This book examines how contemporary women novelists have successfully transformed and rewritten the conventions of post-apocalyptic fiction. Since the dawn of the new millennium, there has been an outpouring of writing that depicts the end of the world as we know it, and women writers are no exception to this trend. However, the book argues that their fiction is distinctive. Contemporary women's work in this genre avoids conservatism, a nostalgic mourning for the past, and the focus on restoring what has been lost, aspects key to much male authored apocalyptic fiction. Instead, contemporary women writers show readers the ways in which patriarchy and neo-colonialism are intrinsically implicated in the disasters they envision, and offer qualified hope for a new beginning for society, culture and literature after an imagined apocalyptic event. Exploring science, nature and matter, the posthuman body, the maternal imaginary, time, narrative and history, literature and the word, and the post-secular, the book covers a wide variety of writers and addresses issues of nationality, race and ethnicity, as well as gender and sexuality.

Susan Watkins is a Professor of Women's Writing at Leeds Beckett University. Her key publications include Twentieth-Century Women Novelists: Feminist Theory into Practice (2001), Doris Lessing (2010) and (as co-editor) Scandalous Fictions: The Twentieth-Century Novel in the Public Sphere (2006), Doris Lessing: Border Crossings (2009) and The History of British Women's Writing Vol 9: 1945-1975 (2017).

'This is an impressive study, homing in on a notable gap in writing within theapocalyptic tradition. It is engagingly written, extensive in its choice of texts and,throughout, the textual analysis is in productive dialogue with critical theory.Repeatedly, we learn how the fiction of elsewhere and the fiction of the futureurgently speak to our here and now.'- Mary Eagleton, author of Clever Girls and the Literature of Women's UpwardMobility (2018) This book examines how contemporary women novelists have successfullytransformed and rewritten the conventions of post-apocalyptic fiction. Since thedawn of the new millennium, there has been an outpouring of writing that depictsthe end of the world as we know it, and women writers are no exception to thistrend. However, the book argues that their fiction is distinctive. Contemporarywomen's work in this genre avoids conservatism, a nostalgic mourning for thepast, and the focus on restoring what has been lost, aspects key to much maleauthoredapocalyptic fiction. Instead, contemporary women writers show readersthe ways in which patriarchy and neo-colonialism are intrinsically implicated inthe disasters they envision, and offer qualified hope for a new beginning forsociety, culture and literature after an imagined apocalyptic event. Exploringscience, nature and matter, the posthuman body, the maternal imaginary, time,narrative and history, literature and the word, and the post-secular, the bookcovers a wide variety of writers and addresses issues of nationality, race andethnicity, as well as gender and sexuality. Susan Watkins is a Professor of Women's Writing at Leeds Beckett University.Her key publications include Twentieth-Century Women Novelists: Feminist Theoryinto Practice (2001), Doris Lessing (2010) and (as co-editor) Scandalous Fictions:The Twentieth-Century Novel in the Public Sphere (2006), Doris Lessing: BorderCrossings (2009) and The History of British Women's Writing Vol 9: 1945-1975(2017).

Autorentext

Susan Watkins is a Professor of Women's Writing at Leeds Beckett University. Her key publications include Twentieth-Century Women Novelists: Feminist Theory into Practice (2001), Doris Lessing (2010) and (as co-editor) Scandalous Fictions: The Twentieth-Century Novel in the Public Sphere (2006), Doris Lessing: Border Crossings (2009) and The History of British Women's Writing Vol 9: 19451975 (2017).

Zusammenfassung
Contemporary Women's Apocalyptic Writing highlights contemporary literature's post-millennial fascination with the apocalypse and questions the ways in which texts written by female authors differ from those of their male counterparts.Susan Watkins's fascinating new study sheds light on this comprehensive body of male-authored work as an essentially patriarchal phenomenon, leaning towards notions of conservatism. Female writing, she argues, has shown a tendency instead to connect these systems with the genesis of the apocalypse itself. Bold, informative and comprehensive in structure, Contemporary Women's Apocalyptic Writing is an important book for higher-level students and scholars of contemporary literature and culture.

Inhalt

1. Introduction: Rewriting and Transforming Traditions.- 2. Science, Nature and Matter.- 3. The Posthuman Body.- 4. The Maternal Imagination.- 5. Time, Narrative and History.- 6. Literature and the Word.- Conclusion: The Postsecular.