The Story of B by Daniel Quinn is the second book in the
Ishmael series. This story is another piece of the "Where did we (society) go wrong puzzle?". While
Ishmael focused on our current society being a culmination of the last 10,000 years of history and how that culture differs from the other indigenous cultures;
The Story of B looks at the problem from the viewpoint of the spiritual and our disconnect from it. After having read
The Story of B, I now realize that I can summarize
Ishmael better. I just re-read my review on
Ishmael so I wouldn't repeat myself. I am a bit shocked that you, my dear readers, let me get away with such a 'non-review'.
So,
Ishmael in a paragraph - Defining Mother Culture. Our current society has arisen from a cradle of civilization roughly 10,000 years ago. It came about as a result of totalitarian agriculture which fixed us to one place and created the need for other skills based on farming and trade. Mother Culture tells us that this is the only way to live and that there is only pre-history before this. Ishmael shows us that there are other cultures that were present before 'civilization' and are still in existence today. Examples would have been Native Americans prior to the European settlers, and currently indigenous peoples such as the Aborigine. What they value is so different from what our Culture values that we think of them as non-people.
Ishmael also shows us that their way of doing things is a way that worked for them for hundreds of thousands of years - and our way is collapsing after only 10,000.
The Story of B looks at the spiritual aspect of what Mother Culture has told us over the last 10,000 years versus what the other indigenous cultures already know spiritually. I'm using the word "spiritually" sort of loosely to connote an idea rather than spirituality in the way we think of things as organized religion. B was a student of Ishmael's who has gone out into Europe, in a sort of underground manner trying to recruit people to this way of thinking. At the very least, to make them aware of the problem. Because as we all know, we need to identify the problem before we can find a solution. I liked it and I didn't. First, I'll start with why I didn't like it.
This book is again a collection of non-fiction ideas told in a fictional setting. However, this time, it is not a telling style like
Ishmael. It is a combination of journal entries and speech transcripts. I found this difficult to keep up with because the speech would be referred to in a journal entry, but was actually written in an appendix. At first, I skipped the speeches and kept reading the journal entries, but found that I was missing out on some key elements. Then I had to go the appendix and read those speeches I missed and going forward, had to flip back and forth between entries and speeches to know what was going on. Mr. Quinn should have just put the speeches in the body of work as it was referred to.
The other aspect I didn't like was that the learning character was a Roman Catholic priest who was sent by the Church to determine if B was the Antichrist, was having a crisis of faith before this started and it pushed him over. Being a Roman Catholic myself, I did not have a crisis of faith over learning these new concepts. He gave up too easily and didn't follow apologetics in any way to really sort of prove or disprove B's support of animism. Animism says that there is not one God, but rather gods of nature living in communion with each other infused throughout all living things - people, plants, animals, earth. This story emphasizes that salvationist religions are useless and we are on the wrong path with them.
What I did like was how it took
Ishmael's concepts are far as culture and expanded them. While
Ishmael looked at the role of historic culture, this book looked at the role of modern culture and the lies we continue to tell ourselves in the name of technology, capitalism, expansion, democracy, government, and so forth.
I would recommend this book only because it takes these ideas further and it is a trilogy. You can't read one and three and get the whole idea. The characters from one book aren't dependent on another book and neither is the plot - but the ideas are. So, my suggestion would be to read the speeches as they are referred to, instead of at the end. If you are person with substantial faith, do not be put off by the references to religions. Just recognize that he is putting forth his idea and doesn't, in my opinion, have to sway you away from your spiritual belief system.
Soon, a review on
My Ishmael, the third installment.
