The Light Ages, Redux
(Some spoilers)
This is something I chatted briefly with tinyjo about at the weekend, and I apologise for going on about the same book again, but: I'd been considering writing a response to this piece by Matthew Cheney, which is partly about the actual merits of Ian R Macleod's novel The Light Ages and partly about how it was received. Before I got around to it, however, Trent Walters said much of what I was going to say at s1ngularity.
For instance, I don't disagree that in-genre hype is a problem - I don't see that anyone credibly can - but there were a couple of things in Cheney's specific criticisms that I could take issue with. Some of them are, admittedly, entirely subjective. I found the writing to be both lucid and immersive, and I thought the characters were interesting, if in many cases not exactly likeable. And in one case, I even agree with him - it is a slow book, and arguably too slow. Still, I'd be very reluctant to ascribe grammatical errors to Macleod rather than to his (somewhat uneducated) first-person narrator; and although he does single the novel's ending out for praise, I think it's perhaps more significant than he gives it credit for. However, see also Cheney's response to Walters, in the comment on the s1ngularity post.
Actually, Cheney also followed up with this fresh post on his own blog, whose comments in turn inspired this discussion from Walters (you'll have to scroll down a bit) of Cheryl Morgan's review. Her style is almost the polar opposite of Cheney's - his concern is primarily with the technical merit of the writing, and whether or not it was unjustly lauded; hers is with the broader argument of the novel - and in considering it I agree with Walters less; where he finds her final assessment of The Light Ages 'intriguing and profound', I find it mistaken.
Leaving aside the (to me, somewhat tenuous) Mieville/Macleod/cover art/politics theory that opens the review, her central argument is this: 'Macleod's message that all political revolutions are dangerous is trite and insulting to anyone who bothers to think deeply about politics. You always have to weigh the costs and benefits. The further message that proponents of revolution are naive dreamers who end up selling out is also simplistic and unsubtle.'
To the first point, I say that I think the novel is offering a model of social progression based on evolution rather than revolution; it's suggesting not simply that revolutions are dangerous, but that they don't often succeed, and that progress more commonly comes only in the smallest of increments, and those hard-won. To the second, I say that it's presenting the dangers of a revolution headed by naive dreamers, rather than suggesting that all revolutionaries are such. That's the key, I think; I see The Light Ages as being about what happens when fantasy meets reality. I think it offers one possible honest answer to that question and I think that's why, for me, it's such a fascinating novel.
EDIT: Note to flyingsauce - the mumpsimus is the blog I was talking about this evening. The lj account is mumpsimus_feed.
This is something I chatted briefly with tinyjo about at the weekend, and I apologise for going on about the same book again, but: I'd been considering writing a response to this piece by Matthew Cheney, which is partly about the actual merits of Ian R Macleod's novel The Light Ages and partly about how it was received. Before I got around to it, however, Trent Walters said much of what I was going to say at s1ngularity.
For instance, I don't disagree that in-genre hype is a problem - I don't see that anyone credibly can - but there were a couple of things in Cheney's specific criticisms that I could take issue with. Some of them are, admittedly, entirely subjective. I found the writing to be both lucid and immersive, and I thought the characters were interesting, if in many cases not exactly likeable. And in one case, I even agree with him - it is a slow book, and arguably too slow. Still, I'd be very reluctant to ascribe grammatical errors to Macleod rather than to his (somewhat uneducated) first-person narrator; and although he does single the novel's ending out for praise, I think it's perhaps more significant than he gives it credit for. However, see also Cheney's response to Walters, in the comment on the s1ngularity post.
Actually, Cheney also followed up with this fresh post on his own blog, whose comments in turn inspired this discussion from Walters (you'll have to scroll down a bit) of Cheryl Morgan's review. Her style is almost the polar opposite of Cheney's - his concern is primarily with the technical merit of the writing, and whether or not it was unjustly lauded; hers is with the broader argument of the novel - and in considering it I agree with Walters less; where he finds her final assessment of The Light Ages 'intriguing and profound', I find it mistaken.
Leaving aside the (to me, somewhat tenuous) Mieville/Macleod/cover art/politics theory that opens the review, her central argument is this: 'Macleod's message that all political revolutions are dangerous is trite and insulting to anyone who bothers to think deeply about politics. You always have to weigh the costs and benefits. The further message that proponents of revolution are naive dreamers who end up selling out is also simplistic and unsubtle.'
To the first point, I say that I think the novel is offering a model of social progression based on evolution rather than revolution; it's suggesting not simply that revolutions are dangerous, but that they don't often succeed, and that progress more commonly comes only in the smallest of increments, and those hard-won. To the second, I say that it's presenting the dangers of a revolution headed by naive dreamers, rather than suggesting that all revolutionaries are such. That's the key, I think; I see The Light Ages as being about what happens when fantasy meets reality. I think it offers one possible honest answer to that question and I think that's why, for me, it's such a fascinating novel.
EDIT: Note to flyingsauce - the mumpsimus is the blog I was talking about this evening. The lj account is mumpsimus_feed.