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Many American works of science fiction are about children and their efforts to reach their full potential...often as superhuman. Canadian A.E. van Vogt's novel Slan, written in 1940, is a classic example of the child to superman theme.
Canadian works tend to portray the child's development in the context of a wider family group; often the child can only achieve fulfillment after coming to terms with his or her parents.
Family is frequently a theme in French-Canadian fantastic fiction. This is not surprising given the importance of family in Québécois culture and literature.
Canadian writers have widened the scope of fantastic fiction to include characters, images, motifs, symbols and mythologies from different ethnic backgrounds.
Phyllis Gotlieb writes of her heritage, using Jewish themes and symbols to enrich short stories like "Tauf Aleph" and "Son of the Morning". Charles Saunders has written a series of "sword-and-sorcery" short stories and novels featuring Imaro, who can best be described as a "Black Conan".
Les Gélules utopiques
Bouchard, Guy
Montréal: Éditions Logiques, 1988.
Joseph Dugré has mixed feelings about Marie's return, because he loves his sister as wildly as she hates him. But this hatred is quite normal; after all, she is only human, while he is ... an android! They combine their efforts during an adventure in which they learn to understand and love one another and discover what is hidden in the secret caverns of the island.
Les Gelules utopiques. Guy Bouchard. Montréal: Éditions Logiques, 1988.
The Woman Who is the Midnight Wind
Green, Terence M.
Porters Lake, N.S.: Pottersfield Press, 1987.
In this collection of short stories, shifts of time, futuristic technology and alien cultures open the door for Terence Green's specialty -- the study of relationships, particularly those between parents and children.
By permission of Pottersfield Press.
Dune
Herbert, Frank
Philadelphia: Chilton Book Company, 1965.
Set in the distant future, this classic epic of the struggle between good and evil, describes how a descendant of the legendary Greek King Atheus avenges the death of his father and achieves his destiny as the ruler of the desert world, Dune.
Slan
Vogt, A.E. van
Sauk City, Wisconsin: Arkham House, 1946.
Slans, with their superior intelligence and mind-reading abilities, are many times more effective than human beings. Even their young are equipped to take over the world -- any world.
Reproduced by permission of Arkham House Publishers, Inc., Sauk City, Wisconsin USA. All rights reserved.
Ender's Game
Card, Orson Scott
Toronto: TOR, 1985, c1977.
The question is whether Ender -- the end-product of genetic experimentation -- is playing computer-simulated war games or if he is involved in a far more desperate activitity. He could be the military genius Earth needs in its war against an alien enemy.
More Wandering Stars: An Anthology of Jewish Fantasy and Science Fiction
Dann, Jack
New York: Doubleday & Company, 1981.
This anthology of 15 stories by Jewish authors presents fantasy with a heavy emphasis on the writers' cultural heritage with stories such as Phyllis Gotlieb's "Tauf Aleph" about the last Jew in the universe and Gardner Dozio's "Disciple", an account of the coming of the Messiah.
More Wandering Stars: An Anthology of Jewish Fantasy and Science Fiction. Jack Dann. Doubleday, a division of Santam Doubleday Dell Publishing Group, Inc.
Imaro
Saunders, Charles R.
New York: Daw Books, 1981.
This character study of a young African warrior carries readers on a journey into African legend and heroic fantasy weaving a tapestry of n'kaa (animal-soul essences), mchawi (black magic) and mafundishu-ya-muran (warrior training) around Imaro's personal history.
Courtesy of DAW Books, Inc.
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Copyright. The National Library of Canada. (Revised: 1995-06-17)