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Metamorphoses of Science Fiction
Returning to print for the first time since the 1980s, Metamorphoses of Science Fiction is the origin point for decades of literary and theoretical criticism of science fiction and related genres. Darko Suvin's paradigm-setting definition of SF as "the literature of cognitive estrangement" established a robust theory of the genre that continues to spark fierce debate, as well as inspiring myriad intellectual descendants and disciples. Suvin's centuries-spanning history of the genre links SF to a long tradition of utopian and satirical literatures crying out for a better world than this one, showing how SF and the imagination of utopia are now forever intertwined. In addition to the 1979 text of the book, this edition contains three additional essays from Suvin that update, expand and reconsider the terms of his original intervention, as well as a new introduction and preface that situate the book in the context of the decades of SF studies that have followed in its wake.
336 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1979
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569 people want to read
About the author
Darko Suvin
54 books20 followersDarko Ronald Suvin (born Darko Šlesinger) is a Canadian academic, writer and critic who became a professor at McGill University in Montreal. He was born in Zagreb, which at the time was in Kingdom of Yugoslavia, now the capital of Croatia. After teaching at the Department for Comparative Literature at the Zagreb University, and writing his first books and poems in his native language (i.e., in the standardized Croatian variety of Serbo-Croatian), he left Yugoslavia in 1967, and started teaching at McGill University in 1968.
He is best known for several major works of criticism and literary history devoted to science fiction. He was editor of Science-Fiction Studies from 1973 to 1980. Since his retirement from McGill in 1999, he has lived in Lucca, Italy. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada (Academy of Humanities and Social Sciences).
In 2009, he received Croatian SFera Award for lifetime achievement in science fiction. He is also a member of the Croatian Writers Society (HDP)
In 2016, Suvin published a series of memoirs in the Croatian cultural journal Gordogan on his youth as a member of the Young Communist League of Yugoslavia during the Nazi occupation of Croatia and Yugoslavia and the first years of Josip Tito's Yugoslavia.
His 2016 book Splendour, Misery, and Potentialities: An X-ray of Socialist Yugoslavia (published in translation as Samo jednom se ljubi: radiografija SFR Jugoslavije in Belgrade in 2014, in two printings), an attempt at a dialectical history of socialist Yugoslavia, is widely quoted in most recent books and articles in the emerging field of "post-Yugoslav studies"
He is best known for several major works of criticism and literary history devoted to science fiction. He was editor of Science-Fiction Studies from 1973 to 1980. Since his retirement from McGill in 1999, he has lived in Lucca, Italy. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada (Academy of Humanities and Social Sciences).
In 2009, he received Croatian SFera Award for lifetime achievement in science fiction. He is also a member of the Croatian Writers Society (HDP)
In 2016, Suvin published a series of memoirs in the Croatian cultural journal Gordogan on his youth as a member of the Young Communist League of Yugoslavia during the Nazi occupation of Croatia and Yugoslavia and the first years of Josip Tito's Yugoslavia.
His 2016 book Splendour, Misery, and Potentialities: An X-ray of Socialist Yugoslavia (published in translation as Samo jednom se ljubi: radiografija SFR Jugoslavije in Belgrade in 2014, in two printings), an attempt at a dialectical history of socialist Yugoslavia, is widely quoted in most recent books and articles in the emerging field of "post-Yugoslav studies"
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June 5, 2021It would be hard to overestimate the influence that this book has had on SF criticism. It contains the pioneering formulations of the novum and of the notion of cognitive estrangement, which, for all the revisions and objections that they have received, remain two of the most useful additions to the SF critic's toolbox. Certainly an essential read for whoever wishes to dip their toes in the magical world of SF as it is discussed in academia.
November 24, 2021
Clásico entre los clásicos de los estudios literarios sobre la ciencia ficción. Me ha sorprendido por lo amena que es su lectura y la facilidad con la que se sigue el hilo argumentativo de Suvin. La verdad, me esperaba mayor opacidad académica. El libro tiene dos partes, en la primera el autor crea su marco teórico para el análisis y sistematización del género: el extrañamiento cognitivo que tienen en común todas las obras en contraposición al naturalismo de la literatura mimética. Y por otro lado el famoso novum, como aquel elemento disruptivo que es la base del extrañamiento cognitivo. En la segunda parte hace un recorrido por la historia de la (proto) ciencia ficción analizando las obras y los autores bajo el prisma de la metodología ya expuesta.
Evidentemente, el extrañamiento cognitivo y la existencia del novum ha sido puesta en cuestión por su incapacidad para abarcar todo el registro del género, pues ya sabemos que este es un género escurridizo que se resiste a ser encerrado totalmente en una sola estructura teórica. Pero es indudable su capacidad para abrir las puertas a una sistematización del género y a poder analizarlo con herramientas que han dado mucho de sí. Una lectura obligada.
Evidentemente, el extrañamiento cognitivo y la existencia del novum ha sido puesta en cuestión por su incapacidad para abarcar todo el registro del género, pues ya sabemos que este es un género escurridizo que se resiste a ser encerrado totalmente en una sola estructura teórica. Pero es indudable su capacidad para abrir las puertas a una sistematización del género y a poder analizarlo con herramientas que han dado mucho de sí. Una lectura obligada.
January 13, 2021
Truly brilliant. Famous within the field for its concept of cognitive estrangement and novum, this is a highly intelligent and beautifully written piece of work. Metamorphoses of Science Fiction easily cements Suvin's place in the tradition of science fiction critique, building upon Eliot, Lukacs, Auerbach, Bloch, and Brecht and inspiring Jameson and Moylan. I might hope to join them!
May 1, 2013
If you ever want to understand science fiction or swim in the sea of literary criticism regarding this genre I'd say this is the starting point. It is no wonder authors such as Fredric Jameson have said that the field of science fiction studies is divided in pre and post-Suvin. His idea of cognitive estrangement helps us understand the difference between its "cousins" (such as fantasy fiction and utopian fiction) and the validity of the genre as a cultural form dedicated to deal with the modern anxieties.
December 4, 2017
Korisno, svakako pročitajte ako se bavite temom znanstvene fantastike i fantastičnog.
May 13, 2017
Profil
Zagreb, 2010.
Kul knjiga.
Suvin je jezično jako razigran. Stil mu je živahan, agilan i kreativan. Dosta je razumljiv, piše poput Žižeka ili, recimo, Fukuyame, očigledno je da mu je SF njegova simpatija. ;)
Ova knjiga je napisana izvorno na engleskom jeziku. Hrvatski prijevod ima par grešaka, vjerojatno tipfelera, kao na primjer sljedeće; "sa iskustvima". Njeni dobrže.
I znam da se po pravopisu, našem, prvi apostrof treba pisati dolje, no meni je to prejeftino. Moji kratkosvrti na ovoj društvenoj mreži slijede moj vlastiti ilirski pravopis.
Neću iznositi teorijski sadržaj knjige. Samo bih napomenuo da Suvin baca, u ovom štivu, jako puno novovjekovnih preteča SF-a koji se čine da jako puno obećavaju, ali baš jako.
To mi je jebeno. Kada pročitam jednu knjigu, preko nje mogu čitati još dvadeset. Ovo je jedna od takvih knjiga.
Pa-pa!
Zagreb, 2010.
Kul knjiga.
Suvin je jezično jako razigran. Stil mu je živahan, agilan i kreativan. Dosta je razumljiv, piše poput Žižeka ili, recimo, Fukuyame, očigledno je da mu je SF njegova simpatija. ;)
Ova knjiga je napisana izvorno na engleskom jeziku. Hrvatski prijevod ima par grešaka, vjerojatno tipfelera, kao na primjer sljedeće; "sa iskustvima". Njeni dobrže.
I znam da se po pravopisu, našem, prvi apostrof treba pisati dolje, no meni je to prejeftino. Moji kratkosvrti na ovoj društvenoj mreži slijede moj vlastiti ilirski pravopis.
Neću iznositi teorijski sadržaj knjige. Samo bih napomenuo da Suvin baca, u ovom štivu, jako puno novovjekovnih preteča SF-a koji se čine da jako puno obećavaju, ali baš jako.
To mi je jebeno. Kada pročitam jednu knjigu, preko nje mogu čitati još dvadeset. Ovo je jedna od takvih knjiga.
Pa-pa!
Read
June 5, 2019(spoilers about Godzilla: King of the Monsters (2019)) this book was supremely helpful in building a framework for thinking about SF, much in the way being thrown blindfolded into a body of water and figuring out if it is a pond or a pool via context clues is helpful in building a framework for thinking about bodies of water. i have no idea what i just drank, but it's certainly having some sort of effect on m'brain. suvin doesn't contextualize the works he references and analyzes, so if you haven't read or even heard of some the works this can be a very challenging book. no harm in that; clearly a man who wrote this for himself and his academic peers, so. I think my issues comprehending this book is also, frankly, that Suvin's methodology is a little wanting in a way i can't quite put my finger on. I guess he just says shit, or his anecdotal evidences don't resonate beyond the specific, or something.
key takeaways:
- more context for what 'cognitive' means when suvin talks about science fiction being the literature of cognitive estrangement! big breakthrough for me. he explicitly says cognition isn't scientific facts, but a scientific method applied to consuming SF. "the presence of scientific cognition as the sign of a method identical to that of a modern philosophy of science", "SF both requires and allows" ... "a methodically systematic cognition". I'm taking this to mean dream-logic is valid, as long as it is consistent, if it is 'hardy' enough. I can see why later in his career he caves about whether fantasy can be SF. i can see why he has the instinct to draw this hard line. I will say that a measure of 'sufficient' cognitiveness feels very personal (as per delaney's claim that the reader's memory/personal experiences are the real benchmark here), contingent on a reader's background, contemporary science, etc.
- "utopianism" as a measuring tape of how 'successful' SF is - does it criticize existing social systems? make readers see it in a new light, and consider how it could be different than how it is (more socialist?)? i love how confidently suvin applies this metric which effectively downgrades basically every piece of science fiction written during the libertarian Golden Age 'cause their politics are so bad it renders them 'unsuccessful'. Suck my nuts, Heinlein.
- suvin is hysterically confident and pompous about his takes, and draws a hard line. he doesn't fully address a piece on its own terms, and instead sees an ideal SF piece that perfectly utilizes novum and cognition to estrange, superimposed onto the actual, imperfect, piece. for example, instead of working *with* the film to figure out how Ghidora being an alien from space and therefore an 'unnatural' bad guy fits into "Godzilla: King of the Monster"'s larger themes of how something destructive and inhuman can and should be accepted into the natural order, Suvin would probably write it off as a weakness of the film, a failure of "scientific" consistency in the messaging. his position to do this is very historical; he mentions tsarist censors, and american chauvinism, and technocratic propaganda, as things that can warp an author's utopian and SF visions. i like this approach, probably too much.
- suvin is very focused on the effect of estrangement being to promote reflection, and criticism, of existing power structures, etc. i think delaney's criticism that suvin is too focused on the reflective aspect, neglecting how estrangement points to potentialities that are ahead, rings a little true here. like, yes, Godzilla: King of the Monsters (2019) is supposed to make you reflect on how humans relate to nature (exploiting it, hurting it), but it also importantly points to a different relationship, one of co-existence and cooperation (if you nurture godzilla, godzilla nurtures you). however, suvin has other essays about 'the horizon' that science fiction can hearken towards that, i think, expounds on the future aspect of SF/estrangement.
- i lost my ABSOLUTE SHIT about "The ... Wellsian structure of science fiction is a mutation of scientific into aesthetic cognition". His example of this is The Time Machine, an inversion of the Social Darwinism everyone around Wells was hot about at the time. Social Darwinism: upper class rightfully rules over and predates on the lower class. Time Machine: Morlocks (lower) eat Eloi (upper). Social Darwinism: a constant evolution upwards. Time Machine: a devolution towards the humanless heat death of the universe. It's like a metaphor, but not exactly, right? Not all SF hangs onto this technique, but this observation feels resonant to both Suvin and Delaney's observations that the cognitive estranging component of SF makes it more similar to poetry than to fantasy, in this absolutely breathtaking way. How many poems have you read that pull at some 'science' fact and unspool it into something more generalized, personal, sociological? Scientific theories and social-psychological paradigms are more interlinked than science bros let on and suvin is just a cool validation of this instinct poets have to aestheticize scientific frameworks and i am so here for it. The novum becomes clearer in relation to the 'Wellsian' model; it is a refraction of existing science in our world that reorganizes the entire science fiction world.
don't read this book, but at least let me babble incoherently to you about it.
key takeaways:
- more context for what 'cognitive' means when suvin talks about science fiction being the literature of cognitive estrangement! big breakthrough for me. he explicitly says cognition isn't scientific facts, but a scientific method applied to consuming SF. "the presence of scientific cognition as the sign of a method identical to that of a modern philosophy of science", "SF both requires and allows" ... "a methodically systematic cognition". I'm taking this to mean dream-logic is valid, as long as it is consistent, if it is 'hardy' enough. I can see why later in his career he caves about whether fantasy can be SF. i can see why he has the instinct to draw this hard line. I will say that a measure of 'sufficient' cognitiveness feels very personal (as per delaney's claim that the reader's memory/personal experiences are the real benchmark here), contingent on a reader's background, contemporary science, etc.
- "utopianism" as a measuring tape of how 'successful' SF is - does it criticize existing social systems? make readers see it in a new light, and consider how it could be different than how it is (more socialist?)? i love how confidently suvin applies this metric which effectively downgrades basically every piece of science fiction written during the libertarian Golden Age 'cause their politics are so bad it renders them 'unsuccessful'. Suck my nuts, Heinlein.
- suvin is hysterically confident and pompous about his takes, and draws a hard line. he doesn't fully address a piece on its own terms, and instead sees an ideal SF piece that perfectly utilizes novum and cognition to estrange, superimposed onto the actual, imperfect, piece. for example, instead of working *with* the film to figure out how Ghidora being an alien from space and therefore an 'unnatural' bad guy fits into "Godzilla: King of the Monster"'s larger themes of how something destructive and inhuman can and should be accepted into the natural order, Suvin would probably write it off as a weakness of the film, a failure of "scientific" consistency in the messaging. his position to do this is very historical; he mentions tsarist censors, and american chauvinism, and technocratic propaganda, as things that can warp an author's utopian and SF visions. i like this approach, probably too much.
- suvin is very focused on the effect of estrangement being to promote reflection, and criticism, of existing power structures, etc. i think delaney's criticism that suvin is too focused on the reflective aspect, neglecting how estrangement points to potentialities that are ahead, rings a little true here. like, yes, Godzilla: King of the Monsters (2019) is supposed to make you reflect on how humans relate to nature (exploiting it, hurting it), but it also importantly points to a different relationship, one of co-existence and cooperation (if you nurture godzilla, godzilla nurtures you). however, suvin has other essays about 'the horizon' that science fiction can hearken towards that, i think, expounds on the future aspect of SF/estrangement.
- i lost my ABSOLUTE SHIT about "The ... Wellsian structure of science fiction is a mutation of scientific into aesthetic cognition". His example of this is The Time Machine, an inversion of the Social Darwinism everyone around Wells was hot about at the time. Social Darwinism: upper class rightfully rules over and predates on the lower class. Time Machine: Morlocks (lower) eat Eloi (upper). Social Darwinism: a constant evolution upwards. Time Machine: a devolution towards the humanless heat death of the universe. It's like a metaphor, but not exactly, right? Not all SF hangs onto this technique, but this observation feels resonant to both Suvin and Delaney's observations that the cognitive estranging component of SF makes it more similar to poetry than to fantasy, in this absolutely breathtaking way. How many poems have you read that pull at some 'science' fact and unspool it into something more generalized, personal, sociological? Scientific theories and social-psychological paradigms are more interlinked than science bros let on and suvin is just a cool validation of this instinct poets have to aestheticize scientific frameworks and i am so here for it. The novum becomes clearer in relation to the 'Wellsian' model; it is a refraction of existing science in our world that reorganizes the entire science fiction world.
don't read this book, but at least let me babble incoherently to you about it.
January 13, 2022
Forse primo saggio di critica letteraria della fantascienza non intesa come "sotto-letteratura". Ho trovato molto interessante la definizione che Darko Suvin dà relativamente alla "fantascienza". Essa è intesa come «letteratura dello straniamento cognitivo», legata, cioè, a un «novum» che produce, appunto, quello "straniamento" in quanto rappresenta, in toto o in parte, una realtà (un dispositivo, un alieno, un mondo, etc.), storicamente collocabile, immaginata dall'autore e diversa da quella "empirica" che lui o il lettore potrebbero esperire. Questo fenomeno di "straniamento" che la narrazione fantascientifica è in grado di produrre, che è intimamente associato tuttavia al possibile, porta con sé anche una dimensione «cognitiva e creativa», in quanto spinge il lettore a una riflessione su un'analogia che è posta dall'autore stesso (ovverosia, quella tra "realtà empirica" vs. "realtà immaginata + novum"). In queste si possono sintetizzare, a grandi linee, le caratteristiche che Suvin associa alla letteratura fantascientifica.
January 7, 2019
Izvrstan pregled povijesti SF-a i perspektiva žanra koja mi je poprilično bliska. Jedino je povremeno teško prohodna kad se radi o manje poznatim djelima.
Read
July 25, 2019A bit stageist about the ideology of SF, maybe even "hard SF chauvinist," but it's compellingly written.
May 28, 2020
i really enjoyed this book. i put off reading it for a while because i worried about it being too "dense" or whatever, but i found suvin's writing style extremely clear, readable, and interesting, and this book was really enjoyable to read because of that.
the first four chapters are an overview of suvin's argument for a definition of science fiction (SF) as "a literary genre whose necessary and sufficient conditions are the presence and interaction of estrangement and cognition, and whose main formal device is an imaginative framework alternative to the author’s empirical environment" (what a mouthful). to put it (maybe) more simply: SF is a genre marked by the narrative domination of a "novum" (novel idea/new thing) validated by cognitive logic (reductively: science, incuding physics and biology but also sociology, anthropology, linguistics, and other "soft" sciences) whose presence determines the course of the story and in doing so estranges the author/reader from their own society by comparison to this alternative society. suvin discusses what SF is not (fantasy, folktale, fairytale, space operas, etc.) and what earlier genres/forms contributed to SF (especially utopian stories, satire, and anticipations).
the rest of the book is a historical overview of western SF literature through the world wars, which i found informative and highly entertaining, the analysis sharp and unflinching as it discussed Swift, More, Shelley, Wells, Capek, and tons of others.
suvin is widely regarded as the landmark theorist of SF literary theory, with the field often being divided colloquially into "pre-" and "post-suvin." as a lover & wannabe writer of SF, i rly loved this book and resonated with its argument that SF is the genre best-situated to conceptualize alternative worlds/realities and possible futures--that it is a genre imbued with ethico-political liberation; an escape from constrictive old norms into a different and alternative timestream; a device for historical estrangement, imagination, and dealienation. all social justice organizing is, after all, science fiction; and all significant SF is a commentary or dialogue in some form on our current society.
the first four chapters are an overview of suvin's argument for a definition of science fiction (SF) as "a literary genre whose necessary and sufficient conditions are the presence and interaction of estrangement and cognition, and whose main formal device is an imaginative framework alternative to the author’s empirical environment" (what a mouthful). to put it (maybe) more simply: SF is a genre marked by the narrative domination of a "novum" (novel idea/new thing) validated by cognitive logic (reductively: science, incuding physics and biology but also sociology, anthropology, linguistics, and other "soft" sciences) whose presence determines the course of the story and in doing so estranges the author/reader from their own society by comparison to this alternative society. suvin discusses what SF is not (fantasy, folktale, fairytale, space operas, etc.) and what earlier genres/forms contributed to SF (especially utopian stories, satire, and anticipations).
the rest of the book is a historical overview of western SF literature through the world wars, which i found informative and highly entertaining, the analysis sharp and unflinching as it discussed Swift, More, Shelley, Wells, Capek, and tons of others.
suvin is widely regarded as the landmark theorist of SF literary theory, with the field often being divided colloquially into "pre-" and "post-suvin." as a lover & wannabe writer of SF, i rly loved this book and resonated with its argument that SF is the genre best-situated to conceptualize alternative worlds/realities and possible futures--that it is a genre imbued with ethico-political liberation; an escape from constrictive old norms into a different and alternative timestream; a device for historical estrangement, imagination, and dealienation. all social justice organizing is, after all, science fiction; and all significant SF is a commentary or dialogue in some form on our current society.
July 15, 2024
Hay una versión traducida al español de este libro que recomiendo solo después de haberlo leído en inglés, sobre todo porque en su versión en español se pierde mucho del cuerpo teórico de Suvin e incluso llega a parecer un ensayo de opinión. La primera mitad me parece que es la que contiene la mayor parte teórica y la segunda mitad es una suerte de reseñas de algunos autores y libros como Wells, Kapek o Iván Yefremov. Su apuesta por la utopía me parece hermosa.
February 12, 2025
Suvin's work on cognitive estrangement is phenomenal. The book is not as tough a read as I'd imagined, given its age, but the novels being referenced are limited in their relevance today, so it's not something to read in isolation.
October 1, 2022
Thought-provoking and informative.
October 21, 2016
science fiction theory - novum
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