Dangerous Visions and New Worlds: Radical Science Fiction, 1950-1985 presents a smorgasbord of articles–and over a hundred very cool paperback covers!–on Science Fiction in the Fifties, Sixties, Seventies, and a bit of the Eighties.
I enjoyed essays on Philip K. Dick, Samuel R. Delany, R. A. Lafferty, Michael Moorcock, Roger Zelazny, J. G. Ballard, Alice Sheldon/James Tiptree, Jr. and a dozen other key SF writers from this period. Just take a quick look at the Table of Contents and you’ll see something that will draw to a subject or writer you’re interested in.
Andrew Nettle and Iain McIntyre assembled a set of essays full of variety and varying perspectives. If you’re a fan of SF, and if you lived through the years this volume focuses on, you’ll want to take a look at this book! I’m hoping for a sequel! GRADE: A
TABLE OF CONTENTS:
Dangerous Visions and New Worlds: An Introduction / Iain McIntyre and Andrew Nette — 1
Imagining New Worlds: Sci-Fi and the Vietnam War / Rjurik Davidson — 5
Sextrapolation in New Wave Science Fiction / Rob Latham — 11
Radioactive Nightmares: Nuclear War in Science Fiction / Andrew Nette — 23
On Earth the Air Is Free: The Feminist Science Fiction of Judith Merril / Kat Clay — 26
Women and Children First! John Wyndham and Second-Wave Feminism / David Curcio — 32
Bursting through the Boundaries: New Worlds Magazine / Iain McIntyre — 37
Vast Active Living (Possibly) Insane System: Paranoia and Anti authoritarianism in the Work of Philip K. Dick / Erica L. Satifka — 39
Flying Saucers and Black Power: Joseph Denis Jackson’s 1967 Insurrectionist Novel The Black Commandos / Iain McIntyre — 45
Doomwatchers: Calamity and Catastrophe in UK Television Novelizations / Iain McIntyre — 52
The Energy Exhibition: Radical Science Fiction in the 1960s / Hicolas Tredell — 56
“We change-and the whole world changes”: Samuel R. Delany’s Heavenly Breakfast in Context / Daniel Shank Cruz — 64
Flawed Ancients, New Gods, and Interstellar Missionaries: Religion in Postwar SF / Iain McIntyre — 70
Speculative Fuckbooks: The Brief Life of Essex House, 1968-1969 / Rebecca Baumann — 73
God Does, Perhaps? The Unlikely New Wave SF of R.A. Lafferty / Nick Mamatas — 81
The Tasty Worlds of Jerry Cornelius / Andrew Nette — 85
Hank Lopez’s Afro-6 / Brian Greene — 88
“The Hell with Heroes”: Rebellion and Responsibility in Roger Zelazny’s Damnation Alley / Kelly Roberts — 92
Eco-Death: Catastrophe and Survival in 1960s and 1970s Science Fiction/ Iain McIntyre — 99
Stepford Wives and Supercomputers Th e Science Fiction of Ira Levin / Andrew Nette — 102
“Houston, we’ve had a problem”: Technology, Mental Breakdown and the Science Fiction of Barry Malzberg / Andrew Nette — 107
The Stars My Destination: The Future According to Gay Adult Science Fiction Novels of the 1970s / Maitland McDonagh — 111
Higher than a Rocket Ship: Drugs in SF / Iain McIntyre — 121
Freedom in the Mind: Louise Lawrence’s Andra / Andrew Nette — 123
Mick Farren: Fomenting the Rock Apocalypse / Mike Stax — 128
Green Deaths and Time Warriors: Doctor Who Serials and Novelizations in the 1970s / Iain McIntyre — 135
A New Wave in the East: The Strugatsky Brothers and Radical Sci-fi in Soviet Russia / Scott Adlerberg — 139
The Future Is Going to Be Boring: The SF Present of J.G. Ballard / Cameron Ashley — 146
By Any Means Necessary: Revolution and Rebellion in 1960s and 1970s Science Fiction / Andrew Nette — 153
Performative Gender and SF: The Strange but True Case of Alice Sheldon and James Tiptree Jr. / Lucy Sussex — 156
Coming of Age between Apocalypses: Young Adult Fiction and the End of the World / Molly Grattan — 161
Crowded Worlds and False Dawns: 1970s Dystopian Science Fiction / Andrew Nette — 166
Cosmic Bond, Super Lover: William Bloom’s Qhe! Series / Iain McIntyre — 170
Feminist Future: Time Travel in Marge Piercy’s Woman on the Edge of Time / Kirsten Bussiere — 177
Who Are the Beasts? Animals in Science Fiction / Andrew Nette — 185
The Moons of Le Guin and Heinlein / Donna Glee Williams — 188
Black Star: The Life and Work of Octavia Butler / Michael A. Gonzales — 195
Herland: The Women’s Press and Science Fiction / Iain McIntyre — 203
Acknowledgements — 206
Contributors — 207
Index — 211
Most of these authors bring back fond memories.
Yes, those were the Golden Days of SF – at least for me, growing up as a teenager in very conservative West Germany.
German SF was either old style from the 1930s or simple minded hackers writing – Perry Rhodan was a good example there.
But then fans started translating and publishing US and GB SF in affordable paperbacks – and I was allowed to read some of these in a relative’s bookstore.
Wolf, 1950-1985 saw the emergence of Science Fiction into a popular genre. Once SF broke out of its ghetto, it impacted movies and the Best Sellers List.
George the Tempter strikes again!
My Christmas wish is for a joyous, relaxing, and meaningful Christmas for you, Diane, Patrick, and Katie. And don’t worry about coal in your stocking — I told santa to cancel that.
Jerry, Patrick and Katie baked FIVE different types of Christmas Cookies yesterday. They made a Yule Log, and today they’re planning on making a pie. Tomorrow we’re hosting four “strays” who would be alone on Christmas if not for Diane’s insistence that they join us (they are all fully vaccinated and Boosted). “No one should be alone on Christmas,” Diane told them. Check this site tomorrow for photos of the Christmas Feast. May you and your family enjoy a wonderful Christmas! And thanks for talking to Santa about that coal!
This looks pretty interesting, since my sojourn with SF started in 1963 (not counting comics and movies, 1956-62) and ended in the mid-80s. I hardly read the new stuff now, the new stuff being (as far as I can tell from scanning the bookshelves) tony polemics, right-wing military agitprop, and commercial franchises.
The world needs more Dianes. Her comment is right on.
A joyous holiday season to all.
Fred, I’ll pass on your praise to Diane. She is one of the most caring people I know and I’m proud to be with her for 43 years! Sadly, most SF today falls into your categories: tony polemics, right-wing agitprop, and commercial franchises. I find myself reading (or rereading) the Good Old Stuff mostly. I think you’d find a lot of what you read from 1963 to the mid-1980s well represented in DANGEROUS VISIONS AND NEW WORLDS. And, you’ll see plenty of great cover artwork from that era! Hope you and your family enjoy the Holidays!
The period in SFF was great, but it looks like many authors chose to aim at political, gender, sexual orientation, and racial aspects, which is off-putting to me. A lot of interesting books covered, no doubt, but my SF reading was for fun, not education.
Rick, I think a lot of the fun of SF went away when Donald A. Wollheim died in 1990. Although DAW Books continued–and is still publishing SF and Fantasy today–Wollheim’s sensibility is missing from contemporary SF publishing. From ACE Books to DAW Books, Wollheim promoted a sense of fun, adventure, and a sense of wonder.
Is this in any way related to Harlan Ellison’s DANGEROUS VISIONS?
Bob, yes, DANGEROUS VISIONS and the literary whirlwind it unleashed is part of the focus of this book. You would enjoy some of the essays included in this volume.
Two days late (I’ve been too exhausted to even string together a few words until this morning) but I just wanted to thank you for the recommendation, George. This looks like a terrific read. Like many of the other respondents here this is pretty much the entire era of SF that interests me. The “classical” style was clearly exhausted by the middle of the seventies and the New Wave lost its momentum in little over a decade as well. Granted, the audience had changed significanty as well, with much of the younger audience gravitating more toward second-rate fantasy (which somehow just keeps getting worse) and fascistic military SF. I do think that many genres blossom and peak over the course of a few seminal decades with everything subsequent diverging toward increasingly self-absorbed sub-sub genres. I still keep a few tabs on what is out there but my reading is solely restricted to vintage anthologies I pick up in used book stores.
I for one think pop culture is at its richest when it resides in the ghetto and there is no surer death sentence than mainstream popularity (just look at the stuff people are hyper-ventilating about on TikTok).
Andre Nette–typo on his surname in the header…
Todd, thanks for the heads up! Once again WORDPRESS changes what I’m typing without telling me.