The first science fiction writer?
Was Andersen the first science fiction writer? It is partly a matter of definition, of course, but certainly there are elements of the genre in his sketch ‘Thousands of Years Hence’, of 1852. ‘Yes, thousands of years hence they will come flying on wings of steam through the air and over the ocean!’ The ‘electro-magnetic wire’ will have ‘telegraphed the size of the aerial caravan’ as young Americans travel to see Europe’s ancient monuments and crumbling ruins, speeding on their way under the Channel Tunnel.
‘”There’s lots to see in Europe,” said the young American, “and we saw it in a week! And it’s possible to do it, as the great traveller’ (mentioning a contemporary name) ‘has shown in his celebrated work, Europe Seen in Eight Days.’ One wonders -did Jules Verne know this piece when he wrote Around the World in Eighty Days twenty years later?