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A review by arkron
The Best of Subterranean by William Schafer
5.0
Full review at my blog.
Best stories in this anthology:
Worst stories:
Contents:
Merged review:
Repost from my blog.
Summary: What would a perfect memory mean for us and our culture? How changed literacy our subjectivity? A journalist explores the pros and cons of a Cyborgish memory enhancement gadget called Remem which lets you capture, search, and replay every instance of your liveblog. It would bring a change similar to reading and writing for our Western culture, so he writes the story of the savage folk of Tev who slowly learn the impact of written truth versus oral truth. He can't stop people adopting the gadget like the tribes oral culture could stop writing on paper; so, he tried to find the positive in it.
Review: First, I feared yet another linguistic exploration of the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis (which Chiang already explored in Story of your Life), but then it gladly developed in a different direction, that of literacy. The story contains lots of brain food about different sorts of truth - the harsh truth of facts versus smoothening truth of feeling, the stories of yourself which you need to comfort yourself or your tribe, which are based on forgiving and forgetting. The author gave us two interposed point of views for comparison, and to understand the concept: one set in the future in first person perspective of the journalist who wrote the whole story. It is mostly about the relationship to his daughter, and his finding out with the help of the memory gadget that he was wrong about his history:
And I think I’ve found the real benefit of digital memory. The point is not to prove you were right; the point is to admit you were wrong.
The tribal version of adopting new forms of memory was narrated in the point of view of a boy who learned reading and writing from a missionary. I found the insights into the process wonderful and bringing a lot to understand what the futuristic gadget would bring to our culture. Just one sample:
It was only many lessons later that Jijingi finally understood where he should leave spaces, and what Moseby meant when he said “word.” You could not find the places where words began and ended by listening. The sounds a person made while speaking were as smooth and unbroken as the hide of a goat’s leg, but the words were like the bones underneath the meat, and the space between them was the joint where you’d cut if you wanted to separate it into pieces. By leaving spaces when he wrote, Moseby was making visible the bones in what he said.
This gadget will change our "private oral culture" just as writing changed the tribal's oral culture. It will be difficult to rewrite our pasts to our needs.
Sometimes the narration feels more like an essay than a story, it moves slowly, even contemplative. And then, it isn't an essay at all but character driven, providing a lot of character development and insights into the main characters. Anyways, it is a masterful usage of futuristic technology to explore philosophical topics in the frame of a short story: Chiang focuses on the searchable story telling capabilities of technology only, and left out several other aspects that this gadget could be used for (think of medical usages).
I fully recommend this novelette to everyone searching for more heavy-weight stories: It will stay with you for some time: Did you already think about your own made-up story?
Best stories in this anthology:
- ★★★★★ • A Small Price to Pay for Birdsong • 2011 • Alternate World novella by K. J. Parker about the creative genius of two musicians • review
- ★★★★★ • The Truth of Fact, the Truth of Feeling • 2013 • Near Future SF novelette by Ted Chiang about a perfect memory recording gadget • review
Worst stories:
- ★ • The Secret History of the Lost Colony • 2008 • SF short story by John Scalzi
- ★ • He Who Grew Up Reading Sherlock Holmes • 2014 • short story by Harlan Ellison • review
Contents:
- 9 • ★★★★ • Perfidia • 2004 • thriller novelette about Glen Miller's death by Lewis Shiner • review
- 49 • ★★★★ • Game • 2012 • Magical realism novelette about hunting tigers in 1950 by Maria Dahvana Headley • review
- 79 • ☆ • The Last Log of the Lachrimosa by Alastair Reynolds • Horror - didn't read
- 125 • ★★★+ • The Seventeenth Kind • SF comedy about a shopping channel presenter, a novelette by Michael Marshall Smith • review
- 145 • ★★+ • Dispersed by the Sun Melting in the Wind • Post Apocalyptic short story with multiple "lasts" by Rachel Swirsky • review
- 157 • ★★+ • The Pile • ghost story about a Macarena dancing gorilla toy by Michael Bishop • review
- 175 • ★★★★ • The Bohemian Astrobleme • 2010 • Steampunk novelette by Kage Baker about a prostitute-spy investigation in Bohemia • review
- 205 • ★★★ • Tanglefoot • 2008 • Steampunk novelette by Cherie Priest about a boy creating a clockwork doll • review
- 235 • ★★★ • Hide and Horns • 2009 • Western novelette by Joe R. Lansdale • review
- 259 • ★★★★ • Balfour and Meriwether in the Vampire of Kabul • 2011 • Steampunk novelette by Daniel Abraham • review
- 285 • ★★★ • Last Breath • 2005 • Weird short story by Joe Hill • review
- 295 • ★★ • Younger Women • 2011 • Weird short story by Karen Joy Fowler • review
- 303 • ★★ • White Lines on a Green Field • 2011 • Magic realism novelette by Catherynne M. Valente • review
- 323 • ★★+ • The Least of the Deathly Arts • 2012 • Fantaasy short story by Kat Howard • review
- 335 • ★★+ • Water Can’t be Nervous • 2012 • Mainstream short story by Jonathan Carroll • review
- 345 • ★★★+ • Valley of the Girls • 2011 • SF short story by Kelly Link • review
- 361 • ★★★+ • Sic Him, Hellhound! Kill! Kill! • 2012 • Urban Fantasy short story by Hal Duncan • review
- 381 • ★★★ • Troublesolving • 2009 • SF novelette by Tim Pratt • review
- 407 • ★★+ • The Indelible Dark • 2012 • SF Metafiction novelette by William Browning Spencer • review
- 435 • ★★★ • The Prayer of Ninety Cats • 2013 • Dark Fantasy novelette by Caitlín R. Kiernan • review
- 471 • ★★+ • The Crane Method • 2011 • Magical realism short story by Ian R. MacLeod • review
- 485 • ★★★ • The Tomb of the Pontifex Dvorn • 2011 • SF novelette by Robert Silverberg • review
- 521 • ☆ • The Toys of Caliban • 1986 • Horror novelette by George R. R. Martin • Screenplay for The New Twilight Zone S2E29 based on an unpublished story by Terry Matz
- 561 • ★ • The Secret History of the Lost Colony • 2008 • SF short story by John Scalzi • A removed chapter from "The Last Colony". Why would anyone else than absurdely hardcore fans of that series want to read something like that? Why is this considered a "Best of Subterranean"?
- 577 • ★★★ • The Screams of Dragons • 2014 • Urban Fantasy novelette by Kelley Armstrong • review
- 619 • ★★★ • The Dry Spell • 2009 • Magical realism short story by James P. Blaylock about a man daring the heavens to rain • review
- 635 • ★ • He Who Grew Up Reading Sherlock Holmes • 2014 • short story by Harlan Ellison • review
- 645 • ★★★★★ • A Small Price to Pay for Birdsong • 2011 • Alternate World novella by K. J. Parker about the creative genius of two musicians • review
- 685 • ★★★★★ • The Truth of Fact, the Truth of Feeling • 2013 • Near Future SF novelette by Ted Chiang about a perfect memory recording gadget • review
- 723 • ★★★ • A Long Walk Home • 2011 • Far future SF novelette by Jay Lake about loneliness • review
Merged review:
Repost from my blog.
Summary: What would a perfect memory mean for us and our culture? How changed literacy our subjectivity? A journalist explores the pros and cons of a Cyborgish memory enhancement gadget called Remem which lets you capture, search, and replay every instance of your liveblog. It would bring a change similar to reading and writing for our Western culture, so he writes the story of the savage folk of Tev who slowly learn the impact of written truth versus oral truth. He can't stop people adopting the gadget like the tribes oral culture could stop writing on paper; so, he tried to find the positive in it.
Review: First, I feared yet another linguistic exploration of the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis (which Chiang already explored in Story of your Life), but then it gladly developed in a different direction, that of literacy. The story contains lots of brain food about different sorts of truth - the harsh truth of facts versus smoothening truth of feeling, the stories of yourself which you need to comfort yourself or your tribe, which are based on forgiving and forgetting. The author gave us two interposed point of views for comparison, and to understand the concept: one set in the future in first person perspective of the journalist who wrote the whole story. It is mostly about the relationship to his daughter, and his finding out with the help of the memory gadget that he was wrong about his history:
And I think I’ve found the real benefit of digital memory. The point is not to prove you were right; the point is to admit you were wrong.
The tribal version of adopting new forms of memory was narrated in the point of view of a boy who learned reading and writing from a missionary. I found the insights into the process wonderful and bringing a lot to understand what the futuristic gadget would bring to our culture. Just one sample:
It was only many lessons later that Jijingi finally understood where he should leave spaces, and what Moseby meant when he said “word.” You could not find the places where words began and ended by listening. The sounds a person made while speaking were as smooth and unbroken as the hide of a goat’s leg, but the words were like the bones underneath the meat, and the space between them was the joint where you’d cut if you wanted to separate it into pieces. By leaving spaces when he wrote, Moseby was making visible the bones in what he said.
This gadget will change our "private oral culture" just as writing changed the tribal's oral culture. It will be difficult to rewrite our pasts to our needs.
Sometimes the narration feels more like an essay than a story, it moves slowly, even contemplative. And then, it isn't an essay at all but character driven, providing a lot of character development and insights into the main characters. Anyways, it is a masterful usage of futuristic technology to explore philosophical topics in the frame of a short story: Chiang focuses on the searchable story telling capabilities of technology only, and left out several other aspects that this gadget could be used for (think of medical usages).
I fully recommend this novelette to everyone searching for more heavy-weight stories: It will stay with you for some time: Did you already think about your own made-up story?