Eleanor Nguyen - Sci-Fi/The Man in the High Castle

What is the difference in emphasis between the terms science fiction and speculative fiction? Which is The Man in the High Castle?

The word "speculative" means "based on guesses or ideas about what might happen or be true rather than on facts" (Merriam-Webster, n.d.). This is basically the nature of fiction - to not be real; but what differentiates speculative fiction from other fiction sub-genre is that in speculative fiction, the author would speculate upon more elemental aspects than character or plot (Neugebauer, 2014). It is difficult to totally differentiate speculative fiction from other fiction genres due to its nature of exploring the human condition, just like other fiction genres; however it just chooses to do so in a speculated setting (Shaheen, 2013). When mentioning speculative fiction, a relevant term to consider is "world-building".  We can say that speculative fiction is a genre that does not focus on keeping it realistic to the world we know (McKenna, 2014), but it still reflects on it. Science fiction can be considered a sub-genre of speculative fiction, but dealing with a science-reliant setting.

Brown (2001) stated that “Dick suggests that the world presented in The Man in The High Castle is but an illusion, that other, better worlds might exist.” The Man in The High Castle's setting was speculated by P. K. Dick, and therefore it could be said that the novel is closer to speculative fiction than science fiction, even though there were scientific aspects. This conclusion can also be strengthened by looking at how the novel speculated the question "What if" Germany and Japan had won WW2. The question "What if" is the most noticeable trait of speculative fiction, according to Brown (2001).

Reference
Brown, E. (2001). Introduction. In Dick, P.K.,The Man in the High Castle(p.v-xii). London: Penguin.
McKenna, J. (2014). The genre debate: Science fiction travels farther than literary fiction. Retrieved
from http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/apr/18/genre-debate-science-fiction-speculative-literary

Merriam-Webster (n.d.). Speculative. Retrieved from http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/speculative

Neugebauer, A. (2014). What is Speculative Fiction?. Retrieved from http://annieneugebauer.com/2014/03/24/what-is-speculative-fiction/

Shaheen. (2013). SpecFic 101: What is Speculative Fiction?. Retrieved from http://www.speconspecfic.com/2013/09/23/specfic-101-speculative-fiction/