Another great episode, and it's years since I read SoZ, but the most striking thing to me is their critique of Brunner 'failing to see solutions'. I'm not saying they're wrong, but I think it's relatively rare to hear contemporary SF novels praised for offering solutions. Interesting disjunct.
Niall Harrison
Episode 52! @danhartland.bsky.social returns for a discussion of John Brunner's cynical yet sympathetic STAND ON ZANZIBAR, what it's like to read it today, and how its failures of prescience might be the best thing about it:
ancillaryreviewofbooks.org
Brunner’s prescient classic about overpopulation: is it about overpopulation? Was it prescient? And, for that matter: what does it mean to be a classic? Reviewer and editor Dan Hartland joins…
