8 Sentence Sunday on Dieselpunks

Last Sunday, I participated for the first time in the 8 Sentence Sunday on Dieselpunks.org. The exercise was fantastic. I met great people and got tremendous feedback. Check it out if you are into dieselpunk and maybe looking for a little feedback on your writing. Or just check it out for fun.  8 Sentence Sunday on Dieselpunks.org.

Characters have a way of appearing in a story. Especially, I think when one is a pantser. In my published novel, The Moscow Affair, such a character strolled onto the stage and stayed there. She is Avdotya, the Baroness Bobrinsky, known to everyone as Dunyasha. She and Lady Dru become best of friends.

Here is a snippet from my forthcoming Lady Dru novel. Dru has just said she is so very glad Dunyasha decided to join the expedition.

“I almost didn’t,” Dunyasha replied, “but this one –”, she hooked a thumb in Klara’s direction, “was most persuasive. Besides, I couldn’t live with myself if anything happened to you.”

“So you decided to join us just to play mother hen,” I said.

“Someone has to. You get yourself into the damnedest predicaments. Doesn’t she, Karl?”

Karl smiled and said, “That she does. Sir Galahad would have to put in overtime.”

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What Is Dieselpunk?

What is Dieselpunk? Ask a hundred dieselpunkers and you’ll probably get a hundred answers. I’m a newbie to the genre and in searching the ‘net for answers and reading the literature that is available I found the technical answers somewhat similar, but the literary execution to be anything but. That is perhaps due to the dieselpunk genre being rather new and as yet mostly unformed, in contradistinction to the much more established steampunk.

So what is Dieselpunk? I see the genre as being an attempt to recreate the Zeitgeist of the era spanning from the end of World War I to the end of World War II (and perhaps extending into the ‘50s). This recreation can be either in the time period itself or in a more contemporary era which is heavily influenced by the Zeitgeist and aesthetic of the diesel era. The recreation of the Zeitgeist is accomplished by a revival of the future vision of the people of the diesel era through their science fiction and especially non-fiction visionary writings as found in magazines such as Popular Science, Popular Mechanics, and Popular Aviation.

In short we could say dieselpunk is the future vision of the people who lived in the ‘20s, ‘30s, and ‘40s made into reality via fiction.

That vision I see as one which was extremely positive and optimistic regarding what humanity could accomplish. In an era weighed down by a massive depression and an era which struggled to maintain peace, there was incredible hope and optimism. Science would indeed make our lives better and the world a better place in which to live. I find that attitude so very encouraging.

Do you have any thoughts on the Diesel Era and the Dieselpunk genre? Let me know.

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