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Red Planets
Marxism and Science Fiction
Edited Mark Bould, China Miéville
Sales Date: 2009-09-08
304 Pages, 5.25 x 8.50 in
A critical exploration of the connections between science fiction and Marxism
Science fiction and socialism have always had a close relationship. Many science fiction novelists and filmmakers have used the genre to examine explicit or implicit Marxist concerns. Red Planets is an accessible and lively account, which makes an ideal introduction to anyone interested in the politics of science fiction. The volume covers a rich variety of examples from Weimar cinema to mainstream Hollywood films, and novelists from Jules Verne, H. G. Wells, Philip K. Dick, and Thomas Disch to Ursula K. Le Guin, Kim Stanley Robinson, Ken MacLeod, and Charles Stross. Contributors include Matthew Beaumont, William J. Burling, Carl Freedman, Darren Jorgensen, Rob Latham, Iris Luppa, Andrew Milner, John Rieder, Steven Shaviro, Sherryl Vint, and Phillip Wegner.
Series Preface – Mike Wayne and Esther Leslie
Introduction: Rough Guide to a Lonely Planet, from Nemo to Neo –  Mark Bould
THINGS TO COME
The Anamorphic Estrangements of Science Fiction – Matthew Beaumont
Art as 'The Basic Technique of Life': Utopian Art and Art in Utopia in The Dispossessed and Blue Mars – William J. Burling
Marxism, Cinema and some Dialectics of Science Fiction and Film Noir – Carl Freedman
Spectacle, Technology and Colonialism in SF Cinema: the Case of Wim Wenders' Until the End of the World' – John Rieder
WHEN WORLDS COLLIDE
The Singularity is Here –  Steven Shaviro
Species and Species Being: Alienated Subjectivity and the Commodification of Animals –  Sherryl Vint
Ken MacLeod's Permanent Revolution: Utopian Possible Worlds, History, and the Augenblick in the Fall Revolution Quartet – Phillip Wegner
BACK TO THE FUTURE
'Madonna in moon rocket with breeches': Weimar SF Film Criticism during the Stabilisation Period –  Iris Luppa
The Urban Question in New Wave SF –  Rob Latham
Toward a Revolutionary Science Fiction: Althusser's Critique of Historicity –  Darren Jorgensen
Utopia and Science Fiction Revisited –  Andrew Milner
Afterword: Cognition as Ideology: A Dialectic of SF Theory – China Miéville
Appendices
About the Contributors
Index
MARK BOULD teaches film and literature at the University of the West of England. He is the author of Film Noir: From Berlin to Sin City (2005) and The Cinema of John Sayles (2008), and coeditor of The Routledge Companion to Science Fiction (2009). CHINA MIÉVILLE is an independent researcher and novelist. He won the Arthur C. Clarke Award for Perdido Street Station (2000) and Iron Council (2004), the British Fantasy Award for The Scar (2002), and the Locus Award for Best Young Adult Book for Un Lun Dun (2007).
"Red Planets is that rare event, an entirely coherent collection where each contributor intervenes to conspire a shared 'problem,' ... (it) is an exemplary collection."
~Darran Jorgensen, Science Fiction, Film, and Television
"Red Planets is a highly readable and interesting collection of essays. Many of the pieces have completely new things to tell us, and will be of interest even to those who are antagonistic toward politically inspired criticism."
~Neil Easterbrook, associate professor of critical theory, TCU
"Red Planets is a highly readable and interesting collection of essays. Many of the pieces have completely new things to tell us, and will be of interest even to those who are antagonistic toward politically inspired criticism."
~Neil Easterbrook, associate professor of critical theory, TCU
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