Fear of a Stupid Planet Sexuality, SF, and Kornbluth's "The Marching Morons"

    Authors

    J. Campbell

    Comments

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    Abbreviated Journal Title

    Extrapolation

    Keywords

    Literature

    Abstract

    This essay traces the interpretive history of C. M. Kornbluth's 1951 story "The Marching Morons" by focusing on the question of readerly sympathy for either the story's elite or its idiotic masses. I connect the question of interpretation of the story's relationship to fan culture by comparing it to Norman Spinrad's The Iron Dream (1972) and A. E. Van Vogt's Slan (1940). I then use recent queer theory to develop a reading of the story that is sympathetic to the elite by constructing them as a sexual minority; in doing so, I compare "The Marching Morons" to Kornbluth's non-sf pulp novel Half (1953), which describes an intersex character's life and eventual change in gender identification from male to female.

    Journal Title

    Extrapolation

    Volume

    55

    Issue/Number

    1

    Publication Date

    1-1-2014

    Document Type

    Article

    Language

    English

    First Page

    51

    Last Page

    74

    WOS Identifier

    WOS:000335634200004

    ISSN

    0014-5483

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