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From: donn@utah-cs
Newsgroups: net.sf-lovers
Subject: re: re: attacks on "Lord of Light"
Message-ID: <2202@topaz.ARPA>
Date: Wed, 5-Jun-85 06:17:39 EDT
Article-I.D.: topaz.2202
Posted: Wed Jun  5 06:17:39 1985
Date-Received: Thu, 6-Jun-85 07:15:44 EDT
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From: donn@utah-cs (Donn Seeley)

I have to agree with John Redford here, although I have some sympathy
with Bill Ingogly's point.  I've read both Naipaul's A BEND IN THE
RIVER and Zelazny's LORD OF LIGHT and they are so different, in plot,
style, characterization and intent, that comparing them on a sentence
by sentence basis strikes me as an absurd exercise.

Having said that, I think I can still make some generalizations about
the books that might help you decide which one is more interesting to
read.  BEND is narrated by an Indian shopkeeper named Salim who has
come to live in an unnamed town on an unnamed river in an unnamed
African country (which is apparently modeled after Stanleyville in the
Congo).  The novel mercilessly describes the gradual, inevitable
collapse of Salim's political and social illusions about life in his
new country.  While the characters appear realistic, I still got the
feeling they mostly exist to flesh out points about social problems in
third world countries.  Little or no effort is made to make the
characters sympathetic, and I felt frequent annoyance at the
foolishness or obstinacy of almost all the characters, particularly the
narrator.  My principal emotion when I finished the novel was disgust,
and the fact that Naipaul intended me to be disgusted didn't make me
feel much better.  I much preferred the other Naipaul novel I've read,
A HOUSE FOR MR. BISWAS, which is a fictionalized autobiography of
Naipaul's childhood in Trinidad.  Although HOUSE is equally pitiless
toward its characters, they seemed much more human, and I was able to
empathize with them almost in spite of the author...

LORD OF LIGHT is about what happens when some otherwise ordinary human
beings try to become gods.  There's probably no point in describing the
book in detail since most of this audience is familiar with it, but I
will say that while LORD is not profound, it is deeper than Bill
Ingogly implies; it suggests that there is more to the god business
than the characters in the novel can imagine, and works this hypothesis
out in careful stages rather than announcing it as a conclusion.  The
style is not as pedestrian as Bill would have it either, although it
does have its weaknesses; the story is a melodrama in the same form as
a classic legend, tending to colorful action at the expense of
sophisticated dialogue.  I think Zelazny clearly relishes his
characters and enjoys playing serious scenes off against comic relief
(which takes the form of anachronisms, typical of Zelazny).  The
characters don't seem dead, as Bill would claim.  In fact the whole
novel is basically written for fun, and the fun rubs off on the reader
(at least on me).

If I had to choose which of the two books I could take to a desert
island, there's no question that I would take LORD OF LIGHT.  Perhaps
this shows I have no taste...  (... which should come as no surprise
to some of you!)

Now, with all that in front, let me back up a little further.  Bill's
point -- that you should not automatically assume that the only good
books, or even most good books, are sf books, WITHOUT TRYING ANY OTHER
KIND -- is basically a good one.  The point I would like to share with
you is simply the converse of Bill's:  Don't assume that a book must be
good just because someone else tells you so; it's YOUR taste in books
that counts, not some snotty reviewer's (who, me?).  It may require
some effort to determine the extent to which a reviewer's taste
coincides with your own, but you have to make it, otherwise you won't
be reading the books you'll enjoy the most.  If you expose yourself
only to sf reviews, you'll miss plenty of non-sf books that you might
have liked, so the implication of both points is that you should hunt
around more.  You shouldn't feel guilty about not reading boring
classics, but you will probably feel chagrin if you overlook a work
you lumped into that category and later on discover that it was
brilliant...  Does all this make sense?  Hope it's not too obvious...

(Here's my little plug: a book that combines gritty realism with the
head space of certain kinds of sf (such as Ballard or Dick) is FAR
TORTUGA by Peter Matthiessen.  Try reading it and see if you don't get
the same kick you get when reading excellent sf; I sure did.)

Trying to figure out what brought on this spasm of self-criticism
in sf-lovers,

Donn Seeley    University of Utah CS Dept    donn@utah-cs.arpa
40 46' 6"N 111 50' 34"W    (801) 581-5668    decvax!utah-cs!donn