Introduction

At the centre of this Episode is the life and work of Samuel R. Delany. Almost always known as Chip, he is a grand master of science fiction and fantasy, sex-radical memoirist, revolutionary pornographer, social commentator, literary critic, architect of one of the queerest and most uncompromisingly experimental literary careers ever undertaken. 

While recognising the harm they cause, he helps reject the stories that power tries to make us believe about ourselves, and creates allegories that amplify his and our lived experiences in ways that are meaningful to us all. He explores worlds that, even whilst under attack, live out of sync with this so-called present.

A beautiful example of this can be found in The Motion of Light in Water, where he reflects on his first encounters of seemingly numberless group sex between parked trucks at the docks or in the St Marks bathhouse. There, you never had to break contact with flesh for more than a few seconds. Delany talks about how men in that space took care of one another not only by offering flesh but by performing a care for the self that encompassed a vast care for others—a delicate and loving being for others.1

I want to have sex with what I want to become. - Bhanu Kapil2

So, following Chip’s lead - this Episode is about the movements, feelings and entanglements of already possible worlds that bear the weight of our desires, and how they help us deal with an often unbearable or impossible present.

It’s about understanding ourselves as tuned to a slightly different spot on the spatio-temporal dial, where—off to the side and in flight—perhaps we can recognise what it is about our cultures that could potentially overwhelm brutality.