Preview of On Wings of Song Summary:

Disch bases his judgment on aesthetics; to understand Disch's work one must first understand that he is aesthetically motivated — that the music of his prose, the images he describes, and the plots he dramatizes are formed in part by what Disch deems beautiful and what he deems ugly. The most overt discussion of aesthetics among his novels is On Wings of Song.

On Wings of Song has the fantastic motif of "flying" and is set in the near future, both traits that seem science fictional. Yet, if one were to remove the "flying" motif from the novel, it would remain largely intact, and its future setting is too much like the present to be convincingly futuristic. In fact, On Wings of Song is not about science, nor is it a speculation about the future; it is about growing up in an amoral society that is contemporary, with...