re:mote voices: literature

Title: Red Mars
Author: Kim Stanley Robinson
Publisher: Voyager

The plan was that they would send a mission to Mars, followed by a larger group that would actually settle there. John Boone and Frank Chalmers are the lead roles in the programme - Chalmers calculates if he allows Boone to lead the first mission and be the first man on Mars his dosage of radiation will have been so high he won't be able to travel into space again. So when Chalmers is made the leader of the American half of the first hundred who will go to Mars after that historic first flight he knows his plan has succeeded. However when one pulls out his replacement is Boone and the two rivals are sent to colonize Mars together, two friends and enemies amongst 100 people.

Red Mars is the first in Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars Trilogy, and it starts with the death of John Boone, first man on Mars. A death engineered by Frank Chalmers, an act which remains key to the development of the story even in to the later volumes of the work. Like Green Mars, which I read first, the story (once it flashes back) follows individual members of the first hundred through key stages of development. This sees the journey from Earth to Mars as related to by Maya, leader of the Russian contingent and at the centre of a love triangle with Chalmers and Boone. Even from this stage we see the development of the first frictions that will lead to the schisms that tear the 100 apart. From there we go through the set up of the first habitats by Nadia, engineer and driving force behind getting the settlements built while everyone else tries to rush ahead with their experiments. She is also lover of Arkady Bogdanov, who emerges as one of the key personalities as he encourages everyone to reject the agenda earth has given them and set up their own socio political environment. Then there is Sax, who is driving for the terraforming of Mars by any means who is opposed by Ann who insists the planet should remain untouched so that they can learn the truth of its history and its place in the world. Amongst those tensions there is the splinter group - a section of the first hundred disappearing into the Martian wilderness to set up a hidden colony led by the charismatic and influential Hiroko. All of this is reported back to earth as the latest soap opera, which everyone follows eagerly, developing into, follow up missions. At first the influx of other people is slow, but as earth runs out of resources and the metanational corporations are increasingly becoming world powers then the situation becomes increasingly tense and the number of people on Mars rockets. This can only go on for so long and despite the divisions amongst the earliest settlers they are all acting against the changes - leading to chaos and revolution inevitably and in step with the chaos that erupts on earth.

Key sections are those that follow the trail of John Boone as he travels round Mars. He moves from community to community like many of the first hundred, but he has a magnetism and notoriety that only the first man on Mars can have. This makes him hugely influential and potentially the only man that can guide the future of Mars forward successfully. Which is particularly interesting to go through as we learn to appreciate who this man is - knowing right from the start that he will be assassinated. Key sections within his chapter are his encounters with the different nationalities - the Japanese and Swiss - and how those affect the way he sees the development of a Martian culture. but most crucial is the time he spends amongst the Sufis, joining in the rituals - touching them with his appreciation of Mars as they touch him with their philosophies, expressed as they dance through the Martian night chanting the words for Mars from every language they can. Another key event that rises in his section is the discovery by Martian scientists of a process that can scan the body for breakages in the DNA structure and using a healthy sample to repair that damage. Effectively this is the explanation of the discovery of an anti ageing treatment - which enables those on Mars to extend their live, but has a greater effect as it filters back to earth and only the rich can get access to the treatment amongst a rocketing population of poor.

Having built up who Boone was through one of the biggest sections of Red Mars while at the same time charting the changes in the Martian society, this is then capped off by one of the most effective sections of the book. Each section is bridged by a couple of pages of italic type, which represents a sudden jump or quick account that provides for the next section. The death of John Boone leads to a series of accounts - where were you the day John Boone died, the day the sky went black? Myth and legend, hearsay and detractors generating scandal - all of which contributes to the creation of a martyr - perhaps a fatal move, perhaps a gelling moment.... Regardless it's an event set in motion by Frank Chalmers, who as a member of the first hundred and leader of the American division is just as influential. But as he drives forward for power and takes out his opposition it is clear that he does not have the same personal ability regardless of that drive. It is clear that he is haunted by regret and what could have been as he is constantly reminded of this one act. Especially as he becomes the key diplomat in the negotiations between earth and the splinters of Martian culture. Regardless it all leaves him helpless as the revolution is forced upon him, without his knowledge, without his involvement - the people of Mars speak. But it is unorganised in its spontaneity and chaos ensues - everyone trying to work out what is going on, with the first hundred being particularly targeted as elected scapegoats for the earth authorities.

Which leaves the survivors with the new world order - the overground, the surviving underground. The growth and changes of the planet and the culture - nothing solved - all leads to the second volume in the series - Green Mars. Which having read it is interesting to see how Robinson successfully drives his characters and their growth, how he deals with the changes in them in parallel to the changes in the planet itself.

RVWR: PTR
November 2000