Past Futures

Probably  the first ever science fiction story was written in the 2nd century A.D. by a  Greek satirist called Lucian of Samosata. He wrote the 'Vera  Historia' (True History): It contained many elements of modern  space travel. Both fact and fiction. He described a space flight, a landing on  another world, and a return journey.

The  story concerned a voyage through the waters of the uncharted western sea. After  passing  the straights of Gibraltar the ship is caught in a huge whirlwind and  is lifted up into the sky.

After  a (surprisingly accurate) seven day journey the ship lands on the  moon Fifteen  hundred years later Cyrano de Bergerac wrote similar stories, chiefly   'Voyages to the Moon and Sun' .

De  Bergerac's first attempt to travel to the Moon used one of the most unusual  methods of all time. He had noticed that early morning dew rises heavenwards  when exposed to the sun. So he set about tying flasks of dew around his waist.  He had only to wait for the levitating rays of the morning sun to lift him up  and away.

This  attempt failed, however. He only managed to fly as far as Canada

De  Bergerac later published another early work of Science Fiction entitled "The Comical History of the States and Empires of the Worlds of the Sun  and Moon'. In this story he almost outdoes Jules Verne's in Prophetic  originality; he builds a flying machine and leaps from a mountain top. falling  and crashing in the valley below. He later returns to his failed machine to find  that soldiers are attaching firecrackers to it. In a spark of inspiration he  leaps aboard as the soldiers Light their fuses. The rockets lift his high into  the sky. Eventually landing him on the Moon.

Though  these stories are today seen as fantastical and unscientific it must be  remembered that they predate Newtonian mechanics, without which little written  by De Bergerac could be disputed, never mind disproved.



The Mods

The first truly modern science fiction writers appeared around the time of the industrial revolution, the generally held the ethic of the machine age. This being a direct consequence of the scientific Revolution instigated by Sir Francis Bacon. Bacon's idea was simply that 'the proper function of science was the search for truth and to benefit all people. The Industrial revolution sprouted from this seed.

The writers of the 19th Century had a sense of optimism about the prevailing age of machines. It was clear that the apparent mechanical innovations were going to change society at every level.

The world of A.D. 820 was different from the world of A.D. 1820; but the difference between 1820 and 1920 would be even greater than this millennial span.

One of the 19th centuries most noted writers, Jules Verne's, published yet another story about a journey to the Moon. Employing a method of transport, that was known to be impossible even when written, it was sufficiently credible to become probably the greatest single stimulus for the pioneering of manned space flight in the history of imaginative literature.

In the story 'From the Earth to the Moon' a 20,000 lb (9 ton) space craft is fired at the Moon by a 900ft long Supergun. Verne was known to have worked with the observatory of Cambridge (Massachusetts) to find a suitable time for his space craft to launch.

This 'projectile' was called Columbiad. It was vaguely bullet shaped, its interior was padded in leather and it carried three astronaughts and a dog. The equipment Vernes provides for his characters shows remarkable insight. Including an air supply generated by chemical reactions understood at the time.

In the book's sequel 'Around the Moon' Verne has his characters orbit the Moon and return to Earth. On returning, their spacecraft achieves the first 'Splash down' in the Pacific, where they are recovered by an American corvette.

Verne's predictions are astonishing but they are not miracles. Verne kept abreast with scientific and technological developments, for example, though he wrote about the submarine 'Nautilus' in 1870 (prior to the first submarine), he did not originate the idea. He did know of developments in engineering that his readers did not.

The first real submarine was launched two years before his death, in 1905.

It may be reasonable to presume that popular science fiction actually helps create the very futures that it describes by having people consider concepts that are beyond their possible daily experiences.

Konstantin Tsiolkovsky regarded today as the father of Rocketry and Astonaughtics credited Verne as a major source of inspiration;

"For a long time I thought of the rocket as everyone else did - Just as a means of diversion and of petty everyday use. I do not remember what prompted me to make calculations of its motions. Probably the first seeds of the idea were sown by that great, fantastic author Jules Verne- he directed my though along certain channels, then came the desire, and after, the work of the mind."

H.G. Wells was a more 'modern' writer than Verne. While Verne was a conservative and part of the establishment, Wells was a radical. Wells and Verne both shared a passion for science, they were however, very different writers.

Verne worshipped the 'hard' sciences and engineering, he more readily used grand inventions as the centre of his stories. Wells was more interested in biology and sociology.

When Wells used inventions and strange machines as the centre of his stories they were usually more fanciful and less 'scientifically considered ', as in 'The Time Machine' .

It was noted that Verne complained about Well's story 'The first men in the moon' In that Wells simply invented a wonder material called Cavorite to get his characters to the Moon. While Verne had worked long and hard on a plausible method of transport to the Moon. It would appear from this that Verne was the more technically able of the two writers. This was not the case. Verne was trained as a lawyer, who's technical knowledge was on a par with that of an enthusiast. Wells on the other hand was a biologist and a part time science teacher. He had a much broader understanding of the sciences, and his work tended to reflect this. Verne tended to focus on specific, well researched ideas while failing to understand how they related to society. It may be Verne's machine orientated 'gee wizz' approach that made him a more widely read and influential writer.

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