Pern Appreciation Month: The White Dragon

(The first part of this book was published as a chapbook entitled “A Time When” in 1975. I’ve managed to procure some copies of early versions of the novels and stories in this series for when it was relevant, but due to my parents not being named Rockefeller I was unable to obtain this.)

This was Anne McCaffrey’s breakout novel. It was also the first “proper” science fiction novel to make it to the New York Times Bestseller Charts.

It focuses on Jaxom, Lord Holder of Ruatha Hold. Way back in Dragonflight, his birth stopped Lessa from taking her birthright back and instead set her on the path to becoming the rider of the golden dragon Ramoth and the partner of F’lar, the leader of Benden Weyr and, by extension, of Pern itself.

Jaxom also, in Dragonquest, Impressed the “sport” dragon, white Ruth. Considered a freak by many of Jaxom’s peers, Ruth is smaller than the other dragons on Pern but also appears to be smarter than them as well.

It’s Jaxom who is the main character of this book, although Robinton, the Masterharper of Pern, also gives us his viewpoint for a large chunk of it, too.

Plotwise, it’s a mess. In terms of what’s happening on Pern and with our favourite characters, though, it’s an absolute delight.

It starts with Jaxom being allowed to fly on Ruth. As a Lord Holder, Jaxom cannot be a dragonrider, as it is too dangerous an occupation for him. However, he does have a dragon and must consider its needs as well. Ruth is very keen to learn how to fly and fight the insidious parasite Thread, so the frustrations that Jaxom feels are shared by his mount.

At any rate, Jaxom and Ruth become involved in many adventures that shape the future of Pern – like a lot of Anne McCaffrey’s longer novels, it feels as though we get a series of adventures that are loosely linked by the main character rather than a “proper” novel. But what these adventures have in common is that they show us Jaxom growing up and becoming somebody mature enough to win the respect of others and, most importantly, of himself.

We also get glimpses of how technology is changing things on Pern. Fandarel, the Mastersmith, was a minor but important character in Dragonquest, but here he manages to become a full-on secondary character, with his insistence on developing technology in order for life to become more “efficient,” as he is fond of saying. We also learn more about Wansor, an astronomer who also appeared in Dragonquest, who has developed a cottage industry in astronomy because of its importance to the daily lives of the average Pernese citizens, who need to be protected from the ravages of the Red star.

But this is one of the more controversial novels in the series, though, and it’s largely because of Corana. She is the sister of a minor holder (a tenant farmer) who tithes to Jaxom in Ruatha. Jaxom first meets Corana while touring some farms as part of his administrative duties then embarks on an affair with her, partly because he’s attracted to her but partly so he and Ruth can practice chewing firestone and breathing fire so they can take part in Threadfall.

Corana seems to be a willing partner in this but we need to remember that a) Jaxom holds the power of life and death over her family and b) when Jaxom meets Sharra, a Healer who he later marries, she is forgotten about and discarded for plot reasons.

His seduction of her (in the very old-fashioned sense of the word) does have more than a touch of “droit de seigneur” about it, as does his cavalier treatment of her which does make you want to slap Jaxom a bit. But in the 1970s, that was how male characters treated female characters in romance and high literature. Go read a few of the acclaimed novels of the time if you don’t believe me. I’m not saying it’s right or proper, just that this was how things were written about in 1978. At any rate, the novels and stories in the series following this take a far more modern approach to human relationships and have a lot fewer complaints about them.

Anyway, Jaxom becomes instrumental in discovering the landing site of the Ancients, the original colonists of Pern. While recovering from an illness on the Southern Continent and then staying on to help in the construction of a new home for Robinton (who has suffered a heart attack and must retire from his duties and recuperate), Jaxom experiences extraordinarily vivid dreams brought about by Ruth communicating telepathically with the local fire lizards. This leads him to discover a long-abandoned site that – when uncovered – reveals the original site that the colonists from Earth landed at and set up as their new home.

Amidst all of this uproar, though, Jaxom has begun his romance with Sharra, who is then detained by her brother Toric, who has plans for Sharra that don’t involve her being married to someone he can’t control or isn’t a part of his own plans. But the book ends with Jaxom and Sharra reunited and married and with Jaxom, who is confirmed (formally recognised) as a Lord Holder as well.

This is an absolutely jam-packed novel. While it appears to deal with a lot of issues that arose during Dragonquest (notably, what to do with the Oldtimers, the dragonriders who willingly came forward in time to help fight Thread but turned into a bigger problem on their own) and brings up some new ones.

There’s also a few character issues that arise. For instance, Piemur (last seen in Dragonsinger) has mysteriously wound up in the Southern Continent and has a queen fire lizard. It’s a long way for him to have travelled, physically and emotionally, from the cheeky lad we last saw in the Harperhall. Mirrim (last seen in Dragonsong) has Impressed a green dragon in this book. While she’s still loyal and assertive, McCaffrey appears to have taken a lot of the softer edges off her, turning her into an insufferable, tactless harridan in this book (which is sad because she’s the first woman in centuries, it would appear, to Impress a non-queen dragon). Fortunately, she improves in later novels, but we don’t get any “softening” or nuance from her like we did in her last two appearances.

Then there’s Toric, a character who appears to go through a similar arc to Jaxom in this book, though without any of the positive traits Jaxom develops. We met him first in Dragonquest, where he was a very minor character who had travelled with F’nor to make the original settlement in the Southern Continent. At the start of this novel, he appears to be in charge of things in Southern Hold (as it’s known) because Robinton takes him to meet F’lar and Lessa to discuss settling folks from the crowded Holds of the Northern Continent to the Southern. By novel’s end he appears to have settled in as an ambitious and somewhat amoral character, but he will come truly into his own in later books.

Oh, and Menolly has Impressed a tenth fire lizard, completely by accident, we learn.

A lot of these issues will be addressed in the next book, but it was indeed a novel twist to present them to us as developments without the audience being aware of them. I honestly love it: it shows us more than anything else that things have changed on Pern and that time has moved on in the novels. McCaffrey does that a fair bit; introducing background details that become quite important several books down the track. It’s a counterpoint that I frequently use when I come across people who just think she writes potboilers or bodice-rippers. I mean, there is definitely an element of that in the books, but there’s a lot more if you care to go and look for it as well.

Coming Up Next: Piemur, The Missing Years… I mean, Dragondrums.