Narrative in the Age of the Genome: Genetic Worlds

by Lara Choksey, Lara Choksey (Editor), John Holmes (Editor), Anton Kirchhofer (Editor), Janine Rogers (Editor)

Overview

Shortlisted for the 2021 BSLS Book Prize

Genomic technologies have had a profound impact on understandings of what it means to be human and our links to the world we inhabit, and on practices of inhabiting the world. This open access book considers this impact across a range of literary forms, cultural practices, and political imaginaries, and argues that new descriptions of biological value introduced through practices of genomic sequencing from the late 1970s registered a broader crisis of narrative form. Examining a wide range of texts by Doris Lessing, Samuel Delany, Boris and Arkady Strugatsky, Kir Bulychev, Kazuo Ishiguro, Saidiya Hartman, Yaa Gyasi, Svetlana Alexievich, and Jeff VanderMeer, Narrative in the Age of the Genome casts new light on the intersections of genomics with politics of racism, sexuality, labour and gender, neoliberal economics and environmental crisis.

The eBook editions of this book are available open access under a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 licence on bloomsburycollections.com. Open access was funded by The Wellcome Trust

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781350213845
Publisher:	Bloomsbury Academic
Publication date:	08/25/2022
Series:	Explorations in Science and Literature
Pages:	232
Product dimensions:	6.14(w) x 9.21(h) x 0.48(d)

About the Author

Lara Choksey is a Research Fellow at the Wellcome Centre for Cultures and Environments of Health at the University of Exeter, UK.

Lara Choksey is a Research Fellow at the Wellcome Centre for Cultures and Environments of Health at the University of Exeter, UK.

John Holmes worked in the Foreign Office for 34 years, finishing as Ambassador in Paris, before taking up the role of UN USG for Humanitarian Affairs in 2007.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements

Introduction

Chapter 1: Deindustrialisation and the Selfish Gene
Gene and Strike
Overpopulation and Whiteness: Doris Lessing's The Memoirs of a Survivor
Brackets and Choice: Samuel Delany's Trouble on Triton

Chapter 2: Cultivating Dreamworlds
Mutual Aid
Cultivating Humans
The Fifth Problem: Boris and Arkady Strugatsky's Roadside Picnic
Genogeography: Kir Bulychev's “Another's Memory”

Chapter 3: Memoir and the Laboratory
Metaphors of the Human Genome Project
Welfare, Profit, and the Vitruvian Man
Ending Development: Kazuo Ishiguro's Never Let Me Go
Algorithmic Governmentality in Andrew Niccols's Gattaca

Chapter 4: Speculative Ancestry
Ancestry Making
Genre, Genetics, and Genealogy
Henrietta Lacks and Stolen Flesh
Reparation, Romance, and Kinlessness
Leaving: Saidiya Hartman's Lose Your Mother
Staying: Yaa Gyasi's Homegoing

Chapter 5: Toxic Infrastructure
Chernobyl and the Postgenomic Condition
Adaptation, Improvisation, and Epigenetics
Mutation and Fragmentation: Svetlana Alexievich's Chernobyl Prayer
Transitional Characterisation: Jeff VanderMeer's Southern Reach trilogy

Conclusion: Disappearance, community, characterisation, genre, and scale

Works Cited

Index

Editorial Reviews

Imbued throughout with deep concern for the peripheral, the possible, and the political … What emerges as most compelling out of this entire tapestry of readings is the author's interpretation of the limits and failures of the extraordinary 'cultural power of the genome.'” —Science

“Intellectually rich and rewarding, this study ranges effortlessly across the fields of biology, socio-economic theory and philosophy, drawing on these perspectives to forge novel readings of a range of literary texts. Imaginative and astute in its reflections on genre and narrative form, it is beautifully written throughout. The argument is bold and original, grounded in rigorous research and always attentive to the specific biosocial contexts it explores.” —Professor Clare Hanson, University of Southampton, UK

“Narrative in the Age of the Genome: Genetic Worlds offers a robust commentary on a broad range of compelling speculative fictions and nonfictions and makes a compelling case for the role of narratives as a critical aspect of emerging biotechnologies and genomics.” —The British Society for Literature and Science

From the Publisher