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Foods of the Gods: Eating and the Eaten in Fantasy and Science Fiction
Gluttony and starvation, pleasure and pain, growth and decay. These and other extremes of our condition related to food, though all but banned from the "civilized" tables of mainstream fiction, are ideal topics for the "undomesticated," free-roaming modes of fantasy.
As acts and ideas, food and eating are fundamental to all that makes us human and dominate our symbolic realms of art, literature, and cuisine. These essays show us the power of speculative modes of fiction to help us look anew at prehistorical and psychomythical attitudes toward food and eating; historical Western-cultural attitudes toward the material fact of food and the necessity of eating; and the relationship between attitudes toward food and how, how much, when, and where we eat.
The contributors come from a variety of backgrounds, including anthropology, film, and French, Russian, English, and medieval literature. Ranging in their focus from shamans to cannibals, utopias to social Darwinism, muscle magazines to supermarket tabloids, the contributors discuss the theory and practice of science fictional eating; the dialectic, at the level of eating, between individual needs and collective norms; and the ways that eating habits and the availability and choice of food serve to contextualize and demarcate modern fictional genres. In addition to discussing such writers as C. S. Lewis, Stephen King, Octavia Butler, Jonathan Swift, and Anne Rice, the contributors also consider such films as Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom and Cocteau's Beauty and the Beast .
As acts and ideas, food and eating are fundamental to all that makes us human and dominate our symbolic realms of art, literature, and cuisine. These essays show us the power of speculative modes of fiction to help us look anew at prehistorical and psychomythical attitudes toward food and eating; historical Western-cultural attitudes toward the material fact of food and the necessity of eating; and the relationship between attitudes toward food and how, how much, when, and where we eat.
The contributors come from a variety of backgrounds, including anthropology, film, and French, Russian, English, and medieval literature. Ranging in their focus from shamans to cannibals, utopias to social Darwinism, muscle magazines to supermarket tabloids, the contributors discuss the theory and practice of science fictional eating; the dialectic, at the level of eating, between individual needs and collective norms; and the ways that eating habits and the availability and choice of food serve to contextualize and demarcate modern fictional genres. In addition to discussing such writers as C. S. Lewis, Stephen King, Octavia Butler, Jonathan Swift, and Anne Rice, the contributors also consider such films as Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom and Cocteau's Beauty and the Beast .
- GenresFantasy
264 pages, Hardcover
First published December 1, 1995
25 people want to read
About the author
Gary Westfahl
46 books4 followersVoluminous, contrarian, methodical and learned, Gary Westfahl is a central figure in SF criticism.
His numerous articles and reviews have appeared in Science Fiction Studies, Extrapolation, Science Fiction Eye, SFRA Newsletter, Journal of the Fantastic in the Arts, and Monad: Essays on Science Fiction, among others.
In the late 1990s, Westfahl became a regular columnist for Interzone, producing 36 columns. In 2001, he began to contribute film reviews and essays to the website Locus Online.
Recent books include The Other Side of the Sky: An Annotated Bibliography of Space Stations in Science Fiction, 1869-1993 (2009), The Spacesuit Film: A History, 1918-1969 (2012), and the author study William Gibson (2013).
Westfahl received the Pilgrim Award in 2003 for lifetime contributions to SF and fantasy scholarship.
His numerous articles and reviews have appeared in Science Fiction Studies, Extrapolation, Science Fiction Eye, SFRA Newsletter, Journal of the Fantastic in the Arts, and Monad: Essays on Science Fiction, among others.
In the late 1990s, Westfahl became a regular columnist for Interzone, producing 36 columns. In 2001, he began to contribute film reviews and essays to the website Locus Online.
Recent books include The Other Side of the Sky: An Annotated Bibliography of Space Stations in Science Fiction, 1869-1993 (2009), The Spacesuit Film: A History, 1918-1969 (2012), and the author study William Gibson (2013).
Westfahl received the Pilgrim Award in 2003 for lifetime contributions to SF and fantasy scholarship.
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
June 8, 2023
If you’re doing research for a thesis (me) about the act of eating in sci fi and fantasy this would probably be very useful for you! Or if you want to know about cannibalism in those genres. Unfortunately, I am looking more around the acts of offering food. Still, a good collection of essays, very interesting.
February 6, 2013
Ending up just skimming. It’s very dense, takes itself VERY seriously, and I would have preferred a setup of each chapter focusing on a book/movie rather than a vague theme. Felt like an English Lit 301 text. Probably would do well with a new edition. Hunger Games anyone?
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews