J. G. Ballard: Difference between revisions

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Those who know Ballard from his autobiographical novels will not be prepared for the subject matter that Ballard most commonly pursues, as his most common genre is [[dystopia]]. His most celebrated early novel is ''[[Crash (novel)|Crash]]'', in which cars symbolise the mechanisation of the world and man's capacity to destroy himself with the technology he creates; and the characters (the protagonist, called Ballard, included) become involved in a violent obsession with the psychosexuality of car crashes. Ballard's disturbing novel was turned into a controversial, and also disturbing, film by [[David Cronenberg]].

Particularly revered among Ballard's admirers is his short story collection "''[[Vermillion Sands]]"'', set in an eponymous desert resort town inhabited by forgotten starlets, insane heirs, very eccentric artists, and the merchants and bizarre servants who provide for them. Each story features some especially exotic and effete technology, such as poetry-composing computers, orchids with operatic voices and egos, phototropic self-painting canvasses, and so on. In key with Ballards' most central themes, these tawdry and exotic technologies serve to bring out dark and hidden desires and schemes in the human castaways that occupy "[[Vermillion Sands]]", often to psychologically grotesque and physically fatal results. In his introduction to "''[[Vermillion Sands]]"'', Ballard cites this as his favorite collection.

In a similar vein, his collection "''[[Memories of the Space Age]]"'' explores many varieties of individual and collective psychological fallout — and initial deep motivation for — the American space exploration boom of the 1960's1960s and 70's1970s.

Several of Ballard's earlier works deal with scenarios of 'natural disaster'; most notably a quartet thematically based on the four [[Classical Elements]] of Aristotle, featuring ''[[The Wind From Nowhere]]'' (Air), ''[[The Drowned World]]'' (Water), "''[[ The Crystal World]]"'' (Earth), and ''[[The Drought]]'' (Fire).

In addition to his novels, Ballard has made extensive use of the [[short story]] form. Many of his earliest published works in the 1950s and 1960s were short stories.