Utopian and Dystopian Literature to 1800

2012 ◽  
Author(s):  
Steve Mentz ◽  
Erin M. Gallagher
Keyword(s):  
Dystopian Literature

scholarly journals JEWGIENIJ IWANOWICZ ZAMIATIN JAKO PREKURSOR XX-WIECZNEJ POWIEŚCI ANTYUTOPIJNEJ

2018 ◽  
pp. 71-84
Author(s):  
Alena Brinko
Keyword(s):  
George Orwell ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Totalitarian Regime ◽  
Dystopian Literature ◽  
The Relationship

The aim of this article is to reveal the relationship between the author of the first dystopia, Yevgeny Zamyatin and a totalitarian regime, by means of analyzing the biography and selected works of that writer; the analysis of the novel We – a prophecy novel, which can be regarded as an exaggerated depiction of the Stalinist regime; the analysis of the influence Zamyatin’s novel had on – far more famous – works by George Orwell and Aldous L. Huxley, as well as on the anti-utopia genre (dystopian literature) in general.

scholarly journals With dark humor about a dark future

2020 ◽  
Vol 29 (1) ◽  
pp. 19-29
Author(s):  
Radka Stahr ◽  
Anne Marlene Hastenplug
Keyword(s):  
Critical Reflection ◽  
Dystopian Literature ◽  
Dark Humor ◽  
Black Humor ◽  
The Relationship

Abstract This article analyses the relationship between black humor and dystopian literature. In dystopia, humor can appear on the surface as language or situational comics, but there is also a deeper link between these two literary phenomena: they confront the reader with an unexpected notion in order to bring him to a critical reflection. There are many dystopias in the Nordic literature that use comic elements. Three of them are discussed in this article: Axel Jensens Epp (1965), Lena Anderssons Duck City (2006) and Kaspar Colling Nielsens Den danske borgerkrig 2018–24 (2013). The analysis shows that classic black humor is enriched with other tragicomic, satirical or surrealistic elements and significantly contributes to the critical tone of the text. In all cases humor is used for the same purpose, and this is a critique of superior power (the so-called superiority theory). Therefore, humor can be considered not only as a stylistic means, but also as a principle of construction of the dystopian works.

scholarly journals Dystopian literature and the sociological imagination

Thesis Eleven ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 155 (1) ◽  
pp. 45-63 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sean Seeger ◽  
Daniel Davison-Vecchione
Keyword(s):  
Personal Experience ◽  
Sociological Imagination ◽  
Social Forces ◽  
Inner Life ◽  
Utopian Literature ◽  
Historical Reality ◽  
Dystopian Literature ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Individual ◽  
The Relationship

This article argues that sociologists have much to gain from a fuller engagement with dystopian literature. This is because (i) the speculation in dystopian literature tends to be more grounded in empirical social reality than in the case of utopian literature, and (ii) the literary conventions of the dystopia more readily illustrate the relationship between the inner life of the individual and the greater whole of social-historical reality. These conventional features mean dystopian literature is especially attuned to how historically-conditioned social forces shape the inner life and personal experience of the individual, and how acts of individuals can, in turn, shape the social structures in which they are situated. In other words, dystopian literature is a potent exercise of what C. Wright Mills famously termed ‘the sociological imagination’.

scholarly journals Memory of Water: Boundaries of Political Geography and World Literature

2020 ◽  
Vol 28 (3) ◽  
pp. 425-434
Author(s):  
Katarina Leppänen
Keyword(s):  
Literary Theory ◽  
World Literature ◽  
Political Geography ◽  
The Other ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Contemporary Theory ◽  
Alternative Futures ◽  
Dystopian Literature ◽  
Slow Violence ◽  
The One

The fact that dystopian literature has a great potential for envisioning alternative futures is elaborated in this article in relation to the Finnish/British author Emmi Itäranta’s Memory of Water (2013). Itäranta’s gloomy low-fi novel is read alongside contemporary ecocritical theory with a focus on issues of vernacular cultures and knowledges versus ideas of cosmopolitan planetary citizenship. Reflections are made about the profound nature of the concept of borders: cultural, temporal, informational, geographical, political, in the event of massive catastrophes. The article investigates how Rob Nixon’s concept of ‘slow violence’ and Ursula Heise’s ‘eco-cosmopolitanism’ are played out in a novel, and how the novel in turn poses important questions for ecocritical theory. Thus, the interplay between ecocritical literary theory, on the one hand, and literature, on the other, is highlighted. What can dystopia make visible in contemporary theory?

“The Electric Boy1 Grows Up”: Science Fiction for a Young Adult Audience

2019 ◽  
pp. 43-76
Author(s):  
Joseph W. Campbell
Keyword(s):  
Young Adults ◽  
Young Adult ◽  
Science Fiction ◽  
History Of Science ◽  
Speculative Fiction ◽  
Dystopian Literature ◽  
Theoretical Approaches ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Over Time

Chapter 2 shows in a compressed, somewhat truncated way, the unique history of science fiction (sometimes called speculative fiction). This chapter also shows some of the myriad theoretical approaches that have been used in the study of science fiction over time. It then demonstrates how those approaches have been used by giving close readings of science fiction texts intended for young adults. This is in an effort to show the difference between science fiction and dystopian literature. It shows that it is a literature directly concerned with the subject’s encounter with the o/Other.

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