Anytime we’re having an argument, my words are measured. Sometimes my dear husband says I should just get to it faster, but I say words matter. The word choice and tone can change the entire trajectory of a conversation, and in the world of Babel, the way words are combined and spoken can have a physical impact as well. Robin learns this all too well after he is pulled from his home in Canton and trained to enroll in the translation school at Oxford, where he’ll master the art of silver-working. By etching similar words in different languages into bars of silver, the silverworker can release a magical effect that is pulled from the thread connecting the two words – two words that have evolved through decades of translation. When silverworkers fluent in both languages speak both words, that threaded meaning magically manifests. For example, creating a match between “discuss” (as we know it today in English) and its Latin origin, “discutere,” which could mean ‘to scatter’, or ‘to disperse,’ results in a stack of pamphlets (that contain ideas for discussion) flying around the city like they’re being blown by the wind. As words shapeshift and evolve to eventually mean something totally new, it’s that space between the original and the current where powerful meaning is kept. Does your brain hurt? That’s to be expected.
At first, Robin is excited that his skills can help power the world – silver bars make carriages run faster and serve as building security systems – but he soon learns he is just being used. Silver – and Britain’s control of it – is only helping Britain. Everyone else on whom the silver trade depends is crushed on the empire’s path to dominance. Robin is soon pulled into the Hermes Society, a group that recognizes the detrimental effect of the Royal Institute of Translation and wants to destroy it from the inside out. He must decide if he’s willing to break the very system that made him.
This is for anyone who wants to scream because they’re sick of other people insisting they know what’s best and forcing those desires upon them “for their own good.” It brings the horrors of colonization into sharp focus and reminds us how important it is to respect and preserve a community’s culture and traditions. I really enjoyed this book but had to take away a star because some of the things I loved about it (R.F. Kuang’s uncanny ability to force us to look at ourselves, the dark academia setting, the class – and magic – system at play) were a bit overshadowed by just how dense this book was. For all the talk of world-building, I somehow didn’t feel transported to someplace entirely different. A different time, absolutely, but not a new world entirely. Though, perhaps that’s part of the point? The silverworkers are doing something totally unique that keeps the entire world running, but the way Britain wants it is for that to all happen under the surface. This is not an easy breezy read, but it’s worth it.
4 out of 5 stars.
Pair with: Imperial brown stout from Kernal Brewery
Peaches to Apples 