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A review by hakimbriki
Babel-17 by Samuel R. Delany
4.0
Babel-17 is an incredible book and a superb achievement for Samuel R. Delany. Let's quickly recap what the author accomplished here.
- He created a majestic, intelligent, compelling and totally badass protagonist and incredibly endearing secondary characters.
- He makes the reader think throughout the whole book - not necessarily about the plot, which I think is pretty minimal, but about the incredible power of language and its role in human relationships.
- He managed to make language less esoteric, and FUN ! Eat your heart out, Ferdinand de Saussure!
- He blows the reader's mind when Rydra attempts to explains the concept of I and You to the Butcher.
- He introduced many language-related ideas and notions which will inspire a whole generation of authors (Neal Stephenson, China Miéville, Ursula K. Le Guin, Octavia Butler...)
I could list a dozen other accomplishments.
Babel-17 is a novel any language enthusiast should read. Though it might not be the most entertaining science fiction book of all time, Delany had the merit of building a strong novel around fascinating concepts.
Oh, and, for the record, Mr. Delany's translation of Jebel Tarik is wrong.
"Tarik, that's mountain in Old Moorish. Jebel's Mountain, maybe."
...
'Tell you some other time. Jebel could be somebody's name."
It's the other way around, sir.
Jebel (جبل) is Arabic (or Moorish) for Mountain.
Tarik is one of the most popular given names in North Africa. It also means Path, Route.
This just proves that doing research and getting the facts right was not an easy task back then. You know, before the internet.
- He created a majestic, intelligent, compelling and totally badass protagonist and incredibly endearing secondary characters.
- He makes the reader think throughout the whole book - not necessarily about the plot, which I think is pretty minimal, but about the incredible power of language and its role in human relationships.
- He managed to make language less esoteric, and FUN ! Eat your heart out, Ferdinand de Saussure!
- He blows the reader's mind when Rydra attempts to explains the concept of I and You to the Butcher.
- He introduced many language-related ideas and notions which will inspire a whole generation of authors (Neal Stephenson, China Miéville, Ursula K. Le Guin, Octavia Butler...)
I could list a dozen other accomplishments.
Babel-17 is a novel any language enthusiast should read. Though it might not be the most entertaining science fiction book of all time, Delany had the merit of building a strong novel around fascinating concepts.
Oh, and, for the record, Mr. Delany's translation of Jebel Tarik is wrong.
"Tarik, that's mountain in Old Moorish. Jebel's Mountain, maybe."
...
'Tell you some other time. Jebel could be somebody's name."
It's the other way around, sir.
Jebel (جبل) is Arabic (or Moorish) for Mountain.
Tarik is one of the most popular given names in North Africa. It also means Path, Route.
This just proves that doing research and getting the facts right was not an easy task back then. You know, before the internet.