However, reality proves to more complicated and less romantic. At the beginning of the story, Dirk is again attempting to impose an idealistic story - that Gwen wants him back, but is being held captive by the brutish Jaan Vikkary, from whom he must rescue her. Likewise, Jaan has an idealised vision of what Kavalar culture was and what it could be, but must contend with what it currently is - brutal, regressive, and self-destructive. It is revealed that Dirk’s inability to accept Gwen as she is, and her inability to conform to his idealised perception, is the reason their relationship failed in the first place. However, Gwen is her own person, with her own needs and wants. For example, he asks, how can we reconcile our ideals with reality? The protagonist Dirk has an idealised vision of Gwen, whom he calls Jenny. In Dying of the Light, Martin poses several challenging existential questions. END OF SPOILERS - ThemesĪrtwork by Juan Miguel Aguilera, from the Spanish cover of Dying of the Light
By the novel's end, many of the characters have died, though some endings are deliberately left ambiguous. Soon Dirk find himself enmeshed in a political and personal struggle, complicated by his feelings for Gwen and a slowly unfolding web of discoveries he makes about Worlorn and its inhabitants. Jaan’s attempts at stopping the bloody sport and bringing his planet to a higher galactic standard further inflame the already volatile tempers. Dirk slowly comes to the conclusion that the whisperjewel represented a mute appeal from Gwen to save her from the unhappy liaison. The situation becomes more problematic as we learn that other Kavalars on Worlorn practice a form of hunt whose prey are the creatures they deem inferior and non-human, which includes everyone else by their standards. Gwen's “marriage” is not an easy one, complicated by the peculiar customs of High Kavalaan, such as its preoccupation with racial purity and mutations.
Jaan, however, is a relatively progressive Kavalar, having been educated at the Academy of Human Knowledge on Avalon (where he and Gwen met), and he is attempting to reform his society. Jaan's teyn is named Garse Janacek is a conservative who strongly dislikes Gwen. A teyn is a sort of blood brother, a bond that stands as the foundation Kavalar culture. After meeting Jaan, he learns that Kavalar culture requires women to be little more than a chattel, shared between her mate and his teyn.
Having never reconciled with the end of the relationship, Dirk departs for the rogue planet full of hope and dreams. Once there, though, Gwen welcomes him with puzzlement, looking distant and ill-at-ease, and soon Dirk discovers she’s bound to another man, Jaan Vikary, a highborn from the aggressive and patriarchal society of High Kavalaan. It’s a summons, based on an old promise made when they both had the jewels crafted for each other. But now Worlorn is heading into dark and sunless space its cities are dying, and so is the world itself.įrom Worlorn Dirk t’Larien receives a whisperjewel – a psi-encoded memory storage from his former lover Gwen Delvano. This "Festival of the Fringe" is, briefly, a great success. Worlorn is a rogue planet, incapable of supporting life for most of its existence however for a generation it passed close enough to a red giant star to be habitable, and fourteen fantastic cities were built there to showcase the cultures of fourteen surrounding human-settled outworlds. Plot Summary - WARNING: THIS SECTION CONTAINS SPOILERS. 7 Connections to the "Thousand Worlds" Universe.