The Unwelding: a novel project
THE UNWELDING project began in the 1990s as a book that would match my first substantial book, Alan Turing: the enigma. It was intended to take many of the themes of that work, and find reflections of them in the period around the great Turn of 1989-1990. In fact it was framed as a historical novel, with a precise span between 16 October 1987 and 2 January 1992. The narrative was mainly in dialogue and focussed closely on particular days, rather like film, but also connecting with other themes from far back in the twentieth century, with particular links to the life of Alan Turing.
However, the book gathered in so many themes and sub-plots that I found I had to abandon this original plan. Instead, the mass of material needs to be broken up into shorter books making a linked series. So THE UNWELDING is now a project which will take some time to finish off.
Here are some themes that run through the material.
-
It's about space and place; in fact it's an Oxford story — but not the usual sort. It's the Oxford that tourists never see and the press never writes about: poor and insecure. Other locations include South London, Berlin, Gran Canaria, Bletchley Park, the Bay Area and, increasingly, cyberspace.
-
It's about science and maths, but not as a popularisation or a public relations exercise. Nor is it like science fiction. In fact, it tries to be realistic (impossible, of course, in fiction, because science is about truth, but that's part of the thought-provocation...)
- It's as down to earth as Queer as Folk with characters who are mostly gay men. There is plenty of realism about gay life, including the HIV crisis, but just as important, a political perspective of lesbian and gay culture emerging during this period out of its underdog status. Important also, analogues with two other done-down cultures: one is the scientific and technical world, and the other is the Second World, inhabited by people who may be highly gifted but have little influence because of their non-European genes. THE UNWELDING has a worm's eye view...
- It also has a bottom-up rather than top-down approach to money and economics, as the story goes from boom to bust to boom. The story also reflects an argument between different theories of history: the generalised marxist one in which the systematic economic base is what matters most, and another in which unpredictable individual personalities and events dominate.
- THE UNWELDING is also a serious response to Roger Penrose's quantum theory of mind, and also has a general Platonic concern with the intersecting worlds of matter, ideas, and mathematical truth: the 'real' and the 'imaginary.'
- It takes uneconomic values very seriously but is an irreligious and will make a series of Antichristmas books.
- I call THE UNWELDING 'counterfictional' because it runs counter to what is expected of literary fiction. It's related to the emergence of the more democratic Internet.
- Music runs through the story. I have written music for the songs that appear in the book, so THE UNWELDING can be extended to a multi-media production.
|
