Provides a nuanced and comprehensive study of Arabic science fiction

Contributes to postcolonial literary studies, genre studies and Arabic literature

Extends research on global science fiction

Ian Campbell is Associate Professor of Arabic and Comparative Literature at Georgia State University, USA. He has published articles in major science fiction journals on Arabic science fiction and also undertakes research in postcolonial Moroccan fiction. He is the author of Labyrinths, Intellectuals and the Revolution: The Arabic-Language Moroccan Novel, 195772 (2013).

This book traces the roots of Arabic science fiction through classical and medieval Arabic literature, undertaking close readings of formative texts of Arabic science fiction via a critical framework developed from the work of Western critics of Western science fiction, Arab critics of Arabic science fiction and postcolonial theorists of literature. Ian Campbell investigates the ways in which Arabic science fiction engages with a theoretical concept he terms double estrangement wherein these texts provide social or political criticism through estrangement and simultaneously critique their own societies' inability or refusal to engage in the sort of modernization that would lead the Arab world back to leadership in science and technology.

Chapter 1:Introduction.- Chapter 2: Postcolonial Literature and Arabic SF.- Chapter 3: Arabic SF: Definitions and Origins.- Chapter 4: Criticism and Theory of Arabic SF.- Chapter 5: Double Estrangement in Nihad Sharif's The Conqueror of Time.- Chapter 6: Continuity Within Rupture in Two Novels by Mu afa Mämud.- Chapter 7: "Utopia" as a Critique of Utopia in abri Musa's The Gentleman from the Spinach Field.- Chapter 8: Male Gaze as Colonial Gaze in 'A mad 'Abd al-Salam al-Baqqali's The Blue Flood.- Chapter 9: Mysticism and SF in alib 'Umran's Beyond The Veil of Time.- Chapter 10: Inheritance and Intertextuality in a Three-Novel Series by iba 'A mad Ibrahim.- Chapter 11: Conclusion.