What is Steampunk?

Or Steampunk Jesus (and a Side of Gyoza) “What is Steampunk?” I’ve heard the question asked of other Steampunk authors, each lending their own unique perspective to the concept. The simple answer is contained in the specific traits that nearly all Steampunk books contain – goggles, airships, mad scientists, etc. And yes, not all of them do, but they’re common enough traits that everyone pretty much gets it. But there are other traits; more subtle ones, that whisper more to the sensibilities of steampunk. It’s a frame of mind, it’s an aesthetic, it’s a slow waltz with a pocketwatch...

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As Pip and I were writing Phoenix Rising: A Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences Novel, we were asked again and again the question that, when you jump from steampunk site to steampunk site on the Internet, have a different answer: What is steampunk? I was asked this by fans of Science Fiction and Fantasy as more of a topic of debate rather than education, leading into the debate of “How do you feel about steampunk going mainstream?” When I try to explain to my parents or the much harder audience to reach—my VP’s at my day job—what steampunk is, it...

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What is Steampunk? I could say it was “Neverwas.”  That’s how a lot of people describe it.  A lot of people talk about gears and goggles.  “When a Goth discovers brown” is a phrase I have heard more than once. I could, but I won’t. It can’t be “never was.”  Authors from HG Wells to Cherie Priest, and before and after and in between, wrote about it, so it was in the pages of the “Time Machine” and “Boneshaker.”  Musicians like Robert Brown sing about it, so it was in the songs of bands like Abney Park, The Clockwork...

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Let me start by explaining when I was first introduced to Steampunk. When I was first introduced to Steampunk it was not called anything other than Victorian science fiction. When I was quite young, before I could read and television was still quite new and exciting, one of my favourite childhood activities was spending a Saturday afternoon watching a show starring Superhost. He did a little pre-movie show called “Supe’s On” followed by an afternoon of monster movies under the banner “Mad Theater”. This is where I was first introduced to The Time Machine, Frankenstein, The Invisible Man, Dracula,...

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They say steampunk’s the next big thing (or maybe the current, who knows?). But what the heck is it? Honestly, steampunk is a lot of things. As a certified expert on the subject* I’d like to give you an overview across steampunk literature, film, video games, and even fashion. * I’m not actually an expert, just a fan of steampunk . . . and of Wikipedia. Steampunk as Historical/Science Fiction At it’s heart, steampunk applies the old sci-fi question — what if? — to the Industrial Revolution. The Industrial Revolution changed the world in a lot of ways, but...

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“What got you into Steampunk?” the hubby asked me recently. “I’ve been into it for awhile,” I replied. “That’s not the question I asked.” I thought for a moment. “I came across the term about two years ago. I was looking for dresses for the Dickens’ ball and all the dresses I liked on ebay had Steampunk in the title. So I googled it. Turns out, I’ve always like it but never knew what it was called.” Then I’d gotten an image stuck in my head, sat down, and wrote my first Steampunk manuscript, unaware of exactly what I...

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Speculative Fiction of the past few years has seen the rise of steam-powered machinery and mechanical monsters within its pages. And if the successive release of Leviathan by Scott Westerfeld, Boneshaker and Dreadnought by Cherie Priest, and the recent Brazilian Vaporpunk anthology among the more than 40 novels and anthologies of the past five years are any indication, then the Speculative Fiction subgenre known as Steampunk is only going to increase in popularity. There’s that word — Steampunk — that keeps getting applied to these fantastic stories set in the Victorian or Edwardian period of world history, with their...

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