The Green Odyssey, Philip José Farmer

This is another book I vaguely remember reading in my teens. Yet, I cannot for the life of me remember any details. I just remember that for awhile I was afire over reading Farmer's books after reading this one. But, people change and perceptions change. What I might have valued more than 20 years ago has changed considerably. Thus far, I am finding that this novel might be one of those books that I no longer appreciate.

This book is more fantasy than science fiction. I find that to be the case for a lot of science fiction. There are some fantastic machines, but science is used to describe their fantastic machinations.

I am probably more of a feminist today than I was then. Although I believed in equal rights, I did not always understand when some things were sexist. I have noticed that about racism as well. Here's to personal evolution! Well, I guess a part of this reading journal entry will be a part of that analysis.

The main character, called Alan Green, is a handsome man from earth who has had the misfortune of being marooned in another world. But thanks to his good looks the best looking and demanding women are weak in their knees over him.

There was only one way to handle her; that was to outtalk outshout, outact her. It was hard going, especially when he felt so tired, and when she would not cooperate with him but would fight for precedence. The trouble was, she didn't feel any respect for the man she could shut up, so it was absolutely necessary to dominate her.

Obviously this is quite chauvinistic and misogynistic. It's definitely a blow to how I see Farmer.

Now that I have finished reading through the book, I can say that the misogyny was limited to a few pages.

The adventure basically begins with a daring escape. He manages to do this with the help of a merchant (who later tries to betray him) and the wife he acquired while on the planet.

He encounters pirates, cannibals, barbarians, and a witch. They have sailboats which use rollers and steady wind to cross a vast plain. While trying to get to a city where there are some captured Terrans, the ship is destroyed by a wandering island which is, in essence, a giant lawnmower a mile wide that can take down everything in its path, but is programmed to avoid spaceships.

Farmer's universe has mankind on planets everywhere. They were spread there by an unknown cause, stranded, and then slipped into barbarism with some, like earth, managing to regain interstellar technology that allows them to respread.

It's an adventure book, but I didn't enjoy it as much as I did when I was younger. Not just because of the sexist paragraph I cut-and-pasted above, but because the style is rather shallow. Its narrative is 3rd person limited, but even the main character seems a two dimensional character. Wikipedia writes, "While that story was almost universally regarded as unique and excellently written, Odyssey was frequently criticised for being clichéd and generic." I have to agree with that criticism.