This post is brought to you by the Space Opera and Space Westerns books at RAGE m a c h i n e. Our reputation in the Sword & Sorcery field is pretty much set but we also publish books about other kinds of fantastic adventures. These include Ships of Steel, an anthology on the Swords of Fire model. Jack Mackenzie has several series that are of note: the Jefferson Odett military SF novels, The Gear Crew, the Solis DeLacey series and a collection of SF stories called The Cryo Game and Other Stories. G. W. Thomas offers the planet Utukku and the Sudana and Zaar stories in Whispers of Ice and Sand.
With Ships of Steel 2 in the works, I’ve been looking back over all the themes that such an adventure SF tale might embrace. Clare Winger Harris famously outlined all the current SF themes back in 1931. Space Opera is mostly based on #1 Interplanetary space travel and #2 Adventures on other worlds, though these two become a range of more specific ideas like space pirates or being stranded in space. These adventure themes have helped to make Space Opera the black sheep of the genre despite its biggest movies being Star Wars and its prequels and sequels. I go on about that there: Space Opera: A Ramble.
I thought a catch-all for the various Space Opera themes might be handy for those interested in such. A blog of this size does tend to bury everything under a pile of stuff. (A needle in a needlestack, as it were.) These posts are largely taken from the 1930s, an era that gets a bad rap from the Golden Agers, but I find quite refreshing. I think it was John Carnell who said Sam Moskowitz was the only one who could read “this stuff” and find enjoyment. I guess I’m another. (Jack Mackenzie is not.)
Derelicts are a creepy favorite, with unknown things going on inside their seemingly abandoned structures.
The Castaways of Space featuring Robinson Crusoe types lost on dire planets and out in space. Rescue is at hand!
The Exiles of Space is similar to the last one but these guys won’t be rescued by a passing ships. They are looking for a new home in space.
The Prison Planet made famous by Star Trek 6 (“Rura Pente! The aliens’ graveyard!) or Dune’s Salusa Secundus.
The Human Zoo is a classic trope where we get to be the creatures in cages.
The Dead Planet is a personal fav, with explorers stumbling on LV-426 or some other place you’d be better to stay away from.
Sargasso of Space takes its lead from naval fiction and William Hope Hodgson (like so much space fiction). Another place better avoided.
Home Is the Hunter looks at hunting in space, where the prey might have a better edge than your average rabbit.
The Lost Cities of Mars is another one from adventure fiction. Old secrets lie out in the desert.
Ice Planets made famous by Ice Planet Hoth and Star Trek, it looks a lot like Canada in the winter.
Winged Humans is another oldie-but-a-goodie. Wouldn’t we all like to have wings?
Beyond the Vortex What lies beyond that cosmic door?
Space Pirates can seem pretty goofy but it never goes away. Ask Jude Law.
Moon Maids is thanks to Edgar Rice Burroughs, of course. Before ERB it was all labs and mad scientists.
Slave Ships From Space has come and gone, with shows like Alien Nation. More Pulp tropes from history.
Asteroids: The 1930s Asteroids are just rocks in space but so much happens there.
Asteroids: 1940-1942 More stuff happening there.
Outpost Peril gets its inspiration from Imperialist outposts around the world. How does it go in space?
A Vision of Venus: 1920s the veiled lady of the Solar System. What’s going on behind those clouds?
The Callistan Menace a moon with a fair number of stories. Famously an Asimov title.
Space Stations are a reality now but here was how we thought it would go.
Conclusion
It’s no mystery to me why I’ve preferred stories from before the Golden Age. (There’s a hint there.) Ever since I read (and re-read) Isaac Asimov’s collection Before the Golden Age (1974) I’ve been hooked on these older, inspirational tales. Yes, they are goofy and badly written sometimes (not always) but it’s fun to see the new Pulp SF evolving before your eyes. Let’s take one story for example, Edmond Hamilton’s “Corsairs of the Cosmos” (Weird Tales, April 1934), the last of the Interstellar Patrol stories. In this tale, Ed gives us robots who raid ships and planets just as the Cyber-men would do on Doctor Who twenty years later. And it wasn’t even new to Hamilton who done giant robots (Weird Tales, December 1926), and killer robots (Amazing Stories, January 1928) years before. Later fiction would become more sophisticated but not necessarily more fun.
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