Ilium

By Dan Simmons.
Begun 17 Feb 2009; finished 05 Mar.

Ilium is Dan Simmons’ masterful retelling of the Iliad in a science fiction future. Before I started the book, I took a peek at the cast of characters supplied. The list began with the familiar names of Greek/Trojan heroes and gods… then, it departed from the Homeric cast and started getting strange. Moravecs? Voynix? Prospero, Ariel and Caliban? This, then, seems to be no mere retelling of the Iliad, but a reinterpretation or projection of it in a future bigger and more complex than Homer’s milieu. I’d heard much praise and acclaim for Simmons’ books (including Ilium), so I was confident that this would be an epic space opera befitting of those praises. And it was.

There are three parallel storylines in Ilium, the main one being the futuristic Iliad itself, which takes place on the plains of Ilium under the shadow of Mount Olympus on Mars. This story of men and gods is told in first-person by the scholic Thomas Hockenberry, a resurrected present-day scholar charged by the gods to ensure that the war between the Greeks and Trojans occurs as per Homer’s Iliad. Hockenberry is little more than a slave, yet plots to rebel against Olympus and upset this progression of events. Of the other two third-person storylines, one takes place on Earth where a few human protagonists uncover the truth of their past and present existence; the other begins on Jupiter, where several moravecs (sentient, semi-organic artificial intelligences) journey to Mars to investigate its anomalous activities and touch base with the post-humans who are suspected to be there. These secondary storylines initially start out very far removed from the plains of Ilium, but gradually intrude as the novel progresses — and reveal the real breadth and scope of this future-Earth setting that stretches beyond the games of gods and men on Mars.

Like most space opera, Ilium is complex and highly detailed in the world-building. I was dropped in a familiar-yet-unfamiliar world far removed from our present-day, and had to learn about history and technology, piecemeal and on the fly. The future-Earth is just this side of completely unrecognizable, and each storyline begins in a setting radically different both from the other storylines and our present-day. This apparent disconnect was the source of my initial disorientation. Yet this method works wonderfully, for Ilium is actually a novel of discovery (or rediscovery) — the Earth-bound humans are rediscovering their heritage, the moravecs are reconnecting with humanity after centuries of isolation, both gods and men are themselves living out the Iliad anew, and Hockenberry has no idea of how significant his rebellion would become.

I think Simmons is a talented author not only for writing a rich and complex story, but also making it so effortless to follow. If the world was an unknown land, the narrative was a skillful tour guide. Simmons described the chars so memorably and distinctly, that I didn’t need the cast of characters to help me keep track. The narrative is fragmented into the three storylines, but it was easy to keep track of what was going on at any time. Exposition is kept to a minimum and at the appropriate junctures — they mostly took place in the Earth-bound storyline, and didn’t seem out of place. Like a good storyteller, Simmons gradually reveals the truth about the world and its mysteries in tantalizing glimpses — it felt like a paint-by-numbers game, for the more I read, the more fragments came to light, and eventually came to form a startling whole picture.

Not only was the story easy to follow, it was incredibly engaging. Simmons’ writing is brisk, sharp, witty and very humourous. It was easy to get absorbed in the writing and become lost in the world — all of which kept me absorbed, for I was eager to learn more about the mysteries of the future-Earth, and both the fate of mortals on the plains of Ilium and the machinations and infighting on Olympus.

Yes, the retelling of Homer’s epic. I haven’t read the Iliad (and currently not interested), but have a rough understanding of the storyline. I thought Simmons did an excellent job of transposing it into his setting, using quantum technology and post-human genetics to fully rationalize the deities’ omnipotence and immortality, and the superhuman feats of the Greek/Trojan heroes. I couldn’t have thought of better agents for Olympus’ power. As for the Iliad’s events, Hockenberry was a very effective interpreter between Homer’s epic and the novel. I can’t comment on the strength or veracity of Simmons’ retelling, but he certainly made the Iliad in Ilium easy to follow.

The Iliad is the main literary reference, but other references are also present in the other storylines. The two main moravec chars engage in analytical discourse of Shakespeare’s sonnets and Proust’s In Search of Lost Time, and the human protagonists of the Earth-bound storyline encounter Prospero, Ariel and Caliban, technological entities of this future-Earth setting that resemble their namesakes from Shakespeare’s The Tempest. I also haven’t read Proust or Shakespeare so I can’t comment on Simmons’ reinterpretation or the moravecs’ analysis. And I do wonder why Simmons has chosen to reference these particular works in his writing, above the reason the moravecs give for their fascination with human literature and philosophy (ie. as human-created artificial sentience, they remain fascinated by their creators’ civilizations). There is surely an additional layer of metaphor or subtext that Simmons has developed here; in my literary ignorance I’m definitely missing out on meaning to be gleaned from this part of the story!

Finally, Ilium is only the first half of a duology. It is the story of Hockenberry’s rebellion against Olympus, and ends with mortals and gods on the cusp of certain war. Many truths about this future-Earth are revealed, but this only serves to deepen the mystery. The moravecs converge with Hockenberry’s story, but we’ve yet to see the connection between Mars and the humans on Earth. In fact, the Earth-bound storyline is the most enigmatic. What are the motivations of Prospero and Ariel? We see the incomprehensible actions of the voynix, but what are they and what is their goal on Earth? There are tantalizing hints of alien links between Mars and Earth, but that is not yet revealed. And certainly, what would be the outcome of the war between mortals and Olympus?

Yes, plenty of reason to read the second half, Olympos! No doubt Simmons is an excellent storyteller who can tell an engaging and intelligent story. Now that I’m finishing my own saga with Iain M. Banks’ space-opera novels, Simmons would probably be the next SF/space-opera author to latch on to. Ilium is well-worth reading, not just for the massive science-fictional saga but also for the intelligent retelling and analysis of literary works, and I think everyone who has read and enjoyed the Iliad should check this out. It definitely satisfies both the SF reader and the literary reader in me.