Transrealism is a literary mode that mixes the techniques of incorporating fantastic elements used in science fiction with the techniques of describing immediate perceptions from naturalistic realism. While combining the strengthes of the two approaches, it is largely a reaction to their perceived weaknesses. Transrealism addresses the escapism and disconnect with reality of science fiction by providing for superior characterization through autobiographical features and simualtion of the author's acquaintances. It addresses the tiredness and boundaries of realism by using fantastic elements to create new metaphors for psychological change and to incorporate the author's perception of a higher reality in which life is embedded. One possible source for this higher reality is the increasingly strange models of the universe put forward in theoretical astrophysics. Science fiction is a form of speculative fiction principally dealing with the impact of imagined science and technology, or both, upon society and persons as individuals. ... Realism in art and literature is the depiction of fact or reality, rather than imaginary subjects. ... Theoretical astrophysics is the discipline that seeks to explain the phenomena observed by astronomers in physical terms with a theoretic approach. ...

Transrealism has its historic antecedents in cyberpunk and Philip K. Dick, who can be considered a proto-transrealist author. Its main proponent and prominent figure is science fiction author Rudy Rucker. Rucker coined the term "transrealism" after seeing Dick's A Scanner Darkly described as "transcendental autobiography," and expounded the principles of transrealism in a short essay titled "A Transrealist Manifesto" in 1983. Rucker applied many of these principles in his short stories and novels, notably White Light and Saucer Wisdom. Damien Broderick has identified some other authors that have at some time utilized transrealist tropes to include Martin Amis, Margaret Atwood, Iain Banks, John Barth, J.G. Ballard, John Calvin Batchelor, Jonathon Carroll, Karen Joy Fowler, Lisa Goldstein, James Morrow, Thomas Pynchon, Joanna Russ and James Tiptree Jr. Berlins Sony Centre in Potsdamer Platz reflects the global reach of a Japanese corporation. ... Philip K. Dick Philip Kindred Dick (December 16, 1928 — March 2, 1982), often known by his initials PKD, was an American science fiction writer and novelist who changed the genre profoundly. ... Rudy von Bitter Rucker (born March 22, 1946) is an American computer scientist and science fiction author, often included in lists of cyberpunk authors. ... A Scanner Darkly is a 1977 science fiction novel by Philip K. Dick. ... Alternate meanings: White (disambiguation) White is a color (more accurately it contains all the colors of the spectrum and is sometimes described as an achromatic color—black is the absence of color) that has high brightness but zero hue. ... Damien Broderick (born 1944) is an Australian science fiction and popular science writer. ... Photo of Martin Amis by Robert Birnbaum Martin Amis (born August 25, 1949) is a British novelist. ... Margaret Atwood Margaret Eleanor Peggy Atwood, CC (born November 18, 1939) is one of Canada’s most important contemporary writers. ... Iain M. Banks at 63rd World Science Fiction Convention in Glasgow, August 2005 Iain Menzies Banks (born on February 16, 1954 in Dunfermline, Fife) is a Scottish writer. ... John Barth John Simmons Barth (born May 27, 1930) is an American novelist and short-story writer, known for the postmodernist and metafictive quality of his work. ... James Graham Ballard (born November 18, 1930 in Shanghai) is a British novelist. ... Jonathan Samuel Carroll (b. ... Karen Joy Fowler (born February 7, 1950) is an author of science fiction, fantasy, and increasingly literary fiction. ... Lisa Goldstein is a Nebula-, World Fantasy-, Arthur C. Clarke Award- and Hugo-nominated fantasy and science fiction writer. ... James Morrow (born 1947) is an award-winning fiction author. ... Thomas Ruggles Pynchon, Jr. ... Joanna Russ (born February 22, 1937), American writer and feminist, is the author of a number of works of Science Fiction (among other types of writing), including The Female Man, an aclaimed SF novel and pioneering meditation on how differing societies might produce very different versions of the same person... James Tiptree, Jr (August 24, 1915 – May 19, 1987) was the pen name of science fiction author Alice Sheldon. ...

Damien Broderick argues that a state of perception (termed transreality) that is playfully contrary to consensus reality is a prerequisite for writing effective transrealist fiction. The necessary viewpoint is playful in the sense that the author does not need to literally believe the fantastic interpretation of the perception and may support and undermine it through reference to speculative science. An example of this can be seen in Rucker's blog, where he discusses an experience in an airport terminal. The term Consensus reality has two usages. ...

Transrealism's stance against consensus reality identifies it as a postmodern literature akin to surrealism and covering much the same ground as slipstream literature. Transrealism may be considered a subset of slipstream, depending on how the latter term is defined, or as Broderick posits, slipstream may be very nearly the same thing as transrealism. Broderick also argues that the approach to literature offered by science fiction as a whole, including both transrealism and slipstream becomes more crucial as society possibly approaches a technological singularity. The literature which arose as a series of styles and ideas in the post-World War II period which reacted against the perceived norms of modernist literature has been termed postmodern literature, even as it extended many of the fundamental techniques and assumptions of modern literature (see modernism, postmodernism). ... The Persistence of Memory by Salvador Dali is one of the most famous surrealist paintings. ... Slipstream is a term for a literary work which pushes the boundaries of the conventions of and thus neither sits comfortably within the confines of either science fiction or fantasy or in mainstream literary fiction. ... When plotted on a logarithmic graph, 15 separate lists of paradigm shifts for key events in human history show an exponential trend. ...

Source

• Broderick, Damien (2000). Transrealist Fiction: Writing in the Slipstream of Science. : Westport, CT: Greenwood Press. ISBN 0-313-31121-8

External link

• The Transrealist Manifesto