Russian Science Fiction
Science
fiction and fantasy have been part of mainstream
Russian literature since the 19th century. Science fiction did emerge as a
coherent genre in the early 20th century through the influence of translated
works by western writers, while fantasy originated from older traditions of
folklore and mythology. In Russian language, fantasy, science fiction, horror
and all other related genres are considered a part of a larger umbrella term, fantastika,
roughly equivalent to "speculative fiction".
Science fiction has always been closely linked
to the ideology of its time, even closer, in some respects, than mainstream
literature. Russian science fiction appearing in the last decades of the 19th
century was viewed as a convenient means of fictionalizing certain statements
about the future rather than as a new artistic method of reflection and
cognition.
While science fiction
did not emerge as a coherent genre until the early 20th century, many aspects
of science fiction (utopia, the fantastic voyage, etc.) can be observed in
earlier works. The first work which is indisputably "proto" science
fiction is Fedor Dmitriev - Mamonov's A Philosopher Nobleman (1769).
Utopia is also recognized as a form of speculative fiction; the first generic
utopia in Russia represented by a short prose piece by Alexander Sumarokov,
"A Dream of Happy Society" (1759). Another example of utopias in form
of imaginary voyage are Vasily Levshin's Newest Voyage (1784, which is
also the first Russian "flight" to the Moon), Ancient Night of the
Universe (1807), an epic poem by Semyon Bobrov, is the first work of
Russian Cosmism.
E.T.A
Hoffmann's fantastic tales caused great impact upon many Russian writers
including Nikolay Gogol, Nikolai Polevoy, Aleksey Tomofeev, Konstantin Aksakov,
Vasily Ushakov etc. Alexander Pushkin's The
Queen of Spades (1834) was called "a masterpiece of fantastic
art" by Dostoyevsky. A central figure of the early 19th century is
Vladimir Odoevsky, a romantic writer influenced by E.T.A. Hoffmann, combined
his vision of the future with faith in scientific and technological progress.
Perhaps the first true science fiction author in Russia was Alexander Veltman.
In 1836 he published The forebears of
Kalimeros: Alexander, son of Philip of Macedon, which has been called the
first original Russian science fiction novel and the first novel to use time
travel. In it the narrator rides to ancient Greece on a hippogriff, meets
Aristotle, and goes on a voyage with Alexander the Great before returning to
the 19th century.
Western
influence also played a vital role in the formation of science fiction in
Russia. Dostoevsky’s magazine Vremya
was first to publish Russian translations of Edgar Allan Poe’s stories with
Dostoevsky’s own forward. Many works of Valery Bryusov, one of the leading
symbolist writers, many be classified as science fiction.
Nikolai
Chernyshevsky's immensely popular and influential novel, What Is To Be Done (1863) describes an utopian dream of the far
future, which became a prototype for many socialist utopias. The image of glass
derived from the Crystal Palace in What
Is To Be Done became an influential image for the later science fiction.
Glass is the symbol of the Future Society, which will be free, luminous, and
open. In Zamyatin’s We this symbol is
effectively used, where all the buildings are made of glasses. Spaceflight
remained a central science fiction topic since the 1890s in In the Ocean of
Stars (1892) by Anany Lyakide, Voyage to Mars (1901) by Konstantin
Tsiolkovsky. Possible miracles of technical progress were regularly described
in form of fiction by scientists Wonders
of Electricity (1884) by electric engineer Vladimir Chikolev, Automatic
Underground Railway (1902) by Alexander Rodnykh etc deals with such themes.
Works Referred For This Article
RAFAIL
NUDLEMAN, Soviet Science Fiction and the
Ideology of Soviet Society, Science Fiction Studies (SF-TH Inc,1989)
DANIEL
GEROULD, On Soviet Science Fiction,
Science Fiction Studies (SF-TH Inc,1983)
