3 posts tagged “science fiction”
The beginning of the year's always a good time to observe anniversaries, it seems. Big Ben turns 150 this year, and a website's been set up for the commemoration. (Incidentally, Big Ben was originally the name of the bell, not the clock tower. Now you know.)
Paleo-Future points to a New York Times editorial from 1909 which speculated on the world of 2009. Apparently automobiles should be obsolete by now. We should really work on that.
What's Next has the 2009 map of trends up, although I'd recommend you not try to see it via dialup. It's in PDF and it's massive.
If you're looking for a fun project to start off the year, get thee to the LEGO Flickr Steampunk Contest! You have two months to create something amazing. If you'd rather read about creations than create, you can check out the progress of Keith Newstead's A Steampunk Romance, or help Eric Orchard come up with some ideas for a new weblog focused on anachronism in science fiction art and literature.
Speaking of anachronisms, it's hard to pull off an old-time movie look properly, but Karl Lagerfeld comes pretty close in this teaser for a silent film on Coco Chanel.
And finally, if you're in the middle of the icy season like we are, you can stay inside and steampunkify board games, like this fun Monopoly modification!
Today's steampunk entry is mostly about the visual oohs and ahhs. If you'd like something with a little more density, however, sink your teeth into the history of science fiction between 1900 and 1910 - great material for research and inspiration! (Swiped from Matt's weblog.)
And now, on to fantastic robots that clank, a synthesizer that steams, a weblog full of artistic wonders that tick, and a game of clones and Cherry Chronoberry pies.
And look, a steampunk podcast! Huzzah!
One of my spam messages yesterday had the subject line of "oyster perpetual cosmograph." Sounds vaguely steampunkish, doesn't it? And off we go...
I was reading details of William Gibson's induction into the Science Fiction Hall of Fame and noticed that steampunk was mentioned as a literary genre. I poked around a bit and found that the Hall even lists a steampunk bibliography. I guess the term really has made it! However, the genre discussions continue, as detailed in this post on Futurismic. An excerpt that caught my eye:
For example, Young Sherlock Holmes (1985) might be dismissed as needlessly fantastical if seen as a detective story, but if seen as a work of steampunk cinema, it takes on a whole new set of meanings - despite the fact that it is rather unlikely that the writer or director had even heard of the term at the time.
(I have a deep and abiding love for this film, as anyone who knows me can attest, and seeing it listed as "steampunk cinema" delights me no end.)
The steampunk portals are arriving, slowly but surely! The Steampunk Feed is open for business, and the brand new SteamList aims to catalog the steampunky stuff available on Etsy. Another source of inspiration is the Steampunk Lab, which shows off items from all over the web. And Coilhouse, which has all sorts of great bits to it, has a steampunk category.
From Cassandra: Gogbot looks like a steampunk-oriented festival taking place this fall in the Netherlands. The site is in Dutch, but I did see that one of the bands performing is named Singing Tesla Coils, so you know it's going to be an interesting time!
Marconi News specializes in collages of "visual fabrications, chronological confusion and technological deception." Of course, I love it.
I also love the Process Indicator. It's for indicating processes, it is!
And lastly, space westerns may be a bit of a tangential interest, but many a steampunk story has a space and/or a western angle to it. It's a great site, regardless of your leanings.
