Richard Powers is a genius and one of the best writers of our time. Some days, I had to stop listening to Playground because I wasn’t getting on with my life. I loved his playground analogies for everything in life and our world. I got hooked when he described the games his female protagonist, Evie Bourlieu had to play to gain recognition as an oceanographer. His description of Evie’s strategies to become a respected scientist and diver at Scripps Institution of Oceanography occurred in the 1950s. However, similar mindsets still exist, and Powers portrays sexism and racism in well crafted plot points of this multilayered story.
Evie wrote a book called Clearly It Is Ocean, which another of the four main protagonists, Todd Keane, discovers and leads to his interest in developing a floating autonomous city. However, that was not until he achieved fame and notoriety for using AI to create Playground, a combination of many recognizable 21st century apps. Todd Keane happens to be a wealthy white man who is telling much of this story as a fifty-ish person who has dementia. He reminisces about his formative years and his strong friendship and connection with Rafi Young, a Black man he met in high school. Much of their relationship grew because both enjoyed playing strategy games, being competitive, and becoming the “best” in “everything.” Their relationship suffers in adulthood, and their accomplishments and longstanding bonds are integral parts of the story since the games they play as adults have monumental consequences.
Todd works in coding and AI, while Rafi is a poet. Their stories converge with Ina Aroita, a sculptor and Rafi’s wife. Todd and Ina live on an island called Makatea, formerly known for phosphate mining but chosen for seasteading. The island’s residents must vote to determine whether they will support proposed technological progress and allow their land to become an autonomous city at the risk of destroying ecosystems, particularly coral reefs and marine life.
The environmental themes are most prevalent in this speculative novel about the decisions we make that affect life. The pros and cons of technology and the people who manage our data are also front and center in the plotlines. However, there are enough relationship stories to convey messages about friendship, trust, betrayal, parental expectations, etc. Richard Powers explores voting rights and cultural values regarding art and literature.
What I appreciated most was all of the metaphors about games and strategy. When I taught, I used to tell middle school students that learning to navigate life was a game, and they had to choose which ones to play. Richard Powers has masterfully shown that this philosophy applies to low and high-stakes decisions, fields of inquiry, and civilization. Games rule humanity, and if winning is one’s only goal without regard for morality, there are complex situations and a plethora of results with which we must contend.
