Samuel Delaney, Part 2

[sub_divided]

Finished Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand and started on the short story collection Aye, and Gomorrah, in which it is clear (if it wasn't before) that Delaney has certain themes he really, really likes. XD For instance, Surprise, this person is actually the opposite gender! is one (The Star Pit); dirty fingernails is another (also The Star Pit); making a sexual fetish the mechanism that drives the plot is a third (ALL OF THEM); and finally there's a couple scenes where illusion/hallucination disguises a reality that's really dirty and shabby, which I was reminded of when Kara mentioned that she'd been shown an absolutely disgusting house when she and J were househunting... owned by druggies. For some reason before she brought this up, I hadn't made the super obvious connection.

Discussed with Sabina how this novel could have been written as a series of short stories. There are a bunch of discrete units in the novel that would have been very good longish short stories: the prologue, the follow-Marq-on-the-job scene (which even ends with a "twist" re: people's genders); the rescue scene; the dragon hunt; the banquet; even the Catalog of the Literary Meanings of Dawn essay at the end, which let me tell you, I was in no state of mind to read after the traumatizing cliffhanger ending.

Again, this (the linked short stories) is something that's pretty obvious, but that I didn't notice until I read the scholarly introduction. Speaking of scholarly, there's a note from Delaney at the end of my library edition of the book. Stars in My Pocket is essentially an unfinished work (Kara said there was going to be a Part 2, but that Delaney didn't write it because he felt bad writing so much casual sex in his book when a lot of his friends were dying from AIDs irl), but does the author say anything about that in his afterword? No, he does not.

Discussed Americanisms and other things with Kara, but I can't find the chatlog now. ^^; ayalesca, help?

Anyway, WIPness aside, this was a very enjoyable book. Some of my specific commentary is below the cut.


1. LOL at the daughter of privilege continually interrupting the narrator as he tries to answer her questions. "I wondered whether Alsrod's abrupt change of subject was an expression of boredom, a social custom, a logic alien to me, or simply personal avidity." Or maybe it's ADD, amirite? :p I bet Delany, as a college professor, met quite a few students like this.

2. Whoa sudden masturbation!

3. Ha, "finked out", this guy is definitey a child of the sixties. Also this kind of utopian "flexible socialism" society where everyone is aways working a part-time job for cash, and it doesn't hurt their "career" advancement, which they also pursue part-time, (and also there's plenty of work for everyone to go around), is very sixties/early seventies.

4. It's kind of cute how all of the cultural references are to literary epics rather than, say, TV shows or films.

5. I really like the way Korga's introduction is handled. He and Marq have an instant sexual connection, and of course they're all over each other... but there's still other stuff going on. Marq still has to go to his part time job and say hi to his family, etc etc. And he and Korga manage to have full conversations and to go out on dates involving other people, etc etc, between all the sex. Contrast this I guess with romance novels where you find your soulmate and the outside world ceases to exist after that.

6. I like my explanation for how radical anxiety termination works better than Delaney's. :p No emotion = no anxiety, yes? Delaney has it that ONLY the "worry" synaptic receptors are permanently switched off, which seems pretty far-fetched to me. Then again, according to Kara most of the biology in this book is pretty much wrong, haha.

7. It is clear from the way Marq treats Korga (whom he calls "Rat") that he has never been in a long term relationship before. Stuff like: how uncomfortable he was with his famiy or students or anyone else knowing; going ahead with the stuff he likes to do without asking Korga what his preferences are; not bothering to give any context for the things he says to Korga (even though his job1 as an Industrial Diplomat and his job2 as a tour guide both require him to explain cultural nuances). It just really feels like a "this is how I roll and you can take it or leave it" kind of attitude, and not an "establishing a basis of communication and learning about the other person so we can build a solid foundation for a long-term relationship" kind of attitude. That no one ever asks Korga how he feels about anything is one of Sam Delany's points, so I wonder if this will become an explicit issue later.

8. The laid-back realization that you can't DECREE a single-universe or even a single-world gov't is very appreciated, but I wonder about the way inter-world travel is handled. It is expensive, but no one ever seems to worry about personal safety or the safety of property when traveling to a world with a totally separate gov't. It's like international travel now, but there are treaties and international dispute-settling bodies that make that possible. So without any kind of liberal institutions regulating international affairs, what's making travel safe? Is it the GI system, which updates information faster than the speed of light, so you can know the conditions on the ground before you go? Or is it that the Web is Everywhere, like the FBI?

9. Speaking of the Web-FBI connection, my conspiracy-theorist explanation for the ending is that Web ARE the XLV, the "aliens" no one knows anything about and who conveniently show up to vaporize planets just as they are on the verge of Cultural Fugue. Though I'm not sure Delaney is as much of conspiracy-theorist as me (for starters, I think he's unlikely to trust or propagate "simplifying" explanations, which is what most conspiracy theories are). Also, having the FBI Web be absolutely everywhere and know absolutely everything, but generally follow a policy of non-interference in domestic affairs, seemed like an Americanism to me, though other countries such as Britain have a similar set-up, I guess.

10. On a world where most of the humans go naked, the ones who don't wear "body masks"! Pretty clever.

11.
me: the banquet scene was totally confusing
well, maybe not the banquet itself so much as all the stuff leading up to it
like all those women arriving (actually I thought, when one of them showed up in the casual sex place, that they were all after Korga's genetic material and I was like LOL delaney, your stud is SUCH A STUD)
(but then i remembered that 'women' includes men too)
(but then the butcher showed up and she rly rly did want his studly genetic material)
Sabina: for HAM SANDWICHES
me: yes!!!

12. Sabina and I talked about the fact that Marq is WAY TOO TRUSTING for someone who works as a "diplomat", but that his job1 in some ways is more like being a consultant than a diplomat, because he uses superior access to resources (GI system subscription) to solve other people's problems, and tends in to fly in for just a couple days, solve the problem, and then fly home again. (Even though all of this could be done with holographic projections for a fraction of the cost.)

13.
me: maybe it shows how beholden he is to his own culture
the Evelmi are way too trusting also
or maybe he's more paranoid when he's not on Velm
he managed not to get killed by that killer dude, after all
Sabina: not managing to get killed by a psycho killer who gives you fair warning that he's going to kill you after a reasonable time period
me: XD
Sabina: when you have the ability to teleport and travel off planet
me: XDXD
Sabina: look, all I'm saying...

14. Banquet scene (we're going to insult your hospitality by talking about you at this party you organized as if you aren't even here) is upsetting. Ending is super upsetting! After forcing Korga and Marq apart (though as Sabina pointed out, "there is another" who matches Marq's specifications), you at least want an explanation for why such a drastic action was necessary, and none is forthcoming in this book. Maybe Korga was "uniquely primed" to tear Velm apart (per Sabina) - we'll never know! ;_; And then Delaney uses his afterword space to state that all his novels are about fractured identity, and complain that the only things he ever gets asked at conventions are "where do ideas come from" and "what is science fiction?" because SF, unlike the academe, doesn't have gatekeepers to keep track of the conversation and ensure that it moves forward.

See also: Stars in My Pocket, Part 1 (spoilers).