The British Library’s science fiction exhibition Out of this World has been open for almost a month now, and has gathered a whole host of positive reviews, including a slot on the Nature Podcast. The exhibition is accompanied by a packed events calendar which has so far featured Iain M Banks, William Gibson and Audrey Niffenegger with more to come: details at the bottom of this post.
Yesterday I finally managed to make it down to Kings Cross to have a look and even for someone who is a self-confessed sci-fi beginner, it makes for a fascinating afternoon out. The first thing to note is that although the actual exhibition space is quite small, it’s very densely packed – it took myself and two sci-fi expert friends more than two hours to see the whole thing. The spine of the exhibition is the glass case running around the edge, tracking books from the very earliest examples through genres including time travel, aliens, utopias, cyberspace and finally to the end of the world. As someone quite pleased with myself for having finally finished Foundation, I was surprised to see dozens of books I had read, but not recognised as science fiction; Kazuo Ishiguro’s Never Let Me Go, Audrey Niffenegger’s The Time Traveller’s Wife and Nevil Shute’s On The Beach to name just three.
As well as the books, there are artifacts from TV and film as well as art work displayed throughout the exhibition, the highlight of which was a steampunk reimagining of K-9, sat a few feet from a large blue TARDIS.
Steampunk design: famously used for the inside of the TARDIS and used here for a new version of K-9.
A large crashed UFO greeting visitors to the exhibition
Suspended over the reading cases
Blurry picture, but important message: who wouldn’t?
Although this is definitely one for the adults (there is a lot of text around book covers which might be struggle to hold the attention of some young visitors for a long time), there are some fun interactive displays: visitors can use a touch screen terminal to draw their own alien, chat with Elizabeth the chatbot (who had to suddenly return her library books when my conversation became too much) and challenge other players on a large, flashing quiz machine.
Aliens, as imagined by British Library visitors
Clay/9000, a motion sensitive robot who will read extracts from classic books to visitors when they approach
I would say definitely worth a visit for anyone with an interest in literature in general, as well as sci-fi in particular. The exhibition runs until September and the Library is open until 6pm weeknights, 5pm weekends, 8pm late opening on Tuesdays. If you hope to visit after work, you could tie in your trip with one of the related events coming up in the next month or so:
LATE at the Library: Out of this World
Fri 17 Jun 2011, 19.30 – 23.00
Space Children (George Clinton and Nona Hendryx)
Sat 18 Jun 2011, 14.00 – 17.00
Brian Aldiss, John Clute, Michael Moorcock and Norman Spinrad
Tue 21 Jun 2011, 18.30 – 20.00
Mary Shelley and Romantic Science (and that Creature)
Wed 22 Jun 2011, 18.30 – 20.00
Aliens and The Imagination
Tue 28 Jun 2011, 18.30 – 20.00
Niall Ferguson: Civilisation and Virtual History
Wed 29 Jun 2011, 18.30 – 20.00
The Universes of Alan Moore
Mon 4 Jul 2011, 18.30 – 20.00
Rossum’s Universal Robots (R.U.R) By Karel Čapek
Wed 6 Jul 2011, 18.30 – 21.15
Mervyn Peake’s Gormenghast
Mon 11 Jul 2011, 19.30 – 21.00
Out of this World Classics: Selected and Dissected
Tue 12 Jul 2011, 18.30 – 20.00
Afro Futures: Pumzi plus Q&A with Wanuri Kahiu
Tue 19 Jul 2011, 18.30 – 20.00
All events should be booked in advance: prices range from £6 – £12.50.
Out of this World is at the British Library, 96 Euston Road, between Kings Cross and Euston. It runs until 25 September: admission is free.