Other Resources

Some of there are available in Tripod

Other Resources for Reading:

Some criticism and pre-texts will be on Blackboard. Not all of these additional sources are in Tripod, but they could all be helpful for this course. Check the Reference section (under PG especially) for info on authors you don't know well.

Anindita Banerjee, We Modern People: Science Fiction and the Making of Russian Modernity (2013) – looks at how SF functioned as a laboratory for social and political discussion in late pre-Revolutionary and early Soviet Russia. NB: The author will be visiting our class in February!

Edith W. Clowes, Russian Experimental Fiction: Resisting Ideology After Utopia (1993) – mostly concerned with utopian and meta-utopian works, but looks at several works of science fiction (and, Darko Suvin would say, SF and utopias are the same family). 

Thomas M. Disch, The Dreams Our Stuff Is Made of: How Science Fiction Conquered the World (1998) - about movies and television as well as books.

Loren R. Graham, The Ghost of the Executed Engineer: Technology and the Fall of the Soviet Union (1993) - a biography of Pëtr Palchinsky, executed in 1929 as alleged head "wrecker" of the "Industrial Party."

John Griffiths, Three Tomorrows: American, British and Soviet Science Fiction (1980) - helpful plot summaries, interesting juxtapositions of authors, some opinionated commentary. Despite its publication date, most of the book was written in the late 1960s.

Yvonne Howell, Apocalyptic Realism: The Science Fiction of Arkady and Boris Strugatsky (1994) - places the two authors in a broader Russian literary and cultural context.

Frederic Jameson, Archaeologies of the Future: The Desire Called Utopia and Other Science Fictions (2005/2007) - Jameson is a hotshot Marxist literary theorist. The book touches lightly on some EE stuff - mentions Lem, Čapek, Zamyatin, and the book is dedicated to Darko (Suvin), among others.

Stanisław Lem, Microworlds (1984) - essays and criticism by the great, cranky Polish author.

Carl D. Malmgren, Worlds Apart: Narratology of Science Fiction (1991) - This (barely) post-Soviet study includes consideration of some works by Zamyatin and Lem.

Rosalind J. Marsh, Soviet Fiction Since Stalin: Science, Politics and Literature (1986) - about science and fiction as well as (a bit of) science fiction.

Patrick Parrinder, ed., Learning from Other Worlds: Estrangement, Cognition, and the Politics of Science Fiction and Utopia (2001) - a collection of articles and other materials, with various contents as usual with an anthology.

Steven M. Sanders, The Philosophy of Science Fiction Film (2008) - only about Western films, but a selection of interesting chapters.

Matthias Schwartz, Die Erfindung des Kosmos. Zur sowjetischen Science Fiction und populärwissenschaftlichen Publizistik vom Sputnikflug bis zum Ende der Tauwetterzeit.(Berliner Slawistische Arbeiten, Bd. 22), Berlin 2013. Surely great if you can read German!

David Seed, American Science Fiction and the Cold War: Literature and Film (1999) - interesting analysis and list of works, perhaps useful for formulating a second (longer) paper topic. (And he clarifies why Philip K. Dick was paranoid about Lem.)

Richard Stites. Revolutionary Dreams: Utopian Vision and Experimental Life in the Russian Revolution (1989) - an overview of various projects and ideas, including some science-fictional ones.

Darko Suvin, Metamorphoses of Science Fiction (1979) - Suvin has an Eastern European background himself (he was born in Croatia, in former Yugoslavia), and the book is an erudite, ground-breaking classic of science fiction scholarship. The book treats SF in general, but has chapters on Russian SF and Čapek in particular.

J. P. Telotte, A Distant Technology: Science Fiction Film and the Machine Age (1999) - has chapters on Soviet science fiction film, as well as French, German, American, and British.

Let me know if you find sources I should add!


Movies to consider as you consider your papers and other work:

Yakov Protazanov, Aèlita, Queen of Mars (1924)
Andrei Tarkovsky, Solaris (1972; based on Lem's book)
Steven Soderburgh's more recent version of Solaris (2002)
Andrei Tarkovsky, Stalker (1980, based on the Strugatskys' Roadside Picnic)
Vzlyot ("The Take-Off"), 1979, with Soviet poet Yevgeny Yevtushenko playing Konstantin Tsiolkovsky (see http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0173432/)

Some of our authors have inspired multiple TV and film treatments:

IMDB site for Mikhail Bulgakov: http://us.imdb.com/name/nm0119888/
IMDB site for Kir "Bulychyov": http://us.imdb.com/name/nm0120273/
IMDB site for Karel Čapek: http://us.imdb.com/name/nm0135015/
IMDB site for Jozef Nesvadba: http://us.imdb.com/name/nm0626592/
IMDB for Arkady Strugatsky: http://us.imdb.com/name/nm0835297/
IMDB for Boris Strugatsky: http://us.imdb.com/name/nm0835298/
IMDB for "Yevgeni Zamyatin": http://us.imdb.com/name/nm0759866/

For background on Russian and EE Literature:

Neil Cornwell, ed., Reference Guide to Russian Literature (PG2940 .R44 1998, in McCabe Reference)
Victor Terras, ed., Handbook of Russian Literature (PG2940 .H29 1985 in McCabe Reference)
Harold B. Segel, ed., The Columbia Guide to the literatures of Eastern Europe since 1945 (PN849.E9 S44 2003 in McCabe Reference)
Robert B. Pynsent, ed., Reader's Encyclopedia of Eastern European Literature ( PN849.E9 R38 1993 in McCabe Reference)
I've included the call numbers in part because there are other useful reference sources beside these on the shelves; PG is the Library of Congress code for Slavic literatures.

Other Swat professors interested in SF:
 

Nathalie Anderson (English Literature and Creative Writing) is an avid reader of science fiction and teaches creative writing (poetry).

Timothy Burke (History), among other things, co-wrote the book Saturday Morning Fever: Growing Up With Cartoon Culture and has taught a course on History of the Future with lots of great SF readings.
Gregory Frost (English Literature and Creative Writing) writes science fiction and teaches creative writing (prose).
William Gardner (Japanese Language and Literature) works on modernism, cinema and anime. He translates from Japanese into English, including some science fiction (Tsutsui Yasutaka).
Bob Rehak (Film and Media Studies) is a specialist in animated cinema, including science fiction.
Sunka Simon (German Studies; Film and Media Studies; Gender and Sexuality Studies) works on popular culture and has taught a class on Cyborgs.

Jamie Thomas (Linguistics) works on all kinds of issues of language and discourse.
Craig Williamson (English Literature) has taught science fiction as well as a course on Beowulf and Tolkein.

Other Swat professors who teach about Russia and East Europe:

David Harrison in Linguistics

Brian Johnson in Russian

Allen Kuharski in Theater (especially re Polish)

Barbara Milewski in Music

Maya Nadkarni in Anthropology

Robert Weinberg in History

Tsvetelina Yordanova in Russian