Babel-17

TL;DR – Five stars for ideas, but fewer because of writing that doesn't gel for me.

I want to love Delany's writing–I think he's an amazing person with wonderful ideas, and anybody who has written a banned book (Hogg, which I think I'll read next) and also semi-mainstream books must have a lot to offer. After being stymied by Dhalgren, I thought I'd take on an early novella. Babel-17 has fascinating elements (fast-food-style plastic surgery, sci-fi ghosts), an interesting protagonist(female! in 1966! a poet warrior), philosophy of language in action–all things that would make this a great read for me.

And yet, this feels clunky for me. Delany is often cited as being a “literary sci-fi writer”–perhaps THE literary sci-fi writer–but most of the plot feels ad hoc to me, and the exploration of the power of language on thinking feels heavy-handed. Lots of interesting science fiction elements are crammed into too few pages (this is the way I feel about many of Philip K Dick's books)–an embarrassment of riches, perhaps, but still makes it not as readable for me.

I'm going to keep trying, though, because I do get the sense that I may just not be understanding him enough, just don't ‘get' his writing on some level.