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This little chap sits outside Keflavik airport in Iceland. I don't know if they ever saw 'The Clangers' in Iceland, but to me this is obviously the Iron Chicken's egg. | ||
Kurt Vonnegut I read 'Slaughterhouse 5' when I was 14. This was my first 'science fiction' novel. I then went through all his other published books (including 'Happy Birthday, Wanda June', the play) before I left school. Of course, he hadn't written quite as many then! Olaf Stapledon I went to University in Liverpool, so I read all the novels of Olaf Stapledon, who had been a lecturer there. As these two authors will probably suggest, I read SF for the ideas, not the slash and burn adventure. Science fiction by Women Did you know that 'James Tiptree junior' was a woman? I was always puzzled by the name, because in Britain it's a make of jam. Apparently Alice Sheldon got her pseudonym from a jam-jar! I have recently read 'Lives of the Monster Dogs' by Kirsten Bakis. This is her first novel. It is a fantastic story of dogs modified to behave like humans, with human levels of intelligence, who have appeared in New York early in the next century. Their 'masters', whom they rebelled against and killed, emigrated from Prussia to Canada in the late 19th century, and lived in isolation, so the dogs' manners and appearance are even more strange because of their anachronism. 'Feminist' Science fiction A few years ago I discovered the 'Women's Press Science Fiction' series, and I worked my way though them as they were published. My favorite is 'A door into Ocean' by Joan Slonczewski. This describes an all-female utopia, taken over by a militarist regime, and the inhabitant's triumphant (though harrowing) passive resistance. Then there are two by Suzette H. Elgin. 'Native Tongue' and 'The Judas Rose' describe a future world in which women's rights have been completely revoked, and they are not considered to be independent of their male 'next of kin'. The books concentrate on the role of language in people's world view. Y tambien... Este año, he leído muchos libros en español. Empecé a aprender el español en Setiembre 1998. Hace unos meses, hallé 'La Función Delta' por Rosa Montero. Entonces, busqué otros libros por ella, y leí 'Temblor'. Los dos son de 'ciencia ficción' para mi, aunque no lo dice en los libros. 'La Función Delta' es ciencia ficcion solo porque trata de una mujer que vive en el año 2010. Ella tiene sesenta años, y recuerda su vida de treinta años antes. 'Temblor' es más como las obras de ciencia ficcion del 'Women's Press'. Una mujer vive despues de una catastrofe, y a la edad de solo veinte años, tiene de salvar su mundo. | ||
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