I will be teaching a new literature course this summer at VCU, May 23-June 23. The class meets Monday through Thursday 10:30 am-12:45 pm. It is listed as English 215-004 Textual Analysis. As with previous summer classes we’ll read a book (or the equivalent) a week, paired with a movie. In previous years, I’ve taught a survey of science fiction from the fifties to the present, as well as an urban fantasy class organized along genre lines with pairings of similar books and films.\u00c2\u00a0 This time out, I want to tour the fantastic as it is now.\u00c2\u00a0 I’ve gone about this as a working professional in the field, selecting texts that have made the most significant impact in recent years.\u00c2\u00a0 They are all also wonderful works of art.<\/p>\n
We’ll start with Pan’s Labyrinth<\/em> (film) and Redemption in Indigo<\/em> by Karen Lord.\u00c2\u00a0 Of the many interesting first novels in the fantastic of late, hers most charmed me.\u00c2\u00a0 The film has been a favorite in the urban fantasy class.\u00c2\u00a0 Both works use traditional mythologies in modern settings to great effect.\u00c2\u00a0 Their narrative techniques are an artful blend of myth and metafiction.\u00c2\u00a0 Both feature delightful heroines who reinvent the myth they inhabit.<\/p>\n Next will be Children of Men<\/em> (film) and The Windup Girl<\/em> by Paolo Bacigalupi.\u00c2\u00a0 Both are buried under awards.\u00c2\u00a0 Future England, future Thailand\u00e2\u20ac\u201dthe dystopian future is alive and as scary as ever.\u00c2\u00a0 The loving attention to both world-building and character in both works belies the notion that there’s somehow a conflict between the two.\u00c2\u00a0 What didn’t occur to me before I chose the pair is the eerie resonance of their final scenes.<\/p>\n It used to be in sf that space was the place, but in the twenty-first century, place is a more complicated concept, and those ftl drives get harder and harder to spin up (or swallow).\u00c2\u00a0 The next pair\u00e2\u20ac\u201d Inception<\/em> (film) and The City & The City<\/em>\u00e2\u20ac\u201dtell stories in worlds of their own devising, worlds the inhabitants themselves help create, worlds that then shape them into who they are.\u00c2\u00a0 Or something like that.\u00c2\u00a0 I’ve gushed about the Mi\u00c3\u00a9ville novel before.\u00c2\u00a0 It too is buried under awards.\u00c2\u00a0 I’m less sure of Inception<\/em>, but it was the most noticed sf film of late (available on DVD).<\/p>\n Those of you who had the pleasure of hearing Kelly Link read at VCU recently know that one of the most exciting developments in the recent fantastic is the emergence of exceptional short fiction writers.\u00c2\u00a0 For this class we’ll read Kelly’s Pretty Monsters<\/em> collection, paired with the Swedish film Let the Right One In.<\/em> Both stories and film do marvelous things with monsters and children who love and fear them.\u00c2\u00a0 Meanwhile they play compelling narrative hell with genre expectations and perspective.<\/p>\n Finally, we’ll go online.\u00c2\u00a0 Not only is the short form enjoying a renaissance, it’s increasingly doing so online.\u00c2\u00a0 Awards nominees and recommended reading lists are now filled with titles from publications such as Clarkesworld<\/em> and Strange Horizons<\/em>.\u00c2\u00a0 I’m still working on a final list\u00e2\u20ac\u201dthere are so many to choose from.\u00c2\u00a0 (Suggestions are welcome).\u00c2\u00a0 I’m pairing these stories with what I’ll call the Netflix film, the film that gets a wide distribution because it’s streamable.\u00c2\u00a0 I’ll show Sleep Dealer<\/em>, the timely Mexican sf film about immigrant labor.\u00c2\u00a0 We’ll see what effects this digital migration is having on the emerging fantastic.<\/p>\n I’m totally psyched.\u00c2\u00a0 Registration starts Monday.\u00c2\u00a0 Love to have you.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I will be teaching a new literature course this summer at VCU, May 23-June 23. The class meets Monday through Thursday 10:30 am-12:45 pm. It is listed as English 215-004 Textual Analysis. As with previous summer classes we’ll read a … Continue reading