Affirming and Questioning National Identity in Alternate Histories

  • Kenneth Hanshew University of Regensburg

Abstract

The study examines the Polish journalist Marcin Wolski’s Jedna przegrana bitwa [One Lost Battle] (2010) and the acclaimed Czech writer Josef Nesvadba’s Peklo Beneš – o šťastnějším Československu [Beneš’s Hell – A Happier Czechoslovakia] (2002) to argue the science fictional subgenre of the alternative history or uchronia more prominently reflects issues of cultural identity than other science fiction and to examine the posited critical function of SF in general.

References

[1] Csicsery-Ronay, Istvan. “Dis-Imagined Communities: Science Fiction and the Future of Nations.” Edging into the Future: Science Fiction and Contemporary Cultural Transformation. Ed. Veronica Hollinger and Joan Gordon. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2002. 217–237. Web. 1 Dec. 2015. .
[2] McCracken-Flesher, Caroline. “Scotland as Science Fiction.” The Bottle Imp 8 (2010): 1–4. Print.
[3] Milner, Andrew. Locating Science Fiction. Liverpool: Liverpool UP, 2012. Print. Liverpool Science Fiction Texts and Studies 44.
[4] Moretti, Franco. Modern Epic: The World-System from Goethe to García Márquez. Verso, 1996. Print.
[5] Nesvadba, Josef. Peklo Beneš: [o šťastnějším Českoslovenks]. Brno: Host, 2002. Print.
[6] Parowski, Maciej. “Fantastyka alternatywna i jej wrogowie.” Fronda Lux 2014. Open WorldCat. Web. .
[7] Porter-Szücs, Brian. Faith and Fatherland: Catholicism, Modernity, and Poland. Oxford University Press, 2011. Print.
[8] Walter, Damien. “Is Science Fiction Literature’s First International Language?” The Guardian 27 Apr. 2012. The Guardian. Web. 1 Dec. 2015. .
[9] Wolski, Marcin. Jedna przegrana bitwa. 2nd ed. Poznań: Zysk i S-ka Wydawnictwo, 2013, Print.
Култура/Culture
Published
2016-07-13
How to Cite
HANSHEW, Kenneth. Affirming and Questioning National Identity in Alternate Histories. Култура/Culture, [S.l.], v. 6, n. 13, p. 79-87, july 2016. ISSN 1857-7725. Available at: <http://journals.cultcenter.net/index.php/culture/article/view/246>. Date accessed: 01 mar. 2026.
Citation Formats
Issue
Vol 6 No 13 (2016): Култура / Culture
Section
English Articles
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Creative Commons License
Култура/Culture by MI-AN is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.