interspecies dating
Masterson Rat: Do you believe in interspecies dating?
Brooke Shields: Well, I've dated some rats before, if that's what you mean.
-from The Muppets Take Manhattan.
One of speculative fiction's more interesting conundrums is that of interspecies dating. Growing up in Jewish day school environment, interfaith dating was always a subject of great consternation and communal concern. In the Deep South (and recently in a fair housing case in Lawrence, KS), interracial dating has provoked much emotional fodder and civil rights cases. But in science-fiction has always made much of the cultural confusion that comes from interspecies dating (Look at poor confused half-Vulcan, half-human Spock who has to grapple with his human side while maintaining his Vulcan shell of imperturabable logic). For speculations on the unlikely biological possibility of interspecies progeny, one episode of Star Trek: Next Generation offered a version of Francis Crick's "directed Panspermia" in which an advanced civilization seeded the galaxy with DNA, which gave rise to our favorite Star Trekian humanoids (humans, Romulans, Klingons, etc), who appear to hybridize with remarkable ease.
I just finished reading the final volume Stephenie Meyers' Twilight series. One of my co-workers, who heads a girl scout troop whose tweenage members are all obsessed with the books, heard me mention that I was 172nd on the waiting list at the public library, insisted I borrow her copy of Breaking Dawn, which I ended up reading while the trick-or-treaters came by on Friday night. I'm not really sure why I enjoyed it, but I certainly did! (My mom, upon reading Twilight in response to the original llama blog post remarked, "I don't get it! What's so great about a 100-year old, cold, undead boyfriend?") But Stephenie Meyers' exploration of interspecies dating (of the teenage human/vampire sort) made me also consider a very different exploration of the concept in Karen Traviss' Wess'har books (City of Pearl, Crossing the Line).
In City of Pearl, Traviss introduces us to Shan Frankland, a kick-ass no nonsense former environmental enforcement cop who is drafted for a multi-light year mission to a habitable planet, on an errand so mysterious her actual orders are locked away into her subconscious mind, only to be opened by appropriate situational triggers. The Planet Constantine is home to a colony of humans who came there several generations before to create an ecologically sustainable, religious colony. One of their prize possessions: A gene bank of unpatented food crops, as well as many other extinct and/or endangered Earth species. As Frankland makes contact, she meets the sole reason for the colonists survival: Aras, a Wess'har (a alien from the other habitable planet in the star's system), whose people have a strict code of ecological justice. Aras, Shan discovers, also appears to have been around for several hundred years and be almost indestructible, even after accidents that should hav resulted in serious bodily injury. And there is also the fact he doesn't look anything like the seahorse-like Wess'har aliens.
Aras reveals that he is host to a parasite called c'naatat, which he accidentally contracted several hundred years before as a soldier on Bezer'ej (the Wess'har name for Constantine). The parasite scavenges DNA from other sources, reshaping the host's DNA (and phenotype) to suit the environment and to some extent, the c'naatat's own whims. C'naatat came to Wess'har attention several hundred years before when overpopulation of a spider-like alien species due to c'naatat-induced lifespans ended up nearly obliterating the fragile native aquatic species. The parasite makes its host nearly indestructible, allowed the Wess'har to create a unit of super-soldiers to enforce their ecological laws within the star system. They discovered the only sure way to kill a c'naatat host was by explosive fragmentation. However, outliving your family (and being barred from contact with your people because of transmission fears), the rest of Aras' unit ended up killing themselves, leaving him the sole survivor and completely cut off from the rest of his people. (He appoints himself the caretaker of the human colony at Constatine, which he does for the next couple hundred years as c'naatat reshapes his body.)
To summarize, the rest of series is about keeping c'naatat away from corporations who would seek to exploit it for military or other commercial applications. However, to save Shan's life after a would-be fatal head wound, Aras' transmits the parasite to her.
As the only two c'naatat infected individuals in the universe, Shan and Aras are much more like each other than any other members of their respective species. My favorite part of the series is Traviss' exploration of their bizarre little family, especially the interspecies cultural and biological intersections (i.e. Shan develops the wess'har ability to track emotions via scent) and challenges (Shan can't figure out how to use wess'har toilets).
The interspecies tension is also part of what makes the "Twilight" universe so much fun. (Hard to take vampire boyfriend out to dinner because he doesn't eat food, can't take him out in direct sunlight, or take him to hang out with your buddies at the local Indian Reservation because of ancient vampire/tribal werewolf blood feud). And both Traviss and Meyers deal with the inevitability of interspecies sex with a good deal of humor and sensitivity.
Brooke Shields: Well, I've dated some rats before, if that's what you mean.
-from The Muppets Take Manhattan.
One of speculative fiction's more interesting conundrums is that of interspecies dating. Growing up in Jewish day school environment, interfaith dating was always a subject of great consternation and communal concern. In the Deep South (and recently in a fair housing case in Lawrence, KS), interracial dating has provoked much emotional fodder and civil rights cases. But in science-fiction has always made much of the cultural confusion that comes from interspecies dating (Look at poor confused half-Vulcan, half-human Spock who has to grapple with his human side while maintaining his Vulcan shell of imperturabable logic). For speculations on the unlikely biological possibility of interspecies progeny, one episode of Star Trek: Next Generation offered a version of Francis Crick's "directed Panspermia" in which an advanced civilization seeded the galaxy with DNA, which gave rise to our favorite Star Trekian humanoids (humans, Romulans, Klingons, etc), who appear to hybridize with remarkable ease.
I just finished reading the final volume Stephenie Meyers' Twilight series. One of my co-workers, who heads a girl scout troop whose tweenage members are all obsessed with the books, heard me mention that I was 172nd on the waiting list at the public library, insisted I borrow her copy of Breaking Dawn, which I ended up reading while the trick-or-treaters came by on Friday night. I'm not really sure why I enjoyed it, but I certainly did! (My mom, upon reading Twilight in response to the original llama blog post remarked, "I don't get it! What's so great about a 100-year old, cold, undead boyfriend?") But Stephenie Meyers' exploration of interspecies dating (of the teenage human/vampire sort) made me also consider a very different exploration of the concept in Karen Traviss' Wess'har books (City of Pearl, Crossing the Line).
In City of Pearl, Traviss introduces us to Shan Frankland, a kick-ass no nonsense former environmental enforcement cop who is drafted for a multi-light year mission to a habitable planet, on an errand so mysterious her actual orders are locked away into her subconscious mind, only to be opened by appropriate situational triggers. The Planet Constantine is home to a colony of humans who came there several generations before to create an ecologically sustainable, religious colony. One of their prize possessions: A gene bank of unpatented food crops, as well as many other extinct and/or endangered Earth species. As Frankland makes contact, she meets the sole reason for the colonists survival: Aras, a Wess'har (a alien from the other habitable planet in the star's system), whose people have a strict code of ecological justice. Aras, Shan discovers, also appears to have been around for several hundred years and be almost indestructible, even after accidents that should hav resulted in serious bodily injury. And there is also the fact he doesn't look anything like the seahorse-like Wess'har aliens.
Aras reveals that he is host to a parasite called c'naatat, which he accidentally contracted several hundred years before as a soldier on Bezer'ej (the Wess'har name for Constantine). The parasite scavenges DNA from other sources, reshaping the host's DNA (and phenotype) to suit the environment and to some extent, the c'naatat's own whims. C'naatat came to Wess'har attention several hundred years before when overpopulation of a spider-like alien species due to c'naatat-induced lifespans ended up nearly obliterating the fragile native aquatic species. The parasite makes its host nearly indestructible, allowed the Wess'har to create a unit of super-soldiers to enforce their ecological laws within the star system. They discovered the only sure way to kill a c'naatat host was by explosive fragmentation. However, outliving your family (and being barred from contact with your people because of transmission fears), the rest of Aras' unit ended up killing themselves, leaving him the sole survivor and completely cut off from the rest of his people. (He appoints himself the caretaker of the human colony at Constatine, which he does for the next couple hundred years as c'naatat reshapes his body.)
To summarize, the rest of series is about keeping c'naatat away from corporations who would seek to exploit it for military or other commercial applications. However, to save Shan's life after a would-be fatal head wound, Aras' transmits the parasite to her.
As the only two c'naatat infected individuals in the universe, Shan and Aras are much more like each other than any other members of their respective species. My favorite part of the series is Traviss' exploration of their bizarre little family, especially the interspecies cultural and biological intersections (i.e. Shan develops the wess'har ability to track emotions via scent) and challenges (Shan can't figure out how to use wess'har toilets).
The interspecies tension is also part of what makes the "Twilight" universe so much fun. (Hard to take vampire boyfriend out to dinner because he doesn't eat food, can't take him out in direct sunlight, or take him to hang out with your buddies at the local Indian Reservation because of ancient vampire/tribal werewolf blood feud). And both Traviss and Meyers deal with the inevitability of interspecies sex with a good deal of humor and sensitivity.