Arkhangelsk 5 - Worldbuilding
What did you think about the worldbuilding behind the colony?
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I guess I found this revelatory aspect of the Exiles _real_ nature and existence confusing, and in the end gave up trying to fit it into the world and just read on.
IIRC, the knowledge of the location - and the existence - of the third ring was deliberately suppressed and removed from any data accessible to the colonists. Anya was in fact searching very close to the area for lost people at one time.
I thought the world-building was fine. Settlement in space should be difficult - I'm sure like Roanoke, lots of colonies will gradually peter out.
There was enough there to set up the situation Bonesteel wanted. I thought it was plausible enough, some features pushed the story a bit, but it wasn't a huge part of the book. It wasn't really about the worldbuilding, but the characters.
I thought it was poor, because there was no historical development. Everything that happens happened before they were colonists, and as far as we know the only thing that matters happens after our protagonists leave the static situation, seemingly unconcerned that life there is pretty shitty for most people.
Basically, the world was backdrop for a society whose members have no agency of their own. In stories occurring over a short term that can be hand waved away, but for a whole society seemingly facing crisis over something like 400 years? IMO that is sign of poor world building.
An example from our present situation - I do not think that a few scientists will be able to maintain our governmental status quo for the next 400 years facing climate change. Of course the elite hope they can, but to be honest they're a little dim.
@BarnerCobblewood All good points. Normally, I'm bothered by lack of these elements in a fantasy world, where I want them all the be more like Tolkien in terms of attention to history, culture, and language. I suppose I've been conditioned to not receiving these things in most SF novels, though, so I didn't really miss it. But yes - 400 years is certainly enough to mould new cultures and identities. Even the English of 2000AD doesn't sound like 1600AD. (The language difference was mentioned in the novel, but more as a curiosity than a barrier.)
I am with you there @Apocryphal I feel like my expectations for worldbuilding in SF to be pretty low so this was not too bad relatively speaking. 400 years is a LONG time though and it was hard to tell how much change there was. But then, with a small population in a highly contained location, would there be the amount of change that we see here? Do we have some real world examples of this? Any of you an anthropologist?!
I do feel like there is no discussion of any really interesting culture though, which would be odd over all of that time.
“Everything must be rewritten about the greatest extinction in humanity and our understanding of this incredible process that will lead Homo sapiens to remain the only survival of humanity,” Slimak said in assessing what this discovery means. “How can we imagine populations that lived for 50 millennia in isolation while they are only two weeks’ walk from each other? All processes need to be rethought.”
https://compass.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/j.1749-818X.2009.00130.x
I think the important thing is that there are no examples of the kind of isolation presented in this book. The lack of change is lampshaded. I find it odd that with such a small community the kind of linguistic innovation that occurs among children has had no effect at all. I find this unbelievable. Of course I have taught translation, so am not an authentic interpreter of what people say and mean - people always say what they mean, and what they mean is always understood, right?
I agree entirely. This is one of the two things that bothered me the most about this book's background. Yes, groups can survive in isolation for huge lengths of time, BUT they change differently than those not isolated. Languages always change, whether in isolation or no, but the changes in the languages are different if they are apart. After 400 years, I would expect 400 years of change. Both languages would be different from the root language of 400 years ago by approximately the same extent, but in different directions. The root language would be as different from either of their languages as Elizabethan English is from modern English. I would expect something like general mutual comprehension at a basic level. For example, I can understand a lot of Italian from my knowledge of Spanish, at least in reading, but nothing like fluid comprehension in conversation. If they were using some kind of AI universal translator, it could probably learn much of the other language fairly quickly from applying known linguistic shifts, but there are changes which occur from innovation which have nothing to do with linguistic shifts. For example a Lally column is a device named for it's inventor. There is no way the AI could figure out its function from its name.
I think there's always in a novel going to be some sleight of hand regarding language and mutual comprehensibility. Star Trek and other such series of course take this to the extreme where every planet speaks pretty good English (possibly sounding a bit quaint and olde worlde) - unless the lack of communication is the plot, as in the season 5 episode Darmok, which was a cracking episode.
But even in written works rather than TV/film it is common to gloss over such difficulties and tone them down to dialect. I did the same in Quarry - someone from the Isle of Man and someone from Cumbria at a time when both were speaking variations of Celtic would really struggle to comprehend each other, as the IoM strand was closely related to the Irish form and not the English form. But for reasons of plot economy I had them differing only in dialect to the extent that different parts of Britain today would differ.
So my point is that expecting a novelist to accurately track probable trajectories of language drift over 400 years is probably unrealistic, and it seemed to me that having a bit of trouble rather than utter incomprehensibility meant that there could be a rest of the plot to get on with.
What bothered me wasn't that they were talking Russian as if there was only was a mild dialectic difference it was that it was all without aid from an AI translator. These devices exist today in more rudimentary form and they should be in routine use in most any future. Instead, they both just spoke Russian. One sentence different would be all that it took, to change unbelievable to acceptable.
I'll have to find the time to read this when I can give it the right attention - thanks!
They just needed a babelfish
> (Quote)
> They just needed a babelfish
😂
@clash_bowley If the world was run by Russians, what makes you think there would be AI translation available.
I don’t ask this to make the point that Russians couldn’t do it - rather, I want to make the point that Russians aren’t Americans and we should not assume that what’s reasonable for one is reasonable for the other.
I thought they were Americans in unconvincing Russian costumes. My bad...
How would the book have been stronger if there had been no way for the groups to communicate?
I'm reminded of the script-writer's rationale for some of the Doctor Who staples: the sonic screwdriver, the psychic paper, the Tardis translator. They all exist to get the action past typical barriers (locked doors, guards, language barriers) so that the characters, and the story, can engage with the fun stuff on the other side.
The story would be no fun if the two groups just couldn't talk to each other.
Totally agree
I don't know Dr Who at all, but communication barriers can be really interesting parts of some stories. Darmok was already mentioned as a Star Trek episode. the communication issues in Project Hail Mary are another example.
I think that can work really well if the struggle to communicate is what the author / screenwriter wants to make the main issue of the work. But if the main issue is not communication but reintegration of a splintered-off group, or the struggle to survive in a hostile environment, or any other broadly similar plot, then surely to constantly have to read "I didn't understand what she said so we reverted to sign language for a while" just gets in the way.
I have been reading Dark Eden, which also features a group of people completely isolated from anyone else (on another planet) and it shows a very different take on how the group of people have developed over time (I think better) - though in this case there are other reasons why they may have changed the way they did as well. In this case their language, customs, and history are all much different than the originators, with a time period of about 160 years since they were first isolated. Anyone else read this book?
I haven't but it sounds like it could be a good read
I just had a quick look at its Wiki page (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_Eden_(novel)) and it seems overall to have bad better reception in the UK than the US, but is generally agreed to be a good premise competently worked through. Sounds like there are some similarities to Ridley Walker which we read as a group a while ago, but that the plot goes off in an entirely different direction after the setup
Still need to get around to Riddley Walker.