LAST SHIP TO PROXIMA CENTAURI IBD

Sinopsi

á'Mr Spock likely would have raised an eyebrow and proclaimed th[is] playáâÇÖfascinating.âÇÖááLAST SHIP TO PROXIMA CENTAURI zips issues of immigration, race, gender, ethnicity, genetics, demographics, history, politics and economics, to name just a few, into space suits for a dark comedy set in a not-so-appealing future. ThereâÇÖs definitely a lot to think about in this highly imaginative and sometimes quite biting work.ááThe titular ship is one of several launched on a mission to save thousands of humans from a planet Earth thatâÇÖs no longer inhabitable. Rotating crews, who are otherwise suspended in a life-extending 'stasis,' take the con as millennia pass. After an unexpected delay, the last ship gets a signal from planet Proxima Centauri, and the two on-duty crew members celebrate madly.ááNot so fast. In author LamâÇÖs Clauder Competition-winning creation, the current inhabitants of the planet have several rather probing questions theyâÇÖd like to ask before their 'committee' decides if the new arrivals will be welcomed. For example, why is this ship from America populated mostly by privileged white people while the new world of Proxima Centauri is in the hands of people who came from more diverse racial and ethnic backgrounds?ááWho takes on the role of 'outsiders' in this new world? The planetary tables have been turned. But is the new order on Proxima any better? The author relentlessly pulls on these threads while the action of a hard landing on a distant planet plays out.'Steve Feeny, Portland Press Heraldáá'...Greg LamâÇÖs dark-comic sci-fi drama LAST SHIP TO PROXIMA CENTAURI. A Clauder Competition winner, this [is a] pointed and very entertaining show....ááááLike all good science fiction, LAST SHIP provides a fantasy world of cultural inversions and alternatives, the better for us to consider our own reality.ááIn this case, Lam gives us an opportunity to rethink American culture by watching what happens when white Euro-Americans show up as refugees in a society that wasnâÇÖt settled by white people, a society whose historical memory of white America includes some Frasier, but a lot more colonialist violence. LAST SHIP channels classic sci-fi tropes to pose challenging questions about race, immigration ethics and politics, the legacy of hegemony, and the plasticity of historical narrative....ááIn his storytelling, Lam deepens these genre hijinks with his rich world-building of the new planet, which is multicultural...but definitely not utopian-kind of like Hawaii under the rule of Chairman Mao....ááLAST SHIP TO PROXIMA CENTAURI continues the sci-fi tradition of letting the last frontier take us back, however uncomfortably, to our own home-to seeing how it might look from a distance, and from the outside.'Megan Grumbling, Portland Phoenix