Steampunk: Fantasy, Science Fiction or something in between?

[Darkblade]

Steampunk, a little genre that has had a big resurgence in popularity these last few years. The blending of Victorian Era sensibilities and aesthetics with impossibly advanced technology to make points about the past and the present.

Does this make for fantasy or science fiction? The way it uses technology to make it's points suggests SF. Whereas the impossible nature of the technology implies a more fantasy nature, especially when combined with the tendency for more recent works in the genre to include folklore of the time. What do you think?

 

[Steerpike]

I'd say it can be either, depending on how rigorous the science is. If the "science" is completely implausible I'd call it Fantasy.

 

[Saigonnus]

I would think it's more science fiction than fantasy, considering it simply adapts a known technology (clockwork, steam power, hydraulics etc.) into something we may have invented in another manifestation. Sure the creations tend to be a bit on the "fantastic" side (like the giant walking spider from the Wild, Wild West movie with Will Smith.) But we can make something like that with electronics and hydraulics if we really had the need to do so. I haven't seen much about steampunk really, but I would think it is simply substituting one set of technologies for another in the creation of things we already know.

 

[wordwalker]

Since it's dedicated to looking like tech, I'd call it a different era of Space Opera, aka very-soft-SF.

Not that fitting one label into another really helps understand a genre.

 

[ThinkerX]

I've read a fair bit of steampunk.

To me it looks like 'alternate history science' which had a head on collision with Lovecraft - because a fair bit of the time, there are things which would not be out of place in Lovecraft either behind the tech, or in conflict with it.

 

[Devor]

I don't think it comes down to "realism," exactly, but more towards the tone. Do they try and explain how the tech works, or do characters just grab their gadgets and push a button? A lot of science fiction stories have just a few points where the science is finicky, but everything after that follows through on those assumptions. Assuming that a steam engine will do what it's supposed to, do the pistons line up well enough, or do the gadgets produce effects that are beyond explanation?

When in doubt, it's Sci Fi. Even Tolkein's work gets placed on Science Fiction shelves nowadays.

 

[Feo Takahari]

My impression was that literally the only difference between steampunk and gaslamp fantasy was that steampunk was science fiction and gaslamp fantasy was fantasy--that is to say, any steampunk-esque work that was fantasy would automatically be gaslamp fantasy.