The Redemptive Implications of Chen Qiufan’s Waste Tide

Abstract

Waste Tide, Chen Qiufan’s debut sci-fi novel, has received growing critical attention. While most of the scholarship focuses on the explicit themes of globalization, post-human, cyborg, and alienation, the perspective of Christianity and the redemptive implications it reveals have not been given due attention. Christian stories and doctrines referred to in the novel are quite closely related to the theme of the redemption of the characters. By presenting the characters’ redemption journey with Christian principles, Chen Qiufan reveals their complex inner world and points out the ways to realize self-redemption. This paper argues that Waste Tide can be most meaningfully interpreted as a story of sin and redemption by utilizing the genre of science fiction. Love, forgiveness, confession, and atonement are emphasized in the novel to serve as the remedies for fallen humanity in a world of technological development and global capitalism. A thorough analysis of the Christian underpinning in this novel reveals Chen Qiufan’s strength in characterization and presenting important moral concerns in a world dominated by technoscience through the Christian voice.