A Sour and Persistent Taste of Violation

It would be unfair to judge China Miéville's writing on just three books so, given that this is all I've read, please consider this to be an entry in a travel diary from an incomplete journey. My first exposure to Miéville was "Perdido Street Station", which I read, while travelling, in electronic form on my phone, which is neither the best format nor the best environment for concentration. I remember the book well, because it left such an unpleasant taste in my mouth. I found it well written, involving, challenging but, above all, I felt like I needed a good shower after reading it.

(I note, now, that there will be what some people would consider spoilers from this point on for "Perdido Street Station", "The Scar" and "The City & The City" but they are required for this post, so read on informed or return later.)


I discussed this with some friends and the issue that seems to bother me the most is the incredibly effective way that Miéville conveys a sense of violation. "Perdido Street Station" and "The Scar" both feature the world of Bas-Lag and the city-state of New Crobuzon. New Crobuzon is a magical-steampunk hybrid civilisation where punishment, often arbitrary and whimsical, tends to take the form of transformation of the criminal into a new form that reflects their crime or makes them useful to the state in some way. Perdido revolves around themes of rape, social and other personal violations and nobody emerges unchanged from the transformational processes and energies of violation that run through Bas-Lag.

Miéville is a committed and active Socialist, so his take on the extremes of the city-state and its consumption of the proletariat in the furnaces of the city (figuratively and semi-literally) is informed by his politics and his general humanitarianism. His vision of the fusion of the human and steampunk, powered by magical transmutation, would be positively utopian, were it not for the fact that the new flesh is not consensual and this is the source of the amplification of violation themes from so many other sources in the work. Yes, some people do and can have transmutative work undertaken, but the ReMakers are almost exclusively in the hands of the judiciary and the agents of punishment and it is not until we take the techniques out of the social fabric of New Crobuzon and into a floating pirate Armada ("The Scar") that we start to see beneficial modifications being produced.  "The Scar" is much easier to read because of this - once the technology can be used to liberate, we have some positive themes (in the middle of so many negative) to give the reader something to cling to.

There is no doubt that it is a sign of the strength of Miéville's writing that he can transport you to a place that is so believable, you can easily see why he picks up awards as he does, but Perdido left me with a very unpleasant taste because it was so resolutely awful and there was, ultimately, an ending for all but no salvation. Perhaps I should stick to juvenilia, as I seem to be bothered by good writing that doesn't offer a glimmer of hope at the end, but I have a very low threshold for authors who exploit violation themes, without some recovery and reconstruction. It does puzzle me that Perdido is, ultimately, Tom Brown with Flashman not only winning, but forcing out Tom after driving his family insane, and leaving the family Flashman in control, again and as always. Again, I suspect it is a reflection of real skill to stand so far from your socialist principles that it can appear (and note that this is only perception) as if the disturbing, murderous and cruel city-state is the form that triumphs, crushing innovation, socialism and autonomy. (Scar provides a strong counter-point to this, because the alternative to the city-state is so effective.)

I was, therefore, very interested to read "The City & The City" and, while this was good, I found it a far cry from some of the obvious inspiring authors but these authors (Schulz and Borges) are very hard acts to follow and a reminiscence or homage is a fine achievement, even if we are not moved as far. However, City deals with causal, geographic and ontological violations, rather than personal ones, and has far more of a sense of consent underpinning it. People elect which city they see and the transfer point at the core provides an explicit zone to accommodate a consensual movement from one zone to another. Strangely enough, while I have complained so much about Miéville's exploitation of the stomach-turning emotive energies associated with violation, I found that the lack of an authoritarian imposition of the city-city separation meant that much of the conflict felt forced. Yes, if you wanted to, you could stray but the magic Breach would find you and deal with you - there was no dodging the Thought Police or evading the drones, and this opposition was ultimately futile. Most citizens, as a matter of existence, maintained the mental separation and it was neither an imposition nor the application of authority. It was just what it was. Is this still in the spectrum of violation?

Miéville seems to be at his best when he is outraged and he seems to be most outraged when writing about it! City had many interesting moments, if a trifle predictable in the well-telegraphed ending, but I did not feel the sense of the chase, the requirement for evasion or the sense of dread that would have brought us fully into the sense of what meant to be in violation of the "rules" of City, until a very long way into the book. Reflecting upon it, I wondered if the strength of Perdido and Scar came from the protagonists and narrators who were chosen, because their sense of engagement, fear, love and achievement gave us real hooks to connect to. Had Miéville been less concerned with trying to stage a reveal in the third act, and allowed us proper access to renegades and fugitives earlier, I think we would have felt some more of the energy of his writing. For me, however, the predominant voice in the novel was too disengaged and compliant - I felt a lot of Lemmy Caution in the character, a slightly duller Caution, but, to be honest, "Alphaville" has never been one of my favourite films and I would preferred more Winston Smith, more fear, more anxiety, more sense of wrongness. Even some Number 6, chewing the scenery in the last two episodes of The Prisoner, would have made us resonate more with the delightfully constructed environment. In its absence, many of the descriptions were of a place I couldn't visit that was apparently as interesting as the suburb next door - when, in fact, this is as much a triumph of curious and otherworldly mental geometry as any of Lovecraft's odd angles and colours from beyond the Pantone charts.

But I am being picky. I am writing about how books could be made better, rather than being made good, or readable. The talent is evident but I really wonder how he will develop over time and which influences, once absorbed, will take him to higher places. I would probably prefer it if he found ways to channel his effectiveness into themes that didn't nauseate me, but such writing has power and, if it makes one person stop and think about the ubiquity of violation themes and misogyny in contemporary literature and society, my queasiness is a more than acceptable price.

I am looking forward to seeking out the remainder of his books, to see which of the themes he chooses to use. I shall probably grab them as I see them, which inevitably means working backwards in time to his first. I suspect it will be an enjoyable journey.