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Werber, Bernard

(1961-    ) French author, most of whose work remains untranslated into English, though the first volume of his Les Fourmis ["The Ants"] sequence, Les Fourmis (1991; trans Margaret Rocques as Empire of the Ants 1996), gives some insight into a creative strategy he has followed subsequently. The admixture of Horror in SF topoi and philosophical discourse (conveyed in part through ample Infodumps) that characterizes Empire of the Ants can therefore be traced through later work. The irruption into human space of an Underground civilization of ants in this tale is conveyed in a contemplatively dispassionate tone very far removed from most thematically comparable English-language fiction, though it may reflect some awareness of the tradition of the Scientific Romance. Most of Werber's subsequent work appears in series, often with linked characters. A singleton of interest is Le Papillon des étoiles ["The Butterfly of the Stars"] (2006), a Generation Starship tale whose vast cast – over 100,000 people – engages upon a journey slated to last a thousand years. [JC]

Bernard Werber

born Toulouse, Haut-Garonne, France: 18 September 1961

works (highly selected)

series

Les Fourmis ["The Ants"]

• Les Fourmis (Paris: Albin Michel, 1991) [Les Fourmis: pb/]
  • Empire of the Ants (London: Bantam Press, 1996) [trans by Margaret Rocques of the above: Les Fourmis: pb/uncredited]
• Le jour de fourmis ["The Day of the Ants"] (Paris: Albin Michel, 1992) [Les Fourmis: pb/]
• La Révolution des fourmis ["The Revolution of the Ants"] (Paris: Albin Michel, 1996) [Les Fourmis: pb/]

individual titles

• Le Papillon des étoiles ["The Butterfly of the Stars"] (Paris: Albin Michel, 2006) [pb/]

links

• Bernard Werber
• Internet Speculative Fiction Database
• Picture Gallery

Entry from The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction (2011-current) edited by John Clute and David Langford.
Accessed 03:10 am on 27 April 2024.
<https://sf-encyclopedia.com/entry/werber_bernard>