Diagram of space station, 1973. WSFC8a

Diagram of space station, 1973. WSFC8a

We've Come a Long Way, Baba. Leningrad, aiming as it was to be a new place in a new time with a new government and society was a natural for the ferment of a literature of science fiction. Strongly influenced by H.G. Wells and Jules Verne, 20th century Petrograd/Leningrad/Petersburg represented to the literary avant-garde a futuristic, revolutionary utopia. It's fun to contrast this image with that of a hot air balloon in a Russian physics manual in our collections, by Petr Ivanovich Gilarovskii, published in 1793. We have come a long way, in spite of the recent Columbia disaster. Spencer Library began collecting science fiction in 1969 with a gift from lunar geologist Larry Friesen and through the efforts of Kansas University's own James E. Gunn, writer and head of the KU Center for the Study of Science Fiction, the Department of Special Collections is now the North American repository for world science fiction; it includes many Leningrad/St. Petersburg imprints. Both the printed books and manuscripts get heavy use by scholars from around the world. This diagram, from a volume about the Russian space station "Saliut," is, of course, science fact rather than fiction. "Saliut" was actually the name of a series of Soviet space stations orbiting Earth since 1971. Cosmonaut V.I. Sevastianov, who was one of the crew of Soyuz 18, launched to deliver cosmonauts to the station, spent 63 days in space and inscribed our copy to Sci Fi writer Frederick Pohl who in turn gave it as a gift to our WSF (World Science Fiction) collection.

WSFC8a