City of Truth

1992 Nebula Award. Funny in the beginning, Sad at the end. Cool how he makes you think that this cold Utopia is such a terrible thing but then you realize that lying, even to make someone feel better, is bad too.

An interesting (and unlikely) follow-up to "Being Mortal," this early science fiction novella by James Morrow tackles the issue of how truthful to be to someone who is dying (in this case, the main character's young son). Though it is rough around the edges and does not delve deeply into character

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(that's not the point), I thought Morrow did a pretty good job of balancing the humorous aspects of a "City of Truth" (Veritas, the vera-city) (where no one lies by order of law and psychological conditioning), the moral and emotional issues of honesty and fabrication, and the tragic circumstance of losing someone you love (yes, truly love).

Another unexpected treat, considering I started this on December 25...Christmas makes an appearance in the story (the holiday with the clearest challenge to parental honesty), and Santa even makes an appearance.

If you haven't read Morrow's Godhead trilogy, you have a treat in store.

Now I find myself intrigued by another of his titles: The Continent of Lies.

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I love James Morrow's work, and while this book is probably my least favorite so far, it was still excellent. Alternately heart-wrenching and hilarious.

City of Truth is a novella set in Veritas, a city where everyone is completely candid all the time and lying is a taboo that causes them physical pain. But when Jack Sperry's son Toby gets diagnosed with a rare illness, he pins all of his hopes on the idea that if they deceive Toby into thinking

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he's not sick, he won't succumb to the disease.

The book half-worked for me. Veritas is clearly written as a satire, but I couldn't connect it to anything "real" (no real-world groups lobbying for unflinching honesty all the time) so the cleverness of that fell flat. I would have actually liked more exposition on the situation; characters allude to a past "Age of Lies" where advertising was deceptive and people could lie with impugnity, and maybe more explanation would have helped me understand Morrow's point to all of this.

However, beneath the construction of this world is a small story about a father coping with the illness and imminent loss of his son. Jack is a desperate father, who gives up his most cherished values and almost his whole life, that his son may not suffer in his illness. So the most meaningful lies in the book are the harmless ones which help us grieve and find solace in dark hours, when people can't quite face a difficult situation fully.

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According to Kant, human beings occupy a special place in creation, and morality can be summed up in one ultimate commandment of reason, or imperative, from which all duties and obligations derive. Known as the categorical imperative, it denotes an absolute, unconditional requirement that asserts

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its authority in all circumstances, both required and justified as an end in itself. It is best known in its first formulation: Act only according to that maxim whereby you can, at the same time, will that it should become a universal law. Based on this Kant asserted that lying, or deception of any kind, would be forbidden under any interpretation and in any circumstance.
Imagine a city, let us call it Veritas, where all human adults are conditioned so that they cannot tell a lie. This is the premise of James Morrow's novel City of Truth, otherwise known as Veritas. In it he explores the implications of this for Veritas society. Some of the results are very funny, as any kind of dishonesty or unsubstantiated claims are impossible. So you have cars with such names as the "Ford Sufficient" and "Plymouth Adequate", a restaurant offering "Murdered Cow Sandwich with Wilted Hearts Lettuce and High-Cholesterol Fries", a morning TV programme called "Enduring Another Day", a "Camp Ditch-The-Kids" summer camp, the "Centre for Palliative Treatment of Hopeless Diseases" and (my favourite) an illuminated sign on the cathedral: "Assuming God Exists, Jesus May Have Been His Son". The effect on interpersonal relationships is indicated by the vow at a traditional wedding ceremony: "To have and to hold, to love and to cherish, to the degree that these mischievous and sentimental abstractions possess any meaning." All those little "white lies" and "lies by omission" which lubricate relationships in our world are impossible, so a degree of frankness which we would consider brutally rude is the norm.
The protagonist of this novella, Jack Sperry, leads a simple straightforward life as a "deconstructionist", one who destroys works of art (all basically lies) for his living. His daily life in Veritas is one which is based only on the truth: "There are no metaphors in Veritas"(p 5). He takes his adequate car to his job "at the Wittgenstein Museum in Plato Borough, giving illusion its due."(p 2) When his son Toby, who is away for the summer at "Camp Ditch-the-Kids", is bit by a Rabbit and contracts a fatal disease Jack's life is turned upside-down in more ways than one. His story is a more a fable, a satirical view of the unintended consequences of being unable to lie and the way that humans who can lie deal with the accidents of living. Filled with humorous notions, phrases, and moments that create mental double-takes for the reader this novella is a delight in both its lightness and heaviness (apologies to Milan Kundera). There are lies that we tell ourselves to help us deal with the world, but this story imagines a city where you cannot do that. It is unpleasant and humorous at the same time, but, like a philosophic thought experiment, sometimes it is the best way to illustrate a complicated philosophical concept in the context of a story or situation.
James Morrow has a reputation of presenting big ideas in clever ways (for an example read his Towing Jehovah). Morrow's style has been likened to Vonnegut's, but this wry little story reminded me of Swift. City of Truth is clever in ways that will leave you thinking about the meaning of life and the nature of truth for a long time after you finish reading the book.

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Speculative fiction, I guess, but more concerned with literary experimentation than the scientific kind. Still, Morrow plays it admirably straight here, and the results are hilarious. I'd like a Plymouth Adequate of my own, in fact. You could, I suppose, criticize this book by saying that he mixes

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up the concepts of personal honesty and rationalist accuracy, and you'd be right: has any scientist ever argued that you should offer your honest opinion about everyone and everything you see? Still, "City of Truth" also succeeds in demonstrating exactly how much of real life is made up of tactful silences, white lies, and euphemism and how necessary these things are to our psychological survival. It's also, as others have mentioned, terribly sad at the end, but Morrow essentially forces his readers to consider the potential virtues of the cheerless dystopia he constructed in the book's first half. A very neat trick indeed.

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A novella that packs a lot in its 160 pages. Enjoyable, humorous, smart, and heartbreaking, and that's the truth.

1992 Nebula Award winner

A story that is both satire and brulat at the same time.

Amusing tale about the Veritas, the city where everyone is compelled to speak the truth. And no lying by omission, either. As the narrator points out after many awkward social moment, it's tough to be a citizen.

Despite milking the truth-in-advertising gag for all it's worth, I think Morrow missed a

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narrative opportuniy here. The Dissemblers, for of course there are some, could have supported the narrator's campaign to save his son via the Placebo Effect in order to create some effective nti-Veritas propaganda. Think of it: a subversive campaign to win hearts and minds by proving that Lying Saves Lives.

Instead, well, we're left with a rather underwhelming resolution.

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Thanks to brutal electro-shock treatments at adolescence, no one in the city of Veritas can tell a lie. For the first part of this short novel, this is used to satirize advertising and branding, very much in the model of classic Galaxy magazine. Then the story shifts into more emotional territory

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as the main character gains a very personal and sad reason for needing to be able to lie. As with the old Galaxy novels, it's not clear how we might get from here to there, but once the premise is established, it's handled well.

Recommended as a good example of Morrow's ability to mix satire, humor, and pathos. A good counterpoint to his longer historical novels such as The Last Witchfinder.

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