Destruction, Ethics, and Intergalactic Love

Peter Admirand is Lecturer (Tenured) in Theology, School Research Convenor, and Director of the Centre for Interreligious Dialogue at Dublin City University, Ireland. He also serves as the Co-Chair of the Irish Council of Christians and Jews. His research interests are in the area of interreligious dialogue and the intersection of religion and ethics with literature, media, and popular culture. His books include Seeking Common Ground: A Theist/Atheist Dialogue, co-written with philosopher Andrew Fiala; Humbling Faith: Brokenness, Doubt, Dialogue—What Unites Atheists, Theists, and Nontheists; and Amidst Mass Atrocity and the Rubble of Theology: Searching for a Viable Theodicy. He is also the editor of Loss and Hope: Global, Interreligious, and Interdisciplinary Perspectives.

“I’m so happy this book exists!”Hillary Chute, comics and graphic novels columnist for The New York Times Book Review, Distinguished Professor of English and Art + Design, Northwestern University, USA, and author of the acclaimed Why Comics?“What role can art (in this case, comics) play in our troubling time of plague and war? Peter Admirand’s loving, attentive reading of Saga and Y: The Last Man are a powerful demonstration of what religious studies can contribute to helping us to understand the meaningfulness of popular culture, addressing questions such as the value of human expression in the face of an apocalypse and the need for moral choices when the world seems out of whack.”Henry Jenkins, author of Comics and Stuff“How do we do good surrounded by meaninglessness and the horrors of destruction? Is it possible to ground an ethics on a planet beset by plague, in a universe riven by war? These kinds of questions endure in the history of humanist thought, their importance as unrelenting as their intractability. Stepping into the fray, Admirand works through his readings of the rich imagetexts of Y: The Last Man and Saga in a brave quest to bring meaningful structure to the ethical quandaries of a human condition beset by meaningless and death. This book is vital—in all senses of the word. Reflective, intimate, generous, and unabashed, this book animates these questions with a persistent belief, but not a blind one, in the expansive and fundamental role of love in enabling meaning to flourish in even the darkest corners of the galaxy.”Thomas Giddens, Professor in Jurisprudence, University of Dundee, and Editor of Critical Directions in Comics Studies

• List of Figures; Acknowledgements: Joy and Gratitude Amidst Distress; Introduction: Death, Decay, and Destruction: Only the Beginning; Part I: Seeking Meaning in a Meaningless World; 1. Ethics (and Art) After the Plague; 2. Inky Darkness: Ethics Amidst Intergalactic War (and The Narrative); Reflection on Part I; Part II: Love and Parenting Through Oppression and Grief; 3. Love and Identity: A Numeric and Heroic Journey; 4. (Intergalactic) Fatherhood: Failure and Maternal Hope; Reflection on Part II; Part III: Being Peace but Surrounded by Violence; 5. Blessed Are the Peacemakers: Gender and Violence; 6. On the Perils of Pacifism During War; Reflection on Part III; Part IV: Beyond Diversity and Tolerance: Towards Communion; 7. Post-Religion: Sex, God, Women, Love; 8. Enfolding the Grotesque and the Borderless: A Politics for All; Reflection on Part IV; Conclusion: Love in the Throes of Destruction and Despair; Bibliography; Index