A gift from culture

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A Gift of Culture (English original title: The State of the Art , published 1991 ) is the only collection of short stories by the author Iain M. Banks . Because of in the book of science fiction - novella The last state of the art it is his culture cycle attributed. In this novella - which gives the name to the English edition of the book - the visit of a spaceship of culture to earth in 1977 is reported.

content

Each of the stories in the book is written in a different style. While all short stories are fantastic narratives, not all of them are science fiction. These are the only stories outside of this genre that have been published under the name Iain M. Banks , since the author uses the spelling of his name with a middle initial only for his science fiction novels.

Street of the skulls

Originally published as Road of Skulls in 20 under 35 , Peter Straus (ed.) 1988, Scepter, ISBN 0-340-48637-6 .

This surreal and dark story falls more into the fantasy realm. A brief glimpse into the lives of two travelers in a rickety wagon on a road that the empire they live in has literally paved with the skulls of its enemies.

A gift from culture

Originally published as A Gift from the Culture in Interzone # 20 , 1987.

This story also belongs to the culture cycle. It tells the story of Worbik , a former resident of culture who has turned away from it and lives in a less advanced civilization. He is threatened there due to betting debts and put under additional pressure because of his homosexual relationship, which is discriminated in this society. Finally, he allows himself to be blackmailed into using the weapon technology of culture to carry out an assassination attempt for which only he can be considered, since the weapon can only be used by people who have the genetic characteristics of the culture.

Odd

Originally published as Odd Attachment in Arrows of Eros , Alex Stewart (ed.) 1989, New English Library, ISBN 0-450-50249-X .

A playful macabre story, which is written from the perspective of a gigantic extraterrestrial tentacle plant.

Run down

Originally published as Descendant in Tales from the Forbidden Planet , Roz Kaveney (ed.) 1987, Titan Books, ISBN 1-85286-004-9 .

This story can also be assigned to the culture cycle. A cultural resident crashes on an inhospitable planet and tries to reach an outpost several hundred kilometers away with his space suit, which is also equipped with a consciousness. During the several months of march, a macabre symbiosis of man and machine develops.

disposal

Originally published as Cleaning Up by the Birmingham Science Fiction Group as a souvenir book for Novacon 17 (1987) in a limited edition of 500 copies.

This is a hilarious short story about alien contact that describes an accidentally created cargo cult on Earth .

Find

Originally published as Piece in The Observer magazine on August 13, 1989 with illustrations by Peter Knock. Piece was also edited for radio by Craig Warner and aired in 1991.

Piece is a fragment of a letter that was found after a plane crash and which deals with the relationship between religion and science as well as ignorance .

The latest state of art

Some earlier editions of the book only included this novella ( The State Of The Art , ISBN 0-929480-06-6 ) and appeared in 1989.

The novella is in the form of a report and makes up a large part of the book with around 100 pages. It reports on a mission that culture undertook in 1977 on planet earth. In addition, the novella can be seen as a kind of prehistory to the use of weapons , as it describes the earlier activities of Diziet Sma - one of the main characters in the novel. Presumably, the novella is part of the first (unpublished) version of the novel.

The inhabitants of the culture spaceship belonging to Kontakt have different opinions: While Sma argues for contact with the earth, Linter decides to move there and even gives up the physical improvements that are common in culture . Li (who becomes a Star Trek fan during the stay ), on the other hand, believes that the entire "undeniably neurotic and proven insane species" should be wiped out with a microscopic black hole . The ship Arbitrary itself, on the other hand, not only has its own ideas about what to do with the earth, but also its own sense of humor:

“ While I was gone, the ship sent a postcard to the BBC World Service saying 'Mr David Bowie's Space Oddity to the proud Arbitrary ship and everyone who travels with it.' (This from a machine that could have flooded the entire electromagnetic spectrum of the earth from somewhere beyond Betelgeuse with everything that could have occurred to her.) The wish was not played. The ship thought that was hilarious. "

scratch

Originally published as Scratch in The Fiction Magazine vol. 6 , No. 6, Jul / Aug 1987.

The last part of the book is an experimental piece of literature written in the stream of consciousness type .

Context within the culture cycle

  • The character of Diziet Sma from The Last Stand of Art reappears later as one of the main characters in the novel Use of Arms . Since the novella begins with Sma - 115 years after the described events on Earth - working for Special Circumstances , it seems reasonable that the novella was originally (as one of many flashbacks) part of the early unpublished version of the novel. In addition, Smas Ode to Zakalwe, which is printed before the prologue in Use of Arms, is dated by her to the year 115 of the calendar of the Khmer Rouge and thus falls at the same time that she also noticed her report on the visit the earth wrote.
  • In A Gift of Culture , the liberal moral values ​​of culture in relation to gender as well as sexual identity and orientation are contrasted against the background of a technically advanced society, in which, however, discrimination on these grounds is the social norm.
  • Shabby sheds light on the relationship between humans and machines in culture .

literature