Review of "Helliconia Winter" by Brian Aldiss

Like an architect seeing a cathedral they’ve designed have the steeple raised, or an engineer watching the bowsprit attached to a ship they’ve built, so too must Aldiss have felt writing the final chapter of Helliconia Winter.   The orbits within orbits, themes revolving around themes, and characters caught in the cycle of life, come to an end.  But only on the page.

More than a year or two in the making, the series has been millennia.  The third and final book, Helliconia Winter, continues to tell a human scale tale in harmony with the larger forces at play—geology, astrophysics, and biology all heavily influencing the narrative.  This time around, however, Aldiss wields a heavier thematic hammer.  The understated Gaian theme of Spring and Summer is now pressed on the reader in more overt and convincing tones.  Tying into the major concepts presented in earlier volumes, Winter is a genuine capstone to a sublime series.

Like Helliconia Summer, Winter does not pick up the story where the previous volume ended.  It instead jumps roughly 500 Helliconian years into the future.  Steam engines are beginning to replace livestock, a railway network is starting to take shape, and cannons and guns are manufactured with precision and consistency.  The apex of the planet’s blistering summer has passed and the onset of winter moves imminently closer with each technological advance. 

Mankind forever subject to their whim, the elements tighten their grip in Helliconia Winter.  The main character Luterin and his fight to survive radically shifts as the religious and political order adapt to Helliconia’s great winter, wars turning civil as the looming cold threatens men’s principles and shorten tempers.  In the harshening weather, even Luterin’s friends turn against him, and in the end he must choose a new path.  Complicating his plight, plague and its ensuing fear storm the land, forcing Luterin to sacrifice everything to survive.

Luterin’s difficulties are only the surface layer of Helliconia Winter, however.  Removing the casing, the larger cogs and gears Aldiss designed into the system back in Spring and rotated in Summer can still be seen moving in Winter.  Humanity’s subjugation to nature, Sisyphian cycles of life, slavery and man’s willingness to enslave others, anthropology, climate change, disease, geography, evolutionary biology, and a variety of other soft science themes fill the book.  The Gaian theme, however, is the strongest. 

In his 1979 Gaia: A New Look at Life on Earth, James Lovelock writes: “it can now be demonstrated… that a diverse chain of predators and prey is more stable and a stronger ecosystem than a single self-contained species”.  Though never stated in such explicit terms, Brian Aldiss hammers home a similar point in Helliconia, Winter being the strongest and final blow.  Humans, on the planet, on Avernus (Helliconia’s manmade orbital), and on Earth, are defined within a framework of being subject to nature.  Phagors provide balance planetside, ennui drastically changes life aboard the orbital, while on Earth, the usual mixture of hubris and acumen continue to spin events out of control, the planets revolving ceaselessly all the while.  Mankind is its own best and worst friend.

If the book—or series—has any faults, it’s inconsistency in style.  Helliconia Spring starts with a 150 page narrative that never breaks from linear, then moves to a variety of viewpoints told in anything but linear fashion.  Narrative and viewpoint focused into a regular cadence, Helliconia Summer is the most consistent of the three.  The beginning of Helliconia Winter, however,  suffers from much the same troubles as the latter half of Spring.  Syntax disjointed and storyline never congealing properly at the outset, it isn’t until about a third of the way through that Aldiss settles down and establishes a rhythm.  Another fault is the abrupt change in perspective on gender.  Women often occupying strong roles in the first two books, Winter finds its two main female protagonists submissive like kittens.  Perhaps requiring a re-read to better determine the author’s reasoning behind the choice, at first glance the message does not shine positively.

Before concluding, I would like address reviewer criticisms regarding Helliconia Winter as obviously some misunderstanding has occurred.  Some have commented that the non-Helliconian portions—the narrative devoted to Avernus and events on Earth—are boring and over-philosophized.  A matter of taste, the point remains that without these sections, Helliconia is just another fantasy series.  With them, however, the scope shifts to sci-fi in the short run, and social, geographical, and evolutionary commentary in the long.  These meta-settings are a juxtaposition, a moral contrast, to the primitive worldview of life on Helliconia and are what make the series worthwhile.  The thought-provoking regions of sci-fi rather are touched upon, than just adventurous. 

Still others have commented that Luterin’s story reads like a travelogue with no purpose or climax.  Again, these readers fail to see how events surrounding the main character draw him unwillingly into the fray, highlighting the Gaian theme as a result.  The climax of Luterin’s story, while subtle, is of utmost importance toward emphasizing the fundamental nature of humanity as Aldiss sees it, instinct the name of the day.  Thus, readers who approach the book as mere entertainment will be missing out on a great deal of human insight.

In the end, Helliconia Winter is a more than fitting conclusion.  It is the best of the series and deserving of the BSFA award it won.  Grand in scope and perfectly suited in setting, Aldiss is able to contextualize the planet, the forms of life existing there, and humanity propagating on it in sublime fashion.  The touch of hope and despair regarding humanity’s future closing the novel is icing on the cake.  As the Gaian theme is pressed hard, readers who enjoyed the story elements of the previous books may be a little disappointed by Winter.  However, those who’ve followed Aldiss’s underlying concepts thus far and are curious how he will connect the oh-so human lives on the planet’s surface with those on Earth will be more than satisfied.  Innate to science fiction is the potential for grandeur, and Aldiss has taken full advantage with Helliconia.

Review of "Helliconia Summer" by Brian Aldiss

The shape of Brian Aldiss’s SF Masterwork Helliconia could be said to be parabolic.  If Helliconia Spring is the slow, curving entry point, then Helliconia Summer, the middle volume, is the zenith story-wise.  Or at least that’s the feel two-thirds of through the series.  Aldiss trying to paint a historical and evolutionary picture of humanity’s existence on a distant planet, Helliconia Summer’s narrative does not pick up where the first volume left off, and instead focuses on a point in the society’s development loosely equivalent to the Baroque Era many centuries in the future from Helliconia Spring.  Were the lives of the kings and queens the only focal points, some would say that the book is mere alternate universe fantasy.  But that Aldiss juxtaposes the land dwellers’ lives with the crew of the space station orbiting Helliconia, focus changes from medieval drama to soft science fiction.  Cementing this idea are the clashes of ideology, science vs. religion, for example, which seed the plot and create points of realistic contention for those inhabiting and orbiting the fantastika of Helliconia.

A more consistent offering than Helliconia Spring, the plot of Helliconia Summer, while unraveling in an atypical, almost backward timeline, forms a cohesive whole with a poignant resolution.  The book opens with the king and queen of one of Helliconia’s many 16th century-esque kingdoms contemplating the divorce the king has organized so that he can marry another.  Feeling shunned, the queen stands on a beach pondering her future when a corpse wearing a digital watch washes ashore.  Stopping at this point, Aldiss jumps back in time to narrate the history of these circumstances, and at the conclusion, resolves the wave of cultural enmity and religious fervor that has built around the two and caused the schism.

Each story woven like strands in a braid into a larger narrative, the number of viewpoints grows in the telling of the king and queen’s history.  A merchant, a scientist, an advisor, a diplomat, the king’s children, and a general, among others, round out the short list of main characters and give the novel the depth needed to describe the variety of lands, cultures, authorities, and interests scattered over the planet.  Once again receiving stage time is the species Aldiss introduced in Helliconia Spring, the phagors.  The planet’s summer a low point in their cycle of existence, the majority of phagors have been killed off or are slaved to humans.  Only random groups are able to live in hiding or in the arctic wilds with any sense of freedom, and as such, inter-species hatred continues playing a hand in human affairs on the planet.

But where Aldiss really advances the overall Helliconia narrative is by developing the Avernus storyline.  Life on the orbiting space station routine and sterile, many of the crew, upon seeing the pleasures and pains of the humans below, yearn for something similar.  Injecting hope into the doldrums and ennui of their prescribed lives, a lottery is routinely held where one member of the crew is allowed to go to the surface to both live and end their life—the microbes and viruses on Helliconia 100% lethal.  In keeping with the denouement of Brave New World, Billy Xiao Pin is a character selected to leave the rote of Avernus for a more visceral life planet-side.  Knowing death is imminent, the manner in which Billy spends his time shows Aldiss has a firm grasp on instincts inherent to humanity.  That Billy’s flaming out in existential glory is viewed as desirable by the crew on Avernus only further indicates the author’s understanding of fundamental human desires.  The lives of those on the planet below likewise wanting more, it seems the grass is always greener on the other side.

And there are a variety of other subjects touched upon in Helliconia Summer.  Foremost among them are religion, science, and the value and role each have in society.  Not a drum beater for science rather a conservative proponent, Aldiss recognizes the value of the more subjective principles of society and entwines them nicely with the narrative.  There is also a Gaian perspective to the novel.  Descriptions of atmospheric, geological, and geomorphic changes appear and reappear, and the fact man is subject to the larger, uncontrollable forces of nature is continually emphasized.  Applicable even to those on Avernus, Aldiss never loses touch of scope.

In the end, Helliconia Summer is an improvement on the previous volume.  The cosmological setup of planets revolving around suns revolving around suns is used to stronger effect.  The characters are more complex and realistic and the storyline is smoother and more oriented toward theme.  Developing the book as such, the “big ideas” underpinning the story punch deeper into both the narrative and reader’s understanding of the text.  The only faults that remain have to do with a rather ordinary prose style and space limitations.  Trying to paint a picture of planet-sized dimensions, including its dispersed cultures, characterization takes a back seat.  But while most characters may indeed be representative, a few, including the king and queen, are fleshed out in enough detail that upon climax it’s possible a pang of empathy may arise for their circumstances.  Fans of Cherryh, Le Guin, and other such writers will want to take note of the series as a whole, and those who’ve read Helliconia Spring and liked it will want to continue.  The series brought to its zenith, it will be interesting to see how the narrative plays out at the other end of the parabola, Helliconia Winter.

Review of "Helliconia Spring" by Brian Aldiss

What if the planets orbited not only the sun, but the whole solar system orbited another, even larger sun?  Cycles within cycles is the basic premise of Brian Aldiss’s Helliconia trilogy, of which the first installment is Helliconia Spring (1983).  A planet of the fantastic, Helliconia is home to a diverse variety of imaginative flora and fauna a la Jack Vance.  The sentient life, however, bears comparison to our own.  Struggling Darwinian style, humans and a species called Phagors inhabit the planet, the latter forming a group which thrives in the ice ages that cover Helliconia in the millennia its meta-orbit moves through aphelion.  Humans likewise having their moment in the sun (forgive the pun) in perihelion, this ongoing cycle highlights the species battles for survival.

Primarily an examination of the base virtues and vices of humanity, Helliconia Spring places more importance on theme than entertainment.  Enforcing this idea is a secondary storyline featuring researchers in an orbiting satellite, observing and watching as life develops and recedes on Helliconia like scientists over an ant farm.  This Gaian perspective sets the mood of the text, both literally and figuratively.  Except for the first 130 pages which tell the unpredictable and fascinating story of Yuli, linear storytelling takes backseat to a collage of interconnected vignettes serving to portray the fundamental struggles and glories of a group of humans and Phagors.  

A situation earth’s present day humanity simply cannot empathize with, the Phagor are a novel element in the puzzle of life on Helliconia.   Able to compete with mankind (from an evolutionary standpoint), these sentient yeti-like beings cause and bear the brunt of humanity’s enmity and physical violence.  Acting as a cultural mirror from which humanity’s own actions and behavior can be plotted and critiqued, it is through these confrontations, big and small, that Aldiss utilizes the “Lucifer Effect” to subtle effect - one of the strong points of the book.

That being said, there are also weak points.  When trying to outlay an entire species’ motivations, shortcomings, and strengths, a writer of fiction must inevitably choose a few characters to exemplify the ideals they wish to express.  While Aldiss does this with a finesse many writers of realist literature fail to achieve, the story nevertheless fails to realize planet-wide dimensions.  On few occasions does the reader get the feeling that the scope of the story is beyond the small group of humans and their town of Oldorodan where the majority of the novel takes place.  By selecting such an isolated group, the wider variety of lives and experiences of people across the planet fails to manifest itself.  It’s possible that in Helliconia Summer and Helliconia Winter Aldiss goes on to provide the reader a wider perspective, but for the moment, viewpoints are limited, though it would seem Aldiss was aiming at something larger.

The second bone to pick, albeit minor, is the novel’s clock.  There are moments time is necessarily accelerated to better contrast societal rather than individual development.  While these transitions most often come across well, there are moments a few of the characters seem caught on a bunjee cord of time.  Some lives zoom ahead but are talked about in the present, while in the next paragraph, a related character’s circumstances are addressed in the present but two years prior.  This situation leads to an occasionally disorienting narrative (particularly the Phagor sections) for what is otherwise a well organized storyline.  

In the end, fans of Ursula Le Guin’s science fiction will find something to like about Helliconia Spring.  Using the “soft” approach, Aldiss examines the social, religious, anthropological, mythological, evolutionary, and gendered aspects of humanity in a science fiction setting.  There are no space ships, lasers, or interplanetary wars.  In fact, the extra-planetary setting and the orbiting station are the only true sci-fi devices; the remainder is able to be read as pure fantasy.  The creatures and animals are creatively imagined and therefore will interest readers of Jack Vance – just don’t come looking for the fast paced plot and wry humor.  Aldiss’ prose is descriptive, direct, flows nicely, and is rarely amateur.  Thankfully, it also has more color than the notes of the scientists orbiting Helliconia, observing man as he emerges from his shell to struggle in the spring of life yet again…

Review of "Gaia: A New Look at Life on Earth" by James Lovelock

While scholars such as Capra, Laszlo, Bohm and others have continued to examine the unexplainable anomalies impenetrable to physics, scientists in the field of chemistry have simultaneously been hypothesizing on the fundamental nature of life on earth based on atmospheric and ecological data. Like their physicist colleagues, rather than dividing the molecule into smaller components as an atom is sub-divided by classic physics, these scientists have approached the interaction of elements and compounds holistically, seeking the underlying patterns which fashion the manner in which primary changes, reformations, and coexistence in compound matter occur.  One such theory, controversial since its emergence in 1979, is Gaia Theory, expounded by James Lovelock in his bestselling book Gaia: A New Look at Life on Earth.  

Immediately clashing with the mechanistic worldview, Lovelock contends that modern science’s approach to knowledge is like reading only specific subsections, let alone whole chapters, of a book.  The ensuing narrow view renders knowledge of the book as a whole—a holistic view of the earth—“unnoticed and unexamined” (xii).  For Lovelock, putting the known pieces—the subsections—together into a cohesive and meaningful whole is of utmost importance when seeking a path toward mitigating the concerns raised by Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring, that is, of the environmental issues seemingly brought about by modern technological development. 

Employing a “top-down” instead of a “bottom-up” perspective on life on earth, Lovelock’s Gaia Theory, rather than seeing earth as a collection of parts functioning independently, proposes that the whole of earth and its biosphere are in fact a large “meta-organism,” an entity he names Gaia after the Greek goddess (x).  Lovelock defines Gaia as “a complex entity involving the Earth’s biosphere, atmosphere, oceans, and soil; the totality constituting a feedback or cybernetic system which seeks an optimal physical and chemical environment for life on this planet” (10).

Lovelock’s arguments for the existence of Gaia are founded upon simple logic and draw upon intuitive experience to conceptualize the structure and processes of his model, namely the stability of the earth’s temperature through the eons, the consistent existence of life in a state of non-equilibrium, and the planet we know seems representative of the cybernetic system all other forms of life exhibit.  From these observations Lovelock infers that the earth, the biosphere and its inherent interactive systems cannot be seen as anything but an interconnected being.  “The entire range of living matter on Earth,” he writes, “from whales to viruses, and from oaks to algae, could be regarded as constituting a single living entity, capable of manipulating the Earth’s atmosphere to suit its overall needs and endowed with faculties and powers beyond those of its constituent parts” (9).  No more a holistic version of life on earth could be imagined.  

Gaia Theory proposes that the earth, as a living organism, is a collection of systems within a larger system wherein each system maintains importance relative to the others, like the heart compared to a finger.  In such an organic system, Lovelock, not surprisingly, considers human life equal to other animate forms of life, each fighting for their space and resources in true Darwinian style.  However, it is important to note he does not accord humans the particular importance Protagoras did when he said “man is the measure of all things.”  Nor does Lovelock subscribe to what Christianity affirms in the book of Genesis, according mankind dominion over “the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and every creature that moves on the ground”.  Rather, Lovelock explicitly states: “it can now be demonstrated… that a diverse chain of predators and prey is more stable and a stronger ecosystem than a single self-contained species” (21).  Implied in this statement is a thought that one species’ attempt to isolate themselves in the overall web of life does not lead to a strong and healthy ecosystem.  In fact, Lovelock relegates humanity and the variety of animals and plants to the periphery of importance, seeing other, more significant forms of life as existing closer to the heart of being, more crucial to the healthy functioning of the overall organism.  Places such as continental shelves, salt marshes, forest ecosystems, and freshwater wetlands which cycle oxygen, carbon dioxide, nitrogen and other important chemicals through the air to keep our biosphere stable are given precedence.  

Despite early criticism, Gaia Theory has since come to be considered a viable scientific theory.  Numerous books, papers, and articles have been written either directly utilizing Lovelock’s tenets.  Regardless whether the theory is correct, the environmental sensitivity and awareness of need to alter humanity’s present course remains an even more fundamental message of Gaia: A New Look at Life on Earth, and is worthy of reading for that alone.