Allyssa Ellis

This week we are attempting to distinguish between writing in genre and writing that may use elements of the genre but that is essentially literary. Discuss this question in relation to the work(s) you read for this week. Do you think this is an important or necessary distinction, or not? Is your experience of the text affected by these questions? This short story to say the least was, disturbing. However, I do not think that disturbing, in this case, is necessarily bad. In The Aquatic Uncle by Italo Calvino, there are many boundaries and limits being pushed and bent. While this piece can likely be considered science fiction or fantasy short story, there is a certain amount of glory and risk in that it doesn't try that hard to be either of these things. It has the elements in science fiction through the biological nature of the story, and how much of it is based on a singular scientific theory. How this information is applied and reused is a completely different story. The disti

Discuss the types of reality rendered in the works you read and watched for this week's assignment. Describe the effects of this reality on the narrative and the implications for the presumed reader.  Mona Lisa Overdrive by William Gibson is a multi-narrative science fiction novel that takes place in what seems like the distant future. Like many other novels of this genre, the reader is thrown in without explanation and is constantly trying to keep up and figure out what's happening. While this was new and intriguing at the beginning of the novel, I found this very hard to follow throughout and stay interested in. The realities in this novel seem very convoluted and obscure, with terms like cyberspace and stims filling the scene. Every narrative in this novel has a completely different setting, and tone that for a long time in the book it seems as though they are not connected at all. I think that the effects of this technologically enhanced reality opens a lot of ideas fo

What does the future look like in 15 years? Everything is mostly the same. Advanced technology has progressed more and more. We have either signed a deal to switch to all-natural energy resources and have regenerated many dying species or gone in the opposite direction and destroyed the Earth even more. The water levels have continued to rise, causing most of the coastal areas to disappear and move people inland. Millions of more people have been displaced by a changing climate and economy, making overpopulation more of a problem in the "cooler" areas of the planet. Automation is in it's fullest form, causing little human interaction and resulting in problems of anxiety and public speaking to grow. I'm 35 years old, and I have made enough money to pay off my student loans or the department of education has decided to pay off student loan debt (how great would that be). I am a senior designer or CEO of my own design studio, using new programs and technology that did

Bloodchild  by Octavia Butler What is your reaction to the text you've just read? My reaction to Bloodchild by Octavia Butler is a mixed one. It seems as though there's a boundary between the so-called alien or Tlic's perspective and the human or Terran perspective. People that had witnessed the transformation of the society from it's original state to one that lives symbiotically with the Tlic's are much more resistant to the idea of the Tlics and may even despise them. Particularly the brother in the story that had seen the pain and even death that can come as a result of them implanting into people. The implanting itself is a very disturbing image that can result in a nauseous feeling. The image that comes to mind when they describe the worms crawling inside of people as Tlic's young babies is revolting. Although it begs the question of whether it's possible to have symbiotic relationships to this extent with other species, and is this something that

For this week, I read the short story Come to Venus Melancholy by Thomas M. Disch. The story had quite a bit of dark tones to it, as well as taking some time to understand. I think the element of surprise was something that played a big part in this story. Something that appears to be so normal, so close to what we know, can be the complete opposite. In this story, in the beginning, I thought that the character was monologuing about their life. The element of surprise here is that the "her" is a cyborg of sorts, that used to be a human, but is now a computer in a house. The second surprise is that the environment of the swamp isn't from planet Earth, it's on planet Venus. The final surprise was the cyborg's confession of both love and craziness. This was quite a short read and an interesting perspective since it's told from the cyborg's point of view. I feel like in many of these stories there is often a hero, and the story is narrated from that hero's

For this week I read The Star by Arthur C Clarke from 1956. One thing that I found interesting about this short story that I believe to be a theme in other pieces of the genre, is the acknowledgment of existential crisis. Everyone that is alive, thinks about how and when they will die. This usually is in accordance with "deep" thinking, outside of what we perceive and think of every day. This can and usually includes thinking about space and other civilizations beyond our own. This comes up in The Star as well. Although, in this situation, all of these mere speculations are true and can be seen through the character's eyes. We see that there is proof of other civilizations when they discover the monolith left behind by beings from another planet. We also are a part of the main character's thinking, in which he questions existence as well as his faith in God. We see that this scientist, astronomer, has a hard time separating scientific facts and proof with the belief i