February 19, 2011, Greencastle, Ind. — The Wesleyan Anthology of Science Fiction, co-edited by two DePauw University professors -- Istvan Csicsery-Ronay Jr.,
University Professor and professor of English, and Arthur B. Evans,
Laurel H. Turk Professor of Modern Languages (French) -- is "more than just an ideal survey of the genre, reaching from the 19th
century (Hawthorne, Verne, Wells) through the pulps, new wave,
cyberpunk and the too-soon-to-classify morsels of the decade that just
ended," opines Ed Park in the Los Angeles Times. "This big book is both a thrilling entertainment and a convincing
argument for the way SF can refresh the mind, play boldly with form and
reflect its era creatively -- in other words, what all good literature
should do."
Park, author of the novel Personal Days, continues, "Put together by the editors of the academic journal Science Fiction Studies [which is published at DePauw], the Wesleyan anthology has a hand-holding function, beckoning those who might still sniff at the genre to take a closer look. (Hey, E.M. Forster's in here — nothing to be afraid of!) Individual introductions give useful biographical information and connect each story to what's called the 'sf megatext,' a 'fictive universe that includes all the sf stories that have ever been told … a place of shared images, situations, plots, characters, settings, and themes generated across a multiplicity of media.'"
Access the complete review at the Times' website.
Art Evans has been called America's "Most Prominent Jules Verne Scholar" by Forbes magazine. He has edited acclaimed translations of Jules Verne's The Kip Brothers, The Mysterious Island, The Begum's Millions, Invasion of the Sea and The Mighty Orinoco. Learn more in this previous article.
Rain Taxi has referred to Istvan Csicsery-Ronay Jr., who authored the book The Seven Beauties of Science Fiction, as "one of the most thoughtful and subtle academic critics of science fiction." The professor also co-edited Robot Ghosts and Wired Dreams: Japanese Science Fiction from Origins to Anime and serves as managing editor of Humanimalia, a refereed and selective online journal.