I am not sure whether I want one of my favourite writers to get into trouble. But in a way it would be wonderful if someone actually noticed what he’d done in The Years of Rice and Salt – which I have read a Locus-ful of glowing reviews of. In an era in which the Western World is proclaiming itself as the Defender of Freedom, God Civilization and All Good Things, here’s a man who has written a novel that says to Western Civilization “you are quite irrelevant”. With the population in Europe obliterated by the Black Death, his world is shaped by China and the Arab nations, by Buddhism and Islam, and is as accomplished, as conflicted, as shot through with light and darkness, as our own. But completely different. I have the same reaction, reading the descriptions of the book, that Marie had to Phillip Pullman’s Dark Materials trilogy – do “they” possibly know what’s being said here. Or is SF/F entirely toothless, and living within its own little bubble.
Author Archives: Alison
The undomesticated female
Revealed I was a drop out from Woman 101 again last night. Went out running with two workmates (great fun and plan to do again), but along the way the other two got to discussing past christmas presents. One said that her mother had given her some [Name]* knives. I’d never heard of that kind of knife, and I was envisioning carving, linocutting and throwing knives, or some martial art. It took a good few yards – panting along, with energetic Border Collie keeping the pace – for it to be established that these were a particular, and reasonably famous, make of kitchen knives. Never occurred to me that kitchen knives might be known by their makes. Thought any adjective attached would donate function.
*Can’t recall name.
Limp cabbage
Came close to giving up on a Sunday’s writing this morning as I trudged through a scene with all the suspense of limp cabbage, while characters wandered in and characters wandered out and I, the writer, did a lot of staring at and describing of the tiles. True, they’re interesting tiles and highly communicative of my world’s history and society, but the POV character didn’t have the knowledge to interpret them. It finally dawned on me that I was telling the whole chapter from entirely the wrong point of view: it was the other character who already knew the information I needed to convey and was going to make the choices that at that point were going to advance the plot (ie, cause trouble). I was going to shift into her viewpoint for a second chapter, but now I’m going to rewrite the first from hers as well, and in the meantime I accumulated 3 700 words of a visit to a village in a bottle, which will be the set for a murderous climax, a rather more balanced and charming archnemesis to Creon than I’d originally envisioned, her children, whom I didn’t expect, and the answer as to why Creon and company get shot down. Why can’t I just send groups of characters in quests off to the ends of the earth without having to have them INTERLOCK so tightly it has me practically doing calculus to figure out who has to know and say what, when. But then when I read groups of characters going in opposite directions I tend to only get interested in one group and start skipping chapters. But then I’m also the kind of reader who will take a peek at the end of a book if I get to like someone and the body count is going higher, or the author is showing signs of a predisposition to doing particularly crushing and nasty things. In short, I cheat.
Tolkien’s poisoned arrow
I have been thinking of Tolkien these past few days – as I make notes which reveal that the novel is not going to go the way I thought it should, but is going to go the way Creon has decided it will go. I remember Tolkein in one of his letters saying something to the effect that Boromir’s brother had shown up, and was a very interesting character, but if he went on much longer most of him was going to have to be removed to the appendix. Maybe he did have that poisoned arrow in mind for Faramir right from the start, but I have a feeling that he found himself in a position where he had a plot well on its way and suddenly found himself with a character coming on stage who could have sent it all askew, just by his presence and personality. I’m very fond of Faramir, and always thought that arrow was a dirty trick, but it may have been authorial need!
Hellspark
Now, this gives me a perfect forum for book-notes, of which I have quite a few fragments on my hard drive, plus others rattling around in my head. Currently, Hellspark, by the wonderful Janet Kagan who does not write enough. What in particular struck me on reading Hellspark was what a great namer she is. Her ill-assorted survey team have names as diverse as the cultures they represent: Swift-Kalat twis Jalakat, Oloitokitok, layli layli calulan (which is not a name, but a title), Timosie Megeve, Ruurd van Zoveel, Tinling Alfvaen, Buntecrieh, Rav Kejesli, Om im Chdeayne, John the Smith and Edge-of-Dark. They’re barely functioning as a team because they’re constantly putting each other’s backs up with inadvertant (or not so inadvertent) obscenities, unintended aggressions and discourtesies, and it isn’t until they learn to see each other as “civilized people” that they are able to perceive the sentience of one of the native species (another marvellous name) the sprookjes.The Hellspark trader who is drawn into the situation is Tocohl Susumo and her ship’s “extrapolative computer” is Lord Maggy Lynn. In contrast to the Galactic standard language. Gal’Ling, which seeks to become a common denominator, Hellspark is an all inclusive language; therefore Hellsparks are traders, interpreters, intermediaries and judges. Tocohl has to start by interpreting the team members to each other. There’s a mob of characters, a great whirl of manners and linguistics, some wonderful descriptions, and of course the names. The last writer who struck me that way was Orson Scott Card (eg ramen, varelse – for his classes of sentients). In contrast to George Lucas, who has a fabulous visual imagination and a tin ear. Kagan is also the author of Mirabile which is sheer fun for any molecular biologist with its linked stories of a fire-fighting (sometimes literally) geneticist who has inherited someone else’s bright idea. And Uhura’s Song in which she got the woman who would fascinate Spock just right
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