 | TIMELINE 1890-1910 |
TIMELINE 1890-1910
Copyright 1996,1997,1998 by Magic Dragon Multimedia.
All rights reserved Worldwide. May not be reproduced without permission.
May be posted electronically provided that it is transmitted unaltered, in its entirety, and without charge.
What happened in the world of Science Fiction between 1890 and 1910? There are xyz hotlinks here to authors, magazines, films, or television items elsewhere in the Ultimate Science Fiction Web Guide or beyond.
Most recently updated: 25 October 1998
Over 27 Kilobytes of text.
Table of Contents for 1890-1910 Click here or scroll down... Executive Summary of the Decades 1890-1910 H. G. Wells Major Books of the Decades 1890-1910 Major Films of these Decades Other Key Dates and Stories of these Decades Major Writers Born these Decades {to be done} Major Writers Died these Decades Hotlinks to other Timeline pages of SF Chronology Where to Go for More: 51 Useful Reference Books Executive Summary of the Decade {to be done} The first airplane, the first epic SF films, Einstein's Theory of Special Relativity, the Ford Model T... a decade of technological transformation and growing realization of the relevance of science fiction. Return to Table of Contents for 1890-1910 H. G. Wells H. G. Wells Herbert George Wells is often considered the father of science fiction. Seminal works include "The War of the Worlds" (1898) and "The Invisible Man " (1897) and {to be done} Return to Table of Contents for 1890-1910 Major Books of the Decades 1890-1910 1890 William Morris: "News from Nowhere" (backwards-looking utopia) 1890 German author Theodor Hertzka's "Freeland: A Social Anticipation" set a super-capitalist utopia in Africa 1890 Maurice Maeterlinck, defeatist allegorical play about six blind people representing humanity, wandering helplessly, led by a priest returned from the dead, who abandons them in a weird uncanny forest, where they wait for death. 1890 "The Golden Bough" by James G. Frazer is unique in Anthropology. It attempts to give anextended description of magic, religion, cults, and folk-lore. An indefatigable collector of information on ancient and "primitive" beliefs, practices, and social institutions, Frazer attempted to weave all this data into a series of integrated pictures of various cultures. By laying out the logical axioms of Magic, he set the standard for rigorous works of Fantasy forever after. 1891 Founding of "The Strand Magazine", perhaps the first cheaply-produced Linotype-set wood-pulp paper magazine. Aimed at a large middle class audience for both fiction and nonfiction, its success was assured when it contracted with Arthur Conan Doyle for a series of Sherlock Holmes stories. 1891 "The Idler" copies the formula of "The Strand Magazine" 1892 Konstantin Tsiolkovsky (1857-1935), the Father of Space Rocketry, publishes his first science fiction story "On the Moon" in a Moscow magazine 1893 "McClure's Magazine" launched, mostly with reprints from "The Idler" 1893: "La Fin du Monde", novel by Camille Flammarion 1895: H. G. Wells "The Time Machine" 1895: "Propellor Island", novel by Jules Verne 1895 "The Black Cat" magazine launched, the first all-fiction periodical, but not the first science fiction magazine as such (although it did publish many science fiction stories). 1895 Konstantin Tsiolkovsky (1857-1935), the Father of Space Rocketry, publishes his second science fiction story "Dreams of the Earth and the Sky and the Effects of Universal Gravitation" and describes in fiction an artificial satellite -- the predecessor of Sputnik, as it were 1895 A. N. Goncharov also publishes a satellite story "Fantasies of earth and Sky" in Moscow 1895 Professor Percival Lowell publishes the influential non-fiction book "Mars" filled with his theories of Martian civilization that built the "canals" 1895 William Morris' "The Wood Beyond the World" [Fantasy] 1896 William Morris' "The Well at the World's End" [Fantasy] 1896: H. G. Wells "The Island of Dr. Moreau" 1896: H. G. Wells "The Invisible Man" 1896 Pearson's Magazine" launched 1896 Frank A. Munsey changes a children's weekly into the grown-up magazine "The Argosy" at 192 pages (135,000 words).By now his flagship "Munsey's" had a circulation of 700,000 -- or almost 1% of the entire population of the United States of America! 1896 Louis Tracy's novel "The Final War" 1897 William Le Queux "The Great War in England in 1897" 1897: "Two Planets", novel by Kurd Lasswitz 1897: Bram Stoker's "Dracula", perhaps the most blood-curdling book-length classical English-language novel, about the king of vampires, Count Dracula. The narrative is in the format of journals or diary enries by the various characters. Jonathan harker must go on business to Count Dracula's castle, where three lovely women (transformed into vampires) try to make him their victim. He escapes to Budapest, where he suffers brain fever, then marries his English friend Mina Murray, who'd nursed him back to health. Mina's friend Lucy Westenra dies in England of a mysterious ailment, and her bloodless body has a starnge mark on its throat. She rises from death to become a vampire. Her finace Lord Godalming and her two suitors, Dr. Seward (who runs an insane asylum) and Quincy Morris, seek the help of the Dutch scientist Van Helsing. They free Lucy from torment by driving a stake through her heart, and also cutting off her head (the original headcrash). Mina now shows realted symptoms. Renfield, a patient in Seward's asylum who eats flies and spiders, is killed when he attempts to help. After numerous adventures, and the death of Morris, the survivors end the vampirism plague to an end in Transylvania. But they could not kill the story, the stage and screen adaptations, the ripoffs, and the spin-offs yet to come. 1898: H. G. Wells "The War of the Worlds" 1898 Luis P. Senarens retires the popular Frank Reade dime-novel character, and starts what end up as hundreds of "Frank Reade Jr." publications with "Frank Reade Jr. and his Steam Wonder", itself an inspiration for the "Tom Swift" (1910) and later "Tom Swift, Jr." [see author page under "Victor Appleton"] 1898 M. P. Shiel writes "The Yellow Danger", which is first serialized in "Short Stories Magazine" in England under the title "The Empress of the Earth", launching the popular (and racist) "Yellow Peril" subgenre 1899 J. Cutcliffe Hyne's "The Lost Continent" in "Pearson's Magazine", one of the better Atlantis stories 1899: H. G. Wells "When the Sleeper Wakes" 1900 George Griffith's "A Honeymoon in Space" 1900 Theodor Herzl's novel "Altneuland" [Old Newland] 1900 Garrett P. Serviss novel "The Moon Metal" 1900 C. J. Cutcliffe Hyne's novel "The Lost Continent" 1901 M. P. Shiel's intensely anti-semitic "The Lord of the Sea" which nonetheless had a Jewish hero, Jewish heroine, and the fopunding of an Isreal-like Jewish homeland. 1901 M. P. Shiel's masterpiece novel "The Purple Cloud" is published, with the Last Man on Earth frantically searching for Last Woman on Earth 1901 George Griffith's novel "Honeymoon in Space" 1901 H. G. Wells' novel "First Men in the Moon" 1902 Joseph Conrad's novel "The Heart of Darkness" is not science fiction, but its psychological approach to the alien experience (madness and exotic jungle societies) colors science fictional approaches to these themes forever after. 1903 Louis Pope Gratacap's debut novel "The Certainty of a Future Life on Mars" 1903 Orville and Wilbur Wright's first heavier-than-air powered flight inaugurates the Air Age 1904 Hugo Gernsback arrives in the United States 1904 G. K. Chesterton's "The Napoleon of Notting Hill" 1904 H. G. Wells' novel "The Food of the Gods" 1904 H. G. Wells' story "The Country of the Blind" 1904 Jules Verne's novel "Master of the World" 1904 Harold Steele MacKaye's novel "The Panchronicon" follows the themes of H.G. Wells' "The Time Machine" 1904 William Henry Hudson's "Green Mansions" concerns itself chiefly with the story of Rima, a child of nature, who is discovered in her Guiana jungle solitude by Abel, a sophisticated Venezuelan vagabond from Caracas. She is unspoiled and wild, like the animals, a sort of female equivalent of Tarzan. She knows neither the evil nore guile common to all civilized humans. This gives her supernatural stature in the eyes of the worldly Abel, who falls passionately in love with her. Toward the end, Rima is burned to death by hostile and corrupt native tribesmen, whom, to protect her beloved birds and animals, she had driven from their hunting ground by preying upon their superstitious fears. Abel's dream bursts like a soap bubble. The book's qualities are of a striking and original sort. It has enchantment; its pages are haunted by an unearthly perception of beauty and a wonderment that stirs the imagination. "Green Mansions" is the work of a great naturalist and a poet in prose. In Kensington Garden, London, there is a statue of Rima, by the sculptor Jacob Epstein, erected as a memorial to William Henry Hudson. 1905 M. P. Shiel's "The Yellow Wave" about the Russo-Japanese war 1905 Edwin Lester Arnold's novel "Lt. Gulliver Jones: His Vacation" 1905 H. G. Wells' novel "A Modern Utopia" 1905 H. G. Wells' novel "In the Days of the Comet" 1905 Gabriel Tarde's novel "Fragment d'histoire future" [Fragment of Future History, in English as "Underground Man"] projects forward to an era of resource-depleted Solar System 1905 Rudyard Kipling's "With the Night Mail" in "McClure's Magazine." The sequel, "As Easy as A.B.C." (1912) has a future world dominated by an international airship service, and a neatly-constructed world, down to convincing details of engineering, clothing, and slang in 2000 A.D. 1905 Frank A. Munsey launches "The All-Story Magazine" 1906 Frank A. Munsey launches "Railroad Man's Magazine" and "The Ocean" 1906 Professor Percival Lowell publishes his second influential non-fiction book "Mars and its Canals" filled with his theories of Martian civilization that built the "canals" 1906 William Le Queux's novel "The Invasion of 1910" 1906 Jack London's novel "Before Adam" 1906 Olof Hogberg's great Swedish historical novel "The Great Wrath" pictures Norrland, the vast forest country between the Dale River in Sweden and the Finnish border, at the end of Swedenb's period of greatness, the reign of Charles XI (ending 1697) and that of Charles XII (1718). It is a work of epic proportions, in which tales, legends, and myths abound, with supernatural powers represented by the mystical Gray Hunter of the Angerman country, who constantly intervenes in the destinies of people. The plot of the book is the essentially democratic struggle between the inherited pagan culture of the district and the civilization coming from the outh; or "between the great common people on one side and the officials and clergy on the other." Its central idea is wholly modern, and its interest far beyond the merely literary. Written by a thinker of lowly orgin who understood the peasant's mode of thought, the work reveals both the imagination of the poet and the insight of the scholar. Furthermore, the novel is a rich source for students of folklore, both local and variants of Norwegian and Russian traditions that travelled over the region. Ethnographic and cultural-historical, it describes the breaking up of an age-old society. The value of "The Great Wrath" is enhanced by its archaic style of unusual expressions and constructions which faithfully reproduce the bold, simple speech of the people and the elegant and pompous language of the officials. The novel is a masterpiece of a creative writer, and, along with Tolkien's "The Lord of the Rings", the proper model for a sweeping work of cultures and magics in collision. 1907 Jack London's dystopian novel "The Iron Heel" 1907 R. H. Benson's novel "The Lord of the World" 1908 William Hope Hodgson's eerie, frightning, and metaphysical fantasy novel "The House on the Borderland", with a gateway from our world into a horrifying other universe 1908 Frank A. Munsey launches "Cavalier Weekly" 1908 Hugo Gernsback launches his first magazine, "Modern Electrics" 1908 Ambrose Bierce's essential artificial intelligence novel "Moxon's Master" 1908 Anatole France's novel "L'Ile des pingouins" [Penguin Island] 1908 Willis George Emerson's novel "The Smoky God; or, A Voyage to the Inner World" 1908 G. K. Chesterton's novel "The Man Who Was Thursday", a fantasy and spy story with political and religious subjects. 1908 H. G. Wells' novel "The War in the Air" 1909 Maurice Maeterlinck's "The Blue Bird", a fantasy about the children of a poor woodcutter who search (at the request of the Fairy Berylune) for the Blude Bird of Happiness, aided by a magic diamond... a symbolic drama, the moral is that happiness is not in possession but in search, and usually the greatest value is found close to home. 1909 Garrett P. Serviss' "Edison's Conquest of Mars" (reprinted as novel from 1898 nespaper serialization) 1909 Garrett P. Serviss' "A Columbus of Space" in "All-Story Magazine" describes a uranium-powered atomic rocket to Venus. This story is still worth reading, and makes good use of his four years of science education at Cornell plus vivid landscapes. 1909 E. M. Forster's short novel "The Machine Stops" superb science fictional account by mainly mainstream author about far future humanity living hive-like in vast Earth-girdling city, isolated their entire lives (except single brief sexual encounter for procreation), one person per cell/apartment, communicating by videoscreens, fed through tubes, and the whole civilization brought to ruin by a meteor strike 1909 J. H. Rosny's novel "Quest for Fire" 1910 P. G. Wodehoue's novel "The Swoop" is the first major spoof of science fiction MUCH MORE {to be done} Return to Table of Contents for 1890-1910 Major Films of these DecadesImportant Films of this Decade
George Melies was surely the father of science fiction/fantasy films: 1902 Le Voyage dans la Lune (A Trip to the Moon) -- by George Melies 1904 Voyage a travers l'impossible [An Impossible Voyage] -- George Melies (the father of science fiction/fantasy films) a half-hour epic which includes a railroad train which morphs into a spaceship but he soon had imitators: 1906 The ? Motorist (driving around the rings of Saturn...) 1909 A Trip to Jupiter 1909 The Airship Destroyer (also known as Aerial Warfare, also known as Aerial Torpedo, also known as Battle in the Clouds) by Charles Urban, 20 minutes in length, and the first such serious and violent drama 1910 A Trip to Mars 1910 Frankenstein (Thomas Alva Edison's version, the first) Return to Table of Contents for 1890-1910 Other Key Dates and Stories of these Decades 1905 Albert Einstein's Special Theory of Relativity, as well as the theory of the Photoelectric Effect (which later won him a Nobel Prize) 1907 First helicopter flight (inventor: Paul Cornu) 1908 founding of The Boy Scouts 1910 founding of The Girl Guides (later The Girl Scouts) 1910 The Model T rolls off Henry Ford's assembly line 1910 Selfridge's department store starts in London, the founder's grandson later comes to America, works with Marvin Minsky, and is a mentor for Your Humble Webmaster Much More {to be done} Return to Table of Contents for 1890-1910 Major Writers Born these Decades {to be done} 1890 Karel Capek 1890 H. P. Lovecraft (20 Aug 1890) 1890 E. E. Smith 1894 Aldous Huxley 1894 J. B. Priestley (13 Sep 1894) 1896 Stanton A. Coblentz (24 Aug 1896) 1896 William Fitzgerald Jenkins (Murray Leinster) 1897 Walter B. Gibson (12 Sep 1897) 1898 Arthur J. Banks (13 Sep 1898) 1900 James Hilton (9 Sep 1900) 1902 Kurt Siodmak (10 Aug 1902) 1903 Eric Blair (later used pseudonym George Orwell) 1903 Ward Moore (10 Aug 1903) 1903 John Wyndham 1904 Clifford Simak (3 Aug 1904) 1905 Eric Frank Russell 1907 Ted Allbeury 1907 Robert A. Heinlein 1907 L. Sprague de Camp 1908 William Shiras (23 Sep 1908) 1908 Jack Williamson 1909 Mary C. Allen 1910 John W. Campbell, Jr. 1910 Fritz Leiber 1910 Raymond A. Palmer (1 Aug 1910) Return to Table of Contents for 1890-1910 Major Writers Died these Decades {to be done} 1905 Jules Verne 1910 Mark Twain Return to Table of Contents for 1890-1910 Hotlinks to other Timeline pages of SF Chronology |Introduction: Overview and Summary |Prehistory: Ancient Precursors |16th Century: Ariosto and Cyrano on the Moon |17th Century: Literary Dawn |18th Century: Literary Expansion |19th Century: Victorian Explosion |1890-1910: Into Our Century |1910-1920: The Silver Age |1920-1930: The Golden Age |1930-1940: The Aluminum Age |1940-1950: The Plutonium Age |1950-1960: The Threshold of Space |1960-1970: The New Wave |1970-1980: The 1970s |1980-1990: The 1980s |1990-2000: End of Millennium |2000-2010: Future Prizewinners Return to Table of Contents for 1890-1910 Where to Go for More: 51 Useful Reference Books Beyond the World Wide Web... there is the library of old-fashioned books printed on paper. I strongly recommend that you start or follow-up your explorations of this web site by consulting any or all of these outstanding sources: ALDISS: "Billion Year Spree: The True History of Science Fiction", Brian W. Aldiss (New York: Doubleday, 1973; Schocken Paperback, 1974) ALLEN: "Science Fiction Reader's Guide", L. David Allen (Centennial Press, 1974) AMIS: "New Maps of Hell", Kingsley Amis (London: Gollancz, 1960; New York: Harcourt Brace, 1960) ASH1: "Who's Who in Science Fiction", by Brian Ash (Taplinger, 1976) ASH2: "The Visual Encyclopedia of Science Fiction", edited by Brian Ash (Harmony Books, 1977) ASHLEY: "The History of the Science Fiction Magazine" [3 volumes] (London: New English Library, 1974) ASIMOV "Asimov on Science Fiction" (New York: Avon, 1981) ATHELING: "The Issue at Hand", "William Atheling, Jr." [James Blish] (Chicago: Advent, 1964) BARRON: "Anatomy of Wonder", edited by Neil Barron (Bowker, 1976) BAXTER: "Science Fiction in the Cinema", John Baxter (London: A. Zwemmer, 1970; New York: A. S. Barnes, 1970) BERGONZI: "The Early H.G. Wells", Bernard Bergonzi (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1961) BLEILER: "The Checklist of Fantastic Literature" Everett F. Bleiler (Chicago: Shasta, 1948) BRETNOR1: "Modern Science Fiction: Its Meaning and Future", edited by Reginald Bretnor (New York: Coward-McCann, 1953) BRETNOR2: "The Craft of Science Fiction", Reginald Bretnor (New York: Harper & Row, 1977) BRINEY: "SF Bibliographies", Robert E. Briney & Edward Wood (Chicago: Advent, 1972) CLARESON1: "SF: The Other Side of Realism", edited by Thomas D. Clareson (Gregg Press, 1978) CLARESON2: "Extrapolation, 1959-1969", edited by Thomas D. Clareson (Bowling Green, Ohio: University Popular Press, 1971) CLARKE: "The Tale of the Future", I. F. Clarke (London: The Library Association, 1961, 1972) CONTENTO: "Index to the Science Fiction Anthologies and Collections", William Contento G.K. Hall, 1978) DAY: "Index to the Science Fiction Magazine: 1926-50", Donald B. Day (Portland, Oregon: Perri Press, 1952) DeCAMP: "Science Fiction Handbook", L. Sprague DeCamp (New York: Hermitage House, 1953) ELLIK: "The Universes of E. E. Smith", Ron Ellik & Bill Evans (Chicago: Advent, 1966) EVANS: "The Index of Science Fiction Magazines", Bill Evans with Jack Speer (Denver: Robert Peterson, 1946?) FRANKLIN: "Future Perfect: American Science Fiction of the Nineteenth Century", H. Bruce Franklin (New York: Oxford University Press, 1966) FREWIN: "One Hundred Years of Science Fiction Illustration", Anthony Frewin (London: Jupiter Books, 1974) GOODSTONE: "The Pulps", Tony Goodstone (New York: Chelsea House, 1970) GUNN: "Alternate Worlds", James Gunn (Englewood Cliffs NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1975) HARRISON: "John W. Campbell: Collected Editorials from Analog", Harry Harrison (Garden City NY: Doubleday, 1966) HOLMBERG: "Science Fiction History", John-Henri Holmberg (Vanersborg, Sweden: Askild & Karnekull, 1974) KNIGHT: "In Search of Wonder", Damon Knight (Chicago: Advent, 1956; enlarged 1967) KYLE: "A Pictorial History of Science Fiction", David Kyle (London: Hamlyn House, 1976) LOCKE: "Worlds Apart", edited by George Locke (London: Cornmarket Reprints, 1972) LUNDWALL: "Science Fiction: What It's All About", Sam J. Lundwall (New York: Ace Books, 1971) METCALF: "The Index of Science Fiction Magazines, 1951-1965", Norm Metcalf (J. Ben Stark, 1968) MILLIES: "Science Fiction Primer for Teachers", Suzanne Millies (Dayton OH: Pflaum, 1975) MOSKOWITZ#1: "The Immortal Storm", Sam Moskowitz (AFSO Press, 1954; Hyperion Press, 19??) MOSKOWITZ#2: "Explorers of the Infinite: Shapers of Science Fiction", Sam Moskowitz (Cleveland & New York: World, 1963) MOSKOWITZ#3: "Seekers of Tomorrow", Sam Moskowitz (Cleveland & New York: World, 1963) NESFA: "Index to the Science Fiction Magazines", New England Science Fiction Association (Cambridge MA: NESFA, 1971) PERRY: "The Penguin Book of Comics", George Perry & Alan Aldridge (London: Penguin, 1971) ROGERS: "A Requiem for Astounding", Alva Rogers (Chicago: Advent, 1964) ROTTSTEINER: "The Science Fiction Book", Franz Rottsteiner (London: Thames & Hudson, 1975) SADOUL: "Hier, L'An 2000 [Illustrations from the Golden Age of Science Fiction]", Jaxques Sadoul (Paris: Editions Denoel, 1973) STRAUSS: "The MIT Science Fiction Society's Index to the SF Magazines: 1951-64" Erwin S. Strauss (Cambridge MA: MIT Science Fiction Society, 1966) TUCK: "The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction and Fantasy, 2nd Edition", Donald H. Tuck (Hobart, Tasmania: Donald H. Tuck, 1959) VERSINS: "Encyclopedie des l'utopie, des voyages extraordinaires et de la science fiction", (Lausanne: L'Age d'Homme, 1972) WAGGONER: "The Hills of Faraway", Diana Waggoner (Athenaeum, 1978) WARNER: "All Our Yesterdays", Harry Warner, Jr. (Chicago: Advent, 1969) WELLS: "Fictional Accounts of Trips to the Moon", Lester G. Wells (Syracuse NY: Syracuse University Library, 1962) WILLIAMSON: "H.G. Wells: Critic of Progress", Jack Williamson (Baltimore: Mirage Press, 1973) WOLLHEIM: "The Universe Makers", Donald A. Wollheim (New York: Harper & Row, 1971) Return to Table of Contents for 1890-1910
Return to Ultimate SF Table of Contents
Compiled by Magic Dragon Multimedia
Go to Ultimate Mystery/Detective Web Guide
Copyright 1996,1997,1998 by Magic Dragon Multimedia.
All rights reserved. May not be reproduced without permission.
May be posted electronically provided that it is transmitted unaltered, in its entirety, and without charge.