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Posthuman Gothic

Posthuman Gothic

Anya Heise-von der Lippe

(2017)

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Book Details

Abstract

Posthuman Gothic is an edited collection of thirteen chapters, and offers a structured, dialogical contribution to the discussion of the posthuman Gothic. Contributors explore the various ways in which posthuman thought intersects with Gothic textuality and mediality. The texts and media under discussion – from I am Legend to In the Flesh, and from Star Trek to The Truman Show, transgress the boundaries of genre, moving beyond the traditional scope of the Gothic. These texts, the contributors argue, destabilise ideas of the human in a number of ways. By confronting humanity and its Others, they introduce new perspectives on what we traditionally perceive as human. Drawing on key texts of both Gothic and posthumanist theory, the contributors explore such varied themes as posthuman vampire and zombie narratives, genetically modified posthumans, the posthuman in video games, film and TV, the posthuman as a return to nature, the posthuman’s relation to classic monster narratives, and posthuman biohorror and theories of prometheanism and accelerationism. In its entirety, the volume offers a first attempt at addressing the various intersections of the posthuman and the Gothic in contemporary literature and media.


Table of Contents

Section Title Page Action Price
Front Cover\r Front Cover
Title Page\r iii
Copyright Page\r iv
Contents\r v
Acknowledgements vii
Notes on Contributors ix
Introduction: Post/human/Gothic 1
Part I: Organic 17
1. Zombie Apocalypse and the Conundrum of Posthumanity in David Wong’s Novels 19
2. Of Crakers and Men: Imagining the Future and Rethinking the Past in Margaret Atwood’s MaddAddam Trilogy 36
3. Of Posthuman Vampires: Science, Blood and Becoming-With 54
Part II: Undead 75
4. ‘Lovie – is the vampire so bad?’: Posthuman Rhetoric in Richard Matheson’s I am Legend 77
5. Coexistence and Hospitality: The Gothic Utopian Vision of True Blood 93
6. Forging Posthuman Identities in Dominic Mitchell’s In the Flesh 109
7. More than Human: Reading the Doppelgänger and Female Monstrosity in Television Vampires 125
Part III: Evolving 143
8. There’s Something in There: The Posthuman Gothic Mind/Body Divide in Jane Campion’s Top of the Lake 145
9. Still Alive: Understanding Femininity in Valve’s Portal Games 161
10. Patchwork Girls: Reflections of Lost Female Identity in LouiseO’Neill’s Only Ever Yours 177
Part IV: Reimagined 197
11. Being Virtual: The True (Posthu)man Show 199
12. The Posthuman Monstrous can only be Gothic, or Screening Alien Sex Fiends 215
13. Gothic Inhumanism: Prometheanism, Nanotechnology, Accelerationism 231
Bibliography 249
Index 265
Back Cover\r Back Cover