If you’re a fan of science-fiction, you might well already have heard of cyberpunk and steampunk. Both have fascinating and distinct aesthetics, and over time have developed strong identities as unique threads of the genre. The grimy, dystopian ‘high-tech, low life’ of cyber-punk was a term coined by Bruce Bethke as a title for a short story in which he wanted to capture an emerging trend in the genre of renegades and outsiders in society using technology and computing, hence ‘cyber’ and ‘punk’ being combined. The subgenre has often been best embodied since by the works of William Gibson, but if you want to know more about the origins of the word you can check out Bethke’s short story at www. infinityplus.co.uk/stories/cpunk.htm
Steampunk is even newer as a term, coined just 35 years ago by author KW Jeter, who was trying to find a term for the ‘Victorian fantasies’ created by him and some of his contemporaries. To quote his letter to Locus:
If anything, steampunk caught on even
