[Ads-l] Has the Earliest Modern Usage of the Term "Science Fiction" Gotten Any Attention from Science Fiction Historians?

[Bill Mullins]

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> The Oxford English Dictionary has an entry for "scientific fiction"
> which is one of the key precursors of "science fiction". The first OED
> citation is dated 1876.

> The passage below is from a book review printed in 1862. . . .

1851 Boston MA _Christian Freeman and Family Visiter [sic]_ 17 Oct 2/6 [genealogybank.com]
"The work might be termed a book of scientific fiction."

The book being reviewed, Vol 3 of _Episodes of Insect Life_, is online here:
https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=uc2.ark:/13960/t6251hj11&view=1up&seq=9

I believe the reviewer is saying that this book, which is scientific non-fiction, has the literary qualities of good fiction.


1860 _The Ladies' Repository_ Oct 634/2 [proquest]
"We regret that a book otherwise so valuable should be blighted by a theory so false and gross as that great scientific fiction revived by Darwin -- [ital]the development theory[/ital]."



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