Miles is introduced to the reader in The Warrior's Apprentice as he tries to take the physical portion of the test to get into the Imperial Academy and follow in his father's footsteps. The problem: he is physically damaged from an attack on his pregnant mother that has left him a dwarf with very brittle bones. He is, however, so brilliant, that he can get a very low score on the physical portion of the test and still get into the Academy. But at 17, he is impatient with his body, lets himself fall down a wall and breaks a number of bones. He is taken away by his minder Bothari, knowing he is a failure.
The rest of the first novel is about his attempt to prove himself not a failure by taking over a mercenary space fleet and becoming its "Admiral Naismith." He is a master of masquerades. He has been masquerading his whole life, pretending that things don't hurt, and more than that, he has been learning how to twist people around his finger, manipulate them into doing what he wants them to do, and making them believe that it is what he wants them to do. All of these sound very much to me like feminine attributes. Women who are told they have to do twice as much as men to compete in the same job, women who learn how to read people's body language because their place in society means that is the only way they have of getting power, obliquely. And the physical problems he has, being more "fragile" physically, as well as appearing to be much "smaller."
There are some times in the course of this series when his size is actually an advantage, but not many. There are also a lot of very interesting romances, including my favorite, with Taura, a woman who has been genetically engineered to be a soldier, who is enormous, and partly animal. She falls for Miles hard, and this is very much a reversed gender Beauty and the Beast. Miles also falls for Ellie, a woman whose face is shot off and whom he gets repaired. But she loves him because he treats her the same when she has no face as when she has the beautiful one he pays for.
You could argue that he's just a guy with some feminine characteristics, but it's obvious that Bujold is playing with gender in her books. She has a whole group of hermaphrodites on the planet Beta, and she writes an entire book about a society of homosexual men whose main purpose in life is caring for children. I don't know any author who I think is smarter about dealing with the sociological consequences of technology. Her ideas about uterine replicators are probably going to become real and then what will happen. AS for cloning, Bujold has the most obvious, matter-of-fact answers there, too.
For me as an author, what I wonder to myself is--what would have happened if Cordelia and Aral had had a daughter. For one thing, this would make their lives a lot easier. Everyone would have assumed that they were hoping that the young Emperor Gregor and this daughter would be married one day and their power could be consolidated. But having a son--a damaged son--makes everything trickier. He's in line for the throne. He's a count's heir. And he's damaged.
Having him be male is really the only choice, I think, in Barrayar. Yes, Bujold does interesting things with Kou's daughters. But they are not Miles, the hyperactive little shit who can take over the universe. He is interesting because he is male, but with all the disabilities that women face. And none of the advantages. Miles can't rest on being pretty. He can't get married and make his parents happy. He is a woman who has to become a man.
The telling moment in the series for me is when Dono appears. Dono used to be a woman, but for the sake of her county, she becomes a man to inherit. She goes to Beta and has a sex change operation beyond what we can do, that actually changes her DNA. And Miles accepts this in a rather blase fashion. Why? Because he is Dono, in another face. He has been changed in the womb, damaged. But he has to still try to become what he was meant to be. He refuses to see his own limitations, refuses to accept his society's view of himself as damaged--sometimes to ridiculous conclusions.
I'm not the first person to argue that Miles is a woman masquerading as a man, I'm sure. I'm not the first female reader who picked up Bujold's books and thought--oh, finally here is a male character we can identify with completely, without having to do translations in our heads or looking at the side character of Hermione the friend. He is me, the me I am trying to be, too. Salute to Bujold.
The rest of the first novel is about his attempt to prove himself not a failure by taking over a mercenary space fleet and becoming its "Admiral Naismith." He is a master of masquerades. He has been masquerading his whole life, pretending that things don't hurt, and more than that, he has been learning how to twist people around his finger, manipulate them into doing what he wants them to do, and making them believe that it is what he wants them to do. All of these sound very much to me like feminine attributes. Women who are told they have to do twice as much as men to compete in the same job, women who learn how to read people's body language because their place in society means that is the only way they have of getting power, obliquely. And the physical problems he has, being more "fragile" physically, as well as appearing to be much "smaller."
There are some times in the course of this series when his size is actually an advantage, but not many. There are also a lot of very interesting romances, including my favorite, with Taura, a woman who has been genetically engineered to be a soldier, who is enormous, and partly animal. She falls for Miles hard, and this is very much a reversed gender Beauty and the Beast. Miles also falls for Ellie, a woman whose face is shot off and whom he gets repaired. But she loves him because he treats her the same when she has no face as when she has the beautiful one he pays for.
You could argue that he's just a guy with some feminine characteristics, but it's obvious that Bujold is playing with gender in her books. She has a whole group of hermaphrodites on the planet Beta, and she writes an entire book about a society of homosexual men whose main purpose in life is caring for children. I don't know any author who I think is smarter about dealing with the sociological consequences of technology. Her ideas about uterine replicators are probably going to become real and then what will happen. AS for cloning, Bujold has the most obvious, matter-of-fact answers there, too.
For me as an author, what I wonder to myself is--what would have happened if Cordelia and Aral had had a daughter. For one thing, this would make their lives a lot easier. Everyone would have assumed that they were hoping that the young Emperor Gregor and this daughter would be married one day and their power could be consolidated. But having a son--a damaged son--makes everything trickier. He's in line for the throne. He's a count's heir. And he's damaged.
Having him be male is really the only choice, I think, in Barrayar. Yes, Bujold does interesting things with Kou's daughters. But they are not Miles, the hyperactive little shit who can take over the universe. He is interesting because he is male, but with all the disabilities that women face. And none of the advantages. Miles can't rest on being pretty. He can't get married and make his parents happy. He is a woman who has to become a man.
The telling moment in the series for me is when Dono appears. Dono used to be a woman, but for the sake of her county, she becomes a man to inherit. She goes to Beta and has a sex change operation beyond what we can do, that actually changes her DNA. And Miles accepts this in a rather blase fashion. Why? Because he is Dono, in another face. He has been changed in the womb, damaged. But he has to still try to become what he was meant to be. He refuses to see his own limitations, refuses to accept his society's view of himself as damaged--sometimes to ridiculous conclusions.
I'm not the first person to argue that Miles is a woman masquerading as a man, I'm sure. I'm not the first female reader who picked up Bujold's books and thought--oh, finally here is a male character we can identify with completely, without having to do translations in our heads or looking at the side character of Hermione the friend. He is me, the me I am trying to be, too. Salute to Bujold.
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