re:considering

The princess vanishes after her betrothed arrives for their marriage and everyone thinks she has been abducted when in reality she is fleeing for her life. Her only hope is Mykkael, the foreigner captain in command of the Lowergate garrison, but to some he is also the prime suspect – mainly based on his foreignness. The commander of the royal guard, and as such Mykkael’s commanding officer, feels he should trust the captain but is too bound by tradition and law to do so.
Mykkael on his part carries a heavy burden of guilt, a guilt which drives him to act in a way to draw suspicion, acting on his oath of loyalty to Sessalie’s king and not heeding command were he thinks it contrary to this oath.

To Ride Hell’s Chasm is a pageturner, even if the prose sometimes gets a bit dense, seamlessly intertwining discussions of racism, fear of the unknown, honour and ethics with good worldbuilding and strong characterisation.

I think it sad that such a good work is soiled by second rate craftsmanship when it comes to the book’s binding and production – usually I love looking at the maps that accompanies a book in the high fantasy genre but this time someone has sent low resolution placeholders to final print. The result is blurred, pixelated, artwork. A disgrace.

Anyone holding the book thinking of buy/not buy should look further than that – the tale is a good one, well worth the time it takes reading it. And strictly speaking – the maps are not needed to follow the story. Because Janny Wurts is real good at painting that picture in words, too.

I have not read any of the other novels in the Culture suite and so initially knew less than nothing about the background. Starting my read it worried me, usually I begin with the first book in any series I’m attempting, but I was told this could stand on it’s own, and so it did.

Written to unfold layer by layer of the life of Special Circumstances agent Zakalwe while at the same time exposing the way the civilisation known as the Culture uses people and whole civilisations as part of their game of Rebuilding the Universe to Fit Our Standards it made me think of nations pursuing interventionist policies of different flavours, like the late USSR or the present-day US, but also of colonialist France, not to mention the British Empire.

The writing – or perhaps that should be the editing? – might work against this book, as it is told in two time frames, alternating with each chapter; one of them working backwards in time, one seemingly tracking the present. Also, in the middle of the “present” time line point of view suddenly changes, without any warning. Both of these can be perceived to be frustrating. But to me it was one of the things conspiring for this to be a pleasurable reading experience.

Shockingly revealing as (one of) the end(ings) was I personally feel that it is those greater questions asked that lingers with me, after I closed the book. Questions linked with the colonial/post colonial discussion (among others who has the right to intervene, and when) but also touching issues as ethics and morality.

I highly recommend this book to anyone who enjoy thinking about such topics.

One of the interesting aspects of reading texts that deal with human history is what these texts tells us about our own time (or the time when they were originally written). Currently I’m reading Gender in the Early Medieval World. It consists of a number of essays written during the early 2000’s by different scholars, and they cover different aspects and themes.

The ‘world’ means, in this context, Europe proper and the Middle East. As the term ‘medieval’ generally is applied to the nations and cultures that succeeded the Roman empire this is an accurate term but to me the ‘world’ is rather larger than that, so that I think the editors show their Eurocentric world view.

Our present values also show through in the implicitly – maybe even unconsciously – made judgements on gender roles during the times discussed. Not that I disagree. But a value judgement is a value judgement, no more no less, and just as we perceive times past our time will in turn be looked down upon – there are no moral absolutes, just as there is no fixed path to civilisation, or an apex of said.

So, halfway through the book I feel like I’m watching a meta-philosophical argument trying to repair damages done by previous generations; putting salve and plasters on an academic agenda which has previously excluded the impact of the hidden society – e.g. those not male and politically and economically empowered – on the evolving cultures, societies and nations.

This willingness to see history as something more than an enumeration of years and important kings, masters and wars is interesting. When this approach was discussed in the 1970’s it was perceived as a Marxist agenda, and thus suspect. Or – this is at least what I remember from my years in compulsory school (from ages 7-15, at the time).

Just let’s hope that academia in general is ready for a more, let’s say, holistic approach to their topics. It is certainly long overdue.
If they manage academia might at last be of some relevance to the civil society.
(Not that this is what some of them remotely wants, but that is a whole another discussion.)