The Ender Series by Orson Scott Card
The Ender Series, authored by Orson Scott Card, begins with "Ender's Game," a novella published in 1977 that tells the story of Ender Wiggin, a gifted child trained to lead Earth's forces against an alien race known as the Buggers. As Ender participates in war games at a space Battle School, he unknowingly directs a real attack that results in the complete destruction of the Buggers. This leads to his later role as a compassionate figure, the "Speaker for the Dead," who seeks to reconcile with the alien race's legacy.
The subsequent novels, including "Speaker for the Dead," "Xenocide," and "Children of the Mind," explore complex themes such as morality, xenocide, and the nature of communication between species. Set thousands of years later, "Speaker for the Dead" introduces a new alien species, the Pequininos, whose life cycle and cultural practices lead to misunderstandings with humans. As tensions rise, Ender works to bridge gaps between different worlds while confronting the consequences of past actions.
Overall, the series delves deeply into the intricacies of empathy, understanding, and the challenges of coexistence among diverse intelligent species, all framed within a rich science fiction narrative.
On this Page
Subject Terms
The Ender Series
First published:Ender’s Game (1985; largely expanded version of a novella in Analog, 1977), Speaker for the Dead (1986), Ender’s War (1986, omnibus edition of Ender’s Game and Speaker for the Dead), and Xenocide (1991)
Type of work: Novels
Type of plot: Science fiction—future war
Time of work: The near future and three thousand years later
Locale: Earth and the Hundred Worlds planets of Lusitania and Path
The Plot
The novella version of Enders Game (1977) was Orson Scott Cards first published science-fiction story. The tale of Ender Wiggin, a child being trained to lead Earths space fleet in a war against the alien Buggers, quickly became one of the most popular Analog novellas of all time. Several years later, while Card was working on Speaker for the Dead (1986), he discovered that the novels extensive background could best be established by revising Enders Game as a novel and developing Enders character as the adult speaker. Xenocide (1991) continues the story, developing both the characters and the themes introduced in Speaker for the Dead. A fourth Ender novel, Children of the Mind, was in progress in 1995.
Enders Game tells how Earth barely defeats a fleet of alien Bugger ships that attacks without warning or provocation. A generation later, Earth believes that the Buggers will return in strength, intent upon destroying humankind. Military intelligence frantically tries to identify a genius to lead a successful military defense. Ender Wiggin is bred to be that leader. As a child of six he is sent to a space Battle School where, for five years, he engages in a series of war and strategy games designed to prepare him for the anticipated war. Mazer Rackham, who orchestrated the first military victory against the Buggers and who has been kept alive via relative space travel, supervises the childs final training. To Enders surprise, he discovers that he was not playing games; he actually was directing Earths offensive against the Buggers, resulting in their complete destruction. The story ends years later, when Ender discovers a message and a queen pupa left to him by the Bugger Hive Queen. Ender becomes the Buggers interpreter and apologist. As a speaker for the dead, he compassionately explains the Bugger’s desire for reconciliation with humankind and their prayer for forgiveness. He departs to search the universe for a safe place where the queen pupa can hatch.
Speaker for the Dead is set three thousand Earth years later. Ender is still alive as a result of extensive travel at the speed of light. Another intelligent alien species has been discovered on the Hundred Worlds planet of Lusitania, and a human colony has been established to observe the alien Pequininos, or Piggies. When a Piggy brutally disembowels the xenobiologist Pipo Figueira, Ender travels to Lusitania to speak his death. He learns that a Piggy goes through three stages of life, first as a larva, then as a Pequinino, and finally as an intelligent tree. A drug is administered so the Piggy can be ceremoniously disemboweled to achieve the third, adult life phase. When the Piggies disemboweled Pipo, their intent was to honor him. Ender also discovers that the Piggies life transformation is made possible by a highly contagious virus called the descolada, absolutely necessary to them but deadly to all other life-forms. Speaker for the Dead ends with the Starways Congress sending a fleet to annihilate Lusitania, thereby ensuring that the deadly descolada will never be spread. This xenocide will destroy Piggies, humans, and, unbeknownst to everyone except Ender, the Buggers who have finally found a new home on Lusitania.
Xenocide begins on the Hundred Worlds planet of Path, a religious colony where the “god-spoken” pay the price of revelation through humiliating obsessive-compulsive behavior. Gloriously Bright, the youngest of the god-spoken, is given the impossible task of discovering how the entire star fleet, on its way to annihilate Lusitania, suddenly vanished. On Lusitania, Ender works with the colonists and Piggies, trying to discover a way to render the descolada harmless against humans but still effective in its life-transforming function for the Piggies. The story becomes complex as divisions occur among the Piggies, among the humans, and among the god-spoken of Path. Misunderstandings and misinterpretations of data lead to cataclysmic mistakes in judgment. It is discovered that both the obsessive-compulsive behavior on Path and the deadly properties of the descolada on Lusitania have been produced through intentional genetic engineering. Although cultural traditions and relationships are destroyed in the process, Lusitania successfully alters the descolada. Every sentient species is saved, and Ender is left to re-establish relationships among species, worlds, and, most important, his own family, all the while trying to stop the Starways fleet.