Midnight Facts for Insomniacs

Lasers, Steam, and Chrome: The History of Science Fiction

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Who wrote the first ever science fiction novel? Why is Isaac Asimov hiding his middle initial? And which psychedelic author attempted to murder the most wives?

 

In the latest MFFI episode, Shane snd Duncan answer all of the burning sci-fi-history questions that you never cared enough to ask.

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Join the MFFI community and vote on episode topics via DISCORD

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In this episode:  

  • The Epic of Gilgamesh?
  • Johannes Kepler’s 1634 “Somnium” (The Dream)
  • Mary Shelly and the Mad Scientist Trope
  • Frankenstein 
  • The Last Man
  • Roger Dodsworth: the Reanimated Englishman"
  • (Another) Last Man: “Le Dernier Homme” by Jean-Baptiste François Xavier Cousin De Grainville 
  • “The Steam Man of the Prairies”
  • Johnny Brainerd, Ethan Hopkins and Mickey McSquizzle
  • Jules Verne and the
  • Extraordinary Voyages
  • HG Wells (Herbert George Wells)
  • Samuel Butler’s “Erewhon”
  • Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Lost World
  • The Futuristic Tales of Rudyard Kipling
  • Edgar Allen Poe goes to the moon 
  • Edgar Rice Burroughs: Mars (Barsoom)
  • The Rise of the Pulps 
  • Amazing Stories
  • Astounding Science Fiction
  • The Big Three:
  • Robert A Heinlein, Arthur C Clark, and Isaac Yudovick Asimov
  • Rendezvous with Rama 
  • Stranger in a strange land
  • Nightfall
  • Ray Bradbury?
  • Fritz Lang’s Metropolis 
  • Art Deco, Googie, the Jetsons
  • The Pulp Films: It Came from Outer Space et al 
  • Science Fiction on Television: Flash Gordon and Buck Rogers
  • The Impact of the Bomb: How Nuclear Weapons Shaped Sci Fi
  • Kaiju, On the Beach
  • Richard Matheson and I Am Legend 
  • Planet of the Damn Dirty Apes
  • Frank Herbert and Dune
  • Phillip K Dick 
  • Harlan Ellison
  • Ursula K. Le Guin’s Left Hand of Darkness
  • Soylent Green
  • Logan’s Run 
  • West World
  • Michael Crichton 
  • Orson Scott Card Saves the Day
  • Avoiding Star Wars 
  • Greg Bear’s Blood Music 
  • Cyberpunk
  • William Gibson’s Neuromancer 
  • Bruce Sterling, Neal Stephenson, Mirrorshades 
  • Richard Calder’s Dead Things
  • The Era of Schwarzenegger 
  • Dan Simmons Hyperion 
  • Kim Stanley Robinson’s Mars Series 
  • The Matrix etc 
  • YA: Divergent, Maze Runner, Ready Player One, Hunger Games 
  • Modern Sci Fi 

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    Episode Transcript

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    Midnight Facts for InsomniacsBy Shane Rogers
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