writers, composers and visual artists gathered. By the middle of the century New York City had become the artistic capital of the world. Theater, films, music and the media had a major influence on fashion and trends in all aspects of life. As many films and much music originate from the United States, American culture spread rapidly over the world. 1953 saw the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II, an iconic figure of the century. Visual culture became more dominant not only in films but in comics and television as well. During the century a new skilled understanding of narrativist imagery was developed. Computer games and internet surfing became new and popular form of entertainment during the last 25 years of the century. In literature, science fiction, fantasy (with well-developed fictional worlds, rich in detail), and alternative history fiction gained popularity. Detective fiction gained popularity in the interwar period. In the United States in 1961 Grove Press published Tropic of Cancer a novel by Henry Miller redefining pornography and censorship in publishing in America. Music The invention of music recording technologies such as the phonograph record, and dissemination technologies such as radio broadcasting, massively expanded the audience for music. Prior to the 20th century, music was generally only experienced in live performances. Many new genres of music were established during the 20th century. Igor Stravinsky revolutionized classical composition. In the 1920s, Arnold Schoenberg developed the twelve-tone technique, which became widely influential on 20th-century composers. In classical music, composition branched out into many completely new domains, including dodecaphony, aleatoric (chance) music, and minimalism. Tango was created in Argentina and became extremely popular in the rest of the Americas and Europe. Blues and jazz music became popularized during the 1910s, 1920s and 1930s in the United States. Bebop develops as a form of jazz in the 1940s. Country music develops in the 1920s and 1930s in the United States. Blues and country went on to influence rock and roll in the 1950s, which along with folk music, increased in popularity with the British Invasion of the mid-to-late 1960s. Rock soon branched into many different genres, including folk rock, heavy metal, punk rock, and alternative rock and became the dominant genre of popular music. This was challenged with the rise of hip hop in the 1980s and 1990s. Other genres such as house, techno, reggae, and soul all developed during the latter half of