Steampunk?!!!!

[Taltos]

I've read 'The Difference Engine' now and would like to read more, but there doesn't seem to be much more out there.

Maybe you should look at the J Gregory Keyes 4 books about the "Age Of Unreason" starting with "Newton's Cannon", which are AFAIK considered steampunk.

 

[iansales]

SciFan: Science Fiction & Fantasy Books by Theme: Steampunk (novels, anthologies, short story collections, non fiction)=

Scifan listing of Steampunk books.

That's an odd list... no Infernal Devices... Jules Verne? But he was writing during the Victorian Age!... The Time Ships? A sequel to a Victorian novel, yes, but it soon changes to late 20th century hard SF... and Pasquale's Angel? That's set in Renaissance Italy!

Ah well, it seems Damon Knight was right after all: [steampunk] means what we point to when we say it...

 

[Lucien21]

and Pasquale's Angel? That's set in Renaissance Italy!

But isn't it an alternate history where Da Vinci is an engineer and has built engines of war. (Possibly steam based).

 

[iansales]

Um, wikipedia lists Pasquale's Angel as a steampunk novel on List of steampunk works - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Maybe I'm just a purist and prefer Jeter's original comment: "Personally, I think Victorian fantasies are going to be the next big thing, as long as we can come up with a fitting collective term for Powers, Blaylock and myself. Something based on the appropriate technology of the era; like "steampunks," perhaps..."

Having said that, whenever a new movement or sub-genre is identified, there are plenty of people who are eager and willing to jam all sorts of disparate works into it...

 

[GOLLUM]

Morlock Night by Jeter (which preceeded Infernal Devices by a few years) is the book some people credit with "establishing" the genre, but James Blaylock was already writing his Langdon St. Ives stories before that.

And don't forget earlier than that was Peake's Titus Alone. As I understand it Jeter was the one credited with coining the term steampunk which I presume is what is meant here by the term "establish".
EDIT: Looks like iansales has clarified things further...

To clarify Blaylock published to my knowledge his first St Ives story back in '86 so unless he published a St. Ives story pre '79 I'm not clear on what you mean unless you're referring to pre-publication or a published story earlier again?

 

[dwndrgn]

Neal Stephenson's Baroque books aren't steampunk (at least in my mind) but would probably appeal to those who like steampunk. I'm sure there is a logical explanation why but at the moment I can't think of a thing. Sheesh. Someone put out an APB for my brain willya?

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

To clarify Blaylock published to my knowledge his first St Ives story back in '86 so unless he published a St. Ives story pre '79 I'm not clear on what you mean unless you're referring to pre-publication or a published story earlier again?

You're thinking of Blaylock's first published St. Ives novel, Gollum. I said stories. The Ape-Box Affair was published in 1978.

The term Steampunk (like Urban Fantasy) is one that some people use very loosely indeed, while others try to narrow it down to the point where the very books it was originally coined to describe would be excluded.

Interestingly (or at least it interests me) the list of influences and precursors on sites like this one
http://republika.pl/steampunk/chrono02.html
tends to a lot of overlap with the influences and precursors of Fantasy of Manners, another subgenre that was much discussed back in the late eighties and early nineties.

 

[Dave]

Neal Stephenson's Baroque books aren't steampunk (at least in my mind) but would probably appeal to those who like steampunk.

I've already read those, and like them, so I would have to agree. They aren't even science fiction except for the presence in them of Enoch Root or Enoch the Red, who by the time of Crytonomicon must be over 400 years old. Apart from his Philosopher's Stone, or whatever he keeps in his box, the science and technology is consistent with the age in which they are set.

We shouldn't really argue over definitions of genres as it is a fairly pointless exercise.

 

[GOLLUM]

You're thinking of Blaylock's first published St. Ives novel, Gollum. I said stories. The Ape-Box Affair was published in 1978.

It's good to get clarification on these things. I've never read The Ape-Box Affair but it's probably something I would like to hunt down now.

I've got that site in my favourites but I've never heard of the sub genre Fantasy Of Manners. Looks like you were very much aware of it though going on this article on Wikipedia.

Fantasy of manners - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

Ah yes. That article on FoM serves as a good reminder that nothing we say on the internet is ever private. I traced that citation (which like everything else in the Wikipedia turns up elsewhere as well) back to a discussion on a private/paid-subscribers-only bulletin board eight or nine years ago. Little did I know that anything I said would be quoted as though I was some sort of authority on the subject. Fortunately, it wasn't anything I wouldn't want repeated.

 

[GOLLUM]

Little did I know that anything I said would be quoted as though I was some sort of authority on the subject. Fortunately, it wasn't anything I wouldn't want repeated.

Well I don't wish to embarrass you in any way but for what it's worth to me generally speaking you're something of an "authority" in SFF. One of the main attractions of being on a board such as this is being able to share knowledge with like-minded individuals...

Off Topic: I've noticed quite a few references to your good self in Wiki and other places.

 

[BAYLOR]

Morlock Night by K W Jeter written 1979 . Great stuff.