What’s your favorite era?

[Writer’s_Magic]

We all have favorites! It doesn’t matter if it’s music, books, movies or any other stuff. But do we have a favorite era? You know. Stone age, ancient, medieval, etc.
Personally, in my favorite era, there didn’t exist any human. Yah! Maybe you know it already. It is the Mesozoic! I mean there were dinosaurs. Those creatures are awesome. For example, the Quetzalcoatlus was a pterosaur. It had a wingspan of between 11 and 13 meters. It weighted 100 metric kg. But it could still fly!
So, what’s your favorite era? Let me know about it.

 

[Heliotrope]

Early 1900's up until about 1940. The era of etiquette and formality... right up to flappers and speak easy's and early jazz.

 

[Chessie2]

We all have favorites! It doesn’t matter if it’s music, books, movies or any other stuff. But do we have a favorite era? You know. Stone age, ancient, medieval, etc.
Personally, in my favorite era, there didn’t exist any human. Yah! Maybe you know it already. It is the Mesozoic! I mean there were dinosaurs. Those creatures are awesome. For example, the Quetzalcoatlus was a pterosaur. It had a wingspan of between 11 and 13 meters. It weighted 100 metric kg. But it could still fly!
So, what’s your favorite era? Let me know about it.

OMG

Medieval, the Wild West era, so like 1870s-late 1890s, and of COURSE the 20th Century up to 1960, mostly the 40s. I posted this on my blog yesterday but it pretty much describes the inspiration for a lot of my work:

 

[pmmg]

Well, I like so many....

Classical Greek 600bc or so, Bronze Age
Any classical culture will do..Sumerians, Egyptians...et al.
And just about any world religion, Hindu is my newest most interest.
1200-1500's
1800's America, westerns
1940's WWII era
Space, just about everything space. Dates don't apply.
I like abandoned worlds and apocalyptic scenarios

Just not terribly thrilled with contemporary stuff.

 

[Tom]

Mine are: pretty much any ancient culture, the Bronze Age as a whole but especially that of Japan, Europe/the Mediterranean from about 0 AD-1000 AD, the Renaissance, medieval Russia and Eurasia, and the late 20th century.

I love ancient world settings as well as modern (not a fan of much in the middle haha, I tend to go for extremes). A lot of what I like relies heavily on the art and costuming of the culture or period.

 

[CupofJoe]

I can't settle on one. Or rather I could and a week later I'd want another. Okay to answer the question I'd like to go back far enough to find out how early humans worked out mathematics, a calendar, why that shiny stuff in the ashes after they heated stones was useful... Stuff like that. Early humans rocked!

 

[ImaginationGoneWild]

I like several as well.

- Ancient times simply because they feel 'exotic' and mysterious to me, it was a time where magic was still real to people. [Mesopotamia, Meso-America, etc...]
- Stone Age/bronze age type of settings, very badass.
- Victorian era up till give or take the 40's-50's ish? Due to their ideals and elegance that the western world had.
- futuristic settings but only if there are aliens or 'evolved' humans involved [like the Expanse, there's a few factions that evolved by adapting to life on asteroids and mars. their bodies underwent changes over time]
- not so much a fan of the medieval ages, unless it was the viking era. Again...badass people.

 

[Yora]

Antiquity is okay. But Bronze Age is where all the really cool stuff is. It's the literal age of myth.

But there are regretfully little fantasy works based on it.

 

[Dark Squiggle]

1850-1950. The clipper ships. The rise of Steam. Robber Barons. Tesla-Edison-Westinghouse. Dogfights. Dirigibles. The golden age of rail. Air races. HMS Turbinia, The Hoqua, Rainbow, The Great Eastern, Great Republic, Challenger, Monitor, Virginia, Hood, Brismark, U-239, Graf von Zepplin, The Globetrotters, Winnie Mae, the list of great ships & aircraft with great stories goes on and on. The second age of naval ramming. Diesel electric submarines. Impressionist, Romantic and Hudson River School painting. Victor Hugo, Jules Verne, Mark Twain, W. Whitman, W. Irving, I K Brunel, Cyrus Field, Glenn Curtis, the list goes on and on.

 

[Orc Knight]

Mine tend to range from the Permian to the modern day. Though I hang out a lot in the Medieval era's, drop off into WW1 and the Western era. There's a lot to go through and I am happy to use whatever, especially for writing fantasy. And throwing dinosaurs into it.

 

[Xitra_Blud]

Victorian. Renaissance is runner up.

 

[DragonOfTheAerie]

ALL OF THEM

Seriously though, it's hard to pick. Uhhh...Carboniferous swamps with their giant club mosses and monstrous invertebrates. Basically all of the dinosaur times. Early ancient times. Any time pre-colonization in the Americas and Australia and Africa. Roman times. Ancient Greece. Ancient Celtic times. Viking era especially the explorations to Greenland and the Americas. Early industrial revolution/very beginning of scientific revolution. Golden age of piracy. Basically all the history of China and Japan and Korea. Late 1800's/Victorian era. 1950's America with the pastel fog of idealism overlaying societal sickness and icy Cold War fear.

And all the other ones.

It's been so long since i've studied many of these...

 

[Ban]

Besides the current one (call me weird, but I like not dying of typhus/syphilis/malaria), I'd go for the early 1900s. The age of exploration, innovation and art deco architecture, set against a whole lot of interesting political and economic issues. It's more difficult to write an early 1900s story without depth than with.

 

[Miles Lacey]

The interwar period (1918 to 1939) would have to be my favourite period of time because it was then that many of the things we now take for granted were being invented or dramatically improved, travel was still an exciting adventure rather than something that practically everyone does, architectural styles like Art Deco and Bauhaus were seeing radical new buildings being built, motorways were starting to appear especially in Germany and the music - such as the blues, jazz and swing - and there was still much to be discovered and learned. In many countries women were granted the right to vote and able to get actively involved in politics and go to work in fields that had been closed off to them previously.

There were some things that were not so pleasant such as the rise of fascism and military dictatorships internationally, the brutal slaughter of indigenous people by the colonial powers in Samoa, Libya and elsewhere and widespread racial and religious discrimination especially in the colonies, Northern Ireland, the United States, Germany and Poland. And what the Japanese were doing in China was unspeakably barbaric.

 

[Devor]

Eras are history, and I'm writing fantasy. For me, taking out electricity, and applying my own rules to gunpowder, I prefer the bigger late-period higher levels of tech. "Nobody's discovered that yet" doesn't interest me as a rule. But once you start applying the fantasy elements, it doesn't fit much into a real world era anymore.

I'm not usually one for picking favorites, but for a real-world story I would definitely go with the present, as I love superheroes.

 

[Heliotrope]

Eras are history, and I'm writing fantasy. For me, taking out electricity, and applying my own rules to gunpowder, I prefer the bigger late-period higher levels of tech. "Nobody's discovered that yet" doesn't interest me as a rule. But once you start applying the fantasy elements, it doesn't fit much into a real world era anymore.

I'm not usually one for picking favorites, but for a real-world story I would definitely go with the present, as I love superheroes.

I took my kid to the new Incredibles movie last night, and I don’t love super hero’s, as a general rule, but mid century super hero’s is super fun.

 

[Writer’s_Magic]

Heliotrope And something like mixing different eras to one would be fun, too. I mean if I would read about it. Not living it! Urgh! Imagine a dinosaur could eat ya or a knight kills you randomly. Or you fight as a gladiator against a lion. (Yah! There did exist female gladiators. It’s a fact! Hollywood movies don’t use it because of it too boring.)

 

[Heliotrope]

Putting super hero’s in 1950 isn’t exactly mixing though, as Superman first came out in 1938. But yeah, I do love a good time travel story, or mixing eras.

 

[Writer’s_Magic]

Heliotrope Personally, since Back to the future trilogy I find time travel a little bit cheesy. Especially, if your character wants to kill Hitler or they changed the time when they come back. ...

 

[Corwynn]

I love history in general, but my oldest and truest love is the 19th and early 20th centuries. I love the exquisite style and aesthetics, the colourful cast of characters, the great power political intrigue, the fantastic inventions and discoveries made, and more. It is also where the old and the new come together in interesting ways. True, life was harsh and unfair for most, but there was a sense that the world could and would become a better place eventually; a refreshing change from the current zeitgeist, where the opposite sensibility seems to have set in.

I also enjoy the Age of Sail, the Bronze Age (with the Egyptians and Minoans being particular favourites), and various cultures prior to colonization/globalization.

I also like the idea of mixing culture and technology from different times and places to create interesting combinations, but only when it is done deliberately and in a fictional setting. If you simply couldn't be bothered to do your research, I'll be one of the first to jump down your throat.