October 17, 2005

Look to Windward by Iain M. Banks

Gentile or Jew
O you who turn the wheel and look to windward,
Consider Phlebas, who was once handsome and tall as you.

T. S. Eliot, `The Waste Land', IV

What should be made of this epigraph taken from `The Waste Land'. It includes a reference back to the first Culture novel by Iain M. Banks, "Consider Phlebas". It could be considered a completion, perhaps this is the final Culture novel? The plot here concerns the aftermath of the Culture's conflict with the Idirans that was the plot in "Consider Phlebas". In this novel, rather than the original swashbuckling action there is a somber reflection of the themes of war and revenge.

So, rather than a grand finale, it seems more like a return to the ideas behind the construction of the Culture, a society which lacks in nothing. Where humans live pleasurable easy lives, being looked over by sentient immortal Minds who are far from infallible but pursue a life of wisdom and a search for abstraction while tending the human flock in their care. But let us first consider what is to be made of Eliot's reference to Phlebas?

Philebus was saying that enjoyment and pleasure and delight, and the class of feelings akin to them, are a good to every living being, whereas I contend, that not these, but wisdom and intelligence and memory, and their kindred, right opinion and true reasoning, are better and more desirable than pleasure for all who are able to partake of them, and that to all such who are or ever will be they are the most advantageous of all things. Have I not given, Philebus, a fair statement of the two sides of the argument?

Plato, `Philebus'

In `Philebus', Plato describes the discussion between Socrates, Protarchus and Philebus on the nature of happiness. If one could have all that one desires, what is it that should be asked for? Perhaps these are the questions being asked by Banks about the Culture.

This novel reminds me of the style of Iain M. Banks in his other Culture novel, "Inversions". It is measured, fabulously inventive and exposes its hidden themes with great skill.

The three main characters are the Hub mind of the Culture Orbital, Masaq' (like people, Minds have peripatetic or homely personalities), the Homomdan Ambassador to the Orbital, Kabe Ischloear and the Chelgrian composer living in exile, Mahrai Ziller. The Chelgrians don't like the Culture, for the same reasons that the protagonist of "Consider Phlebas" did not like them: for their arrogance in presuming to know what was right. However, they send a diplomat to meet the exiled composer Ziller to try and coax him back to his home. Ziller is busy composing a symphony for the Orbital Mind Masaq' to commemorate the destruction of two suns in the Idiran war at the hands of the warship it used to be before it retired to become an Orbital.

While themes are different from the usual space opera, the setting is more than worthy of the title. The descriptions of elaborate engineering and exotic alien landscapes are among the best in this genre. As John Clute says in his review of this book: ``So start here. Then explore backward to Phlebas.''

John Clute's review of Look to Windward. 


%T Look to Windward
%A Iain M. Banks
%I Orbit
%D 2000
%G ISBN: 1841490598 (pb)
%P 403
%K science-fiction

Review written: 2002/02/23

Posted by anoop at October 17, 2005 11:46 PM