JAMES GRAHAM BALLARD (1930-)
"The future is going to be boring. The suburbanisation of the planet will continue, and the suburbanisation of the soul will follow soon after."
J.G. Ballard was the author of the original story 'Crash' which became the David Cronenburg film of the same name. There is an interesting article in its defense here Future Shock Ballard is keen to make a comparison of Crash with Alfred Hitchcock's groundbreaking Psycho: "I think of Crash as the first film of the next century, if you like. I think that the very influential role of Psycho since 1962 will apply to Crash..."
Other people disagree: "This author is beyond psychiatric help. Do not publish!" said one editor.
Shortlisted for the Booker Prize, his best known work 'Empire of the Sun' was about his childhood struggle to survive in a Chinese internee camp, and has subsequently become a major film. Both 'Empire of the Sun', and its sequel, 'The Kindness of Women', are autobiographical. 'Empire of the Sun' is a fascinating child's-eye war novel; but his short stories combine existentialism and science fiction.
Always controversial, Ballard predicted Ronald Reagan's rise to president in a 1967 short story, but the words of title of the story alone, got the whole book itself pulped.
He established himself as a science fiction guru in the 1960s, but stylistically shifted gears towards an unnerving, futuristic variant on social realism in the 1970s, before his autobiographical novels of the 1980's. While early works such as the post-apocalytic 'The Drowned World' brought Ballard fame, it was 'Crash' that gained him infamy.
In the latest novels, 'Cocaine Nights' and 'Super-Cannes', J.G. Ballard makes a partial return to his more provocative, more successful mid-career style employed in novels such as 'Crash' and 'High Rise'.
"The main theme of 'Super-Cannes'," Ballard says, "is that in order to keep us happy and spending more as consumers, then capitalism is going to have to tap rather more darker strains in our characters, which is of course what's been happening for a while."
I personally, have only read some of his short science fiction stories such as 'The Drowned World' and another, which I've forgotten the title of, about time travel back to ancient Egypt, but would recommend them.
"The future is going to be boring. The suburbanisation of the planet will continue, and the suburbanisation of the soul will follow soon after."
J.G. Ballard was the author of the original story 'Crash' which became the David Cronenburg film of the same name. There is an interesting article in its defense here Future Shock Ballard is keen to make a comparison of Crash with Alfred Hitchcock's groundbreaking Psycho: "I think of Crash as the first film of the next century, if you like. I think that the very influential role of Psycho since 1962 will apply to Crash..."
Other people disagree: "This author is beyond psychiatric help. Do not publish!" said one editor.
Shortlisted for the Booker Prize, his best known work 'Empire of the Sun' was about his childhood struggle to survive in a Chinese internee camp, and has subsequently become a major film. Both 'Empire of the Sun', and its sequel, 'The Kindness of Women', are autobiographical. 'Empire of the Sun' is a fascinating child's-eye war novel; but his short stories combine existentialism and science fiction.
Always controversial, Ballard predicted Ronald Reagan's rise to president in a 1967 short story, but the words of title of the story alone, got the whole book itself pulped.
He established himself as a science fiction guru in the 1960s, but stylistically shifted gears towards an unnerving, futuristic variant on social realism in the 1970s, before his autobiographical novels of the 1980's. While early works such as the post-apocalytic 'The Drowned World' brought Ballard fame, it was 'Crash' that gained him infamy.
In the latest novels, 'Cocaine Nights' and 'Super-Cannes', J.G. Ballard makes a partial return to his more provocative, more successful mid-career style employed in novels such as 'Crash' and 'High Rise'.
"The main theme of 'Super-Cannes'," Ballard says, "is that in order to keep us happy and spending more as consumers, then capitalism is going to have to tap rather more darker strains in our characters, which is of course what's been happening for a while."
I personally, have only read some of his short science fiction stories such as 'The Drowned World' and another, which I've forgotten the title of, about time travel back to ancient Egypt, but would recommend them.
