Yu, E. Lily: The Cartographer Wasps and the Anarchist Bees
The Cartographer Wasps and the Anarchist Bees (2011)
Written by: E. Lily Yu
Genre: Short Story/Fantasy
Published by: Clarkesworld
Rating: It's a Gamble
And at last, we come to the final short story nominated for the Hugo, and incidentally, it was my least favorite of the bunch. Yet, despite knowing it won't get my top vote, I went ahead and read it for a second time before reviewing. My first read was filled with interruptions, and as a result (or maybe the interruptions themselves were a result of the following), I had a hard time grasping the shifts in perspective, of understanding when we'd moved from a human perspective to a wasp perspective to a bee perspective and then back and forth again. On the second read, I had that trouble one specific time, in the beginning, despite knowing what to look for. After that, I was okay with the shifts, and honestly, the story's not so badly written that I should have trouble. Instead, it requires careful attention. A reader must pick up key words to recognize the shift, and a second read really helps in this regard. My first read was not one where I gave full, careful attention, so I'm glad I gave this a second shot for the sake of review.
As previously mentioned, the writing is good. It should be, given the publisher in particular, but the style of prose is enjoyable once you understand the type of story you're getting. It's kind of fable-esque, an allegory, given that we get the point of view of both the cartographer wasps (which is an utterly fantastic premise) and the anarchist bees, reminding of stories like Orwell's Animal Farm, though this isn't nearly so bleak. There was an interesting discussion in the comments as to whether or not this story merited the term "science fiction" (for the record, you can read this story for free and its comments on Clarkesworld's website, and I've got a direct link to the story above), and my first reaction was, "Hell to the no." I'm all for soft and/or social science fiction stories, but short of a commentary on colonialism, there was little to nothing here that lent this story to any kind of SF label in mind. Rather, and you'll notice this distinction in the genre tab above, I felt this story was clearly fantasy. There's a whimsical quality to the story, to the world-building, that lends itself to magic more than it does to SF, and despite some debates I've seen online, a story about colonialism does not immediately make a story SF. Colonialism might be a common theme in SF, but it is not a staple of the genre.
Then I noticed the author's comments regarding the genre of the story, referring to entomology and how many people don't consider it a hard science, but it is, and the author seems to acknowledge the fact that this story pushes many a genre envelope (really, it's best just to call this sucker speculative fiction and be done with it), I got the impression that she, too, considers it science fiction.
Interesting. Entomology is the study of insects, and certainly, given her world-building, the author has put a great deal of real-world research into her cartographer wasps and anarchist bees (I think I read someone that bees can ACTUALLY be anarchists? Fascinating!). But I resist the label of science fiction in particular. On one hand, one can argue that this is a story heavily based in science, and therefore science fiction, and I'd roll with that rather begrudgingly. On the other hand, I'm not entirely certain that just because a book requires scientific research in order to convey accurate world-building necessarily makes the resulting piece of fiction science fiction. To me, it's more of a matter of keeping things authentic and real, so that one's story isn't so bogged down by bad research it isn't taken seriously.
It can go either way. But this is too fantasy/allegorical/fable-esque for me to roll with the hard SF label. Of course, I know next to nothing about wasps and bees, let alone insects, so who am I say for sure? Maybe this is the greatest piece of hard SF ever… if you're a entomologist.
All of this musing came after the second reading, and I'm grateful for it. I missed the colonialism on my first read-through (yeah, that's how distracted I was), though I did wonder on that first read if the author wasn't perhaps positing a theory as to the disappearance of honeybees? Yet there's a prevailing feeling of, well, I don't want to say hope, but persistence. Because despite everything that happens, ideas never die. They find a way to keep going and infecting others, and on my second read, that's what I walked away with.
It's an utterly creative and interesting story, one well worth discussing. Yet compared to the other Hugo nominees, it failed to inspire any emotional connection. "The Paper Menagerie" hit me in the heart. "The Shadow War" made me laugh. "Movement" engaged my intellect on an active level, the kind that gets me genuinely excited for the material. "Homecoming" tried to engage my heartstrings and my wonder, failed utterly, but it did try. Poor "Cartographer" was a fascinating piece of work, and while it engages my intellect, it doesn't do so on an active level. I'm not inspired to learn more about wasps or bees or anarchy or any of those things, and for my two cents, if a story is going to truly engage me on an intellectual level, it must hook me in a way that makes me see the world through a completely new lens. It must fascinate me, engage me to the point of obsession. This is a personal thing, and it's not the author's fault that "Cartographer" didn't grab me.
Which is why the rating is "It's a Gamble." It's an interesting story that's worth reading, with the most fantastic title out of the nominated bunch, but your mileage may vary, and you may need to read it again just to make sure you didn't miss anything the first time.