scholarly journals The relationship between Arthurian tradition and science fiction in Diana Wynne Jones's novel 'Hexwood'

Kultura ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 14-27
Author(s):  
Tijana Tropin

This paper analyses Diana Wynne Jones's use of the Arthurian tradition in her novel Hexwood and the links she establishes with the contemporary traditions of the fantasy novel for children and science fiction. By employing a complex non-linear narration and a rich network of intertextual allusions ranging from Thomas Mallory and Edmund Spenser to T. H. White, Wynne Jones creates an unusual and successful genre amalgam. The central concept of the novel, a version of virtual reality where individuals adopt false identities and act accordingly, enables a highly uncommon self aware use of motifs adopted from myth and literature.

2002 ◽  
Vol 32 (2) ◽  
pp. 55-60 ◽  
Author(s):  
James Sey

This paper uses a detailed reading of the 1973 novel Crash!, a work of dystopian science fiction by British author J.G. Ballard, to outline a new theory of psychopathology in a thoroughly technologised culture. The paper proposes that, in the light of the evidence of the novel, it may be possible to reconceptualise both trauma and the somatic relationship to pathology, through the mediation of a saturated technoculture, at least in the sense of a closer investigation of the relationship between perversity and aesthetic expression. The argument concludes that there is a privileged relationship between such extreme forms of pathological symptom as are presented in the novel, and the aesthetic form itself, which leads to a more productive understanding of psychopathology.


2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (4) ◽  
pp. 30
Author(s):  
Md. Shafiqul Islam

This paper attempts a cybercritical reading of William Gibson’s novel Neuromancer (1984) to explore the genesis of cyborgs in the novel, address issues pertaining to cyberpunks and scrutinize the portrayal of a cyberculture set in the futuristic dystopian city of Chiba. The relationship between humans and machines has gone through multiple phases of changes in the recent past. That is why instead of satirizing machinized-humans, science fiction writers have embraced different dimensions of man-machine relationships during the past few decades. ‘Cyborg’ is no longer represented as the ‘mutation of human capabilities’, but as ‘machines with Artificial Intelligence’. Gibson’s Neuromancer, a landmark piece of literary work in the sphere of Sci-Fi literature, specifically predicts a new height of man-machine relationship by employing both human and cyborg characters at the center of his story line. This paper shows how Gibson accurately prophesizes the matrix of machine-human relationship in his novel. It also explores Gibson’s depiction of female characters through the lens of cyberfeminist theories. In view of that, this paper uses contemporary critical and cultural theories including Donna Haraway’s idea of cyberfeminism, Baudrillard’s simulation and simulacra, Foucauldian discourse analysis, Jeremy Bentham’s concept of tabula rasa and other relevant theoretical ideas to examine and evaluate the transformative changes.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cole Bisson

[Introduction] William Gibson’s 1984 novel, Neuromancer, declared cyberpunk as a fully realized science fiction subgenre that reverberates into the current time. The text follows a hacker, Case, who was recruited by an artificial intelligence program, Wintermute. The AI plans to release itself into cyberspace or the matrix; a virtual reality separate from the cruel outside world of the novel. Case joins a veteran solider, Armitage, an assassin-like agent, Molly, and other morally ambiguous individuals in a novel that pushes the boundaries of the 1980s culture. In addition to this, Neuromancer also represents postmodern architecture in the form of the text’s urban cityscapes, but also through the virtual reality of cyberspace. Each location relays a strained relationship between humanity and technology. The development of the 1980’s information technology along with the growth of the personal computer was believed to be a harbinger of a shifting paradigm. Paweł Frelik’s article, “Silhouettes of Strange Illuminated Mannequins: Cyberpunk’s Incarnation of Light,” examines the ocularity of light pertaining to cyberspace’s visual aesthetic. Frelik defines Neuromancer’s technological equipment as a gateway to cyberspace which is where global information is made concrete in the form of neon light. I will take up this technological gateway as defining cyberspace to be an information utopia. The construction of data into concrete light establishes the freedom a tangible identity can occupy in a world where physical limitations have no relevance. I will integrate this with a postmodern architectural and literary theory. Sabine Heuser’s text, Virtual Geographies: Cyberpunk at the Intersection of the Postmodern and Science Fiction¸ examines the representation of postmodern architecture in relation to cyberpunk. She defines “double coding” as communicating not only with the public, but with a concentrated minority consisting of learned professionals working in the industry. Heuser’s text declines to apply this theory to Neuromancer as she explains double coding is too binary to be useful, but Gibson’s spatial descriptions allow for a coded interpretation into the purpose of each temporality: cyberspace and reality. By using double coding, I will utilize this architectural concept to examine Neuromancer’s representation of neon lights as concrete fixtures of data which liberate a person’s identity. Therefore, this situates the dichotomy of cyberspace as a utopia and the cityscape as a dystopia in order to capture the zeitgeist of the democratization of technology (the relinquishment of computers from the elite to the masses).


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cole Bisson

[Introduction] William Gibson’s 1984 novel, Neuromancer, declared cyberpunk as a fully realized science fiction subgenre that reverberates into the current time. The text follows a hacker, Case, who was recruited by an artificial intelligence program, Wintermute. The AI plans to release itself into cyberspace or the matrix; a virtual reality separate from the cruel outside world of the novel. Case joins a veteran solider, Armitage, an assassin-like agent, Molly, and other morally ambiguous individuals in a novel that pushes the boundaries of the 1980s culture. In addition to this, Neuromancer also represents postmodern architecture in the form of the text’s urban cityscapes, but also through the virtual reality of cyberspace. Each location relays a strained relationship between humanity and technology. The development of the 1980’s information technology along with the growth of the personal computer was believed to be a harbinger of a shifting paradigm. Paweł Frelik’s article, “Silhouettes of Strange Illuminated Mannequins: Cyberpunk’s Incarnation of Light,” examines the ocularity of light pertaining to cyberspace’s visual aesthetic. Frelik defines Neuromancer’s technological equipment as a gateway to cyberspace which is where global information is made concrete in the form of neon light. I will take up this technological gateway as defining cyberspace to be an information utopia. The construction of data into concrete light establishes the freedom a tangible identity can occupy in a world where physical limitations have no relevance. I will integrate this with a postmodern architectural and literary theory. Sabine Heuser’s text, Virtual Geographies: Cyberpunk at the Intersection of the Postmodern and Science Fiction¸ examines the representation of postmodern architecture in relation to cyberpunk. She defines “double coding” as communicating not only with the public, but with a concentrated minority consisting of learned professionals working in the industry. Heuser’s text declines to apply this theory to Neuromancer as she explains double coding is too binary to be useful, but Gibson’s spatial descriptions allow for a coded interpretation into the purpose of each temporality: cyberspace and reality. By using double coding, I will utilize this architectural concept to examine Neuromancer’s representation of neon lights as concrete fixtures of data which liberate a person’s identity. Therefore, this situates the dichotomy of cyberspace as a utopia and the cityscape as a dystopia in order to capture the zeitgeist of the democratization of technology (the relinquishment of computers from the elite to the masses).


Author(s):  
Christian McCrea

David Lynch's Dune (1984) is the film that science fiction — and the director's most ardent fans — can neither forgive nor forget. Frank Herbert's original 1965 novel built a meticulous universe of dark majesty and justice, as wild-eyed freedom fighters and relentless authoritarians all struggled for control of the desert planet Arrakis and its mystical, life-extending “spice.” After several attempts to produce a film, Italian movie mogul Dino De Laurentiis and his producer daughter Raffaella would enlist David Lynch, whose Eraserhead (1977) and The Elephant Man (1980) had already marked him out as a visionary director. What emerges out of their strange, long process is a deeply unique vision of the distant future; an eclectic bazaar of wood-turned spaceship interiors, spitting tyrants, and dream montages. Lynch's film was “steeped in an ancient primordial nastiness that has nothing to do with the sci-fi film as we currently know it,” as Village Voice critic J. Hoberman put it — only with time becoming a cult classic. This book is the first long-form critical study of the film; it delves into the relationship with the novel, the rapidly changing context of early 1980s science fiction, and takes a close look at Lynch's attempt to breathe sincerity and mysticism into a blockbuster movie format that was shifting radically around him.


2013 ◽  
Vol 43 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Frederike Felcht

Abstract Torgrim Eggen’s Hilal (1995) is an early example of literature on the subject of Islam in Norway in its global contexts. As a romantic love story with elements of an action thriller and science fiction in form of future technological inventions, the novel combines an intense reading experience with thought provoking reflections on the role of religion and religious conflicts in secular societies. Based on Almuth Hammer’s ideas on the relationship between religion and literature as well as Jan Assmann’s theses on functions of oral and written language in religions, my essay analyzes the representation of Islam in Hilal and shows parallels between the structure of love and faith in the novel.


1985 ◽  
Vol 24 (02) ◽  
pp. 91-100 ◽  
Author(s):  
W. van Pelt ◽  
Ph. H. Quanjer ◽  
M. E. Wise ◽  
E. van der Burg ◽  
R. van der Lende

SummaryAs part of a population study on chronic lung disease in the Netherlands, an investigation is made of the relationship of both age and sex with indices describing the maximum expiratory flow-volume (MEFV) curve. To determine the relationship, non-linear canonical correlation was used as realized in the computer program CANALS, a combination of ordinary canonical correlation analysis (CCA) and non-linear transformations of the variables. This method enhances the generality of the relationship to be found and has the advantage of showing the relative importance of categories or ranges within a variable with respect to that relationship. The above is exemplified by describing the relationship of age and sex with variables concerning respiratory symptoms and smoking habits. The analysis of age and sex with MEFV curve indices shows that non-linear canonical correlation analysis is an efficient tool in analysing size and shape of the MEFV curve and can be used to derive parameters concerning the whole curve.


2016 ◽  
Vol 1 (3) ◽  
pp. 141
Author(s):  
Rana Sağıroğlu

Margaret Atwood, one of the most spectacular authors of postmodern movement, achieved to unite debatable and in demand critical points of 21st century such as science fiction, postmodernism and ecocriticism in the novel The Year of The Flood written in 2009. The novel could be regarded as an ecocritical manifesto and a dystopic mirror against today’s degenerated world, tending to a superficial base to keep the already order in use, by moving away from the fundamental solution of all humanity: nature. Although Atwood does not want her works to be called science fiction, it is obvious that science fiction plays an introductory role and gives the novel a ground explaining all ‘why’ questions of the novel. However, Atwood is not unjust while claiming that her works are not science fiction because of the inevitable rapid change of 21st century world becoming addicted to technology, especially Internet. It is easily observed by the reader that what she fictionalises throughout the novel is quite close to possibility, and the world may witness in the near future what she creates in the novel as science fiction. Additionally, postmodernism serves to the novel as the answerer of ‘how’ questions: How the world embraces pluralities, how heterogeneous social order is needed, and how impossible to run the world by dichotomies of patriarchal social order anymore. And lastly, ecocriticism gives the answers of ‘why’ questions of the novel: Why humanity is in chaos, why humanity has organized the world according to its own needs as if there were no living creatures apart from humanity. Therefore, The Year of The Flood meets the reader as a compact embodiment of science fiction, postmodernism and ecocriticism not only with its theme, but also with its narrative techniques.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Agnieszka Wykowska ◽  
Jairo Pérez-Osorio ◽  
Stefan Kopp

This booklet is a collection of the position statements accepted for the HRI’20 conference workshop “Social Cognition for HRI: Exploring the relationship between mindreading and social attunement in human-robot interaction” (Wykowska, Perez-Osorio & Kopp, 2020). Unfortunately, due to the rapid unfolding of the novel coronavirus at the beginning of the present year, the conference and consequently our workshop, were canceled. On the light of these events, we decided to put together the positions statements accepted for the workshop. The contributions collected in these pages highlight the role of attribution of mental states to artificial agents in human-robot interaction, and precisely the quality and presence of social attunement mechanisms that are known to make human interaction smooth, efficient, and robust. These papers also accentuate the importance of the multidisciplinary approach to advance the understanding of the factors and the consequences of social interactions with artificial agents.


2020 ◽  
Vol 17 (9) ◽  
pp. 1084-1101
Author(s):  
Tingjuan Wu ◽  
Xu Yao ◽  
Guan Wang ◽  
Xiaohe Liu ◽  
Hongfei Chen ◽  
...  

Background: Oleanolic Acid (OA) is a ubiquitous product of triterpenoid compounds. Due to its inexpensive availability, unique bioactivities, pharmacological effects and non-toxic properties, OA has attracted tremendous interest in the field of drug design and synthesis. Furthermore, many OA derivatives have been developed for ameliorating the poor water solubility and bioavailability. Objective: Over the past few decades, various modifications of the OA framework structure have led to the observation of enhancement in bioactivity. Herein, we focused on the synthesis and medicinal performance of OA derivatives modified on A-ring. Moreover, we clarified the relationship between structures and activities of OA derivatives with different functional groups in A-ring. The future application of OA in the field of drug design and development also was discussed and inferred. Conclusion: This review concluded the novel achievements that could add paramount information to the further study of OA-based drugs.


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