Singapore Science Fiction, a 1980 anthology drawn from the entries to a short story competition, sparked a local interest in the genre and was followed by landmark works such as Han May's Star Sapphire (1985), in which a young Asian scientist joins the crew of an intergalactic starship in the 23rd century. Despite this, the genre did not really take root in Singapore. SMU Associate Professor of English Literature Kirpal Singh, one of the editors of the 1980 anthology, attributes this to the disdain with which it was met by the literary community. Nevertheless, he believes science fiction should be compulsory teaching in schools. "Nations with the best science fiction - America, Poland, the Nordic countries - are doing very well today in terms of emotional and ideological adjustments to the new technological era," he said. "Whereas countries such as Singapore tend to be mostly apprehensive and thus afraid of tomorrow."