The SFFaudio Podcast #044 – Jesse and Scott are joined by Professor Eric S. Rabkin of the University Of Michigan to discuss fairy tales, fantastic literature and Science Fiction.

Talked about on today’s show:
Department Of English Language And Literature @ the University Of Michigan, the Winter 2010 semester: English 342 Science Fiction, English 418/549 Graphic Narrative, hey sign us up!, The Teaching Company, Science Fiction: The Literature Of The Technological Imagination |READ OUR REVIEW|, Masterpieces of the Imaginative Mind: Literature’s Most Fantastic Works, Franz Kafka, H.G. Wells, Edgar Allan Poe, Science Fiction (the most important literature for adults), I, Robot by Isaac Asimov |READ OUR REVIEW|, Brothers Grimm, fairy tales, Neuromancer by William Gibson |READ OUR REVIEW|, Asimov’s three laws of robotics, the conversation that is Science Fiction, humans are pattern seeking animals, Starship Troopers by Robert A. Heinlein |READ OUR REVIEW|, The Forever War by Joe Haldeman |READ OUR REVIEW|, Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card |READ OUR REVIEW|, the ansible, Armor by John Steakley, Old Man’s War by John Scalzi |READ OUR REVIEW|, Gundam, The Ship Who Sang by Anne McCaffrey, Science Fiction as a form of children’s literature, Thomas Disch, Camp Concentration, 334, Kurt Vonnegut, The Plot Against America by Philip Roth, alternate history, Hugo Gernsback, pulp literature, paperback originals, adolescent power fantasies, Frank Reade and His Steam Man of the Plains by Noname, Ralph 124C 41+ by Hugo Gernsback, pushing science education through Science Fiction, The Time Machine by H.G. Wells |READ OUR REVIEW|, The Facts In The Case Of M. Valdemar by Edgar Allan Poe, From The Earth To The Moon by Jules Verne, Henry James and H.G. Wells in conversation over the future of fiction, The Portrait Of A Lady by Henry James, WWII, the societal effect of the G.I. Bill, tracking an author’s intentions, powerful fiction becomes classic?, Ted Chiang, Blankets by Craig Thompson, has Science Fiction crossed a certain cultural Rubicon?, Momento, Blindness by José Saramago, Briefing for a Descent into Hell by Doris Lessig, Galatea 2.2 by Richard Powers, has our culture become “fully Science Fictionized”?, does SF history begin with Frankenstein and end with Neuromancer?, Alan Moore, Watchmen, The League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen, pattern recognition, allusion (and literary allusion).

Posted by Jesse Willis