Marvin wrote,
>
>In particular, DB dislikes the "superhuman hero who must save the >world"
>motif because it implies that ordinary people working >together are
>ultimately powerless to improve their fate.
I wouldn't doubt that he would argue this, but I think that he would be
mistaken. If one looks at fantasy books, one usually sees a ordinary looking
person who finds that they have hidden talents or hidden reserve, or are
really more special than they imagined.
The books are usually written from a point of view that gets the reader
involved with the main character. They identify with the person who has the
hidden potential. Its not that uberman over there who is bigger than us, it
is me, the individual who has greater potential than I realized.
The reality, of course, is that most people actions don't matter much in the
grand scheme of history. One contributes; one does one's best; but one
rarely is at the key position...where one's success or failure has grand
proportions.
These stories celebrate the potential within all of us, at least the better
ones do. Many/most of them deal with archetype figures of humanity: The
quest/the young man/woman coming into his/her own. The mentor, the
nurturer, the deceiving false friend, etc. are all figures from stories that
have been retold for eons. They are mythical figures...mythical in that
they tell us stories about ourselves.... in the sense that David was a
mythical as well as historical figure.
LOTR is the best fantasy story, IMHO. It set the stage for the whole
modern genre. (Yes, other people like CS Lewis were trying fantasy around
the same time, but JRR was part of that same group and he read bits of LOTR
to Lewis and his regular crew.) JRR had overwhelming talent with languages,
and it showed. I'm pretty sure that most people know that JRR was one of
the better language scholars of the 20th century.
In LOTR, weak and strong, wise and foolish free folk all band together to
fight a powerful being who wants to rule them all. Yes there are kings, but
one has to remember...JRR wanted to create a mythical system out of whole
cloth. Democracies did not exist in those systems, and he pushed it as hard
as he could with the Hobbits electing the Mayor.
In TLOTR, certain people have more power than others, but with the power
comes tremendous responsibility. The truly wise, such as Gandalf, showed
full respect to the little people. Even a Hobbit could rise to greatness
when called upon.
I think it rather ironic that DB would engage in such a radical
deconstruction of LOTR, since his opinion of deconstruction did not seem to
be all that worthwhile. I think the use of luck in Brin's books, finding
Herbie is blind chance, for example...unless he has some hidden purpose that
still hasn't come out, is not as good a plot ploy as people being called on
in time of need. That's a YMMV item, I realize, but basing books on chances
in a million highlighting the protagonists in the book only works when its
clear that some person would have to end up being that one in a million.
With Herbie, the simple fact that a Terran crew found Herbie is that chance
in a million, not this particular Terran crew.
And, as another poster pointed out, Tom and Gillian are both genetically
engineered uberhumans.
We know t
hat DB's books tend
>to show an optimistic view of the human/sentient potential for
>positive-sum cooperation & competition over the long haul. In the Uplift
>books, contstant POV changes reinforce the idea that no one protagonist
>shoulders the burden alone (with the possible exception of Jacob Demwa in
>Sundiver). Individual decisions may have a huge impact, but no individual
>is permitted to dominate the story overall. Tom Orley, possibly the
>closest thing we've seen to the superhuman hero, even gets left behind in
>a manner that makes me wonder if DB is making a statement...something
>like, "Compared to the species, we're all expendable."
>
That's a message that I'm not comfortable with. While I strongly believe in
responsibility to the community, and social needs, I believe the
collectivism expressed in the last sentence is overdone. In the 20th
century, that sort of argument has resulted in some very nasty political
systems. I think it is one of the strong failings of Marxism...that it only
considers the historical trends of the collective and ignores what happens
to individuals.
>There ought to be some deep consequences from shifting the focus of >people
>from culture to species, aside from finding ethnicity writ >large, but I
>have to go do some work now....
>
>
The answers to this have actually exited for thousands of years, IMHO:
belief and ethical systems that recognize the value of each and every
person. While it is true that most of these have been twisted and perverted
into supporting exclusive agendas, at least there is something that can be
returned to. Most of them do have balance between community and
individuals.
Dan'm Traeki Ring of Crystallized Knowledge.
Known for calculating, but not known for shutting up
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