Includes index. Includes bibliographical references and index.
Contents:
Pt.1. The desire called utopia. Introduction: Utopia now ; Varieties of the utopian ; The utopian enclave ; Morus: the generic window ; Utopian science versus utopian ideology ; The great schism ; How to fulfill a wish ; The barrier of time ; The unknowability thesis ; The alien body ; Utopia and its antinomies ; Synthesis, irony, neutralization and the moment of truth ; Journey into fear ; The future as disruption. -- Pt. 2. As far as thought can reach. Fourier, or, Ontology and utopia ; Generic discontinuities in SF: Brian Aldiss' Starship ; World reduction in Le Guin ; Progress versus utopia, or, Can we imagine the future? ; Science fiction as a spatial genre: Vonda McIntyre's The exile waiting ; The space of science fiction: narrative in Van Vogt ; Longevity as class struggle ; Philip K. Dick, in memoriam ; After armageddon: character systems in Dr. Bloodmoney ; History and salvation in Philip K. Dick ; Fear and loathing in globalization ; "If I can find one good city, I will spare the man": realism and utopia in Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars trilogy.
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