Rational Dreaming

Well that’s the final nail in the coffin.  I remember discovering Card’s famous first novel, Ender’s Game, and being completely taken with it.  On the strength of that and his other early efforts, I read all five books of his Homecoming Saga, the first few books of The Tales of Alvin Maker, and the sequels to Ender’s Game.  I knew nothing of his religious or politics views, and since they didn’t seem to be influencing the quality or tone of his writing, I had no interest in finding out what they were.

But, as seems to happen with all too many authors, when they get a wee bit famous, they start injecting all kinds of personal views and prejudices into their stories.  I guess they feel that they have earned that right, and I suspect that editors tend to have less control over the content and tenor of their prized authors’ later novels.

I remember slogging my way through Terry Goodkind’s marathon Sword of Truth fantasy series a couple of years ago.  As with many such series, the first few books were entertaining and engaging, but then the pace of the action began to slow and I found myself skipping whole pages as the same plots and conversations were rehashed over and over again.  Then in book eight, Naked Empire, the hero of the story saves a bunch of pacifists from themselves, but not before he holds up the action and gives a chapter-long speech on the evils of pacifism.

Now, I’m not a pacifist.  If a nation is under attack from an aggressor, I believe they have the right to defend themselves.  But the last thing I need when reading a fantasy novel is a  twenty-odd page diatribe against pacifism just because the author has an axe to grind.  Nothing turns me off more.

Anyway, back to Orson Scott Card.  It was when reading the books in the Ender series when I noticed things starting to go downhill.  The sequel to Ender’s Game, Speaker for the Dead, was okay, but Xenocide began to get a little preachy, and I found Children of the Mind unbearable and couldn’t finish it.

That was around the time I discovered that Card was a Mormon (no big deal) and a social conservative (a slightly bigger deal), but since I had already been turned off by the failing quality of his work, I had no further interest in reading anything more of his anyway.

Then I read Ender’s Game again, as part of a reading group, and it turned out to be an interesting exercise.  This time I was fully aware of Card’s politics, and was surprised how much of his personal beliefs can be found in the novel now that I knew what to look for.  Knowing that Card was, and still is, an enthusiastic backer of Bush’s misadventure in Iraq certainly shed new light on the militaristic nature of Ender’s training, not forgetting that he is a very young child at the time.  Now there is no reason why an author should not create such a setting for their novel and it may not be any reflection of the author’s personal views or prejudices, but I have little doubt that in Orson Scott Card’s case, it is.

Of course, now that Card has fully allied himself with the religious wingnuts in their ridiculous effort to “defend marriage from the gays,” I have absolutely no inclination to contribute further to the coffers of Mr. Card by buying any more of his books.