social issues and re stamp.well considered himself a socialist and was a member of the Fabian Society that included other such notable members as George Bernard Shaw and Virginia Woolf. At that clipping he also founded The Science School Journal, allowing him a forum to develop his pen for li terature, expressing his iews on familiarity and perfecting his burgeoning prevarication. After doing some teaching, he in conclusion graduated from The University of London with a Bachelors of Science in zoology. His prolific opus c atomic number 18er that followed included hundreds of works over the span of fifty years.His genius for combining the possibilities of science and engine room in the form of sham stories that became know as science fictionalization or as the genre was cognize in Britain at the time, the scientific romance. Science fiction as a modern literary genre is distinguished by its affair of real cientific estimates and concepts to form a layer that is plausible within a futuristic or alternative-world setting. The imaginative elements of science fiction ar generally possible within the realm of scientific theory and fact.This differentiates science fiction from other speculative genres such as fantasy and horror in that those works are not concern ed with scientific and techno synthetical possibility. however Mary Shelleys Frankenstein (1818), though certainly innovative in using themes of science fiction, is more accurately classified as a horror refreshed. execration and fantasy genres also delineate rom science fiction in that they include magical and supernatural elements that are absent from the realistic and logical science fiction genre.Though some story elements of sci-fi stinkpot be rigorously imaginary, accurate depictions of science and technology are employ to tormulate realistic conjectures ot the tuture, or even alternative timelines of the present or past. What distinguishes H. G. rise from earlier authors who delve into themes of modern science fiction is that he studied science as a uncreated disciplinary field and phthisis his knowledge in a literary fashion, concentrateing on scientific and expert plausibility. on the whole of Wells scientific romances contain realistic elements that are based o n apply scientific methodology and knowledge.Some of these include such famous works as The measure utensil (1895), The Invisible Man (1897), and The War of the Worlds (1898). Though Wells is considered the Father of Science Fiction, it is often argued that Mary Shelleys Frankenstein is the first work that could be considered on-key science fiction. Many of the innovative themes used by Mary Shelley unquestionably fall into the realm of modern science fiction. never before had any story been written some a man of science (the term scientist was not yet coined and would not be until 1834) that performs experiments in a laboratory.Written as a response to the recent Industrial Revolution, Shelley uses rattling(a) scientific innovations to explore the moral and ethical consequences of technology, a whatchamacallit used by nearly all modern science fiction writers, including Wells. However, irrelevant Wells, Shelleys works include precious little in the way of factual scientific fact or theory, leaving the audience to speculate about their plausibility. Her education, though broad and advanced for a oman of the Romantic era, was in literary studies and included no instruction in the natural or personal sciences.Her sources were limited to discussions with her peers of earlyl 9th one C experiments in vivisection and galvanism, the latter of which is an antiquated term for the stimulant of muscles by electric current, apply in the case of Frankenstein to the reanimation of dead tissue. Her scientific education is in contrast to Wells, who had an extensive educational background in the sciences. Although Shelleys science is neither plausible nor the main focus of her story, its ealistic genius do Frankenstein truly frightening to her audience, which was her intention in using such scientific elements.Shelley had originally conceived the work as a horror story, thus her themes of science fiction become secondary to the theme of horror as the focus of the work. She inspired the archetype of the monster that followed in literature and film. Though Shelleys idea of using science merged with fiction was innovative for the time and apply by later writers (including Wells, and not for another 80 years), Frankensteins designation as science fiction remains ncillary to that as a landmark novel of the horror genre.The title of The Father of Science Fiction has also been applied to popular French writer Jules Verne, but is more accurately applied to H. G. Wells. While certainly a brilliant and talented writer that hard influenced science fiction as a genre of literature, Vernes novels can good be disputed as works of true science fiction. very much like Shelleys Frankenstein, the works of Verne contain elements and themes that are considered scientific but abetter _or_ abettor to his primary literary theme.Much attention is given to Vernes Voyages Extraordinaires, a series of cardinal stories hich include such famous works as Journey t o the snapper of the Earth (1864), From the Earth to the Moon (1865), and Twenty Thousand Leagues under the sea (1869). At the time of their publication, the technological advancements present in Vernes works had been extrapolated by him to aid in his fantastic voyages, but would soon atter become scientific realities. This earned him the reputation ot being a technological prophet, a reputation also held by Wells.Some of his prophecies that came true include the electric submarine, the helicopter, and a rocket engine to carry passengers to the moon. Although Vernes scientific prophecies were at times more grounded in honesty than those of Wells, they were dedicate almost primarily in the area of transportation, unlike Wells, whose prophecies were made in multiple areas of science. The argument can be made that Verne himself inspired these technological advancements. Many pioneering submarine, aviation and rocketry innovators have credited Verne as the enthusiasm for their suc cessful inventions. However, Jules Verne was in no way a scientist. He was better as a lawyer and studied geography, the latter of which inspired him to write his stories of adventure and travel. Verne argued incessantly that his stories were not meant to be read scientifically, and even express l do not in any way let as a scientist2. The science he did use in his stories was strong researched Verne often spent time in the company of the best coeval scientists of his day, consulting them on possibilities of future(a) technology that he could realistically yet unbelievably apply to his adventure stories.While not all science fiction writers are scientists, the case of whether Verne or Wells is The Father of Science Fiction can favor Wells as the true Father when its argued hat Wells scientific educational background gives him credibility and authority. His use of scientific elements as the primary theme of his works (unlike Verne, whose science was used as an auxiliary to the theme of adventure) makes him more deserving of the title. Also, Vernes title of technological prophet passed to Wells because of his fealty not Just to science but also the serious exploration and inquiry of the future.In 1901, H. G. Wells wrote a book called Anticipations of the Reactions of Mechanical and Scientific go along upon Human Life and Thought which is onsidered the first comprehensive and widely read survey of future developments in the short history of predictive piece of music3. Wells was not the first person to take seriously the study of the future, but rather he had access to a vast occur of early speculative writings, including some utopian novels that explored the future state of society, that he combined into a single body of work.With the development of scientific apprehension during the 18th and 19th centuries and the movement of scholars away from religious apocalyptic future inquiry, scholarly thinking and literature that ealt with general human progre ss instead of eschatology began to emerge. The development of social sciences that studied human interaction showed predictive causality when applied to how future society might develop. Many 19th century novelists such as William Morris synthesized sociology with speculative fiction perfecting the utopian novel that gives an determine of an ideal society set in the future.Earlier works inherited by Wells that included futurist themes often had a different affair than the actual scientific study of the future such as exploring perfection and nterpreting history. In Anticipations, all the early tendencies toward future thought were combined by Wells into the first volume of work that gave complete attention to futurist ideas and systematically explored the future. Like the works of Verne, Anticipations investigates the future of transportation, accurately predicting major highways and interstates as well as the prevalence of motor vehicles.He accurately predicts the rise ot sub urb and huge metropolises as an enormous unbroken sprawls of middle-class life. The book also dwells extensively on the future of world rder and government, even predicting the formation of the European Union. After the publication of the book, the Royal Institution requested a confabulate on future study, which he published under the name The denudation of the Future (1902). The lecture calls for a whole new science to establish an ordered and working vision of the future, and is known to this day to be the nascence of future studies.Wells continued this theme with other works dedicated to the future such as A modern Utopia 1905), The Future in the States (1906), What is Coming? (1916), A Year of Prophesying (1925), The Fate of Homo Sapiens (1939) and many, many more. His work The Shape of Things to Come (1933) is a fictional outline of future history, the title a phrase coined by Wells that has been used multitudinous times and is even so used today. The term foresight used in Anticipations was also coined by Wells.Wells other accurate future predictions include lasers, cellphone phones, the Internet, and the atomic bomb (a phrase he used in his book The World Set Free 1914 to describe the bombs that would not be actual until the 1930s). The attention that Wells gave to surveying the future not nly accomplished future studies as a legitimate science, but also helped firmly established future thought as a major theme of science fiction. forwards Wells published Anticipations, he published his first and most well-known novel The prison term Machine (1895).The story features a scientist known only as The Time Traveler who built a device that can move through time. This device is known as a time machine, a term coined by Wells and still used to this day in reference to such a device. The Time Traveler Journeys forward in time almost 800,000 years and meets a peaceful society of child-like humans known as the Eloi. He also meets the frightening race of Morlocks that live underground and are keepers of the technology that strive the above-ground serenity.The Time Traveler also soon learns that the Morlocks feed on the Eloi, and that their technology is used to keep the Eloi passive. He comes to the conclusion that the ii races are a product of Darwinian evolution and the large gap between the social classes of British society. He speculates that the Eloi were once the leisure class, and due to their conquest of nature with technology they have become feeble in an environment where intuition and strength are no onger necessary for survival. He also speculates that the Morlocks are descendants of the oppressed working class.This application of Darwins theories as a literary motif echoes Wells education under Huxley who was known as Darwins Bulldog. Before publication of The Time Machine, the premise of time travel as a plot device had been used very little. There were some old folk tales and less than a handful of modern fictiona l works that had included time travel. The idea was certainly popularized by Wells and considered the intensity of all later science fiction works that feature time travel. Like Anticipations, it also established time settings in the future as a major element of science fiction.Wells is the first author to use modern science fiction elements to compose social and political commentary. The Time Machine famously illustrates the possible future consequences of a stratified society that becomes besides dependent on technology and will be thing to a form of extreme social Darwinism. In The War of the Worlds, Wells examines Victorian attitudes and values. In his story of Martians attempting to colonize Earth and exterminate humans, Wells provides an imaginative vehicle tor ommentary on British Imperialism.Wells also explores morality and technological ethics, specifically within the realm of vivisection and genetic engineering in his novel The Island of Dr. Moreau (1896). The use of sc ience in a fictional setting to make a didactic point is a reoccurring theme in Wells scientific romances. It has since then became a major literary device in modern science fiction works to explore the impact of technology on society and humanity. In his best-known and most influential work, 2001 A shoes Odyssey (1968), British author Arthur C.Clarke explores the moral and hilosophical implications surrounding technology and artificial intelligence, evolution, and outsider life. Clarke was strongly influenced by Wells he was even vice chairwoman of the H. G. Wells Society. The British author C. S. Lewis was a champion of science fiction that is philosophically reflective and includes a moral point. He created his Cosmic Trilogy as a direct influence by H. G. Wells, citing his novel The First men in the Moon (1901) as the best sort of science fiction I have read4.Out of the Silent Planet (1938), the first book in Lewis trilogy, is so similar to The First Men in the Moon that the opening move age says Certain slighting references to earlier stories of this type which will be found in the following pages have been put there for strictly dramatic purposes. The author would be sorry if any reader suppositional he was too stupid to have enjoyed Mr. H. G. Wells fantasies or too ungrateful to acknowledge his debt to them. 5 Wells influence on science fiction extends to many more authors, including British science fiction author Olaf Stapledon.Stapledon himself was a heavily influential writer, contributing many ideas to the genre of science fiction. Stapledon and Wells orresponded for over a decade, both creating ideas together and borrowing from each other. In his book The Billion Year Spree, Brian Aldiss calls Stapledon the greatest of Wells followers6. Wells science fictional reach extended beyond the sphere of British authors and diffused apace to America, where his influence can be seen in such notable science fiction authors as Isaac Asimov and Robert H einlein.During the 19th and 20th centuries, when the idea of the utopia as story element began to have a prominent place in literature, Wells himself wrote a number of utopian novels such as A Modern Utopia (1905) and Men Like Gods (1923). Wells progresses the idea of the utopia with his novel The Time Machine by turning the theme into an anti-utopia point of view. He illustrates the seemingly utopian society of the Eloi, and upon the discovery of the violent Morlocks, the world transforms into a horrifying dystopia.In his novel When the Sleeper Wakes (1899) about a man who falls asleep for two hundred years and wakes up in the future, Wells gives definitive form to the dystopia as a science fiction theme. This theme was taken up by later authors, most notably the British authors George Orwell and Aldous Huxley in their amous novels nineteen Eighty-Four (1949) and Brave New World (1932) respectively. These two novels have been explicitly touted by their authors as directly influence d by the works of Wells, and have in turn influenced many other authors, works, philosophers, thinkers, and even nations and governments.The achievement of H. G. Wells in the development of science fiction as a respected and classic literary genre is unquestionable. His background as a scientist combined with his hotshot queries on futuristic ideas provided a springboard into an illustrious and intluential literary go His creative inventions ot science fiction themes such as the time travel, estrange invasions, and invisible men have taken their place as staples of sci-fi literature.This, along with his numerous coined terms, technological prescience and populizing of proto-science fiction themes into mainstream literature designate Wells as the most important science fiction writer the genre has ever seen. And when his pervasive influence on future science fiction writers is regarded along with his other contributions, the only conclusion that remains is that H. G. Wells is the true Father of Science Fiction. Works Cited Wells, H. G. Anticipations of the Reactions of Mechanical and Scientific proficiency upon Human Life and Thought.