{"id":1340,"date":"2020-01-16T23:06:07","date_gmt":"2020-01-17T05:06:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lfs.org\/blog\/?p=1340"},"modified":"2025-05-05T23:10:32","modified_gmt":"2025-05-06T04:10:32","slug":"an-appreciation-of-ken-macleods-the-stone-canal-the-1998-prometheus-best-novel-winner","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/an-appreciation-of-ken-macleods-the-stone-canal-the-1998-prometheus-best-novel-winner\/","title":{"rendered":"Identity, anarchy, robots with rights and space colonization: An Appreciation of Ken MacLeod\u2019s The Stone Canal, the 1998 Prometheus Best Novel winner"},"content":{"rendered":"

To make clear why past winners deserve recognition as pro-freedom or anti-authoritarian sf\/fantasy and how each fits our award, we’ve published review-essays of all past Prometheus Award-winners. Here\u2019s the latest Appreciation for Ken MacLeod’s\u00a0The Stone Canal<\/em>, the 1998 Best Novel winner:<\/p>\n

By Michael Grossberg<\/p>\n

Ken MacLeod\u2019s\u00a0The Stone Canal\u00a0<\/i>ranges widely in its exploration of different political systems on different planets in a future marked by wars, revolutions, space colonization and a cyberworld in which people\u2019s memories and personalities can be downloaded or uploading to clones on demand.
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\nAmong the many exciting ideas that MacLeod explores in his ambitious 1997 novel\u00a0\u2013 Book 2 in his Fall Revolution series, but set earlier than The Cassini Division\u00a0<\/i>– are several of special interest to libertarian sf fans \u2013 including his complex and ambiguous depiction of capitalist anarchy on Earth, how free markets might develop on a terraformed planet in another solar system and the possibility of independent robots with individual rights.<\/p>\n

The settings are far-flung, too, from 20th\u00a0<\/sup>century Scotland to a 21st\u00a0<\/sup>century extra-solar planet called New Mars with a free market. It\u2019s a \u00a0future of longer life-spans but also new kinds of death.<\/p>\n


\nMacLeod\u2019s story also imagines the problems and challenges in determining identity, basic rights and ownership \u2013 i.e. basic meta-foundational libertarian questions – when more than one copy of a personality can be downloaded into working infrastructure.<\/p>\n

At the center of one pivotal thread of the post-Singularity story is an anarchist stranger, a clone who arrives on Mars with nuclear capability and memories of his life on Earth as Jonathan Wilde, when he was accused of losing World War III.<\/p>\n

But the characters reflect the motley tapestry of a complex and messy future, from Marxist mercenaries and Abolitionists to uploaded \u201cFast Folk,\u201d robotic copies, old loves, old enemies, sex slaves and anarcho-capitalist escaped slaves living in a new republic in a high-tech city in another solar system.<\/p>\n

Full of kaleidoscopic literary and historical references, the novel is also a mystery with pieces of its puzzle in both the fragmented societies of the future and the past.<\/p>\n

The stranger\u2019s Wilde and wild memories explore an intriguing friendship forged over radical politics and ideological differences with David Reid, an old college buddy from 1970s Glasgow. Their relationship, strained by a centuries-old rivalry over politics and the affections of a woman, changes their lives and history.<\/p>\n

Few sf writers blend imaginative cyberpunk hard-sf futures, a fast-paced and unpredictable plot and a vivid assortment of evolving, changing characters with such a fascinating blend of social, political and economic speculation.<\/p>\n

In this work and other novels in his fascinating and sophisticated future-history series, MacLeod weaves in thought-provoking and plausible speculations about free will, consciousness, immortality through cloning, and the perennially fraught future of capitalism, socialism, anarchy and corporate responsibility.<\/p>\n

ABOUT KEN MACLEOD<\/strong><\/p>\n

Note: MacLeod also won Prometheus Awards for Best Novel for The Star Fraction\u00a0<\/i>in 1996 and Learning the World\u00a0<\/i><\/a>in 2006.<\/p>\n

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Ken MacLeod<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

His Prometheus Best Novel finalists include The Cassini Division\u00a0<\/i>(2000), The Sky Road <\/i>(2001), Dark Light\u00a0<\/i>(2003), Newton\u2019s Wake\u00a0<\/i>(2005), The Execution Channel <\/i>(2008), The Restoration Game\u00a0<\/i>(2012), The Corporation Wars: Dissidence\u00a0<\/i>(2017), The Corporation Wars: Insurgence\u00a0<\/i>(2017) and The Corporation Wars: Emergence\u00a0<\/i>(2018).<\/p>\n

* Read our previous Appreciation<\/a><\/strong> for Ken MacLeod\u2019s The Star Fraction<\/em>, the 1996 Prometheus Best Novel winner.<\/p>\n

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IF YOU WANT TO KNOW MORE<\/b><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

* See related introductory essay<\/a>\u00a0<\/strong>about the LFS\u2019 40th<\/sup>anniversary retrospective series of Appreciations of past Prometheus Awards winners, with an overview of the awards\u2019 four-decade history.<\/p>\n

* Other Prometheus winners:\u00a0<\/strong>For a full list of winners \u2013 for the annual Best Novel and Best Classic Fiction (Hall of Fame) categories and occasional Special Awards \u2013 visit the recently updated and enhanced Prometheus Awards page<\/a>\u00a0<\/strong>on the LFS website.<\/p>\n

* Join us<\/strong>! To help sustain the Prometheus Awards, join<\/strong><\/a> the Libertarian Futurist Society (LFS), a non-profit volunteer association of libertarian sf\/fantasy fans and freedom-lovers.
\nLibertarian futurists believe cultural change is as vital as political change (and often more fun!) in achieving universal individual rights and a better world (perhaps eventually, worlds) for all.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

To make clear why past winners deserve recognition as pro-freedom or anti-authoritarian sf\/fantasy and how each fits our award, we’ve published review-essays of all past Prometheus Award-winners. Here\u2019s the latest Appreciation for Ken MacLeod’s\u00a0The Stone Canal, the 1998 Best Novel winner: By Michael Grossberg Ken MacLeod\u2019s\u00a0The Stone Canal\u00a0ranges widely in its exploration of different political … Continue reading Identity, anarchy, robots with rights and space colonization: An Appreciation of Ken MacLeod\u2019s The Stone Canal, the 1998 Prometheus Best Novel winner<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[43,159,2205,2605],"tags":[284,278,279,274,285,281,225,152,109,277,283,275,282,280,276,286,260],"class_list":["post-1340","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-appreciations","category-best-novels","category-ken-macleod","category-sequels","tag-abolitionists","tag-anarchy","tag-capitalism","tag-cyberpunk","tag-free-markets","tag-human-rights","tag-identity","tag-ken-macleod","tag-libertarianism","tag-mars","tag-marxism","tag-revolution","tag-singularity","tag-socialism","tag-space-colonies","tag-terraformed-planet","tag-the-stone-canal"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pe8nGl-lC","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1340","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1340"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1340\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6820,"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1340\/revisions\/6820"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1340"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1340"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1340"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}