Cosmic empire: Colonialism and postcolonial thought in Liu Cixin’s The Three-Body Problem

Abstract

Liu Cixin’s The Three-Body Problem (2006), the first novel in his acclaimed Remembrance of Earth’s Past trilogy, is often celebrated for its integration of hard science, Chinese political history, and cosmic imagination. This paper applies postcolonial theory—particularly the works of Fanon, Said, Spivak, Loomba, and Santos—to read The Three-Body Problem as a sustained metaphor for colonial encounter, ideological fragmentation, and epistemic subjugation. In doing so, it demonstrates that the novel’s cosmic setting and futuristic plot serve not to escape history but to reinscribe and magnify its central crises: domination, collaboration, and the uncertain possibility of resistance.