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Oasx posted:But ultimately the “good guys” won in PSS by killing the moths, sure they were still being hunted, but they accomplished their goals. That is what makes it the most satisfying ending to me.
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Nov 4, 2017 19:21
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I'm curious to see the actual quote because Embassytown doesn't fit into that, like, at all.
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Nov 4, 2017 21:39
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My guess is http://pubs.socialistreviewindex.org.uk/isj88/newsinger.htm quote:For Tolkien, the function of his fantasy fiction is 'consolation'. If you read his essay 'On Fairy Tales' you find that, for him, central to fantasy is 'the consolation of the happy ending'. He pretends that such a happy ending is something that occurs 'miraculously', 'never to be counted on to recur'. But that pretence of contingency is idiotic, in that immediately previously he claims that 'all complete fairy stories must have it [the happy ending]. It is its highest function.' In other words, far from 'never being counted to recur', the writer and reader know that to qualify as fantasy, a 'consolatory' happy ending will recur in every story, and you have a theory of fantasy in which 'consolation' is a matter of policy. It's no surprise that this kind of fantasy is conservative. Tolkien's essay is as close as it gets to most modern fantasy's charter, and he's defined fantasy as literature which mollycoddles the reader rather than challenging them. It's worth noting in "On Fairy-Stories" Tolkein is talking about a specific type of happy ending, which he terms a "Eucatastrophe". While not a deus ex machina, it does refer to a sudden, miraculous resolution which he compares to the resurrection of Christ. Going beyond this there is a demand in modern entertainment that every story end with all threads neatly tied up down to every character getting married. Mieville comes from the intersection of the historical materialism of Marx with the simulationism of Gygax. You can end a crisis and have a positive effect, but to expect everything to conveniently work out is both historically naive and statistically unlikely. Even in Embassytown Avice stops the genocide, but the society she belonged to is gone, millions are dead or mutilated (including many of her friends), and it's probably neither the first nor the last planetary-scale genocide that will be accidentally committed as part of galactic exploration.
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Nov 5, 2017 05:13
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So It Goes posted:The Scar owns and is his best book except for Embassytown. The ending is great too. PSS has a lackluster ending, not because of being a downer but because the story kinda randomly veers into debating the ethics of rape and cultural punishment. My copy is in a different room and I'm lazy but isn't that scene in an afterword, and like 3 pages out of a 500 page novel? I agree that it completely threw me, but that's the point. At no point before that did I ever question Yag's motives at all. Also, the scene doesn't really introduce the idea of mutilation as a criminal punishment to the story because you've already been reading about the Remade for the entire book, and tbh in the world of Bas-Lag and in a Cymek that has the values Yag's victim describes it honestly kind of felt to me that he got off kind of easy. I could very easily see a different mutilation as a punishment
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Nov 5, 2017 07:48
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pile of brown posted:My copy is in a different room and I'm lazy but isn't that scene in an afterword, and like 3 pages out of a 500 page novel? I agree that it completely threw me, but that's the point. At no point before that did I ever question Yag's motives at all. Also, the scene doesn't really introduce the idea of mutilation as a criminal punishment to the story because you've already been reading about the Remade for the entire book, and tbh in the world of Bas-Lag and in a Cymek that has the values Yag's victim describes it honestly kind of felt to me that he got off kind of easy. I could very easily see a different mutilation as a punishment I'd argue the mutilation you're suggesting is not as terrible to Yag as the one that he received.
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Nov 5, 2017 17:16
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Okay, thanks for the feedback on the endings. I'll definitely have to give the non-Bas-Lag stuff a look sometime. Really, at this point, I get the impression that starting with Perdido Street Station for reading China Miéville is probably like starting with Consider Phlebas for reading Iain M. Banks, except without the big flashing warning signs of the latter.
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Nov 5, 2017 21:18
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Most of his work can be described as: very bad stuff happens to people in a fantastic setting. You may like some of his other work better, but I really think Perdido Street Station is the best representation of his work. For non-Bas Lag stuff I can recommend Railsea, it is a YA novel but it is not something you really notice.
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Nov 5, 2017 21:45
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Microcline posted:
To me I think that's explicitly the reason why his Bas-Lag books in particular are grim and/or end badly - they're a Marxist critique of society translated into fantasy (with some digs at the left as well). I think he'd argue that happy endings are impossible, given how society is structured in that setting. To me that's one of the points of the books.
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Nov 7, 2017 01:22
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What is the general opinion on The Last Days of New Paris and This Census-Taker? They seem a little short compared to the rest of his work, but that doesn't really matter if they are good.
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Nov 24, 2017 12:58
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This census taker owns
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Nov 24, 2017 13:16
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Notahippie posted:To me I think that's explicitly the reason why his Bas-Lag books in particular are grim and/or end badly - they're a Marxist critique of society translated into fantasy (with some digs at the left as well). I think he'd argue that happy endings are impossible, given how society is structured in that setting. To me that's one of the points of the books. So you are saying he wrote a world where Marxism is not inevitable?
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Nov 24, 2017 13:22
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Oasx posted:What is the general opinion on The Last Days of New Paris and This Census-Taker? They seem a little short compared to the rest of his work, but that doesn't really matter if they are good. This Census Taker is a secret Bas-Lag story and not enough people know this.
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Nov 24, 2017 13:48
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Oasx posted:What is the general opinion on The Last Days of New Paris and This Census-Taker? They seem a little short compared to the rest of his work, but that doesn't really matter if they are good. I didn't like This Census-Taker at all. Too inscrutable for me. Easily my least favorite Mieville book, secret Bas-Lag connection or no. Haven't read Last Days of New Paris yet and would be interested to hear what the consensus is.
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Nov 24, 2017 14:46
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Oasx posted:What is the general opinion on The Last Days of New Paris and This Census-Taker? They seem a little short compared to the rest of his work, but that doesn't really matter if they are good. A lot of people hated This Census-Taker but it's one of my favorites, though inscrutable is definitely the word. So strange and grim and sad, and confusing as hell in the way that childhood itself can be melancholy and confusing, even if you don't live in a desperate hellscape. Not a particularly enjoyable read though, like at all. It gave me some seriously jacked-up nightmares.
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Nov 24, 2017 20:28
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This Census Taker was miserable and disconcerting. I loved it. I like how, even though it was set in a fantasy word, it wasn't an exciting world. It wasn't fun wish fulfillment like most fantasy or over the top grotesqueness like most Mieville. It was very dull and mundane, but setting it in another world worked because it was odd and confusing, as an uncaring world would be from the perspective of a child. If it is set in the Bas Lag world, that connection is one that doesn't really improve or mean anything to This Census Taker, but it does make the world of Bas Lag that much richer, paradoxically by emphasizing how dull it can be. And just to clarify, I've used the word "dull" a couple of times- This Census Taker was never boring to me. The story and setting were really compelling. It just wasn't your typical Bas Lag book with whimsical horrors dancing out of every page. Cardiac posted:So you are saying he wrote a world where Marxism is not inevitable? And that's where the book ends, with defeat for now but also a promise that the past is still with us and revolution is still in the air. It sounds like Mieville's distaste of Tolkien's idea of one time miraculous change fixing everything at the end of a fairy tale might have inspired him to create a fantastic ending where the status quo prevails, but the need to constantly fight against it is reinforced. Reading October, he seems really fixated on the brilliant potentiality of revolution. October abruptly ends when the Bolsheviks seize power. It's not the story of Bolshevik rule, it's the story of the revolution- the sudden change that shatters society and throws everything into the air. Anything could happen next.
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Nov 25, 2017 01:08
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Eiba posted:Oh it's still inevitable, it's just coming in the form of (end of Iron Council) a train full of revolutionaries frozen in time, perpetually immanent but never moving. Getting serious The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe flashbacks here.
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Nov 26, 2017 04:29
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this lists the evidence for and against This Census Taker being in Bas Lag if you're interested. https://outtherebooks.wordpress.com/2016/03/29/is-this-census-taker-set-in-bas-lag/
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Nov 26, 2017 04:38
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Census Taker is obviously meant to be *maybe* set in maybe Bas Lag. It's also not remotely relevant to the story being told, he's just throwing a bone to fans in a silly short story from three moments that got published as a stand-alone for some reason
Lunchmeat Larry fucked around with this message at 05:20 on Nov 26, 2017 |
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Nov 26, 2017 05:17
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Eiba posted:
I read that more cynically - although plenty of characters explicitly draw hope from the fact that the revolution is coming, to me he was saying that the revolution is always a future that never arrives, because if it actually takes place in the hyper-capitalist society of Bas-Lag then it's doomed . I feel like he's a modern Marxist: he's fully aware of both how ineffectual a lot of the left is and also how bad authoritarian systems can be whether they claim to be capitalist or communist, and that comes through in his writing. But he's also fully aware of how bad modern capitalism is and in a lot of his books his characters are struggling against that. I think the climax of Railsea is great for that and also tongue-in-cheek: the enemy is a bunch of bankers who have been waiting for generations for their loans to be repaid.
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Nov 27, 2017 20:40
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Yeah, I think the "message" of Railsea is actually my favourite of all the books. Plus, thanks to Mieville's love of pulp, we as the reader get a "you maniacs, you blew it up! drat you!" moment, even if the actual protagonist doesn't.
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Nov 27, 2017 23:58
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I couldn't put The Last Days of New Paris down, so it's good that it was relatively short. It was definitely one of his more 'fun' books to read.
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Nov 29, 2017 18:11
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The one thing I'd mention about The Last Days of New Paris is that you really need to be able to GIS the artwork he's referencing, at least if you're anything like me. I tried reading it on the subway once where I didn't have cell service and it drove me half-crazy.
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Nov 29, 2017 19:47
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Xiahou Dun posted:The one thing I'd mention about The Last Days of New Paris is that you really need to be able to GIS the artwork he's referencing, at least if you're anything like me. I tried reading it on the subway once where I didn't have cell service and it drove me half-crazy.
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Nov 29, 2017 21:24
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I didn't like the Bas-Lag hints in TCT, they reduced the sense of alienation and mystery.
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Dec 2, 2017 18:12
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Peel posted:I didn't like the Bas-Lag hints in TCT, they reduced the sense of alienation and mystery. Like I said before, the connections do nothing for the story of This Census Taker, but they make the world of Bas Lag more interesting.
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Dec 2, 2017 18:23
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Is King Rat really not worth reading?
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Dec 13, 2017 17:00
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I've read Perdido Street Station, then went to Iron Council, and currently reading The Scar. I must say that, although I enjoyed Iron Council, I didn't like the ending much (the actions of the characters seemed to be shaped by the storyline that the book was trying to convey, instead of the actions of the characters shaping the storyline), and the book seems even weaker now that I'm reading The Scar (where the conceit of the story seems to be a copy/replace, although the actual flow of the storyline and the characters between the two books are markedly different).
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Dec 13, 2017 18:12
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Kurtofan posted:Is King Rat really not worth reading? It's not TERRIBLE. If you want to read all of Mieville's work (like I did) it's worth getting just to read it. It's definitely his weakest book, in my opinion, and a lot of the super weird stuff he's famous for isn't really present, but it's still a serviceable story. I don't regret reading it when I did, but I probably won't read it again.
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Dec 13, 2017 18:59
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Kurtofan posted:Is King Rat really not worth reading? It's a paean to mid-90's big-pants rave culture, which if you lived through makes the whole thing loving ridiculous because you know how dumb a lot of that scene was.
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Dec 13, 2017 19:59
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I've got no idea what mid 90's big pants rave culture is, but your phrasing conjured up a pretty magical mental image of it
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Dec 17, 2017 03:30
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Oh my young lad, that phrase will bring an instant mental picture to anyone over 25: https://www.google.ca/search?q=90s+...bih=966#imgrc=_
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Dec 21, 2017 03:48
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I remember when I thought UFO pants were the dopest thing ever. Now I have a wife and a shameful understanding of my younger self.
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Dec 21, 2017 18:09
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Benson Cunningham posted:I remember when I thought UFO pants were the dopest thing ever. Looking really stupid for a while is an important part of being a teenager.
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Dec 21, 2017 20:22
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Finished embassytown, moving onto iron council.
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Jan 1, 2018 00:00
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I just finished PSS, what a great book. Question, did I miss something about jack half-a-prayer? Or did the shootout scene where he saved Isaac & co's asses near the end seem to come out of seemingly nowhere?
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Jan 2, 2018 22:32
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chimi changa posted:I just finished PSS, what a great book. Question, did I miss something about jack half-a-prayer? Or did the shootout scene where he saved Isaac & co's asses near the end seem to come out of seemingly nowhere? it's a common complaint, yes. you didn't miss anything.
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Jan 2, 2018 22:38
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I think he was trying to make some point about Deus Ex Machinae, but it got lost. PSS is a solid book that falters in places.
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Jan 13, 2018 06:05
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So I’ve read PSS, The Scar, Iron Council, Embassytown and TC&TC. What next?
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Jan 13, 2018 12:55
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Tekopo posted:So I’ve read PSS, The Scar, Iron Council, Embassytown and TC&TC. What next? Three Moments of an Explosion.
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Jan 13, 2018 14:02
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Tekopo posted:So I’ve read PSS, The Scar, Iron Council, Embassytown and TC&TC. What next? Railsea.
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Jan 13, 2018 19:47
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