As I had no problem mentioning in class, I actually really enjoyed this story. When it first opened, I enjoyed the myth-like quality about it. It had me from the beginning. From the second paragraph I noticed that this story was far from typical (for scifi) in the way in which it was told. It was sort of olden in nature, an intriguingly told story of history (only later do we find out that it was in fact a story of the future - which makes it more interesting because that means a futuristic story is coming off as primitive, which would normally be a backwards step and therefore usually thought of as undesirable).
Between the middle and the bottom of the first page is when we discover that this world is one which was created, something manmade and separate from the "real" one. Right after that do we see what kind of rules this new world plays with, as apparently the narrator has killed a baby.
Because we are not yet privy to the ways of this world, reading the conversation between the narrator and "Koinnage" is extremely intriguing. We are learning much more about their culture, and therefore what kind of people they are.
As the story continues to unfold and we read of the different stories the narrator tells his people, we start to wonder which is the side we should be rooting for, and which is the side we should fear. In my opinion the little anecdotes keep the whole story interesting.
We continue to hear more of this thing referred to as "Maintenance" and finally when we reach page 815 we begin to receive a little bit of an explanation as to what this world actually is. We see that the narrator, the mundumugu has access to a computer! Until this point, I was under the impression that this story was taking place far before our time. It is here where we start to question if the story will be at all like the Village (of course after reading this we know that's the case, but this is the first time where anyone could even make such a guess). Someone else may have guessed that something monumental occurred that threw society into a rudimentary state, perhaps technology became too advanced and burnt itself out, or a nuclear war all but wiped everyone out.
On page 817, we see that though the mundumugu does not appear to be in power over Maintenance on paper, he does look to be very at home when speaking to Barbara, and not at all in fear of anything she may do to him as a result of her little "check up".
Over the next couple of pages is when I made the decision that though I would never condone the cold-blooded murder of a live infant, I do understand the need for a society to maintain its traditions, and likewise everything that the mundumugu is doing in an effort to keep their culture alive. Apparently something devastating happened to his people when they lost sight of who they were a long time ago: "We cannot change our way of life because it makes you uncomfortable. We did that once before, and within a mere handful of years, your culture had corrupted our society. With every factory we built, with every job we created, with every bit of Western technology we accepted, with every Kikuyu who converted to Christianity, we became something we were not meant to be. I am the mundumugu, entrusted with preserving all that makes us Kikuyu, and I will not allow that to happen again" (819).
This is the point over which our class got into a debate. The young lady who sits in the front (I feel rude for not knowing your name since I enjoy what you have to contribute to all our discussions :]) was saying that there must be a line drawn when it comes to upholding tradition. She found the manner in which the mundumugu lied to his people in order to keep things as they had been to be a bit much. I suppose since I'm not actually in the situation I found it a lot easier to agree with the mundumugu's ways, and to advocate ancient customs.
As the story came to a close the question remained, albeit only with he and the reader, as only we know both sides of the story, whether or not the mundumugu was in the right. Only in the final paragraph is it apparent that not only does he feel the need to protect his way of life, but is prepared to send his whole village into battle in an effort to do so. For me that was when I thought perhaps the narrator was just crazy, and paranoid about the potential good that could have come from conforming a little bit. Either way Resnick did a great job detailing a country's struggle between tradition and growth, and what lengths some would go to in an attempt to maintain the former.
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