Secondary Works:
- Mythen, Gabe. Ulrich Beck: A Critical Introduction to the Risk Society. LONDON;
STERLING, VIRGINIA, Pluto Press, 2004. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt18fs3c4.
- Beck, Ulrich. Risk Society: towards a New Modernity. Sage, 2010.
- Tate, Andrew. Apocalyptic Fiction. London, UK ; New York, NY,
USA: Bloomsbury Academic, an imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc, 2017., 2017. 21st century genre fiction series.
- Szendy, Peter. Apocalypse-Cinema: 2012 and Other Ends of the World. New York : Fordham
University Press, 2015., 2015. College Complete.
- Robert Torry, author. “Apocalypse Then: Benefits of the Bomb in Fifties Science Fiction
Films.” Cinema Journal, no. 1, 1991, p. 7.
Literary Journal:
Cinema Journal published by University of Texas Press on behalf of the Society for Cinema & Media Studies.
Key Words:
- “Apocalyptic Fiction / Risk Society”
- “Genre”
- “Film Studies”
My thesis currently stands as a more general genre study of apocalypse fiction, with possible connections to society and disaster. From the The Broadview Anthology of Short Fiction, Third Edition by Levine, LePan, and Mather, genre is defined as a class or type of literary work with different levels of generality. I intend to create a genre “map”, that is, a comprehensive study of changing ideas in current works of Apocalypse fiction. I want to discover latent links between film, television, and literature in the genre. I focuses currently on one critic, Ulrich Beck, while also on several films and novels. Beck fits my interest in the post disaster or apocalypse genre with his book “Risk Society”, which is also a concept he loosely defines as everyday risks our society takes in the name of progress, such as nuclear science disasters. Risk society sub-genres, as I like to label them, also include natural, epidemic, technological, transportation-related, and conflict-based disasters.. This text is in conversation with Gabe Mythen, which may prove to be a valuable secondary source. In my discussion with Professor Malchic, we discussed films such as “Children of Men” (2006), The Day The Earth Stood Still and “Melancholia” (2011). I was drawn on my own to the short book called Apocalypse Cinema by Peter Szendy, as well as Andrew Tate’s Apocalypse Fiction for their insight into works such as these. I believe it is likely that I will need to find more critics and articles of the genre in literature or film to talk about.
For now I have framed my working thesis on: Why does the apocalypse genre always focus on “irreversible” tragedies? What does apocalypse fiction say about our current state of the zeitgeist? What are some aspects of “risk society” that have not been explored in fiction yet?
Very interesting and engaging thesis idea. I also love post-apocalyptic/ dystopian novels. I’m sure you already know this, but Kurt Vonnegut has some incredible stories along those lines, but always with a twist. The one I think you might be most interested in is “Slapstick”, or, “Lonesome No More!”. It takes place mainly in the ruins of New York City. Interestingly, it is written in the form of a faux-autobiography. Since you’re also looking at genre, maybe you can study how these two genres of autobiography and apocalyptic literature relate.