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sophia_sol) wrote2014-12-01 08:17 pm
sophia_sol) wrote2014-12-01 08:17 pm
Ancillary Justice, by Ann Leckie
I was slow to get into the book but from the moment where Anaander Mianaai was on Justice of Toren and ordered her to kill Awn I was super there for the rest of the story.
It's interesting, this book has SO MUCH to talk about, but I feel like the only thing I've been seeing reviews really discuss is the gender/pronoun thing. Which to an extent I understand? It's fascinating and a big deal and something that hasn't really been done before that I know of! BUT IT IS NOT THE ONLY THING WORTH TALKING ABOUT.
So I will start by talking about that but then move on to the other stuff.
So. As you may know, this is a book where the main character is from a culture that just...doesn't do gender. And so the ungendered Raadchai pronoun she uses to refer to everyone is rendered in English as "she/her". Which is FASCINATING and great because historically speaking English has used "he" as a general pronoun, and using "she" instead calls up very different associations and I love it.
I've seen multiple people comment on how soothing it is to read a book in which pretty much all the characters are read as female by default.
And idk, I think it was a little bit like that for me? But mostly it was not. See, here and there throughout the book, information about gender of some characters is revealed - eg when Breq has to use a language that genders people when you talk about/to them and she needs to make guesses about what pronoun is correct, and stuff like that. And given that of the first few gender identity/gender presentation/whatever you want to call it reveals, most of them are that the character is in fact male, it kind of put me in a mindset of seeing ALL the characters as possible stealth dudes. Instead of settling comfortably into a female-dominated world, I felt like I was on guard at all times against the possibility that all the characters were in fact dudes and I just hadn't been informed (yet).
This was only made worse when fairly late on in the book, Anaander Mianaai, the Lord of the Radch, is referred to as having a baritone voice - a vocal range that is strongly correlated in our culture with a person we would read as male. And add that to the fact of Seivarden being bodied in a way we would consider male, with Seivarden being characterized as that type of person who just oozes contemptuous and thoughtless power and privilege, which is a character trait I read as pretty male and associated with male privilege. And together those things felt like it cemented to me this notion that this world is still very dude-dominated, especially in positions of power/privilege. Whether that's a fair reading of the book or not, I don't know, but it's how I felt!
And so the gender stuff this book does WASN'T so much comforting and relaxing to me. Instead it was uncomfortable and distancing and put me on edge. Which is too bad. Because in theory I do really love what the book was doing! (And I'm sure that the use of the "she/her" pronouns did affect my subconscious reactions to things.)
And at any rate the other stuff about Breq's complete confusion about how other cultures do gender is A+, eg the excellent point she makes about how in this one culture she visited everyone dresses and acts more or less the same no matter the gender, and everyone says that gender doesn't matter/genders are equal, whatever, but EVERYONE can unerringly identify everyone else's genders, and whenever Breq misgenders someone they're terribly insulted. Or the matter-of-fact way Breq describes the way that Radch do reproduction and completely fails to realize that anything about it might be considered unusual by other cultures.
MOVING ON.
Okay so like the questions of identity in this book are SO FABULOUS? I am so into the stuff about Breq vs One Esk vs Justice of Toren and all of that being one identity but also...not quite. And Anaander Mianaai being divided within herself and trying not to acknowledge that fact to herself! And the viewpoint character of the book being an "I" with multiple bodies! And whether a spaceship counts as a person or a tool! Spaceships being friends with each other or not, spaceships having favourites among their officers, spaceships having VERY STRONG FEELINGS about things, spaceships (or parts of spaceships) having odd quirks (like One Esk's singing)! I AM SO INTO ALL OF THIS.
And speaking of One Esk's singing, gosh do I love how important music is throughout this book. All the different bits of songs One Esk has picked up from various cultures, and that she can sing choral music by herself!! And everyone thinks she's weird for singing all the time, but also get V E R Y weirded out when she stops!
And this ties into something else the book does very well, which is in interesting and diverse and believable representations of different cultures and religions. I really appreciate that this is a scifi book that doesn't shy away from the fact that humans generally tend to be pretty into religion and RELIGION WILL PROBABLY ALWAYS BE A THING even if in very different forms.
Also: hahaha wowwww I super appreciate that this book does not shy away from the awful side of empires. Empires (good or evil) tend to be...set-pieces in certain kinds of sff, but this book recognizes things like how a) most people within an empire are perfectly good people who think that they aren't doing anything wrong while still b) DOING SOME PRETTY TERRIBLE THINGS. This empire felt recognizably empire-like to me in a whole variety of ways! I appreciate that fact.
Relatedly, this book understands stuff about power and privilege and oppression and all that.
On another note something I want to talk about is Breq's relationship with Seivarden? I am just so intrigued! Like, there are obviously strong and not-particularly-positive feelings involved there yet Breq still feels very protective of Seivarden and Seivarden eventually feels the same way about Breq. And I rather agree with Breq that Seivarden is not super likeable, and I rather agree with Seivarden that Breq is occasionally rather out to lunch. SHE JUMPED OFF A BRIDGE FOR SEIVARDEN. Like. What. And I don't know where I'm going with all of this, except that I am very intrigued by everything we're shown in the book about their relationship and its history and how it changes and progresses over the course of the book and I want more!
Actually that's really the conclusion to the entirety of this post: I WANT MORE. Thankfully a sequel exists! Which I will have to get my hands on at some point.
OH! but looking back at the point-form list I made of things I wanted to make sure I covered in this write-up, I seem to have missed two points.
One: Daos Ceit, the wee flower girl from the temple, now all grown up and doin' things but still having strong feelings about the injustice she witnessed as a child! Awww, I like her.
And two: SPACESHIPS!! That is a direct quote from my list, double exclamation and all. I already talked about this a bit up above in the section on identity, but I just want to reiterate that I am really into spaceships as characters. And the main character as a spaceship embodied in a single human body is great! And then OUR SPACESHIP MAIN CHARACTER BECOMES CAPTAIN OF A SPACESHIP at the very end of the book and CAN I JUST SAY HOW EXCITED I AM BY THIS PROSPECT.
It's interesting, this book has SO MUCH to talk about, but I feel like the only thing I've been seeing reviews really discuss is the gender/pronoun thing. Which to an extent I understand? It's fascinating and a big deal and something that hasn't really been done before that I know of! BUT IT IS NOT THE ONLY THING WORTH TALKING ABOUT.
So I will start by talking about that but then move on to the other stuff.
So. As you may know, this is a book where the main character is from a culture that just...doesn't do gender. And so the ungendered Raadchai pronoun she uses to refer to everyone is rendered in English as "she/her". Which is FASCINATING and great because historically speaking English has used "he" as a general pronoun, and using "she" instead calls up very different associations and I love it.
I've seen multiple people comment on how soothing it is to read a book in which pretty much all the characters are read as female by default.
And idk, I think it was a little bit like that for me? But mostly it was not. See, here and there throughout the book, information about gender of some characters is revealed - eg when Breq has to use a language that genders people when you talk about/to them and she needs to make guesses about what pronoun is correct, and stuff like that. And given that of the first few gender identity/gender presentation/whatever you want to call it reveals, most of them are that the character is in fact male, it kind of put me in a mindset of seeing ALL the characters as possible stealth dudes. Instead of settling comfortably into a female-dominated world, I felt like I was on guard at all times against the possibility that all the characters were in fact dudes and I just hadn't been informed (yet).
This was only made worse when fairly late on in the book, Anaander Mianaai, the Lord of the Radch, is referred to as having a baritone voice - a vocal range that is strongly correlated in our culture with a person we would read as male. And add that to the fact of Seivarden being bodied in a way we would consider male, with Seivarden being characterized as that type of person who just oozes contemptuous and thoughtless power and privilege, which is a character trait I read as pretty male and associated with male privilege. And together those things felt like it cemented to me this notion that this world is still very dude-dominated, especially in positions of power/privilege. Whether that's a fair reading of the book or not, I don't know, but it's how I felt!
And so the gender stuff this book does WASN'T so much comforting and relaxing to me. Instead it was uncomfortable and distancing and put me on edge. Which is too bad. Because in theory I do really love what the book was doing! (And I'm sure that the use of the "she/her" pronouns did affect my subconscious reactions to things.)
And at any rate the other stuff about Breq's complete confusion about how other cultures do gender is A+, eg the excellent point she makes about how in this one culture she visited everyone dresses and acts more or less the same no matter the gender, and everyone says that gender doesn't matter/genders are equal, whatever, but EVERYONE can unerringly identify everyone else's genders, and whenever Breq misgenders someone they're terribly insulted. Or the matter-of-fact way Breq describes the way that Radch do reproduction and completely fails to realize that anything about it might be considered unusual by other cultures.
MOVING ON.
Okay so like the questions of identity in this book are SO FABULOUS? I am so into the stuff about Breq vs One Esk vs Justice of Toren and all of that being one identity but also...not quite. And Anaander Mianaai being divided within herself and trying not to acknowledge that fact to herself! And the viewpoint character of the book being an "I" with multiple bodies! And whether a spaceship counts as a person or a tool! Spaceships being friends with each other or not, spaceships having favourites among their officers, spaceships having VERY STRONG FEELINGS about things, spaceships (or parts of spaceships) having odd quirks (like One Esk's singing)! I AM SO INTO ALL OF THIS.
And speaking of One Esk's singing, gosh do I love how important music is throughout this book. All the different bits of songs One Esk has picked up from various cultures, and that she can sing choral music by herself!! And everyone thinks she's weird for singing all the time, but also get V E R Y weirded out when she stops!
And this ties into something else the book does very well, which is in interesting and diverse and believable representations of different cultures and religions. I really appreciate that this is a scifi book that doesn't shy away from the fact that humans generally tend to be pretty into religion and RELIGION WILL PROBABLY ALWAYS BE A THING even if in very different forms.
Also: hahaha wowwww I super appreciate that this book does not shy away from the awful side of empires. Empires (good or evil) tend to be...set-pieces in certain kinds of sff, but this book recognizes things like how a) most people within an empire are perfectly good people who think that they aren't doing anything wrong while still b) DOING SOME PRETTY TERRIBLE THINGS. This empire felt recognizably empire-like to me in a whole variety of ways! I appreciate that fact.
Relatedly, this book understands stuff about power and privilege and oppression and all that.
On another note something I want to talk about is Breq's relationship with Seivarden? I am just so intrigued! Like, there are obviously strong and not-particularly-positive feelings involved there yet Breq still feels very protective of Seivarden and Seivarden eventually feels the same way about Breq. And I rather agree with Breq that Seivarden is not super likeable, and I rather agree with Seivarden that Breq is occasionally rather out to lunch. SHE JUMPED OFF A BRIDGE FOR SEIVARDEN. Like. What. And I don't know where I'm going with all of this, except that I am very intrigued by everything we're shown in the book about their relationship and its history and how it changes and progresses over the course of the book and I want more!
Actually that's really the conclusion to the entirety of this post: I WANT MORE. Thankfully a sequel exists! Which I will have to get my hands on at some point.
OH! but looking back at the point-form list I made of things I wanted to make sure I covered in this write-up, I seem to have missed two points.
One: Daos Ceit, the wee flower girl from the temple, now all grown up and doin' things but still having strong feelings about the injustice she witnessed as a child! Awww, I like her.
And two: SPACESHIPS!! That is a direct quote from my list, double exclamation and all. I already talked about this a bit up above in the section on identity, but I just want to reiterate that I am really into spaceships as characters. And the main character as a spaceship embodied in a single human body is great! And then OUR SPACESHIP MAIN CHARACTER BECOMES CAPTAIN OF A SPACESHIP at the very end of the book and CAN I JUST SAY HOW EXCITED I AM BY THIS PROSPECT.
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