Books - The Dawning Light

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	Books - The Dawning Light

The Dawning Light is a 1959 science fiction novel published under the name Robert Randall, but actually the collaborative work of two writers, Robert Silverberg and Randall Garrett. It depicts the changes in the society of the fictional planet Nidor, a world perpetually covered in dense cloud, inhabited by humanoids resembling humans but differing in several respects, notably in being covered from head to foot in short downy fur. The technological level of the society is about that of Renaissance Europe, and has been that way for thousands of years.

In the novel the main characters are struggling to throw off the influence of the Earthmen. These are humans with advanced technology who came to their planet as benefactors, founding a University and presiding over advances in agriculture, but whose work always seemed to have adverse results. Some of this was depicted in a previous set of shorter stories, collected as The Shrouded Planet two years previously.

Genesis of the novel

This is described in detail in forewords by the authors. In the late 50's the best paying magazine was Astounding Science Fiction, edited by John W. Campbell. Campbell was a complex man and a tough editor to please, but he was very much in tune with the times and believed fervently in the triumph of American society and values, specifically those of a white middle class. He was not fond of other cultures or their values, to the point where Isaac Asimov, for one, regarded him as borderline anti-Semitic. However he spent more of his energy pushing his own values than disparaging others.

Garrett and Silverberg set out to write the ultimate Campbell storyline - one featuring benevolent white men bringing civilization to the backward aliens, founding the Bel-rogas School of Divine Law. The motives of the humans are not fully explained until the end of the novel.

The protagonists of the stories are all Nidorians, specifically the Brajjyd line, beginning with Kiv, followed by his daughter Sindi, her husband Rahn and then their son Norvis, who is one of the protagonists of this novel. Nidorians are culturally homogeneous, although there are some stereotypical characters from the outlying Bronze Islands, home to miners of copper and zinc.

The authors' motives were strictly mercenary but as often happens, in attempting to produce pablum they let go all inhibitions and created some of the finest writing in 1950's science fiction.

Nidorian culture

Nidor is a world and a single continent. The rest of the planet is ocean. Tradition says that a disaster or flood, the Great Cataclysm, wiped out all other lands and peoples. The survivors were led to Nidor by Bel-rogas Yorgen who gave them the Law and Scripture by which they have lived for millenia. The culture is patriarchal with a caste system dominated by the High Priests of the Great Light, a form of sun worship, although the sun is never visible except as a bright area of the sky.

People belong to one of sixteen clans with intra-clan marriage forbidden, although the taboo is beginning to broken as the novel opens. Names consist of a given name, a patronymic and a clan name. The patronymic for a son is the prefix pe concatenated with the father's given name, while the prefix ge indicates a daughter. Wives add a spousal name consisting of the prefix i with their husband's given name.

At the bottom are the farmers of a single major crop, the peych bean, which supplies all food, textiles and other needs. Peych farming is highly ritualized, with set procedures for planting, dealing with pests, fertilizing with manure, and harvesting. The main pest is an insect called the hugl, which is fought using Edris powder, a plant-derived insecticide similar to permethrin. There are some domestic animals, including the horse-like deest.

Backstory

By the time the novel opens, radical changes have already occurred. A new kind of hugl almost wiped out the peych crop, but Kiv peGanz Brajjyd found a new way to use the Edris powder, almost wiping out the hugl. In doing so, he impoverished the manufacturers of Edris powder, causing a minor economic dislocation, not to mention a group of people with a grudge. He entered the priesthood, and is now the Leader of the Council of Elders, the supreme religious and legal authority. His daughter Sindi geKiv married another Brajjyd, breaking the ancient rule against in-clan marriage. Her husband's family was one of those which lost its livelihood making Edris powder. Kiv's grandson, Norvis peRahn Brajjyd devised a new growth hormone for peych which doubled yields. The credit for the hormone was stolen from him, apparently by the Earthmen, and given to another student, while Norvis was disgraced and had to flee, changing his name to Norvis peKrin Dmorno. The luckless recipient of the Earthmen's largesse was lynched by a mob when the peych market collapsed, due to Norvis giving the hormone to all the farmers secretly, causing a glut and an economic depression.

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