To Your Scattered Bodies Go (Book 1 of Riverworld)

I finished reading To Your Scattered Bodies Go (Book 1 of Riverworld) by Philip Jose Farmer.📚

An unknown entity resurrected the whole of the human race on a unique planet consisting only of a river. They provide food and other necessary items by a special device each day. What will happen?

I’ve started rereading the Riverworld series. After a discussion about where we heard first about Esperanto. I’m not sure if I ever read the first issue. I have the suspicion that I only read some later issues.

I feel the age of the book. It was written in a different period. Or perhaps part of this is also just the perspective of our main protagonist Sir Richard Burton. I’m bothered by how the author handles women in this book. They seem only to be present to give the men enjoyment. I also find the actions of the first night highly questionable and unrealistic. When being resurrected from death, I don’t think your first instinct would be to have sex with any random person you happen to be restored next to.

On the other hand, the author explores a fascinating concept in the series. To which I’m still hooked. How can humans live together when they don’t need to fight for food each day. What could they achieve together?

I liked the scene where they were discussing the question of whether the resurrected persons are the original humans from earth or just a copy with all the original memories.

I think this part showed the concept of a soul very nicely, and I understood the concept for the first time. It feels hard to write this here, but I think it opened my eyes to how this should work. As before, I was pretty indifferent to the idea of a soul. If a soul would exist and be attached to the copy, then it would not be a copy — as the soul does never die and contains the identity of the being.

I hope the series will start looking at different themes and defocus on sexual fantasies. I think they are not really needed.

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• /riverworld
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