A Research Guide to Science Fiction Studies


Book Description

Academic attention to science fiction and fantasy began in 1958, when the Modern Language Association scheduled its first seminar on science fiction at its New York meeting. Over the years science fiction emerged as a popular subject that achieved critical attention and acceptance as an academic discipline. A Research Guide to Science Fiction Studies, originally published in 1977, is designed to provide the reader – whether they be scholar, teacher, librarian, or fan – with a comprehensive listing of the important research tools that have been published in the United States and England through 1976. The volume contains over 400 selected, annotated entries covering both general and specialized sources, including general surveys, histories, genre studies, author studies, bibliographies, and indices, which span the entire range of science fiction and fantasy scholarship.







Science Fiction Authors


Book Description

For students, scholars, readers' advisors, and curious SF readers and fans, this guide provides an easy-to-use launch pad for researching and learning more about science fiction writers and their work. Emphasizing the best popular and contemporary authors, this book covers 100 SF writers, providing for each: • a brief biographical sketch, including a quote from theauthor, awards, etc. • a list of the author's major works (including editions and other writings) • research sources-biographies, criticism, research guides, and web sites • In addition, you'll find read-alike lists for selected authors. For anyone wanting to find information on popular SF authors, this should be the first stop.




Science Fiction: A Guide for the Perplexed


Book Description

From its beginnings in the works of H.G. Wells and Jules Verne to the virtual worlds of William Gibson's Neuromancer and The Matrix, Science Fiction: A Guide to the Perplexed helps students navigate the often perplexing worlds of a perennially popular genre. Drawing on literature as well as example from film and television, the book explores the different answers that criticism has offered to the vexed question, 'what is science fiction?' Each chapter of the book includes case studies of key texts, annotated guides to further reading and suggestions for class discussion to help students master the full range of contemporary critical approaches to the field, including the scientific, technological and political contexts in which the genre has flourished. Ranging from an understanding of the genre through the stereotypes of 1930s pulps through more recent claims that we are living in a science fictional moment, this volume will provide a comprehensive overview of this diverse and fascinating genre.




Science Fiction: A Critical Guide


Book Description

This book, first published in 1979, presents a portrait of science fiction as a distinct form of serious and creative literature. Contributors are drawn from Britain, America and Europe, and range from well-known academic critics to young novelists. The essays establish the common properties of science fiction writing, and assess the history and significance of a field in which critical judgements have often been unreliable. The material ranges from the earliest imaginative journeys to the moon, to later developments of British, American and European science fiction.




Latin American Science Fiction Writers


Book Description

Many readers are unaware of the vast universe of Latin American science fiction, which has its roots in the 18th century and has flourished to the present day. Because science fiction is part of Latin American popular culture, it reflects cultural and social concerns and comments on contemporary society. While there is a growing body of criticism on Latin American science fiction, most studies treat only a single author or work. This reference offers a broad overview of Latin American science fiction. Included are alphabetically arranged entries on 70 Latin American science fiction writers. While some of these are canonical figures, others have been largely neglected. Since much of science fiction has been written by women, many women writers are profiled. Each entry is prepared by an expert contributor and includes a short biography, a discussion of the writer's works, and primary and secondary bibliographies. The volume closes with a general bibliography of anthologies and criticism.




Irish Science Fiction


Book Description

An innovative examination of Irish science fiction from the 1850s to the present day, covering material written both in Irish and in English. Considering science fiction novels and short stories in their historical context, it analyses a body of literature that has largely been ignored by Irish literature researchers.




Anatomy of Wonder


Book Description

This classic work is an essential tool for collection development, research, reference, and readers' advisory work."--BOOK JACKET.




Science Fiction


Book Description

How science fiction has been a tool for understanding and living through rapid technological change. The world today seems to be slipping into a science fiction future. We have phones that speak to us, cars that drive themselves, and connected devices that communicate with each other in languages we don't understand. Depending the news of the day, we inhabit either a technological utopia or Brave New World nightmare. This volume in the MIT Press Essential Knowledge surveys the uses of science fiction. It focuses on what is at the core of all definitions of science fiction: a vision of the world made otherwise and what possibilities might flow from such otherness.




The Science Fiction Handbook


Book Description

The Science Fiction Handbook offers a comprehensive and accessible survey of one of the literary world's most fascinating genres. Includes separate historical surveys of key subgenres including time-travel narratives, post-apocalyptic and post-disaster narratives and works of utopian and dystopian science fiction Each subgenre survey includes an extensive list of relevant critical readings, recommended novels in the subgenre, and recommended films relevant to the subgenre Features entries on a number of key science fiction authors and extensive discussion of major science fiction novels or sequences Writers and works include Isaac Asimov; Margaret Atwood; George Orwell; Ursula K. Le Guin; The War of the Worlds (1898); Starship Troopers (1959); Mars Trilogy (1993-6); and many more A 'Science Fiction Glossary' completes this indispensable Handbook