Gray Prince

This is certainly not one of Jacks better books and I would give it a 4 but one has to try and bolster its rating after reading what has been written about this book.This book will keep you entertained and disregard those that slate it from their high horses.

If I could, I would assign this book 3.5 stars. The Gray Prince is interesting in the vein of the vastly superior Emphyrio by Vance (i.e. this is not one of Vance's whimsical and zany Dying Earth type books) but its characterization is minimal. The ideas are fairly original and complex and have led to confusion among some of the less thoughtful reviewers. These less-educated reviewers resemble the princess in the fable "The Princess and the Pea," claiming to detect a pea of racism under forty mattresses and are hallucinating visions of "racist filth." Why? Ostensibly, Vance modeled a world of 5 cultures, the first 3 of which are human: 1) Human "Nomads" civilization resembling Amerinds 2) Human "Land-barons" inhabiting Vance's typical Manses, which rule the wild lands 3) Human "Urban effetes" living in the north 4) Erjin slaves 5) Morphote "planet's original indigenous race" Two of the three human cultures - the Nomads and the Urban Effetes - subjugate the Erjin race. Hypocritically, these 2 human slaveholding cultures denounce the Land-barons for "stealing" the Nomads' land, even though the Land-barons are not slaveholders. Vance's allegiance is with the Land-barons. This leads the reader to make a decision on whom to support: 1) The slaveholding Nomads whose land was "stolen" by the Land-barons 2) The Land-barons who do not hold slaves and merely inhabit land that the Nomads themselves had stolen from a race who had stolen it from the indigenous race on the planet (the Morphotes). The readers decrying this as "racist filth" are choosing to support the slaveholding Nomads over the Land-barons because -- well, it's hard to avoid the conclusion -- the readers are racist. They assume the Land-barons represent Europeans and the Nomads symbolize Amerinds so the Land-barons just hafta be bad. Furthermore, since Jack Vance is of European descent he just must be a jack-booted purveyor of racism (Likely, these confused readers would think differently if Jack Vance were of Amerind descent, which means that the author's race, not his ideas, determines whether these readers charge him with racism). These readers don't just insult Jack Vance; they insult all SF fans. One major point of the book is that some people (like the readers decrying "racist filth") view "stealing" land as worse than subjugating people. Another point of the book -- SPOILER COMING -- is that the species that is ostensibly victimized and enslaved (the Erjin) are actually offworld conquerors of the original indigenous race, Morphotes. Humans conquered the erjin who had previously conquered the Morphotes. Vance's final conclusion is that all SF worlds where humans reside are "stolen" from the indigenous inhabitants. The only way humans can avoid committing this crime is to remain on Earth and wait for the sun to die (a la Dying Earth), or hang out in generation ships and expire when supplies deplete, or people a lifeless world and die when stores are gone. F

Those hasty readers who sought, and therefore found, "racist filth" here have seriously misunderstood the meaning of Kelsse Madduc's "magnificent joke." [WARNING: SPOILER FOLLOWS] The whole point of the book is that the "oppressed" "native" Uldra are not natives but off-world conquerors -- of the Erjin, who are THEMSELVES off-world conquerors, of the autochthonous Morphotes, for whose welfare not one of the bleeding-heart societies of the planet cares a bent farthing. A further irony is that Uldra and Erjin alike are separately, and actively, plotting to regain their conquests by wholesale slaughter. The Morphotes? They kill on a retail level, so far as I recall.... The only ones, in fact, manifesting a trace of fellow-feeling for the other races of the planet (native and other) are the wicked nasty "colonialists."

Vance delivers his straight-faced wit and fully conceived worlds almost to perfection with The Gray Prince. In the far future, newcomer land barons and longtime inhabitant nomads clash on the planet Koryphon. But this is only the backdrop. The characters are completely believable and well thought-out. They each have their own interests and motivations. Who are the good guys? Vance leaves that up to you. Refreshingly, he does not preach. He just writes a great story.

A returnee to the planet Koryphon discovers changes and mysteries in the behavior of his old friends. The displaced former masters of Koryphon are subservient to human immigrants, who are trying to agree upon a formal relationship with them. Typically humanity cannot agree, and the differences between advocates degenerates to opposition and conflict. The urban factions promote their solution based upon abstractions formed through social fashion and educated consensus. Those who deal most with the native population are faced with the threat of externally imposed order and loss of their way of life. Told in Vance's typically elaborate manner the story shows how the most convoluted human and alien relationship must be understood internally, by the participants, to reach a working relationship. The tale hinges on enlightened self interest of the characters as they all pursue individual goals; not at all transparently. An exemplary Vance title, with all his sense of! ! wonder and roundabout manner of getting to the real point of the story. Well worth a read!!