Saturday, October 09, 2004
Usually, after an absence of 4-5 days, I come in with a flurry of books. Not today.
This whole time I have been reading one book:
Iron Council by China Mieville. Why did it take so long? Well, it's a dense book with lots of action, description, and characters to keep straight and it was so good that I was trying to make it last as long as I could. My endeavour ended as it always does late at night tragically trying to make the story last but unable to stop reading.
Just lately I've been struck by how different authors use and introduce interesting vocabulary. Lemony Snicket, in the series "A Series of Unfortunate Events", uses a word and then explains in an aside to the readers what the word means in this instance. "Klaus's glasses were hanging askew, a phrase which here means "tilted to one side from leaning over logs the entire morning."" Cornelia Funke, in Inkheart, uses the entire sentence and the context that the word is used in to define the word. "The entire room was red. The walls, the columns, even the ceiling were vermilion, the color of raw meat or dried blood." China Mieville uses the words as a matter of fact and scatters in words native to his fantasy world. If I don't already know the word, I can guess that it is part of his world or I can go look it up. "Coruscant" was a word that sounded familiar but I looked it up to be sure. (It means "glittering" or "light flashing".)
China Mieville's stories are set in and out of the many levels of cities and cultures. Don't expect pretty people though there is great beauty and a certain grace in the deep passion that his characters have for their lives and missions.
One of the great things about Iron Council is that the people in the story know only what they know, they do not see the big picture, and the reader only knows what each character knows and that bias keeps the reader from knowing exactly what the big picture is until it is revealed by the author. Sure, I may think that Ori is being lead astray from his revolutionist activist group and into something darker but I feel and hope that this will be something greater, something more than talktalktalk. As Toro's group seems to be turning thuggish, I wonder if the means will justify the end and at that end I feel the betrayal that Ori suffers. He's been used! What kind of person uses that passionate desire to make things better for the world for their own desires? The answer is real people, real people who finally get some power and focus more on themselves than on the good that could be done for the community.
One of the great struggles in Iron Council is the need to get a group to work for some collective good while not sacrificing the valid lives and desires and passions of the individuals AND not letting an individual take over responsibility of the group. This works out different ways in New Corbuzon and on the Iron Council and nobody is immune from the corruption that power can bring, especially the mistake of assuming that one person knows the will of the group.
Another thing to think about: How powerful is myth? Can myth change the way a people work and think? If that myth comes back into our interactive world, will the flawed reality destroy the power of the myth or can seeing the strength of the reality make the whole thing even more powerful?
(sigh) Lovely.
Iron Council by China Mieville. Why did it take so long? Well, it's a dense book with lots of action, description, and characters to keep straight and it was so good that I was trying to make it last as long as I could. My endeavour ended as it always does late at night tragically trying to make the story last but unable to stop reading.
Just lately I've been struck by how different authors use and introduce interesting vocabulary. Lemony Snicket, in the series "A Series of Unfortunate Events", uses a word and then explains in an aside to the readers what the word means in this instance. "Klaus's glasses were hanging askew, a phrase which here means "tilted to one side from leaning over logs the entire morning."" Cornelia Funke, in Inkheart, uses the entire sentence and the context that the word is used in to define the word. "The entire room was red. The walls, the columns, even the ceiling were vermilion, the color of raw meat or dried blood." China Mieville uses the words as a matter of fact and scatters in words native to his fantasy world. If I don't already know the word, I can guess that it is part of his world or I can go look it up. "Coruscant" was a word that sounded familiar but I looked it up to be sure. (It means "glittering" or "light flashing".)
China Mieville's stories are set in and out of the many levels of cities and cultures. Don't expect pretty people though there is great beauty and a certain grace in the deep passion that his characters have for their lives and missions.
One of the great things about Iron Council is that the people in the story know only what they know, they do not see the big picture, and the reader only knows what each character knows and that bias keeps the reader from knowing exactly what the big picture is until it is revealed by the author. Sure, I may think that Ori is being lead astray from his revolutionist activist group and into something darker but I feel and hope that this will be something greater, something more than talktalktalk. As Toro's group seems to be turning thuggish, I wonder if the means will justify the end and at that end I feel the betrayal that Ori suffers. He's been used! What kind of person uses that passionate desire to make things better for the world for their own desires? The answer is real people, real people who finally get some power and focus more on themselves than on the good that could be done for the community.
One of the great struggles in Iron Council is the need to get a group to work for some collective good while not sacrificing the valid lives and desires and passions of the individuals AND not letting an individual take over responsibility of the group. This works out different ways in New Corbuzon and on the Iron Council and nobody is immune from the corruption that power can bring, especially the mistake of assuming that one person knows the will of the group.
Another thing to think about: How powerful is myth? Can myth change the way a people work and think? If that myth comes back into our interactive world, will the flawed reality destroy the power of the myth or can seeing the strength of the reality make the whole thing even more powerful?
(sigh) Lovely.
# posted by JJ @ 5:36 PM 
