#lit and science

[mysharona1987]

[jstor]

🎃 Ever wonder how Frankenstein and The Vampyre came to life? It all began during the stormy summer of 1816, a time so eerie it’s now called the "Year Without a Summer." Confined indoors by relentless rain, Mary Shelley, Lord Byron, and John Polidori challenged each other to write the scariest story they could. What followed was nothing short of legendary: Shelley’s Frankenstein—a tale of ambition, creation, and consequence—and Polidori’s The Vampyre, the first modern vampire story that still haunts us today.

These works explore themes we still grapple with—ambition, relationships, power, and the unknown. And they remind us of what the humanities do best: helping us ask the big questions about who we are and how we live together.

This Halloween, revisit these iconic stories and reflect on how literature challenges us to confront our fears—both real and imagined. Check out our latest blog post to explore the spirit of Villa Diodati and the enduring importance of these tales.

Read it now on the JSTOR blog.

[tehstripe]

this sequence of pages in act 5 is so striking to me.

in acts 1-4, jade is a mysterious, all-knowing figure who knows about sburb and how it needs to go, and shes very systematic about logging and remembering important things through the little bands on her fingers. even though shes just some goofy little girl, shes smart!! she knows whats going on and knows what she has to do, and shes been studying the clouds to make sure that she and her friends are ready. because honestly, what else is she going to do with her time? she's alone on the island, and this is her destiny. she's going to make sure it happens.

here, we're finally seeing a bit of her friendly and put together self image start to fall apart as she just gives up on keeping track of things. she's grieving the loss of prospit, shes just had her first ever nightmare, AND she had to deal with an obnoxious teenage boy (karkat), and she's reached her breaking point. and she just. gives up. forget the reminders, forget the systems, they aren't serving her right now, so off they go.

plus, we get this tidbit a few pages later:

jade always knew she was going to die. she had seen herself, stuffed and perfectly preserved as a thirteen-year-old. she must have known that it was coming soon, but that didn't stop her from going through the plan to play the game with her friends. personally i think she thought it was worth it if she could at least see her friends, hopefully keep them safe, and have some fun times with them right before she had to die.

i wonder if theres a part of her unsettled by the fact that she's finally faced something she didn't already know was going to happen. she no longer has the comforting clouds of skaia to tell her what's going to happen - she's as clueless as everyone else. probably MORE clueless than some characters, like the trolls, who have a window into her future that she can't see.

jade's realized that she doesn't know all of the beats of this story anymore. she might just grow up now, and that means she has to go forth into the unknown.

[quotespile]

I don't miss him anymore. Most of the time, anyway. I want to. I wish I could but unfortunately, it's true: time does heal. It will do so whether you like it or not, and there's nothing anyone can do about it. If you're not careful, time will take away everything that ever hurt you, everything you have ever lost, and replace it with knowledge. Time is a machine: it will convert your pain into experience. Raw data will be compiled, will be translated into a more comprehensible language. The individual events of your life will be transmuted into another substance called memory and in the mechanism something will be lost and you will never be able to reverse it, you will never again have the original moment back in its uncategorized, preprocessed state. It will force you to move on and you will not have a choice in the matter.

Charles Yu, How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe

[torpublishinggroup]

Devilman Crybaby meets Marvel’s Venom in Exordia, the science fiction debut of Seth Dickinson, author of The Traitor Baru Cormorant. 

Ssrin Character Illustration by Julie Dillon

WHAT’S IT ABOUT

Meet Anna Sinjari, a refugee and disaffected office worker eking an existence in New York City. Her life is about to be upended by Ssrin, an alien with eight serpent heads, no qualms with cold-blooded murder, and an appetite for turtles (yum).

The universe is governed by seven passions, seven patterns which appear again and again, across species and across time. Anna and Ssrin are bound by the last and the greatest. The cosmos itself ships their very souls. Specifically for them, that means they’ll have to outmaneuver spies, armies, and government agencies to save humanity from a diabolical alien entity, hellbent on pinioning the souls of every creature on earth.

Exordia is expansive adventure science fiction that reads like a race-against-the-clock thriller in the vein of Michael Crichton, but steeped in the irony, humor, and pain of the Internet age. An alien-human epic for those who've always rooted for the monster.

[thehauntedrocket]

Metropolis

Art by Michael Kaluta

[academic-vampire]

ℌ𝔬𝔴 ℑ 𝔴𝔞𝔫𝔱 𝔱𝔬 𝔟𝔢 🏛️

[soracities]

J. Estanislao Lopez, from "Alternate Ending: The Invention of Science", We Borrowed Gentleness

[prettyinaccurate]

hes doing SCIENCE

[bigskyandthecoldgun]

imagine eddie’s out of work because reefer rick got put away for good, and rick kept such a tight lid on his own supplier that eddie has no clue where to buy from now. he’s applied to a couple of jobs, but nobody’s gotten back to him yet. thankfully, his saving grace comes in the form of a flyer for someone seeking a babysitter.

enter single dad steve, who just needs someone to watch his five kids (and occasionally the miracle baby hopper-byers twins from nextdoor, because they’re best friends with his kids and refuse to be separated from them for longer than twelve hours) for a couple hours while he takes a much-needed nap every few days. he can’t keep asking their auntie robin and auntie vickie, after all. even if they’re more than willing to watch them, steve feels like it’s too big of an ask without payment, which they refuse to accept. and if the babysitter that responds to his flyer just so happens to be a very attractive guy whose guitar-playing and d&d skills are enough to captivate said children’s collective attention for those hours, well…that’s just an added bonus.

[labcoated-lunacy]

"this edible ain't shit LMAO"

*ten minutes later, trembling feverishly" "devil! do you dare approach me?? and do not you fear the fierce vengeance of my arm wreaked on your miserable head??? begone, vile insect!! or rather, stay, that I may trample you to dust! and oh! that i could, with the extinction of your miserable existence, restore those victims whom you have so diabolically murdered!!"

the yellow-eyed daemon i have cobbled together from flesh and alchemical genius: "I expected this reception. all men hate the wretched; how, then, must i be hated, who am miserable beyond all living things! yet you, my creator, detest and spurn me, thy creature, to whom thou art bound by ties only dissoluble by the annihilation of one of us-"

[visionsofaselfmademan]

[literaryvein-reblogs]

Hello! First of all, thank you for the wonderful content! It's a real joy, and an enrichment, food for both the brain and the heart! I was wondering if through your treasures, you could find some writing notes/words/concepts/vocabulary relating to genetic engineering? Like...creating a virus, and a vaccine for it, modifying the virus so it has certain specific effects.... Thank you in advance!

Writing Notes: Virus & Vaccine

References How Viruses Work; Replication Cycle; Mutation, Variants, Strains, Genetically Engineering Viruses; Writing Tips; Creating your Fictional Virus & Vaccine

Virus - an infectious microbe consisting of a segment of nucleic acid (either DNA or RNA) surrounded by a protein coat.

It is a tiny lifeform that is a collection of genes inside a protective shell. Viruses can invade body cells where they multiply, causing illnesses.

It cannot replicate alone; instead, it must infect cells and use components of the host cell to make copies of itself. Often, a virus ends up killing the host cell in the process, causing damage to the host organism.

Well-known examples of viruses causing human disease include AIDS, COVID-19, measles and smallpox. Examples of viruses:

Viruses are even smaller than bacteria and can invade living cells—including bacteria. They may interfere with the host genes, and when they move from host to host, they may take host genes with them.

Bacteriophages (also known as phages)—viruses that infect and kill bacteria.

Size differential between virus and bacterium

Viruses are measured in nanometers (nm).

They lack the cellular structure of bacteria, being just particles of protein and genetic material.

How Viruses Work

Viruses use an organism’s cells to survive and reproduce.

They travel from one organism to another.

Viruses can make themselves into a particle called a virion.

This allows the virus to survive temporarily outside of a host organism. When it enters the host, it attaches to a cell. A virus then takes over the cell’s reproductive mechanisms for its own use and creates more virions.

The virions destroy the cell as they burst out of it to infect more cells.

Viral shedding - when an infected person releases the virus into the environment by coughing, speaking, touching a surface, or shedding skin.

Viruses also can be shed through blood, feces, or bodily fluids.

Virus Replication Cycle

While the replication cycle of viruses can vary from virus to virus, there is a general pattern that can be described, consisting of 5 steps:

Attachment – the virion attaches to the correct host cell.

Penetration or Viral Entry – the virus or viral nucleic acid gains entrance into the cell.

Synthesis – the viral proteins and nucleic acid copies are manufactured by the cells’ machinery.

Assembly – viruses are produced from the viral components.

Release – newly formed virions are released from the cell.

Mutations, Variants, and Strains

Not all mutations cause variants and strains. Below are definitions that explain how mutations, variants, and strains differ.

Mutation - errors in the replication of the virus’s genetic code; can be beneficial to the virus, deleterious to the virus, or neutral

Variants - viruses with these mutations are called variants; the Delta and Omicron variants are examples of coronavirus mutations that cause different symptoms from the original infection

Strains - variants that have different physical properties are called strains; these strains may have different behaviors or mechanisms for infection or reproduction

Genetically Engineering Viruses

Using reverse genetics, the sequence of a viral genome can be identified, including that of its different strains and variants.

This enables scientists to identify sequences of the virus that enable it to bind to a receptor, as well as those regions that cause it to be so virulent.

Vaccine - a special preparation of substances that stimulate an immune response, used for inoculation

Vaccines & Fighting Viruses with Viruses

Common pathogenic viruses can be genetically modified to make them less pathogenic, such that their virulent properties are diminished but can still be recognized by the immune system to produce a robust immune response against. They are described as live attenuated.

This is the basis of many successful vaccines and is a better alternative than traditional vaccine development which typically includes heat-mediated disabling of viruses that tend to be poorer in terms of immunogenicity.

Viruses can also be genetically modified to ‘fight viruses’ by boosting immune cells to make more effective antibodies, especially where vaccines fail. Where vaccines fail, it is often due to the impaired antibody production by B-cells, even though antibodies can be raised against such viruses – including HIV, EBV, RSV & cold-viruses.

Related Articles: Modified virus used to kill cancer cells ⚜ Genetic Engineering ⚜ Engineering Bacterial Viruses ⚜ Benefits of Viruses

A Few Writing Tips

As more writers look to incorporate infectious diseases into their work, there are quite a few things writers should keep in mind:

Don’t anthropomorphize. Really easy to do, but scientifically wrong. Viruses don’t want to kill you; bacteria don’t want to infect you; parasites don’t want to make your blood curdle. None of these things are big enough to be sentient to want to do anything. They just do it (or don’t do it).

Personal protective equipment. This includes wearing gloves, lab coats, safety glasses, and tying your hair back if it’s long. It is the same as Edna Mode’s “no capes.” Flowing hair looks cool all the way to the explosive ball of flames that engulfs someone’s head.

Viruses are small. You can’t see viruses down a normal microscope—they need a special microscope called an electron microscope. These are highly specialized and take a long time to make the preparations to be able to see the virus. Normally viruses are detected by inference—measuring part of them using an assay that can amplify tiny amounts of material, for example PCR.

Viruses don’t really cause zombie apocalypses. 

Vaccines work. But they take time. The best vaccine in the world will still only prevent infections two weeks after it is given. Drugs are quicker, but still take some time. But the good news is an infection is not going to kill you (or turn you into a zombie) quickly, so they both have time to work.

Scientists use viruses as a vector to introduce healthy genes into a patient’s cells:

Your Fictional Virus & Vaccine

When creating your own fictional virus, research further on the topic and consider choosing a specific one as your basis/inspiration.

Here's one resource. For some of them, you'll need a subscription to access, but those that are available give you a good overview of the virus, as well as treatment options.

You can do the same for creating your fictional vaccine:

Here's one resource. And here's one on vaccine developments.

Sources: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 ⚜ Writing Notes & References

Lastly, here's an interesting article on how science fiction can be a valuable tool to communicate widely around pandemic, whilst also acting as a creative space in which to anticipate how we may handle similar future events.

Thanks so much for your kind words, you're so lovely! Hope this helps with your writing. Would love to read your work if it does :)

[lets-get-lit]

It is as inhuman to be totally good as it is to be totally evil. 

- Anthony Burgess, A Clockwork Orange

[stuckinapril]

Reading an article on how no one truly knows how to read a book front to back anymore is making me so terrified I literally don’t gaf if I’m a biochem major it’s looking more and more every day like I’m going for that literature master’s degree for no reason other than to feel something

[torpublishinggroup]

Devilman Crybaby meets Marvel’s Venom in Exordia, the science fiction debut of Seth Dickinson, author of The Traitor Baru Cormorant. 

WHAT’S IT ABOUT

Meet Anna Sinjari, a refugee and disaffected office worker eking an existence in New York City. Her life is about to be upended by Ssrin, an alien with eight serpent heads, no qualms with cold-blooded murder, and an appetite for turtles (yum).

The universe is governed by seven passions, seven patterns which appear again and again, across species and across time. Anna and Ssrin are bound by the last and the greatest. The cosmos itself ships their very souls. Specifically for them, that means they’ll have to outmaneuver spies, armies, and government agencies to save humanity from a diabolical alien entity, hellbent on pinioning the souls of every creature on earth.

Exordia is expansive adventure science fiction that reads like a race-against-the-clock thriller in the vein of Michael Crichton, but steeped in the irony, humor, and pain of the Internet age. An alien-human epic for those who've always rooted for the monster.