2066: Red Star Over America

2066: Red Star Over America
AuthorHan Song
GenreScience fiction
PublisherHeilongjiang People's Publishing House
Publication date
February 1, 2000
ISBN978-7-207-04637-6

2066: Red Star Over America is a 2000 science fiction novel by Chinese writer Han Song.[1][2]: 202  In the story, the United States of America has experienced a series of economic disasters and political crises, while China has become an idyllic superpower. The protagonist is a Chinese Go prodigy who goes to a competition in the US and is caught in the midst of the Second American Civil War,[2]: 202  and a terrorist attack at the World Trade Center (the buildings were destroyed the year after it was published).[1] After a series of adventures, he returns to China.[2]: 202 

In the novel, China has achieved its superpower by accepting the influence of Amando, "an intelligence that plans the citizens' lives and oversees their happiness".[2]: 202  Amando fails when Martians come to Earth, turning China into the Land of Promise (fundi, also a way of referring to a cemetery).[2]: 202  The story is told as a flashback from the year 2126, a time when earthling civilization no longer exists.[2]: 203 

The book deals with themes of nationalism versus globalism. Academic David Der-wei Wang writes that the novel deals also with "the geopolitics of utopia in terms of socialist (China), capitalist (America), and extraterrestrial space."[2]: 202 

Its title is in part a reference to Edgar Snow's classic reportage of China, Red Star Over China.[2]: 202 

See also

References

  1. ^ a b Sebag-Montefiore, Clarissa (2012-03-25). "Cultural Exchange: Chinese science fiction's subversive politics". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 2025-05-22.
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h Wang, David Der-wei (2016). "Red Legacies in Fiction". In Li, Jie; Zhang, Enhua (eds.). Red Legacies in China: Cultural Afterlives of the Communist Revolution. Harvard Contemporary China Series. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Asia Center. ISBN 978-0-674-73718-1.