Tuesday 9 August 2011

Thoughts on 'Shades of Grey'

Note: This is a book review, of sorts, and although I'm not going to give away the ending (or much of the story at all, actually) there may be some spoilers along the way.


I recently read a book by Jasper Fforde, called Shades of Grey. It gave me a lot to think about and I decided to share. Fforde has a rather whimsical style, at times verging on nonsense, but his writing is intelligent and astute, making his work thought provoking once one gets past the more light hearted fun.


Shades of Grey is set in a dystopian future where social position is determined by one's perception of colour. Unlike many science fiction books, the societal rules in Shades of Grey accurately depict the complexities found in actual societies, instead of over simplifying matters. For example, The basic social order goes, from top down; purple, blue, green, yellow, orange, red, grey (these terms indicate what colours a person can see, purples see only purple, oranges see only orange and greys see no colour at all). However a high-perceptor red (someone who sees a lot of red. Perception is measured in percentages, anything above 50 is considered good and allows one into the Chromogentia, while below 10 qualifies as grey) would have higher status than a low-perceptor yellow in some situations. Primary colour perceptors also have certain extra privileges, and further subtleties develop as the story continues.


The people in this world live at least 500 years after some huge event, referred to only as 'the Something that Happened' and since then people have been living under rules laid out by someone named Munsell (a man who actually invented a certain system of categorising colour) with religious fervour, despite the inexplicability of many of these rules. Any inquisitiveness or curiosity is greatly frowned on, so people continue to follow rules such as the one banning the manufacture of spoons despite the problems it causes.


This obsessive conformity and blind obedience is the true focus of the book, although it is delightfully dressed in witty dialog and entertaining characters. As with all good literature, it studies human nature, and manages a very good break down of innate traits and learnt behaviour patterns. At first the world seems so wildly different that it can be difficult to translate into a modern context but once you break away from the world there are many insightful messages.


That is not, of course, to say the world should be ignored. As an artist I found the thoughts on colour to be entertaining and I actually checked what quite a few colours from the book would look like, which added some depth, though, it can be argued, is a tad obsessive. The way colour is used as medicine, drugs, poison and a subliminal message device, possibly accessing some sort of shared memory, is clever and interesting as well.


Finally, one would be amiss if looking at a story by Fforde and not studying his word play and invented terms. My favourite this time is 'loopholery', a term which is self explanatory and one I have incorporated into my vocabulary. There are others though, highlights including beigemarket, youknow and chromosynthesis.


Anyway, the book (my copy at least) is 432 pages long, and it is only the first of the trilogy. As such, there is no way I can do it justice in a single blog post and I therefore encourage you to buy it. Do with that recommendation what you will.