Zero communicates by radio both with One who dwells in the same cave and with Two who is forty miles away although we must never forget that "Two" is only:
"...the person who might as well be called Two..." (p. 180)
When Zero sees something large descend and land, he transmits an alarm which is answered by Two, Hundred and many others. Two has noticed something peculiar in Zero's direction and asks what the matter is. Hundred, the oldest, who has had half a dozen bodies and presides in councils, calls for silence and orders Zero to report. Suddenly, an entire society is revealed to us.
I used to like the idea of radio hams conversing without meeting. Now we have email and other social media. The radio conversation between Zero, Two and Hundred in "Epilogue" reminds me of the email dialogue between the members of Hacker Republic in Stieg Larsson's Millennium Trilogy. Wasp is in hospital and under arrest but her friends smuggle in her hand-held so that she can converse with her fellow citizens who could probably sabotage the Swedish government if she gave the ok: science fiction if it had been published forty years earlier.
1 comment:
Kaor, Paul!
I think long distance truckers still communicate with each other via some kind of ham radio in the US and Canada.
Ad astra! Sean
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