alternate histories
What-if past scenarios
Alternate histories are narratives that imagine how events might have unfolded if history had taken a different course: What if the Confederacy had won the Civil War?
The genre appears in fiction, counterfactual essays, and thought experiments.
Also called alternative histories.
The singular form describes either the genre or a specific work: an alternate history where Rome never fell.
- timelinesOrdered sequences of dates
- counterfactualContrary-to-fact supposition
- novelsExtended prose fiction
- parallel worldsSeparate coexisting realities
- literatureBody of written works
fiction · multiverse · speculative fiction · sliding doors · genres · hypothetical scenarios · world-building · scenario · Philip K. Dick · temporal paradoxes · narratives · imaginary worlds · time travel · genre bending · steampunk · post-apocalyptic worlds · what-if · turning point
- False Realitiesillusions, simulations, virtual reality, delusions, hallucinations
alternate historiesrecorded history
Past preserved through documentation
chronicles · historiography · reality · academic history · primary sources
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