Alternative Masculinities in Feminist Speculative Fiction

Michael Pitts is assistant professor at the University of South Bohemia.

• AcknowledgmentsIntroductionChapter 1: Recovering Men in Dorothy Bryant’s The Kin of Ata Are Waiting for YouChapter 2: Precarious Masculinities in Ursula K. Le Guin’s The DispossessedChapter 3: Complicating Manhood in Marge Piercy’s Woman on the Edge of TimeChapter 4: Masculinity Crossing Borders in Octavia Butler’s Lilith’s BroodChapter 5: “This is the Way a New World Begins”: Revolutionary Masculinities in N.K. Jemisin’s Broken Earth TrilogyConclusionReferencesAbout the Author

Michael Pitts’s Alternative Masculinities in Feminist Speculative Fiction is a book that needed to be written. It sheds light on a body of work underappreciated for its critique of hegemonic masculinity and its effects on society. Pitts traces the development of this critique over several decades as it evolves along with feminist discourse, becoming more intersectional and historically situated…. Alternative Masculinities in Feminist Speculative Fiction provides a much-needed exposition of the important work that these writers produced about types of masculinity. It traces the evolution of a critique that reimagines masculinities, estranging the performance of manhood as only sf allows. It also maps the ways in which feminist discourse has become more inclusive and intersectional since the publication of Bryant’s novel in 1971. It is a valuable addition to masculinity studies that presents alternatives for the future of gender performance and the effects of masculinity on women.