More of the Imperial Dragon Temeraire
Dec. 15th, 2007 04:44 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bibliogrammaI was so delighted with the first of the Temeraire novels, His Majesty's Dragon that I went right out and bought all the other published novels in the series (it is my understanding that there is one more to come).
Throne of Jade
Black Powder War
Empire of Ivory
I continue to be delighted with the series. The books are well written, with great worldbuilding and wonderful characters. It's got politics, travel, adventure, and of course, dragons.
And it continues to do marvellous things with gender politics, race issues, and a critique of colonialism and imperialist thought that slowly unfolds as the series progresses. Temeraire's human aviator, Laurence, begins the series with a full set of standard white European colonialist preconceptions and prejudices, and as the series progresses and he visits more of the world, he is brought face-to-face, over and over again, with the narrowness and prejudice of his worldview.
To say nothing of the grand questions of how does one recognise the agency of and live amicably and productively with persons that are different? The exploration of different approaches to the relationship of dragon and man - from indentured servitude and slavery in Europe, to a negotiated co-existence in China to a full integration into the kin system in parts of Africa - makes us look head-on at how humans relate to The Other.
For a further perspective on the series, I recommend this review by N. K. Jemisin (nojojojo), although I must in all conscience note that it containes major spoilers for the series to date.
Throne of Jade
Black Powder War
Empire of Ivory
I continue to be delighted with the series. The books are well written, with great worldbuilding and wonderful characters. It's got politics, travel, adventure, and of course, dragons.
And it continues to do marvellous things with gender politics, race issues, and a critique of colonialism and imperialist thought that slowly unfolds as the series progresses. Temeraire's human aviator, Laurence, begins the series with a full set of standard white European colonialist preconceptions and prejudices, and as the series progresses and he visits more of the world, he is brought face-to-face, over and over again, with the narrowness and prejudice of his worldview.
To say nothing of the grand questions of how does one recognise the agency of and live amicably and productively with persons that are different? The exploration of different approaches to the relationship of dragon and man - from indentured servitude and slavery in Europe, to a negotiated co-existence in China to a full integration into the kin system in parts of Africa - makes us look head-on at how humans relate to The Other.
For a further perspective on the series, I recommend this review by N. K. Jemisin (
nojojojo), although I must in all conscience note that it containes major spoilers for the series to date.