Danged Black Thing by Eugen Bacon
Danged Black Thing (2021) is an eclectic collection of speculative short stories by Tanzanian-Australian computer scientist and author Eugen Bacon. Spanning across different continents and cultures, from the past to the future, the stories celebrate the author’s own hybridity with breathtaking complexity and lyricism. They cover the deeper nuances of love, relationships, familial ties, grief, class differences, migration and tradition with a dystopian and often mystical edge.
The stories of Danged Black Thing explore worlds different to and yet not unlike our own – dystopian communities, the advancement of technology, corrupt political systems, the effects of climate change and the outcomes of migration. These settings lend the book a framework that allows for fluid movement between the supernatural, the mythical, the speculative and the mundane.
Each dreamlike story carries within it an ancestral connection to Africa, and the characters are influenced both consciously and subconsciously by these unseverable ties to tradition. In some cases, this manifests in the worries of migration and growing language gaps, while in others, in the ever-present mythological pull to something bigger or more whole.
A constant throughout all the stories is the presence of the magical – this comes in the form of seemingly supernatural powers in ‘Simbiyu and the Nameless’, tangible hallucinations in ‘A Taste of Unguja’, a not-so-all-knowing medicine man in ‘The Widow’s Rooster’ or a talking turtle in ‘De Turtle o’ Hades.’ No matter the context, magic is woven so deeply and effortlessly into the fabric of these stories that it becomes natural, almost expected.
My favourite stories were those told by women, making decisions for themselves and for those they’re responsible for – in ‘Messier 94’, a psychologist gets an inexplicable taste of her own medicine when she plunges headfirst into the digital portal that aids her in helping her patients. The result is a vivid and fantastical search for meaning, on par with the dreamlike fluidity that laces sleep, in itself a critique of technological advances.
In ‘A Pod of Mermaids’, a mythological goddess gravitates towards a small orphaned boy, for whom she becomes responsible like she had done with many a boy before. As she ponders her own choices and those of the gods around her, she wishes to understand this pull she feels towards the Earthling.
“What creature was he, so able to plummet her defences that – yet again, the heart needs what the heart wants; even immortal gods fall ill with craving – she arrowed her gaze into a silver pierce that trapped distance between the galaxy and the boy?”
In ‘The Water Runner’, one of the most chilling of the stories, a couple squabble in a tech-controlled dystopian future where water is so scarce that it needs to be extracted from dead bodies and where the government controls harvesting clinics meant for creating children of the state – in exchange for a willing womb, women can get credit to use as they wish, among other things to travel to a promised land unaffected by the drought. The man believes his girlfriend should do the harvesting, which is what he would do if he was a woman – they need the credit for a better future. The woman resists at first, but as her job and circumstances eat away at her, she finally gives in.
My favourite theme running through these stories was the exploration of the effects of migration, and how tradition can transcend both physical and mental gaps. It is fascinating to read about how Africa returns to those who have left it: in the scents and the tastes, in the wisdom of elders, in the promise of home and belonging. In ‘The Failing Name’, young Jolainne endures many things in the name of a so-called better future in a faraway land. And yet when it comes down to it, her hard-earned money cannot save anyone:
“She sent money home but her father still died. His virus was one of poverty and a broken heart for his far-gone child donated as a migrant to distant lands.”
In other stories, those dislocated always appear as outsiders, even when they are not – it’s as if this pull prevents assimilation not in appearances, but in the mind. What underpins these stories are the roots that cannot be changed, and that, given the chance, will reach to the farthest corners of the galaxy to wind their way around your ankles and yank you back towards home.
The wholly engrossing nature of these stories is undoubtedly a tribute to Bacon’s superpowers in juxtaposing the mundane and the mystical so wonderfully, so that each story feels both refreshingly (and sometimes scarily) new and also somehow intimately familiar. Even in those stories which depict dystopian futures and exotic planets, there is always something that pulls you in and grounds you within the narrative.
Bacon’s writing is like nothing I’ve experienced before. Reading Danged Black Thing felt like a visceral dream that took place in parallel universes at the same time; her incredible craftsmanship was evident in each line, creating wholly new worlds on top of very much real ones. Her writing delivers an experience so full of sounds, smells, and textures, that you feel like you’re standing right next to each character:
“Nine windy steps down from the hammer of beats on the street, I found myself in a basement of inside music that wasn’t so loud. It was like the notes and mismelodies had escaped from themselves and the basement, and spilled into the streets. What remained was a husk, a memory of a song. A haze of pearls, a prowl of wails. A sound of something you didn’t know but you wished it was deep. A whistle of broken lips, a tap of bones. Keening, wailing. On occasion, a drum. Clapping, too, vibrating to a shuffle groove.”
With lyricism like that of The Prophets by Robert Jones Jr and a literary imagination unparalleled, Danged Black Thing asks you to travel into the heart of each story without expectation or reserve. The result is a disturbing, poignant, sharp lesson in the nature of humanity – one that should be read by everyone.
Fruzsina Gál is an aspiring writer, born in Hungary but living in Australia. She has been a reader all her life, and her first short story, 'The Turul' was published in Griffith University's 2018 anthology, Talent Implied. Her writing is often focussed on identity and the effects of immigration on the self. You can find her online at www.fruzsinagal.com or @thenovelconversation.