Fear of Seeing

With Fear of Seeing, Mingwei Song opens our eyes to a brave new world of Chinese science fiction. It is a book that simultaneously celebrates the genre’s literary audacity, explores its innovative vision of the future, and reveals the uncanny horror hidden beneath its surface. -- Michael Berry, translator of Exorcism
Song has written the most critically significant and astonishingly revelatory account of the rise of new wave Chinese SF. Brilliant scholarship like this appears once in a lifetime, if we’re lucky. -- Junot Díaz, Pulitzer-Prize winning author of This Is How You Lose Her
Fear of Seeing demonstrates the paradoxical significance of the “new wave” of Chinese science fiction as a genre whose aesthetics and ethics offer their audience an alternative window on the cultural sphere: a window upon that which is unknown, uncertain, or otherwise hidden. -- Nathaniel Isaacson, author of Celestial Empire: the Emergence of Chinese Science Fiction
This is remarkably visionary and insightful scholarship on Chinese New Wave science fiction from the late 1990s to 2020s. Song’s panoramic yet in-depth analysis of various New Wave sf works is exceptionally informative. His theoretical exploration of the Neo-Baroque poetics in Chinese SF is thoroughgoing and inspiring. -- Hua Li, author of Chinese Science Fiction during the Post-Mao Cultural Thaw
Drawing on a near-encyclopedic knowledge of contemporary Chinese-language SF literature, combined with long-standing friendships with many of the corresponding authors, Song’s Fear of Seeing offers a provocative new look at this dynamic emerging field, while also examining how a dialectics of sight and blindness runs through the genre itself. -- Carlos Rojas, author of Homesickness: Culture, Contagion, and National Transformation in Modern China
Mingwei Song has written the definitive book on contemporary Chinese science fiction. From space odyssey to dystopian adventure, galactic cataclysm to millennial apocalypse, Song probes why science fiction matters so much for how we engage with—and imagine—China’s future and past, and offers observations on speculative poetics at the planetary scale. A groundbreaking work! -- David Der-wei Wang, author of Why Fiction Matters in Contemporary China
Fear of Seeing is the most definitive and comprehensive work on contemporary Chinese science fiction to date. Its powerful theoretical intervention opens new pathways for analyzing narratives that challenge previous notions of science fiction from China . . . This is a must-have book for anyone studying or teaching Chinese science fiction. -- Melissa A. Hosek * H-Sci-Med-Tech, H-Net Reviews *
Highly recommended. * Choice Reviews *
A commendable overview of contemporary Chinese New Wave SF. -- Wenxi Hu * Chinese Literature and Thought Today *
Fear of Seeing not only enriches our comprehension of Chinese science fiction but also invites readers to reflect on the genre’s capacity to illuminate the unseen and challenge established literary paradigms. With its compelling insights and expansive scope, Fear of Seeing leads the way for those
eager to delve into the rich tapestry of speculative literature from China and beyond. -- Hsin-Hui Lin * Sun Yat-sen Journal of Humanities *
Song’s dazzling capacity to connect disparate literary and temporal regimes makes Fear of Seeing an engrossing read, with the book’s true strength lying in the kaleidoscopic breadth of its references. * Los Angeles Review of Books *
A must-read for every researcher interested in Chinese sf and sf aesthetics. * Science Fiction Studies *
A must-read for anyone interested in science fiction and wishing to understand the historical and contemporary dynamics of this genre in the Chinese-speaking world. The breadth of its corpus and the richness of the themes addressed also pave the way for many studies that will follow in its wake, even outside the Sinophone world. * China Perspectives *
An eloquently written, robustly researched, and theoretically sophisticated book that is a welcome addition to the bourgeoning scholarship on Chinese SF. * Chinese Literature: Essays, Articles, Reviews *