Babel, or The Necessity of Violence

Professor Lovell plucks orphan Robin Swift from China and brings the boy to England where the professor has Robin tutored in Ancient Greek, Latin, and Chinese in preparation for admission to the Royal Institute of Translation—Babel—at Oxford. It is when Robin is admitted to Oxford that he meets and befriends his fellow year of students, and it is then that he begins training in what is to be his life's occupation: silver-working, the magical art of manifesting meaning held deep within translated words into enchanted silver bars. And it is then that Robin learns of the wider and destructive results of silver-working around the world and of the Hermes Society, the organization that has risen up in opposition to imperial expansion.

Some books are so beautifully written, with such rich characters and intricate settings and widespread truth and meaning, that the books feel as if they are magic; Babel is one of these.

Reading Babel was a rich reading experience.