Helliconia - British author Brian Aldiss' superb creation, science fiction worldbuilding comparable to Frank Herbert's Dune, or, if you like, in the world of fantasy, comparable to J.R.R. Tolkein's Lord of the Rings.
Helliconia Spring is the first volume in the trilogy; the second volume is Helliconia Summer and the third volume is Helliconia Winter.
HELLICONIA SPRING
Take a look at the below diagram. Helliconia is a planet revolving around its sun Batalix as Batalix revolves around larger sun Frayr in an elliptical orbit. The consequence of Helliconia being either closer to or more distant from Frayr results in a particular season - spring, summer, winter - lasting for centuries. This Frayr-Batalix binary sun solar system is within our Milky Way but thousands of light years away.
Survival on Helliconia centers around the Darwinian struggle for supremacy between humans and phagors. A word on each species:
Humans, sort of
Unlike humans on Earth where you are either alive or dead, on Helliconia, once humans leave their bodies, they descend into a pitch-black realm to become first gossies and then with the passage of more time, fessups. All living humans can communicate with the gossies when they, the living humans, enter a trance state called pauk.
Phagors
Built like big, powerful professional wrestlers, phagors walk human-style on their two hind legs and speak their own language. Phagor heads are like mountain goats with two lethal horns; shaggy white fur and antifreeze-like blood make phagors impervious to the bitter cold. Phagoes fight ferociously with swords and spears; phagors take humans as slaves and some phagors ride huge horse-like beasts called kaidaws.
Climate
Alas, in many critical ways, there's a third major player in the cycles of life on Helliconia: the weather itself. Can you imagine what the planet must be like during those hundreds of years of Siberia-like subzero ice and snow? And how about those other hundreds of years when Helliconia moves closer to Fraya and the surface of the planet turns into tropical jungles and scorching deserts? Then there are those hundreds of transitional spring-like years where summer-dominating humans and winter-dominating phagors continually battle it out.
Brian Aldiss builds the world of Helliconia Sping methodically, in carefully elaborated detail over the course of 450 pages. This to say, the novel requires a bit of time and energy but once I began to immerse myself in Aldiss' creation, I gladly returned to the book again and again. As part of his worldbuilding, Aldiss explores myth and religion, anthropology and sociology, landscape and architecture, gender and class.
Helliconia Spring begins with an extensive Prelude where we follow Yuri, a young hunter from a tribe of hunters (think of Jean M. Auel's The Clan of the Cave Bear) as he makes his way to the city of Pannoval, a city having much in common with one of our first prehistoric cities along the banks of the Euphrates in Mesopotamia.
"He breathed deep as he got his first sight of Pannoval. Ahead was a great cliff, so steep that no snow clung to it. In the cliff face was carved an enormous representation of Akha the Great One. Akha squatted in a traditional attitude, knees near his shoulders, arms wrapped round his knees, hands locked palms upward, with the sacred flame of life in his palms. His head was large, topped with a knot of hair. His half-human face struck terror into a beholder. There was awe even in his cheeks. Yet his great almond eyes were bland, and there was serenity as well as ferocity to be read in that upturned mouth and those majestic eyebrows. Beside his left foot, and dwarfed by it, was an opening in the rock. Yuri saw that this mouth was itself gigantic, possibly three times taller than a man."
Yuri remains in Pannoval and even subjects himself to rigorous training in order to become one of the city's priests. But you just can't keep a hunter tribesman down - forever his own man and a lover of freedom, Yuri sickens of the whole domesticated rule-bound society and his role as priest. Along with three companions, Yuri flees the city, ventures forth across mountains and planes to establish the priest-free community of Oldorando.
The bulk of Aldiss' novel picks up 50 years later in Oldorando. Yuri is long dead but the men and women still live mostly in The Clan of the Cave Bear-style until, decades later, new discoveries and innovations transform Oldorando into a medieval-like village complete with guilds and tradespeople, new fabrics and fashions, writing and books, even an academy of science run by women.
Every week Helliconia undergoes a further winter thaw. Ah, springtime! Although one could write a short book on all the happenings, I'll simply bullet the following to serve as a taste test:
Flora and Fauna
Many species of our animals and plants are found in Helliconia, including pigs and sheep, boars and dogs, geese and blackbirds, bats, lice and mosquitoes. Additionally, a number of unique creatures roam the land such as a giant worm with wings.
Social Strata
Oldorando has its leaders and lieutenants, hunters and craftsmen, and there are also slaves, not only humans (usually captured from outlining tribes) but as the phagors take human slaves, so humans have their phagor slaves. In Oldorando, there's old Myk, a phagor that has never known freedom, a phagor taken captive by humans at birth. Among Myk's duties through the years once he reached maturity: giving human children rides on his big, broad furry back.
Space Station Observatory
Halfway through the novel, we discover there are researchers from Earth orbiting Helliconia in an enormous space station called Avernus. As much as the researchers on board would love to go down to the planet's surface, even pay a visit to Oldorando (wouldn't that be fun!), unfortunately, such a trip would be a death-sentence since our immune system could never handle deadly Helliconian microbes.
Meanwhile, Back on Planet Earth
All of the information about Helliconian life is transmitted back to Earth - including actual photos and film footage of human interaction within Oldorando and phagors riding across the planes. Universities compile encyclopedias; theaters show Helliconia feature films; computer programmers create entertaining games (natch) simulating all aspects of Helliconian life - one blockbuster: battles between humans and phagors.
The Big Picture
Of course, the prime question looms: will humans accumulate enough knowledge and recorded history so when the next cycle unfolds and Helliconian Winter turns into the next Helliconian Spring, humans can benefit from the previous spring's accomplishments. In other words, will humans learn from the past or must they begin again at Clan of the Cave Bear cultural ground zero?
HELLICONIA SUMMER
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.
HELLICONIA WINTER
The rousing conclusion. For me personally, a sense of elation and accomplishment having read all three books of this epic. The combined SF Masterworks edition clocks in at 1,300 pages. Unforgettable.
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.
HELLICONIA WINTER
The rousing conclusion. For me personally, a sense of elation and accomplishment having read all three books of this epic. The combined SF Masterworks edition clocks in at 1,300 pages. Unforgettable.
Following
the spirit of the author's wishes, I'll assume readers are familiar
with the first two volumes and thus take an immediate shift to
highlighting several of the many unique features of Helliconia Winter,
the story picking up during the time when the planet of Helliconia is
on the cusp of entering its extreme winter phase - 300 years of minimal
sunlight and temperatures plunging to well below zero degrees.
Action Adventure - At the center of the novel, we have a hero's journey - Luterin Shokerandit, a young man, son of a great political and spiritual leader, assuming the role of army lieutenant leading his men into battle against the forces of barbarism. But then the unexpected, forcing Luterin to flee. Brian Aldiss takes this opportunity to describe the various forms of fauna and flora, peoples and customs as Luterin walks, rides, sleds and sails across lands and seas. Fortunately, Luterin has travel companions, most notably beautiful, dark haired Toress Lahl, a young woman Luterin captured following a victory on the battlefield.
The Fat Death - Plague is a necessary part of life as the planet moves away from huge sun Frayr and temperatures plummet - necessary in the sense that for humans to survive winter, they must be transformed by "the Fat Death" wherein each person gains in body mass and becomes shorter, thicker. The downside: less than half the human population survive the Fat Death - harsh, certainly, but that's the way it is.
Here's a snip of Luterin Shokerandit metamorphosis via the Fat Death: "After a rest, he stood up and felt his filthy body. He was changed. He had survived the Fat Death and was changed. The painful contortions to which he had been subject had served to compress his spine; he was now, he estimated, three or four inches shorter than he had been. His perverted appetite had caused him to put on flesh. . . . His limbs were thicker. He gazed down at his barrel chest in disbelief. He was now a smaller, rounder, more thickset person."
Art and Theater - Ah, theaters exist on Helliconia! In a small medieval-like city: "To one side of the street stood a small theatre where extraordinary plays were produced, plays which could not fill the theatres in the center of town: plays trafficking in magic and science, fantasies dealing with possible and impossible things (for both sorts were much alike), tragedies dealing with broken teacups, comedies dealing with wholesale slaughter. Also satires. Irony and satire were things the authorities could neither understand nor abide. So the theatre was often closed."
This bit of detail relating to theater is critically important, underscoring the common humanity between men and women on Helliconia and on Earth. I love that part where irony and satire are things people in power will never understand or tolerate - so much like cultural politics here on Earth.
These two actors could be performing on the stage of a small theater on Helliconia. No wonder those of us on Earth, both readers of the novel and the Earthlings in the novel, can identify so readily with women and men from distant Helliconia.
Stone Sculpture - Sailing near a mountainous shore, Luterin and the others on board catch sight of a colossal statue carved from the side of a mountain: over 1,000 yards high, that is, taller than a football field is long, a gigantic statue of a man, arms upraised, knees slightly bent, a cap or wings flowing back from his broad shoulders, suggesting he is about to take flight. "The statue was stylized, cut with curious whorls as if to confer an aerodynamic shape. The face was sharp and eaglelike, yet not entirely inhuman." When someone asks the captain what the statue symbolizes, he replies, "He represents nothing. He is himself. He's the Hero."
Again, the arts to the rescue to convey to readers that Helliconian civilization might not have our advanced technology but the population takes its ability to express and create seriously. One can only marvel at how many years and how much effort and creative energy went into sculpting such a gigantic figure out of rock.
Smokin' the Peace Pipe - There's no mention of recreational drugs in the first two volumes as Helliconians stick to drinking their own version of beer and wine. A certain drug, occhara, makes its appearance in Helliconia Winter: the effects are much like marijuana. On Helliconia, occhara is entirely legal.
Avernus Anarchy - "After being ruled by the head, men and women on Avernus turn into savages ruled by their guts." Sorry to say, after many centuries orbiting Helliconia in the Avernus, at a certain point, all those test tube men and women get fed up with the strict rules put forth by their elders. Rebellion! The androids take over the technical running of the ship while human activity begins to resemble those boys in Lord of the Flies. Brian Aldiss chronicles the ship's devolution in all its sordid detail.
Meanwhile, Back on Earth -- In this final volume, we're given the backstory regarding the ways in which those advanced futuristic civilizations on Earth began exploring other lifeless planets. But then New Earth was discovered, a planet with its own organic lifeforms. Colonies from Earth were sent to New Earth. Fascinating. But with the discovery of Helliconia, every single person on Earth became enthralled with their distant human cousins.
New Humans - One of the more intriguing parts of Helliconia Winter is the change in human nature in the centuries following nuclear devastation - empathy and an enhancement in brain chemistry and neural networks. And what do humans on Earth do, now that they are empowered with their new found capacity for empathy? Help those on Helliconia!
Helliconia Winter is a fitting conclusion to the British author's masterful worldbuilding.
British author Brian Aldiss, 1925 - 2017
Action Adventure - At the center of the novel, we have a hero's journey - Luterin Shokerandit, a young man, son of a great political and spiritual leader, assuming the role of army lieutenant leading his men into battle against the forces of barbarism. But then the unexpected, forcing Luterin to flee. Brian Aldiss takes this opportunity to describe the various forms of fauna and flora, peoples and customs as Luterin walks, rides, sleds and sails across lands and seas. Fortunately, Luterin has travel companions, most notably beautiful, dark haired Toress Lahl, a young woman Luterin captured following a victory on the battlefield.
The Fat Death - Plague is a necessary part of life as the planet moves away from huge sun Frayr and temperatures plummet - necessary in the sense that for humans to survive winter, they must be transformed by "the Fat Death" wherein each person gains in body mass and becomes shorter, thicker. The downside: less than half the human population survive the Fat Death - harsh, certainly, but that's the way it is.
Here's a snip of Luterin Shokerandit metamorphosis via the Fat Death: "After a rest, he stood up and felt his filthy body. He was changed. He had survived the Fat Death and was changed. The painful contortions to which he had been subject had served to compress his spine; he was now, he estimated, three or four inches shorter than he had been. His perverted appetite had caused him to put on flesh. . . . His limbs were thicker. He gazed down at his barrel chest in disbelief. He was now a smaller, rounder, more thickset person."
Art and Theater - Ah, theaters exist on Helliconia! In a small medieval-like city: "To one side of the street stood a small theatre where extraordinary plays were produced, plays which could not fill the theatres in the center of town: plays trafficking in magic and science, fantasies dealing with possible and impossible things (for both sorts were much alike), tragedies dealing with broken teacups, comedies dealing with wholesale slaughter. Also satires. Irony and satire were things the authorities could neither understand nor abide. So the theatre was often closed."
This bit of detail relating to theater is critically important, underscoring the common humanity between men and women on Helliconia and on Earth. I love that part where irony and satire are things people in power will never understand or tolerate - so much like cultural politics here on Earth.
These two actors could be performing on the stage of a small theater on Helliconia. No wonder those of us on Earth, both readers of the novel and the Earthlings in the novel, can identify so readily with women and men from distant Helliconia.
Stone Sculpture - Sailing near a mountainous shore, Luterin and the others on board catch sight of a colossal statue carved from the side of a mountain: over 1,000 yards high, that is, taller than a football field is long, a gigantic statue of a man, arms upraised, knees slightly bent, a cap or wings flowing back from his broad shoulders, suggesting he is about to take flight. "The statue was stylized, cut with curious whorls as if to confer an aerodynamic shape. The face was sharp and eaglelike, yet not entirely inhuman." When someone asks the captain what the statue symbolizes, he replies, "He represents nothing. He is himself. He's the Hero."
Again, the arts to the rescue to convey to readers that Helliconian civilization might not have our advanced technology but the population takes its ability to express and create seriously. One can only marvel at how many years and how much effort and creative energy went into sculpting such a gigantic figure out of rock.
Smokin' the Peace Pipe - There's no mention of recreational drugs in the first two volumes as Helliconians stick to drinking their own version of beer and wine. A certain drug, occhara, makes its appearance in Helliconia Winter: the effects are much like marijuana. On Helliconia, occhara is entirely legal.
Avernus Anarchy - "After being ruled by the head, men and women on Avernus turn into savages ruled by their guts." Sorry to say, after many centuries orbiting Helliconia in the Avernus, at a certain point, all those test tube men and women get fed up with the strict rules put forth by their elders. Rebellion! The androids take over the technical running of the ship while human activity begins to resemble those boys in Lord of the Flies. Brian Aldiss chronicles the ship's devolution in all its sordid detail.
Meanwhile, Back on Earth -- In this final volume, we're given the backstory regarding the ways in which those advanced futuristic civilizations on Earth began exploring other lifeless planets. But then New Earth was discovered, a planet with its own organic lifeforms. Colonies from Earth were sent to New Earth. Fascinating. But with the discovery of Helliconia, every single person on Earth became enthralled with their distant human cousins.
New Humans - One of the more intriguing parts of Helliconia Winter is the change in human nature in the centuries following nuclear devastation - empathy and an enhancement in brain chemistry and neural networks. And what do humans on Earth do, now that they are empowered with their new found capacity for empathy? Help those on Helliconia!
Helliconia Winter is a fitting conclusion to the British author's masterful worldbuilding.
British author Brian Aldiss, 1925 - 2017
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