But Shelley's Last Man is so *dull* to read ... and *Greybeard* (sadly I think you're right, out of print) so much better than *Children of Men*. Why not Byron's poem 'Darkness', and something else contemporary ... *Girlfriend in a Coma*, say? Or even *Cloud Atlas*? Or would that be too long?

Sounds like an excellent course.

May I recommend Earth Abides, by Stewart? It's different -- no war porn, no heroics, no mutants, no grand tales of saving the world or America, just ordinary people coping. It's probably the most realistic post-apocalypse novel I've read.

Ooooh, another speculative fiction class! Keep me posted on the apocalypse ideas. As you well know, I am interested in the area. We should talk/email sometime about that. Your class inspired a section of my thesis.

The Holdfast series by Charnas is very good. It's now sold with book one and book two bound together. In my humble opinion, there is a benefit to reading the two (Walk to the End of the World and Motherlines) together. You get so many different perspectives on the world. Also, they are super easy to read unlike Russ's The Female Man, which another bulk of my thesis is on. I keep meaning to read the other two Holdfast books and well...I really should considering my thesis deals with Charnas's other Holdfast books. Have you read them?

Oooh, also I recommend _Where Late the Sweet Birds Sang_ by Kate Wilhelm. It is a post-apocalyptic world. In it an isolated family relies on cloning to carry on the species, but it has adverse effects. Although, I am not so sure about whether or not it is in print. I love that book, though. One word to describe it: Haunting.

Theodora Goss has put together an online anthology of poems of the fantastic, and it includes "The White Women" by Mary Coleridge, which is, apparently, about a colony of women. Not very apocalyptic, but worth a read.

Lots of great recommendations, not all of which I have read. Preparing for this course is going to be fun.

I know a single-sex society movie which is also post-apocalyptic. "Earth II", a Gene Rodenberry made-for-TV-movie from the 70's. It was the pilot for a show he never sold. Guy wakes up in post-apocalyptic America and goes searching. Runs up against an all female society right off the bat. Pretty much what you'd expect from a 70's movie, but fun.

My favorite post-apocalyptic book is "Star Man's Son" by Andre Norton. I'm having my son read it as part of his homeschool curriculum - cold-war era science fiction. I'm also having him watch "Them" so we can discuss mutants. He has already covered basic genetics (very basic) so we can talk about mutations. Should be fun.

I know a single-sex society movie which is also post-apocalyptic. "Earth II", a Gene Rodenberry made-for-TV-movie from the 70's. It was the pilot for a show he never sold. Guy wakes up in post-apocalyptic America and goes searching. Runs up against an all female society right off the bat. Pretty much what you'd expect from a 70's movie, but fun.

My favorite post-apocalyptic book is "Star Man's Son" by Andre Norton. I'm having my son read it as part of his homeschool curriculum - cold-war era science fiction. I'm also having him watch "Them" so we can discuss mutants. He has already covered basic genetics (very basic) so we can talk about mutations. Should be fun.

Oops! Sorry about the double post. And on second thought, Earth II wasn't really single-sex, it was female dominated. Different thing entirely.

For a very good book on gender I'd suggest the excellent Ursula Le Guin's Left Hand of Darkness. An entire world called Winter where the inhabitants are human but neither male nor female. The alien ambassador has trouble trying not to label individuals or their habits as masculine and feminine. Our Book Group loved it when we covered it last year and it is a slim book, so easy to fit into a summer course.

Also on the book front is Sheri S Tepper's lovely Beauty, a fascinating reworking of myth and foklore and feminism. The firls will like it and the boys should be made to read it!

On the film front, I raided horror and SF for my honours dissertation many years ago. I wanted to refute the stereotypical notion of these genres always denigrating women. I pointed out that long before mainstream Hollywood picked up on the 'action heroine' the B-movies and genre flicks had them. The 'final girl' who defeats the mad killer comes of age back in the 70s with Carpenter's Halloween. Slumber Party Massacre is a hilarious spoof slasher horror made by feminist movie lovers and littered with Freudian references to masculinity and feminism (notably when the killer's enromrous drill bit is symbollically chopped off!). Before Jodie Foster's Oscar for The Accused there was the B-movie of I Spit on Your Grave.

Women-dominated and post-apocalyptic society come together in a very silly (I think Polish) movie called Sex Mission (two men wake up in the future run by women where there are no more men). There has also been a recent series of comics, now avaible in two volumes of graphic novel collections called Y: the Last Man you may look into for something different.

Phew! I just meant to add a couple there, but once my brain started on the subject out they came...

Joe :-)

Hmmm ... "Sex Mission." I doubt it is in our uni library ...

Fritz Leiber's story "Coming Attraction" is a great gynophobic post-apocalyse tale, which could be used as a prologue to the Charnas. Dick's Dr. Bloodmoney is a classroom fave. Parable of the Sower is interesting, as it's one of the few books in print that's not post-catastrophic but catastrophe-in-progress, AFAIK. Canticle for Leibowitz will bore many students to tears.

No 12 Monkeys? Post-apocalyptic AND time travel AND interesting cinematography.

I recently saw Lucas's THX 1138. It is re-released in a remastered edition on DVD. Very interesting film in which sex is taboo. Dystopic/consumerist society. Very good. Lucas before he became "a rich bastard," as a friend of mine once put it.