good leftist science fiction?

[edwad]

im really interested in reading some scifi about/involving leftist ideas. the closest ive come is 1984, but i wasnt really impressed with it so i wanna read some other stuff. what are your favorites?

[RedCeltic]

Science fiction has long been the realm of leftist writers. A Clockwork Orange
by Anthony Burgess is one of my favorites, as well as Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury and Brave New World by Aldous Huxley.

[CyM]

The Culture series (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Culture_series)

[ANTIFA GATE-9]

Michael Moorcok's works often express his leftist views. Try the"A Nomad of the Times Streams" trilogy. Its about a guy that goes to alternative worlds and in each book he takes part in a different socialist movement. Great trilogy.

[Popular Front of Judea]

Trying to escape Alabama? I know the feeling. Ursula Leguin's The Dispossessed is a classic and a great place to start. An anarchist utopia -- warts and all. A personal favorite is Ken Macleod's 'Fall Revolution' series starting with The Star Fraction.

This is a good if idiosyncratic list: 50 Sci-Fi & Fantasy Works Every Socialist Should Read (by China Mieville) (http://theweeklyansible.tumblr.com/post/20777236577/50-sci-fi-fantasy-works-every-socialist-should-read)

[Jimmie Higgins]

After you read the link above, you could also check out "Perdido Street Station" by China Mieville - or "Iron Council" for a more overtly political plot (a Paris Commune type situation, Insurrectionism, Multi-species class solidarity). But the first one is a more enjoyable book IMO. "City and the City" is a shorter and less verbose book by him and I think it would also be of interest in regards to left-wing politics, it deals with ideology and borders and nationality in a spy-thriller type genre with some fantastic concepts (two cities occupy the same geographic space and law and custom dictate that people "unsee" the other city).

A couple of classic (though problematic by today's standards) utopian or at least non-dystopian (since modern leftist-sci-fi is all [understanably] depressed:lol:) things which you can find online:

"Looking Backwards" - interesting but too beurocratic; the book was loved by US socialists, specifically Eugene Debs, but the autrhor was more of a "progressive" until later joining as a right-wing member of the Socialist Party. His concept of a utopia was that basically all the large monopolies of the victorian era began to merge and became one big monopoly which then workers nationalized through electorial means and *poof* class conflics are solved and we all live in a rational utopia of consumption.

"News from Nowhere" William Morris - written as a reaction against the industrial-beurocratic "Looking Backwards" - but this goes too far in the opposite direction and becomes sort of semi-feudal romanticism... in his utopia people live in harmony with nature but also basically live like yeomen farmers except that they can read philosophy.

They are both outdated, but I think interesting (and pretty easy) reads. I'd like it if leftist sci-fi authors could revive a utopian strain in their writings... but maybe it will take movements that actually strive for a better world before those sorts of ideas can regain some legitimacy and urgancy in contemporary culture.

[Consistent.Surprise]

To build off of PFoJ's suggestion on LeGuin (a favorite sci-fi author of mine) she wrote a series based on the "races" in Dispossessed. There are at least 5 & all amazing.

In the instance of female authors, which I usually read, Atwood's Handmaid's Tale & Amonite (can't recall the author) are great takes on the future of North America & the earth (respectively)

[Lenina Rosenweg]

The Dispossessed by Ursula Leguin, about an anarchist society ,is an all time classic.Her other stuff is worth reading as well. Four Ways To Forgiveness is about a revolution in a slave society which combines elements of the Chinese Cultural Revolution and anti-colonial revolutions is interesting.

Fire On The Mountain bu Terry Bisson is great. Its an alternate history in which John Brown's attempt to start a slave uprising was successful and eventually there was a socialist revolution in the US South. The forward to the recent edition is by Mumia.

I haven't read it yet but this looks interesting

http://www.overlookpress.com/any-day-now.html

Kim Stanley Robinson's books are interesting,more on the cerebral end of leftist SF. His Mars Trilogy and Years of Rice and Salt are must reads IMO.His recent 2312 did not do much for me. Pacific Edge is interesting.

I'm looking forward to this coming out.

http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/imagine-frances-goldin/1115888725?ean=9780062305572

Terry Bisson has a short story in here, "Thanksgiving 2077" about a socialist America later this century.

[bricolage]

After you read the link above, you could also check out "Perdido Street Station" by China Mieville - or "Iron Council" for a more overtly political plot (a Paris Commune type situation, Insurrectionism, Multi-species class solidarity). But the first one is a more enjoyable book IMO. "City and the City" is a shorter and less verbose book by him and I think it would also be of interest in regards to left-wing politics, it deals with ideology and borders and nationality in a spy-thriller type genre with some fantastic concepts (two cities occupy the same geographic space and law and custom dictate that people "unsee" the other city).
I just bought city & the city but haven't got round to reading it yet.
The only one i've read so far by china mieville was kraken which wasn't overtly political but had a big general strike of all the magic familiars.

[Devrim]

Science fiction has long been the realm of leftist writers. A Clockwork Orange
by Anthony Burgess is one of my favorites, as well as Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury and Brave New World by Aldous Huxley.

Burgess was quite an extreme right winger actually. His '1985' is a good example of his radib anti-working class beliefs.

Wiki says this about him:


Burgess was a Conservative (though, as he clarified in an interview with The Paris Review, his political views could be considered "a kind of anarchism" since his ideal of a "Catholic Jacobite imperial monarch" wasn't practicable[46]), a (lapsed) Catholic and Monarchist, harbouring a distaste for all republics. He believed that socialism for the most part was "ridiculous" but did "concede that socialized medicine is a priority in any civilized country today."

Devrim

[The Garbage Disposal Unit]

If you are in to experimental / post-modern lit. at all, I highly, highly, highly recommend Learning Processes with a Deadly Outcome by Alexander Kluge (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_Kluge). It has everything you could possibly want - space-facists, Maoists on the remains of post-nuclear war earth, non-stop mass executions, and more laugh out loud moments than is befitting of a novel where the "protagonists" (antiheroes) are Nazis.

[Tim Redd]

im really interested in reading some scifi about/involving leftist ideas. the closest ive come is 1984, but i wasnt really impressed with it so i wanna read some other stuff. what are your favorites? In Time (2011) is one if my favorite leftie sci-fi flicks: 9230
Justin Timberlake is the protagonist (meaning as defined by literary analysis he is the key character of interest) and Amanda Seyfried his girlfriend.

[Comrade Samuel]

Although it's leftist nature has been called into question many times on this website I still really liked the Hunger Games series.

[Jimmie Higgins]

Although it's leftist nature has been called into question many times on this website I still really liked the Hunger Games series.i've heard (from nonrevo friends incidentally) that the 2nd and 3rd books get both politically more intense but then also worse from a socialist perspective, but I haven't read them yet. I read the first one right before the movie came out though and I was like -- holy shit this is a kids book all about inequality and ruling class hegemony and ideology and shit! Even the way that there's viewpoint divides among the oppressed within a district is interesting.

Also to put in a sort of broad category ( Even moreso) I think any leftist should get a kick out of the Harry potter books for at the very least the subplots of Dolores umbridge, house elf rights, and dumbledoor's army. If those books had come out in the 50s, then in the 60s there would have been some militant group of young activists calling themselves d.a.
Edit: h.p.'s not really sci-fi though.



I just bought city & the city but haven't got round to reading it yet.
The only one i've read so far by china mieville was kraken which wasn't overtly political but had a big general strike of all the magic familiars.ha, yeah I have kraken, but haven't er krakened it open yet. (I'm truly sorry for that.) But it sounds like fun.

[khad]

The Culture series (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Culture_series)
A setting where AIs keep people around for entertainment value and people are so bored with their meaningless lives that they voluntarily euthanize themselves. Sounds swell.

[Tim Redd]

Although it's leftist nature has been called into question many times on this website I still really liked the Hunger Games series. It has some leftie points and exposes reality TV, but the central game to fight to be top dog is right wing.

[Lenina Rosenweg]

Stanislew Lem is supposed to be good., I've only read The Futurological Congress which didn't do much for me. It sem,s to have been meant as somewhat over the top satire.

The Strugatsky brothers Noon world is interesting

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noon_Universe

Its Hard To be A God is a classic. The Strugatskys haven't gone over well in the English speaking world because of poor translations and cultural barriers but they are worth a read.


Continuum is a US SF TV series which looks interesting. Its indirectly political-the reference point is a socialist world in 2077 and present day schemes of evil corporations to change historical timelines to ensure this world doesn't happen. I haven't followed it closely but it looks better made than most of the stuff on SyFy.

[Ceallach_the_Witch]

A setting where AIs keep people around for entertainment value and people are so bored with their meaningless lives that they voluntarily euthanize themselves. Sounds swell.
I wouldn't necessarily look at it that way tbh although certainly I can see where you're coming from.

I mean, consider this - the Culture is the ultimate post-need society - indeed, you could call it a post-want society, such is the scale of the Culture's exploitation of resources and technological proficiency. People are free to pursue their own creative interests and curiosities, for the most part - often what appears to be work turns out to be some kind of bizarre hobby.

I think the voluntary euthanasia part comes in due to the Culture's advanced science in terms of medicine. It is entirely possible and if I reccall correctly, is in fact mentioned in the books that your average person is theoretically non-senescent i.e capable of living indefinitely. That is a lot of time to fill, and I imagine most people would tire of life eventually (with the exception of a few characters who don't seem to mind living for millenia on end.)

[Rafiq]

Science fiction has long been the realm of leftist writers. Ray Bradbury

Oh

[4MyNation]

Defiance on ScyFy seems leftist.

[Popular Front of Judea]

Ray Bradbury among others would have been surprised to hear himself described as a "leftist". This is after all a man who voted for every Republican president starting with Nixon. He had kind words for both Reagan and Bush. He was a postwar liberal that became a neoconservative.

Hard pinning "leftist" on Huxley either. He did say some insightful things about consumerism. He was also quite the crank.


Science fiction has long been the realm of leftist writers. A Clockwork Orange
by Anthony Burgess is one of my favorites, as well as Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury and Brave New World by Aldous Huxley.

[Lenina Rosenweg]

A few more, FWIW

China Mountain Zhang by Maureen McHugh

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/China_Mountain_Zhang

Interestingly it was written in the early 90s shortly after the collapse of "actually existing socialism" and it has a positive view of communism. It takes place in the late 21st century when China is the number one world power and the US has had a communist revolution.It's made up of several slice of life stories of people whose lives intersect. and is essentially a coming of age story of a gay engineer/architect who develops a different form of Marxism. Its one of the few books I've read that make a communist America seem both very plausible and desirable.its light reading but quite moving.

On Wings of Song and Camp Concentration by Thomas Disch are good, while maybe not strictly leftist.The first one is hard to describe but is basically the story of a young man rebelling in a future repressive US Midwest and sort of a gay coming of age story although the sexuality of the main character isn't clear.

Camp Concentration is about an intellectual in a future fascistic America.Depressing but definitely worth reading.

[CyM]

It has some leftie points and exposes reality TV, but the central game to fight to be top dog is right wing.

Umm... that's the point. It's critiquing that gladiator slave thing. And then without giving too much away, there is a revolt provoked by it.

I think you didn't understand it if you think it is painting the games in a positive light.

[Thirsty Crow]

Stanislew Lem is supposed to be good., I've only read The Futurological Congress which didn't do much for me. It sem,s to have been meant as somewhat over the top satire.

I have to admit, my experience with science fiction is nonexistent.
But due to chance I had an encounter with Lem's theory of science fiction. It's quite rigid in that it poses the criterion of probability, and consequently of the close building on the world on extrapolations from current states of science and technology. Which would imply that good sci fi writers need to be scientists themselves or at least very well versed in relevant fields.

And as far as theory is concerned (yeah, I'm kinda hijacking the thread), another prominent theorist is Darko Suvin (probably the most prominent living theorist of sci fi), though what I read didn't seem to be grounded that well (ahistorical genre analysis). He also makes the distinction between sci fi and fantasy as one of relatively political character - one rooted in projection into the future, thus inherently tilted to progressive and leftist politics, and the other rooted in a regression of sorts (prime example, LotR).

[Popular Front of Judea]

Speaking of theory I just came across this good roundtable discussion between four progressive science fiction writers, Gwyneth Jones, Marge Piercy, Ken MacLeod and Kim Stanley Robinson.

http://www.redpepper.org.uk/other-worlds-are-possible-science-fiction-authors-roundtable/

[BigMoneyFast]

Science fiction has long been the realm of leftist writers. A Clockwork Orange
by Anthony Burgess is one of my favorites, as well as Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury and Brave New World by Aldous Huxley.
Friday Evening
September 6, 2013

Try: "I rode a Flying Saucer" by George Van Tassel, circa 1952.
However it's very very true!

Big Money Fast
in O-HI-O

[cyu]

http://www.truthdig.com/arts_culture/item/science_fiction_writer_ursula_k_le_guin_warns_agai nst_capitalism_20141122

We will need writers who can remember freedom. Poets, visionaries, the realists of a larger reality.

Right now we need writers who know the difference between production of a market commodity and the practice of an art. Developing written material to suit sales strategies in order to maximize corporate profits and advertising revenue is not the same thing as responsible book publishing and authorship. Yet I see sales departments given control over editorial. I see my own publishers in a panic of ignorance and greed, charging public libraries for an e-book six or seven times more than they charge customers. We just saw a profiteer try to punish a publisher for disobedience. And I see a lot of us who write the books and make the books, accepting this, letting commodity profiteers sell us like deodorant, and tell us what to publish and what to write.

We live in capitalism. Its power seems inescapable. So did the divine right of kings. Any human power can be resisted and changed by human beings.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

I wouldn't necessarily look at it that way tbh although certainly I can see where you're coming from.

I mean, consider this - the Culture is the ultimate post-need society - indeed, you could call it a post-want society, such is the scale of the Culture's exploitation of resources and technological proficiency. People are free to pursue their own creative interests and curiosities, for the most part - often what appears to be work turns out to be some kind of bizarre hobby.

I think the voluntary euthanasia part comes in due to the Culture's advanced science in terms of medicine. It is entirely possible and if I reccall correctly, is in fact mentioned in the books that your average person is theoretically non-senescent i.e capable of living indefinitely. That is a lot of time to fill, and I imagine most people would tire of life eventually (with the exception of a few characters who don't seem to mind living for millenia on end.)

Sure, but the thing is, the Culture is explicitly run by AI because its biological citizens, Banks sometimes implies, are just too damn stupid to know what's good for themselves (even as the AIs push them toward war with a force that would have broken them if not for a gigantic deus ex machina). Then there's the entire thing with interstellar war being a fairly common occurrence, and the Culture's subtle chauvinism toward "less advanced" species (e.g. their actions toward humanity in State of the Art). Honestly, I think the Culture is more of a liberal utopia than a socialist one.

To be honest, a lot of "leftist" science fiction is either:

(1) a criticism of the present society with few or no details about the sort of society the author supports; various kinds of liberals, religious nutjobs (*cough* Card *cough*) and other pond scum can write such work as well as socialists;

(2) outright creepy (H. G. "let's exterminate the coloured races" Wells) or subtly politically wrong (the Culture, Forever War with its weird rationing fetish);

(3) civics and future history porn in the same sense in which a lot of bad SF is technology description porn.

As for good examples, I would genuinely suggest some SF from the old Eastern Bloc. These writers are rarely explicit about it ("HELLO COMRADE DO YOU REMEMBER THE TIME OUR ANCESTORS GLORIOUSLY OVERTHREW THE BOURGEOISIE?"), but the world they portray is usually a genuinely communist one. Their vision has its flaws of course, but it's an interesting and vibrant tradition that is often unfairly ignored in favour of quite frankly inferior Western writers.

[Creative Destruction]

Jack London's Iron Heel was a good book. London himself wasn't that great of a socialism and seemed like more lip service than anything else, but the Iron Heel is a good story.

[Sewer Socialist]

As for good examples, I would genuinely suggest some SF from the old Eastern Bloc. These writers are rarely explicit about it ("HELLO COMRADE DO YOU REMEMBER THE TIME OUR ANCESTORS GLORIOUSLY OVERTHREW THE BOURGEOISIE?"), but the world they portray is usually a genuinely communist one. Their vision has its flaws of course, but it's an interesting and vibrant tradition that is often unfairly ignored in favour of quite frankly inferior Western writers.

Do you have any specific recommendations?

[Sasha]

Buroughs Cities of the Red Night is excellent and involves lots of anarchist and socialist concepts, more alternate history fantasy trip than sciencefiction though...

[Brandon's Impotent Rage]

The various works of the Strugatsky Brothers is a must read. Their works portrayed what a communist world would look like in the future, while at the same time making some subltle but pointed criticisms of the Soviet state.

[The Disillusionist]

H.G. WELLS!

Seriously.... H.G. Wells: Outspoken socialist, one of the fathers of science fiction, and one of the most important writers of all time, both in and out of the sci-fi world... Nobody has thought to mention him yet?

Oh, and spare me any hipster talk about Wells being overrated or secretely a Nazi or some garbage like that...

Edit: I see 870 beat me to the garbage. Wells was actually an outspoken anti-racist, and wrote a number of pieces denouncing racism and colonialism, even collaborating with Booker T. Washington for the chapter "The Tragedy of Colour" in his book, "The Future in America".

[Slavic]

Dune?

Not socialist, but depicts an exploited native population fighting off feudal space merchants.

Good read none the less. Also, mounting giant sand worms.

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y54/Reber/SpiceCat.jpg

[Brandon's Impotent Rage]

Many of the science fiction manga by Osamu Tezuka have a particularly strong (if subtle) leftist bent. It can be a bit sentimental at times, but still worth reading.

[Atsumari]

Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex series is not a promotion of left-wing politics imo, but it does have left-wing themes, mostly based in continental philosophy which surprises me in hindsight since continentalists have a habit of not merging with pop culture. Having Frederic Jameson's theories and name actually mentioned is pretty awesome.

The heroes in the show are cops and the second season is surrounded around defending the moderate right-wing prime minister of Japan. The opening dialogue explains them perfectly.

Perp: [after being chased down by the Major] You people are cops?! Now I know there’s no hope for justice in the system!
Major: If you’ve got a problem with the world, change yourself. If that's a problem, close your eyes, shut your mouth, and live like a hermit. And if that’s a problem… [cocks gun and presses it against his head]

Whenever I watch the show, I often relate it to my experience with reading Hegel. Both of them are not exactly friendly towards revolutionary ideas, obscure, but is compatible with all ideologies.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

H.G. WELLS!

Seriously.... H.G. Wells: Outspoken socialist, one of the fathers of science fiction, and one of the most important writers of all time, both in and out of the sci-fi world... Nobody has thought to mention him yet?

Oh, and spare me any hipster talk about Wells being overrated or secretely a Nazi or some garbage like that...

Edit: I see 870 beat me to the garbage. Wells was actually an outspoken anti-racist, and wrote a number of pieces denouncing racism and colonialism, even collaborating with Booker T. Washington for the chapter "The Tragedy of Colour" in his book, "The Future in America".

And yet, he also wrote this:

"The essential aspect of all this wild and windy business of the sexual relations is, after all, births. Upon this plain fact the people of the emergent New Republic will unhesitatingly go. The pre-eminent value of sexual questions in morality lies in the fact that the lives which will constitute the future are involved. If they are not involved, if we can dissociate this relationship from this issue, then sexual questions become of no more importance than the morality of one's deportment at chess, or the general morality of outdoor games. Indeed, then the question of sexual relationships would be entirely on all fours with, and probably very analogous to, the question of golf. In each case it would be for the medical man and the psychologist to decide how far the thing was wholesome and permissible, and how far it was an aggressive bad habit and an absorbing waste of time and energy. An able-bodied man continually addicted to love-making that had no result in offspring would be just as silly and morally objectionable as an able-bodied man who devoted his chief energies to hitting little balls over golf-links. But no more. Both would probably be wasting the lives of other human beings—the golfer must employ his caddie. It is entirely the matter of births, and a further consideration to be presently discussed, that makes this analogy untrue. It does not, however, make it so untrue as to do away with the probability that in many cases the emergent men of the new time will consider sterile gratification a moral and legitimate thing. St. Paul tells us that it is better to marry than to burn, but to beget children on that account will appear, I imagine, to these coming men as an absolutely loathsome proceeding. They will stifle no spread of knowledge that will diminish the swarming misery of childhood in the slums, they will regard the disinclination of the witless "Society" woman to become a mother as a most amiable trait in her folly. In our bashfulness about these things we talk an abominable lot of nonsense; all this uproar one hears about the Rapid Multiplication of the Unfit and the future of the lower races takes on an entirely different complexion directly we face known, if indelicate, facts. Most of the human types, that by civilized standards are undesirable, are quite willing to die out through such suppressions if the world will only encourage them a little. They multiply in sheer ignorance, but they do not desire multiplication even now, and they can easily be made to dread it. Sensuality aims not at life, but at itself. I believe that the men of the New Republic will deliberately shape their public policy along these lines. They will rout out and illuminate urban rookeries and all places where the base can drift to multiply; they will contrive a land legislation that will keep the black, or yellow, or mean-white squatter on the move; they will see to it that no parent can make a profit out of a child, so that childbearing shall cease to be a hopeful speculation for the unemployed poor; and they will make the maintenance of a child the first charge upon the parents who have brought it into the world. Only in this way can progress escape being clogged by the products of the security it creates. The development of science has lifted famine and pestilence from the shoulders of man, and it will yet lift war—for some other end than to give him a spell of promiscuous and finally cruel and horrible reproduction."

And:

"And how will the New Republic treat the inferior races? How will it deal with the black? how will it deal with the yellow man? how will it tackle that alleged termite in the civilized woodwork, the Jew? Certainly not as races at all. It will aim to establish, and it will at last, though probably only after a second century has passed, establish a world-state with a common language and a common rule. All over the world its roads, its standards, its laws, and its apparatus of control will run. It will, I have said, make the multiplication of those who fall behind a certain standard of social efficiency unpleasant and difficult, and it will have cast aside any coddling laws to save adult men from themselves.[52] It will tolerate no dark corners where the people of the Abyss may fester, no vast diffused slums of peasant proprietors, no stagnant plague-preserves. Whatever men may come into its efficient citizenship it will let come—white, black, red, or brown; the efficiency will be the test. And the Jew also it will treat as any other man. It is said that the Jew is incurably a parasite on the apparatus of credit. If there are parasites on the apparatus of credit, that is a reason for the legislative cleaning of the apparatus of credit, but it is no reason for the special treatment of the Jew. If the Jew has a certain incurable tendency to social parasitism, and we make social parasitism impossible, we shall abolish the Jew, and if he has not, there is no need to abolish the Jew. We are much more likely to find we have abolished the Caucasian solicitor. I really do not understand the exceptional attitude people take up against the Jews. There is something very ugly about many Jewish faces, but there are Gentile faces just as coarse and gross. The Jew asserts himself in relation to his nationality with a singular tactlessness, but it is hardly for the English to blame that. Many Jews are intensely vulgar in dress and bearing, materialistic in thought, and cunning and base in method, but no more so than many Gentiles. The Jew is mentally and physically precocious, and he ages and dies sooner than the average European, but in that and in a certain disingenuousness he is simply on all fours with the short, dark Welsh. He foregathers with those of his own nation, and favours them against the stranger, but so do the Scotch. I see nothing in his curious, dispersed nationality to dread or dislike. He is a remnant and legacy of mediævalism, a sentimentalist, perhaps, but no furtive plotter against the present progress of things. He was the mediæval Liberal; his persistent existence gave the lie to Catholic pretensions all through the days of their ascendency, and to-day he gives the lie to all our yapping "nationalisms," and sketches in his dispersed sympathies the coming of the world-state. He has never been known to burke a school. Much of the Jew's usury is no more than social scavenging. The Jew will probably lose much of his particularism, intermarry with Gentiles, and cease to be a physically distinct element in human affairs in a century or so. But much of his moral tradition will, I hope, never die.... And for the rest, those swarms of black, and brown, and dirty-white, and yellow people, who do not come into the new needs of efficiency?

Well, the world is a world, not a charitable institution, and I take it they will have to go. The whole tenor and meaning of the world, as I see it, is that they have to go. So far as they fail to develop sane, vigorous, and distinctive personalities for the great world of the future, it is their portion to die out and disappear."

(both from "Anticipations")

And at first, this does seem to be inconsistent with his remarks about how colour means nothing to him, etc. (although do note that many of these remarks were made in the context of the First World War and Wells's chauvinist argument that Britain can't leave "the black races" to "the Hohenzollerns"). But note who Wells actually targets: not the "black, and brown, and yellow", but those "inferior races", including the "dirty white" (the "dark Welshman" for example, which means Wells invented anti-Welsh racism far before RevLeft) who "do not come into the new needs of efficiency", the races he associates with "squatters" and so on. His racism is inexorably linked to his pro-capitalism, his anti-worker attitude, as it usually is. So of course, he, like Lovecraft, another notorious racist (who also considered himself a socialist of some description, although he would call the system his Great Race of Yith practiced a "fascistic socialism"), can tolerate some of the black, the brown and the yellow, as long as they are the aristocratic, landowner, bourgeois or professional element of these races.

And his "socialism" is so explicitly anti-democratic, anti-worker, something that Scott and others would develop into their semi-fascist "technocracy", that I'm surprised anyone would defend it.


Do you have any specific recommendations?

"The Noon Universe" novels by the brothers Strugatsky (their most famous work in the West, "Roadside Picnic", is outside that universe, and while it is one of the best SF works I have ever read, it occurs in capitalist Canada), and "Andromeda" by Efremov.

[Ethics Gradient, Traitor For All Ages]

The culture isn't intended to be a utopian society, Banks said so himself. The culture is a society that isn't capable of self-criticism, is hellbent on expansionism and is beyond the control of 90% of its population. Its utopian only in the minds of it's inhabitants but the reality of what it actually represents only filters in from the occasional perspective of characters who are not actually a part of it. I think it's supposed to represent something like the USSR in space rather than something readers should idealize.

[The Feral Underclass]

The State and Revolution -- Vlad Lenin.

[BIXX]

The State and Revolution -- Vlad Lenin.
#getrekt

[Collective Reasons]

Ken MacLeod and Kim Stanley Robinson are lots of fun. And Mack Reynolds wrote a stack of leftist space operas that range from excellent to minor but entertaining.

[Brandon's Impotent Rage]

Although it's not technically science fiction....I'd recommend the Gormenghast trilogy by author/poet/illustrator Mervyn Peake.

[Tim Redd]

Umm... that's the point. It's critiquing that gladiator slave thing. And then without giving too much away, there is a revolt provoked by it.

I think you didn't understand it if you think it is painting the games in a positive light.

If overall the games are being criticized why are the winners of the games made to be heroes?

[Ravn]

Anybody mention "Hard To Be God", by the Strugatsky Brothers?

[hiac]

I am strongly recommending Ken Macleod's books.

When I have looked about leftist literature, I have found that there are many novels which are practically conservative or even right-winged (conservative Terry Pratchett).

It was illumination, when I red first time Star Fraction by Ken Macleod. Singularity, smart gun, anarchistic enclaves, freedom and reason - interesting ideas, very helpful.

Also he write out idea of IWWW-webblies, Internet World Wide Workers - IT Union. After 40 years or so computing technologies development there are so few IT unions. Please consider 1905 in Europe where unions were strong and active.

[CyM]

If overall the games are being criticized why are the winners of the games made to be heroes?
Are the slaves not heroes? Was Spartacus not a hero, despite having killed other slaves as a gladiator before his revolt?

Don't willfully misunderstand the book just to be edgy.

[Lev Ulyanov]

Philip K. Dick is probably the best there is when it comes to sci-fi. His work isn't leftist as such, but it is very satirical and dystopian. See The Man in the High Castle (alternative history where Axis win WW2 (guess what, it's not much different) and Ubik.

[Ethics Gradient, Traitor For All Ages]

The world of man in the high castle is extremely different; Russia and the entire continent of Africa have been depopulated. That's probably his best written book, I love PKD but he's kind of a shit writer.

The penultimate truth is also a favorite

[motion denied]

History of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (Bolshevik) (http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1939/x01/), by J. V. Stalin

[Ethics Gradient, Traitor For All Ages]

Pfft more like costume drama

[pax et aequalitas]

One of my all time favorites is War with the Newts by Karel Čapek published in 1936. It is dark satire in which a race of intelligent newts get discovered. Throughout the book it makes fun of: colonialism, Nazis (Nordic newt master race), racism in America (newts getting lynched), the arms race, consumerism, etc.

I can really recommend it. It's a pretty funny book and yet sadly accurate and in a few cases prophetic.

[Hrafn]

If overall the games are being criticized why are the winners of the games made to be heroes?

Did you... read the books? At all?

Katniss & co. are the "heroes" of the story, yes, because they reject the games, and the system. Some other previous victors are highly sympathetic characters as well, all because of how abused and traumatized they have been by said games and system. The majority of victors, and absolutely everyone who actively strives to win the games, are presented far less benevolently.

[CyM]

Did you... read the books? At all?

Katniss & co. are the "heroes" of the story, yes, because they reject the games, and the system. Some other previous victors are highly sympathetic characters as well, all because of how abused and traumatized they have been by said games and system. The majority of victors, and absolutely everyone who actively strives to win the games, are presented far less benevolently.
I had to hold my tongue about reading comprehension. I think it's actually an issue of "hollywood made a movie and it's popular, so I hate it".

[BIXX]

(conservative Terry Pratchett).

I refuse to believe this. Please say it ain't so.

[BIXX]

I personally couldn't really get into the hunger games and I don't really care for the movies but seriously hating it just because it got popular is the most annoying thing.

[Lev Ulyanov]

Well, that's basically a lot of leftists' argument against postmodernism, is it not? Just because they're popular amongst a wide range of people.

[CyM]

Lev, no, we hate on postmodernism because it's idiotic, not because it's popular. It being popular only means we have to express how stupid it is even louder and more often than other stupid ideas which are less popular and therefore less of a problem.

[Ethics Gradient, Traitor For All Ages]

Who is we?

[hiac]

I find Pratchett conservative, because:
- his heroes are free individuals, but they are not interested to ask why. Look at the Ankh Morpork, they got aristocratic, peasants, workers and bourgoise, but there is no class struggle, everyone are happy, because they can be whatever they want due hard work (haha)
- Pratchett shows his views by Commander Vimes, Commander Vimes is conservative, does not believe in other man, but trust rich man. Yes, he is quite tough with rich criminals, but also against property violation.
- look at other cities or countries, no class struggle, everyone accept their place in world, every riot is from major offence, not intentional act, rather emotional,
- look at Witches, they help poor, but not ask why they are poor, it is for them natural way of life.

These are only a few points, but I think it is reasonable point of view.

[Invader Zim]

While true, that the final chapter of Anticipations is particularly grating for the modern reader, it is also the case that Wells wrote it in 1901, and then spent much of his remaining career making entirely different and more palettable arguments.

One only has to read The Future in America (1906) to see a marked evolution in his thinking. He also publically advocated against the treatment of the Scottsboro Boys. The issue is not that Well's at various points in his life was moulded by the typical and fashionable views of the day, the key questions are whether he overcame those views and whether he can be considered on balance to have been progressive? In both cases we can answer in the affirmative.

[Invader Zim]

I find Pratchett conservative, because:
- his heroes are free individuals, but they are not interested to ask why. Look at the Ankh Morpork, they got aristocratic, peasants, workers and bourgoise, but there is no class struggle, everyone are happy, because they can be whatever they want due hard work (haha)
- Pratchett shows his views by Commander Vimes, Commander Vimes is conservative, does not believe in other man, but trust rich man. Yes, he is quite tough with rich criminals, but also against property violation.
- look at other cities or countries, no class struggle, everyone accept their place in world, every riot is from major offence, not intentional act, rather emotional,
- look at Witches, they help poor, but not ask why they are poor, it is for them natural way of life.

These are only a few points, but I think it is reasonable point of view.


Your view is unreasonable because you have missed the point. Pratchett's universe is a pastiche that humorously explores archetypes of fantasy fiction, science fiction, historical fiction and fable. The entire point is that it is set against familiar environments, settings, tropes and literary devices. The aim is not to preach to the reader (which is apparently what you want) but to use fantasy fiction to humorously mirror existing literature and society back to the reader. If he didn't create his characters and universe in this fashion the jokes wouldn't work. The Guards books are a send up of the Hard Boiled genre, the Witches Shakesperian and fairy tale fabels, etc. Thus these books exist within a warped yet familiar rendition of stories and characters we are already familiar - and that's what makes them amusing. They are the same but different.

If you want to see another side to Pratchett, then you should read his fiction for younger audiences - the Bromeliad trilogy is a cutting critique of religion, while is Johnny series is as much a social commentary on suburban working class poverty in early 1990s Britain as they are tropes in science fiction.

[BIXX]

Your view is unreasonable because you have missed the point. Pratchett's universe is a pastiche that humorously explores archetypes of fantasy fiction, science fiction, historical fiction and fable. The entire point is that it is set against familiar environments, settings, tropes and literary devices. The aim is not to preach to the reader (which is apparently what you want) but to use fantasy fiction to humorously mirror existing literature and society back to the reader. If he didn't create his characters and universe in this fashion the jokes wouldn't work. The Guards books are a send up of the Hard Boiled genre, the Witches Shakesperian and fairy tale fabels, etc. Thus these books exist within a warped yet familiar rendition of stories and characters we are already familiar - and that's what makes them amusing. They are the same but different.

If you want to see another side to Pratchett, then you should read his fiction for younger audiences - the Bromeliad trilogy is a cutting critique of religion, while is Johnny series is as much a social commentary on suburban working class poverty in early 1990s Britain as they are tropes in science fiction.
Thank you sir, for saving my childhood.

[Invader Zim]

Thank you sir, for saving my childhood.


No problem. it is also worth pointing out that they are mostly also beautifully crafted stories, and that even if you don't 'get' the joke a lot of the time then you can still enjoy the books and get a lot from them.

Like you, I read a lot of Pratchett from the age of about 10-11 and came back to them several times over the course of my teenage years and 20s. I recently re-read a few of the early ones (for instance, I re-read Johnny and the Bomb because I was interested in modern depictions of the 'Home Front' in the Second World War and then started on the Discworld again because I was in the mood) and each time I re-read them more and more jokes become apparent that I hadn't noticed before. This is because I've read rather a lot more since I first read them so the references become clear. But as I say, you don't need that to still enjoy the books, whch is why Pratchett is such a remarkable author.

[Brandon's Impotent Rage]

I've heard many people recommend to me Cixin Liu's The Three Body Problem. Liu is a chinese sci-fi writer and engineer for a power plant in Shanxi. He also uses Marxist historical materialism in this particular title (and its two sequels in the trilogy). He also offers a rather pointed critique of the GPCR and its excesses, as well as a critique of those who would put ideological bias before scientific fact.

[The Idler]

I've started a sci-fi group here
http://www.revleft.com/vb/group.php?groupid=1288

[hiac]

Let me introduce you to discuss this topic

At Group SCI-FI, I have started a discussion about Pratchett
youknowwhat/vb/group.php?do=discuss&group=&discussionid=8111

[hiac]

Let me introduce to discussion on Sci-fi group

[Pawn Power]

Woman on the Edge of Time