Translation State

“The first Middle I saw opened up was an unpopular, inoffensive creature whose only crime, I thought, was being weak. Now I suspect their real crime was being not sufficiently zealously protected by those Adults who’d cared for us when we were Tinies and Littles and Smalls.”

The casual violence that Qven refers to is standard in eir life as a Presger Translator juvenile. Although Qven does not yet understand this, e belongs to a prestigious clade, which gives em a kind of Familial Belonging that guards and protects em as e grows up. Presger Translator upbringings are difficult for humans to understand.

“You know, your genes aren’t your destiny. You in particular. You have what you have, whatever you were born with, but you get to decide what to do with that. There’s nobody telling you what those genes mean, what they’re supposed to make you.”

Istver’s words connect to the theme of Self-Determination and Personhood. Much of the book involves characters grappling with what it means to be a person and what it means to belong to a group. Istver’s argument foreshadows Reet’s later assertion that he is human by culture and by belonging if not by genetics.

“None of us had names. Names were a thing we had to learn about when we reached the Edges. They’re really just words, just a way to talk about things, but they’re fixed in a way that was terribly unfamiliar to us new Edges, and it took some time before we understood the idea.”

Of all the characters, Qven has to go on the most profound journey of Self-Determination and Personhood because e does not even understand emself to be an individual for many years of eir childhood. Learning about human concepts like names is the first thing that allows Qven to understand that e can make individual choices that do not solely benefit existing authority structures. The passage allows Ann Leckie to explore the difference between nouns in general and proper nouns in particular—like all nouns, names are “just words” that refer to concepts, but unlike “just words,” names are “fixed” because they demarcate individuals with sapience and autonomy.

“They said that it wasn’t the same thing at all. That when we matched, we wouldn’t just be fragments inside someone, or them inside us. That instead we would be whole, part of a greater being. It was a beautiful thing, wonderful beyond description.”

Several characters in Translation State insist that matching is not like sex, but quotes like this one are reminiscent of how many people talk about sex in the real world. Since matching does not exist in reality, sex and perhaps marriage are the closest analogies through which to understand what matching entails.

“After a week of this, it occurred to Enae that sie might as well still be trapped at home. Sie was doing exactly what sie had always done, obediently following the path someone else had set out for hir and not even trying to do anything different. And sie could do something different! Something small, or maybe…”

Enae’s decision to take hir new job seriously is a step toward Self-Determination and Personhood outside of Grandmaman’s control. Instead of remaining subservient, Enae decides to understand hirself as a competent, capable person who refuses to shirk responsibility.

“But these past months he’d belonged somewhere, known all this time that there was somewhere he’d come from, somewhere his quirks were recognized. He hadn’t realized until he’d found it just how much, how badly, he’d needed that.”

Taking part in the Siblings of Hikipu meetings gives Reet a sense of deep Familial Belonging for the first time in his life. It is so important to him that he is willing to take the political risks involved in associating with Hikipi activists. Reet has yet to understand that belonging is about more than DNA.

“‘I don’t want to match,’ I said. ‘I don’t want to be an Adult. Not ever.’ I shuddered, thinking of that pulsing, breathing thing in the garden.”

As Qven grows up, e realizes that the life laid out for em is not something e wants. E starts to desire Self-Determination and Personhood, which is at odds with the Presger Translator way of life. Even though Qven cannot avoid matching forever, eir strong desire not to become an Adult motivates many of their actions for the rest of the story. Though the text does not address is, some readers may interpret Qven’s reaction to observing matching as evidence of something analogous to asexuality.

“But what would that mean, exactly, to discover that you belonged with aliens? That you were not, in fact, quite as human as you’d supposed?”

Enae is the one who realizes that Reet is not human, and sie sympathizes with his position. This is one of the first times that the book creates a direct link between being a human and being a person, which will become a central debate in Reet’s quest for Self-Determination and Personhood later on.

“But really, it should be fine. Shouldn’t it? It would be all right, because legally he could choose where he belonged.”

Enae immediately intuits the best solution to Reet’s problem: He should be able to choose to be legally human. While this solution seems straightforward to Enae, such a permissive attitude toward Self-Determination and Personhood inherently challenges the authority of existing power structures.

“I grew up in a family I was genetically related to, but most of them didn’t care about me. Your parents love you. You have sibs. It might not be a place to belong in the sense that everyone understands you or is like you somehow, but it’s a place you belong. Because they love you. And that’s worth so much.”

Enae provides Reet with a different perspective on Familial Belonging, echoing Istver’s earlier statement that blood and genetics do not dictate belonging. Reet is looking for belonging with people he might be genetically related to while forgetting that he already has a family who loves him.

“They had adopted a human child. Or so they had thought. All those things that had marked him out as strange, as not belonging—those weren’t normal, human things at all, they were alien. Truly alien. What would they say when they knew?

What did Reet have if he lost them?”

Reet worries that if he is not biologically human, his parents will reject him and he will lose the only tenuous sense of Familial Belonging that he still has. If Ambassador Seimet had her way, Reet’s fears would be realized, as maintaining family belonging across species lines is a direct challenge to authoritarian means of categorizing people.

“‘Reet is human,’ insisted Mx Hluid.

‘Legally I think he must be,’ Enae agreed. ‘But we have to convince the right authorities.’”

Unfortunately for Reet, the legal definition of “human” is tied up in the Presger Treaty and the political maneuvering of ambassadors. Redefining, or clarifying, what a human is could upset the treaty that keeps all humans safe from the Presger.

“But he is not human, and therefore not a Zeoseni citizen. As such, he has no rights here. Even if he did, those rights would be superseded by the fact of what he is.”

Ambassador Seimet’s argument that Reet is not a human strips him of his citizenship, legal rights, and family. This is why an inclusive definition of “human” is so important: Many people’s lives could be destroyed if those in power decide that they do not fit the definition. If humanity can be stripped away, other legal rights can as well.

“You have only small and seemingly pointless choices available to you. But if there is anything I have been trying to teach you, it is that small actions can have larger consequences. If one has only small choices available, one must be patient, and canny.”

Teacher’s words offer Qven hope that eir choices, however small, are not inconsequential. Very little in Qven’s life is in eir control, which, in the face of Tzam’s attack, contributes to eir feeling of intense powerlessness. Making even a small decision helps em take back eir power and become a self-actualized individual.

“‘They kill people and take over their bodies,’ Echemin insisted. ‘That’s how they seem so human to you!’”

Echemin is describing AIs implanting their consciousnesses into human bodies, called ancillaries. This idea is explored more fully in Ann Leckie’s Imperial Radch trilogy. The process of creating ancillaries necessitates murdering a body’s original consciousness, and as such, it is a highly controversial process that makes many people treat AIs with suspicion or hostility. This explains Sphene’s desire for an alternative way to house her consciousness.

“‘What?’ I asked, surprised. ‘Can you do that? Just add words?’

Reet shrugged uncomfortably in his gray jacket. ‘If enough people use it, and it sticks, I guess.’”

Reet and Qven are talking about adding new pronoun words to Radchaai, which traditionally only uses “she.” This is a form of Cross-Cultural Communication that allows people from gendered societies to better discuss their experiences, but it is also something that stands in opposition to the power of the Radch. Characters like Seimet and Sphene tend to stick with “she” when speaking Radchaai, reflecting Seimet’s belief that gender is a silly affectation and Sphene’s disinterest in it.

“The teacher—there was only one, he understood, despite there very clearly being two bodies, both of which were apparently the same person—withdrew again, and left Reet and Qven to their own devices.”

This is the first clear indication in the text that adult Presger Translators have two bodies; after matching is complete, they separate instead of remaining merged. The savvy reader may already have guessed this, but because it is normal to Qven, e never mentions it directly. This is a major reveal for those who have read the Imperial Radch trilogy, and it is something that Reet finds initially baffling. One of the ways Leckie accomplishes worldbuilding is by not having exposition be delivered by characters to characters who already know the information—an often clunky necessity for science fiction or fantasy fiction. For Qven to explain that adult Translators have two bodies would be like for readers to constantly tell people in their lives that they have only one body—it’s too much of a given to mention. This allows readers to perceive Qven as a more fully realized character.

“It’s always something of a shock. It’s never the way you imagine it. But it’s not like dying. Not at all. You don’t lose who you are. You become…more. There’s nothing to be afraid of.”

Qven and Reet both initially envision matching to require an inherent loss of Self-Determination and Personhood. While it is certainly possible that some matches do involve a sense of loss, Qven’s Teacher suggests the possibility of a better future, foreshadowing Qven and Reet’s eventual decision to match happily.

“‘Humans are very different from people,’ whistled the ambassador. ‘But they are like people.’”

Cross-Cultural Communication can be challenging, and different species do not always see eye to eye. The Geck are sympathetic to Reet’s case, but this comment reveals that Agagag does not truly see human beings as people; in her eyes, Geck are people, and humans are something else. Regardless of this misunderstanding, Agagag still stands up for Reet and Qven’s rights.

“And then there’d been Tzam.

I hadn’t felt safe since then. I had been surrounded by enemies, under siege.”

Matching might be required for Presger Translators, but that does not mean it is always a positive experience. Tzam’s attack traumatizes Qven, so e only very gradually learns to trust Reet before e can even consider matching with him.

“I don’t know, I guess Translator Dlar here recognizes my DNA, and Qven has told me about growing up as a Presger Translator juvenile, and I’m sure they’re right about that, I’m sure that’s what I am, if you look at my genetics. But I grew up human, I have a family.”

When Reet argues that he is human, he is not making an argument about biology, but about culture and belonging. He is human in all the ways that matter, even if his biology is different from that of other human beings. This argument is comparable to many contemporary arguments that gender should be self-determined based on culture, belonging, and desire.

“But it would have been nice. It would have been nice to finally have someone who understood his impulses and desires. Who shared them. Somewhere he actually belonged.

Just like always, the thing he wanted would hurt someone else.”

Where Qven initially conceptualizes matching as a form of violence that will one day be enacted upon em, Reet sees the positives of the process. He sees matching as a way to get a sense of Familial Belonging, which has always been elusive for him.

“Sometimes a sacrifice won’t really save anyone. The problem is, when someone comes to you and says only you can save us by sacrificing yourself, how do you know they’re right?”

Batonen warns Qven about sacrificing emself by matching with the mech. In connection with the theme of Self-Determination and Personhood, this moment suggests that individuals ought to be able to prioritize their own needs, boundaries, and desires over a self-sacrificial sense of duty.