This series focuses on stories that are both enjoyable and do something that I find interesting from a technical perspective. This week, let’s do some listening.
Theodicy (A.K.A. The Problem of Evil) is a word coined by Leibniz for use as a shorthand way of describing the question of why evil exists in the world from a Christian perspective.* Theological disputes are difficult to work into a story without completely killing its momentum, but, if done subtly, they add a fascinating complexity.
The Last Listener, by Eric Cline and published in New Myths, is, on the surface, a story of bureaucracies, murder, unintended consequences, and well-founded general paranoia. It’s a wonderfully believable tale of what governments would do with rare, emotionally damaged telepaths that unfolds into a blistering analysis of the nature of God with its last few lines. And, using an older meaning of the word “pray,” I suppose it’s also a warning to the reader to be careful to whom you pray.
Cline does an excellent job of burying all of that in the story, though. Readers less inclined to consider Christian philosophical disputes could read the story, enjoy it for what it is, and walk away without having to stop to pry the rhetorical hammer out of their heads. There’s no smashing of the fourth wall, nor any author filibusters; just a clever story that asks interesting questions about the nature of power.
*This question is less vexing in other philosophical traditions. For instance, Buddhists would respond, “Of course the world stinks. Suffering is fundamental to existence.” On the other hand, Discordians would say, “If nobody likes it when everyone suffers, why don’t they stop making each other suffer?”