Why you
should read an epic four-volume sci fi series on the beach this summer.
If you’re
a fan of science fiction already, I probably won’t have to work very hard to
convince you to give Tad
Williams’ Otherland series—all four
800-page volumes of it—a shot. Williams
has had a long and impressively varied career in sci fi, fantasy, and related
genres, in print and in numerous other media (Otherland is in fact currently being developed into an
online gaming system and also has been optioned as
a film which Williams is set to script), and to my mind this series remains
his most significant achievement; I’d put it alongside Dan Simmons’
Hyperion novels as the best sci
fi series of the last couple decades. So if you’re a fan of the genre and haven’t
read Williams’ series yet, feel free to stop reading now and go pick ‘em up; I
promise you won’t be disappointed.
But if you’re
not a fan, I know that much of that paragraph—and especially the part about
3200 pages of epic science fiction—is more likely to send you running in the
other direction than to scream “beach read!” to you. Moreover, Williams’ series
is set in numerous places, real and virtual, and if I’m remembering correctly
only two of its many central plot threads take place in the United States;
hardly an obvious fit for a series on American Studies beach reads. Yet I am
including Williams’ series in my own, and there are a couple of pretty good
reasons why. For one thing, Williams sets his series in a near-future in which
numerous early 21st century American and world trends—historical,
cultural, technological, and more—have been extended and amplified; as
with all of the best sci fi, then, his works allow us to consider and analyze
our own moment and society from that distance. It doesn’t hurt, for the
beach reading and for helping that socially critical medicine go down more
smoothly, that Williams’ touch in these areas is both wry and funny; each
chapter begins with a brief glimpse into one or another of these futuristic
trends, and taken together they comprise a dark satirical vision on par with
the kinds of black comedy I referenced in yesterday’s post.
That’s one
good reason for any American Studier to engage with science fiction, and
particularly with a series as pitch-perfect in its futuristic world-building
and social commentary as Williams’. But I would argue that the series’ central
theme is even more salient for any and all 21st century American
Studiers. I’m not going to spoil the specifics of how Williams develops this
theme, as it’s central to the series’ mysteries and arcs, but will say that his
characters and his books are concerned, on multiple key levels, with questions
of story-telling: how we create and tell stories; what stories mean for
individuals and communities; how stories can be put to the worst as well as the
best uses; what the oldest and most enduring stories have to offer all of us in
a 21st century, technologically driven society; and many more such
questions. As
I’ve argued many times in this space, I think few questions matter more to
American politics, culture, society, and Studies than that of our national
narratives, the stories we tell about our past, our community, our identity. Williams’
series makes for a hugely imaginative and entertaining way in to thinking about
such narratives, and about the deepest human questions to which they connect.
Definitely worth your suntanning time!
Next beach
read post tomorrow,
Ben
PS.
Nominations for American Studies beach reads, for the weekend’s crowd-sourced
post? Bring ‘em!
7/12
Memory Day nominee: Henry David Thoreau, one of
America’s foremost philosophers, environmentalists, political activists, travel
writers, lecturers
and essayists, and literary voices.
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