Science Fiction: Voyage to the Edge of Imagination

(Hardback)

Publishing Details

Classifications

Physical Properties

Description

A compelling, fully illustrated account of the worldwide phenomenon of science fiction as depicted in film, literature and art, and the scientific advances and imagination behind it.

Drawing on a wide range of examples from the literary and visual canons - short stories, novels, films, television programmes, video games, graphic novels, artworks and more - in both cult and popular culture, this extensively illustrated book examines how science fiction has provided a human response to science, exploring every reaction from complacency to exhilaration, and from hope to terror.

Across five chapters this volume reviews the role played by science fiction in exploring our world and a multitude of ideas about our relationship with the human condition. This encompasses a fascinating range of themes - machines, travel, aliens (the Other), communication, threats and anxiety. Featuring a range of essays by experts on the subject as well as interviews with well-known science-fiction authors and reproductions of classic ephemera, graphics and objects throughout, it also focuses on the darker elements of this fascinating genre - the anxieties, fears, dystopias, monsters and apocalypses that have populated science fiction from the beginning. Ultimately, science fiction asks what makes us human, and what lies in the future to test, threaten and even destroy humanity. This publication has these questions at its core, making it especially relevant for a contemporary readership in an age preoccupied with the climate emergency, the coronavirus pandemic, the development of nuclear missiles and military technologies, and other global challenges.

Reviews

'An excellent guide to the importance of science fiction for complete beginners, and has plenty to interest the genre buff, or just the reader who has enjoyed science fiction on film but wants to explore the most resonant ideas and stories a bit more thoroughly' - The Arts Desk
'A fascinating companion to the exhibition very readable [and] colourfully illustrated' - Fortean Times
'Stunningly illustrated' - Nature
'Far from just a glossy tie-in to the exhibition, this book is a hugely ambitious attempt to show SF for what it is in 2022: the culturally dominant global literary and media form for an age of unprecedented social and scientific change' - Prospective Cultures
'Excellent definitely one for the school library regardless of any visit' - Schools Week
'This sumptuous work features interviews with prominent thinkers, wonderful artwork and a gallop through sci-fis key works of literature, films and inventions. A timely reminder of how the genre has the power to provoke and prompt thought' - Teach Secondary

Author Bio

Dr Glyn Morgan is the project curator for the 'Science Fiction' exhibition at the Science Museum, London. He is a former editor of Vector: The Critical Journal of the British Science Fiction Association. He frequently contributes to journals including the Los Angeles Review of Books, Science Fiction Studies Review and European History Quarterly. His publications include Imagining the Unimaginable: The Holocaust in Speculative Fiction and as editor, Sideways in Time: Critical Essays on Alternate History Fiction.