Customer Reviews

Sublime Voices: The Fictional Science and Scientific Fiction of Abe Kōbō (Harvard East Asian Monographs)

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I was turned on to Kobo Abe way back in undgrad school by a fellow English major. Later, when I was getting my MFA in Photography, I obsessively read his entire body of work because it was important to my style of visual narrative at the time.

"Sublime Voices" by its nature is probably a niche book .. I mean, I don't know too many people outside academia who are interested in Abe ... but for years I have been searching for and reading every critical work I could locate on Kobo Abe. Bolton's book is perfect for me, for I view my photographic practices as "science," both in the darkroom and at the pixel level. Beyond that it is also an excellent look at Abe's work from a different perspective ... the collision and love between science and literature.

I am enjoying reading this as much as I enjoy (re)reading a Kobo Abe novel.

The full table of contents for this book is as follows:

Introduction. Abe K'obo''s Dictionary

Chapter 1. Transforming Science: Metamorphosis in Abe's Life and Work

Chapter 2. Abe's Essays and Some Historical Distinctions Between Literature and Science

Chapter 3. Whirring Clicking Poetry: "Inter Ice Age 4"

Chapter 4. The Dialogue of Styles, the Dance of Fiction, and "The Face of Another"

Chapter 5. The Hope of Technology and the Technology of Hope in "The Woman in the Dunes"

Chapter 6. The Parody, Perversity, and Cacophony of "Secret Rendezvous"

Chapter 7. A Technology of Silence: "The Ark Sakura" and the Nuclear Threat

Notes, List of Works Cited, Index