The Blue World (1966)

Big fat King Kragen
chubby terror of the sea
fear his mighty girth! ( )

This is one of my very favorite novels by one of my favorite authors.

I am not quite sure why I like this novel so much, out of all Vance's works. To be frank, The Blue World does not have the finesse or the poignancy of many of his more complex works. However, there is a sly humor found throughout the novel that I find particularly funny. Also, this world is fascinating in many ways. Firstly, the environment itself is intriguing, with the watery world survivable only because of the vast, habitable lilypad-esque plants, and the maniacally intelligent homicidal sea monster. Secondly, the society is a perfect rendition of a small community, with the oblivious old guard versus the younger irreverent citizens. Thirdly, this novel has a sense of concentrated urgency because of its short length, the intense life-and-death struggle, and the closed environment.

Sklar Hast is the prototypical Jack Vance hero. Change his name and he is Shimrod, or Adam Reith, or Kirth Gersen. However, he is tailor-made for what he must accomplish, namely mortifying the men who hold power, defeating the dreaded Kragen, and leading all the worthwhile people in his society to a new paradise.

If you love Jack Vance but have somehow missed this one, you will really enjoy this short novel. If you've never read any Vance, this is a good place to begin. With a scaled-down vocabulary compared to much of his other work, it will allow you to ease yourself into a Vancian state of mind. ( )

CVIE edition

The Blue World is an longer version of Vance's novella "The Kragen". They're very similar, though the novel tells the story with a little more finesse. Essentially, Sklar Hast, one among the descendants of a crashed human ship, becomes dissatisfied and runs into trouble with the authorities. So far, standard Vance.

Sklar, however, is one of the most appealing and sympathetic of Vance's characters. Not only that, but his love interest, Meril Rohan, is unusually independent. The story itself covers how Sklar and others deal with King Kragen - a giant among the native sea life. King Kragen is clearly intelligent, and it's disappointing that Vance spends virtually no time exploring that aspect of the world - not even the history of how humans and kragen first communicated.

The story is in many ways not one of Vance's best, but it is among the most optimistic. Good things consistently happen to good people, and that's unusual in itself in a Vance story.

As always, there's great fun with language. In this case, for example, society is stratified by caste, including Hoodwinks (who, naturally, wink hoods), Advertisermen, and Swindlers.

Worth a read by anyone, and not a bad place to start with Vance. Non-serious fans won't need to read both this and the novella. ( )

http://speculiction.blogspot.com/2012/05/review-of-blue-world-by-jack-vance.html ( )