The five stories in ‘Science Fiction in Colonial India, 1835–1905’ speculate about utopian and dystopian futures. They represent the earliest Indian science fiction, imagining futures ranging from an end-of-the-world deluge to violent revolution to feminist utopia.

"Science Fiction in Colonial India, 1835–1905" shows, for the first time, how science fiction writing developed in India years before the writings of Jules Verne and H. G. Wells. The five stories presented in this collection, in their cultural and political contexts, help form a new picture of English language writing in India and a new understanding of the connections among science fiction, modernity and empire. [NP] Speculative fiction developed early in India in part because the intrinsic dysfunction and violence of colonialism encouraged writers there to project alternative futures, whether utopian or dystopic. The stories in "Science Fiction in Colonial India, 1835–1905," created by Indian and British writers, responded to the intellectual ferment and political instabilities of colonial India. They add an important dimension to our understanding of Victorian empire, science fiction and speculative fictional narratives. They provide new examples of the imperial and the anti-imperial imaginations at work.

Acknowledgements; List of Abbreviations; Introduction; 1. The Junction of the Oceans: A Tale of the Year 2098, Henry Meredith Parker (1796?–1868); 2. 1980, H. H. Goodeve (1807–84); 3. A Journal of 48 Hours of the Year 1945, Kylas Chunder Dutt (1817–59); 4. The Republic of Orissá: A Page from the Annals of the Twentieth Century, Shoshee Chunder Dutt (1824–85); 5. Sultana’s Dream, Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain (1880?–1932); Appendix: Jagadish Chandra Bose (1858–1937); Runaway Cyclone, Translated by Bodhisattva Chattopadhyay; Index.