riginally published in 1950, this collection of six linked stories represents Jack Vance's first book. (The omnibus volume cited above contains all the sequels in the series as well.)
"Earth ... A dim place, ancient beyond knowledge. Once it was a tall world of cloudy mountains and bright rivers, and the sun was a white blazing ball. Ages of rain and wind have beaten and rounded the granite, and the sun is feeble and red. The continents have sunk and risen. A million cities have lifted towers, have fallen to dust. In place of the old people, a few thousand strange souls live. ... Earth is dying, and in its twilight. ... "
Such is the setting for these crepuscular yet vibrant tales, a setting so poignant and powerful that it lent its name to a whole subgenre of such narratives: the Dying-Earth tale. Here we will encounter magicians both beneficent and malign; odd creatures and queer customs; brave explorers and cowardly townsfolk; tragedy and drollery.
"Turjan of Miir" follows the magician Turjan in his quest to imbue his synthetic humans with true intelligence. He journeys to an alternate world or dimension named Embelyon, where dwells the master mage Pandelume. There he earns the desired knowledge from Pandelume, creating a beautiful woman named T'sain. But T'sain has a wretched twin named T'sais, for whom life is vile. Can Turjan redeem T'sais as well? The next story follows directly on the first. Turjan has been captured by a rival named Mazirian, and only T'sain can save him. By the end of "Mazirian the Magician," T'sain has revealed by her brave actions how well Turjan wrought. The third story, "T'sais," follows the cursed woman as she too reaches the Dying Earth and finds both love and hatred under the tutelage of Etarr the Hooded One.
One of T'sais's assailants upon her arrival on Earth was a frisky rogue named Liane. T'sais left him wounded, but Liane obviously recovered offstage, for in "Liane the Wayfarer" we witness his ultimate end in his ill-conceived quest for an astonishing tapestry. "Ulan Dhor" is the hero who lends his name to the next tale. Dispatched by his uncle in search of two sacred and powerful magical plaques, Ulan finds himself in the ancient city of Ampridatvir, where the fallen descendents of two cults have contrived a weird means of coexistence. Ulan finds the plaques, and also a true love. Finally, "Guyal of Sfere" charts the strange destiny of the title character, a young lad with a burning quest for sheer knowledge. Bound for the distant and semi-mythical Museum of Man and its omniscient Curator, Guyal encounters many hazards before attaining his goal—only to find that Blikdak the demon lies in wait to thwart his ultimate dream.
Birth of a grand synthesis
Jack Vance—whose first published story occurred in 1945, a milestone that makes next year the 60th anniversary of the start of his career—proved his genius and originality by melting down several precious ingots of imaginative literature in the furnace of his imagination and decanting a unique alloy that has in turn inspired numerous followers, from Gene Wolfe to Michael Shea, Richard Calder to Matthew Hughes.
Vance plainly took his inspiration from several great sources. The medieval never-never lands of William Morris; the dreamlands of Lord Dunsany; the ghoulish subterranean depths of H.P. Lovecraft; the shadowy otherworlds of Clark Ashton Smith; the glittering provinces of James Branch Cabell; and the wry barbarian lands of Fritz Leiber. From all these inputs, Vance fashioned his own signature style and themes that would supply all his later work, whether SF or fantasy.
In this seminal opener to his career, we see the already mature lineaments of his voice and vision. The arcane vocabulary, the resonant neologisms, the sardonic yet empathetic tone, the febrile landscapes with their evocative place names, the contorted cultures, the fertile flow of incident, the rebellious heroes and merciless antiheroes. All these features are on display in these six tales. Despite lacking a single narrative thread, the sextet serves to conjure up a world in vivid detail.
It's a world characterized best by the word "mystery" which Vance employs so often here. The Dying Earth milieu can be seen as an attempt to restore mystery to our world. In an age when seemingly there are no enigmas left to the landscape, when every culture is mapped and charted and the subject of a National Geographic documentary, Vance's great mission is to bring back awe at the surprises the world can provide. He is a master of cognitive estrangement, grounded in the familiar emotions of his characters. We accept the alluring weirdness because we perfectly comprehend the familiar motivations of characters like Guyal and T'sain and Ulan Dhor.
Vance continues to write wonderful new books, despite being overtaken by blindness in his old age. But like his many plucky heroes of the age of the red sun, he won't let a little darkness hinder him from his quest.
