1st Edition

American Science Fiction and the Cold War Literature and Film

By David Seed Copyright 1999
222 Pages
by Routledge

225 Pages
by Routledge

American Science Fiction--in both literature and film--has played a key role in the portrayal of the fears inherent in the Cold War. The end of this era heralds the need for a reassessment of the literary output of the forty-year period since 1945. Working through a series of key texts, American Science Fiction and the Cold War investigates the political inflections put on American narratives in... Read more
Introduction; Chapter I Postwar Jeremiads: Philip Wylie and Leo Szilard; Chapter II Variations on a Patriotic Theme: Robert A. Heinlein; Chapter III History and Apocalypse in Poul Anderson; Chapter IV Views from the Hearth; Chapter V Cultures of Surveillance; Chapter VI Take-Over Bids: Frederik Pohl and Cyril Kornbluth; Chapter VII The Russians Have Come; Chapter VIII Embodying the Arms Race: Bernard Wolfe’s Limbo; Chapter IX The Cold War Computerised; Chapter X Conspiracy Narratives; Chapter XI Absurdist Visions: Dr. Strangelove in Context; Chapter XII The Signs of War: Walter M. Miller and Russel Hoban; Chapter XIII In the Aftermath; Chapter XIV The Star Wars Debate;

Biography

David Seed