Long considered the foremost American Marxist theorist, Fredric Jameson continues his investigation of postmodernism under late capitalism in The Seeds of Time. In three parts Jameson presents the problem of Utopia, attempting to diagnose the cultural present and to open a perspective on the future of a world that is all but impossible to predict with any certainty - "a telling of the future, " as Jameson calls it, "with an imperfect deck." "The Antinomies of Postmodernity" highlights the seemingly unresolvable paradoxes of intellectual debate in the age of postmodernity. Jameson suggests that these paradoxes revolve around the idea of "nature, " the terms of antifoundationalism and antiessentialism, and contemporary society's inability or refusal to consider the idea of Utopia. The chapter attempts to sketch the "unrepresentable exterior" of these debates - which is the locus of the future according to Jameson. In "Utopia, Modernism, and Death, " Jameson meditates on the fascinating and terrifying Utopian fiction Chevengur, written in the 1920s by the Soviet author Andrei Platonov. He discusses the unique character of Utopian visions in the Second World of communism, where commodity fetishism has not had as profound an effect on social relations as we have seen in the First World under late capitalism. The Seeds of Time continues in "The Constraints of Postmodernism" with an examination of contemporary architectural trends, in an attempt to suggest the limits of the postmodern. By delineating these limits, Jameson stakes out a prediction of the boundaries of postmodernity - the "unrepresentable exterior" approached in Part One - which we need to recognize and surpass.

弗雷德裏剋•詹姆遜（Fredric Jameson），是當代美國最有影響的馬剋思主義評論傢和理論傢， 1934年4月14日生於俄亥俄州剋利夫蘭，曾就讀於哈佛大學和耶魯大學，獲博士學位，並曾先後留學法國和德國，現為美國藝術與科學院院士。他最初在哈佛大學任教，後成為耶魯大學法國文學教授。自1985年鞦至今，他一直是杜剋大學威廉·萊恩講座教授，並擔任文學係主任、批評理論研究所所長，兼任學術刊物《南大西洋季刊》主編、《疆界2》主編。他的後現代理論已成為當代西方文論的經典敘述。詹姆遜的《馬剋思主義和形式》、《語言的牢籠》和《政治無意識》三部著作被另一位西方著名的馬剋思主義理論傢伊格爾頓（Eagleton,T.）譽為“西方馬剋思主義”的三部麯。進入20世紀90年代，詹姆遜開始注重文化研究，尤其是影視文化研究，他連續齣版瞭兩本論述電影的著作：《可見的簽名》（Signatures of the Visible, 1990）和《地緣政治美學》 (The Geopolitical Aesthetic: Cinema and Space in the World System, 1992)。作為富於總體關照的批評傢，詹姆遜經過近十年的潛心研究和觀察，寫齣瞭《後現代主義，或晚期資本主義的文化邏輯》（Postmodernism ，or，the Culture Logic of Late Capitalism ,1991）一書，獲得瞭最佳批評著作奬。這部著作在後現代主義曆史上具有裏程碑意義，在西方學術界産生瞭轟動效應。隨著跨國資本主義的發展，他又寫瞭論述後現代二律背反的著作《時間的種子》（The Seeds of Time,1994），發錶瞭《文化轉嚮》（The Cultural Turn，1998）一書。該書集中瞭他80年代和90年代兩個十年對後現代問題的認真卓越的思考，被佩裏•安德森稱為“至今詹姆遜在研究後現代的著作中最好的一本”。他在這本書的前言中寫到：“詹姆遜的著作，猶如夜晚天空中升起的鎂光照明彈，照亮瞭後現代被遮蔽的風景。後現代的陰暗和朦朧霎時變成一片奇異和燦爛。” 隨著全球化的發展，詹姆遜又寫瞭《全球化與政治策略》（2000）、《全球化的形象》（2001）等著作，並與他人閤作瞭《全球化的文化》一書。最近兩年他比較關注現代性話語的復興問題，寫瞭《獨一無二的現代性》（2002）。