Reviewer:[Sasabe]&[ttani]&[Ripley]&[Moz]
English translation by Mitsuya Sakaemura and Preston Nevins. |
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| "SUNDIVER" |
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1980 by David Brin,Cover:Naoyuki Kato |
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Translated by Akinobu Sakai |
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'86/9/30,HAYAKAWA PUBLISHING,INC |
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ISBN 4-15-010685-1 |
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| "STARTIDE RISING" |
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1983 by David Brin,Cover:Naoyuki Kato |
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Translated by Akinobu Sakai |
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'85/10/31,HAYAKAWA PUBLISHING,INC. |
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ISBN 4-15-010636-3
ISBN 4-15-010637-1 |
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| "THE
UPLIFT WAR" |
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1987 by David Brin,Cover:Naoyuki Kato |
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Translated by Akinobu Sakai |
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'90/6/30,HAYAKAWA PUBLISHING,INC. |
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ISBN 4-15-010872-2
ISBN 4-15-010873-0 |
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| Sasabe |
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Commemorating David Brin's visit to Japan as Guest of Honor of the 65th World Science Fiction Convention "Nippon2007," as a cooperative plan :) we at Anima Solaris have decided to put together a book review.
Tom Whitmore wrote an introducion to Brin in Nippon2007 Progress Report #2. In it, Tom recommends reading Startide Rising as an introduction to Mr. Brin's body of work, but which do you like the best? |
| ttani |
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Personally I like Heart Of The Comet (1986) that he wrote in collaboration with Gregory Benford. |
| Sasabe |
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Ah, there's some hard SF that showed off the good points of both Brin and Benford. I like that too, but let's try to choose from stand-alone works shall we? :) First of all, Brin's debut work, Sundiver. |
| ttani |
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It's been quite a while since I read it, but in Japanese translation it was actually Startide Rising that was released first. I enjoyed the story well enough, but maybe because of the timing in which I read it, I had no idea it was part of the Uplift series. Since there's a gap of a year to several years between parts of a series, it's tough to remember all the fine details. And then there's the intentions of the publisher… About the best you can do is forget the whole thing, then let things drift back into memory as you read the next part of a series. :) So I still don't quite get that being part of the Uplift series. :) |
| Sasabe |
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I guess the reason for releasing Sundiver after Startide Rising was that it'd be more interesting to read if you had an idea about the various plots of the Galactics. With only Sundiver, there's a feeling of things being left unexplained concerning the Patron and Client races. To accept the resolution, having a sense of the Galactics' megalomania from Startide Rising really helps :) |
| ttani |
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There might be a simpler reason. The publishing order was: Sundiver (1980), Sundiver (Hayakawa Bunko SF, 1986), Startide Rising (1983), Startide Rising (Hayakawa Bunko SF, 1985).
The Japanese publishers didn't trust that the first full-length novel from a (then) rookie like Brin would sell in Japanese translation. But then when Startide Rising won both the Hugo and Nebula they translated it and sure enough it sold! So the next year they went back and released Sundiver. While they were at it they figured The Practice Effect would sell as well, so translated it too. It was probably just a business decision. |
| Sasabe |
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When I asked the translator, Mr. Akinobu Sakai, he said, "It was because Startide Rising took the Hugo and Nebula that Brin was finally recognized as a novelist. When it won they rushed to release Stardust Rising, and since it was the same series, they did Sundiver too. That sort of flow."
The saying goes that "The Golden Age of SF is age 12 (or maybe 15)." That's when the flexible minds of young readers tend to consider everything they read a masterpiece (I was the same way). Oftentimes SF is written from a young point of view, and while that may be expected from a youth-oriented genre, you're always going to find people who love stories of nameless young people succeeding through their wits and effort.
The Uplift series, Sundiver included, paints an easily-understandable structure of the mature and stubborn Galactics with their power and status, versus the young Human race (chimpanzees and dolphins included) having flexible thinking and courage. It's not even necessary to mention Arthur C. Clarke's masterpiece short story "Rescue Party," but SF fans are pushovers for that sort of pattern than tickles their pride. :)
Brin is a doctor of astronomy, and part of the appeal is his smooth use of the latest research of that time to describe the solar depths. There are few SF fans who could resist this combination of the latest science and that golden pattern. :D |
| Ripley |
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It seems that there aren't many children 12 to 15 that actually read books these days. (ToT) You could probably divide them into kids who read anything they can get their hands on, those who read nothing but manga and light novels,* and those who don't read anything at all (the ones who read manga pretty much all read light novels). We can only pray that some of those kids graduate from light novels up to actual SF.
* Light novel - A "light novel" (ライトノベル, raito noberu) is a novel with anime- or manga-style illustrations, primarily targeting teens and young adults. The term "light novel" is a wasei-eigo, or a Japanese term formed from words in the English language. (Adapded from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia) |
| Sasabe |
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My sons like manga and light novels. My oldest reads regular mysteries (that's my wife's influence) but not SF. Educational failure… :-} |
| Ripley |
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It's manga and light novels for my son too (and pure literature, for some reason), but he doesn't seem to have awakened to true SF yet. If he did, I could even loan him anything he wanted… Educational failure here too. ＿|￣|○ |
| MOZ |
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Sundiver was the first Brin I read. After that… Hold on, what did I read??? XD Oh, Startide Rising…but I sort of ground to a halt in the middle of it. :)
To my mind, the solar super-hot temperatures… Wait, that's a spoiler so I'll leave that out… But anyway, I was barely able to keep up with it, and wound up skipping bits all over the place! Really, when I finished Sundiver I was like, "Whew, that was interesting, but man I'm glad that's done!" I remember saying that to myself while coming back to Osaka on the Shinkansen… Wow…Brin's coming to Japan… |
| Sasabe |
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Moz, is hard SF perhaps a bit difficult for you? :) |
| MOZ |
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No, no, I like it a lot! Don't even get me started on J. P. Hogan… :D I don't know, I guess Sundiver just wasn't a match for me. I wanted to keep reading (it was interesting!), but while reading it there were parts where the images just leaped to mind, and parts where everything was all fuzzy for me. It was that bridging that gap that was tough on me I guess. Part of me wants to read it again, but at the same time I don't want to go through that tiring part again… Okay, so I'm conflicted! :) |
| Sasabe |
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Kind of connected to that, reading Sundiver first can be kind of difficult to get an idea of what's going on, so that might make it less interesting… But Startide Rising, that's an award-winning masterpiece. The scene at the start of Sundiver where Jacob and the fin Makakai are training in mechanical whales, that comes up later in Startide Rising, doesn't it… I just love that scene :) |
| ttani |
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In it they use the expression "crafting the glyph." I first just read right past it without understanding what it meant, but since then computer icons started to be used, and I thought, "Oh, a thing like an icon projected holographically above their head!" Now a three-dimensional holo-projection of a question mark for example, depending on the angle you see it would look like a "1" or "i" but in 2D though it'd just look like "?" you'd have to face the person you're showing it to. I thought about pointless things like that. :) |
| Sasabe |
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The emotion-glyph called syullf-tha is described as rotating, so Brin probably thought about that sort of stuff. |
| ttani |
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The major premise of this series seems the opposite of Asimov's, in that aliens have reigned over space with great power and wisdom much earlier than humanity, so it's interesting that Brin is working on the continuation of Asomov's Foundation series. |
| Sasabe |
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Ah, the trilogy by the "Killer B's." All three are Asimov fans, and maybe Brin was given the last volume because they knew of his ability to end things "forcibly." :)
One of the distinguishing features of this Uplift series is Humanity's undaunted spirit - we never submit to the powerful Galactics - and this could be considered an overall optimism. As shown in Poul Anderson's famous early short story "The Helping Hand," I think it's pretty standard in American SF to find a spirit that isn't comfortable being absorbed into a large power, and sets a high value on diversity.
(http://www.sf-fantasy.com/magazine/bookreview/000701.shtml)
Heinlein's Lazarus Long refused to be absorbed into the Group Ego and live an idle life, and Mike Resnick's Kirinyaga (linked above) also celebrates self-reliance and diversity. Basically this boils down to valuing uniqueness, and for SF fans who like unusual things, that's an easy thing to accept. That's why reading stories by women SF writers has such an impact, for example choosing but a refined clone state over barbaric pirates, or a woman who chooses an ET over a disagreeable man. I guess such novels are perfectly suited for that kind of SF fan with old-fashioned tastes. |
| The reviewers: |
| [Sasabe] |
| I'm an SF fan that loves hard SF. I really enjoy Brin's works, but I'm also connected with the <Komaken> group focusing on the works of Nippon2007 Japanese guest of honor Komatsu Sakyou. |
| [ttani] |
| I'm an SF fan just starting to comprehend that even if I spend my entire life in the process, I'll never be able to read all of the high-quality SF that's been released, and all that's still to be released. |
| [Ripley] |
| Former manga artist (mainly SF). Now I'm a special part-time teacher and volunteer, teaching elementary and junior-high school students art and manga. |
| [MOZ] |
MOZ Nakano. Overseas sales-promotion tool director. My job description in the office is "Chief Planner" for what it's worth.
From early childhood my SF-loving father took me to see countless 50's and 60's golden-age SF movies, and I'm still traumatized. Since part of my job is video production, I hold strong opinions especially about "SFX" works. I'm a complainer. :) |
| The translators: |
| [Emura] |
The encounter with SF is the TV programs which I saw in early the 60s. "The Outer Limits" remains to my impression strongly. The works seen at my childhood, I think episodes had big influence on my SF view.
My present favorite writers are Clarke, Lem, Sakyo Komatsu, and Le Guin.
I belong to the fan group <Komaken> |
| [Pres] |
| I'm an American SF fan living in Japan. The first SF novel I chose for myself back in the 1970s (other than the Heinlein my father used to read) was "A World Out Of Time" by Larry Niven, mostly because his last name was almost the same as mine (Nevins), and there was a nifty picture of a "cat-tail" on the cover. Hopefully my selection criteria have improved somewhat since then… |
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