Planets in science fiction

The exploration of other worlds is one of the most enduring themes of science fiction.

During the first decades of science fiction, Mars was the most common planet and the most romanticized of our solar system whose surface conditions seemed closest to being amenable to life. Percival Lowell's idea about canals of Mars[?] was taken at face value then. Currently Mars in depicted mainly as a target of terraforming.

See Mars in fiction for more details on the red planet's numerous roles.

During the early-to-mid 20th century, Venus was also a popular subject. Venus is very similar to Earth in its size and surface gravity, and its surface is hidden by a thick cloud layer. Venus was usually depicted as a warm, wet, jungle- and marsh-covered world where life was plentiful, with often thinly-veiled allegories of the European colonization of Africa. Venus is in fact an inhospitable world -- the clouds are sulfuric acid, the atmosphere is hundreds of times thicker than Earth's, and the surface temperature could melt lead.

See Venus in fiction[?] for more details and particular works.

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1 Fictional planets

1.1 Unusual Social environment
1.2 Unusual Physical environment
1.3 Other

2 Books

3 External Links

4 Related articles

Fictional planets

Authors have created thousands of fictional planets. Most of them are nearly indistinguishable from Earth, which is why Brian M. Stableford[?] calls them "Earth-Clones". In these, differences with Earth life are mostly social (like Barrayar[?] in the science fiction of Lois McMaster Bujold). More physically unusual planets have been in the hard science fiction books.

Unusual Social environment

Typical examples are prison planets, primitive cultures, political or religious extremes and pseudo-medieval societies. See Utopia, Dystopia.

Anarres – Ursula K. Le Guin's Dispossessed (socialist)
Barrayar[?] – Lois McMaster Bujold's Miles Vorkosigan series (feudal military culture)
Cetaganda[?] – Bujold's Vorkosigan series (genetically engineered culture)
Chthon[?] – Piers Anthony's Chthon (prison planet)
Dorsai[?] – Gordon R. Dickson's Dorsai[?] series (soldier culture)
Gethen[?]/Winter - Ursula K. Le Guin's The Left Hand of Darkness (hermaphrodites)
Gor - John Norman's Gor series (men are warriors; women are sex-slaves; all are happy in their appointed roles)
Orthe[?] – Mary Gentle[?]'s Golden Witchbreed (post-holocaust/medieval aliens)
Pern - Anne McCaffrey's Dragonriders of Pern series (people ride genetically-engineered dragons)
Riverworld – Philip Jose Farmer's Riverworld series (all humans of history)
Rubanis[?] – Valerian[?] series (ultra-capitalist)
Sangre[?] – Norman Spinrad's Men in the Jungle (cannibalism)
Shora[?] – Joan Slonczewski[?]'s A Door into Ocean (waterbound culture)
Tiamat[?] – Joan D. Vinge[?]'s The Snow Queen (matriarchy/monarchy)

Some Fantasy Worlds are also depicted as alien planets.

Unusual Physical environment

Typical examples are one-climate planets - deserts, waterworlds, arctic conditions and especially jungles.

Abyormen[?] – Hal Clement's Cycle of Fire (temperature extremes)
Arrakis - Frank Herbert's Dune (desert world)
Ballybran[?] – Anne McCaffrey's Crystal Singer
Big Planet[?] – Jack Vance
Dhrawn[?] – Hal Clement's Star Light (high gravity)
Dragon's Egg[?] – Robert Forward (life on neutron star)
Garth[?] – David Brin's Uplift War (weird biology)
Hekla[?] – Hal Clement's Cold Front (ice age aliens)
Helliconia[?] – Brian Aldiss (seasons last millennia)
Hoth – The Empire Strikes Back (arctic)
Hydros[?] – Robert Silverberg's Face of the Waters (waterworld)
Ishtar[?] – Poul Anderson's Fire Time (periods of intense heat)
Kithrup[?] – David Brin's Startide Rising (waterworld)
LV-426[?] - Aliens
Lamarckia[?] – Greg Bear's Legacy (Lamarckian evolution)
Majipoor[?] – Robert Silverberg (large planet)
Medea[?] – Harlan Ellison's worldbuilding project
Mesklin – Hal Clement's Mission of Gravity[?] (superjovian)
Nacre[?] – Piers Anthony's Omnivore
Poseidon[?] – Blue Planet Roleplaying game[?] (ocean world)
Pyrrus[?] – Harry Harrison's Deathworld (high gravity and psionic animals)
Regis III[?] - Stanislaw Lem's Invincible (inorganic evolution)
Rocheworld[?] – Robert Forward (double planet)
Smoke Ring[?] – Larry Niven's Integral Trees & Smoke Ring (gas ring around a neutron star)
Solaris[?] – Stanislaw Lem's Solaris (living planet)
Tatooine - Star Wars movies (desert world)
Tenebra[?] - Hal Clement's Close to Critical[?] (high gravity and corrosive atmosphere)
Thalassa – Arthur C. Clarke's Songs of Distant Earth (waterworld)
Zahir[?] – Valerian[?] series (hollow planet)

Other

Altair IV[?]- Forbidden Planet
Arisia[?] - E. E. Smith's Lensmen[?] series
Athse[?] – Ursula K. Le Guin's The Word for World is Forest
Barsoom - Edgar Rice Burroughs, heroic fantasy[?] version of Mars
Boskone[?] - Smith's Lensmen series
Belzagor[?] – Robert Silverberg's Downward to the Earth
Cyteen[?] – C. J. Cherryh's Cyteen series
Darkover – Marion Zimmer Bradley's Darkover series (medieval culture and psi powers)
Epsilon 3[?] - orbited by Babylon 5
Exxilon[?] - Doctor Who episode "Death to the Daleks"
Gallifrey - Doctor Who (main character's home planet)
Hegira[?] – Greg Bear
Hyperion[?] – Dan Simmons (Hyperion and sequels)
Qo'noS/Kronos - Klingon homeworld in the Star Trek universe
Kashyyyk - Star Wars planet of Wookiees
Krypton - Superman
Lithia[?] – James Blish's Case of Conscience
Lusitania[?] – Orson Scott Card's Speaker for the Dead
Magrathea - The Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy
Metaluna[?] - This Island Earth[?]
Mongo[?] - Flash Gordon
Oa - home of the Green Lantern Corps
The Planet of the Apes – originally a book by Pierre Boulle
Reverie[?] - Bruce Sterling's Artificial Kid
Skaro - Home planet of the Daleks
Trantor - Galactic Empire series by Isaac Asimov - A planet-wide city
Vulcan - Star Trek
Z'Ha'Dum[?] - Home of the Shadows in Babylon 5

In addition, some writers and scientists have speculated about artificial planets or planet-equivalents; see Larry Niven’s Ringworld or Freeman Dyson’s Dyson sphere.

Books

Neil F. Comins[?]: What if the Moon didn’t exist
Stephen Gillette[?]: World-Building (Writer’s Digest Books)
Brian Stableford[?]: The Dictionary of Science Fiction Places

External Links

Worldbuilding Class in http://www.world-builders.org/ (http://www.world-builders.org/)