Back in 1877, while Schiaparelli was busy making scientific notes on the surface of Mars, never in his dreams would he have imagined the lasting impact his Martian canali would have on the genre of science fiction!
Just three years after his (mistaken) discovery, a science fiction novel, called Across the Zodiac, was published in which an explorer goes to Mars, and meets Martians who refuse to believe that he is from the Earth. This book, written by Percy Greg, is also said to contain the first use of alien language in fiction! Another popular novel, Journey to Mars (1893), written by Gustavus Pope, is about humans who get kidnapped by Martians.
Meanwhile, the American astronomer Percival Lowell, under the belief that Mars was home to intelligent beings who were constructing waterways to revive their dying planet, popularized his views through three books starting with Mars (1895). Though his publications were not intended as fiction, countless writers of science fiction took inspiration from his descriptions, and their works went on to become bestsellers! Kurd Lasswitz’s Auf zwei Planeten (1897) translated as Two Planets (1971), H. G. Wells’ The War of the Worlds (1898), Edgar Rice Burroughs’ A Princess of Mars (1917) and its sequel The Gods of Mars (1918), Robert A. Heinlein’s Red Planet (1949), and Ray Bradbury’s The Martian Chronicles (1950) are among them.
Picture Credit : Google
