Wiki Fiction: Ranchers of Koryphon

Dec 15, 2020

Ranchers of Koryphon

I finally read Jack Vance's novel The Gray Prince as originally published in Amazing Science Fiction, serialized in the August and October issues of 1974 under the title "The Domains of Koryphon". Vance did not like to be categorized as a science fiction story writer and as shown on the cover to the right on this page, The Gray Prince was marketed as fantasy by Avon books.

I love the idea that some writers have careers long enough for them to create an interesting story in one decade and then re-create that same story in a later decade, producing an even better story the second time around. Isaac Asimov did that when he returned to his Foundation Saga in the 1980s after having started it in the 1940s. It can be argued that Vance's Cadwal Chronicles (1987-1992) is a re-do of The Gray Prince.

The Domains of Koryphon

In Asimov's case, he retro-fitted the Foundation with positronic robots, magically inserting one of his most beloved characters (Daneel) into the Foundation Saga. In making the Cadwal Chronicles, what magic did Vance have to sprinkle on The Gray Prince and transform it into a better story?

Alien Invasion

image source

I despise alien invasion stories. For The Gray Prince, Vance imagined a world (Koryphon) where there was a series of alien invasions. The native morphotes evolved on Koryphon, but long ago they were conquered by invading aliens, the telepathic erjins. Much later, when humans arrived, they took control of Koryphon and never even realized the erjins were originally from another planet, so completely had the erjins integrated themselves into to the Koryphon ecosystem.

another human variant: feeks

Eventually, over the course of thousands of years, the human settlers on Koryphon also integrated themselves into the planet's environment, becoming nomadic tribes (particularly the blue-skinned Uldras) with very little technological sophistication. Then, a second wave of human settlers arrived from outer space (called the Outkers) who pushed aside the Uldras, in much the same way that Europeans invaded the Americas and pushed aside the natives.

From the perspective of the Outkers, the erjins and the morphotes were little more than strange alien beasts. The Uldras provided a convenient source of laborers and menial workers for those Outkers who adopted the role of aristocratic ranchers. The story begins 200 years after the arrival of the Outkers on Koryphon.

review

The titular Gray Prince (named for his gray clothing, not his blue skin) is an Uldra orphan who is raised by the Outker Madduc family (on their ranch, called Morningswake) and given the name Muffin. Muffin hates the way he is treated as a second-class member of the Madduc family.

However, in "The Domains of Koryphon", Vance quickly and bluntly assures readers that the Uldra women folk are not at all charming and so we should not be surprised that little Muffin develops a serious crush on the cute girl Schaine Madduc. However, when Schaine begins to show a romantic interest in Muffin, her father explodes, driving away both Muffin and Schaine from Morningswake ranch.

Outkers and erjins

Schaine travels off world and goes to school on another planet for five years. Returning home, she discovers that Muffin has become a social reformer who is trying to put the Outker ranchers out of business and return the land to the Uldras. However, Schaine's father has discovered that the erjins owned the land before the Uldras, having conquered the native morphotes. So why give the land back to the Uldras and not the erjins? This rather theoretical question is cast into higher relief when the erjins revolt and try to take back possession of Koryphon from the human invaders.

Space Westerns

The Big Domain

I doubly despise alien invasion stories in which elements from the past history of Earth are simply transferred to the new setting of an imagined exoplanet. For his Gaean Reach stories, Vance imagined a future in which cheap space travel allowed humans to spread through the galaxy just as easily as human tribes had spread over the surface of Earth.

Schaine gave Muffin
more than just a taste

For The Gray Prince, Vance's imagined future with humans settling planets of the galaxy is not significantly different than the Earthly past with pioneers settling the heartland of North America. Yawn.

I want my science fiction to at least consider the possibility that a few things could be different in the future, and I don't mean just converting six shooters into blasters. Asimov faced the same problem with his original Foundation Trilogy, where he imagined a future Galactic Empire that was little different than the Roman Empire. Since he was young and desperate for a story idea, I can almost excuse Asimov for constructing an imaginary galactic empire based on the Roman Empire. However, Vance was in his 50s when he wrote The Gray Prince and I wish he had shown a bit more creativity.

Cadwal

Aliens on Cadwal

In the Cadwal Chronicles, events take place on the planet Cadwal where the human settlers (members of the Naturalist Society) treated the planet Cadwal as a nature preserve. The native tribes of Cadwal were protected and allowed to continue their lives without disruption.

However, with time (a thousand years, or so), the human population on Cadwal grows larger and a disident faction on the planet wants to start more aggressively colonizing the planet, exploiting the natural resources and putting restrictions on the native tribes.

Unlike The Gray Prince in which the erjuns, Uldras and Outkers are all equally unlikable alien invaders, for the Cadwal Chronicles we can have sympathy for the protagonist Naturalists who struggle to defend the natives of Cadwal against the predatory Yips.

Predatory Romulans
The Prime Directive

What changed for Asimov as a story teller between the 1940s and the 1980s? Asimov had spent some time thinking about the process by which technological changes lead to social changes.

In particular, having lived through the computer revolution, Asimov recognized that he would probably be best remembered for his stories about positronic robots. He knew that his Sci Fi fans liked his stories about Daneel the robot, so why not add R. Daneel into the Foundation Saga?

Schaine, Kelse and Elvo vs an erjin

What changed for Jack Vance and his story telling between 1974 and 1987? In the late 1960s, the television show Star Trek changed the Sci Fi landscape by providing a widely-known imaginary future in which it would only be Evil Aliens™ such as the Klingons and the Romulans acting like Unionized Imperialists and abusing the natives of conquered exoplanets. Earth and the Federation would be guided by enlightened principles such as the Prime Directive.

see The Currents of Space

In the early 1970s, the EPA began to enforce environmental protections laws. By the 1980s, no longer could writers such as Vance depict the future colonization of exoplanets as if it would be round 2 of Cowboys and Indians, Earth style.

My advice is to go right to the Cadwal Chroncles first and only read The Gray Prince if you are intrigued by Vance's growth as a writer. The Gray Prince begins with the story being seen from the perspective of Schaine Madduc, but then Vance abandoned her, much in the way that Asimov teased readers of The Currents of Space with Lady Samia.