Sometimes
I think Ishmael Reed is the only person paying attention to what is
really going on. His new novel, Conjugating Hindi, a
satire
of the world during the Trump--I mean, Kleiner Führer administration,
is dead-on hilarious and scary as all hell. Does the job that
science fiction should do, but usually fails at.
And
what is that job? Why, it's taking a look at current changes, giving
us clues to where it’s going and what to do about it. (Yeah, some
people say that’s more speculative fiction than, sci-fi, but who
goes to a bookstore looking for spec fic?)
This
one is right on the cutting edge, set in 2017, now the sudden past;
it’s almost a new kind of journalism, beyond gonzo, which is so
Twentieth Century. This makes it an alternative universe, one that
defines the present, and lays the foundations for the future.
We
also get historic and myth figures appearing in dreams. Magic
realism, if you will.
As
it says on the back cover blurb, this is Reed’s
“global
novel. One that crosses all borders.”
Global.
As in the whole planet. Not just the cultural ghetto skewed to a New
York/Washington D.C. axis that kicks and screams when it becomes obsolete.
Delusions
like that don’t die easily. But then that’s the point of most of
Ishmael Reed’s work.
Sometimes
it seems like wild fantasy, but the outrageous things that happen in
Conjugating
Hindi’s
war with India have already happened in other wars. If you think the
news is fake, what about history? What are we doomed to repeat?
Here
emerging conflicts are brought to light, along with the fact that the
answer is for people who disagree to come together, talk, argue, even
fight, as they struggle to figure it out.
Afrofuturists
take note, buy, and read. And even though I’ve said it before:
Afrofuturism is just a reboot of Reed’s NeoHooDooism.
We need this sort of thing to survive the world that Kleiner
Führer--I mean Trump--is making.
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