The Garments of Caean [Hardcover]

Barrington J. Bayley's novels are characterized by extremely inventive concepts, generally poor characterization, and an uncanny lightness combined with a dose of visceral brutality. In the works of his I've read so far he never leaves the galactic empire/space opera format and is utterly uninterested in extrapolating potential or possible future technology.

Along with Doris Piserchia's The Billion Days of Earth (1976) and Lloyd Biggle, Jr.'s The Light That Never Was (1972), The Garments of Caean is one of the most off-the-wall strange space operas I've read from the 70s (key word: `strange'). Of the three, The Garments of Caean most successfully integrates a though-provoking overarching social science fiction theme: the power that external ornament-in this case clothes-plays in manipulating, controlling, and forming body image + self. Imagine a society where the garment maker "supplants the functions of psychiatrist, priest, and molder of public opinion [...]" (31)!

Brief Plot Summary/Analysis (*some spoilers*)

There are two main plot narratives. The first concerns Peder Forbath and Realto Mast -- partners in an expedition to pillage a crashed Caeanic ship containing a hull full of rare prossim (a mysterious cloth) vestments. Peder, a sartorialist on Ziodean, descends to the planet's surface in a soundproof suit (due to "infra-sound" emitted by the planet's denizens). In the vessel he discovers a fantastic and highly prized Franchonard suit made of prossim -- one of the prized objects of Caean. The plan is to sell off all the cloth back on Ziodean but Peder keeps the suit for himself.

Caeanic clothes have the power to amplify, manipulate, and even create a particular body image. They raise awareness of the world around you, they heighten your charisma, and, when removed, the wearer feels less than human. When Peder puts on the Franchonard suit he becomes "a new Peder Forbarth, upright, rational, and aware, the kind of Forbath he liked to imagine in himself were in possession of his latent qualities" (41). The clothes serve as the "appropriate interface" to "exteriorize these formant inner powers" (41).

Caeanic society, placed at opposition to Ziodean society, argues that "the Art of Attire is held to be a practical, extrovert method of fulfilling life, and not to rely on introspective mood changes" (32). Ziodean society is incredibly suspicious of Caean because they believe that the clothes are simply "mood drugs" (32) which cause the wearers to become no more than clothes robots. The Ziodeans are convinced that the Caeanics are plotting war.

Bayley's images are often delightfully fun. Because Caeanic clothes have the power to create the man, Bayley often personifies them -- "the closeted smell of cloth greeted him. In his imagination the population of garments huddled on their racks, like a close-packed army on parade, seemed to welcome him" (37).

The second narrative strand follows Amara, a sociologist explorer on the interstellar vessel Callan. This expedition was sent by Ziodean to investigate the origins and nature of Caeanic society. Amara, although particularly unintelligent for large portions of the narrative, is by far the most substantial female character in any of Bayley's novel's I've read to this point. He has a notorious problem even incorporating "token" female characters into his work. Thus, I considered the presence of Amara, whose revelations lead to the great revelation moment at the end, an added boon.

Amara discovers a strange race of metallic humanoid formed individuals speaking Russian that live in space. They decide to capture one of the humanoids. Her crew believes that the space-suited individual, named Alexei, is simply a man inside of a suit. In haste and without sufficient investigation, they hack the metal suit and discover that not only does Alexei believe that his metal external self is his natural external self but promptly goes into shock when he sees his "inmost innards" (30). Eventually Amara realizes that Alexei's "body-image of himself doesn't include anything we would recognize as a human being. When he thinks of himself as a person, the picture in his mind is that of the suit's exterior. Probably he isn't even conscious of his biological body, except as a sort of internal organ or essential core" (49). Bayley has the unfortunate tendency to over explain his themes as if they are not obvious enough -- for example one character proclaims, "God, where does the suit end and the man begin?" (49).

Amara discovers that Alexei's people were Russian descendants. Alexei's bitter enemies, the cyborgs (who have adapted their bodies with metal objects to live in the void of space) are descendent from the Japanese. And Caeanic society was created by members of Alexei's people who removed their suits and created prossim clothes to serve a similar purpose!

Final Thoughts

The voyage of the Callan in its quest to find the origins of the Caeanic people is by far the most intriguing aspect of the work. Bayley's philosophical ruminations on the metal bodies of Alexei's people (their newly born babies are placed grow within metal suits!) can be a tad obvious but insightful nevertheless. Bayley pairs Alexei's people who derive their self-image from their metal exteriors (unknowing of the nature of their interiors) with Caeanic society and their obsessions with clothes and the power their exert in creating their "selves." This is placed in opposition to Ziodean society which derives their nature, supposedly, purely from their inner being. The cultural clash between the two philosophical world systems -- Caeanic vs. Ziodean -- form the core of the novel.

The novel loses some of its power in the last quarter. The great reveal leaves something to be desired. It has the unfortunate side effect of weakening the philosophical discussion by applying non-human agency to the equation. The entire work is told in a lighthearted almost whimsical manner. Despite the social science fiction core, the work never departs from pulp stylings, pulp characterizations, pulp planet landscapes (a planet filled with layers of flies!)...

Egregious H. R. Van Dongen cover aside (unfortunately, I own that edition), I recommend The Garments to fans of unusual space opera, bizarre social science fiction, and Bayley completests.

Seeing as how this book occupies a special place in my heart, I feel duty bound to write a quick something ...

10 years ago, in my mid-twenties, I unexpectedly got bitten by the SF bug, after reading "Wolfbane" by Pohl and Kornbluth which I found in a box of abandoned books in an alley behind the house where I lived. I struck out in search of SF paperbacks and after not too long fate would have it that I spied a copy of "The Garments of Caean" loitering towards the back of a dusty shelf in the far-flung reaches of a basement Sydney 2nd hand bookstore. I'm talking about the UK Fontana edition here, with a striking and eerie Tony Roberts cover (which does relate to the story). The premise sounded intriguing and as soon as I started reading I was hooked. After this, I read everything I could find by Bayley.

His writing style has been criticized for being limited - I would call it deceptively simple. He certainly has insights if you care to look, but it is generally concise and effectively outlines scenes and action whilst performing its primary function (like blood carrying oxygen) of delivering the IDEAS to your brain.

Garments of Caean (like all Bayley's novels) is a series of set pieces for exploring the implications of ideas, whether for sheer entertainment, like "Garment's" opening scene of treasure-looting on a godforsaken planet infested with dinosaur-like giant reptiles attacking each other with subsonics, to ideas seemingly thrown away off the cuff (the Sentient Mirror is one subtle and particularly unsettling example that sticks in my mind), or to others forming part of the plot framework and background - in this book the divergence of human cultures along the length of Tzist Arm of space and their philosophies towards attire specifically.

That's not to say it isn't a cracking good ball of yarn, unrolling at kittenish speed, either. There is pyrotechnic violence, gore, and sex of more than one persuasion (although note a scene dealing with one particular "persuasion" has been edited out of the US DAW edition pictured on this page). There are a clutch of variously a- and im-moral characters, including scientists with their heads in a theoretical dimension (a classic Bayley trope), and atypically for Bayley, some semi-developed female characters. There are ether-breathing yakuza. And a mind-blowing denouement something on the order of a galactic Day of the Triffids! (Day of the Tailors?)

If you enjoyed the Garments of Caean, I would read anything by Bayley, although real favourites for me were also The Grand Wheel, the Soul of the Robot and its incredible sequel, The Rod of Light, and the epic, brutal, nihilistic Pillars of Eternity.

Although the premise of this book could be compared to one of Yakov Smirnoff's Soviet Russia jokes -- "in Caeanic sector, clothes wear you" -- and the blurb [see below] calls it "a whimsical tale", I would say that "The Garments of Caean" is rather darker than that. Most of the characters can be described as, at best, indifferent to the suffering of their fellow human beings, though even the worst of them is more callous than sadistic. It's as though no one in the book ever really has any feelings at all for anyone else, and so thinks nothing of cheating them, or causing horrible psychological trauma, or killing them, if it seems an easy path to a goal.

Some say Science Fiction is a literature of Ideas, and there are some interesting ones in this book, enough so that I re-purchased a copy based on what I remembered from having read it twenty+ years ago, but there certainly aren't any characters in it I'd want to get to know in person.

From the Back Cover:

At one time they had been called tailors. Peder's father had been a tailor. And on Peder's home world -- as indeed on many worlds of the Ziode Cluster -- they were still referred to as tailors. But that was because in Ziode vestments did not have the esteem that, in Peder's view, they deserved. He, like others of his ilk, called himself a sartorial, and his was not a trade but a profession.

Twice before he had been privileged to handle garments from that strange, clothes-conscious civilization, Caean -- a damasked gipon and a simple flowered cravat -- but even then he had been captivated, entranced, and had realized that all the legends concerning Caean were true...

In Caean clothes were not merely an adornment but a philosophy, a way of life -- the way of life. Even Peder Forbarth knew that he failed to grasp the fullness of this philosophy. In the Ziode cluster, the covering of the body was of no importance and it was even sanctioned to go naked. But despite any amount of official disapproval, the love of clothing -- one of man's oldest arts -- flourished, and Caeanic articles were recognized for the consummate, sublime treasures that they were ... and very few of them had ever crossed the black gulf of light years...

... At first he doubted his judgment; but then, feeling the forbidden material, its texture that seemed to bring the nerves and blood more alive than before, the dazzling twills, damasks, displays, and culverts into which it could be woven, he decided there could be no other explanation. This was the fabled fabric which no one in Ziode was absolutely sure existed. And Peder Forbarth now owned an entire suit of it.

From the front flap:

Peder is not just a tailor, but a "sartorial" -- a lowly trade that has now been elevated to an incredibly high standard. Sartorials compete fiercely in creating new apparel, and Peder has heard that the greatest of them all are in the Caeanic worlds, where clothing is a way of life and a philosophy of living.

In Peder's sector, though, Caeanic clothing is prohibited, and he has fallen in with a band of pirates attempting to salvage a Caeanic freighter. In splitting the loot -- clothes -- Peder cleverly spot a legendary suit, one of five in the entire galaxy, and walks off with it. And no sooner does he put it on than his personality changes; he becomes self-assured, clever, successful -- it almost seems as though the suit of clothes is wearing him!

A whimsical tale of a suit of clothes that really makes the man...