NONFICTION - Dec. 26, 1993

THE HISTORY OF THE FUTURE: Images of the 21st Century by Christophe Canto and Odile Faliu. (Flammarion: $45; 159 pp). Here is a scholarly look at visions of the future from the past, as far back as the 17th Century. Illustrations from the 19th Century full of steam, gaslight and early electrical use give us a view of 1952 (the hourglass figure is still the rage). The great science fiction writers posited their future utopias/dystopias (as in the imaginary city above, 1890), here represented by their book jackets and pulp magazine covers illustrating parades of aliens, benign and rapacious, and their technological wonders and horrors; rocket ships, robots, spacemen and terrified, scantily clad women. As the authors point out, projections of the future always took on some of their baggage of their time. If electricity was just coming into play, then the future would be festooned with wires; with flight, the air would be full of single person flying machines; the fear of Communism, nasty alien invasions. For the curious and the science fiction fan alike, this is an intelligent, erudite look back at the year 2000.