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70 of 73 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Exaltation & Debasement, Hilarity & Wickedness, February 7, 2006
This review is from: Tales of the Dying Earth (Paperback)
I'll try to be short, but I cannot resist this opportunity to bang the gong for one of our greatest American authors, the immortal JACK VANCE (b. 1917), and what will likely be his most enduring work, "The Dying Earth."
Folks, it's all here--drama, heroics, adventure, atmosphere, a keen understanding of human nature, all liberally garnished with one of the dryest senses of humor ever. I first encountered the lead-off short story of the opening collection "The Dying Earth" back in 1969 in a paperback short story collection, and it grabbed me by the throat even at age 12. I found a used paperback of "Dying Earth" just a few years later and discovered to my continuing delight that the promise of that anthologized tale, "Mazirian the Magician" was more than born out by the rest of the book.
Other critics have classified Vance as science fiction's "premier stylist" and I tend to agree. Characters in the end-of-time world Vance creates here speak in almost Shakesperian dialogue, with outlandish flourishes of verbosity. I can certainly understand if more literal minded readers are put off by what appears to be a pretentious or effete manner of writing. BUT if you can get on Jack's wavelength--and it isn't difficult--you are in for one of the most unique and imaginative collection of page-turners ever written.
I'll leave to new readers the pleasure of discovering for themselves Mazirian, T'sais & T'sain, Liane the Wayfarer, Chun the Unavoidable, and of course Cugel the Clever--not to ignore the redoubtable Rhialto the Marvellous. Fictional characters definitely, but also vehicles for Vance to express his sharply perceptive take on the human condition in all its extremes of exaltation and debasement, hilarity and wickedness. These stories represent Vance across his career as a professional author (the first of the "Dying Earth" tales were written while he was still a merchant seaman in the 1940's) through 1983, when "Rhialto" was published. Throughout, the quality and consistency of his writing is FORMIDABLE. His unique voice and style were apparent from the beginning, and if anything, as he matured, he tended more toward the sardonic humor that REALLY ran riot by the time "Rhialto" was published.
I envy you new readers the opportunity to laugh out loud for the first time at Vance's over-the-top characterizations and allegories; you like me will surely be dazzled by the threads of plot drawing all the early cast of characters together throughout "The Dying Earth" to make a complete (and intensely satisfying) story cycle. Really, the riches available here between two covers can be rediscovered for the rest of your life. For those of us who waited years between "Dying Earth" collections, you newcomers are on the shores of paradise; despite the crummy, knock off cover and shabby typos this omnibus collection is blighted with, the quality of the work outshines any such drawbacks.
-And don't stop there--Vance collections "The Demon Princes," "Lyonesse Trilogy" and "Planet of Adventure" are no less beguiling in their own uniquely Vancian way. However, for me, nothing can surpass "Dying Earth" for that thrill of discovery and the lingering golden-hour whisper of an exotic life of tingling weirdness awaiting man's last days on an indescribably ancient Earth where the sun spasms and casts long, ruddy shadows into eternity...
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55 of 60 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
The cervantes of fantasy / sci fi, June 19, 2004
This review is from: Tales of the Dying Earth (Paperback)
There is something unusual about Jack Vance which reminds me of two of my other favorite writers, Philip K Dick and Stanislaw Lem. That is the conceit of hiding subtle, and nuanced social commentary beneath a veneer of light escapism. Lem, writing from behind the iron curtain, wrote brilliantly clever Robot fairy tales with sly underlying critiques of power and human folly. Those who know Philip K Dick's work also know how much biting wit he hid behind what seem superficially goofy sci fi tales. I'm starting to realise Vance was doing much the same thing. The first time I read the Dying Earth (the original anthology of short stories) was when I found it on a bookshelf as a young teenager. I found the stories entertaining at the time, with hints of genius, but ultimately they seemed like nothing more or less than escapism, of the kind of fantasy found in the dungeons and dragons games I was into back then (no coincidence, Vance was a key inspiration for that game, for better or worse), albiet perhaps the best possible example of the genre I had encountered. As I ran into the other Dying Earth novels over the years, and read them again and again, I think I originally had the same reaction many other people did. I was a little put off at first by the grandiose words and odd use of language (I had to read the books with a dictoinary by my side) the flowery dialogue, the 'thin' unlikely plot. But early on I recognized something about it that was unique. Over the years, as I vorcaciously absorbed basically everything written in the Fantasy and Sci Fi Genres, it was Vance and one or two others that stuck with me. Returning again and again to the Dying Earth books in particular, it was the small things about them which increasingly struck me as more than merely clever and amusing... the ironic prose, the delightful come-uppances, the ruthless turn-abouts, the put downs and verbal contests. As so much else fell by the wayside, the words of Jack Vance stayed with me. As I grew older and began to experience people from all walks of life, some of these characters and situations resonated still more. It struck me, that what had seemed like haphazard or almost random human situations in those stories were actually archetypes of many dilemmas in the human condition, some of which I had never seen expressed as clearly anywhere else. The self serving morality, the technical obfuscation, the distorted spirituality... the facility of man to delude himself. These traits shine through from the characters in the books, and I recognized them more and more often in real life. How many times have I encountered the rationaization of the "laws of Equivalency" in real life, or felt the pang of self doubt that cugel does just as he realises he's been duped yet again... Of couse, while amusing, cugel is a fairly awful person, (though he seems to evolve ethically somewhat by the end of the second novel, finally learning something about the futility of revenge) . I think in general thinking of cugel as any kind of literal moral guide is silly. Similarly, those reviewers who thought the Murthe novella was 'mysogynisitc' miss the point. It is a swiftian parody of mans failure to understand, or even be willing to try to understand women. There is one hilarious passage where the learned Wizards discuss a profound tome purported to explain everything understood about the nature of woman at the very end of history, wherin the female genius is compared to a river which occasionally overflows it's banks. The only reccomended solution is to ride it out with 'stout boat of high freeboard'. My girlfriend found this hilarious. Yes, cugel is a lout and a bufoon. In a sense, he reminds me of an anti-heroic variation of Don Quixote. While Don Quixote's grandiose schemes of glory and noble chivalry fall through, Cugel's equally grandiose schemes of revenge and domination over his enemies also invariably fail, in both cases causing great chaos for those around them. Cugel of course lives in an even more cynical time at the very end of the world. A time where there ARE wizards and dragons and giants, but they are as petty and manipulative as the peasants and bandits faced by Quixote. As cugel travels from one scene to another, we are treated to a lurid landscape of all the myriad forms that human self delusion and inspired stupidity can take. Even as Cervantes uses the backdrop of Don Quixote's travels to lampoon 16th century Spain, Vance uses cugel's travels across the Dying Earth to do the same thing to all of humanity, from the very beginning of time to the day the sun winks out of existence. Ultimately, not just the protagonist cugel, but all of the characters in the Dying earth novels have one thing in common: they are all fools. Even at the very end of history, we have learned nothing except perhaps, a better vocabulary. I think this is something Vance is telling us about ourselves. One thing I can promise you about the Dying Earth, the laughs do come harder and longer with every read, even if you feel to some degree as if you are laughing at yourself. DB
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14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Adventures of Magic and Treachery, July 1, 2001
This review is from: Tales of the Dying Earth (Paperback)
"Tales of the Dying Earth" is a great series of books by Jack Vance. Set in a time so distant from ours, the sun is a dull red ball in a dark sky, futuristic cities are half-buried mounds of ancient rubble, and magic is as natural as walking. These four books are generally regarded as fantasy, but it has elements of science fiction as well. The magic that characters perform is really just advanced science, but it's so sophisticated it looks like magic to us. (If a caveman could see how we live in the 21st century he would think everything we did was magic too.) The future in these books is so remote, there is a religous sect who won't walk on the ground because it would seem like desecration to the aeons of dead people in the soil. The first book in the collection, "The Dying Earth", involves a range of colourful characters. They each go on a mini-quest of some sort, facing many exotic dangers. The next two books, "The Eyes of the Overworld" and "Cugel's Saga", follow the adventures of Cugel the Clever, an amoral, likeable rogue who lives on his wits. Most of the time it's his own greed that gets him into trouble. The last book is "Rhialto the Marvellous". This series is quite an achievement. I read "The Book of the New Sun" a couple of years ago, knowing it was inspired by Jack Vance's work. I find that Vance's style of writing is easier to comprehend, it's less cryptic and less ornate. There is always something to keep the reader interested. Anyone who likes fantasy or science fiction should read these.
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