The 60s – Science Fiction

The world was fully in the grip of the cold war by the turn of the 60s, the US and USSR were competing in any which way they could, and with Sputnik being launched in 1957, the 60s were set to become the age of space exploration. You’d probably expect that in this age of scientific discovery that science fiction would flourish, but at the turn of the century the exact opposite was occurring. This was largely due to the fact that stories of space travel and nuclear Armageddon weren’t reserved for the pages of Sci-Fi anymore, they were all over the news – Science fiction was becoming science fact. The old-fashioned writers largely lost their audiences, with magazines going out of business rapidly and by the end of 1960, only 6 mainstream magazines remained in the US. Science had caught up with fiction, and so was not able to capture the imagination of its readers, but also, the readers themselves had largely grown up. This was where the (r)evolution of science fiction writing was about to begin…

It is well known that the 60s were the years of the rebellious youth, where they decided to create their own cultures, some even choosing to drop out of society all together. This was known as counterculture. Counterculture was a hotbed for revolution in all areas of society, with radical new ideas being sparked by the lack of will to conform. People became experimental in all aspects of life, thus creating an atmosphere of reinvention and reform, which appeared to influence everything in the 60s, even Sci-Fi. Many of the authors of this new generation were in their youth who challenged literary taboos almost as a way of rebelling against the norm, following suit with the rejection of authority that had encapsulated the era.

However, this could only achieve so much, as books and scripts were constantly turned away by publishers for being ‘too inappropriate’. This was until Penguin Books won a watershed court case over the publishing of ‘Lady Chatterly’s Lover’ in 1960. While this book was definitely not Sci-Fi in the slightest, it contained themes that were too obscene for the public – basically it was a book about the necessity of sexual expression in a time of sexual suppression by states worldwide. As soon as this was allowed to be published in one of the main centres of suppression – 1960s Britain, the revolution of Sci-Fi and literature in general kicked off. This was literature’s Brown vs Board of Education moment, as it was a change in attitude by the state, a shift which would change the course of Sci-Fi for good. It is thanks to this case that we have the likes of ‘2001: A Space Odyssey’ and ‘A Clockwork Orange’.

Image taken from: https://www.anthonyburgess.org/a-clockwork-orange/

I guess what can be said on the revolution of Sci-Fi is that although it was a fairly insignificant development in the grand scheme of things, it shows how the zeitgeist – or ‘spirit of the time’, caused revolution in even minor aspects of culture. Also, it is almost a parallel of what happened throughout the 60s, small and seemingly insignificant events leading to dramatic changes in society.

By Mathew Hardy