#The Inhabited Island

[aldo-n-canp]

The Inhabited Island

[halucygeno]

The Strugatsky brothers: general notes on style and storytelling

Heya. If you want something to disagree with right out of the gate, here’s my tier list:

Ok, but seriously, I'm about halfway through the whole Strugatsky bros bibliography, and it's been kinda hit-or-miss. Some books are fantastic in terms of both storytelling and themes, some are a bit confusing and start very slow, but stick the landing with the drama and philosophy kicking into high-gear towards the end, and others are just... meh.

Anyway, here’s a loose, disorganised list of things I’ve noticed:

1) The Strugatsky's style of narration feels a tad homogenous after a while. Their POV character is usually a pragmatic, goal oriented man, intelligent enough to analyse themselves and the world around them, and often cynical to the point of distrusting simple, comforting narratives (voicing their scepticism through dry wit or sarcasm). The main variation seems to be in the protagonist's level of refinement vs. crudeness (some of them have a short fuse and poor manners), and how much they are motivated by a sense of duty vs. self-interest. The other character archetype they sometimes do is the "inexperienced young man with ambition and spunk" ("Space Apprentice", "Monday Begins on Saturday"). Yet there's some crossover - Sasha from "Monday" often shifts between bewildered novice and confident snarker, depending on the scene - and it all still "sounds" quite similar. I guess you could say this is their authorial voice - the "Strugatsky style", if you will - but to me, it makes reading their books back-to-back feel a bit... same-y.

2) Mystery is everywhere. Im surprised the Strugatskys only wrote one detective novel (which kind of turned out not to be a detective novel anyway), when tons of their works start with some inexplicable, mysterious event which then goes on to be gradually unravelled. I mean, half of "The Waves Extinguish the Wind" is just reports from an investigation into the motives of a mysterious alien species. "Beetle in the Anthill" is one long hunt for a mysterious fugitive, gradually finding out who they are and why they're so dangerous, and "The Final Circle of Paradise" is about busting a crime ring peddling a new, mysterious drug. But even when it’s not explicitly about detectives or investigations, they still often focus on an unexplained event or series of events ("Space Mowgli", "One Million Years to the End of the World").

A lot of the appeal which keeps the stories engaging for me is that they either set up a big question and slowly reveal pieces of the answer, or set up a lot of small questions that get much quicker answers, which then lead to more questions (sometimes both). In one case, they even nested a mystery within a mystery! “Beetle in the Anthill” is both a question of “where is Lev Aboukin hiding and what is his next move” and “who is Lev Aboukin and why was I ordered to track him down”?

Maybe this mystery focus is just part of the wider space fantasy sci-fi genre. Alien contact, phenomena beyond our understanding... these are very conducive to mystery; A few other sci-fi authors I've read have very similar set-ups. Well, whatever it is - authorial style or genre trope - I love it. It gives stories this feeling of discovery and learning, often with only half-satisfying conclusions that leave room for interpretation and reflection.

3) Holy shit, their representation of women is (mostly) terrible. I've heard a few people call the Strugatskys' writing misogynistic, and while I was sceptical at first (Guta from "Roadside Picnic" struck me as pretty cool and strong), after reading more, I definitely see it now. Most of the time, they depict women as trivial side characters, love interests for the protagonist, or worse, symbols of promiscuity, decadence and stupidity. I could maybe argue that some of these portrayals are more nuanced than it would first seem, but others are just... blegh.

A handful of their works ("Space Mowgli", "Monday Beings on Saturday" and "Space Apprentice") show women working alongside men as equals - suggesting some progressive ideals. "Space Apprentice" even has one chapter where they take down Shershen - a controlling, misogynistic professor who tries to sabotage his female student's career because he doens’t think women should work in space.

But none of this counters the causal sexism displayed generally, even in these seemingly positive examples. Stella's introductory scene from "Monday Begins on Saturday" shows her cowering in fear from Vybegallo's upiór, screaming hysterically. While she goes on to be much cooler in Story 3 of that book, she's still a rather lowly employee of the institute - not as experienced as the magisters (who are, you guessed it, all men).

Maya Glumova in "Space Mowgli" - the female character with perhaps the most screen time and agency from everything I've read so far - is still hinted to be more emotional and motherly towards the alien which the team discovers. So even when the female character is important and actively participates in the plot, she is partially defined by her femininity. And when she comes back in "Beetle in the Anthill", she's basically just a childhood love interest, acting as another clue to the mystery of Lev Aboukin's identity.

Natasha from "Space Apprentice" is the only time I've seen the Strugatskys write from a female POV, and even so, it only lasts two chapters, with her being completely irrelevant for the rest of the story. For the short while we get to see from her perspective, she mostly sits around and listens to other people, rarely taking the initiative to do anything. Some of her scenes feel like they could be commentary on workplace sexism, but they're too short and fleeting for the message to read clearly.

All these baby steps towards decent female representation are even harder to appreciate when you consider... everything else. Most egregiously, some visual descriptions of female characters are just gross, focusing on the lips, curves and skin in a very sexualised way. At first I thought that maybe this was a condemnation of the POV character, showing that we're following a crass, tactless protagonist who isn't above ogling someone they find attractive; a contemptible person who doesn't reflect the opinions of the authors. But without clear textual elements criticising this creepy behaviour, it really feels like it's being treated as normal, which... no, it really, really shouldn't be. At least the Strugatskys had the decency not to use this kind of sexualised, beauty-obsessed language when describing the aforementioned respectable worker women - Stella, Maya and Natasha.

On two occasions, women are shown arguing in favour of shallow, self-interested hedonism - an ideological foil to our responsible, socially-minded male protagonists. While this is a fine direction to take a character (and some male characters are criticised in a similar way - mostly in "The Final Circle of Paradise", where hedonism is a central theme), it feels like a waste to use an already small female presence as fodder for this philosophical debate.

So yeah, even though I love these stories, my appreciation is heavily dampened anytime a female character is introduced and turns out to be underutilised and irrelevant (which is disappointing), some dumb bimbo for the protagonist to sexualise (which is cringe), or a proxy for an ideology the Strugatskys want to criticise (which is disappointing).

4) Bromance! While the Strugatskys’ depictions of relationships between men and their female love interests are rather underdeveloped (a side effect of women having so little prominence, I think), the way they write emotional relationships between men and men is quite amazing. Most of these stories are brimming with a sense of camraderie and emotional closeness, with the male characters inspiring each other, guiding each other, criticising each other, learning from each other, etc. My three favourite dynamics have to be from "The Inhabited Island", "Space Apprentice" and "Monday Begins on Saturday".

In "The Inhabited Island", Maxim manages to gradually deprogram Guy from his nationalistic, fascist ideology by just being there, acting kind and showing him that an alternative way of thinking is possible. He points out inconsistencies in the government’s propaganda in a non-confrontational, innocuous way. Then, we see Guy's inner conflict when Maxim defects from the military and joins the resistance - having to view this close friend as a "traitor", despite having a lingering affection for him. And when Maxim finally gets Guy to defect and join his side, this affection is twisted into something monstrous and horrifying in a scene that I dare not spoil. It's an emotional roller-coaster, that one.

"Space Apprentice" has an interesting tension between two role models. Young Yura Borodin, despite his somewhat mundane job as a space welder, is eager to travel the stars and self-actualise. He's hungry for action, and would rather die than retire. Due to unfortunate circumstances, he's unable to catch his flight for the planet Rhea, and has to join the crew of another ship as a trainee (kinda like hitch-hiking, but in space, haha). He ends up under the supervision of Yurkovsky and Ivan Zhilin, both of which try to impart different lessons onto him. Yurkovsky is the embodiment of Yura's ideal - a world-renowned planetologist past his prime, still yearning for exciting work and hoping to make the "discovery of his lifetime". Zhilin is the ship's engineer, and has a far more cautious, protective attitude. Both of them like Yura's youthful enthusiasm, but while the former encourages his ambition and adventurous spirit, the latter tries to temper his expectations and teach him about responsibility. The stops along their route form a series of unrelated vignettes where we see the two philosophies in practice, and the ending resolves this tension in a really beautiful, heart-wrenching way.

"Monday Begins on Saturday" is just one huge "me and the boys" meme and I fuckin' love it. We have the confused yet curious newbie, Sasha Privalov, the measured and wise mentor figure, Roman Oira-Oira, the talented but rude snarker and critic, Vitya Korneev (who is still affectionate in his own way - he doesn't actually hate people, just enjoys banter), and the polite and helpful sidekick, Edik Amperian (+ a whole bunch of other colourful characters). The shenanigans these lads get up to are just a wonderful romp, as they juggle their own eccentricities and the absurd bureaucracy of a magical Soviet institute. Despite the chaotic nature of their work, often wrought with disagreement and a lack of resources, everything has this undercurrent of mutual respect and affection. I swear, this book has the most idyllic workplace culture I've ever seen, to the point that it makes it actually fun to read about office politics.

5) They start in medias res and fill the gaps with natural-sounding exposition. This is one of the core things that I believe makes the pacing of (most) Strugatsky novels feel very brisk. Characters are dropped into already unfolding situations - no lengthy backstories or elaborate speeches about the history of the world. Flashbacks are relatively rare and often contextualised (some focal point prompts the memory, making for a smoother transition). The majority of what we learn about characters comes from clues in their speech, thoughts and actions. Same applies to the world - details are drip-fed to you as they become relevant.

That's not to say that the Strugatskys never drop exposition dumps on the audience, but it's less common, and even then, is usually done intelligently. Most often, a character will see something and, in the process of expressing their opinion, bring up background details that show how they feel about it - we get both world-buiding and characterisation at the same time.

An even better way they disguise exposition dumps is by having characters casually debate something - in a moment of respite from the action, they sit together and bounce arguments back and forth: “is X thing ethical”, “what would happen if Y”, “these Z activists are starting to get on my nerves”, etc. As they make their points, they bring up examples, facts, anecdotes, and very quickly, not only do we know what they believe, but also learn about a whole bunch of things that exist or happened, all while never being explicitly told.

This is probably the best lesson you can learn from the Strugatskys - if your setting has interesting elements, either show them directly in the action of the story, or make them a talking point which characters have conflicting opinions on (better yet, do both - the Zone in “Roadside Picnic” is a masterclass in being a springboard for both characters and plot). If not, don’t bother - you’ll just distract the audience with pointless guff.

* * *

That’s about it. I could probably go on, but I’m too tired to continue writing. I’d love to pick apart more specific examples of points 2), 4) and 5), so maybe I’ll make separate posts for them in the future (lemme know if that’s something you’d be interested in). Mostly, though, I'm desperate to find other people as obsessed with the Strugatskys as I am and discuss their lesser known works. I personally feel that "The Final Circle of Paradise" is a hidden gem of theirs, one that has flown under the pop-culture radar but is well worth discussing.

Peace.

[fisheito]

I want to be in the room when this massage happens

[runawaymun]

Can you do gender fluid bi flags thranduil?

Here he is!!! Back on my indigenous Sindar agenda hehe :D Thank you SO much for this request, I always love drawing him especially for Pride because I get to design the most fabulous outfits. I used the bi flag colors mostly in the crown, and the genderfluid flag colors in his outfit.

I finished this one on stream so if you'd like to watch me color and render it, here it is.

Pride Request Guidelines

[54625]

We all accept the fact that qsmp is homoerotic and gay as fuck, but no one ever talks about how absolutely hilarious the lore implications of that are. Like this super secretive and powerful organisation called the federation is in charge of what seems to be a long-term phycological experiment involving select individuals from all around the world, but at some point during whatever selection process occurred the person in charge went: REMEMBER. EVERYONE WHO WILL INHABIT THIS ISLAND MUST BE FUCKING GAY. IT IS IMPERATIVE.

[moongothic]

My Forbidden OP Headcanon is that if there is an island with a functioning society exclusively for gay drag queens, the Kamabakka Queendom, then the opposite island should also exist; an island for lesbian drag kings, Nabebakka Kingdom

That said, if Momoiro Island is literally heart shaped and all cutesy and pink and frilly, then like. The island opposite of that would be like. Ballsack Island. And Oda can't put that in a kid's manga

[kryptonbabe]

It's interesting how, in the DC universe, we tend to think of Ollie when we think about "leftist" politics, but despite his words and judgments he's never a real political figure of relevance in his stories -weirdly appearing as some sort of antagonist time and again- the New 52 and the recent Absolute Power stuff, but usually he's just your old leftist uncle yelling at a cloud. I mean, it's really not surprising since that's how America perceive or at least try to portray the left (the real one, not this Democratic Party political anomaly). Socialism is either an autocratic all-consuming dictatorship or a useless political position, too weak to deal with "real world problems" (like Ollie embodies). You gotta choose America, are we the villains of Stranger Things or are we just queer communist catboys, tag yourself, I'm both. Am I saying that Ollie is the communist catboy uncle of the DCU? Yes

[lazy-toad]

God on my third watch of Midnight Mass and I just finished episode 2, and I love how actually kinda painfully obvious Father Paul is, like every time he talks to anyone he'll say some shit like 'oh yes you have a deep love of the colour purple and go to the store every Thursday evening. I know this because Monsignor Pruitt told me about it'

And not to mention he then he turns around to talk to Sarah and/or Mildred and literally looks at them like this

[bookwyrminspiration]

everyone SHUT UP and look at him. THE main character of all time. was your fav the god of the sun in a past life turned prince of destruction destined to destroy the world? i didn't think so. AND he's bisexual

[the-night-gods-moon]

Through a series of freak accidents and misunderstandings, Shen Yuan’s plane lands on an island where a Bachelorette-style reality tv show is getting ready to film, instead of the island where he was scheduled to perform research for his doctoral thesis. It would be an easy mix up to fix, but then he discovers that this island is home to a never before documented flower and… well, he can’t let these meathead bachelors trample it to extinction! Thank goodness Shen Yuan is able to recruit one of the cameramen into helping out, or the ruse of “super marriageable Shen Qingqiu” would be impossible to keep up!

[whimsical-sonic]

another au doodle

[arealtrashact]

Have you played Animal Crossing? If so, who are your favorite villagers?

You know, I'm not much of a gamer but I do like Animal Crossing. It's the only video game that's ever managed to keep my attention for more than a few days.

Off the top of my head, my favorite villagers are Julian, Lucky, Elvis and Skye.

Bonus Julian sketch I did last year.

[zoesophiaspeaks]

[quibbs126]

Okay they have all these dinosaur things, but no new Dino Cookies to go along with it?

I mean yeah, I know it’s for Ananas and Pitaya, and there’s been a discussion over Devsis putting in new after new characters while letting old ones rot, and this is a thing that needs to be fixed, but still

At some point we should get more Dino Cookies that are in the area. Hell I’d take it being like a semi-filler update, in that it takes place in a plot relevant area, but doesn’t actually do anything to advance the dragon plot

Sorry I just like the Dino Cookies as a concept and want to see more of them

[waywardsalt]

linebeck would probably be a cat person and in addition to not really enjoying the company of other people would rather hang out with cats. there’s a whole group of cats that live on mercay, some of them being pets to the people who live there and some of them being strays that hang around the port or wildcats that live in the forest.

linebeck can’t be bothered to learn the names of any of the people on mercay but has gone out of his way to give names to every cat and does his best to individually identify them based on fur and brings little food scraps or leftover fish with him to mercay specifically so he can feed all of the cats because cats are easier to please and understand than people and they purr and rub against his legs and hang out with him and linebeck does not care about anyone on mercay except these cats and has figured out what fish each cat seems to like best.

of course this leads to him getting followed around by this whole clutter of affectionate cats every time he steps foot on the island and he really would not rather divulge that he hangs out at night with these cats and just tries his best to pass it off like he probably smells of fish or that he’s just naturally good with animals or whatever or something while there’s some kitten trying to climb up his leg while another cat keeps head-butting his ankle. at least one cat brings him a dead mouse or something every mercay visit. linebeck misses the cats most of all after he leaves the world of the ocean king.

thankfully it turns out that windfall island also happens to have a bunch of cats living on it and in the roughly two weeks he hangs around there with link he has these cats following him around too and bringing him little gifts. man might as well be made of catnip and he wouldn’t have it any other way.

[raindrops-on-concrete]

y'all need to read Herodotus, there's so much talk of lesbians and lesbian ships, it's truly magnificent