Tales of the Dying Earth | Jack Vance | A Classic and Defining Work of Fantasy

Tales of the Dying Earth | Jack Vance | Vance struck gold

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Tales of the Dying...

	Tales of the Dying Earth Jack Vance Orb Books, 2000 - 752 pages average customer review:based on 45 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

Jack Vance is one of the most remarkable talents to ever grace the world of science fiction. His unique, stylish voice has been beloved by generations of readers. One of his enduring classics is his 1964 novel, The Dying Earth, and its sequels--a fascinating, baroque tale set on a far-future Earth, under a giant red sun that is soon to go out forever.

This omnibus volume comprised all four books in the series, The Dying Earth, The Eyes of the Overworld, Cugel's Saga and Rialto the Magnificent. It is a must-read for every sf fan.

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A Classic and Defining Work of Fantasy

Jack Vance's Dying Earth series is set in the distant, remote future when technology and magic have become entwined. His stories are tales of humour, tragedy and whimsy set at the end of human history, and are among the most distinctive tales in fantasy fiction.

Tales of the Dying Earth collects all four of the principal Dying Earth books: The Dying Earth (1950), The Eyes of the Overworld (1964), Cugel's Saga (1983) and Rhialto the Marvellous (1984). Written over a period of thirty-four years, these books (themselves collections of short stories or episodes) are nevertheless fairly cohesive in style and readability. That said, The Dying Earth is somewhat more serious than the latter three books, and the central two novels are sometimes considered to form a duology, as they relate the misadventures of a scoundrel and thief named Cugel the Clever, whilst the other two books feature different characters and situations.

The Dying Earth itself is a collection of six short stories, but these are connected by an interesting writing device. Each story focuses on a central character who meets the central figure of the subsequent story in his own adventure, so the narrative is passed almost like a baton to the next character. So the book opens with Turjan, a wizard of some power, encountering the artificial construct T'sais. In the next story he is imprisoned by the wizard Mazirian, who is defeated in turn by T'sain, T'sais' brother. Then the narrative switches to T'sais' adventures. And so on. It's an interesting device for a short story collection and the stories are bound closely together because of it. However, The Dying Earth's success is in its atmospheric depiction of a far-future, dying world under a shrunken red sun. The stories themselves are interesting, but not as compelling as the later books.

The Eyes of the Overworld introduces Cugel the Clever, a rogue and scoundrel always on the look-out for a profit. He is manipulated by a dubious rival, Fianosther, into attempting to rob the manse of Iucounu the Laughing Magician, who discovers this attempt and is not impressed. He offers Cugel a choice between being entombed 45 miles below the Earth's surface, or journeying to remote lands to seek a mystical 'eye of the overworld'. Cugel is thus exiled to the far ends of the world to seek the artifact and has to return home, having numerous adventures along the way. It's Cugel's constant misfortune, at times reaching ridiculous and farcical levels, that makes this part of the story both hilarious and breathlessly enjoyable. By this volume Vance's skills as a writer have grown tremendously and his command of the English language is a joy to behold, with its flowery, polite terminology used to disguise feelings of hatred and jealousy like a particularly demented take on medieval court language. At length, Cugel apparently succeeds in his mission and gains the upper hand...until misfortune once again befalls him and he is left on a cliffhanger.

Nineteen years later (a break in a series that would be unthinkable today), Vance resumed the story in Cugel's Saga. Once again banished to the ends of the Earth, Cugel once again sets out for home, but this time travels by a different route. Essentially a second picaresque travelogue, the story is similar in structure to the preceding volume but is possibly even better, with more polished writing and Cugel's ambiguous appeal remaining intact. If anything, this book is even more hilarious than the second, although some may feel the relatively happy ending is not entirely in keeping with Cugel's typical fortunes.

The final book, Rhialto the Marvellous, is also sadly the weakest. It is much more overtly fantastical than the first three, incorporating voyages through space, but the focus on less interesting protagonists than Cugel means it feels like an afterthought. That's not to say the stories here are unenjoyable, merely that they are of a different nature than Cugel's and less distinctive because of it.

Jack Vance is one of SF&F's most distinctive authors, with a formidable grasp of language and a keen wit making him one of the genre's most interesting writers. The Dying Earth stories are rightly regarded as genre classics, inspiring works such as Gene Wolfe's astonishing Book of the New Sun and being cited as a major influence on numerous writers. The Dying Earth and Rhialto the Marvellous have aged somewhat, but the central Cugel stories are as fresh, comical and as fun to read now as they were when they were first published.

Tales of the Dying Earth (*****) is published in the UK by Gollancz as part of their Fantasy Masterworks range and by Orb Books in the USA. A new Dying Earth book, Songs of the Dying Earth, containing short stories by writers such as Tad Williams, Robert Silverberg and Neil Gaiman, edited by Gardner Dozois and George RR Martin, and authorised by Jack Vance, will be published early next year by Subterranean Press and HarperCollins Voyager.

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Vance struck gold

Upon reading this title I thought it was a complete ripoff of Gene Wolfe's The Sword and the Claw series, which is one of the best Fanstasy/sci fi literary achievements ever in this genre.

Cugel indeed is an unlikely character. He is the textbook definition of a book. Add to that he exhibits utter stupidity at times and resorts to theivery and con man games.

But that is just what makes this book so ver very compelling. You never can quess what will happen to cudgel, and lets face it, he is an outright funny character. I believe the language of the book does much to mask its' humor, but you will catch on and pay far more careful attention.

Cugel is my no means a hero, but his is a driven survivor, and at times very clever. It is sort of refreshing to read about a character that isn't typecast in one paragraph. This is one of the best books of its kind, and I highly recommend reading it. I couldn't drop it after I started. There are few books that I take such an interest in reading and this one captivated me from start to end. The series deserves a special place in any fantasy/sci fi readers library. and it should be prominently displayed.

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From a weak beginning to supreme mastery

The first piece of this book is early Vance from 1950. The legendary Dying Earth. In reality, it's clearly the weakest of the lot, and it would be good for Vance's reputation if more people began to see beyond their nostalgia and acknowledge the fact. All real artists develop, and Vance is a real one and a big one. Only easy things come to even talented people early in their life, and, sadly for new writers, the modern publishing world isn't the place to grow. Marketing people of course try to hide this harsh reality. Fortunately for all true readers, Vance grew up in a different world. He would only have been exploited in today's.

The next piece from 1966 is better, and shows Vance as a work in solid progress. However, it's not until the stuff from the late 70s and early 80s that this collection shows Vance at his peak.

You hear many people these days saying that Vance's main worth is to be found in his influence on subsequent writers. This is absurd, and betrays a certain lack of sensitivity to what Vance is trying to do in his fiction. More people need to start reading him more carefully, especially his dialogues. They are often odd because they are often meant to be odd, as well as amusing in some way, often in a wry sort of way. Once you begin to appreciate Vance's style, you'll never be able to rank him below any writer. Vance is the favorite writer of people like G.R.R. Martin for a reason. And please, don't think that this is the only Vance you'll need to read. His ouvre is rich and varied, and the worst mistake you can make is to avoid the rest of it in the belief that he is a one trick pony. All of Vance's work from the 70s and later should be read and read again by every lover of good fiction.

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Humor in fantasy

There's a wonderful strain of humor in the early American fantasy writers of which I was unaware. After reading authors like Vance, de Camp, and Pratt, the existential gravitas of the Morris-Eddison-Tolkien axis seems rather tedious. Life is too short for gravity; the highest art must be to combine great fantasy with great comedy!

I first discovered Jack Vance when I happened to read "The Last Castle" in an anthology of Hugo Award-winning stories. I was immediately blown away by his mastery of a high, lovley prose style reminiscent of the greats like Lord Dunsany and Eddison. Only years later did I find this series, the Vance mother-load.

Tales of the Dying Earth is a compilation of Jack Vance's four, famous "Dying Earth" novels. In spite of giving the compilation five stars, I really only like the first two books, with the exception of "Morreion" from "Rhialto the Marvelous", for reasons I'll discuss. The first two books were published as serials in sci-fi pulp magazines relatively early in Vance's career. Therefore, they have the sort of splotchy, episodic style typical of that genre, so this must be forgiven.

"Dying Earth" is a series of loosely connected short stories set in the extreme future when the sun is supposedly burning out. This idea comes from Clark Ashton Smith's "Zothique" stories, and ultimately from the "Time Machine" of H.G. Wells. In the future, as human populations dwindle, magic will again rise to replace technology, as magic was the predominant force in the mythic early days of prehistory. (I feel it necessary to point out that current stellar evolution theories say that the sun will pass through a red giant phase, consuming the earth and near planets. So apparently the world will end in fire after all.)

The second book "Eyes of the Overworld" is a sort of mock Odyssey set in the "Dying Earth" world, but not directly connected with the original stories. The main character Cugel is a super-rogue who goes from caper to caper and engages in all manner of depravity. I hope Cugel's antics are aimed at comedy and not at moral edification, but on second thought, I wonder just how different from Cugel most men really are, at least at the psychological root level.

I would recommend reading "Eyes of the Overworld" first in order to get a sense of the series. "Dying Earth" is good, but the stories are somewhat uneven in quality(Mazirian the Magician is a standout). The reader who has been "hooked" by Eyes will probably enjoy the early stories more. The final two books (except for Morreion) were written much later in Vance's career, in fact shortly before his death. While the prose expression remains strong, the later books lack the mad-cap imagination of the youthful Vance that I find so intoxicating. The humor in Cugel's Saga flows from situations, more akin to that of PG Wodehouse, than from the fantasy itself, as in Eyes. Also, these later works are unoriginal and simply retool ideas from the stories written in Vance's prime. However, there are occasional glimpses of that old Vancian black magic for the die-hard readers. . .

At his best, Vance has a picaresque, inventive imagination full of colorful details and artful asides. For example, in one story among the wares of a powerful wizard is a "pickled homonculus". There are various, original recurring monsters in the series, such as the deodand and the leukomorph. In one later story Vance describes how these creatures had their genesis in the menagerie of an insane wizard! Full of artful things like that. Overall the series has a vivid, Flash Gordony flavor.

I think "Eyes of the Overworld" would make a great movie if a screen-writer tightened it up a little bit. The excellent pilot of the failed series "Korgoth of Barbaria" was loosely based on it.

As a word on the edition, this compilation is terrible. I don't think there was any editing at all, what with all the typos. There's no scholarly introduction. And the cover art is not only bad, but doesn't pertain to the book in any way. We should only thank the publisher for keeping this series in print and making them available in one volume.

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