Speculative fiction

Speculative fiction is used as an umbrella term for more fantastical genres, including science fiction, fantasy, horror, weird fiction, supernatural fiction, superhero fiction, utopian and dystopian fiction, apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction, and alternate history. The page also says the term covers related static, motion, and virtual arts.

Reading notes

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• The category is presented as broad enough to include literature and related arts.
• Its history is described as ranging from ancient works to 21st-century works.
• The page links speculative fiction to ancient Greek drama, historiography, Shakespeare, and mythography.
• It says the modern English-language genre term is often attributed to Robert A. Heinlein.
• Heinlein first used the term as a synonym for science fiction, but later said it did not include fantasy.
• Earlier uses of the term are cited from 1889 and 1900.
• The term was popularized in the 1960s and early 1970s by Judith Merril and others in connection with New Wave science fiction.
• In the 2000s, it came into wider use as a collective term for a set of genres.
• The page says the term is sometimes used to express dissatisfaction with the limits of science fiction.
• It also mentions “suppositional fiction” as fiction built around an internally consistent world.