Chinese Science Fiction

Mingwei Song is Professor of Modern Chinese Literature at Wellesley College. He is the author of numerous books and research articles, including Young China: National Rejuvenation and the Bildungsroman, 1900–1959 (2015), New Wave in Chinese Science Fiction: History, Poetics, Texts (2020; in Chinese) and Fear of Seeing: A Poetics of Chinese Science Fiction (2023). He is the co-editor of The Reincarnated Giant: An Anthology of Twenty-First Century Chinese Science Fiction (2018). Nathaniel Isaacson is Associate Professor of Modern Chinese Literature in the Department of World Languages and Cultures at North Carolina State University. His book, Celestial Empire: the Emergence of Chinese Science Fiction (2017), examines the emergence of science fiction in late Qing China and the relationship between science fiction and Orientalism. Hua Li is Professor of Chinese in the Department of Modern Languages and Literatures at Montana State University. She has published two monographs: Contemporary Chinese Fiction by Su Tong and Yu Hua: Coming of Age in Troubled Times (2011) and Chinese Science Fiction during the Post-Mao Cultural Thaw (2021).

“This book offers a robust framework for understanding Chinese science fiction within its broader cultural and literary contexts. ... Meticulously researched and thoughtfully crafted, this is an invaluable resource for a diverse range of readers. It serves as an essential textbook and reference for science fiction scholars worldwide, while also supporting educators, students and researchers interested in Chinese literature. Furthermore, it appeals to general readers intrigued by Chinese science fiction and its reflections on Chinese society and culture.” (Yuqin Jiang, The China Quarterly, April 21, 2025)

• Chapter 1. Introduction.- Chapter 2. Kang Youwei’s Book of the Heavens and the Porous Epistemological Grounds of Early-modern Chinese Science Fiction.- Chapter 3. Intelligent Humanoid Machines: Imaginations of Physical and Mental Transformation in late Qing Literature and Their Intellectual Origins.- Chapter 4. The King of Electricity from China: Science, Technology, and the Vision of World Order in Late Qing China.- Chapter 5. Formal Fictions: “Chinese” “Science” “Fiction” in Translation.- Chapter 6. The Writing Editors: Late Qing and Republican Media Professionals as Authors of Science Fiction.- Chapter 7.  Projecting Eco-Futures: Cinematic Visions of Utopian Science and Ecology from the Mao Era to the Deng Era.- Chapter 8. Information, the Body, and Humanism in the Chinese Cyber Novel Forty Millennia of Authenticity Cultivation.- Chapter 9. Open Up Your Brain Hole: Spatial Imaginaries in Chinese Online Science Fiction.- Chapter 10. Of Illness and Illusion: The Chaosmology of Han Song’s Hospital Trilogy.- Chapter 11. Liu Cixin and the Cosmic Pastoral.- Chapter 12. Bodies in Transformation: The Politics of Post-80s Science Fiction Authors Chi Hui, Chen Qiufan, and Zhang Ran.- Chapter 13. The Posthuman and the Neo-Baroque in Taiwan Science Fiction