Darwinia
My latest read is Darwinia by Robert Charles Wilson, subtitled "A Novel of a Very Different Twentieth Century." It's an alternate history that does not stop at showing the differences between our familiar history and the alternate history that unfolds; it is also quite concerned with this alternate history's causes and repercussions.
The novel opens in 1912 with the outright disappearance of Europe as we know it. A green light covers and surrounds the continent (like the Northern lights but somehow more apocalyptic) and overnight the civilizations that had grown up there over centuries are gone, replaced by wild growth unlike any ever before seen on earth. This causes great changes across the world, particularly seen in America. There, all things European are shunned; Darwinia (as the continent is at first fancifully called, as a way of "implying that the miracle had discredited natural history" [17]) is a wilderness to be explored and claimed, just as America was once explored and claimed by the Europeans; and most people believe that the destruction of millions of people in the creation of Darwinia is a "miracle" of God, proof that evolution is false.
The protagonist, Guilford Law, travels in 1920 to Darwinia as part of an expedition to photograph and map the interior of the continent (England being somewhat settled already, though only by rough frontier towns on the edge of the wild jungle). During the expedition, much goes wrong and Guilford begins to see that there is more to this new land than meets the eye. There are strange and unfathomable things in this land and in his head. He has dreams that he cannot understand, dreams of a Great War in which he dies. Others have these dreams as well. And still others feel a god speaking to them, speaking through them and using them.
Ultimately, these two groups (those who dream of an alternate past and those who are vessels for the "gods") come into conflict. The dreamers are those good, conscientious humans who are intended to protect the earth from the invaders, those "gods" that have invaded others' minds and bodies. Those whom the gods speak to and control are the liars and con men of the earth, those who already have a desire for power and the inclination to do unsavory things in order to gain that power. And the gods these power-hungry individuals encounter are in fact alien beings who are attempting to take over the earth and its inhabitants.
But, in yet another twist, the success of this invasion would spell doom for not only the earthlings but for all sentient life in the universe, for the earth is an archive of all sentience, a way to protect it from the future heat death the rest of the universe suffers. (Yes, it gets complicated. And, honestly, I did not follow all of this plot device terribly closely. The gist of it is that the earth must be protected.)
And the way this battle for protection plays out is interesting in light of ideas about religion and morality. The book raises questions early on about where Darwinia came from, about where humanity came from, about god and science and the possible intersections between the two. Throughout the book, characters are visited by and spoken through and to by beings they call "gods." Some of these gods are monstrous aliens; others are sentient beings that inhabit the space between the stars. But despite the human characters' insistence on calling these beings gods, they are not. They are merely beings beyond human understanding, beings that have a wider range of motion and more history and knowledge than any human being does. They have the power to behave as gods would behave toward humans, but ultimately the message is that there is an explanation. It's just not one that our human science can yet encompass.
Science is the ultimate source of knowledge and power here, not gods. Guilford realizes early on that science "was nothing more than curiosity . . . tempered by humility, disciplined with patience" (3). Furthermore, he states, the appearance of Darwinia is "not a miracle, . . . but a mystery. Unexplainable, but maybe not intrinsically unexplainable" (17). We begin the book with this premise, that science can provide us with the answers we need. This belief is tested throughout the book, but ultimately it is reaffirmed as Guilford learns what Darwinia is and that it is, "after all, not a miracle, only a technology so monstrously advanced that no single human being could make sense of it or recognize its signature" (348).
The book is also humanist to its core. While some within the book look to gods or demons for answers and choose to sacrifice themselves and their merely human lives for a chance (however false) at a greater power, Guilford chooses a human life. He is given the opportunity to become something more than human, to join the beings who have created and helped to save the earth and thus to never fully die, to somehow live outside of death and time. "What did dying mean," after all, he asks, "when the world was made of numbers?" (346). But Guilford chooses otherwise. He is offered "All the life you want--eventually" (364). But he says instead that he wants a life: "I mean a human life. I want to walk like a whole man, grow old before I die. Just . . . human life." The god questions him, saying, "But the pain--" and Guilford has no hesitation. "The pain. That, too," he replies (365). He chooses a fully human life over the eternal, unchanging life he is offered and in this choice affirms the value of human life, the worth of our existence as opposed to the eternal life gods (or aliens) can offer us.
Darwinia is an interesting novel. It far surpasses Sharon Shinn's Samaria trilogy in quality and complexity. My only real disappointment at this point is in the way the plot develops. The descriptions of Darwinia are fascinating (there are hollow trees, giant river snakes, and fur snakes [which are apparently six-legged, hooved, white-furred pack animals]) and I was sad to see them phased out for broader concerns. Similarly, the social consequences of such a dramatic event and its impact on scientific, philosophical, and theological thought are key early in the book but become less so as the book develops. The book's only real flaw is in the way in which the alien plot necessitates a move away from the places where the book begins as well as away from the characters and themes that the early chapters present as central to the novel. Even Guilford, our protagonist, becomes less interesting, less developed, and less important as the book moves on. The alien plot is so big that it takes over the book entirely, overshadowing world-building (physical and social), character development, and philosophy.
The novel opens in 1912 with the outright disappearance of Europe as we know it. A green light covers and surrounds the continent (like the Northern lights but somehow more apocalyptic) and overnight the civilizations that had grown up there over centuries are gone, replaced by wild growth unlike any ever before seen on earth. This causes great changes across the world, particularly seen in America. There, all things European are shunned; Darwinia (as the continent is at first fancifully called, as a way of "implying that the miracle had discredited natural history" [17]) is a wilderness to be explored and claimed, just as America was once explored and claimed by the Europeans; and most people believe that the destruction of millions of people in the creation of Darwinia is a "miracle" of God, proof that evolution is false.
The protagonist, Guilford Law, travels in 1920 to Darwinia as part of an expedition to photograph and map the interior of the continent (England being somewhat settled already, though only by rough frontier towns on the edge of the wild jungle). During the expedition, much goes wrong and Guilford begins to see that there is more to this new land than meets the eye. There are strange and unfathomable things in this land and in his head. He has dreams that he cannot understand, dreams of a Great War in which he dies. Others have these dreams as well. And still others feel a god speaking to them, speaking through them and using them.
Ultimately, these two groups (those who dream of an alternate past and those who are vessels for the "gods") come into conflict. The dreamers are those good, conscientious humans who are intended to protect the earth from the invaders, those "gods" that have invaded others' minds and bodies. Those whom the gods speak to and control are the liars and con men of the earth, those who already have a desire for power and the inclination to do unsavory things in order to gain that power. And the gods these power-hungry individuals encounter are in fact alien beings who are attempting to take over the earth and its inhabitants.
But, in yet another twist, the success of this invasion would spell doom for not only the earthlings but for all sentient life in the universe, for the earth is an archive of all sentience, a way to protect it from the future heat death the rest of the universe suffers. (Yes, it gets complicated. And, honestly, I did not follow all of this plot device terribly closely. The gist of it is that the earth must be protected.)
And the way this battle for protection plays out is interesting in light of ideas about religion and morality. The book raises questions early on about where Darwinia came from, about where humanity came from, about god and science and the possible intersections between the two. Throughout the book, characters are visited by and spoken through and to by beings they call "gods." Some of these gods are monstrous aliens; others are sentient beings that inhabit the space between the stars. But despite the human characters' insistence on calling these beings gods, they are not. They are merely beings beyond human understanding, beings that have a wider range of motion and more history and knowledge than any human being does. They have the power to behave as gods would behave toward humans, but ultimately the message is that there is an explanation. It's just not one that our human science can yet encompass.
Science is the ultimate source of knowledge and power here, not gods. Guilford realizes early on that science "was nothing more than curiosity . . . tempered by humility, disciplined with patience" (3). Furthermore, he states, the appearance of Darwinia is "not a miracle, . . . but a mystery. Unexplainable, but maybe not intrinsically unexplainable" (17). We begin the book with this premise, that science can provide us with the answers we need. This belief is tested throughout the book, but ultimately it is reaffirmed as Guilford learns what Darwinia is and that it is, "after all, not a miracle, only a technology so monstrously advanced that no single human being could make sense of it or recognize its signature" (348).
The book is also humanist to its core. While some within the book look to gods or demons for answers and choose to sacrifice themselves and their merely human lives for a chance (however false) at a greater power, Guilford chooses a human life. He is given the opportunity to become something more than human, to join the beings who have created and helped to save the earth and thus to never fully die, to somehow live outside of death and time. "What did dying mean," after all, he asks, "when the world was made of numbers?" (346). But Guilford chooses otherwise. He is offered "All the life you want--eventually" (364). But he says instead that he wants a life: "I mean a human life. I want to walk like a whole man, grow old before I die. Just . . . human life." The god questions him, saying, "But the pain--" and Guilford has no hesitation. "The pain. That, too," he replies (365). He chooses a fully human life over the eternal, unchanging life he is offered and in this choice affirms the value of human life, the worth of our existence as opposed to the eternal life gods (or aliens) can offer us.
Darwinia is an interesting novel. It far surpasses Sharon Shinn's Samaria trilogy in quality and complexity. My only real disappointment at this point is in the way the plot develops. The descriptions of Darwinia are fascinating (there are hollow trees, giant river snakes, and fur snakes [which are apparently six-legged, hooved, white-furred pack animals]) and I was sad to see them phased out for broader concerns. Similarly, the social consequences of such a dramatic event and its impact on scientific, philosophical, and theological thought are key early in the book but become less so as the book develops. The book's only real flaw is in the way in which the alien plot necessitates a move away from the places where the book begins as well as away from the characters and themes that the early chapters present as central to the novel. Even Guilford, our protagonist, becomes less interesting, less developed, and less important as the book moves on. The alien plot is so big that it takes over the book entirely, overshadowing world-building (physical and social), character development, and philosophy.