Centuries before Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landed on the Moon, several fictional characters had already set foot on it. In the absence of any real means to do so, literature made the journey easier.
Half a century after Kubrick’s futuristic metaphor, the mythical creation of Zarathustra survives and continues to be the cosmogonic core for some. This auditive start accompanying the sequence of a primate throwing a bone into the air as a first tool, thus starting the Anthropocene, became iconic.
Long before the first successful transplants were performed on humans, some writers had already written about them in fiction. Literature can contribute to the ethical and social debate surrounding transplants.
This article examines the figure of the scientist in such fictional narratives and what these characterizations indicate about public attitudes toward science in our contemporary world.
If Verne and Wells were the fathers of science-fiction, Poe was its grandfather.
In an ever-more complex world, it is absolutely imperative that we include science and technology and their effects in narratives which speak to us about humanity.