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Robot Ghosts and Wired Dreams Japanese Science Fiction from Origins to Anime Christopher Bolton, Istvan Csicsery-Ronay Jr., and Takayuki Tatsumi, editor |
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Connecting Japan’s vibrant science fiction tradition to the global phenomenon of anime. Since the end of the Second World War—and particularly over the past decade—Japanese science fiction has strongly influenced global popular culture. Unlike American and British science fiction, its most popular examples have been visual—from Gojira (Godzilla) and Astro Boy in the 1950s and 1960s to the anime masterpieces Akira and Ghost in the Shell of the 1980s and 1990s—while little attention has been paid to a vibrant tradition of prose science fiction in Japan. Robot Ghosts and Wired Dreams remedies this neglect with a rich exploration of the genre that connects prose science fiction to contemporary anime. Bringing together Western scholars and leading Japanese critics, this groundbreaking work traces the beginnings, evolution, and future direction of science fiction in Japan, its major schools and authors, cultural origins and relationship to its Western counterparts, the role of the genre in the formation of Japan’s national and political identity, and its unique fan culture. Covering a remarkable range of texts—from the 1930s fantastic detective fiction of Yumeno Kyûsaku to the cross-culturally produced and marketed film and video game franchise Final Fantasy—this book firmly establishes Japanese science fiction as a vital and exciting genre. “If you want to learn about real groundbreaking sci-fi visionaries, this is the book to take to heart.” —Animation Magazine “Older fans of manga and anime will appreciate this cross-cultural investigation byy leading scholars and critics of Japanese science fiction.” —Northern Virginia Magazine “A clear, balanced, and theoretically sophisticated compendium of Japanese science fiction.” —Japanese Studies “The storylines described were fascinating; their themes and plots vital to understanding Japanese culture and history... Robot Ghosts and Wired Dreams will appeal to a wider audience than most academic non-fiction — it is just as enthralling to newcomers of Japanese science fiction as fans. The information is well organized and exceptionally well chosen to appeal as much to readers as writers, anthropologists and historians. Reading and viewing Japanese animation now is a completely new, and far more intellectual experience.” —M/C Reviews “Robot Ghosts and Wired Dreams signals the maturing of English-language studies of Japanese culture and represents one of the better efforts at putting together an edited volume from largely previously published articles, including three translated from Japanese. As such, it deserves a spot on scholars’ bookshelves and college course reading lists alike.” —Monumenta Nipponica “This is a terrifically useful collection of new and reprinted essays. It will be valuable not just to those who have a special interest in Japanese or nonanglophone [Science Fiction], but to the entire field of [Science Fiction] studies. From start to finish, this is an excellent book, leaving very little to qibble about. Robot Ghosts and Wired Dreams is an interesting, intelligent, and exceedingly rewarding volume.” —Science Fiction Research Association Review “Scholars of science fiction and fans of Japanese culture will find the exploration of the genre to be a wonderfully complex endeavor.” —Journal of the Fantastic in the Arts Contributors: Hiroki Azuma, Hiroko Chiba, Naoki Chiba, William O. Gardner, Mari Kotani, Livia Monnet, Miri Nakamura, Susan Napier, Sharalyn Orbaugh, Tamaki Saitô; Thomas Schnellbächer. Christopher Bolton is assistant professor of Japanese at Williams College. Istvan Csicsery-Ronay Jr. is professor of English at DePauw University. Takayuki Tatsumi is professor of English at Keio University in Tokyo and the author of Full Metal Apache: Transactions between Cyberpunk Japan and Avant Pop America. 288 pages | 27 b&w photos | 7 x 10 | 2007 TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction. Robot Ghosts and Wired Dreams: Japanese Science Fiction from Origins to Anime Part I. Prose Science Fiction 2. Has the Empire Sunk Yet? The Pacific in Japanese Science Fiction 3. Alien Spaces and Alien Bodies in Japanese Women’s Science Fiction 4. SF as Hamlet: Science Fiction and Philosophy 5. Tsutsui Yasutaka and the Multimedia Performance of Authorship Part II. Science Fiction Animation 7. The Mecha’s Blind Spot: Patlabor 2 and the Phenomenology of Anime 8. Words of Alienation, Words of Flight: Loanwords in Science Fiction Anime 9. Sex and the Single Cyborg: Japanese Popular Culture Experiments in Subjectivity 10. Invasion of the Woman Snatchers: The Problem of A-Life and the Uncanny in Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within 11. Otaku Sexuality Afterword. A Very Soft Time Machine: From Translation to Transfiguration Publication History |
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$20.00 paper