On the Apocalypse that No One Noticed

Abstract

“[W]hat if they gave an apocalypse and nobody noticed?” was the question that Brooks Landon (1991, 239) proposed as the central thematic concern of the 1980s cyberpunk – a movement which today represents a landmark in the development of the science fiction genre. Diverse as they are in their focus and scope, the contributions to this issue of ELOPE, dedicated to the position and role of speculative fiction, and especially science fiction, in a world which is increasingly becoming speculative and science fictional, invariably demonstrate that an apocalypse did indeed take place and went by largely unnoticed.