And from Peter again:

On Dec 7, 2007, at 6:21 AM, Peter wrote:

Hm. That answers my question of where your caste system came from. I admit to having thought you were a libertarian, that's my mistake. I guess I assumed you sort of fit your own perspectives into the book under the guise of Duncan, as sort of a wise old man who could tell the answers as you know it. Knowing that you actually created the character gives me much more respect for you as an author, regardless of your political standings.

I guess he just does a great job of seeming to have the answers when he should when Hari needs a bit of a push, but I suppose that gets back to your idea of your characters rationalizing their circumstances into what they think they need. If so, nicely done.

Did you think that the 'Reality-TV-From-Hell' required, specifically, a business-based caste system, or did it require little more than unwashed masses and the rest is part of the eternal sci-fi idea of drawing lines into the future based on current problems and their evolving solutions?

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A lot of people make that Stover-Must-Be-a-Libertarian mistake; one spectacularly dippy reviewer (I won't mention any names, but her initials are C. How Stupid I. M. Morgan) claimed she could tell I was a Libertarian by looking at my author photo.

Apparently it never actually strikes anyone that Duncan's good advice to Hari (essentially: keep your head down and inch toward daylight) has NOTHING TO DO with political philosophy; as for Duncan being the "voice of the author," it never seems to strike anyone that Duncan is consistently portrayed as being (periodically) ENTIRELY FUCKING BUGNUTS.

One would think someone might have noticed that Duncan gets his philosophical ass handed to him when he goes head-to-head against Tan'elKoth, who can be read as a direct personification of mystic fascism. Or that the only character who is more often right than wrong in either of those books is Deliann, who doesn't really believe in ANYTHING . . . he's just stumbling along, trying to do the right thing . . . and Caine, who doesn't believe in anything either, except that people he cares about are worth dying for.

But hey, that's the breaks.

Anyway: it takes more than the "unwashed masses" to make the Studio work, because Actors have to participate voluntarily (facing almost certain death or dismemberment -- not to mention the willingness to murder innocent people -- for the hope of economic advantage and social advancement). Unlike, say, Roman slave gladiators, who could just be given a weapon and thrown into the ring, an Actor has to play along -- has to create a character that people enjoy being, and portray that character convincingly. I could go into greater detail on the social mechanics of it, but that's the fundamental concept.


Matthew Woodring Stover
numquam desisto