Skip to content
MIT Press
  • MIT Press
  • Books
    • Column
      • View all subjects
      • New releases
      • Catalogs
      • Textbooks
      • Series
      • Awards
    • Column
      • Authors
      • Distributed presses
      • The MIT Press Reader
      • Podcasts
      • Collections
    • Column
      • MIT Press Direct

        MIT Press Direct is a distinctive collection of influential MIT Press books curated for scholars and libraries worldwide.

        • Learn more
  • Journals
    • column
      • Journals all topics
      • Economics
      • International Affairs, History, & Political Science
    • column
      • Arts & Humanities
      • Science & Technology
      • Open access
    • column
      • MIT Press journals

        MIT Press began publishing journals in 1970 with the first volumes of Linguistic Inquiry and the Journal of Interdisciplinary History. Today we publish over 30 titles in the arts and humanities, social sciences, and science and technology.

        • Learn more
  • Open Access
    • column
      • Open access at the MIT Press
      • Open access books
      • Open access journals
    • column
      • Direct to Open
      • MIT Open Publishing Services
      • MIT Press Open on PubPub
    • Column
      • Open access

        The MIT Press has been a leader in open access book publishing for over two decades, beginning in 1995 with the publication of William Mitchell’s City of Bits, which appeared simultaneously in print and in a dynamic, open web edition.

        • Learn more
  • Resources
    • column
      • Current authors
      • Prospective authors
      • Instructors
    • column
      • Media inquiries
      • Booksellers
      • Rights and permissions
    • column
      • Resources

        Collaborating with authors, instructors, booksellers, librarians, and the media is at the heart of what we do as a scholarly publisher. If you can’t find the resource you need here, visit our contact page to get in touch.

        • Learn more
  • Give
  • About
    • Column
      • About
      • Jobs
      • Internships
      • MIT Press Editorial Board
      • MIT Press Management Board
      • Our MIT story
    • Column
      • Catalogs
      • News
      • Events
      • Conferences
      • Bookstore
    • Column
      • The MIT Press

        Established in 1962, the MIT Press is one of the largest and most distinguished university presses in the world and a leading publisher of books and journals at the intersection of science, technology, art, social science, and design.

        • Learn more
  • Contact Us
Newsletter
MIT Press
Newsletter

Books

    Authors

      On the site

        • Home
        • Semiotext(e) / Native Agents
        • fiction
        • Babylon Babies
        Babylon Babies

        Semiotext(e) / Native Agents

        Babylon Babies

        by Maurice G. Dantec

        Translated by Noura Wedell

        • $19.95 Paperback

        526 pp., 6 x 9 in,

        • Paperback
        • 9781584350231
        • Published: September 30, 2005
        • Publisher: Semiotext(e)

        $19.95

        • Penguin Random House
        • Amazon
        • Barnes and Noble
        • Bookshop.org
        • Indiebound
        • Indigo
        • Books a Million

        Other Retailers:

        • Amazon.co.uk
        • Blackwells
        • Bookshop.org
        • Foyles
        • Hive
        • Waterstones
        • Penguin Random House
        • Amazon
        • Barnes and Noble
        • Bookshop.org
        • Indiebound
        • Indigo
        • Books a Million
        • Request permissions
        • Description
        • Author(s)
        • Praise

        In a futuristic thriller, a veteran of Sarajevo must escort a young woman pregnant with a mutant embryo, a genetically modified messiah whose birth may signal the end of human life as we know it.

        A cult novel in France, this sci-fi thriller is now being made into a movie by Mathieu Kassovitz. Set in the hidden "flesh and chip" breeding grounds of the first cyborg communities and peopled by Serbian Mafiosi, Babylon Babies has as its hero a hard-boiled leatherneck veteran of Sarajevo named Thoorop who is hired by a mysterious source to escort a young woman named Marie Zorn from Russia to Canada. A garden variety job, he figures. But when Thoorop is offered an even higher fee by another organization, he realizes Marie is no ordinary girl. A schizophrenic and the possible carrier of a new artificial virus, Marie is carrying a mutant embryo created by an American cult that dreams of producing a genetically modified messiah, a dream that spells out the end of human life as we know it.

        Inspired by Philip K. Dick, William S. Burroughs, Gilles Deleuze, and other extrapolationists of the future, Babylon Babies unfolds at breakneck speed as Thoorop risks his life to save Marie, whose brain—linking to the neuromatrix—loses all limits and becomes the universe itself. Exploring the symbiosis between organic matter and computer power to spin new forms of consciousness, Maurice Dantec rides Nietzsche's prophecy: "Man is something to be overcome."

        Maurice G. Dantec was born in Grenoble in 1959. A former advertising executive and songwriter for a French rock group, he is a shameless lover of science fiction, crime novels, metaphysics, and rock and roll. He has published The Red Siren, The Roots of Evil and Villa Vortex as well as three huge journal essays, Theatre of Operations.

        Dantec has created a compelling story with evocative ideas that may prove even more illuminating with subsequent readings, and a reader who undertakes the arduous journey from cover to cover will be rewarded with an entertaining tale.

        Arthur Bangs, sffworld.com

        Dantec is a literary revolution.

        Science Fiction

        Babylon Babies, an under-appreciated novel by French punk rocker turned writer Maurice G. Dantec, deserves a wider audience, and not just because its author is frequently mentioned in the same breath as Michel Houellebecq (and definitely not because the book is being adapted into a movie starring Vin Diesel)... what makes this novel (translated by Noura Wedell) so haunting is its vision of a near future in which society has fractured along every possible national, tribal and sectarian fault line.

        New York Times Book Review

        Riddled with acronyms and pop culture allusions, this is an intense, intellectually labyrinthine ride.

        Publishers Weekly

        [T]his novel by Maurice Dantec was an epic ride.

        ThickOnline.com

        The book deals with the breakdown of community and political certainty. It is gingered with snippets from Dantec's favourite philosophers and loaded with thoughts of his own. The result is a real workout for the reader. Babylon Babies is a vast encyclopedia of the future as seen through a crystal ball with cracks in the glass.... Babylon Babies is part of a genre that makes play with religious ideas. You might call it theo-fiction.

        The Sydney Morning Herald

        Related Books

        Twelve Tomorrows
        Global Dystopias
        logo
        • Column 1
          • Books
          • Journals
          • The MIT Press Reader
          • Podcasts
          • Imprints
        • Column 2
          • The MIT Press
            • About
            • Bookstore
            • Catalogs
            • Conferences
            • Press Editorial Board
            • Jobs
            • Internships
            • Press Management Board
            • News
            • Staff
            • Code of Conduct
            • Give
        • Column 3
          • Site Help
            • Accessibility
            • FAQ
            • Our eBooks
            • Privacy Policy
            • Terms of Use
        • Column 4
          • Resources
            • Current Authors
            • Prospective Authors
            • Booksellers
            • Instructors
            • Rights and Permissions
            • Media Inquiries
            • MIT Discounts
        • Column 5
          • Digital
            • CogNet
            • Digital Partners and Products
            • Knowledge Futures Group
            • MIT Press Direct
        • Global

          One Broadway 12th Floor Cambridge, MA 02142

        • Contact

        Connect

        © 2023 MIT Press. All Rights Reserved.

        Powered by Supadu