The Survivors aka Space Prison by Tom Godwin

The Survivors aka Space Prison by Tom Godwin (Italian edition)
The Survivors aka Space Prison by Tom Godwin (Italian edition)

The novel “The Survivors”, later republished as “Space Prison”, by Tom Godwin was published for the first time in 1958.

The starship Constellation carries 8,000 people from Earth who have the task of founding a colony on the planet Athena. During the journey, the Gern Empire begins a war against Earth and the Constellation is attacked by far superior alien forces, forcing the Captain to surrender.

Crew and settlers are taken prisoner. The humans deemed useful are taken away by the Gerns to work for them while the others are abandoned on the planet Ragnarok. Few natural resources, ferocious animals, and gravity 1.5 times the Earth’s gravity will test the resistance of the humans to the extreme.

Tom Godwin was a decidedly not very prolific writer as he only wrote three novels in his career. “The Survivors” is his first novel and remained his most famous. He started writing science fiction in the early 1950s, when adventure stories were still dominant in science fiction magazines.

“The Survivors” mixes the theme of the clash with an alien species with that of survival in a very difficult environment, in this case not after a shipwreck but after being abandoned. A few thousand humans who were supposed to colonize the planet Athena end up on the planet Ragnarok instead, where the environmental conditions seem to have been made to kill them.

The story unfolds over a very long period, recounting the efforts of entire generations to survive the many pitfalls of Ragnarok. The meaning of the novel lies in the ability of human beings to adapt to even the most difficult conditions. Some parts seem a little naive like the fact that children adjust to Ragnarok’s gravity as if it were an evolutionary leap. In general, however, the adaptation is the result of intelligence and the desire to take revenge over the Gerns even after centuries. As is typical of science fiction of the time, the Gerns are evil aliens and want to enslave humans, at least the ones who have skills that make them useful, otherwise they abandon them on planets like Ragnarok, where they are supposed to die quickly.

The length of the novel is very limited by today’s standards, so Tom Godwin focuses on important events, and there are often leaps forward in time, even decades. This makes the pace fast with considerable intensity and tension because the characters are practically always in danger. Even the important characters are present only in a part of the story but have at least a fair characterization.

“The Survivors” has some characteristics typical of the era in which it was written. The adventurous component is dominant, there’s an exaltation of indomitable human beings with their ability to adapt to very difficult situations to face cruel aliens, and it’s better not to analyze the technical and scientific side. If all this is not a problem, it’s a novel that makes the most of certain elements of a classic type of science fiction that is a little naive but with a great sense-of-wonder. That’s why it has become a classic of that type of science fiction and can still ensure a pleasant read.

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