A most peculiar take on Ender's Game

[Jayaprakash Satyamurthy]

The Internet Review of Science Fiction (www.irosf.com) is shaping up to be an interesting critical journal. However, some articles puzzle me. Specifically, the latest issue contains an article by one Dotar Sojat called 'The Fuzzy Courage at the Heart of A Geek' which essentially dismisses Douglas Adams at large and Card's Ender's Game and goes on to celebrate the author's love for the much-reviled Ewoks. All I can say about that is, it takes all kinds and I suppose inverse snobbery is as acceptable as the other variety, in the larger scheme of things. I can also understand not relating to Adams' humour - humour is a notoriously subjective thing, after all. But her/his take on Ender's Game just baffled me. To put it bluntly, I think Dotar Sojat is pretty much cracked on this matter. Anyway, I know a fair number of people here have read this landmark work, and have a range of views of it. Try this on, see if it fits:

I wasn't so impressed with Ender's Game, either. Forgive. It just didn't do it for me. Borderline pedophilia, incest, and child abuse do not a great book make. While Mr. Card may have predicted the rise of the internet, the irony is that instead of 14-year-olds using the anonymity of the internet to pass as adults, reality is usually the opposite. While The Game was fun and took up a lot of pages, it didn't have much to do with the combat they were eventually in. Poor way to train people. At least it was better than William Gibson.
...that last part wasn't a confession, just a statement...

 

[Brian G Turner]

Sometimes people try to make a name for themselves by being notoriously bitchy. The fact that he's got his name here shows that it's already working to some degree.

However, I'm not convinced that there's going to be an audience for such criticisms with sff itself - you have to be a little more cerebral when it comes to popular criticism, rather than if criticising soap operas or gameshows.

I made no secret of the fact that I was pretty critical of various elements of Enders Game - but I certainly did not dismiss the work.

 

[dwndrgn]

Well, I haven't read the book (or series, isn't it?) so I can't comment on the critic's view of it. However, I have noticed that quite a few critics like to be overly critical and not helpful to the reader - speaking as someone who hasn't read the book. For example, he doesn't discuss whether the bits he found distasteful were major parts of the plot or secondary color pieces. He doesn't even say what kind of story it is and whether or not he enjoyed any parts of it. As a matter of fact he's very vague on why he doesn't like it. Of course, this isn't meant to be a review of the book(s) but just a personal confession of likes and dislikes.

In any case, if I had discovered this on my own, I wouldn't have read on after I heard what he said about Douglas Adams. Sorry. Forgive. I refuse to like anyone that doesn't like Douglas Adams .

 

[littlemissattitude]

I could have sworn I had replied to this thread. Ah, well. We gets forgetful in our old age, we does.

I don't know what alternate-universe version of "Ender's Game" the person who wrote that...can't even really call it a review, it's so vitriolic...read, but it's so off-base that all I can think of is that he (as I assume) is trying to make a name for himself by making outrageous claims about Card's writing. Pedophilia? I mean, really. That's just silly. And incest? There wasn't any incest in the "Ender's Game" I read. I can see where someone might make a case that some of the things the Battle School cadets were made to do, and especially the hell Ender was made to go through, might be considered abusive, but as I read it, one of Card's points was the extent to which adult society will abuse children if they think they can justify it as in defense of the society at large.

Anyway...I just wonder what Card's reaction to this was, if he is aware of it. I understand he kind of went ballistic when some woman reviewer compared Ender to Hitler in print awhile back. Can't say I blame him, either.

 

[Amber]

Huh. Pedophilia? I assume the reviewer is referring to Mazer Rackham. There was nothing in Ender's Game which I wouldn't give to my 11 year old sister to read. Unfortunately she hates fantasy and sci-fi so she wouldn't read it anyway lol. Incest is ridiculous. There was simply a deep friendship.

Sometimes people try to make a name for themselves by being notoriously bitchy. The fact that he's got his name here shows that it's already working to some degree.

You're totally right my clever friend

 

[Jay]

Interesting, thansk for bringing it up Knivesout.

I also read IROSF, and although I enjoy reading most critical sites/opinions, generally the ones I read have some sort of validity behind tehre opinion and at least show us the reasoning. I love reading John Clute's reviews, Jeff VanderMeer's reviews, Micahel Moorcok's review's, also Matt Cheney's reviews as they IMHO tend to be fair, and articualte there issue with books if i nfact they makea negative comment. The IROSF, which must be well funded, or liked by someone with some amount of influence a lot as they are mentioend quite a bit, always struck me as the opposite. As Brian is saying trying to stir up something just for the exposure. That said this has little to do with Orson Scott Card's work, as the IROSF is hardly teh first critical group to denoucne Card as a legitimate SF writer. I personally enjoy Card, but I have seen the arguments and admitteldy there is some validity to a lot of them, however IRSOF ignores those arguments that have some basis and instead wites somethign ridiculous as this "Borderline pedophilia, incest, and child abuse do not a great book make." I take it GRR Martin doesn't write good backs as well then? Nor do many of the post modern writers who IRSOF supposedly caters too. No there reasoning is riduculous and contrived just for exposure.

First of all it, was a pay site at first, and then all the sudden I joined when they had a free period (don't know ofi that is still the case of not), thus far I have seen nothing over there I would pay to read either now or in the future. it's an interesting idea, and they have potential (speaking from a pure fan perspective, I am no industry professional nor do I profess to be)

I sometimes IRSOF admittedly (They send you an email when a new issue is available if your a member), and I like critical sites, but this isn't among my favorite ones. They just seem to try to hard, in a genre tht your really don't ahve to try hard in to find aspects to be critical of.

 

[littlemissattitude]

That said this has little to do with Orson Scott Card's work, as the IROSF is hardly teh first critical group to denoucne Card as a legitimate SF writer. I personally enjoy Card, but I have seen the arguments and admitteldy there is some validity to a lot of them,...

I wasn't aware that there is some institution or organization that decides which writers are "legitimate" science fiction (or fantasy, for that matter) writers and and which aren't. I was always under the impression that if a person writes science fiction he or she is, for that partiular piece at least, a science fiction writer. To call someone a "legitimate" writer in any genre and then to say that someone else is not smacks of over-intellectualization. Writers write what they write. Kafka wrote "The Metamorphisis", which could probably be called horror or fantasy, and while I don't think anyone would classify him primarily as a writer of horror fiction or of fantasy, certainly he was a horror (or fantasy, depending on how one looks at it) writer when he wrote that piece.

This whole concept also brings up the question of definitions. In my opinion (and I recognize that is all that it is), to say that some writers are legitimate science fiction writers and other writers are not by extension supposes that there is some hard and fast definition of what science fiction is and what it is not. While there are certainly stories that fall within a definition of science fiction and others that definitely fall outside anything that could be called that, formalized and restrictive definitions are not productive especially in a genre where so many different approaches can be taken. Jules Verne was a science fiction writer. So was Robert A. Heinlein. So is William Gibson. But I would hardly say that their subject matter or their approaches are anywhere close to similar.

 

[Jay]

LOL, speaking of over-intellectualization, Card on Star Trek in his [url=http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-card3may03,0,6007802.story[/url]]LA Times article .

 

[cyborg_cinema]

...inverse snobbery...

"Borderline pedophilia, incest, and child abuse..."

...the story is not politically correct—based on today's standards—but I'm halfway through Ender's Game, and have not seen any of that. Basically, kids are bullying other kids in military school—might as well be public school. If kids abusing kids is "borderline child abuse", then any kid who has picked on another kid is a "borderline child abuser". Dotar Sojat sounds like a borderline alarmist.

Ender's Game is the story of the rise of a great military leader. I think it's simplicity makes it appealing to many age groups—including young intellectuals who have been pummelled by school bullies.

 

[Elenilsa]

I just finished teaching Ender's Game to my ninth grade accelerated English class, and most of them enjoyed it. None of them complained about anything like "pedophilia, incest, and child abuse."

The only complaint a few of them had was the profanity, but this is Mississippi, smack dab in the middle of the Bible belt, and folks are ultra-conservative.

Even so, it was a very good experience for the class.......they grappled with issues some of them had never thought of before. I look forward to next year's go at the book.

 

[Jeremy]

I have read often that Card is one of the greatest science fiction writer of our age, and I confess that I sometimes wonder where his greatness lies. I read only three of his books: Ender's Game, Ender's Shadow, and The Seventh Son. I tried to read others but could not finish them. I believe most of Card's great reputation was built on Ender's Game. Although it is an engaging and entertaining read, it does not strike me as a novel that deserves being called great. To begin with, Card has very little grasp of child behavior and psychology. Children, even the extremely smart ones, simply do not behave the way that Card describes. I'm sure younsters reading this book must be more than willing and gratified to identify themselves with the child heroes who speak and act like the most intelligent of adults and become the saviors of earth, and this may explain the book's popularity with kids, much the same way that Harry Potter and Eragon are so popular. Card's expositions on human nature and politics are mostly wrong. I agree with the article that the simulated battle games that took up so much of the novel have almost nothing to do with the final battle with the aliens near the end. It seems that Card was so taken with the idea of the battle room that he lost sight of the real purpose of the military training. The kids should have learned to pilot or command spaceships and not doing hand to hand combats. And I was more than a little disturbed to read Bean quoting the Bible in Ender's Shadow. What is religion doing in "science" fiction? I love The Seventh Son, which is saturated with Christianity and Mormonism, but I think Card should have been more subtle in propagating his own religious beliefs in his "science fiction" works.

Jeremy

 

[littlemissattitude]

Umm...last things first. Jeremy, you ask:

What is religion doing in "science" fiction?

Science fiction regularly grapples with questions of religion/spirituality. See, for example, Robert Heinlein's Stranger in a Strange Land, Ray Bradbury's short story The Man, Arthur C. Clarke's The Nine Billion Names of God, to mention only three works from the masters, among many works and writers whose work does so.

You also say that:

I agree with the article that the simulated battle games that took up so much of the novel have almost nothing to do with the final battle with the aliens near the end.

Really? Well, you certainly have a right to your opinion. Still, it seems to me that the strategy and tactics learned in battle school had everything to do with the strategy and tactics used in the final battle.

Card's expositions on human nature and politics are mostly wrong.

Again, you are entitled to your opinion. And that is exactly what this is. I don't agree with a lot of Card's politics, either, not to mention some of the social positions he takes as a consequence of his religious belief, but that doesn't mean that I'm absolutely, incontrovertably right and he is absolutely wrong, either.

To begin with, Card has very little grasp of child behavior and psychology. Children, even the extremely smart ones, simply do not behave the way that Card describes.

First of all, it would be well to remember that Ender's Game is fiction. The characters within it are not required to act exactly as real people in the time we know behave. But having said that, I wonder exactly how many gifted - I mean, really gifted - children you have been around. At the risk of sounding arrogant, I was one of those children, or at least my school district at the time felt I was when they put me into a special MGM (mentally gifted minors) program at around the age many of the children in Ender's Game seem to be. I certainly recognized many of the general behaviors Card gives the Battle School students as slightly (and sometimes only slightly) exaggerated behaviors I saw as a participant in my program. I have also seen similar behaviors since then in interactions with honors students in other contexts. A lot of them are miniature adults, in behavior if not in psychology. That may or may not be exactly healthy for them, but that's the way it is. Goodness knows that I was much too adult as a child, something I've been trying to remedy as an adult. On another note, I suspect that Card was, himself, one of those "extremely smart" children, based on other things he's written and on some comments he made during a science fiction con I attended at which he was guest of honor.

Anyway, I really haven't heard too many people call Card "the greatest science fiction writer of our age." He is very good, I think, although I personally try to stay away from the more overtly religious of his fiction. That's my choice because I have had a not very satisfactory experience with his religion, though, not a critique of his writing in those books. I would recommend some of his stand-alones, not all of which are science fiction. In the science fiction genre, I would especially recommend Pastwatch as a fascinating exploration of the consequences of time travel.

 

[Narainatar]

That guy is totally obnoxious (the guy who wrote the artical) and he blows thing completely out of porportion, there is no incest in the story Ender just loved his older sister because she was the only person (it seemed) who cared about him, there was no pedophilia in the story either the colonel just said he cared about Ender in the fact that he didn't want to destroy Ender, just make him better. Yes there was child abuse but that was just an element of the story that made it more militaristic, it was military school after all, they don't baby you that's not their job. And the whole thing about adults pretending to be 14 is stupid, just because he does it with his childish comments doesn't mean everyone else does, in fact all the kids in my freshman class admit to pretending to be older than they are to gain rep on the internet. And his dismission of the Game had no precedence at all, it in fact allowed him to gain a reputation for leading as well as meet the few people in the school that matched him mentally and had the endurance to stay up through the invasion of the bugger homeworld minus Petra and Ender himself who were just worked to much.

All in all this guy is just an overly critical ass who tries to make himself seem smart by doggin' on Card. I wouldn't give what he had too much thought seeing as how as soon as this thread is done with noone will talk about him again.

Littlemissattitude don't forgot the Wotrthing saga by Card himself which deals with a great deal of religion.

 

[alicebandassassin]

My mother always taught me if you do not have somthing positive or construtive to say always best to keep your thoughts to yourself and mothers are always right.

 

[purple_kathryn]

I really enjoyed Enders Game, I really don't know how the critic saw paedophilia or incest in the story.

I also read Homecoming series (which I got cheap) and although I can't recall exactly why I remember feeling a little put off by the religious overtones

 

[-Demosthenes-]

I also read Homecoming series (which I got cheap) and although I can't recall exactly why I remember feeling a little put off by the religious overtones

It was an allegory of the Book of Mormon.

Homecomming Saga

 

[Protossguy]

all i can say to that guy is
"lawl cry more noob l2p"

 

[Bel-Riose]

After enders game the next of orson scott card books i read was the enders shadow series. I actually thought OSC might be a bit anti-religious in those ones! Bean does quote the bible but he doesn't believe in it, he makes some very good arguments againest it! So, I was really surprised when i found out that OSC is a practising mormon!
But in the speaker for the dead series, ender does seem to have found religion! Haven't read the homecoming yet though..

 

[stellspalfie]

Hi,

I dont like to bad mouth books in general, but Enders Game has to be one of the most overated books I have ever read, it reads and feels like a cheap 80's sci-fi movie or at best a BBC childrens TV programme (Biker Grove in space) I would pass it on to others to read, but only if they are teenagers and they can use it as launch pad for better books. Does anybody remember that film where the kid goes into space to fight because he's good at an arcade game (last starfighter, i think). That was a bad movie, Enders is a bad, bad, bad book, nothing originall. On the other hand a child probably could handle Iraq better than Bush and Blair. Lets make a PC game sees who wins and get them to sort it out!

Cheers Stell.