Carnivalising the future: a new approach to theorising childhood and adulthood in science fiction for young readers

Sambell, Kay

Abstract

The comic narrative strategies that Reeve uses in Mortal Engines set it apart from the bulk of deeply serious, starkly pessimistic science fiction for young readers. Sambell illustrates how Reeve eschews the oppressive admonitory tone of the dystopian genre, by playfully and humorously carnivalising the future instead. She argues that this innovative approach allows him to critique and subvert the polluted adult world in a manner that is not at odds with the desire to offer young readers optimistic possibilities within the post-catastrophe novel. A new style of didacticism is achieved, based upon an emancipatory model of child-adult relations.

Citation

Sambell, K. (2004). Carnivalising the future: a new approach to theorising childhood and adulthood in science fiction for young readers. Lion and the Unicorn, 28(2), 247-261

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Publication Date: 2004-04
• Deposit Date: May 25, 2017
• Journal: Lion and the Unicorn
• Print ISSN: 0147-2593
• Electronic ISSN: 1080-6563
• Publisher: Johns Hopkins University Press
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 28
• Issue: 2
• Pages: 247-261
• Keywords: Literature, science fiction, history and criticism, children's literature.
• Public URL: http://researchrepository.napier.ac.uk/Output/852209