Science Fiction in Multicultural America Black Speculative Fiction

Delany Neveryon Samuel R. Delany's novel, Tales of Neveryon depicts a society where the monetary system is highly eroticized. Slavery is eroticized, and human sexuality becomes a commodity that can be bought and sold with the purchase of a slave. The story of the Rublyn culture reveals that inter-gender and inter-class relationships are closely impacted by a change from the barter to a monetary system, as women begin to choose males with money, rather than choosing males with which they can live harmoniously.

Eroticizing slavery, class relations, and economic exchange has an important impact on society, as shown within Tales of Neveryon. In Delany's book, sexuality becomes intimately tied to ownership and economics, and individuals lose the ability to love freely. Tales of Neveryon is part of a larger series, which includes the titles Tales of Neveryon, Neveryona, Flight from Neveryon, Return to Neveryon, and The Bridge of Lost Desire. Delany's series looks closely into the story of Gorgik, Nerema the tale-teller's childhood, and Small Sarg, who eventually becomes Gorgik's lover.

Tales of Neveryon delves into many complex and controversial issues. In the novel, Delany looks into the limits of human beings, human identity, and the often-devastating impact of technology. Further, he is not afraid to challenge societal roles that are based both on gender and race. Tales of Neveryon describes a society's transformation from an economy based on the old-fashioned barter system to an economy that is based on a more modern system of monetary exchange.

Slavery is deeply entrenched within this society, and it is also deeply contested by many within the society. Delany's novel portrays the economic marketplace as an eroticized zone in several important ways. Importantly, the novel's protagonist, Gorgik, is taken into slavery as a boy, and is only freed due to his appeal as an erotic object to a powerful woman. Gorgik is freed from slavery by a rich woman of noble birth (the Vizerine Myrgot) because she has taken a sexual and romantic interest in him.

In this way, Gorgik's release from slavery is seen as completely conditional upon his willing acceptance of his role as a sexual object, in exchange for money. In other words, Gorgik's sexuality can be bought and sold. Slavery has changed Gorgik's view of the world, and hardened him to love and personal relationships. He sees personal relationships as only a function of an economic exchange. In other words, human relationships exist only when one person is the owner and the other is property.

The eroticization of the monetary system occurs across social classes. Gorgik's rich benefactress is also constrained by social conventions, and her personal relationships are also governed by the eroticism of the marketplace. Although she can own Gorgik, an erotic object, she does not wholly own her own life. In the patriarchal society of the novel, Vizerine Myrgot would give up her title and lands to the male if she married. As such, she chooses to have sexual relationships with only slaves like Gorgik.

In this way, the seemingly powerful noblewoman is constrained by her social class. She can only have erotic and romantic objects with an individual who is her "inferior," or risk losing her status and money. Thus, status and money are highly eroticized both in Vizerine Myrgot and Gorgik's lives. Later on in the book, Gorgik purchases a slave, Sarg, so he can have sexual relations, further showing the eroticizing of the economic marketplace. When he has sex, Gorgik wears a slave collar, even though his is free.

Gorgik has sex with both men and women, with the common denominator being the use of the people as objects to fulfill his sexual needs. To Gorgik, sexuality has become an entirely commercialized activity. he is a free man, and free to love whom he wishes, and yet he cannot see people as individuals to love. Instead, he can only see sexuality in terms of the marketplace, and in terms of his ability to possess another person's sexuality.

Sex replaces love in the lives of many of the people in this story, thus further intertwining the themes of sex, slavery, and freedom. Inter-class relationships are intimately connected to the market, as well as to both the barter or money economies. In a description of the Ruvlyn culture, Tales of Neveryon shows that barter and money economies can have a powerful effect on culture and inter-class and inter-gender relationships.

Venn describes the Ruvlyn culture during a time of a barter economy, where men and women have a largely equal status in the society. They seem comfortable with their sexuality, and women seek to live harmoniously with a man who is a hunter. As the Ruvlyn culture switches to a currency or monetary system, this social system changes drastically. The men gain a role as the keepers and handlers of money, while women are less involved with money.

As a result, women learn to compete with each other to marry a man with money. This switches the inter-gender relationship significantly, as women have less societal power, and seek marriage with a high-status man with money, rather than seeking a harmonious marriage with a hunter. During this switch from a barter to monetary system, many of the cultural roles of the tribe are thus changed, and cultural customs that bound the tribe are quickly lost as the monetary system takes over.

It is during this switch from a barter to monetary system that the economy becomes eroticized in the Ruvlyn culture. Women learn to marry men with money, and thus male sexuality becomes associated with money and power, and female sexuality becomes associated with the ability to woo a man with money. It is in this switch from the barter to monetary system that we can see the beginnings of the eroticized monetary system seen in Gorgik's society.

Other stories within the book show a marked difference from Gorgik's patriarchal society that has eroticized the marketplace. Raven is a masked swordswoman from a matriarchal society beyond the reaches of Neveryon who tells the matriarchal creation story of her culture. As Raven speaks, the reader becomes aware of the switch of gender roles in her society, as Raven is clearly a powerful and independent female warrior, a fact that would never be possible in Gorgik's society.