Review: Draw me After by Peter Cole

Abstract

Wealthy and powerful, thanks to this magical silver, Britain has amped up its colonial program by the 1830s, focusing especially on China, due to its silver. As Robin and his friends eventually learn, China's resistance to Britain's pursuit of its silver through opium trafficking (Kuang's reference to the Opium Wars of the mid-nineteenth century) will eventually lead to war, which Britain will likely win. Robin, Ramy, and Victoire are especially concerned because they see themselves as pawns in this colonial game, used for their fluency in Chinese, Arabic, Kreyol, and other languages. As natives of China and India, Robin and Ramy resent how differently they are treated by white Britons (Victoire, as a black Frenchwoman, feels the same). Robin soon meets a half-brother he never knew he had-one who works for a clandestine organization that siphons off Babel translators to work against the British colonial program. Griffin insists that violent resistance is the answer and eventually steers Robin to the same conclusion, one that will (as Robin admits) disproportionately hurt lower-and middle-class Britons who won't be able to escape their cities once sanitation collapses, bridges fall, and food can no longer find its way to markets. The goal, though, is to stop Britain's secret planned invasion of China-planned, that is, by the heads of Babel and not the British government (think India and the British East India Company). Babel is creative in its exploration of the power of language and how translators can be used both to bring the people of the world together and to exploit other countries in pursuit of colonialist domination. Nonetheless , the novel often becomes bogged down in discussions about exploitation and injustice that would be better communicated by a more dynamic plot. The footnotes that Kuang includes are interesting asides, except when they, once again, tell instead of show. Ultimately, Babel offers an intriguing take on an Industrial Revolution driven by silver and language, and its fluid mix of actual and fictional history make it a compelling read.