Space Operas Used to Be So Entertaining

When I was younger, I avidly consumed space operas in both written form and television/movies. In my retirement, I've returned to some of those. Either I've become more sophisticated or they have not aged well. Or it could be both. One of my favorite authors was Robert A. Heinlein. Now I cannot understand how it was that I found anything interesting in his work; it just seems so sophomoric. Similarly, a portion of Isaac Asimov's work including the Foundation trilogy is definitely space opera, but Asimov's writing and plotting is so straightforward that it bores me.  I have a similar feeling when viewing various entries in the Star Trek , Star Wars, or Babylon 5 franchises. I enjoyed most of them (An exception is that odd-numbered Star Trek movies were always dreadful and remain dreadful to this day.) when they first came out. For perspective, realize that Star Trek: The Original Series was first broadcast when I was still in elementary school.  But today, I find it hard to believe that I once liked much of that stuff. There are exceptions: a few Start Trek episodes still pack a punch: "The City on the Edge of Forever" and "Let That Be Your Last Battlefield" are both still worth watching. Others might be too but I'm not going to endure so many juvenile programs hoping for a couple more that have enduring value.

On the other hand, The Expanse (a fairly recently-published series of space operas available in both written and television miniseries forms) gives me something to talk about with my older grandson, and it is worth reading for that alone. 

Bottom line: I used to enjoy space opera a lot, but it doesn't do all that much for me anymore.

 Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro

I cannot shake the feeling that I've misread this book. To me, it's a horror story involving human clones fated to spend and ultimately end their lives as organ donors. The way in which they passively await their destiny ("completion") alarmed me.  This was my second book by Ishiguro. Previously, I had read Klara and the Sun. Both books are written in first person with a narrator who seems to have an incomplete understanding of the world. Both books are set in an alternate timeline that varies slightly from our own. Klara seems to be in a near future, and Never Let Me Go is in an alternate past from just after world war 2 to the late 1990s. The narration is set in the 1990s, looks back over the previous couple of decades, and focuses on the relationship among three "donors" (Kathy, Ruth, and Tommy) as they grow up and become adults.

I feel as if I was missing something. Why did Kathy (the narrator) and her friends passively accept their roles? Why didn't they run? Initially, they misunderstood their situation, but even as understanding came they still didn't react. They were created to be organ donors, but there was never any exposition explaining why their choices were constrained. They were not confined. They were free to come and go and travel. What am I missing?

I found such films (and by the way, Never Let Me Go came out as a movie in 2010) as Parts: The Clonus Horror -- wonderfully adapted in the eighth season of Mystery Science Theater 3000 -- or its higher-budget remake The Island easier to understand. In these latter stories, a clone flees upon learning their purpose. I feel as if Ishiguro must have put in something that is escaping me.

Ishiguro is a master of the English language. Even as I was frustrated with the plot, I kept reading because I enjoyed consuming the fruit of his ability as a writer. If you want to sample the output of this Nobel Prize winner, consider reading Klara and the Sun or one of his other books.