[Chronique France Culture] In this Brave New World program, the Numerama column is dedicated to Claire Garand. The French writer publishes with La Volte a magnificent SF novel, where the narrator seeks to regain power over her body and her life. A powerful initiatory tale about an initially intimate rebellion, which germinates seeds of possibilities.
We often talk about the dystopian tradition in SF. We talk less about the characters who rebel there. Welcome to Gattaca, a famous film about a eugenic society, is also the story of a man who circumvents the system. In this register, a magnificent SF novel which has just been released: Paideiaby Frenchwoman Claire Garand.
In the distant future, exit the Earth, decimated by climatic disasters and wars. There are 10 stations left around the Moon. In each of them, there is a young girl genetically modified to be gifted – physically, mentally. These 10 children have a predefined role, so Scarlet Servant : they must repopulate humanity on the Moon, they are supposed to carry in them embryos, with the chain. They have no choice, but they are recruited to see this role as natural — even as an honor.
The narrator is all the more stuck in a dystopian context as she is rejected by the nine other young girls. In question: an intelligence and a physical capacity which would be less, compared to the others. This status earned him mockery and humiliation.
” Here, lightness was dead. Putting my heavy boots on the ground one after the other unbalanced me and I constantly felt like throwing myself simply above the regolith. The worst, however, remained this unpleasant downward attraction of the blood, as if something was sucking my life away and only reluctantly let it return to my heart. Didn’t the Moon pick up a little as it passed? We had no choice and were panting dripping in our suits. »
A social revolt that starts from the intimate
The narrator has many other dreams: crossing clouds of comets and planets to explore the stars, discover the cosmos. She profoundly rejects the role that has been structurally assigned to her. ” Stop resisting, accept this honor like I accepted it », Assaults him another young girl. But, no, the narrator holds firm, she takes back her right to choose, she defies everything that society imposes on her.
This rebellion is first described as an inner feeling of emancipation:
” After dessert, she had us sing the anthem of the stations, filled with “conquerors of mankind who will fill the universe by the thousands”. I gasped in the hope of regaining the warmth it usually gave me, and the momentum that strengthened my will. My voice sounded right in my ears, but wrong in my heart. »
The heroine of Paideia regains power over her body, over her life, in a futuristic world in which, as often, certain structures make us think of the present – remember that access to abortion is a threatened right today. Claire Garand offers a science fiction where poetry is in the intimate revolt of the narrator. A great way to sow seeds of possibilities.
The novel is published by La Volte, a house whose name is already evocative of revolt. It is in this same house, moreover, that we find Alain Damasio, Sabrina Calvo, novels where SF is a vehicle for social movements that challenge pre-established codes.
(Re)listen to Brave New World podcast
In this episode of Brave New WorldFrançois Saltiel explores, with his guests, demonstrations 2.0 or when social struggles take place in networks:
- Remy Buisine, journalist at BRUT
- Artoise, journalist and streamer within the “Piquet de Stream” collective
- Edouard Boute, researcher in information and communication sciences at CERES at Sorbonne University
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