Technology and 21st Century Fiction: Resisting/Embracing an Impending Irrelevance

This article asks how the technological devices and achievements that hold unmistakable status in contemporary life are represented in contemporary fiction. I suggest three levels of engagement with which to define and analyse the presence of technology in contemporary texts. These are: the reference to technology within fiction, the representation of a digital environment by fiction, and the creation of digital fiction. A variety of literary works are considered in this analysis, including works by Don DeLillo, Jennifer Egan, Else Fitzgerald, A.M Homes, Martin Lukes and Lucy Kellaway, Ruth Ozeki, and Richard Powers. Wendy Hui Kyong Chun’s work on obsolescence is utilised as consistent frame in analysis of each literary example, used to question the effects and issues in engaging with digital culture. The danger of irrelevance due to the relentless cycle of digital upgrading is highlighted as a perceived, but not always realised, threat to engagement and legacy. Consistent attention is paid to literary heritage in interrogating both fiction’s established record of technological experimentation and the resistance to depictions of contemporary digitality. Conclusions uphold the value of fictional engagement with technology in a continuation of this heritage, and in authentically depicting the contemporary moment.