I Wish I Could Give This Post an Epigraph Half as Good as Those Found in The Stars Are Legion

Kameron Hurley’s The Stars Are Legion has received no shortage of accolades, here and elsewhere. I totally agree. Believe the hype; this is a stunning novel. But none of the glowing reviews I’ve read mentioned one fascinating aspect of this book: the epigraphs that Hurley uses to introduce each chapter.
An epigraph is a short quote from a literary work, found at the beginning of a book, or even a subsection of a book. An author may use these quotes as a preface or a counterpoint, as a summary or a way to place the work in the context of a wider literary tradition. Science fiction and fantasy authors have been using epigraphs at least as far back as Frankenstein, which Mary Shelley opens with an apropos quote from John Milton’s Paradise Lost:

“Did I request thee, Maker, from my clay
To mold me Man, did I solicit thee
From darkness to promote?”

Since then, many other SFF authors have used epigraphs to grand effect. Margaret Atwood starts A Handmaid’s Tale with three of them: one from Genesis about Rachel’s difficulty conceiving a child with Jacob, one from Jonathan Swift’s “A Modest Proposal” (a satiric essay suggesting that the poor raise and sell their children to be eaten), and a Sufi proverb, “In the desert there is no sign that says, Thou shalt not eat stones.”  Together, the three quotes foreshadow the themes of this dystopic tale.
Ray Bradbury suggested the theme of non-conformity in Fahrenheit 451 through a quote from the Spanish poet Juan Ramón Jiménez:
“If they give you ruled paper, write the other way.”
And Neil Gaiman makes a point about not just fairy tales, but also fantasy and science fiction in general with the G. K. Chesterson quotation that prefaces Coraline:
“Fairy tales are more than true: not because they tell us that dragons exist, but because they tell us that dragons can be beaten.”
However, SFF authors also use epigraphs in another way that I have not seen outside the genres: as in-universe worldbuilding—background information provided through quotes from nonexistent works. It is a way to make the dreaded “infodump” more palatable.

Isaac Asimov did this extensively in the Foundation books, many sections of which begin with a quote from the imaginary Encyclopedia Galactica. Asimov’s 500-plus published works included as much science fact as science fiction, so creating a future reference book must have been second nature. The short extracts from the Encyclopedia give information on key persons, places, and events in his future history.
(Douglas Adam poked fun at Asimov’s venerable reference book in The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, in which he jests, “In many of the more relaxed civilizations on the Outer Eastern Rim, the Hitchhiker’s Guide has already supplanted the great Encyclopaedia Galactica as the standard repository of all knowledge and wisdom, for though it has many omissions and contains much that is apocryphal, or at least wildly inaccurate, it scores over the older, more pedestrian work in two important respects. First, it is slightly cheaper; and second, it has the words ‘DON’T PANIC’ inscribed in large friendly letters on its cover.”)

Another bonafide science fiction classic, Frank Herbert’s Dune, employs a similar device. Each chapter begins with a quote a work by Princess Irulan, daughter of Emperor Shaddam and Paul Atreides’ future Imperial Consort. Information from her personal diary, historical commentaries, and biography provide details that help the reader understand an incredibly complex world.
Like Asimov and Herbert, Hurley takes her all her epigraphs from an imaginary work, the Annals of the Legion, penned by a “Lord Mokshi.” And they do provide a bit of worldbuilding, but her purpose is much more subtle. The epigraphs offer a counterpoint to the main narrative—subtext, not background.
In advance of the first chapter, we encounter the epigraph:
“There is nothing I fear more than someone without memory. A person without memory is free to do anything she likes.”

Then we meet Zan, a woman who cannot remember who she is. As the story progresses the epigraphs give us clues – “…Stories make memories…”, “Worlds can be reborn. But the rest of us… Doomed to live with choices we’ve made.” The narrative reveals that the Legion is a fleet of organic world sized ships, orbiting a strange sun and torn by war with each other. And that two families in the Legion are battling to possess the Mokshi, a rogue ship. But Lord Mokshi herself remains an enigma.
In the second section, Zan is thrown down to the center of the organic worldship. Like Dante in Inferno, she struggles through circles of suffering, gathering companions as she goes. But as Lord Mokshi tells us in the Annals:
The monsters don’t live in the belly of the world like they all say. The monsters live inside of us. We make the monsters.”
As we watch Zan learn more about herself, the epigraphs reveal more of Lord Mokshi’s struggles to us: “When I released the Mokshi from its orbit I never expected to encounter resistance on the way out of the Legion. I should not have been surprised how many feared the future.” “To escape the Legion, you must first understand what it is. My mistake was in assuming I understood how the worlds worked.” “Be careful what you pretend to be. It’s far too easy to become what you pretend.”
In the last section of the book Zan finally finds her way back to the surface of the world, and into the war raging there. Amidst that struggle, Zan and her companions ultimately find hope. Just as Lord Mokshi found a way forward:
“All I am, and all I love, is war. I don’t know who I will be if I stop. The world, if it is to survive, needs a leader, not a warmonger. The world I want to make does not require me.”
To really appreciate what Hurley has accomplished, read through The Stars Are Legion focusing solely on the epigraphs, and see how your impressions of them change, and how they inform the narrative. But don’t do it until you’ve finished the book once already; you don’t want to spoil the ending. Hurley definitely followed one bit of Lord Mokshi’s advice.
“I don’t hope for the best ending. I plan for it.”
The Stars Are Legion is available now in a signed edition from Barnes & Noble.