Tag: Darwin

Japanese Steampunk: Science, Religion, and Technology in ‘Fullmetal Alchemist’

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The retrofuturism of steampunk literature relies often on representations of science fiction and fantasy to construct neo-Victorian alternative histories populated with advanced technology pushing the views of scientific progress. These narratives not only imagine new possibilities for the future, but also situate their alternative histories within a framework that juxtaposes scientific advancement against the notion of faith and religious dogma. In the case of Shonen manga, Japanese comics and graphic novels written for young male audiences, the steampunk genre is

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“That tree gives me the creeps!”: Tales of Vampiric Plants

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Readers of Gothic literature will quickly recognize that Irene is suffering from a vampire bite. She is not the victim of Dracula, Carmilla, or Lord Ruthven, though. Rather, it is a vampiric sumach tree that has attacked her during her sleep. Ulric Daubeny’s “The Sumach,” published in his collection The Elemental: Tales of the Supernormal and the Inexplicable (1919), is a fascinating killer-plant story. It tells of a tree that has grown from a stake plunged into the heart of a buried vampire. The tree possesses hypnotic powers that seduce young women to its branches to feed upon them.

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‘A Vision of Animal Existences’: Popular Responses to Darwin

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In the refreshment room of London’s Zoological Gardens, the protagonist of Edmund Saul Dixon’s short story, ‘A Vision of Animal Existences’ (1862), spots a woman reading a ‘thick volume’ that he recognizes. He pulls out reading material of his own—a newspaper—and, perusing its contents, finds a discussion appropriate to his surroundings: extinction, artificial selection, and species are amongst its topics. Prompted to refocus on the ‘volume’ of his nearby reader, however, he forges a further connection: ‘the blue-robed lady’s green-covered

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