this post was submitted on 22 Dec 2023
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I think it's definitely one of those series that looks worse in hindsight - and when we're adults - than it did in the 90s. But like... it's one thing to write a society that, due to external factors, has a definite class system, but quite another for the author to reinforce it through their choices - like defaulting to only gold and bronze dragons being worth anything. There were many parts of the narrative where a rider didn't need a bronze/gold dragon for story reasons (would the events of Dolphins of Pern have been any different if T'lion's dragon had been green or blue rather than bronze? Would Menolly's story have been any less compelling if the majority of her firelizards had been green or blue, rather than a largely ignored minority?), so the choice to make sure that a character who is supposed to be sympathetic has the "best" dragon/firelizard colour is very much classism on the author's part, albeit through the metaphor of an alien species with a caste system.
Agreed. I mostly ignored all of those aspects as part of "suspension of disbelief"... and probably read the books too fast to really reflect on much of the stuff. Also read some of them translated, and others in English while still learning it, so probably missed a lot of the nuances both ways.
With hindsight, what I think looks the worst, is learning that she would C&D anyone for not interpreting them "the right way". That's low.
Yep! Especially since most of the people she was threatening were kids. I know there was at least one person, slightly older, who fought it and the matter went to court. I've always wondered what the judge thought, having to make a decision regarding an old lady suing a 20-something woman over fictional dragons being depicted in the "wrong" way. The fan won the case, probably because the whole thing was ridiculous.