Wells and Verne are considered the Grandfathers of SF. For Wells, look at his "First Men in the Moon", "The Invisible Man", "The Island of Dr. Moreau",
The Time Machine" and "The War of the Worlds" to name just some.
For Verne, look at "Journey to the Center of the Earth", "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea" and "Around the World in 80 Days."
However, Robert Louis Stevenson can be considered a part of that with Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. I've always considered it a look at the human mind and what insanity looks like.
Hugo Gernsback started the first SF magazine and is called The Father of Science Fiction. The Hugo was named after him. His novel Ralph 124C 41+ gave a look at the future, as many SF stories do, and predicted many things: TV, RADAR, sound in movies, synthetic foods, artificial cloth, tape records, etc.
We then start getting into the "Juvies", books written for the Juvenile Male market. That is where Campbell, Heinlein, etc came out. This is also when the "crossover" between SF and Fantasy started becoming strong. Authors like Norton who wrote in the "SF" setting of space, other worlds, put in concepts of mental powers, god/goddesses, etc. Norton did the Witch World series but also did the Time Traders series. Campbell was big in the "Terra über alles" or Earth over everything. His novels such as his Invaders fro the Infinite series have man come from Earth bound to traveling the Universe and controlling it. Heinlein was known to do orbital calculations on his kitchen table just so one small almost unnoticed scene in his novel would be technically accurate. Heinlein's "Starship Troopers" is a look at what it means to place something else before you. The novel is misunderstood by many (Verhoeven for one) but this is not the place for that.
You also have the idea of the Space Opera in the writings of E. E. "Doc" Smith with his Skylark series. Others in this area are Flash Gordon and Buck Rogers serials that came from comic strips. Buck Rogers was two novels: "Armageddon 2419 A.D." and "The Airlords of Han" that spawned the movie serials. On the Flash Gordon side, who can forget the campy movie with the Queen soundtrack?
You also have to consider the writing of Clarke and Asimov. Clark gave us "2001: A Space Odyssey", "Against the Fall of Night", "Childhood's End", "Rendevous with Rama", etc. Asimov gave us "Pebble In The Sky", "I, Robot", "Foundation", etc. Both of these authors did "Grand Fiction" where they made people look at themselves and their place in the universe.
Then you have Keith Laumer with his Bolo series and books like "Plague of Demons" which have you asking what does it mean to be human. Along with him comes Philip José Farmer and his Riverworld and World of Tiers series.
A mixture of these areas is done by Roger Zelazny in his Chronicles of Amber series. While I've liked these I also found his Jack of Shadows series to be good and my favorite of his novels is "Doorways in the Sand."
Later authors such as William Gibson started dealing with human/computer/mind, etc mixture with "Neuromancer".
There are many authors that I haven't even touched on (any some are listed in others' posts in this thread.)
The Time Machine" and "The War of the Worlds" to name just some.
For Verne, look at "Journey to the Center of the Earth", "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea" and "Around the World in 80 Days."
However, Robert Louis Stevenson can be considered a part of that with Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. I've always considered it a look at the human mind and what insanity looks like.
Hugo Gernsback started the first SF magazine and is called The Father of Science Fiction. The Hugo was named after him. His novel Ralph 124C 41+ gave a look at the future, as many SF stories do, and predicted many things: TV, RADAR, sound in movies, synthetic foods, artificial cloth, tape records, etc.
We then start getting into the "Juvies", books written for the Juvenile Male market. That is where Campbell, Heinlein, etc came out. This is also when the "crossover" between SF and Fantasy started becoming strong. Authors like Norton who wrote in the "SF" setting of space, other worlds, put in concepts of mental powers, god/goddesses, etc. Norton did the Witch World series but also did the Time Traders series. Campbell was big in the "Terra über alles" or Earth over everything. His novels such as his Invaders fro the Infinite series have man come from Earth bound to traveling the Universe and controlling it. Heinlein was known to do orbital calculations on his kitchen table just so one small almost unnoticed scene in his novel would be technically accurate. Heinlein's "Starship Troopers" is a look at what it means to place something else before you. The novel is misunderstood by many (Verhoeven for one) but this is not the place for that.
You also have the idea of the Space Opera in the writings of E. E. "Doc" Smith with his Skylark series. Others in this area are Flash Gordon and Buck Rogers serials that came from comic strips. Buck Rogers was two novels: "Armageddon 2419 A.D." and "The Airlords of Han" that spawned the movie serials. On the Flash Gordon side, who can forget the campy movie with the Queen soundtrack?
You also have to consider the writing of Clarke and Asimov. Clark gave us "2001: A Space Odyssey", "Against the Fall of Night", "Childhood's End", "Rendevous with Rama", etc. Asimov gave us "Pebble In The Sky", "I, Robot", "Foundation", etc. Both of these authors did "Grand Fiction" where they made people look at themselves and their place in the universe.
Then you have Keith Laumer with his Bolo series and books like "Plague of Demons" which have you asking what does it mean to be human. Along with him comes Philip José Farmer and his Riverworld and World of Tiers series.
A mixture of these areas is done by Roger Zelazny in his Chronicles of Amber series. While I've liked these I also found his Jack of Shadows series to be good and my favorite of his novels is "Doorways in the Sand."
Later authors such as William Gibson started dealing with human/computer/mind, etc mixture with "Neuromancer".
There are many authors that I haven't even touched on (any some are listed in others' posts in this thread.)