Zepke Stephen: Head in the Stars. Essays on Science Fiction
Science fiction concerns the future, of course, this being its simple, organising essence. But science fiction wants to do more than just be in the future, it wants to predict the future, to reveal its horrors and beauty, its similarities and difference, and more importantly, tell us about all the cool stuff. This means that the ‘future’ science fiction explores has changed a lot over the years, and has a fascinating past, one with a twistier time-line than a Phillip K. Dick story […]. But this book is not a history of science fiction, because although historical context plays a part – the Cold War from which alien arrival films emerge, or our biopolitical present in which interface films become symptomatic – this book is most concerned with science fiction futures that crack history open, allowing something unaccountable to emerge, something singular and new. As a result, this book sees the ‘new’ and its ‘future’ in science fiction in a very different way from Darko Suvin and Frederic Jameson, whose astoundingly influential theory sees science fiction futures as forms of ‘cognitive estrangement’ that seek to reflect on the present that produces them. [from the Introduction] Layout: Dejan Dragosavac Ruta 260 pages [Paperback : 13,5 x 19 cm] Publisher: Multimedijalni institut [Zagreb, Croatia] ISBN: 978-953-7372-67-5 — the book is available via Amazon: https://www.amazon.de/dp/9537372677/ref=olp_product_details?_encoding=UTF8&me=
Science fiction concerns the future, of course, this being its simple, organising essence. But science fiction wants to do more than just be in the future, it wants to predict the future, to reveal its horrors and beauty, its similarities and difference, and more importantly, tell us about all the cool stuff. This means that the ‘future’ science fiction explores has changed a lot over the years, and has a fascinating past, one with a twistier time-line than a Phillip K. Dick story […].
But this book is not a history of science fiction, because although historical context plays a part – the Cold War from which alien arrival films emerge, or our biopolitical present in which interface films become symptomatic – this book is most concerned with science fiction futures that crack history open, allowing something unaccountable to emerge, something singular and new. As a result, this book sees the ‘new’ and its ‘future’ in science fiction in a very different way from Darko Suvin and Frederic Jameson, whose astoundingly influential theory sees science fiction futures as forms of ‘cognitive estrangement’ that seek to reflect on the present that produces them. [from the Introduction]
Layout: Dejan Dragosavac Ruta
260 pages [Paperback : 13,5 x 19 cm]
Publisher: Multimedijalni institut [Zagreb, Croatia]
ISBN: 978-953-7372-67-5
— the book is available via Amazon: https://www.amazon.de/dp/9537372677/ref=olp_product_details?_encoding=UTF8&me=
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it – is not to go from the bottom to the top, from small
to large, from the finite to the infinite. Instead, we must
understand how the smallest is the largest, the bottom is
the top (in all senses), the finite is infinity everywhere we
look. These crude rednecks and dumb-ass niggers, these
illiterate and illegitimate offspring of faggots and whores,
these immigrants and trannies and slaves and abuse victims
seeking refuge and love, these drinkers of dog and donkey
piss, eaters of shit, pig-, cow- and horse-fucking collectors
of trash, dirty unwashed losers all, instruct us in the simple
wisdom of living in the world without restraint, without
regret, with dignity, love and with joy. And the world, it
gives them exactly what they deserve; happiness, pleasure,
health, and knowledge leading to mystical insight – all
a result of the lowest being the highest, and the bottom
providing the rule for all. As Spinoza had it, and it will be
the second sentence of the Ethics that Eric understands;
‘By reality and perfection I understand the same thing.’ (EI,
Appendix III, quoted 525) Everything, in other words, is
equally perfect, equal in its perfection, but – and this is the
problem – we don’t understand it as such.
How then to act, given that one only receives the
pleasure and love that one’s actions deserve? Through the
Valley of the Nest of Spiders gives us ethical advice straight
out of Spinoza; if it feels right do it, and if it doesn’t don’t;
‘There ain’t no normal.’ Shit says, ‘There’s just comfortable
and uncomfortable. And I like to be comfortable with pretty
much everything.’ (305) As Spinoza has it, there are affects of
joy and sadness, and these are the only ethical indications
we need to do what’s right. Ethical evaluation therefore
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