Ender's Game:
Ender's Game (1985) is the best-known novel by Orson Scott Card.[1] It is set in Earth's future where mankind has barely survived two conflicts with the Formics (an insectoid alien race also known as the "Buggers") and the International Fleet is preparing for war. In order to find and train the eventual commander for the anticipated third invasion, the world's most talented children, including the extraordinary Ender Wiggin, are taken into a training center known as the Battle School at a very young age and trained in the arts of war through increasingly difficult games. Its sequels, Ender in Exile, Speaker for the Dead, Xenocide, and Children of the Mind, follow Ender to different worlds as he travels far into the future.
The book originated as the novelette "Ender's Game" published in the August 1977 issue of Analog Science Fiction and Fact.[2] Card later expanded the novel into the Ender's Game series, dealing with the long-term effects of the war. A slightly updated version was released in 1991 to keep political facts accurate (such as the decline of the Soviet Union).
[edit] Synopsis
[edit] Setting
In the book, mankind has had confrontations with a largely unknown alien race that nearly wiped out humanity called the buggers or Formics. As a result, mankind entered into a shaky truce to help combat the Formics, and an international military unit was formed called the International Fleet (IF). In the futuristic setting, mankind has developed interstellar travel, faster-than-light communication, various new weapons and defense mechanisms, and control over gravity. Earth is governed by two separate bodies, the Hegemony and the Polemarch which compete for dominance during the war.
Most of the story focuses around the Battle School, a military training program for children located in the outer space. All children on earth are tested by the IF and the brightest are taken here for military training. Students are organized into 41 man armies that fight each other in null gravity and upon graduation they move on to either Tactical School, Command School, Combat School, or Pre-Command School. The Battle School was formed in response to the need of highly skilled officers for the wars against the Formics, and most of the officers in the IF passed through the school at one time.
[edit] Characters
[edit] The Wiggins
[edit] Ender's jeesh
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[edit] Other Battle School students
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[edit] Others
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[edit] Plot summary
Ender Wiggin is approved by the government for training at the elite Battle School to combat the Formics. Upon departure for Battle School, Ender is immediately singled out by the administration as the most intelligent student, causing other students to dislike him. Ender gains the reputation of an elite soldier and becomes ranked top of all the soldiers in battle school. He seeks refuge from his isolation and frustration in various ways, though is unable to be comforted until his older sister Valentine writes a letter to him, reminding him of the reason he went to battle school in the first place.
After the realization that he is at battle school to protect his sister, Ender is quickly promoted to commander of a brand new Army in the school's zero-gravity wargame league. He quickly molds his young soldiers into an unbeatable team despite being given what appears to be a completely inexperienced army. Ender implements never before heard of strategies and abolishes old methods including the use of formations in the battle room.
Ender is then promoted to Command School ahead of schedule. In command school, Ender is instructed in a game very similar to the Battle Room, only this time instead of commanding soldiers, he commands ships in a 3-D space battle. His subordinate officers are fellow students advanced early from the battle school who later become known as "Ender's jeesh." Each day the games become more and more grueling, and Ender slowly worn down to exhaustion. Waking and sleeping blend together as Ender nearly loses his sanity, but he maintains his military brilliance.
Ender's "final exam" consists of Ender's forces outnumbered 1,000 to 1 near a planetary mass. When the planet is finally in range, Ender orders the use of a special weapon, Dr. Device, against the planet itself, destroying the simulated planet and all ships in orbit. Ender makes this decision knowing that it is expressly against the respectable rules of the game, hoping that his teachers will find his ruthlessness unacceptable and remove him from command, and allow him to return home.
After he destroys the planet it is revealed to Ender that all the simulations were real battles taking place in Bugger space as the human ships sent long ago reached their destinations. Ender realizes that he had just ordered the actual destruction of an entire race, and the guilt of the massacre forces him into a coma.
Ender is convinced, after his recovery, to leave on the first colony ship to another world. On his colony, Ender discovers an unborn Formic queen who can communicate with him through a psychic link. She tells him that her race was not aware that humans were sentient creatures. It was through their defeat in the Second Invasion that forced them to realize humanity's true nature; and had resolved to never attack the Earth again. He decides to atone for his destruction of the Bugger race by finding a place to resurrect the queen, bringing the alien race back into existence. Ender writes a book under the pseudonym "Speaker for the Dead" entitled The Hive Queen, wherein he tells of the compassion and pain of the Bugger race. At Peter's request he also writes The Hegemon to tell the truth of his brother's troubled life.
[edit] Creation and inspiration
The original novelette Ender's Game is merely a snapshot of Ender's experiences in Battle School and Command School; the full-length novel is a more encompassing work dealing with Ender's life before, during, and after the war, and it also contains some chapters describing the political exploits of his older siblings back on Earth. In a commentary track for the 20th Anniversary audiobook edition of the novel, as well as in the 1991 Author's Definitive Edition, Card stated that Ender's Game was written specifically to establish the character of Ender for his role of the Speaker in Speaker for the Dead, the outline for which he had written before novelizing Ender's Game.[3]
In his 1991 introduction to the novel, Card discussed the influence of Isaac Asimov's Foundation series on the creation of the novelette and novel. Historian Bruce Catton's work on the American Civil War also influenced Card heavily.[3] He also derived the name and basic function of the ansible from Ursula K. Le Guin's works.
[edit] Revisions
Card has made various changes to the book. He made several minor changes in 1991 to reflect the political climates of the time including the decline of the Soviet Union. In the afterword of the audiobook for Ender in Exile, Card stated that many of the details in chapter 15 of Ender's Game have been modified for use in the subsequent novels and short stories. In order to more closely match the other material, Card has rewritten chapter 15, and plans to offer a revised edition of the book sometime in the future.[4]
[edit] Awards and impact
Ender's Game was the winner of the Nebula Award for best novel in 1985,[5] and the Hugo Award for best novel in 1986[6], two notable awards in science fiction. The following year, the sequel Speaker for the Dead also won both awards; Card is the only author to have won both awards in two consecutive years.[1] In 2008, it received the Margaret Edwards award for its long term impact on science fiction.
Many schools around the world have adopted Ender's Game as required reading, some for its psychological aspects, others for its science fiction background. Some examples include the Marine Corps University at Quantico, as a textbook on the psychology of leadership,[1] and the state of New South Wales, Australia, Higher School Certificate.[7]
[edit] Adaptations
The latest author-written screenplay was finished and submitted to Warner Brothers by Orson Scott Card in May 2003. David Benioff and D.B. Weiss were later signed to write a new script, working closely with Wolfgang Petersen.[8] However, as of 15 December 2005, all previous attempts to write a script had been dropped. Card himself has announced he will be writing a new script not based on any previous one, including his own.[9]
While Ender's Game is officially in pre-production, according to IMDb,[10] there is still no financier for the movie rights to the book.[11] Nothing has been released on the content of the approved script, or casting; however, based on information from Orson Scott Card's previous scripts, it will be a fusion between Ender's Game and Ender's Shadow, both of which take place in the Battle School at the same time, but the former from Ender's point of view, and the latter from Bean's point of view.[8]
[edit] Video game
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Ender's Game: Battle Room will be a digitally distributed video game for all viable downloadable platforms.[12] It is currently under development by Chair Entertainment, who also developed the Xbox Live Arcade game Undertow. Chair had sold the licensing of Empire to Card, which became a best-selling novel. Little is known about the game save its setting in the Ender universe, and that it will focus on the Battle Room.[12]
[edit] Comics
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Main article: Ender Comics
Marvel Comics and Orson Scott Card announced on April 19, 2008 that they would be publishing a limited series adaptation, Ender's Game. The first issue was released on October 8, 2008). It is the first in a plan to release a comic book series based on all of Card's Ender's Game novel series. Card was quoted as saying that it is the first step in moving the story to a visual medium.[13] The first series is titled Ender's game: Battle School, and includes five-issues written by Christopher Yost. The second series is titled Ender’s Shadow: Battle School and is also a five issue series. It is written by Mike Carey and will be released on December 3.[14]
[edit] Translations
Ender's Game has been translated into 27 different languages:
- Bulgarian: Играта на Ендър ("Ender's Game").
- Chinese: 安德的游戏 ("Ender's Game"),2003.
- Croatian: Enderova igra ("Ender's Game"), 2007.
- Czech: Enderova Hra ("Ender's Game").
- Danish: Enders strategi ("Ender's Strategy"), 1990.
- Dutch: De tactiek van Ender ("Ender's Tactic").
- Estonian: Enderi mäng ("Ender's Game"), 2000.
- Finnish: Ender ("Ender"), 1990.
- French: La Stratégie Ender ("The Ender Strategy"), 1996, 1999, 2000, 2001.
- German: Das große Spiel ("The Big Game"), 1986, 2005.
- Hebrew: המשחק של אנדר ("Ender's Game").
- Hungarian: Végjáték ("Endgame"), 1991.
- Italian: Il gioco di Ender ("Ender's Game").
- Korean: 엔더의 게임 ("Ender's Game"), 1992, 2000 (two editions).
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- Japanese: エンダーのゲーム ("Ender's Game"), 1987.
- Latvian: Endera spēle ("Ender's Game"), 2008.
- Norwegian: Enders spill ("Ender's Game"), 1999.
- Polish: Gra Endera ("Ender's Game"), 1994.
- Portuguese: O jogo do exterminador ("The exterminator's game") (Brasil).
- Portuguese: O jogo final ("The final game") (Portugal).
- Romanian: Jocul lui Ender ("Ender's Game").
- Russian: Игра Эндера (Igra Endera) ("Ender's Game"), 1995, 1996, 2002, 2003 (two editions).
- Serbian: Eндерова игра (Enderova igra) ("Ender's Game"), 1988.
- Spanish: El juego de Ender ("Ender's Game").
- Swedish: Enders spel ("Ender's Game"), 1991, 1998.
- Thai: เกมพลิกโลก ("The game that change the world"), 2007.
- Turkish: Ender'in Oyunu ("Ender's Game").
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[edit] See also
[edit] References
- ^ a b c "Ender's Game The Book". Fresco Pictures. Retrieved on 2008-01-17.
- ^ "Short Stories by Orson Scott Card". Hatrack River Enterprises Inc. (2009). Retrieved on 2009-01-03.
- ^ a b Card, Orson Scott (1991). "Introduction". Ender's Game (Author's definitive edition ed.). New York: Tor Books. ISBN 0-812-55070-6.
- ^ "Ender in Exile". Audio edition, Macmillan Audio, Nov 2008
- ^ Mann, Laurie (22 November 2008). "SFWA Nebula Awards". dpsinfo.com. Retrieved on 3 January 2009.
- ^ "The Hugo Awards By Year". World Science Fiction Society (9 December 2005). Retrieved on 3 January 2009.
- ^ "Annotations of Texts Prescribed for the First Time for the Higher School Certificate: Common Content", News South Wales Board of Studies: 3, 2001-2002, http://www.boardofstudies.nsw.edu.au/syllabus_hsc/pdf_doc/english_textnotes.pdf
- ^ a b "Benioff and Weiss to Write Ender's Game Script" (2005-03-14). Retrieved on 2008-05-24.
- ^ Stax (April 18, 2007). "Card Talks Ender's Game Movie". IGN Entertainment, Inc.. Retrieved on 2009-01-01.
- ^ Ender's Game at the Internet Movie Database
- ^ "Ender's Game: The Movie". "Ender's Game" (December 08, 2008). Retrieved on 2009-01-05.
- ^ a b Croal, N'Gai (January 29, 2008). "Exclusive: Chair Entertainment's Donald and Geremy Mustard Shed Some Light On Their Plans For 'Ender's Game'". Newsweek. Retrieved on 2009-01-05.
- ^ Penagos, Ryan (May 12, 2008). "NYCC '08: Marvel to Adapt Orson Scott Card's Ender's Game Series". Marvel Characters, Inc.. Retrieved on 2008-09-13.
- ^ "Enders Shadow Battle School #1 (of 5)". Things From Another World, Inc. (1986-2009). Retrieved on 2009-01-05.
[edit] External links
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