Re: Vaster than Empires

On Fri, 27 Jul 2007 13:14:43 GMT, jsavard@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
(John Savard) wrote:

On Wed, 25 Jul 2007 10:03:54 -0700, ilya2@xxxxxxx wrote, in part:

Really, why don't fantasy authors ever show an empire at the *height*
of its power?

Well, authors in general want to start from situations in which
something exciting will happen.

A big strong empire crushing some poor indigenous people on its frontier
isn't much of a story... unless you're writing a *serious* tragedy from
the viewpoint of the indigenous people.

Um, there appears to be some unintended irony above, if you look at
the thread title. Doubly so if you recall another LeGuin book on a
similar theme, "The Word for World is Forest". Both move slowly to a
resolution, and both show imperial crushing (of a sort).

I do object to the identification of TWfWiF with Vietnam, though. It
reads more like the Belgian Congo. Another sad empire.

Regards,
Jack Tingle
.

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