Stars in my Pocket like Grains of Sand explores the idea of someone having to restart their life in a completely different culture. In Delany’s novel, Rat Korga is the character that moves to a different planet after his gets destroyed. In class on Thursday, we discussed what questions and technology assistance we would provide an individual whose planet (or previous living) was destroyed.
I had similar questions as the ones we discussed in class. I would ask how they are feeling, learn about their culture, and try to the best of my ability to comfort them. I would want to learn about and document their culture and society. I feel that with only one survivor from a different world, it would be very beneficial and educational to record what life in the planet was like. I would be interested to know what the social structure and government was like and how it compares and contrasts to what we know in the US and on Earth. Discussing the relationship between individuals on their previous planet would also be interesting. If they were comfortable talking about their personal story of living on a planet that got destroyed and their feelings towards everything that happened, I would ask them.
Another theme in Stars in my Pocket like Grains of Sand is gender. In the book, the concept of gender binary is opened up and explored. For example, Delany uses the pronoun “she” for beings of any gender.