Jack Vance - the gardener of worlds

[Jayaprakash Satyamurthy]

I've only read three of his books so far - Emphyrio, Night Lamp and Lyonesse: Suldrun's Garden, but his beautiful prose style and unique world-building already has me hooked.

Style is the first thing that strikes you about Vance - he has a graceful, almost Victorian way of writing, complete with exquisitely balanced sentences, aptly used words and rich, compelling description. In fact, I'd suggest you avoid reading any Vance if you are currently engaged in a writing project - the rhythms of his prose have this very insidious quality!

The next thing that sets Vance apart is his world-building. His worlds are not the complex politico-ecological creations of a Frank Herbert, nor are they based on extensive social or tech extrapolations. Instead, he creates worlds that express ideas, states of mind and philosophical conceits, much like the fantastic metropolises in Italo Calvino's Imagnary Cities.

Vance then goes on to set leisurely, gracious tales in these worlds. His plots seem to be fairly straightforward, as far as theme goes - more often than not, the story revolves around an individualistic protagonist, something of an outsider, who embarks on a journey of discovery and transformation.

His works are both in the fantasy and sf genres, but there is really little difference between the two, except by way of stage-dressing. His SF is best described as galactic fairy-tales.

If anyone else has read his works, I would be interested to know what you though of them. If not, try picking up a Vance the next time you're at the library. His books are rather leisurely, as I've said, but if you have the time for them, they can provide you with a truly pleasurable read.

 

[Brian G Turner]

It really does sound interesting - I'm a real fan of 19th century literature - whever you're talking Dickens and Poe, through to Hardy, and Lovecraft, I really do love the use of language. I would naturally write in such an ornate style, if I hadn;t once read that such work would be very hard to publish these days.

 

[Jayaprakash Satyamurthy]

I really do enjoy that whole era, too. I suspect there may actually be enough people who share that taste to ensure that a book written in more or less Victorian style would at least recoup its costs, but business people don't really like taking on anything that doesn't reek of 'runaway success' potential.


One contemporary SF writer who seems to be getting away with that kind of stuff is John C Wright, author of the Golden Transcendance trilogy.

 

[nemogbr]

The books written by Jack Vance I remember reading were:

Planet of Adventure and the Demon Princes. All book series

Knivesout was very astute in describing his protagonist as an outsider discovering his place in the world.

Planet of Adventure was the story of a Terran who finds a planet with a human/alien populace. All the humans were taken from Earth at least 30,000 years beforehand to one degree or another slaves of five different races.

Demon Princes concerned a man bent on revenge on five criminals so heinous they have become known as Demon Princes. The five books concerned his hunt and along the way partial rediscovery of his humanity. I wasn't sure whether he was on the verge of having psychopathic tendencies, but then revenge is alive and breathes.

 

[Jayaprakash Satyamurthy]

I've got The Face from the Demon Princes series in my stack of books to be read. Is it something that stands on its own or should I wait until I get the rest of the series?

 

[nemogbr]

I've got The Face from the Demon Princes series in my stack of books to be read. Is it something that stands on its own or should I wait until I get the rest of the series?

Definitely better in my opinion to get the rest as well....otherwise you jump right into the middle. I suppose there is enough explanation to follow the story line, but still more fun to have read the first...

 

[rune]

Just checking on some old discussions and found a listing for this authors books

http://www.fantasticfiction.co.uk/authors/Jack_Vance.htm

He's got a collection of short stories coming out in December

 

[GOLLUM]

Knivesout was very astute in describing his protagonist as an outsider discovering his place in the world.

Yep as usual JP has that uncanny habbit of hitting the nail well and truly on the head. This is indeed a hallmark of Vance's writing.

In the 4 major areas of language, plot, setting, and characterization Vance is a gun in at least three, with only the plots being somewhat linear in nature as JP has already alluded to, although this is not to say the stories are bad or uniteresting, far from it.

In addition to his brilliantly conceptualized potrayals of imagined societies and people his other key feature is his ability to infuse his dialogue with a very cutting style of humour or wit. If you enjoyed this latter style of humour JP you might like to investigate early 20th Century british author Ernest Bramah's Kai Lung tales about a storyteller in an imagined Ancient China who runs afoul of the local authorities in a series of misadventures that also employs a similarly ironic wit. Nothing particularly profound but an exercise in cutting humour.

Turnning back to Vance, he has been fairly prolific with something like 40 odd novels and almost 20 short stories, a number of which I am yet to read but by all reports, all of a good to high quality.

Personally his first book, The Dying Earth (1950) remains for me perhaps his finest work.

 

[Leto]

I've only read three of his books so far - Emphyrio, Night Lamp and Lyonesse: Suldrun's Garden, but his beautiful prose style and unique world-building already has me hooked.

And now, where are you in your Jack Vance journey ?

Note of Jack Vance beginners, The Many worlds of Magnus Ridolph is a good starting point.

 

[ravenus]

@JP:
Didn't you also read something called Tales of a Dying Earth? I remember the first story with some wizard and some good girl / evil girl twins which was not my cuppa.

 

[Jayaprakash Satyamurthy]

That's Vance, yes. The Dying Earth is a bit loose as a story, but the setting that it establishes was brilliant, I thought, and eventhe stories in that collection were brilliant in that they felt like half-forgotten legends brought back from the distant future, a bit like Clark Ashton SMith's Zothique tales.

 

[GOLLUM]

So JP, have you read Ernest Bramah's Kai Lung tales as per my previous post.....

Also good analogy there with Ashton Smith's Zothique tales...