“Science Fiction Fandom in United Berlin” by Prof.Sonja Fritzsche
An excellent article of Prof. Sonja Fritzsche about the german science fiction fandom from Berlin, in the prestigious “World Literature Today”, “Science Fiction Fandom in United Berlin” :
“Fan club activities can be essential to the promotion of domestic science fiction in a foreign country. The science-fiction fan clubs of Berlin share a unique history shaped by the Cold War division of the city and the subsequent reunification of Germany in 1990. In the years since, they have become a center of German-language science-fiction production.
The Berlin science-fiction fan clubs are an exception. Fan clubs from the eastern and western halves of the city had always been very open to science fiction and to fans and authors from all over Europe and the US, and they had initiated contact abroad whenever possible. To this end, several fans from West Berlin’s Science-Fiction Club Berlin (SFCB) traveled to East Berlin in May 1988 to see Andymon’s second Tage der Phantastischen Kunst (Days of fantastic art). Over one thousand people attended the event at the Zeiss Major Planetarium in the Prenzlauer Berg neighborhood. Some fans from the East went out for dinner with their western visitors. This initial contact led to a further visit just over a year later…”
Author’s note: I wish to thank Andymon co-founder, active club member, and Alien Contact and Shayol Verlag editor Hardy Kettlitz as well as longtime West Berlin fan Anita Winkler for their help with the histories of the two Berlin fan clubs. I also wish to thank Wolfgang Both, Hans-Peter Neumann, and Klaus Scheffler for the information in their fan club history Berichte aus der Parallelwelt (1998).
©Sonja Fritzsche & World Literature Today
“Science Fiction Fandom in United Berlin” :
Sonja Fritzsche is Professor of German and Eastern European Studies at Illinois Wesleyan University, USA. Her publications include “Science-Fiction Literature in East Germany” (2006) and “The Liverpool Companion to World Science-Fiction Film” (2014).
