Widescreen baroque

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Widescreen baroque is a style of science fiction writing "characterized by larger-than-life characters, violence, intrigue, extravagant settings or actions, and fast-paced plotting". [1] It is closely aligned with, and an outgrowth of, space opera fiction.

The term widescreen baroque was coined by Brian Aldiss (as "wide-screen baroque") in his 1973 work The Billion Year Spree in reference to works by E.E. Smith and A.E. van Vogt. [2]

Authors associated with widescreen baroque include:

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<i>Slan</i> Novel by A. E. van Vogt

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A fix-up is a novel created from several short fiction stories that may or may not have been initially related or previously published. The stories may be edited for consistency, and sometimes new connecting material, such as a frame story or other interstitial narration, is written for the new work. The term was coined by the science fiction writer A. E. van Vogt, who published several fix-ups of his own, including The Voyage of the Space Beagle, but the practice exists outside of science fiction: The use of the term in science fiction criticism was popularised by the first (1979) edition of The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction, edited by Peter Nicholls, which credited van Vogt with the creation of the term. The name “fix-up” comes from the changes that the author needs to make in the original texts, to make them fit together as though they were a novel. Foreshadowing of events from the later stories may be jammed into an early chapter of the fix-up, and character development may be interleaved throughout the book. Contradictions and inconsistencies between episodes are usually worked out.

<i>The Mixed Men</i> Book by A.E. van Vogt

The Mixed Men is a fix-up novel of science fiction short stories by Canadian-American writer A. E. van Vogt that focus on the mixed offspring of Dellian Supermen and human beings. The novel's title is taken from van Vogt's 1945 Astounding SF short story "Mixed Men", which was nominated for a Retro-Hugo Award in 1996. The stories published in the novel were originally released between the years of 1943 to 1945 in Astounding SF, with the novel being first published in a 5,000 copy printing in 1952 by Gnome Press and a 1955 Berkley Books edition under the title Mission to the Stars.

<i>Of Worlds Beyond</i>

Of Worlds Beyond is a collection of essays about the techniques of writing science fiction, edited by Lloyd Arthur Eshbach. It was first published in 1947 by Fantasy Press in an edition of 1,262 copies. It has been reprinted by Advent in 1964 and by Dobson in 1965.

<i>The Book of Ptath</i> Book by A.E. van Vogt

The Book of Ptath is a science fiction novel by Canadian-American writer A. E. van Vogt. It was first published in book form in 1947 by Fantasy Press in an edition of 3,021 copies. The novel was originally serialized in the magazine Unknown in October 1943. The book has also appeared under the titles Two Hundred Million A.D. and Ptath.

<i>Masters of Time</i> Book by A.E. van Vogt

Masters of Time is a collection of two science fiction novellas by A. E. van Vogt. It was first published in 1950 by Fantasy Press in an edition of 4,034 copies. It contains the unrelated novellas "Recruiting Station" and "The Changeling". The latter features a recurring character of van Vogt's called Pendrake. Both works of fiction originally appeared in the magazine Astounding SF. More confusingly, the title novella has also appeared on the third title of "Earth's Last Fotress".

<i>Out of the Unknown</i> (collection) Book by A.E. van Vogt

Out of the Unknown is a collection of fantasy short stories by Canadian writers A. E. van Vogt and E. Mayne Hull. It was first published in 1948 by Fantasy Publishing Company, Inc. in an edition of 1,000 copies. The stories originally appeared in the magazine Unknown.

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Analog Science Fiction and Fact is an American science fiction magazine published under various titles since 1930. Originally titled Astounding Stories of Super-Science, the first issue was dated January 1930, published by William Clayton, and edited by Harry Bates. Clayton went bankrupt in 1933 and the magazine was sold to Street & Smith. The new editor was F. Orlin Tremaine, who soon made Astounding the leading magazine in the nascent pulp science fiction field, publishing well-regarded stories such as Jack Williamson's Legion of Space and John W. Campbell's "Twilight". At the end of 1937, Campbell took over editorial duties under Tremaine's supervision, and the following year Tremaine was let go, giving Campbell more independence. Over the next few years Campbell published many stories that became classics in the field, including Isaac Asimov's Foundation series, A. E. van Vogt's Slan, and several novels and stories by Robert A. Heinlein. The period beginning with Campbell's editorship is often referred to as the Golden Age of Science Fiction.

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Isaac Asimov Presents The Great SF Stories 4 (1942) is a science fiction anthology edited by Isaac Asimov and Martin H. Greenberg. It is the fourth volume of Isaac Asimov Presents The Great SF Stories, a series of short story collections that attempts to list the great science fiction stories from the Golden Age of Science Fiction. They date the Golden Age as beginning in 1939 and lasting until 1963. The book was later reprinted as the second half of Isaac Asimov Presents The Golden Years of Science Fiction, Second Series with the first half being Isaac Asimov Presents The Great SF Stories 3 (1941). This volume was originally published by DAW books in 1980.

Black Destroyer Van Vogt story

"Black Destroyer" is a science fiction short story by Canadian-American writer A. E. van Vogt, first published in Astounding SF in July 1939. It has been marked as the story that represents the start of the Golden Age of Science Fiction.

<i>Fantasy Book</i> American science fiction magazine (1947–1951)

Fantasy Book is a defunct semi-professional American science fiction magazine that published eight issues between 1947 and 1951. The editor was William Crawford, and the publisher was Crawford's Fantasy Publishing Company, Inc. Crawford had problems distributing the magazine, and his budget limited the quality of the paper he could afford and the artwork he was able to buy, but he attracted submissions from some well-known writers, including Isaac Asimov, Frederik Pohl, A. E. van Vogt, Robert Bloch, and L. Ron Hubbard. The best-known story to appear in the magazine was Cordwainer Smith's first sale, "Scanners Live in Vain", which was later included in the first Science Fiction Hall of Fame anthology, and is now regarded as one of Smith's finest works. Jack Gaughan, later an award-winning science fiction artist, made his first professional sale to Fantasy Book, for the cover illustrating Smith's story.

Murray Smith is a film theorist and philosopher of art based at the University of Kent, where he is Professor of Film and co-director of the Aesthetics Research Centre. He is the author of three books and numerous articles on film and aesthetics, and the co-editor of three collections of essays. He was President of the Society for Cognitive Studies of the Moving Image from 2014-17, and has served on the editorial boards of Screen, Cinema Journal, the British Journal of Aesthetics, Projections and Series. He has held a Leverhulme Research Fellowship (2005-6), and a Laurance S Rockefeller Fellowship at Princeton University’s Centre for Human Values (2017-18). He delivered a Kracauer Lecture in 2014 at the Goethe University Frankfurt, the inaugural Beacon Institute lecture in 2015, and the Beardsley Lecture in 2018, sponsored by Temple University at the Barnes Foundation.

References

  1. "Widescreen baroque". Jeff Prucher, ed. The Oxford Dictionary of Science Fiction. Oxford University Press, 2006. (paywall link)
  2. Wide-screen Baroque Revisited. University of Wales Press, November 10, 2016.