Slipstream (genre)

Slipstream is a kind of fantastic or non-realistic fiction that crosses conventional genre boundaries between science fiction, fantasy, and mainstream literary fiction.

The term slipstream was coined by cyberpunk author Bruce Sterling in an article originally published in SF Eye #5, in July 1989. He wrote: "...this is a kind of writing which simply makes you feel very strange; the way that living in the twentieth century makes you feel, if you are a person of a certain sensibility." Slipstream fiction has consequently been described as "the fiction of strangeness," which is as clear a definition as any of the others in wide use. Science fiction authors James Patrick Kelly and John Kessel, editors of Feeling Very Strange: The Slipstream Anthology, argue that cognitive dissonance is at the heart of slipstream, and that it is not so much a genre as a literary effect, like horror or comedy.^[1]

Slipstream falls between speculative fiction and mainstream fiction. While some slipstream novels employ elements of science fiction or fantasy, not all do. The common unifying factor of these pieces of literature is some degree of the surreal, the not-entirely-real, or the markedly anti-real.

In 2007, the first London Literature Festival at the Royal Festival Hall held a Slipstream night chaired by Toby Litt and featuring the British authors Steven Hall and Scarlett Thomas.^[2]

See also

• Bizarro fiction
• Magic realism
• New Weird
• Speculative fiction
• List of genres

References

1. ↑ Dead link 11 February 2010: http://www.scifi.com/sfw/interviews/sfw12963.html
2. ↑ "London Literature Festival: Slipstream by Toby Litt with Steven Hall & Scarlett Thomas". Nature Network. 2007. Retrieved 2011-12-12. 

External resources

• Bruce Sterling's original article on slipstream from SF Eye #5, July 1989
• Sterling and Lawrence Person's combined slipstream list from Nova Express, Volume 5, Issue 2
• A Working Canon of Slipstream Writing : Compiled in Readercon 18, 2007
• James Patrick Kelly covers slipstream in two of his "On the Net" columns from Asimov's Science Fiction: Slipstream and Genre
• A roundup of slipstream links, including links to commentary, discussions, and reviews of slipstream texts.
• Fantastic Metropolis.com
• Webpage on the special issue of Science-Fiction Studies discussing slipstream fiction - Table of Contents and article abstracts

Slipstream (O de como la Ciencia Ficción ya no es Ciencia Ficción)

• (In Spanish).