threemonkeys (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
threemonkeys) wrote2007-09-10 01:54 pm
threemonkeys) wrote2007-09-10 01:54 pm
Entry tags:
Tightrope
Justina Robson’s Living Next Door to the God of Love fits into a grouping of books which has often frustrated me. That is a group which involves characters who are supposedly vastly superior to humans. We are talking about books where gods, superior aliens or hyper evolved (transcended) humans are core or even POV characters in the book. You can immediately see where the problem lies – how do you present the thoughts of a character who is by definition so beyond us that its motivations are beyond your comprehension. I’m borrowing from the vocabulary of such books in using these terms.
One common way to handle this is to declare godhood and then ignore it. Treating the powerful as if they are ordinary people, or more commonly, spoiled children. Another approach is to handle the incomprehensible by writing in an incomprehensible fashion. This approach is usually characterised by lots of vague or undefined terms or streams of fragmentary consciousness. Another way to go is to ignore the consciousness aspect altogether and concentrate on the mechanical super-power aspects. None of these are really satisfactory but then you have to ask, is it really possible to do justice to the indescribable?
So how does Justina Robson handle the four dimensional aspects of beings which operate in seven dimensions in an eleven dimensional space which does not include a conventional time dimension and which can accommodate the simultaneous consciousness of all the intelligences which have been assimilated into it? All this as the humans involved inhabit a bubble universe which changes its aspect to reflect the subconscious of those it houses. The answer is “surprisingly well”. By taking elements of all the above approaches and multi-threading the narrative so that the thoughts of the superbeings are contrasted with the humans they interact with, a tale of personal discovery can be told.
Sure, it is a bit of a talk-fest where the narrative gets bogged down a bit. Sure there are a few moments where the constraints to keep the scope human seem a bit arbitrary. Sure there are a few magic-like moments where explanation is replaced by unexplained terms. But the overall effect is pretty damn impressive. I really enjoyed this book – both for the tale being told and the sheer skill demonstrated by the author in keeping the balance between the needs of the more-than-human story and the human audience.
One common way to handle this is to declare godhood and then ignore it. Treating the powerful as if they are ordinary people, or more commonly, spoiled children. Another approach is to handle the incomprehensible by writing in an incomprehensible fashion. This approach is usually characterised by lots of vague or undefined terms or streams of fragmentary consciousness. Another way to go is to ignore the consciousness aspect altogether and concentrate on the mechanical super-power aspects. None of these are really satisfactory but then you have to ask, is it really possible to do justice to the indescribable?
So how does Justina Robson handle the four dimensional aspects of beings which operate in seven dimensions in an eleven dimensional space which does not include a conventional time dimension and which can accommodate the simultaneous consciousness of all the intelligences which have been assimilated into it? All this as the humans involved inhabit a bubble universe which changes its aspect to reflect the subconscious of those it houses. The answer is “surprisingly well”. By taking elements of all the above approaches and multi-threading the narrative so that the thoughts of the superbeings are contrasted with the humans they interact with, a tale of personal discovery can be told.
Sure, it is a bit of a talk-fest where the narrative gets bogged down a bit. Sure there are a few moments where the constraints to keep the scope human seem a bit arbitrary. Sure there are a few magic-like moments where explanation is replaced by unexplained terms. But the overall effect is pretty damn impressive. I really enjoyed this book – both for the tale being told and the sheer skill demonstrated by the author in keeping the balance between the needs of the more-than-human story and the human audience.