Author | J. G. Ballard |
---|---|
Language | English |
Genre | Surrealism, Postmodernism, Science fiction |
Publisher | Jonathan Cape |
Publication date | 1979 |
Publication place | United Kingdom |
Media type | Print (Hardcover & Paperback) |
Pages | 223 |
ISBN | 0-09-976941-7 |
The Unlimited Dream Company is a novel by British writer J. G. Ballard, first published in 1979. It was nominated for the John W. Campbell Memorial Award in 1980. It won the British Science Fiction Association Award in the same year. [1]
In The Unlimited Dream Company, a man named Blake crashes a stolen aircraft into the River Thames outside the Surrey suburb of Shepperton. [2] Whether he survives the crash, to become a sort of supernatural messiah for the small town, or if he actually drowns, and dying, imagines the whole thing, is never truly revealed. [3] Contradictory hints are scattered throughout the novel which may support both interpretations.
Since the story is told by Blake in the first person, we know what he wants us to know, and we are only told what he chooses to tell us. In the first chapter of the novel, where Blake outlines his life before the air accident, there are elements that may make us suspect that he is insane, so that he is an absolutely unreliable narrator.
Blake has extraordinary powers: he can fly, heal sick people, phagocytize other people whenever he likes; but he cannot leave the suburbs, though he repeatedly tries to get away. Moreover, Blake is obsessed by the relic of the small Cessna aircraft that he crash-landed in, which has been left submerged in the Thames. This might support the hypothesis that he is dead and is only imagining the strange events of the story.
However, there is a crucial moment when Blake, who is about to absorb all the citizens of Shepperton in order to gain energy to escape the suburb, is shot by Stark, another loner who manages a rickety zoo. The wound triggers a deep inner change in the character, who gets rid of his cannibalistic drives and becomes more human and compassionate. He then helps other people to escape Shepperton, and remains there alone, waiting for the return of the woman he loves, Miriam St. Cloud.
As well as the protagonist's name, the novel draws on the works of William Blake, [4] particularly his epic work Milton: A Poem [5] in other ways. The surreal descriptions of Shepperton's transformation are drawn in part from William Blake's psychogeographical descriptions of London, while the final confrontation between Blake and the corpse of the drowned pilot (which he comes to realise is himself) echoes that between Milton and Satan at the end of Milton a Poem.
Crash is a novel by English author J. G. Ballard, first published in 1973 with cover designed by Bill Botten. It follows a group of car-crash fetishists who, inspired by the famous crashes of celebrities, become sexually aroused by staging and participating in car accidents.
James Graham Ballard was an English novelist and short-story writer, satirist and essayist known for psychologically provocative works of fiction that explore the relations between human psychology, technology, sex and mass media. Ballard first became associated with New Wave science fiction for post-apocalyptic novels such as The Drowned World (1962). He later courted controversy with the short-story collection The Atrocity Exhibition (1970), which includes the 1968 story "Why I Want to Fuck Ronald Reagan", and later the novel Crash (1973), a story about car-crash fetishists.
Christopher Riche Evans was a British psychologist, computer scientist, and author.
Christopher Mackenzie Priest was a British novelist and science fiction writer. His works include Fugue for a Darkening Island (1972), The Inverted World (1974), The Affirmation (1981), The Glamour (1984), The Prestige (1995), and The Separation (2002).
The Crystal World is a science fiction novel by English author J. G. Ballard, published in 1966. The novel tells the story of a physician trying to make his way deep into the jungle to a secluded leprosy treatment facility. While trying to make it to his destination, his chaotic path leads him to try to come to terms with an apocalyptic phenomenon in the jungle that crystallises everything it touches.
Shepperton is a village in the Spelthorne district, in north Surrey, England, around 15 mi (24 km) south west of central London. The settlement is on the north bank of the River Thames, between the towns of Chertsey and Sunbury-on-Thames. The village is mentioned in a document of 959 AD and in the Domesday Book.
Jack Dann is an American writer best known for his science fiction, as well as an editor and a writing teacher, who has lived in Australia since 1994. He has published over seventy books, the majority being as editor or co-editor of story anthologies in the science fiction, fantasy and horror genres. He has published nine novels, numerous shorter works of fiction, essays, and poetry, and his books have been translated into thirteen languages. His work, which includes fiction in the science fiction, fantasy, horror, magical realism, and historical and alternative history genres, has been compared to Jorge Luis Borges, Roald Dahl, Lewis Carroll, J. G. Ballard, and Philip K. Dick.
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The Drowned World (1962), by J. G. Ballard, is a British science fiction novel that depicts a post-apocalyptic future in which global warming, caused by increased solar radiation, has rendered uninhabitable much of the surface of planet Earth. The story follows a team of scientists who are researching the environmental developments that occurred in the flooded city of London. The novel is an expansion of the novella "The Drowned World", which was first published in Science Fiction Adventures magazine, in the January 1962 issue, Vol. 4, No. 24.
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William Blake's body of work has influenced countless writers, poets and painters, and his legacy is often apparent in modern popular culture. His artistic endeavours, which included songwriting in addition to writing, etching and painting, often espoused a sexual and imaginative freedom that has made him a uniquely influential figure, especially since the 1960s. After Shakespeare, far more than any other canonical writer, his songs have been set and adapted by popular musicians including U2, Jah Wobble, Tangerine Dream, Bruce Dickinson and Ulver. Folk musicians, such as M. Ward, have adapted or incorporated portions of his work in their music, and figures such as Bob Dylan, Alasdair Gray and Allen Ginsberg have been influenced by him. The genre of the graphic novel traces its origins to Blake's etched songs and Prophetic Books, as does the genre of fantasy art.
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Peter Ackroyd is an English biographer, novelist and critic with a specialist interest in the history and culture of London. For his novels about English history and culture and his biographies of, among others, William Blake, Charles Dickens, T. S. Eliot, Charlie Chaplin and Sir Thomas More, he won the Somerset Maugham Award and two Whitbread Awards. He is noted for the volume of work he has produced, the range of styles therein, his skill at assuming different voices, and the depth of his research.
"Now: Zero" is a short story by British author J. G. Ballard, released in 1959 in the December issue of Science Fantasy. It is included in The Complete Short Stories of J. G. Ballard: Volume 1.
Chronopolis and Other Stories is a 1971 collection of science fiction stories by British writer J. G. Ballard. Originally published in the United States by Putnam, it was reprinted in paperback in 1972 by Berkley Books, under the title Chronopolis, subtitled "The Science Fiction of J. G. Ballard."
Climate fiction is literature that deals with climate change. Generally speculative in nature but inspired by climate science, works of climate fiction may take place in the world as we know it, in the near future, or in fictional worlds experiencing climate change. The genre frequently includes science fiction and dystopian or utopian themes, imagining the potential futures based on how humanity responds to the impacts of climate change. Climate fiction typically involves anthropogenic climate change and other environmental issues as opposed to weather and disaster more generally. Technologies such as climate engineering or climate adaptation practices often feature prominently in works exploring their impacts on society.