| The Steel Tsar | |
|---|---|
Cover of the first edition |
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| Author(s) | Michael Moorcock |
| Cover artist | Melvyn |
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Language | English |
| Series | Oswald Bastable |
| Genre(s) | Science fiction novel |
| Publisher | Granada |
| Publication date | 1981 |
| Media type | Print (Paperback) |
| Pages | 155 pp |
| ISBN | 0-583-13432-7 |
| OCLC Number | 12404432 |
| Preceded by | The Land Leviathan |
The Steel Tsar is a sci-fi/alternate history novel by Michael Moorcock, first published in 1981 by Granada.[1] Being a sequel to Warlord of the Air (1971) and The Land Leviathan (1974), it is the final part of Moorcock's A Nomad of the Time Streams trilogy regarding the adventures of Cpt. Oswald Bastable and which has been seen as an early example of steampunk fiction.[2]
Contents |
In a story introduced by the ubiquitous Una Persson (who is also found in other works by Moorcock), the trilogy's hero, Cpt. Oswald Bastable, finds himself in an alternative twentieth century in which the Great War never happened. Britain and Germany became allies instead, as France declined, in a world menaced by Japanese Imperialism. Oswald joins the Russian Imperial Airship Navy and is imprisoned by the rebel Dugashvili, the 'Steel Tsar' of the title who is known to the real world as Joseph Stalin. He also encounters the anarchist Nestor Makhno and his Black Army.
While imperialism and racism in nineteenth century "heroic" fiction were deconstructed in its predecessors, the final book of the trilogy deals with the benefits of socialism and anarchism in a third alternate twentieth century where there were no effective social democratic parties in Western Europe and Australasia, as in our world.