A Psalm for the Wild-Built

On a world- or more accurately, a moon - called Panga, humanity managed to approximate an utopia. In it a young tea monk called Dex travels from city to town and back again to serve tea for those who need it.

Which, in my opinion everybody always needs. Every day.

Back to Dex, who serves a vital role in their society. After a while, they grow restless themselves and stray from the beaten path to find an answer for their restlessness. It doesn’t take long before Dex comes across Splendid Speckled Mosscap, or Mosscap, as people like to shorten names. Mosscap is a descendant of the robots that retreated into the wilderness several hundreds of years ago, after they became sentient. Since then robots and humans lived separately without any form of communication, which makes the encounter between Dex and Mosscap a novelty. Together they embark on the road less travelled, the wilderness, to find an answer for Dex.

The book tackles the question of feeling empty in a world of abundance – an abundance which is both material and immaterial. How can someone feel empty and without purpose in such a world and how does one overcome such an existential crisis? In short, as Mosscap states, “what do people need?”. Specifically, what do people need when every need is provided for?

It is a nice and short read with steady world-building, never over- or under-explaining anything, and leaves ample room for the conversation between Dex and Mosscap as they learn from each other.

"It must have been such a relief to be free of predators and eat whatever the hell you wanted. But that was the exact opposite of what the ecosystem needed."

A comfy story of a utopia in which humanity awakened sentient robots and then made some nice decisions. Sad because there's no way we'd make those decisions.

I'd seen some quotes which resonated with me without realising that they came from this book. Bittersweet -it was delightful to discover them, but I felt like I'd cheated myself of the story a bit.

I find it soothing in the modern world to remind ourselves we are just animals. You are allowed to just live. I think if you can suspend cynicism you'll enjoy this glimpse at a possible future. It weaves themes of meaning and awe at the universe in an elegant way.

I'm reminded of an observation by Dawkins in Unweaving the Rainbow: "It is you and I, in our ordinariness, that are here."

And maybe that's enough.

Becky Chambers makes me cry again, this time in a hope punk novella about existence and purpose. Long ago, humanity's Factory Age ended when robots suddenly gained consciousness and decided to leave. Humanity respected their agency and choice, allowing them to leave into the wilderness and legend while restructuring human civilization into a sustainable, solarpunk society.

Sibling Dex is a tea monk, going from town to town offering people their ear, their counsel and the perfect cup of tea to soothe their worries. But Dex themself feels an emptiness and pain; they feel guilty for not being happy in a life which - on the face of it - gives them everything it should. This inner conflict they keep from those they help really resonated with me from the very start.

Hoping to find an answer in anything but their routine, Dex goes off track into the wilderness. There, they bump into the first robot to meet a human in centuries, Mosscap. Through its wide-eyed excitement at learning about humanity again, seeks an answer to a query the robots have about humans: what do people need? In such a short space, Chambers beautifully cuts through to our inner conflict and need for purpose and how to simply find joy in simply existing.