Hothouse (1962)

http://speculiction.blogspot.com/2012/08/review-of-hothouse-by-brian-aldiss.html ( )

Written in 1962, Brian Aldiss' Hothouse is similar to works like [a:Jack Vance|5376|Jack Vance|http://photo.goodreads.com/authors/1207604643p2/5376.jpg]'s "Dying Earth" series and [a:Gene Wolfe|23069|Gene Wolfe|http://photo.goodreads.com/authors/1207670073p2/23069.jpg]'s Book of the New Sun. In most novels of this dying earth genre, the world is gasping under the weight of civilization; a million years of customs and artifacts, countless empires risen and fallen, cities piled upon cities. In Hothouse, it's nature, not culture which dominates the last days of Man.Far in the future, under a swollen red sun, the Earth and Moon have long since dragged each other to a halt, leaving one side of Earth permanently lit and the other in permanent darkness. Under the plentiful radiation on the lit side, plants have become the primary inhabitants of the land, diversifying into thousands of forms to fill every available ecological niche. Of the animal kingdom, only a few species remain: one or two insect-like predators, and a much-altered humanity. These humans are tribal hunter-gatherers, living in the canopy of a continent-spanning forest.The novel follows Gren, who is forced out of his tribe (for, essentially, excessive cleverness) and so begins a journey to seek a new home. Actually, "journey" is perhaps too charitable. Gren is more often driven from place to place by forces he can't control. Early in the novel, he is infected by a parasitic, sentient fungus which slowly takes control of his mind and plans to use Gren to conquer the world. Over the course of the book, Gren travels to the dark side of the Earth, meets a variety of strange creatures, is helped and threatened to various degrees, manages to free himself from the fungus, returns with the fungus--now as a sort of advisory partner--to the light side, is given the choice to flee the first stages of the sun's explosion by riding to the stars inside an interstellar spider-plant, and chooses ultimately to return to the jungle and make babies because--hey--he'll be dead by the time the s**t hits the fan in any case.We see much of this strange world through Gren's eyes, and he knows no more than any of his race. Many things he encounters during his journey remain mysterious, though some of human history is glimpsed in flashback as the mushroom probes (somewhat improbably) through Gren's racial memories, and at times it is possible to guess at the possible origins of species or artifacts.In addition to being delightfully strange, Hothouse takes full advantage of the philosophical possibilities of the Dying Earth setting. The fungus, perhaps, stands in for one part of contemporary human nature: though it is clearly base, cruel, selfish, perhaps even evil--it ultimately is the key to whatever salvation humanity is offered. Our hero, too, is no noble Odysseus; he is often petty, mean, or irresponsible. Yet for all that, or perhaps because of it, he seems more human than his companions--who are generally either passive or completely incomprehensible. The nature of time is also explored: the end of the world is an intellectual threat to the fungus, merely one more incomprehensible event to Gren, who wants mostly to find a good tree and settle down with a woman or two. The end of time, while tragic and romantic, is also suggested as a kind of rebirth. The "green streamers…." escaping from the planet as it dies are beautiful, and it's hard not to read hope into them. As one phase passes, so another begins.These are not particularly profound observations, although they do place the book in the realm of "cerebral" SF. But for me, the greatest achievement of Hothouse is in its depiction of a nature "green in tooth and claw" as Aldiss puts it in the book. Science fiction does not lack for scary monsters; many-tentacled aliens are a dime a dozen. But the biological horror of a relentless, vegetal Earth is something memorable. I find Venus Flytraps slightly unsettling, and a little malevolent. Hothouse takes that feeling and multiplies it to fill a planetary landscape. ( )

What a luxury to read a book where a child dies horribly in the first couple of pages, where the earth’s temperature has risen to the point where almost all mammals are extinct and small groups of humans cling to a precarious existence, where women lead those human groups and the men are protected and pampered because reproduction depends on their survival, and where none of these things is weighed down by real-life concerns about child protection, anthropogenic global warming or hegemonic patriarchy. Hothouse was first published in 1962 (and a year earlier as a five-part serial in a science fiction magazine), when gender politics and ecological anxieties were dots on the horizon for most people, and it was possible to approach in a spirit of joyful play subjects that are now matters for earnest, urgent and often acrimonious discussion. ( )

I'm finding this book difficult to review having read it in one form or another three times over 40 years or so. First as a short story, which covers the first episode in the full book, then the whole novel a few years later, and finally re-reading it many years on. The impressions it left are very different.

What's consistent about my feeling after each reading is the originality of the premise. On a far-future Earth, the sun has begun to swell as it approaches red-giant stage (or perhaps nova; I'm not sure Aldiss really made his mind up about this) and the result has been an explosion of the plant world and the virtual elimination of animal life. There are a few exceptions, among them very primitive humans, shrunk to monkey-like proportions, who eke out a perilous existence amongst fast-moving carnivorous and poisonous plants of many forms. This world is well-portrayed in the early chapters and is captivating.

On my first readings, that feeling stayed with me throughout; I almost wonder now whether I read a different version. Because I now feel somewhat let down by the way the book plays out, and feel that the author wasted a fantastic premise which could have been explored in many ways and instead ended up with a lacklustre adventure story with characters that one doesn't feel sympathy for. The later reading also revealed a lack of consistency in the portrayal of this future world that spoils it. For instance, at one point a human group emerging from the forest for the first time sees what we must guess is some future evolution of the termite mound. They exclaim that it looks 'just like a castle' and wonder who built it. But these are humans who for thousands of generations have known a world with no buildings of any sort and who have no history. Why would they even have a word for 'castle' or know the concept of 'building'? There are other similar incidents that jar.

But despite these flaws, there are some ideas that are wondrous. The transporters, giant vegetable vessels kilometers long that travel between Earth and moon laying spider-like webs as they do so are one such. There are others. Read the book for these alone, and if you get frustrated as the ideas get fewer, leave it be. It's not at all like me to suggest you leave a book unfinished, but this is one time when it might be worth it. But do try to finish; it's a slim volume. ( )

Poor. The initial premise is fairly interesting and more or less reasonable, however the plot rapidly devolves into shaky logic, inconsistencies and contradictions.

The basic premise is that over millennia the tidal effect of the moon has stopped the Earths rotation, and both bodies are now in a fixed aspect to the sun. This is feasible if somewhat difficult to fully determine. The sun as it ages has got hotter - this definitely is true, but I'm unsure whether the sun would nova before the earth became tidally locked. This manifold increase in solar radiation caused the decline of the animals and the blossoming of the planet kingdoms. Well I'll accept this as the one free pass that SF stories get in order to explore something novel.

Gren and his surviving troop mates are devolved humans living in this luxuriant forest world, surrounded and competing with various vegetable evolved species for nutrients. And here almost straightaway Aldiss starts failing to make sense. Humans have survived but almost all other animal species haven't. Termites and wasps are the remainders. What? Why humans, why those? What about cockroaches and rats species far more able to survive the fall of civilisation than we, or wasps. Even more weirdly he then refills those same niches with motile plant forms. This just doesn’t make sense. Advanced plant forms yes - predatory also yes, maybe some increased freedom of movement I could see. But spider forms? Really? Not just in shape but in web spinning ability! This was just beyond believable without explanation. Unfortunately there was no such forthcoming. For the truly preposterous idea that such vegetable Transferers could reach the Moon, he offers a brief techno-babble. But even in '62 when this was first written Aldiss seems to have no concept of just how far away the Moon is, or how harsh the conditions are in-between.

Anyway, Gren is somewhat of a throwback to a slightly more inquisitive type of human, and soon quarrels with his troop. We briefly follow the fate of the rest of his troop before abandoning them for 200 pages. Meanwhile Gren strikes out on his own and has some adventures - again mostly with preposterous adapted plants. The mental siren call was particularly bizarre. Eventually he becomes infected with a mutant Morel fungus - which is apparently the original source of intelligence in humans, and is now the renewed source of intelligence in the world. I guess Hothouse is a story solely based on how a Morel looks vaguely like a brain - all wrinkled and spongy. One wonders what Aldiss was tripping on when he wrote this.

Subsequently we discover that there are a few other animals in the world. Gren gets to see the twilight zones between the absolute cold of the dark side and the brilliance of the sun side. Guided by his new morel intelligence Gren eventually decides to attempt to return home.

There is no characterisation, no attempts at making a subtle point about society or culture, no deeper meaning at all. As an exploration of what the future of Earth could be aeons later, it is briefly interesting, before becoming laughable. It doesn’t even manage to summon the tension of a B-movie thriller. I never cared what happened to Gren or his various women, and ended up skipping over various passages waiting for something interesting to happen. ( )