A Stereoscopic Vision of the Future
Albert Robida’s Twentieth Century
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 11060686 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Philippe Willems (corresponding author) |
| Year | 1999 |
| Volume | 26 |
| Issue | Part 3 |
| Pages | 354-378 |
| Publication date | 1999-11-01 |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Science Fiction Studies (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0091-7729 • E-ISSN: 2327-6207 |
| Publisher | University of California Press (PUBLISHER • US) |
| DOI | 10.1525/sfs.26.3.0354 |
| OpenAlex | W4409424662 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 2 |
Although often neglected by sf scholars, Albert Robida deserves recognition as a highly original and important figure in the history of science fiction. In this essay, I analyze the link between Robida’s unique narrative strategies and his skill in endowing his fictional speculations with verisimilitude. Robida’s vision of France in the 1950s is striking in its overall organic coherence—a sense of wholeness that is paradoxically brought about by his use of hermeneutic heterogeneity. Multiple factors enhance the impression of realism in the novels of his Twentieth Century trilogy: their historical dimension, the depth of Robida’s cultural and social insights, the network of different narrative voices used, and the innovative multimedia format of these works, superbly illustrated by the author himself. Robida’s artwork often supplements his narrative descriptions hypertextually, supplying peripheral information and avoiding the redundancy of conventional illustration. The distinctive characteristics of Robida’s sf that set him apart from other early sf novelists are perhaps best illustrated by an analogy with an apparatus that was contemporary to him, the stereoscope. Like stereoviews, Robida’s snapshots of the future are multi-dimensional, creating the illusion of both depth and substance. (PW)
Art · Art history · Computer vision · Stereoscopy · Computer Science · Medicine · Philosophy, History, and Historiography · Optometry
| Citations per year | 0.17 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 2014 - 2023 (10) |
| Highly cited | No |