British Library set to leave this world

It’s Sci-Fi time at the British Library. The long-awaited, and destined to be a classic, exhibit Out of this World: Science Fiction but not as you know it, opens on Friday.

“This new exhibition will invite visitors to enter the world of the future, alien worlds, parallel worlds and virtual worlds, and speculate on how our universe might change. These imaginings can provoke hopes and dreams, exhilaration or fear – and shed light on the time and place in which they were created. We hope to encourage visitors’ questions such as: ‘Is there such a thing as a perfect world?’ ‘When and how will the world end?'”

Domingo Gonsales. The Discovery of a World in the Moone, 1638

In addition to a healthy sampling of books, manuscripts and illustrations the exhibit will feature old radio recordings, movies, and jukeboxes playing the curator’s top 20 songs from the world of science fiction pop and rock. Of course, a smattering of robots and other worldly gadgets will grace the library as well.

Interestingly enough, the exhibit opens the day before what many believe will be the beginning of the end of the world. There is no word from the Library on whether or not the exhibit was planned around the coming of the Apocalypse.

Raymond Taylor’s composition, A Signal from Mars, 1901
Raymond Taylor’s composition, A Signal from Mars, 1901

Raymond Taylor’s composition, A Signal from Mars, 1901Raymond Taylor’s composition, A Signal from Mars, 1901
Raymond Taylor’s composition, A Signal from Mars, 1901
Raymond Taylor’s composition, A Signal from Mars, 1901
Raymond Taylor’s composition, A Signal from Mars, 1901

The curators of the exhibition are blogging here for the duration of the exhibit.
Catalog of the exhibition


Images courtesy of the British Library Board.