Is The Man in the High Castle science fiction?

Alternate history is one of those subgenres that's typically associated with science fiction, but there's nothing inherently "science fiction-y" about it.  Certainly, you can't claim that it's a part of "normal" non-speculative fiction since its version of history is alternate.   In addition, many of its most famous examples, including such classics as Harry Turtledove's The Guns of the South, use science fiction-y elements like time travel to create the alternate realities in which they occur.  On the other hand, there are plenty of examples of works in which the only speculative device the author uses is the alternate history itself; one of the most notable of these is the work that I'll be focusing on today: Philip K. Dick's Hugo-winning novel The Man in the High Castle.

Is It's a Wonderful Life science fiction?

"What?" you think. "It's a Wonderful Life is definitely NOT science fiction. Why are you even bothering to ask?" Well, I do think it's science fiction, and here's why:


It honestly doesn't take much to begin to imagine It's a Wonderful Life in science fiction terms. The angels, for example, taken out of their spiritual context, become an advanced extraterrestrial race. In fact, even within their spiritual context, they are still a race of enormously powerful beings from outside the Earth—literally, an advanced extraterrestrial race. They use their powers to take human form and to transport George Bailey to an alternate universe in which he had never been born; both of these plot devices are firmly established within the science fiction realm. With these things in mind, why ISN'T It's a Wonderful Life science fiction?