ARTS & DRAMA
Keep Watching the Shores
Thursday 29 June 2006 11:30-12:00 (Radio 4 FM)
Repeated: Monday 3 July 2006 0:15-0:45 (Radio 4 FM)
Francis Spufford charts the history of Britain - through its Science Fiction. Francis won't quite be arguing that every starship in British SF is a milkfloat in disguise, but the diversity of ideas in British SF means that these novels do give startling alternative snapshots of Britain down the years. Science Fiction has always been a genre of ideas, and so, contrary to its escapist image, can provide a hugely evocative record of the time in which it was written.
In the work of HG Wells, therefore, we find Fabian dreams of a future without poverty, nightmares about overpopulation and dark eugenic designs; in Huxley, a fascination with intelligence, and how it can be achieved; in Iain M Banks, curious echoes of the benign Wilson-era Britain in which the author grew up. This series features some of the biggest names in British Science Fiction, past and present, including Arthur C Clarke.
Francis asks why Albion succumbed so often to invasion, disaster and collapse.
