Authors: Brian W. Aldiss
HARM (20 page)
DR:
In many novels with this kind of dual structure, the fantastic world functions as a utopian escape from a less-pleasant reality. But in
HARM
, that is not the case; in fact, the fantastic world recapitulates the “real” world in disturbing ways, not the least of which is the extermination of the indigenous intelligent species of Stygia. I was wondering how much your wartime experiences in Burma contributed to your devastating portrait of a “new” civilization arising on Stygia from the fragments of the old?
BA:
Burma illustrates my previous point. On leaving Burma, the British erected a memorial with an epigram carved into the stone. It read:
When you go home, think of us and say
For your tomorrow we gave our today.
I like the sentiments, but who are these “yous” for which we gave our today? The country once known as the Rice Bowl of Asia now lives on handouts, while the lives of ordinary people are prison sentences. As you seem to know, or to guess, Burma somehow always remains in mind, whatever else gets forgotten.
DR:
Following is a quote from the last interview I had the pleasure of conducting with you, back in 2000, in connection with
White Mars
:
Perhaps the further evolution of humankind does require some sort of collaboration; at present almost a quarter of humanity is disenfranchised, starved, exploited. Could we not do better? Why does pity not move us? These are questions worth asking. I have no great faith in utopias ever being established, but questions must be posed now and again. Could we not do better? Is not the West at present in a position to do better?
How do these words resonate for you today?
White Mars—
which, like
HARM
, features an attempt to build a utopia on another world—seems a much more hopeful book than this one. Have you become more pessimistic about humanity’s future?
BA:
I have become less optimistic about today. Many people have taken refuge in Britain from dirty, dusty villages in the Middle East. They neither know nor understand the West. Consequently, many would destroy it. They have never heard of that ancient piece of sound advice: “When in Rome, do as the Romans do.”
DR:
I know you’ve been hard at work on a new novel,
Walcot
. What can you tell us about that?
BA:
Walcot
is the story of a family living throughout the twentieth century. Great world events mingle with small family affairs. It is a narrative very hard to get “right.” It took me three long years to compose. I wrote draft after draft, sometimes laughing, often driven to tears. So far, it has brought me not a penny—nor was there a financial reason for writing it. I just wanted to say things that had eluded speech. Of course, it is an English family. What else do I know? You don’t happen to know an Anglophile American publisher who might be interested, do you?
DR:
I wish I did! It’s incomprehensible to me that a writer of your proven gifts and stature could have difficulty placing a novel. Does this discourage you? Do you ever think about retiring? You seem more productive in your eighties than most writers half your age!
BA:
No, I do not plan to retire. I enjoy the thought-adventure of writing. On the whole, I find that being eighty is more pleasant than being adolescent. I was encouraged by the award of an O.B.E., which made me think that someone must have been listening. True, a few aches and pains accumulate, but you can edit those out, on the whole. Every day, when awakening, you think what a surprise and joy it is still to be here, some wits remaining, and—with luck—still being published.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
B
RIAN
W. A
LDISS
served in the Royal Signal Corps between 1943 and 1947, then worked as a bookseller and as the literary editor of the
Oxford Mail
before turning to writing full-time. He is the author of the autobiography
Bury My Heart at W. H. Smith’s,
and his many prize-winning novels include
Hothouse,
which won the Hugo Award,
The Saliva Tree,
which received the Nebula Award, and
Helliconia Spring
and its sequels. Several of his books and stories, including
Frankenstein Unbound
and
Brothers of the Head,
have been adapted for the screen. His story “Supertoys Last All Summer Long” was adapted into
Artificial Intelligence,
a film initially conceived by Stanley Kubrick and ultimately directed by Steven Spielberg.
HARM
is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2007 by Brian W. Aldiss
“A Conversation with Brian W. Aldiss” copyright © 2007 by Random House, Inc.
All rights reserved.
Published in the United States by Del Rey Books, an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.
D
EL
R
EY
is a registered trademark and the Del Rey colophon is a trademark of Random House, Inc.
eISBN: 978-0-345-50037-3
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