10.26180/5c11d4b3e6a38 Adam Lovasz Adam Lovasz Heterocosms of Machinic Desire: Philip Reeve’s Mortal Engines Quartet as Propulsive Dystopia Monash University 2018 dystopia ecology globalisation English literature Philip Reeve posthumanism utopia Literary Studies not elsewhere classified 2018-12-13 06:18:17 Journal contribution https://bridges.monash.edu/articles/journal_contribution/Heterocosms_of_Machinic_Desire_Philip_Reeve_s_Mortal_Engines_Quartet_as_Propulsive_Dystopia/7459208 <div>Dystopian literature directed at teenage audiences has attracted much attention. Early twenty-first century global society and literature are pervaded by the sense that, to quote Philip Reeve, “the worst is yet to come.” Reeve’s <i>Mortal Engines Quartet a</i>ddresses precisely such concerns. In my study, I focus upon the predatory mobile cities represented in the novels as constituting independent self-organising agents of deterritorialisation. Inverting Alfredo Bonanno’s idea of “propulsive utopia,” I propose a reading of the <i>Mortal Engines Quartet</i> as a propulsive dystopia already in the process of enactment. A specifically posthumanist reading would focus upon the nonhuman desires embodied by cities and cyborgs alike. “Traction Cities,” far from encapsulating evolutionary dead ends, actually represent the possibility of a completely deterritorialised subjectivity, an “asignifying faciality” to use Félix Guattari’s expression. These monsters of globalisation represent a line of flight we ourselves may follow, leading to an affirmation of asubjectivity.</div>