A city on Helliconia holds much in common with a late medieval European city, as per this market scene depicted by 16th century Dutch artist Pieter Aertsen.
Helliconia Summer, second volume in the trilogy Helliconia by British author Brian Aldiss, is bookended by Helliconia Spring and Helliconia Winter.
Helliconia Summer follows Helliconia Spring chronologically and should definitely be read after one experiences Helliconia Spring. The SF Masterworks edition of Helliconia is the way to go, one key reason: maps and detailed Appendices will prove extremely helpful as you negotiate this magnificent, multifaceted planet.
Helliconia Summer features a detailed account of human society, only logical since, in scorching hundred degree summer heat, humans flourish and that other language speaking species, prime rival to humans, the shaggy fur phagors, will mostly hide in caves or in vast mountain caverns. And that's human society as in kings and queens, generals and admirals, priests and religion, scholars and tradespeople, weapons and warfare, language, writing and history.
Likewise, Helliconia Summer highlights the planet's natural world in exquisite detail: land formations, seas, coastal regions along with the entire range of flora and fauna, from plants to seaweed, from mammals and birds to reptiles, fish, insects and microorganisms. Hundreds of issues of National Geographic could be devoted to Helliconia, enough material to keep teams of animal biologists, botanists, biochemists, geographers and ecologists busy for a lifetime.
As readers, we're treated to the planet's grand expanse as we follow the travels and travails of many characters, all these women and men fully developed by master storyteller Brian Aldiss - to name several: queen, king, king's son, king's chancellor, king's general, ship captain. The novel's multiple plot lines crisscross and overlap in intriguing ways, providing insight into the entire social and cultural web of those living in the lands of Helliconia.
However, for me, the most fascinating aspect of Helliconia Summer is something new, something absent in Helliconia Spring: one of our kind, an Earthling, travels to the surface of Helliconia and interacts with the planet's inhabitants.
And there he is, Billy Xiao Pin, age 20, fresh from starship Avernus. Brian Aldiss provides the background: many centuries prior to the birth of Billy, Planet Earth sent the Avernus to orbit Helliconia in order to gather and transmit information on all aspects of the planet as well as other members of its solar system, including smaller sun Batalix and larger sun Freyer.
Billy is not the first Earthling to visit Helliconia. We learn a lottery has been in place for generations, a lottery held every ten years within the great Helliconia summer. The winner gets to travel via capsule down to the planet's surface. But, and this is a big but, winning the lottery is a mixed blessing since humans from Earth lack the necessary immune system to withstand Helliconia microbes; in other words, for those on Avernus, the Helliconian adventure amounts to a death sentence, the winner dying within weeks of their arrival on the planet.
No matter for Billy; our strapping young man is a red-blooded adventurer. Billy even sends the android that accompanied him to Helliconia (to serve as additional protection) back to the Avernus in the capsule. Billy prefers to handle solo whatever comes his way. That's the spirit, Billy!
As anyone might imagine, Billy enjoys a string of intriguing conversations and dealing with the Helliconians - men, women, even phagors. Well, some of those interactions prove less than enjoyable. What exactly transpires is for Brian Aldiss to chronicle. I'll segue to a trio of other fascinating aspects of this astonishing novel. Here goes:
Spellbound Spectators - Those on the Avernus, all 6000 men and women, follow Billy's every move on Helliconia. Billy's adventures are also big news back on Earth. "To the people of Earth, Helliconian events were news. The signals were received first of all on Charon, on the extreme fringes of the solar system. There again they were analyzed, classified, stored, transmitted. The most popular transmission went to Earth via the Eductainment Channel, which carried various continuous dramas from the binary system."
Other Intelligent Species - The king's son, a lad by the name of Robayday, runs away from court and joins a tribe of nomadic Madis. These human-like peoples never achieved full human consciousness; they have little understanding of time, they sing rather than speak their unique language. Madis spend their entire lifecycle on the move, back and forth across the lands of Helliconia. Occasionally humans will mate with a Madi to produce a child possessing a cross of human/madi qualities.
Queen of Queens - Queen MyrdemInggala is in unique communication via telepathy with dolphins. When ships out at sea are planning an invasion of her lands, dolphins come to her rescue. "A line of dolphins streamed from the bay and could be seen heading beyond the Good Hope as if summoned by something there. The sea convulsed." You bet it convulsed. The dolphins summoned two creatures from the deep having the appearance of enormous sea dragons. The dragons set the sea rocking around the ship, prompting the captain to abandon his attack. Good thinking, mate!
Don't lose out! Journey to Helliconia with Brian Aldiss. So worth a reader's time.
"Eventually, Billy and Abath appeared, holding hands. Billy's face was only just wide enough to accommodate his grin. They sat down at the table without speaking." Billy delights in a round of lovemaking with fetching Abath. This heartfelt encounter underscores two significant similarities between humans on Earth and humans on Helliconia: the capacity to behold great beauty in another person and also the emotional power to feel deep love for another.
British author Brian Aldiss, 1925-2017
Comments
Post a Comment