The Fungal Utopia: Seeing Utopia in Mushrooms and Mushrooms in Utopia

The fungal utopia: photos from Weston Wood

As autumn turns to winter it’s time for me to summarise what I’ve read and thought about fungi this season. I started off from the current trend for fungal fiction. I found myself asking whether fungi are being used to think about better ways of being, and this made me wonder about the relationship between fungi and utopia. This led me to think about the fungi appearing in contemporary utopian fiction, and to ask what work authors are putting fungi to in their literary utopias. Here’s what I found when exploring these questions.

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Current Research in Speculative Fiction (CRSF) 2025 conference report

The CRSF annual conference took place on 3-4 July 2025. It was a hybrid event and I joined remotely. The official theme of the conference was ‘boundaries’. However, I felt there were two other themes that emerged from the event. Firstly the global prevalence of SF, which the hybrid format supported as it allowed for attendees from around the world. Secondly, fungal fiction, a current favourite topic of mine.

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Fungal fiction: a field guide to the mushroom trend in speculative fiction

Fungal fiction: a photo of some real life fungi growing at the mossy base of an ivy-covered tree

Mushrooms are a big thing right now in speculative fiction. I’ve enjoyed putting together this glossary of terms relating to fungi and the trend for fungal fiction. I wrote this in response to Jasmin Kirkbride’s keynote on mushroompunk at the Current Research in Speculative Fiction conference in July 2025.

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