Speaker for the Dead

story (though the next one will, I swear it!).
    And, like Speaker for the Dead before it, Xenocide was the hardest book I'd ever written up to then.   You see, the work of a storyteller doesn't get any easier the more experience we get, because once we've learned how to do something, we can't get excited about doing exactly the same thing again--or at least most of us can't.   We keep wanting to reach for the story that is too hard for us to tell--and then make ourselves learn how to tell it.   If we succeed, then maybe we can write better and better books, or at least more challenging ones, or at the very least we won't bore ourselves.
    The danger that keeps me just a little frightened with every book I write, however, is that I'll overreach myself once too often and try to write a story that I'm just plain not talented or skilled enough to write.   That's the dilemma every storyteller faces.   It is painful to fail.   But it is far sadder when a storyteller stops wanting to try.
    Now I fear that I've told you more than you ever wanted to know about how Speaker for the Dead came to be.   A writer's life is boring indeed. I write stories about people who take risks, who reach out and change the world.   But when it comes to my life, it mostly consists of hanging around at home, writing when I have to, playing computer games or watching TV whenever I can get away with it.   My real life is being with my wife, with my children; going to church and teaching my Sunday school class; keeping in touch with my family and friends; and, the primary duty of every father, turning off lights throughout the house and muttering about how I'm the only one who seems to care about turning them off because I'm the one who has to change the lousy light bulbs. I doubt that there's much of a story in that.
    But I hope that in the lives of Ender Wiggin, Novinha, Miro, Ela, Human, Jane, the hive queen, and so many others in this book, you will find stories worth holding in your memory, perhaps even in your heart.   That's the transaction that counts more than bestseller lists, royalty statements, awards, or reviews.   Because in the pages of this book, you and I will meet one-on-one, my mind and yours, and you will enter a world of my making and dwell there, not as a character that I control, but as a person with a mind of your own.   You will make of my story what you need it to be, if you can. I hope my tale is true enough and flexible enough that you can make it into a world worth living in.
    Orson Scott Card
    Greensboro, North Carolina
    29 March 1991

Some People of
    Lusitania Colony
     
    Xenologers (Zenadores)
     
    Pipo (João Figueira Alvarez)
    Libo (Liberdade Graças a Deus Figueira de Medici)
    Miro (Marcos Vladimir Ribeira von Hesse)
    Ouanda (Ouanda Quenhatta Figueira Mucumbi)
     
    Xenobiologists (Biologistas)
     
    Gusto (Vladimir Tiago Gussman)
    Cida (Ekaterina Maria Aparecida do Norte von Hesse-Gussman)
    Novinha (Ivanova Santa Catarina von Hesse)
    Ela (Ekaterina Elanora Ribeira von Hesse)
     
Governor
     
    Bosquinha (Faria Lima Maria do Bosque)

Bishop
     
    Peregrino (Armão Cebola)
     
Abbot and Principal of the Monastery
     
    Dom Cristão (Amai a Tudomundo Para Que Deus vos Ame Cristão)
    Dona Cristã (Detestai 0 Pecado e Fazei o Direito Cristã)
     

The Figueira Family
     
     

     
     
     
    The Family of Os Venerados
     

    * All dates are expressed as years after adoption of the Starways Code.

Pronouncing
    Foreign Names
     
     
    Three human languages are used by characters in this book.   Stark, since it originated as English, is represented as English in the book.   The Nordic spoken on Trondheim evolved from Swedish.   Portuguese is the native language of Lusitania.   On every world, however, schoolchildren are taught Stark from the beginning.
    The Portuguese language, while unusually beautiful when spoken aloud, is very difficult for readers who are accustomed to English to sound out from the written letters.   Even if you aren't planning to read this book aloud, you may be more comfortable if you have a general idea of how the Portuguese names and phrases are pronounced.
    Consonants:   Single consonants are pronounced more or less as they are in English, with the addition of ç, which always sounds like ss .   Exceptions are j , which is pronounced like the z in azure, as is g when followed by e or i ; and the initial r and double rr , which are pronounced somewhere between the American h and the