The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter
Science fiction had its beginnings in ancient times, when the line between myth and fact was blurred. Written in the 2nd century CE by the satirist Lucian, "A True Story" contains many themes and tropes characteristic of modern science fiction, including travel to other worlds, extraterrestrial lifeforms, interplanetary warfare, and artificial life. Some consider it the first science-fiction novel. Some of the stories from "The Arabian Nights", along with the 10th-century "The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter" and Ibn al-Nafis's 13th-century "Theologus Autodidactus," also contain elements of science fiction.