Oryx and Crake illustrations

An artist named Jason Courtney has done a short series of very cool illustrations based on Margaret Atwood's novel Oryx and Crake. Go, look.

(Found on the blog Uncertain Times, which you really should check out.)

Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood

Oryx and Crake

You know, this one has dystopian elements, but it's less an actual dystopia and more apocalyptic. Or maybe it's about a dystopian society (the compounds) living right next to a pre-apocalyptic one (the pleeblands). Or maybe it's just a romantic novel with big ideas.

In a way, it reminded me of Fight Club. No, no, bear with me. Only in the case of the main character's (Snowman) relationship with Oryx, the woman or women he obsesses over. Much is made of her, she's his every other thought, and yet her actual participation in the action of the story - either before or after the fall - is minimal at best. She's really got jack shit to do with what happens, aside from transportation that would be handled by anyone. She's just a point for him to orbit - she might as well be mythical. And, in fact, Snowman does his best to make her so by the end.

Anyway, I liked this one as a story. Plenty of funky little details, plenty of worrying ideas. If I made a pie chart showing the different styles of dystopia and how likely I find them, class-based commercial control would be a big ol' slice. I'm not one to be spooked by the idea of cloning, or even gene-splicing particularly - although the ChickieNobs grossed me right out (does anyone else watch the show Squidbillies? they had something very similar just a week or two ago, but it was buffalo wing style) - it was more the marketing elements that I find myself still thinking about. A pill that enhances sexual prowess and good moods, but secretly sterilizes the user? Yes, I believe people would fall over themselves to take it, and that scares the crap out of me.

final thought: I'm a bright-but-not-overly-so word-happy writer type, and I still found Snowman shallow and sort of annoying in a Holden Caulfield kind of way. Your mileage may vary.

The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood

The Handmaid's Tale

I honestly have little to say about this one. The Christian dystopias always get to me. I think I find them a little more likely than the hive-mind ones in my lifetime. Or maybe growing up in the bible belt just makes me more cautious of those who would encode biblical morals into law.

Margaret Atwood writes better speculative fiction centered around the subjugation of women than, for example, Sheri S. Tepper. Mostly, I think, because she's also skillful at telling a story while she gets her point across.

Once again, though, all of civilization comes down to reproduction. And I feel like that's pretty much true - when only a few can have children, the powers-that-be will seek to control them.

final thoughts: And yet Canada's still safe space?