The novel “To Live Forever”, later reprinted as “Clarges”, by Jack Vance was published for the first time in 1956.
Gavin Waylock has been keeping a very low profile for years waiting to be able to assert what he believes to be his rights. In Carnevalle, the only place where the inhabitants of Clarges can relax and forget for a while the very tough competition to achieve immortality, Waylock meets an Amaranth woman, The Jacynth Martin, who could ruin his plans. An apparent accident causes her death, only temporarily because a new body with which the woman had empathized is activated.
When the Amaranth known as The Grayven Warlock is officially declared dead, Gavin Waylock can come out and declare himself his relic, a clone who has become a separate person because the original didn’t establish the empathy with him necessary to make him a replacement. However, The Jacynth Martin is investigating her own death and believes that Waylock is the culprit, complicating the man’s plans.
Creating societies with customs and laws that can be truly peculiar was Jack Vance’s trademark. This is also true in “To Live Forever” and in this novel, the author explores the consequences of those laws more than ever. It’s set in a future in which the Earth has been devastated by famine and war due to uncontrolled population growth.
Clarges is the only region in the world where civilization survives, but the fear of a new catastrophe has pushed the inhabitants to accept very strict laws to avoid overpopulation. In the social order created in Clarges, it’s possible to obtain immortality for special merits, but only citizens who prove to be the best in their field can reach the level called Amaranth.
Jack Vance shows the dark sides of Clarges society by following Gavin Waylock’s attempts to return to being an Amaranth after claiming to be the relic of an Amaranth known as The Grayven Warlock, who had been sentenced to death for a murder. The competition to reach the level of Amaranth is very tough, and a good part of the novel concerns the mental disorders that many people suffer from as a consequence. Waylock thinks he can advance in the social levels by excelling in psychiatry and sees up close people who have been mentally destroyed by that competition.
Gavin Waylock is cynical and ruthless in pursuing his plans but this is irrelevant in a society like the one of Clarges, at least until he’s discovered breaking some law. The protagonist is an anti-hero who tries to achieve his goal in any way, even trying to obtain political power, a way for Jack Vance to show this side of that society. Again, Waylock is ready to use any trick but it doesn’t seem to be a big problem because he lives in a society where his antagonists don’t seem better than him from an ethical and moral point of view.
Jack Vance was a master of adventurous science fiction but “To Live Forever” is much closer to social science fiction, although interpreted with the author’s inimitable and very personal style. In his own way, Vance shows the struggle to conquer immortality and the consequences that the stress it involves can have on the inhabitants of Clarges. Carnevalle is a place where transgression is allowed and represents a sort of relief valve but for some people that’s not enough to bear the rot of Clarges society.
“To Live Forever” has become a classic in which Jack Vance gives his best in a story that is sometimes disturbing in the description of the truly dark sides of Clarges society. For this reason, in my opinion, it remains a must-read novel. It’s available on Amazon USA, UK, and Canada.
