The theme of 'humanity is just at the threshold of turning into a spacefaring species when we encounter a malevolent species which just about wipes us into extinction, and then humanity unifies to fight them' has been well explored. Consider Starship Troopers and The Forever War. But Orson Card delivers a different version of this in Ender's Game. In this story, Ender is a six year old who is taken away to 'Battle School', an orbital where the smartest and most talented children are trained in strategy and whatnot. The pressure is turned on him the very first day, because as side conversations let us know, he is 'humanity's last hope'. His training becomes progressively more and more difficult and brutal, all in the hope of honing him as a master strategist where skill and ruthlessness are driven into his rather pathetically sensitive psyche.
Why I am not particularly impressed.... hmm, for all that the book talks about, there is little else from a 'superman complex' happening. The impression I get is that the author is one of those men who sat slack jawed after reading about the Riders of Rohan. Don't get me wrong here, nothing bad about it. But the point, of course is that there should be much more to the martial way then just this. Something approaching greatness was achieved by Robert Heinlein in Starship Troopers where the philosophy and morality of arms is discussed at length. Heinlein has always been one of those smaller authors: neither as good at 'hard SF' as Clarke, and not as perceptive of society as Asimov. But he tried hard, and the niche that he carved out for himself was as a voice for the young America, the nation of colonists, for that was the image that he had of humanity's first fumbling attempts to the stars. But he transcends his technique in Starship Troopers where the whole book is essentially about the molding of a soldier's character.
The other great effort in this direction is The Forever War, written by Joe Haldemann. This was a riposte to Starship Troopers and has a proper hard-SF theme to it. The author manages to show the gradual alienation of the soldier from the society he is supposedly a centurian of when he returns from each operation. Future shock is what happens when the world has moved on, and you have not. This is a basic theme underlying the novel.
Ender's Game is rather puerile in comparison. It smacks of furious and impotent dreams of being 'the best of the best of the best' being translated to words. And Ender's objective, puportedly is to fight out the Battle of the Jutlands in space. At the end of the day, a rather tired work.
Why I am not particularly impressed.... hmm, for all that the book talks about, there is little else from a 'superman complex' happening. The impression I get is that the author is one of those men who sat slack jawed after reading about the Riders of Rohan. Don't get me wrong here, nothing bad about it. But the point, of course is that there should be much more to the martial way then just this. Something approaching greatness was achieved by Robert Heinlein in Starship Troopers where the philosophy and morality of arms is discussed at length. Heinlein has always been one of those smaller authors: neither as good at 'hard SF' as Clarke, and not as perceptive of society as Asimov. But he tried hard, and the niche that he carved out for himself was as a voice for the young America, the nation of colonists, for that was the image that he had of humanity's first fumbling attempts to the stars. But he transcends his technique in Starship Troopers where the whole book is essentially about the molding of a soldier's character.
The other great effort in this direction is The Forever War, written by Joe Haldemann. This was a riposte to Starship Troopers and has a proper hard-SF theme to it. The author manages to show the gradual alienation of the soldier from the society he is supposedly a centurian of when he returns from each operation. Future shock is what happens when the world has moved on, and you have not. This is a basic theme underlying the novel.
Ender's Game is rather puerile in comparison. It smacks of furious and impotent dreams of being 'the best of the best of the best' being translated to words. And Ender's objective, puportedly is to fight out the Battle of the Jutlands in space. At the end of the day, a rather tired work.
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