James Nicoll Quotes

It's more fun having him as everyman in the 25th Century. It is better to concentrate on what this planet will be like 500 years from now, and not be dealing with little aliens in space and all that related stuff.

Science fiction is where I started out, really. When I was a kid, I was a complete addict of science fiction. It was one of my earliest interests as a writer, and I've just taken a long time to circle back around to it.

[Science fiction is] a specialized type of fantasy, in which the prime assumption usually is a new scientific discovery or invention.

I don't write science fiction. I've only done one science fiction book and that's Fahrenheit 451, based on reality. Science fiction is a depiction of the real. Fantasy is a depiction of the unreal.

Science fiction is not about the freedom of imagination. It's about a free imagination pinched and howling in a vise that other people call real life.

It's a fun thing for journalists to say that Captain Kirk is the boyfriend role. I'm happy to give a laugh. But it's a really complex story.

Science fiction is anything published as science fiction.

What science-fiction premises do is it gives you a "what-if" prism to look at the contemporary world with a wack on the side of the head.

It seems like the original 'Star Trek' could have gone on longer.

I grew up as a fan of the original Star Trek series. When I was in middle school, I think in the 6th grade, I remember going to a book fair and finding a book called The Making of Star Trek, by Stephen Whitfield, and I grabbed it and took and home and just devoured it, over and over again. It was a really influential book. It was very nuts and bolts.

A good science fiction story is a story with a human problem, and a human solution, which would not have happened at all without its science content.

Everybody always talks about the science fiction genre, in particular, which always makes me think about people in spaceships. I can appreciate that, but that's not really where I think my dramatist aspect lies.

Science fiction, to me, has not only things that wouldn't happen, but other planets.

I like sci-fi.

'Farscape' is not what you call hard science fiction.

Lots of science fiction deals with distant times and places. Intrepid prospectors in the Asteroid Belt. Interstellar epics. Galactic empires. Trips to the remote past or future.

I'm very fond of the Talent series, and also the Crystal Singer trio.

Science fiction rarely is about scientists doing real science, in its slowness, its vagueness, the sort of tedious quality of getting out there and digging amongst rocks and then trying to convince people that what you're seeing justifies the conclusions you're making.

With science fiction I think we are preparing ourselves for contact with them, whoever they may be.

Science fiction was never my thing. I have no interest in it.

We have people being a little uncomfortable in their life on Earth with finances and so on, so Science Fantasy or Science Fiction allows people to think that there are possibilities beyond the gravity of our planet.

As long as the plots keep arriving from outer space, I'll go on with my virgins.

The cynical part of the answer is that I expect to see a good deal more space opera, set far enough in the future as to be disconnected from contemporary issues.

I quite enjoy science fiction.

I've always been a fan of science fiction.