Reviews
One of the most thought provoking books I've read in a long time. Fascinating read. I'm considering reading the dialogues of Plato because of this haha.
Pretty much everthing I've read by Jo Walton has been worth reading. Her writing is excellent. Her writing actually carries me along even when the subject matter starts to lose me. Plato is a closed book to me. I have no particular interest in Plato, and relatively little interest in philosophy in general. I fall pretty solidly on the side of Samuel Johnson and his refutation of Bishop Berkeley. Samuel Johnson's refutation of Bishop Berkeley. I know, I know, and I'm sure my life if poorer for it, but alas, there it is. So I wasn't too sure that a book about a Greek god and goddess wanting to set up a society based on the one in Plato's Republic would be for me. I was partly right, I guess. A lot of the story sounded like earnest freshman debates in college to me. Would people actually talk like that in real life? Do people really worry about the things these characters worry about? There were sections where I thought "Ok, this is addressing THIS hot button topic of our day." I did a little eye-rolling in spots. But the writing pulled me along in spite of my doubts. And then things Got Real at the end. And I'm curious about what happens next. So: earnest philosophical discussion, Apollo and Athene, and Sokrates being a gadfly to everyone. If this sounds like fun, read this book. Even if it DOESN'T sound like fun, give it a try. It's interesting.
For clarification sake; I have received a copy of The Just City through netgalley.com, but I ended up reading a copy through the library instead. The Just City felt like a odd, but weirdly intriguing mix between Greek mythology, Ancient Greece and more modern times. Athene and Apollo meddles with mortal humans (as gods always does), and sets up a societal experiment using Plato's Republic as a blue print, with other mortals involved. It's weird, fascinating and strange to read, all in a good way.
Clever and detailed, not to mention elegantly written, but ultimately the narrative is constrained by the very strictures it sets out to explore. I have a pretty high tolerance for musing, thoughtful, character novels which ramble gently without heavy plot, and of course the promise of Socratic dialogue in spades was a huge draw. However, the book did drag in places even for me; I found myself skimming Maia's sections but avidly reading Simmea's and Apollo's. What definitively knocked the last star off for me was Sokrates. Any story which includes him as a character is always going to be taking a risk, since he is a phenomenally influential character for whom readers will have high expectations. I suspect only Plato or another Socratic scholar could have any hope of pulling it off. Matt Hilliard once said that authors should refrain from writing messianic messages or sermons unless they are themselves Messiahs. I wonder if perhaps this also applies to writing philosophical arguments, when authors are not philosophers. The didactic rhetoric and Socratic dialogue often fell flat for me, with logical disconnects between arguments. I would also argue that Socratic dialogue isn't really debate; it's artificial and constructed to prove the main speaker's point. Walton seems to have aimed for a halfway point between true rhetoric and group discussion, but didn't quite nail either in many instances. Sokrates versus Athena carried well (the Final Debate) but not so much Sokrates and Simmea/Apollo. The novel did offer a robust defense of the Republic which often gets much flack, although in the end it did come down firmly on the side of Plato's ideas being too unworkable in many cases. I think its other strong point (I don't usually say this) is the thoughtful and scintillating examination of feminism in this context, with full nuance and no easy answers. I would happily recommend to any fans of Jo Walton's other works, or fans of literary and/or philosophical science fantasy.
