Modesto. La storia s'incentra sullo studio da parte di alcuni ricercatori terrestri di una misteriosa e stranissima piccola civiltà semi-selvaggia in un remoto pianeta-foresta da poco colonizzato. Gli incomprensibili comportamenti di quest'individui saranno molto difficili da capire e alla fine riveleranno una storia ed una biologia incredibili e inimmaginabili.

Il plot certo non è dei + originali ma l'autore scrive bene ed è anche bravo a strutturare il racconto in modo da tenere viva l'attenzione del lettore ma nella sostanza siamo di fronte ad un romanzo modesto e con una "spiegazione" finale del tutto improbabile. ( )

Get ready for adventure and excitement to blow your mind. Really blow your mind.

Transfigurations is American author Michael Bishop's 1979 science fiction novel about anthropologists and their encounters with a jungle tribe on a distant planet in the far reaches of outer space. As a once avid reader of cultural anthropology myself, detailed studies like Colin Turnbull's The Forest People, Raymond Firth's Tikopia Ritual and Belief and Michael Harner's Hallucinogens and Shamanism, I found Mr. Bishop's book an enthralling page-turner. And, to be more precise, Transfigurations treats readers to not one but two adventures.

I could only locate a handful of reviews of the book and none going into any depth. Perhaps the novel's relative obscurity is a good thing since the many surprises are not given away by reviewers or the publisher. Thus a reader is left to make their own discoveries. And let me assure you, many of the discoveries will be positively jaw-dropping.

Keeping in the spirit of not revealing any more than I should in my capacity as reviewer, I offer the following bare bones outline on each of the two adventures in the hope you will seek out a copy and read for yourself.

ADVENTURE #1
The first third of the novel was previously published in novella form under the title Death and Designation Among the Asadi. Here anthropologist Egan Chaney recounts his field work among the Asadi in a rain forest on the planet BoskVeld.

There are a number of mysteries looming around the Asadi. Other than small insects, why is this tribe of about 500 (considered the optimum number for a tribe on any planet), the only form of animal life in the forest? Since they do not use either spoken words or any form of sign language, what are the details revolving around their evident eye communication? Why are social relations among the Asadi so extremely antisocial? And most dramatically, what is the relationship between the uncommunicative Asadi, a tribe with no detectable tools, arts or crafts, and their distant ancestors, the Ur’sadi, supposed builders of temples?

As for the Asadi themselves, they are nearly as tall as humans when standing upright, creatures of grey flesh and heads heavy with draping fur. When the sun comes up, they assemble on a rectangular forest clearing the size of a football field where they stroll around with no apparent purpose, sometime engage in violent, loveless sex, sometimes bend at the waste to glare at one another. In many ways, the Asadi are more like chimpanzees than humans.

But, as Egan Chaney himself admits, we shouldn’t be too quick to judge. There are those Asadi eyes as per his report: “like the bottoms of thick-glassed bottles. Except that I’ve noticed the eye really consists of two parts: a thin transparent covering, which is apparently hard like plastic, and the complex, membranous organ of sight that this covering protects. It’s as if each Asadi is born wearing a built-in pair of safety glasses.”

Chaney goes on to chronicle how the Asadi eyes change colors with dazzling speed, sparkling and zooming through the complete visual spectrum in seconds. Moreover, these changes appear to be controlled and self-willed in the same way human speech is self-willed; in other words, the Asadi choose the colors they flash as we human choose the words we speak.

Over a series of weeks living among the Asadi, Egan Chaney admits their behavior simply does not make sense. But then there is a first dramatic event, then another and another and another. In the aftermath of these striking happenings, when Egan Chaney reluctantly departs the forest in a futuristic helicopter and returns to his colleagues in town, he is a much changed man. So much so, in a matter of days, Egan Chaney returns to the forest, never to be seen again.

ADVENTURE #2
Six years following Egan Chaney's disappearance, his daughter, Elegy Cather, now a twenty-three year old university educated anthropologist, is joined by Chaney's prime colleague, fellow anthropologist Thomas Benedict, in her quest to enter the forest to study the Asadi and, most importantly, find her missing father. Elegy's quest forms the bulk of the novel.

Elegy has some serious help in her expedition in the form of an extraordinary creature designed to assimilate itself into the Asadi tribe: genetically engineered from both the genes of chimps and baboons (please keep in mind we are in the distant future and this is science fiction), Kretzoi is outfitted with an Asadi-like mane of hair and surgically implanted eye lenses to replicate Asadi eyes. With a human-like capacity for abstract thought, Kretzoi can directly communicate with Elegy via American sign language. I found the inclusion of Kretzoi one of the most fascinating aspects of the story.

Michael Bishop has a background in anthropology. Another fascinating aspect of his novel: these futuristic social scientists make direct comparisons between their own work with the Asadi and the insights of twentieth-century anthropologist Colin Turnbull in the field with African pygmy (The Forrest People) and among the Ik, an African tribe kicked out of their hunting grounds and left to starve (The Mountain People).

And how about those ancestors, the Ur’sadi? Egan Chaney made a number of stunning discoveries he noted in his field report and material evidence he returned with that found its way into the town’s archeological museum. And closely related in some mysterious way to the Ur’sadi is a purplish-black blind creature looking like a cross between a bat and a winged lizard. What’s that all about?

Lastly, there's the issue of human boredom and hatred culminating in brutality toward "the other." In an interview, Michael Bishop spoke out against such stupidity: "In any event, it outrages me to see people treat other people as something less than human for any reason at all: race, class consciousness, religious differences, sex or sexual orientation, intellectual pride, etc. But because the human condition, along with ignorance and/or greed, continually triggers brutality, I have no shortage of outrage, and outrage often fuels my fiction."

Again, I purposely went light on plot and detail so as to leave the excitement of the adventures to each reader.


American author Michael Bishop, born 1945

Dark and disturbing. Part science-fiction and part horror. I may never shed my mind of the concept of 'meat-sibling'. Ugh!

Despite the horrific subject matter, this is a well-written and very atmospheric story about one of the strangest alien races I've ever read about in science-fiction. Humanoid but without vocal speech, the Asadi communicate mostly with light waves using their multi-chromatic eyes. Exhibiting an incomprehensible, (at first), and extremely rigid social structure, the Asadi are an unsolvable puzzle to the humans that are there to study them.

The first part of the story is told via the journal of an anthropologist who has mingled with the aliens and participated in their strange rituals. After he 'goes native' and disappears, his daughter travels from Earth to find him and to also attempt to decipher the mystery of the Asadi.

This was almost a four-star read for me. What reduced the rating is mostly the pace. While the writing style is very, very good, the story dragged a bit in places. It took me a while to get into the book. Once I reached the halfway mark, it really started to pick up and moved quickly toward the conclusion.

The other issue I had was with the reactions of the characters. Especially Elegy, the daughter of the missing anthropologist. There are moments of extreme horror where, instead of reacting with emotion, she clinically and casually explains her view of what it means to the other characters in the scene. Her lack of emotional response rang a bit false at times.

These are minor complaints though. Overall, despite some of the more horrific elements, I really liked this book. Bishop has quite the twisted imagination - and I appreciate that! :) ( )

This was a difficult book to like ,but it really made me think. It starts off with notes from an anthropologists diary, watching hominid aliens on the planet of Bosk Veld. It cleverly avoids all out human/alien conflict but lets you see the tensions, despite the general populace knowing little about the inscrutable alien's culture.
Six years after the anthropologist disappears, and his diaries are published to acclaim, his daughter arrives, with a genetically modified ape to infiltrate the alien culture and find out more. At this point the book descends into horror; at least, we would find the things the aliens do horrific if they were human, and we question how their culture and environment led them to this particular life cycle.
I have to admit, despite hints about links to human past history, I didn't really see the connection, and will need to read again to pick up on that. ( )

I liked this book a lot. I didn't think it was as well polished as Michael Bishop's 'No Enemy but Time' but it was faster paced and an easier read. Special mention should go to the first chapter, which takes the form of a scientific journal and formed the original short story on which the rest of the novel is based. This is a superb piece of SF on its own, and it's almost worth buying the full novel just for this! ( )