Babel-17, Samuel R. Delany

Continuing what has turned into a recent tour of the New Wave, I come to Babel-17. This novel first appeared in 1966. It won the Nebula in ’66 and was short-listed for the Hugo award in 1967.

Robert at The Valve was dissappointed by this novel; he writes that this book is representative of award winners that represent the mediocre mainstream rather than the greatest potential of art. I can’t support this argument. Considering that Babel-17 was in contention against a Heinlein novel, in only the second year of the Nebula awards, it shows a substantial bias towards art over popularity that the Nebula voters chose the Delany novel (in a tie with Daniel Keyes’ Flowers for Algernon).

It’s true that the novel has dated itself somewhat. Its main theme is an exploration of the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis (see Wikipedia) that language strongly limits thought. More recent linguistic thought has all but rejected Sapir-Whorf, more or less nullifying the premise of Babel-17. But remember, the premise could be recast with the word “language” replaced by “memes” and it would have seemed current into the ’90′s.

And anyway, the novel does still have something to offer. For one, the first half or so of the book is a long sequence in which the heroine, Rydra Wong, is searching out a crew for her starship amongst the Transport community, who’s habits are somewhat wild, to say the least. She’s accompanied by a Customs officer, clearly representing mainstream and “straight” (in every sense) culture. The interaction is a direct comment on what 1960′s mainstream American culture had to learn from the various peripheral subcultures around it, and it’s still valid today.

The second half of the book brings the Sapir-Whorf premise more into play, as Wong takes her starship and crew out to find the source of a mysterious language that has been recorded in radio transmissions preceding various attacks on the Alliance government. This section also reflects a bit of the 1960′s SF’s romantic infatuation with the aristocracy, another feature that dates the novel. Nonetheless, the later part of the book does develop an action-oriented plot, without sacrificing Delany’s poetic writing style.

Given Delany’s style, and apt social commentary, Babel-17 is still well worth reading, even if other aspects of the book have aged in the 43 years since the original publication.

Driftglass, Samuel R. Delany (Part 2)

To wrap up my review of this collection, begun here.

“Driftglass” Cal Svenson is a former depth gauger for International Aquatic Corp, adapted with gills and webbed digits to work underwater. His career ended years ago in a major accident in the Slash, an underwater trench. He’s living as something of a beachcomber in a tropical fishing village near the Slash, when he runs into a younger Aquatic who tells him about new plans to explore the Slash.

The story explores themes of generational torch-passing and of living in the world as it is and not how it might ideally be. Its as poetically and dramatically told as any other in the collection.

Driftglass, Samuel R. Delany (Part 1)

Driftglass collects Samuel R. Delany’s first 10 published short stories. These stories were originally published in a four-year period from 1966 to 1970. Before any of these stories appeared, Delany had already written eight novels, but when he wrote the last of them he was still aged in his 20′s. I read a 1977 facsimile of the 1971 Signet edition. According to Wikipedia, all of these stories are also available in the 2003 collection Aye, and Gomorrah, and Other Stories.

The collection shows why Delany is often ranked with the likes of Gene Wolfe as one of the foremost literary stylists in science fiction. In a few cases, Delany’s style has suffered from age, for example when he uses contemporary slang, like “rumble” for fight. Otherwise, his prose is as evocative and compelling as any author in SF.

The Star Pit This story pretty much hits you right in the nose with its theme, which is our reaction to human limitations. The story starts with the narrator, Vyme’s, recollection of an ant farm he had as a child, and the central premise is that most people die if they attempt to leave our home galaxy. Only a limited few, known as golden, have the psychological make-up needed to survive travel to other galaxies. The flip side is that golden are all more-or-less psychotic, uninterested in the feelings of others.

Vyme lives at the Star Pit, a waystation on the edge of the galaxy, compelled to push the limits of his containment. There he encounters a variety of other societal misfits, some of whom turn out to be golden. Finally the golden discover aliens who can travel to places the golden cannot, and they too must face the limits of their containment.

Knowing Delany is one of very few African-American SF writers, its hard not to draw a parallel with the black experience in America. In the ’60′s even more than today, blacks faced constraints and limits that did not affect the whites around them. And whites by-and-large must have seemed as callous toward blacks as golden toward normal humans in the story. Realizing that whites face their own social limitations must be small consolation to those who were (or are) stuck in some narrow role dictated not by their own will but by uncontrollable forces.

And there’s much more to the story than just human limits. There’s Vyme’s lost family and others scarred by war; and there’s Vyme’s fatherly adoption of various young riff-raff of the Star Pit. There’s really as many intertwined themes here as you’d normally find filling out a novel. This is truly a fantastic piece of science fiction.