- Solar System in fiction
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The Solar System and its various bodies (planets, asteroids, moons, etc.) were the earliest objects to be treated as fictional locations in works of science fiction. Among these, imaginary voyages to and explorations of Earth's Moon are found in seventeenth century literature. By the early twentieth century, following the increase in scientific and technological development spurred by the Industrial Revolution, fictional journeys to (or from) the Solar System's other planets had become common in fiction.
Early literature regarding the Solar System, following scientific speculations dating back to the 17th century, assumed that every planet hosted its own native life forms—often assumed to be human in form, if not in attitudes. Later literature began to accept that there were limits set by temperature, gravity, atmospheric pressure and composition, or the presence of liquids that would set bounds on the possibility of life as we know it existing on other planets. By the 19th century the Moon was given up as an airless desert, incapable of supporting life on its surface (hopes for subsurface life continued until later). Jupiter and the planets beyond were too large, too cold, and had atmospheres composed of poisonous chemicals. Mercury was too close to the Sun and its surface was exposed to extremes of temperature. The asteroids were too tiny and airless. By the early 20th century, prospects for life in the Solar System focused on Venus, the larger moons of Jupiter and Saturn, and especially Mars.
With the onset of the Space Age, planetary probes cast increasing doubt on the likelihood of extraterrestrial life in the Solar System, at least life of any magnitude greater than organisms such as bacteria. By the mid-1960s, it was firmly established that life could have no foothold on the hostile surfaces of Mercury or Venus, and that Mars could hardly support any macroscopic life forms on its surface, much less an advanced civilization. In the 1980s it was shown that the surfaces of Jupiter's moons were just as hostile to life. More recent fiction focused on the Solar System has thus tended to address its exploration for purposes such as terraforming, the engineering of planets for human habitation, than the possibility of any existing life.
Contents
Specific articles
Most of the major bodies of the Solar System have articles concerning their use as settings for fiction:
Moon · Phobos and Deimos · Asteroids · Jupiter's Moons · Saturn's Moons · Titan · Comets · Fictional planets Works
The following works or series use multiple planets and other locations within the Solar System as their primary settings:
Novels and series
Adult
Name Dates Author A Honeymoon in Space 1901 George Griffith Northwest Smith 1933–1936 C. L. Moore Planetary series 1934–1936 Stanley G. Weinbaum Space Trilogy 1938–1943 C. S. Lewis Spacehounds of IPC 1947 E. E. Smith Leigh Brackett Solar System 1940–1964 Leigh Brackett Space Odyssey 1948–1997 Arthur C. Clarke The Rama Series 1972–1993 Arthur C. Clarke Eight Worlds 1974–1985 John Varley Shaper/Mechanist 1982–1985 Bruce Sterling Grand Tour 1993–present Ben Bova Juvenile
Name Dates Author Captain Future 1940–1951 Edmond Hamilton Heinlein juveniles (first six) 1947–1952 Robert A. Heinlein Lucky Starr series 1952–1958 Isaac Asimov Tom Corbett, Space Cadet series 1952–1956 Cary Rockwell (pseud.) Dig Allen series 1959–1962 Joseph Greene Comics and animation
- The Dan Dare comics series (first five stories, 1950–1955)
- The Cowboy Bebop comics, animated television series and film (1998–2001) by Hajime Yatate
- The Exosquad animated television series (see Exosquad planets) (1993–1995)
Film, radio and television
- The Space Patrol radio and live action television programs (1950–1955)
- The Tom Corbett, Space Cadet radio and television programs (1950–1955)
- Space Patrol, the puppet television program (1962)
- Defying Gravity, television program (2009)
Games
Name Date Developer Triplanetary 1973 Game Designers' Workshop Buck Rogers XXVC 1988 TSR, Inc. Space: 1889 1988 Game Designers' Workshop Jovian Chronicles 1992 Dream Pod 9 Mutant Chronicles 1993 Target Games GURPS Terradyne campaign 1995 Steve Jackson Games Transhuman Space 2002 Steve Jackson Games Rocketmen 2005 Wizkids Eclipse Phase 2009 Catalyst Game Labs Astronomical locations in fiction Solar System Mercury • Venus • Earth (Moon) • Mars (moons) • Ceres (other asteroids) • Jupiter (moons) • Saturn (Titan • other moons) • Uranus • Neptune • Pluto (other TNOs • comets) • Fictional planets
Other systems Aldebaran • Alpha Centauri • Altair • Betelgeuse • Deneb • Epsilon Eridani • Rigel • Sirius • Tau Ceti • Vega • Binary stars • Nebulae • Black holes • Galaxies • Supernovae • Wormholes
Categories:- Solar System in fiction
- Planets in fiction
- Planetary systems in fiction
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