Review: Babel 17

Title: Babel 17
Author: Samuel R. Delany

Rydra Wong is the best poet of the known universe, an intuitive genius with languages and a licensed starship captain. This makes her the perfect person to turn to when the Alliance is faced with an Invader plot which seems to be orchestrated using a new and undecipherable language dubbed Babel 17. Captain Wong gathers a crew, including a huge pilot, several discorporate officers, and a married trio of navigators and heads out to solve the mystery, putting herself and her crew in harms way at every step.

A while back, I reviewed Nova, by Samuel R. Delany, and I mentioned that one reason I read it was because of my love for Babel 17. Yet, with age, I had forgotten most of the book, and wanted to read it again.

All of the things which had intrigued me as a teenager were still there: the body modifications which Delaney extrapolated from the tatoos and earrings of the 1950s & 1960s presaged the kind of work we see people put into themselves these days, yet surpass it as well; the idea that a sufficiently complicated language could be a code to the uninformed; the potential for consciousness to live on after death but continue to interact with the living in a societal way -- these stuck with me over the decades and were still fresh and intriguing.

Fortunately (I guess?) I had forgotten most of the plot, so re-reading gave me the opportunity to ride along with Rydra Wong and uncover the mystery again. Also, at my somewhat more experienced age, I was better able to appreciate the short works of poetry, and the complex relationships between some of the characters.

In a strange serendipity, I decided to re-read this book exactly when I was listening to a Great Course on Language, and since Rydra Wong is a master linguist, but Samuel R. Delaney had a 1950's author's knowledge of linguistics, my reading of Babel 17 was supplemented by my newly gained appreciation for language. The fact that Delaney chose to include a theory of linguistics which has been largely discredited in the years since merely points out how well-versed he was in the science of his time, and how science advances as the years go by.

In any case, Babel 17 won a Nebula Award, and I think deserved to. This novel is not as approachable to the non-sci-fi reader as, say, the Jack McDevitt books I've reviewed, but it is a tight story, with imagination galore, a strong female hero, and speculation about the future of humanity that brings up very interesting questions. What more do you want from science fiction?