UDC

Authors

Abstract

The paper dwells on the science fiction fan movement in the Soviet Union during the 1980s and analyzes its characteristic features and peculiarities. The author comes to the conclusion that the party leadership attempted to control the science fiction fan movement in the last years of the Soviet Power. Fan clubs started to emerge and spread across the country in the 1960s through 1980s, which was quite natural as it was then that science fiction enjoyed wide popularity. The article looks at the forms and methods of work of the provincial science fiction fan club using new materials on the history of “Aelita” fan club in Ivanovo. This club used to organize meetings with famous science fiction writers; its work was featured in the local press. Moreover, at the end of the 1980s “Aelita” activists tried to organize their own publishing. “Aelita” was a “typical” Soviet fan club of the 1980s, but did not have the same expanded structure as some older clubs. The history of “Aelita” shows that the party leadership tried to create a controlled science fiction fan movement, an attempt that can hardly be called a failure. “Aelita” attracted science fiction fans and lovers from the town of Ivanovo, including the local intelligentsia, students and schoolchildren. The club members had repeatedly tried to establish contacts with other science fiction fan clubs within the Soviet Union but no stable relations were developed until the late 1980s. Having analyzed the activities of “Aelita”, the author found a pattern typical of the Soviet science fiction fan clubs and of the Soviet fan movement as a whole. This common feature is their dependence on the social and political situation in the country. “Aelita” intensified its activity in the second half of the 1980s, which definitely had to do with perestroika, attempts to reform the Soviet Union and hopes for a better future.

Keywords

References

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