by Ted Gioia
For most of us, our first introduction to the
concept of magic is through the stories told
us by our elders. As we grow up, we
typically leave these tales behind. Yet even
as we congratulate ourselves for embracing
a world of invigorating realism and stark
practicalities, we realize that something is
lost. Our connection to our own
past, to the previous generations,
and to the magic of unconstrained
imagination—these are all linked
together through such narratives.
For this reason the stories of
childhood are often remembered
more vividly than the actual
quotidian events of our earliest
years.
Natalia Stefanovic, the narrator
for much of Téa Obreht's novel The Tiger's
Wife, has been profoundly shaken by news
of her grandfather's death, and finds herself
returning to the fanciful stories he had
related to her of his own past. These
accounts seem so true-to-life, despite their
fantastic elements, that Natalia is driven to
probe deeper into her grandfather's personal
history in a quest to uncover the
biographical roots of his improbable
narratives. The line between the
imaginative excesses of storytelling and the
brutish facts of modern reality begin to blur
almost from the start of Obreht's novel—and
the border between fact and fiction is still
left largely undefended even at the
conclusion of this masterful work.
The same cannot be said for the other
borders dealt with in The Tiger's Wife. The
novel is set against the backdrop of the
Balkan wars that splintered the former
Yugoslavia and devastated the combating
parties. Their conflicts seems both timeless
and endless. "When your fight has purpose—
to free you of something, to interfere on
behalf of an innocent—it has a hope of
finality," writes Obreht, who was born in
Belgrade in 1985, but left at age seven and
spent much of her youth in the United
States. "When the fight is about unraveling—
when it is about your name, the places to
which your blood is anchored, the
attachment of your name to some landmark
or event—there is nothing but hate, and the
long, slow progression of people who feed
on it and are fed it, meticulously, by the
ones who came before them."
Think of these as narrative and counter-
narrative. On the one hand, we find the
fairy tales of youth, accounts that feed our
imagination and broaden our horizons.
Opposed to these are the historic
resentments and antagonisms—also handed
down to us in the form of stories from our
elders—which constrain our world view and
disfigure our emotional attachments. Both
kinds of stories play a role in The Tiger's
Wife, one constitutive and liberating, the
other destructive and self-immolating.
Both Natalia and her grandfather are
doctors, and the constant bloodshed
resulting from bombings, land-mines, and
combat, as well as the dislocations and
disease that spread in their aftermath, bring
the medical profession into constant contact
with the turmoil and violence of the era. In
this context, Natalia's grandfather shares
with her the story of his encounters with
Gavran Gailé "the deathless man"—loosely
based on Koschei the deathless, a folktale
hero from Eastern Europe—a mysterious
figure who, like the doctors and caregivers,
is drawn to locales where violence is
prevalent and lifespans are short.
The grandfather encounters the deathless
man several times over a period of decades.
At the first meeting, Gailé has literally risen
from his coffin—Twilight fans take note!—
and is shot two times in the head by a
mourner who doesn't want to see the
funeral canceled. But even these bullet
wounds are insufficient to lay low the
deathless man. Natalia’s grandfather is
stunned by Gailé's unwillingness to receive
medical treatment, and even more amazed
when the risen corpse insists that he cannot
die, although he can predict when others are
about to meet their end.
The story of the deathless man is presented
alongside a tale about the "tiger's wife"—
another dark and fantastic story from the
grandfather’s past. During his childhood
years, a tiger escaped from a distant zoo
settles in the outskirts of town. The
residents are fearful, and all their efforts to
kill or capture the tiger are unsuccessful.
Yet a deaf-mute, married to the local
butcher, seems to have some special
relationship with the tiger, apparently
meeting up with the wild animal late at
night when the rest of the village is asleep.
When the butcher disappears, and the wife
shows signs of pregnancy, dark tales start to
spread, filled with rumor, superstition and
accusation—the woman murdered her
husband….or had the tiger kill him….the
child in her belly is the tiger’s…or the
devil's…or perhaps both.
The grandfather is drawn both to the
woman, and to the tiger. His prized
possession is a copy of Kipling’s The Jungle
Book, and the arrival of the tiger in the
village seems like a story out of the book
come true—again Obreht blurs the line
between fantastic fiction and reality. When
a famous hunter comes to the village,
hoping to kill the tiger, the boy is frantic. He
wants to intervene, and save both the tiger
and the "tiger’s wife," but is uncertain how
he can halt the inevitable tragedy he sees
looming in the near future.
Obreht presents these tales from the past
against the context of Natalia's activities in
the aftermath of her grandfather’s death.
She is treating orphans housed at a
monastery when she hears the news, and is
determined to make the trek to the place of
his death and retrieve his personal effects.
In the course of this journey, she becomes
convinced that her grandfather, in his final
days, had been seeking out the deathless
man. As part of her attempt to find both
solace and closure, she too sets out in search
of Gavran Gailé.
The Tiger's Wife is fanciful and heartrending
by turns, and it reminds me of many of the
masterpieces of magical realism—such as
One Hundred Years of Solitude, Midnight's
Children and The Tin Drum—in its striking
juxtaposition of dark chapters in actual
history books with the stuff of myths and
legends. I am especially impressed by
Obreht's ability to hold back at key
junctures, allowing her narrative to advance
by means of hints and silences rather than
through detail and exposition. She shows
tremendous restraint for such a young
writer (she was only 25 when this novel was
published), and embraces a pleasing sort of
ambiguity, one that in the hands of a lesser
author would be mere vagueness. At the
end of this book, you will be left with more
than a few unanswered questions, and even
the "facts" that have been presented with
reasonable clarity are susceptible to
reinterpretation or a symbolic reading.
But what is irreducible is the allure of the
magic and the power of the human
connection, which are both presented in
various forms and guises in The Tiger's
Wife. This is an imaginative book that
expands our sense of the possible, but also a
thought-provoking work about different
levels of responsibility—of child to elder, of
doctor to patient, of people to animals, of
races and religions to each other. This is a
novel of caring and compassion, but not in a
sentimental or stereotypical fashion, rather
in a way grounded on both myth and
history. In short, Téa Obreht is a young
woman who has delivered a frighteningly
mature book. The fact that much of it is
presented with overtones of a fairy tale or a
story for children only makes it all the more
impressive.
For most of us, our first introduction to the
concept of magic is through the stories told
us by our elders. As we grow up, we
typically leave these tales behind. Yet even
as we congratulate ourselves for embracing
a world of invigorating realism and stark
practicalities, we realize that something is
lost. Our connection to our own
past, to the previous generations,
and to the magic of unconstrained
imagination—these are all linked
together through such narratives.
For this reason the stories of
childhood are often remembered
more vividly than the actual
quotidian events of our earliest
years.
Natalia Stefanovic, the narrator
for much of Téa Obreht's novel The Tiger's
Wife, has been profoundly shaken by news
of her grandfather's death, and finds herself
returning to the fanciful stories he had
related to her of his own past. These
accounts seem so true-to-life, despite their
fantastic elements, that Natalia is driven to
probe deeper into her grandfather's personal
history in a quest to uncover the
biographical roots of his improbable
narratives. The line between the
imaginative excesses of storytelling and the
brutish facts of modern reality begin to blur
almost from the start of Obreht's novel—and
the border between fact and fiction is still
left largely undefended even at the
conclusion of this masterful work.
The same cannot be said for the other
borders dealt with in The Tiger's Wife. The
novel is set against the backdrop of the
Balkan wars that splintered the former
Yugoslavia and devastated the combating
parties. Their conflicts seems both timeless
and endless. "When your fight has purpose—
to free you of something, to interfere on
behalf of an innocent—it has a hope of
finality," writes Obreht, who was born in
Belgrade in 1985, but left at age seven and
spent much of her youth in the United
States. "When the fight is about unraveling—
when it is about your name, the places to
which your blood is anchored, the
attachment of your name to some landmark
or event—there is nothing but hate, and the
long, slow progression of people who feed
on it and are fed it, meticulously, by the
ones who came before them."
Think of these as narrative and counter-
narrative. On the one hand, we find the
fairy tales of youth, accounts that feed our
imagination and broaden our horizons.
Opposed to these are the historic
resentments and antagonisms—also handed
down to us in the form of stories from our
elders—which constrain our world view and
disfigure our emotional attachments. Both
kinds of stories play a role in The Tiger's
Wife, one constitutive and liberating, the
other destructive and self-immolating.
Both Natalia and her grandfather are
doctors, and the constant bloodshed
resulting from bombings, land-mines, and
combat, as well as the dislocations and
disease that spread in their aftermath, bring
the medical profession into constant contact
with the turmoil and violence of the era. In
this context, Natalia's grandfather shares
with her the story of his encounters with
Gavran Gailé "the deathless man"—loosely
based on Koschei the deathless, a folktale
hero from Eastern Europe—a mysterious
figure who, like the doctors and caregivers,
is drawn to locales where violence is
prevalent and lifespans are short.
The grandfather encounters the deathless
man several times over a period of decades.
At the first meeting, Gailé has literally risen
from his coffin—Twilight fans take note!—
and is shot two times in the head by a
mourner who doesn't want to see the
funeral canceled. But even these bullet
wounds are insufficient to lay low the
deathless man. Natalia’s grandfather is
stunned by Gailé's unwillingness to receive
medical treatment, and even more amazed
when the risen corpse insists that he cannot
die, although he can predict when others are
about to meet their end.
The story of the deathless man is presented
alongside a tale about the "tiger's wife"—
another dark and fantastic story from the
grandfather’s past. During his childhood
years, a tiger escaped from a distant zoo
settles in the outskirts of town. The
residents are fearful, and all their efforts to
kill or capture the tiger are unsuccessful.
Yet a deaf-mute, married to the local
butcher, seems to have some special
relationship with the tiger, apparently
meeting up with the wild animal late at
night when the rest of the village is asleep.
When the butcher disappears, and the wife
shows signs of pregnancy, dark tales start to
spread, filled with rumor, superstition and
accusation—the woman murdered her
husband….or had the tiger kill him….the
child in her belly is the tiger’s…or the
devil's…or perhaps both.
The grandfather is drawn both to the
woman, and to the tiger. His prized
possession is a copy of Kipling’s The Jungle
Book, and the arrival of the tiger in the
village seems like a story out of the book
come true—again Obreht blurs the line
between fantastic fiction and reality. When
a famous hunter comes to the village,
hoping to kill the tiger, the boy is frantic. He
wants to intervene, and save both the tiger
and the "tiger’s wife," but is uncertain how
he can halt the inevitable tragedy he sees
looming in the near future.
Obreht presents these tales from the past
against the context of Natalia's activities in
the aftermath of her grandfather’s death.
She is treating orphans housed at a
monastery when she hears the news, and is
determined to make the trek to the place of
his death and retrieve his personal effects.
In the course of this journey, she becomes
convinced that her grandfather, in his final
days, had been seeking out the deathless
man. As part of her attempt to find both
solace and closure, she too sets out in search
of Gavran Gailé.
The Tiger's Wife is fanciful and heartrending
by turns, and it reminds me of many of the
masterpieces of magical realism—such as
One Hundred Years of Solitude, Midnight's
Children and The Tin Drum—in its striking
juxtaposition of dark chapters in actual
history books with the stuff of myths and
legends. I am especially impressed by
Obreht's ability to hold back at key
junctures, allowing her narrative to advance
by means of hints and silences rather than
through detail and exposition. She shows
tremendous restraint for such a young
writer (she was only 25 when this novel was
published), and embraces a pleasing sort of
ambiguity, one that in the hands of a lesser
author would be mere vagueness. At the
end of this book, you will be left with more
than a few unanswered questions, and even
the "facts" that have been presented with
reasonable clarity are susceptible to
reinterpretation or a symbolic reading.
But what is irreducible is the allure of the
magic and the power of the human
connection, which are both presented in
various forms and guises in The Tiger's
Wife. This is an imaginative book that
expands our sense of the possible, but also a
thought-provoking work about different
levels of responsibility—of child to elder, of
doctor to patient, of people to animals, of
races and religions to each other. This is a
novel of caring and compassion, but not in a
sentimental or stereotypical fashion, rather
in a way grounded on both myth and
history. In short, Téa Obreht is a young
woman who has delivered a frighteningly
mature book. The fact that much of it is
presented with overtones of a fairy tale or a
story for children only makes it all the more
impressive.
| THE YEAR OF MAGICAL READING The Tiger's Wife by Téa Obreht |
Click on image to purchase
| The Year of Magical Reading (click here) |
| conceptual fiction Exploring the Non-Realist Tradition in Fiction |
reading. Each week during the
course of 2012, I will explore an
important work of fiction that
incorporates elements of magic,
fantasy or the surreal. My choices
will cross conventional boundary
lines of genre, style and historical
period—indeed, one of my intentions
in this project is to show how the
conventional labels applied to these
works have become constraining,
deadening and misleading.
In its earliest days, storytelling almost
always partook of the magical. Only
in recent years have we segregated
works arising from this venerable
tradition into publishing industry
categories such as "magical realism"
or "paranormal" or "fantasy" or some
other 'genre' pigeonhole. These
labels are not without their value, but
too often they have blinded us to the
rich and multidimensional heritage
beyond category that these works
share.
This larger heritage is mimicked in
our individual lives: most of us first
experienced the joys of narrative
fiction through stories of myth and
magic, the fanciful and
phantasmagorical; but only a very
few retain into adulthood this sense
of the kind of enchantment possible
only through storytelling. As such,
revisiting this stream of fiction from a
mature, literate perspective both
broadens our horizons and allows us
to recapture some of that magic in
our imaginative lives.
The Year of Magical Reading:
Week 1: Midnight's Children by
Salman Rushdie
Week 2: The House of the Spirits by
Isabel Allende
Week 3: The Witches of Eastwick
by John Updike
Week 4: Magic for Beginners by
Kelly Link
Week 5: The Tin Drum by Günter
Grass
Week 6: The Golden Ass by
Apuleius
Week 7: The Tiger's Wife by Téa
Obreht
Week 8: One Hundred Years of
Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez
Week 9: The Book of Laughter and
Forgetting by Milan Kundera
Week 10: Gargantua and Pantagruel
by François Rabelais
Week 11: The Famished Road by
Ben Okri
Week 12: Like Water for Chocolate
by Laura Esquivel
Week 13: Winter's Tale by Mark
Helprin
Week 14: Dhalgren by Samuel R.
Delany
Week 15: Johnathan Strange & Mr.
Norrell by Susanna Clarke
Week 16: The Master and
Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov
Week 17: Dangerous Laughter by
Steven Millhauser
Week 18: Conjure Wife by Fritz
Leiber
Week 19: 1Q84 by Haruki Murakami
Week 20: The Hobbit by J.R.R.
Tolkien
Week 21: Aura by Carlos Fuentes
Week 22: Dr. Faustus by Thomas
Mann
Week 23: Orlando by Virginia Woolf
Week 24: Little, Big by John Crowley
Week 25: The White Hotel by D.M.
Thomas
Week 26: Neverwhere by Neil
Gaiman
Week 27: Alice's Adventures in
Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
Week 28: Fifth Business by
Robertson Davies
Week 29: The Kingdom of This
World by Alejo Carpentier
Week 30: The Bear Comes Home
by Rafi Zabor
Week 31: The Color of Magic by
Terry Pratchett
Week 32: Ficciones by Jorge Luis
Borges
Week 33: Beloved by Toni Morrison
Week 34: Dona Flor and Her Two
Husbands by Jorge Amado
Week 35: Hard-Boiled Wonderland
and the End of the World by Haruki
Murakami
Week 36: What Dreams May Come
by Richard Matheson
Week 37: Practical Magic by Alice
Hoffman
Week 38: Blindess by José
Saramago
Week 39: The Fortress of Solitude
by Jonathan Lethem
Week 40: The Magicians by Lev
Grossman
Week 41: Suddenly, A Knock at the
Door by Etgar Keret
Week 42: Cloudstreet by Tim Winton
Week 43: The Obscene Bird of
NIght by José Donoso
Week 44: The Fifty Year Sword by
Mark Z. Danielewski
Week 45: Gulliver's Travels by
Jonathan Swift
Week 46: Harry Potter and the
Sorcerer's Stone by J.K. Rowling
Week 47: The End of the Affair by
Graham Greene
Week 48: The Chronicles of Narnia
by C.S. Lewis
Week 49: Hieroglyphic Tales by
Horace Walpole
Week 50: The View from the
Seventh Layer by Kevin Brockmeier
Week 51: Gods Without Men by
Hari Kunzru
Week 52: At Swim-Two-Birds by
Flann O'Brien
course of 2012, I will explore an
important work of fiction that
incorporates elements of magic,
fantasy or the surreal. My choices
will cross conventional boundary
lines of genre, style and historical
period—indeed, one of my intentions
in this project is to show how the
conventional labels applied to these
works have become constraining,
deadening and misleading.
In its earliest days, storytelling almost
always partook of the magical. Only
in recent years have we segregated
works arising from this venerable
tradition into publishing industry
categories such as "magical realism"
or "paranormal" or "fantasy" or some
other 'genre' pigeonhole. These
labels are not without their value, but
too often they have blinded us to the
rich and multidimensional heritage
beyond category that these works
share.
This larger heritage is mimicked in
our individual lives: most of us first
experienced the joys of narrative
fiction through stories of myth and
magic, the fanciful and
phantasmagorical; but only a very
few retain into adulthood this sense
of the kind of enchantment possible
only through storytelling. As such,
revisiting this stream of fiction from a
mature, literate perspective both
broadens our horizons and allows us
to recapture some of that magic in
our imaginative lives.
The Year of Magical Reading:
Week 1: Midnight's Children by
Salman Rushdie
Week 2: The House of the Spirits by
Isabel Allende
Week 3: The Witches of Eastwick
by John Updike
Week 4: Magic for Beginners by
Kelly Link
Week 5: The Tin Drum by Günter
Grass
Week 6: The Golden Ass by
Apuleius
Week 7: The Tiger's Wife by Téa
Obreht
Week 8: One Hundred Years of
Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez
Week 9: The Book of Laughter and
Forgetting by Milan Kundera
Week 10: Gargantua and Pantagruel
by François Rabelais
Week 11: The Famished Road by
Ben Okri
Week 12: Like Water for Chocolate
by Laura Esquivel
Week 13: Winter's Tale by Mark
Helprin
Week 14: Dhalgren by Samuel R.
Delany
Week 15: Johnathan Strange & Mr.
Norrell by Susanna Clarke
Week 16: The Master and
Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov
Week 17: Dangerous Laughter by
Steven Millhauser
Week 18: Conjure Wife by Fritz
Leiber
Week 19: 1Q84 by Haruki Murakami
Week 20: The Hobbit by J.R.R.
Tolkien
Week 21: Aura by Carlos Fuentes
Week 22: Dr. Faustus by Thomas
Mann
Week 23: Orlando by Virginia Woolf
Week 24: Little, Big by John Crowley
Week 25: The White Hotel by D.M.
Thomas
Week 26: Neverwhere by Neil
Gaiman
Week 27: Alice's Adventures in
Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
Week 28: Fifth Business by
Robertson Davies
Week 29: The Kingdom of This
World by Alejo Carpentier
Week 30: The Bear Comes Home
by Rafi Zabor
Week 31: The Color of Magic by
Terry Pratchett
Week 32: Ficciones by Jorge Luis
Borges
Week 33: Beloved by Toni Morrison
Week 34: Dona Flor and Her Two
Husbands by Jorge Amado
Week 35: Hard-Boiled Wonderland
and the End of the World by Haruki
Murakami
Week 36: What Dreams May Come
by Richard Matheson
Week 37: Practical Magic by Alice
Hoffman
Week 38: Blindess by José
Saramago
Week 39: The Fortress of Solitude
by Jonathan Lethem
Week 40: The Magicians by Lev
Grossman
Week 41: Suddenly, A Knock at the
Door by Etgar Keret
Week 42: Cloudstreet by Tim Winton
Week 43: The Obscene Bird of
NIght by José Donoso
Week 44: The Fifty Year Sword by
Mark Z. Danielewski
Week 45: Gulliver's Travels by
Jonathan Swift
Week 46: Harry Potter and the
Sorcerer's Stone by J.K. Rowling
Week 47: The End of the Affair by
Graham Greene
Week 48: The Chronicles of Narnia
by C.S. Lewis
Week 49: Hieroglyphic Tales by
Horace Walpole
Week 50: The View from the
Seventh Layer by Kevin Brockmeier
Week 51: Gods Without Men by
Hari Kunzru
Week 52: At Swim-Two-Birds by
Flann O'Brien
Follow Ted Gioia on Twitter at
www.twitter.com/tedgioia
Conceptual Fiction:
A Reading List
(with links to essays on each work)
Home Page
Abbott, Edwin A.
Flatland
Adams, Douglas
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
Aldiss, Brian
Barefoot in the Head
Aldiss, Brian
Hothouse
Aldiss, Brian
Report on Probability A
Allende, Isabel
The House of the Spirits
Amado, Jorge
Dona Flor and Her Two Husbands
Amis, Martin
Time's Arrow
Apuleius
The Golden Ass
Asimov, Isaac
The Foundation Trilogy
Asimov, Isaac
I, Robot
Atwood, Margaret
The Handmaid's Tale
Banks, Iain M.
The State of the Art
Ballard, J.G.
The Atrocity Exhibition
Ballard, J.G.
Crash
Ballard, J.G.
The Crystal World
Ballard, J.G.
The Drowned World
Barth, John
Giles Goat-Boy
Bester, Alfred
The Demolished Man
Blish, James
A Case of Conscience
Borges, Jorge Luis
Ficciones
Bradbury, Ray
Dandelion Wine
Bradbury, Ray
Fahrenheit 451
Bradbury, Ray
The Illustrated Man
Bradbury, Ray
The Martian Chronicles
Bradbury, Ray
Something Wicked This Way Comes
Brockmeier, Kevin
The View from the Seventh Layer
Bulgakov, Mikhail
The Master and Margarita
Bunch, David R.
Moderan
Burgess, Anthony
A Clockwork Orange
Card, Orson Scott
Ender's Game
Carpentier, Alejo
The Kingdom of This World
Carroll, Lewis
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
Chabon, Michael
The Yiddish Policemen's Union
Chiang, Ted
Stories of Your Life and Others
Clarke, Arthur C.
Childhood's End
Clarke, Arthur C.
A Fall of Moondust
Clarke, Arthur C.
2001: A Space Odyssey
Clarke, Susanna
Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell
Crowley, John
Little, Big
Danielewski, Mark Z.
The Fifty Year Sword
Danielewski, Mark Z.
House of Leaves
Davies, Robertson
Fifth Business
Delany, Samuel R.
Babel-17
Delany, Samuel R.
Dhalgren
Delany, Samuel R.
The Einstein Intersection
Delany, Samuel R.
Nova
Dick, Philip K.
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
Dick, Philip K.
Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said
Dick, Philip K.
The Man in the High Castle
Dick, Philip K.
Ubik
Dick, Philip K.
VALIS
Disch, Thomas M.
Camp Concentration
Disch, Thomas M.
The Genocides
Doctorow, Cory
Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom
Donoso, José
The Obscene Bird of Night
Ellison, Harlan (editor)
Dangerous Visions
Ellison, Harlan
I Have No Mouth & I Must Scream
Esquivel, Laura
Like Water for Chocolate
Farmer, Philip José
To Your Scattered Bodies Go
Fuentes, Carlos
Aura
Gaiman, Neil
American Gods
Gaiman, Neil
Neverwhere
Gibson, William
Burning Chrome
Gibson, William
Neuromancer
Grass, Günter
The Tin Drum
Greene, Graham
The End of the Affair
Grossman, Lev
The Magicians
Haldeman, Joe
The Forever War
Hall, Steven
The Raw Shark Texts
Harrison, M. John
The Centauri Device
Harrison, M. John
Light
Heinlein, Robert
The Moon is a Harsh Mistress
Heinlein, Robert:
Stranger in a Strange Land
Heinlein, Robert
Time Enough for Love
Helprin, Mark
Winter's Tale
Herbert, Frank
Dune
Hoffman, Alice
Practical Magic
Huxley, Aldous
Brave New World
Keret, Etgar
Suddenly, A Knock at the Door
Keyes, Daniel
Flowers for Algernon
Kundera, Milan
The Book of Laughter and Forgetting
Kunzru, Hari
Gods Without Men
Lafferty, R.A.
Nine Hundred Grandmothers
Le Guin, Ursula K.
The Dispossessed
Le Guin, Ursula K.
The Lathe of Heaven
Le Guin, Ursula K.
The Left Hand of Darkness
Leiber, Fritz
The Big Time
Leiber, Fritz
Conjure Wife
Leiber, Fritz
Swords & Deviltry
Leiber, Fritz
The Wanderer
Lem, Stanislaw
His Master's Voice
Lem, Stanislaw
Solaris
Lethem, Jonathan
The Fortress of Solitude
Lewis, C. S.
The Chronicles of Narnia
Link, Kelly
Magic for Beginners
Malzberg, Barry N.
Herovit's World
Mann, Thomas
Doctor Faustus
Márquez, Gabriel García
100 Years of Solitude
Markson, David
Wittgenstein's Mistress
Matheson, Richard
Hell House
Matheson, Richard
What Dreams May Come
McCarthy, Cormac
The Road
Miéville, China
Perdido Street Station
Miller, Jr., Walter M.
A Canticle for Leibowitz
Millhauser, Steven
Dangerous Laughter
Mitchell, David
Cloud Atlas
Moorcock, Michael
Behold the Man
Moorcock, Michael
The Final Programme
Morrison, Toni
Beloved
Murakami, Haruki
1Q84
Murakami, Haruki
Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the
End of the World
Nabokov, Vladimir
Ada, or Ardor
Niffenegger, Audrey
The Time Traveler's Wife
Niven, Larry
Ringworld
Noon, Jeff
Vurt
Obreht, Téa
The Tiger's Wife
O'Brien, Flann
At Swim-Two-Birds
Okri, Ben
The Famished Road
Percy, Walker
Love in the Ruins
Pohl, Frederik
Gateway
Pratchett, Terry
The Color of Magic
Pynchon, Thomas
Gravity's Rainbow
Rabelais, François
Gargantua and Pantagruel
Robinson, Kim Stanley
Red Mars
Rowling, J.K.
Harry Potter & the Sorcerer's Stone
Rushdie, Salman
Midnight's Children
Russ, Joanna
The Female Man
Saramago, José
Blindness
Sheckley, Robert
Dimension of Miracles
Sheckley, Robert
Mindswap
Sheckley, Robert
Store of the Worlds
Shelley, Mary
Frankenstein
Silverberg, Robert
Dying Inside
Silverberg, Robert
Nightwings
Silverberg, Robert
The World Inside
Simak, Clifford
City
Simak, Clifford
The Trouble with Tycho
Smith, Cordwainer
Norstrilia
Smith, Cordwainer
The Rediscovery of Man
Stephenson, Neal
Snow Crash
Spinrad, Norman
Bug Jack Barron
Stross, Charles
Glasshouse
Sturgeon, Theodore
More Than Human
Sturgeon, Theodore
Some of Your Blood
Swift, Jonathan
Gulliver's Travels
Thomas, D.M.
The White Hotel
Tiptree, Jr., James
Warm Worlds and Otherwise
Tolkien, J.R.R.
The Hobbit
Updike, John
The Witches of Eastwick
Van Vogt, A.E.
The Mixed Men
Van Vogt, A.E.
Slan
Van Vogt, A.E.
The Voyage of the Space Beagle
Van Vogt, A.E.
The World of Null A
Vance, Jack
Emphyrio
Verne, Jules
Around the Moon
Verne, Jules
From the Earth to the Moon
Verne, Jules:
Journey to the Center of the Earth
Vonnegut, Kurt
Cat's Cradle
Vonnegut, Kurt
The Sirens of Titan
Vonnegut, Kurt
Slaughterhouse-Five
Wallace, David Foster
Infinite Jest
Walpole, Horace
Hieroglyphic Tales
Wells, H.G.
The First Men in the Moon
Wells, H.G.
The Island of Dr. Moreau
Wells, H.G.
The Time Machine
Wilson, Robert Anton & Robert Shea
The Illuminatus! Trilogy
Winton, Tim
Cloudstreet
Woolf, Virginia
Orlando
Zabor, Rafi
The Bear Comes Home
Zelazny, Roger
Lord of Light
Zelazny, Roger
This Immortal
Special Features
Notes on Conceptual Fiction
When Science Fiction Grew Up
Ray Bradbury: A Tribute
The Year of Magical Reading
Remembering Fritz Leiber
A Tribute to Richard Matheson
Samuel Delany's 70th birthday
The Sci-Fi of Kurt Vonnegut
Curse You, Neil Armstrong!
Robert Heinlein at 100
A.E, van Vogt Tribute
The Puzzling Case of Robert Sheckley
The Avant-Garde Sci-Fi of Brian Aldiss
Science Fiction 1958-1975: A Reading List
Links to related sites
The New Canon
Great Books Guide
Postmodern Mystery
Fractious Fiction
Ted Gioia's web site
Ted Gioia on Twitter
SF Site
io9
Graeme's Fantasy Book Review
Los Angeles Review of Books
The Millions
Big Dumb Object
SF Novelists
More Words, Deeper Hole
The Misread City
Reviews and Responses
SF Signal
True Science Fiction
Tor blog
Disclosure: Conceptual Fiction
and its sister sites may receive review
copies and promotional materials from
publishers, authors, publicists or other
parties.
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Conceptual Fiction:
A Reading List
(with links to essays on each work)
Home Page
Abbott, Edwin A.
Flatland
Adams, Douglas
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
Aldiss, Brian
Barefoot in the Head
Aldiss, Brian
Hothouse
Aldiss, Brian
Report on Probability A
Allende, Isabel
The House of the Spirits
Amado, Jorge
Dona Flor and Her Two Husbands
Amis, Martin
Time's Arrow
Apuleius
The Golden Ass
Asimov, Isaac
The Foundation Trilogy
Asimov, Isaac
I, Robot
Atwood, Margaret
The Handmaid's Tale
Banks, Iain M.
The State of the Art
Ballard, J.G.
The Atrocity Exhibition
Ballard, J.G.
Crash
Ballard, J.G.
The Crystal World
Ballard, J.G.
The Drowned World
Barth, John
Giles Goat-Boy
Bester, Alfred
The Demolished Man
Blish, James
A Case of Conscience
Borges, Jorge Luis
Ficciones
Bradbury, Ray
Dandelion Wine
Bradbury, Ray
Fahrenheit 451
Bradbury, Ray
The Illustrated Man
Bradbury, Ray
The Martian Chronicles
Bradbury, Ray
Something Wicked This Way Comes
Brockmeier, Kevin
The View from the Seventh Layer
Bulgakov, Mikhail
The Master and Margarita
Bunch, David R.
Moderan
Burgess, Anthony
A Clockwork Orange
Card, Orson Scott
Ender's Game
Carpentier, Alejo
The Kingdom of This World
Carroll, Lewis
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
Chabon, Michael
The Yiddish Policemen's Union
Chiang, Ted
Stories of Your Life and Others
Clarke, Arthur C.
Childhood's End
Clarke, Arthur C.
A Fall of Moondust
Clarke, Arthur C.
2001: A Space Odyssey
Clarke, Susanna
Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell
Crowley, John
Little, Big
Danielewski, Mark Z.
The Fifty Year Sword
Danielewski, Mark Z.
House of Leaves
Davies, Robertson
Fifth Business
Delany, Samuel R.
Babel-17
Delany, Samuel R.
Dhalgren
Delany, Samuel R.
The Einstein Intersection
Delany, Samuel R.
Nova
Dick, Philip K.
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
Dick, Philip K.
Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said
Dick, Philip K.
The Man in the High Castle
Dick, Philip K.
Ubik
Dick, Philip K.
VALIS
Disch, Thomas M.
Camp Concentration
Disch, Thomas M.
The Genocides
Doctorow, Cory
Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom
Donoso, José
The Obscene Bird of Night
Ellison, Harlan (editor)
Dangerous Visions
Ellison, Harlan
I Have No Mouth & I Must Scream
Esquivel, Laura
Like Water for Chocolate
Farmer, Philip José
To Your Scattered Bodies Go
Fuentes, Carlos
Aura
Gaiman, Neil
American Gods
Gaiman, Neil
Neverwhere
Gibson, William
Burning Chrome
Gibson, William
Neuromancer
Grass, Günter
The Tin Drum
Greene, Graham
The End of the Affair
Grossman, Lev
The Magicians
Haldeman, Joe
The Forever War
Hall, Steven
The Raw Shark Texts
Harrison, M. John
The Centauri Device
Harrison, M. John
Light
Heinlein, Robert
The Moon is a Harsh Mistress
Heinlein, Robert:
Stranger in a Strange Land
Heinlein, Robert
Time Enough for Love
Helprin, Mark
Winter's Tale
Herbert, Frank
Dune
Hoffman, Alice
Practical Magic
Huxley, Aldous
Brave New World
Keret, Etgar
Suddenly, A Knock at the Door
Keyes, Daniel
Flowers for Algernon
Kundera, Milan
The Book of Laughter and Forgetting
Kunzru, Hari
Gods Without Men
Lafferty, R.A.
Nine Hundred Grandmothers
Le Guin, Ursula K.
The Dispossessed
Le Guin, Ursula K.
The Lathe of Heaven
Le Guin, Ursula K.
The Left Hand of Darkness
Leiber, Fritz
The Big Time
Leiber, Fritz
Conjure Wife
Leiber, Fritz
Swords & Deviltry
Leiber, Fritz
The Wanderer
Lem, Stanislaw
His Master's Voice
Lem, Stanislaw
Solaris
Lethem, Jonathan
The Fortress of Solitude
Lewis, C. S.
The Chronicles of Narnia
Link, Kelly
Magic for Beginners
Malzberg, Barry N.
Herovit's World
Mann, Thomas
Doctor Faustus
Márquez, Gabriel García
100 Years of Solitude
Markson, David
Wittgenstein's Mistress
Matheson, Richard
Hell House
Matheson, Richard
What Dreams May Come
McCarthy, Cormac
The Road
Miéville, China
Perdido Street Station
Miller, Jr., Walter M.
A Canticle for Leibowitz
Millhauser, Steven
Dangerous Laughter
Mitchell, David
Cloud Atlas
Moorcock, Michael
Behold the Man
Moorcock, Michael
The Final Programme
Morrison, Toni
Beloved
Murakami, Haruki
1Q84
Murakami, Haruki
Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the
End of the World
Nabokov, Vladimir
Ada, or Ardor
Niffenegger, Audrey
The Time Traveler's Wife
Niven, Larry
Ringworld
Noon, Jeff
Vurt
Obreht, Téa
The Tiger's Wife
O'Brien, Flann
At Swim-Two-Birds
Okri, Ben
The Famished Road
Percy, Walker
Love in the Ruins
Pohl, Frederik
Gateway
Pratchett, Terry
The Color of Magic
Pynchon, Thomas
Gravity's Rainbow
Rabelais, François
Gargantua and Pantagruel
Robinson, Kim Stanley
Red Mars
Rowling, J.K.
Harry Potter & the Sorcerer's Stone
Rushdie, Salman
Midnight's Children
Russ, Joanna
The Female Man
Saramago, José
Blindness
Sheckley, Robert
Dimension of Miracles
Sheckley, Robert
Mindswap
Sheckley, Robert
Store of the Worlds
Shelley, Mary
Frankenstein
Silverberg, Robert
Dying Inside
Silverberg, Robert
Nightwings
Silverberg, Robert
The World Inside
Simak, Clifford
City
Simak, Clifford
The Trouble with Tycho
Smith, Cordwainer
Norstrilia
Smith, Cordwainer
The Rediscovery of Man
Stephenson, Neal
Snow Crash
Spinrad, Norman
Bug Jack Barron
Stross, Charles
Glasshouse
Sturgeon, Theodore
More Than Human
Sturgeon, Theodore
Some of Your Blood
Swift, Jonathan
Gulliver's Travels
Thomas, D.M.
The White Hotel
Tiptree, Jr., James
Warm Worlds and Otherwise
Tolkien, J.R.R.
The Hobbit
Updike, John
The Witches of Eastwick
Van Vogt, A.E.
The Mixed Men
Van Vogt, A.E.
Slan
Van Vogt, A.E.
The Voyage of the Space Beagle
Van Vogt, A.E.
The World of Null A
Vance, Jack
Emphyrio
Verne, Jules
Around the Moon
Verne, Jules
From the Earth to the Moon
Verne, Jules:
Journey to the Center of the Earth
Vonnegut, Kurt
Cat's Cradle
Vonnegut, Kurt
The Sirens of Titan
Vonnegut, Kurt
Slaughterhouse-Five
Wallace, David Foster
Infinite Jest
Walpole, Horace
Hieroglyphic Tales
Wells, H.G.
The First Men in the Moon
Wells, H.G.
The Island of Dr. Moreau
Wells, H.G.
The Time Machine
Wilson, Robert Anton & Robert Shea
The Illuminatus! Trilogy
Winton, Tim
Cloudstreet
Woolf, Virginia
Orlando
Zabor, Rafi
The Bear Comes Home
Zelazny, Roger
Lord of Light
Zelazny, Roger
This Immortal
Special Features
Notes on Conceptual Fiction
When Science Fiction Grew Up
Ray Bradbury: A Tribute
The Year of Magical Reading
Remembering Fritz Leiber
A Tribute to Richard Matheson
Samuel Delany's 70th birthday
The Sci-Fi of Kurt Vonnegut
Curse You, Neil Armstrong!
Robert Heinlein at 100
A.E, van Vogt Tribute
The Puzzling Case of Robert Sheckley
The Avant-Garde Sci-Fi of Brian Aldiss
Science Fiction 1958-1975: A Reading List
Links to related sites
The New Canon
Great Books Guide
Postmodern Mystery
Fractious Fiction
Ted Gioia's web site
Ted Gioia on Twitter
SF Site
io9
Graeme's Fantasy Book Review
Los Angeles Review of Books
The Millions
Big Dumb Object
SF Novelists
More Words, Deeper Hole
The Misread City
Reviews and Responses
SF Signal
True Science Fiction
Tor blog
Disclosure: Conceptual Fiction
and its sister sites may receive review
copies and promotional materials from
publishers, authors, publicists or other
parties.