The Songs of Distant Earth - Arthur C Clarke
First published 1986.
Arthur C Clarke is one of the most well-known science fiction writers. Even if you don't know his name, you will likely know of the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey. Arthur C Clarke wrote the story that the movie was based on, as well as co-writing the screen-play for the movie itself.
This is the first book I have read that Clarke has written, and I can understand from reading it why he is admired among science fiction circles. The Songs of Distant Earth is not a long book and yet Clarke helps the reader understand the various cultures he portrays quite easily, providing logical reasons for the ways they have developed and changed from our current culture.
The story is fairly laid-back in pace, describing the interactions between two human civilizations: the Lassans from Thalassa, whose civilization has arisen from intentional genetic seeding from Earth, and the crew of the spaceship Magellan who are the last survivors of Earth before the sun went nova. The interactions between these two groups are peaceful, with the Magellan crew only seeking resources from the Lassans before carrying on to their own colony, and Clarke instead focuses the story on the ways these culture clashes will affect the different groups. Lassans, for example, have purposefully had the idea of God and religion removed from their history books, something that the Earth-born crew (and likely Clarke himself, who was an atheist) think is important to preserve. Lassans also have a more relaxed pace to life, leading the Earth-born humans to assume that they are less intelligent than they actually are. The morality of the Lassans is also quite different to the crew, with sharing of partners being far more allowable. Clarke portrays this in almost a positive light, which is something I would not do myself. But the story never gets explicit, which is nice.
A third, more foreign culture, is introduced later in the book, and here again the interactions between cultures are the main focus, rather than portraying any real conflict.
In some ways, Songs is a book in which nothing major happens. Possible hindrances to various goals are introduced, but mostly are overcome without much fuss (even one characters untimely demise is quickly reversed!). And yet, it was still an enjoyable read, and a good taster for what Clarke's style may be.
Completed 8 January 2021.
Comments
Post a Comment