Tag Archives: 1960

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[July 27, 1960] Footloose and Fancy Free (Japan and the August 1960 Fantasy & Science Fiction)

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Perhaps the primary perquisite of being a writer (certainly not the compensation, though Dr. Asimov is the happy exception) is the ability to take one's work anywhere.  Thanks to 'faxes and patient editors, all of this column's readers can follow me around the world.  To wit, I am typing this article in the lounge of my hotel deep in the heart of Tokyo, the capital of the nation of Japan. 

Japan is virtually a second home for me and my family, and we make it a point to travel here as often as time and funds permit.  Now that the Boeing 707 has shrunk the world by almost 50%, I expect our travels to this amazing, burgeoning land will increase in frequency.

Tokyo, of course, is one of the world's biggest cities, and the crowds at Shinjuku station attest to this.  And yet, there are still plenty of moments of almost eerie solitude–not just in the parks and temples, but in random alleyways.  There are always treasures to find provided one is willing to look up and down (literally–only a fraction of Tokyo's shops is located on the ground floor!)

Gentle readers, I have not forgotten the main reason you read my column.  In fact, the timing of my trip was perfect, allowing me to take all of the September 1960 digests with me to the Orient.  But first, I need to wrap up last month's batch of magazines.  To that end, without further ado, here is the August 1960 Fantasy and Science Fiction!

Robert F. Young has the lead short story, Nikita Eisenhower Jones.  I'd liked his To Fell a Tree very much, so I was looking forward to this one, the story of a young Polynesian who finagles his way onto the first manned mission to Pluto only to find it a lonely, one-way trip.  Sadly, while the subject matter is excellent, the tale is written in a way that keeps the reader at arm's length and thus fails to engage in what could have been an intensely powerful, personal story. 

The Final Ingredient is a different matter altogether.  Jack Sharkey had thus far failed to impress, so I was surprised to find him in F&SF, a higher caliber magazine, in my opinion.  But this tale, involving a young girl whose efforts at witchraft are frustrated until she abandons love entirely and embraces wickedness, is quite good indeed. 

John Suter's The Seeds of Murder, a reprint from F&SF's sister magazine, Ellery Queen's Mystery, is about telling the future through regressive (or in this case progressive) hypnosis.  It's cute, but something I'd expect to find in one of the lesser mags.  I suppose this should come as no surprise–this is Suter's first and only science fiction/fantasy story, so far as I can tell.

Rosel George Brown is back with another dark tale: Just a Suggestion.  When aliens subtly introduce the idea that the way to win friends and influence people is to be less impressive than one's peers, the result is economic downturn and, ultimately, planetary destruction.  Obviously satirical; rather nicely done.

This brings us to Robert Arthur's novelette, Miracle on Main Street.  A boy wishes on a unicorn horn that all of the folks in his small town, good and bad, should get what they deserve.  There is no ironic twist, no horrifying consequences.  It's a simple tale (suitable for children, really) that very straightforwardly details the results of the wish.  It should be a vapid story; Arthur goes out of his way to ensure there are no surprises.  Yet, I enjoyed it just the same.  I suppose a little unalloyed charm is nice every so often. 

The Revenant, by Raymond Banks, is a fascinating little story about human space travelers who explore a planet less fixed in sequence and probability than ours.  Their lives are far less dependable, but infinitely more varied and interesting.  The closest approximation would be if our dreams were our waking lives and vice versa (and perhaps this was the tale's inspiration).  Good stuff.

Avram Davidson has a one-pager, Climacteric, about a man who goes hunting dragons in search of romance.  He finds both.  It is followed by G.C.Edmondson's Latin-themed The Sign of the Goose, a strangely written story about an alien visitation that, frankly, made little sense to me.  It stars the same eccentrics as The Galactic Calabash.

Asimov has an article about the Moon as a vacation spot whose main attraction is the lovely view of Earth.  Catskills in the Sky, it is called, and it's one of his weaker entries.

Finally, we have Stephen Barr's Calahan and the Wheelies, about an inventor who creates a species of wheeled little robots with the ability to learn.  The concept is captivating, and the execution largely plausible.  Sadly, the story sort of degenerates into standard sci-fi clichés: the robots, of course, become sentient and rather malicious.  It's played for laughs, but I can just imagine a more serious story involving similar machines being put to all sorts of amazing uses.  Imagine a semi-smart machine that rolled around your house vacuuming and mopping your floor.  Or a programmable dog-walker.  I like robots that don't look like people or act like living things, but which are indispensible allies to humanity.  I want more stories featuring them.

All told, I think this issue clocks in about a shade over 3 stars.  A thoroughly typical F&SF, which is no bad thing.

See you in a few days with more from the Land of the Rising Sun!

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Movies

[July 23, 1960] Beyond the Schlock Barrier! (Beyond the Time Barrier)

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Every week, Rod Serling talks about the "Twilight Zone" between fear and knowledge, science and superstition, light and dark.  He might have added sublimity and schlock.  Every few weeks or so, my daughter and I plunge into that twilight zone known as the cinema.  Sometimes, we find quality in the lowest budget movies.  Other times, we leave an A-rater in disappointment. 

This time, we found ourselves truly in the middle ground.  Beyond the Time Barrier hardly has the luster of a high-budget production, but neither is it the worst of the C-rate sludge. 

First, a summary:

Major William Allison is a modern-day Air Force test pilot.  At the zenith of his first suborbital flight in the "X-80" (looking suspiciously like one of the new F-102 interceptors), he finds himself hurled forward some 64 years.  He does not discover this immediately–when Allison arrives at the decayed ruins of "Sands Air Force Base," he hasn't a clue what's happened.  This bit is nicely done and strongly reminiscent of the debut episode of The Twilight Zone, even to Allison's shouting of its title: "Where is everybody?"

We soon find out.  Allison is shot unconscious by a ray gun controlled by the Security Captain of an underground citadel.  When the pilot comes to, he is in the custody of several armed guards and one lovely young maiden.  After a brief questioning by the Captain and his boss, the citadel's "Controller," and a stint in the city dungeon, populated by bald mutants, Allison is given free run of the city.  It seems that Trirene, the Controller's granddaughter, has taken a liking to Allison.  The pilot finds the city a strange place, beautifully constructed, but its people are all deaf-mutes with the exception of the Controller, his Captain, and the insane-seeming mutants.  Trirene is a special case–she is a telepath, which makes things awfully convenient for Allison.

There is one other group of humans in the city: the Escapes.  Like Allison, they are people who flew their spacecraft fast enough, and in the right trajectories, to end up in the future.  Two are scientists from 1994, residents of planetary colonies.  Another is a Russian space pilot from 1973.  They inform Allison that the Earth has been doomed by atomic testing, which has destroyed the atmospheric/magnetospheric layer that protects the surface from hard radiation.  All the people left are sterile or mutated.  Allison is wanted so that he can mate with Trirene and foster a new generation.

Lucky Allison!  But he is persuaded by the Escapes to try flying back in his rocket plane on a path that will take him back to 1960 in the hopes that he might warn the world of their impending doom.  The Russian pilot frees all the mutants as a distraction–they ravage the city, pouncing on the fleeing citizens and eating them alive.  This is the scene the trailers boasted as making the film "the scariest ever made!"  More on this later.

Then the plan goes to Hell.  Each of the Escapes, in turn, betrays Allison for a chance to fly back to their own time.  Trirene is killed in a scuffle with the last one.  The Controller, bereaved, wishes Allison luck and sends him on his way.


My daughter observed at this point, "I don't know how they got the cameraman up there… but they sure aren't going to be able to bring him down!"

Allison makes it back, and he is able to warn his colleagues, but the movie has a twist: Allison has returned an old, feeble man–the consequence of Breaking the Time Barrier.. backwards, I imagine.

The End

I'll be honest in my admission that i enjoyed the film, though I likely would not remember it a year from now if not for the commiting of my thoughts on it to print in this article.  There is uneven pacing, some truly bad acting (particularly the Captain), ridiculous science, and plot holes big enough to plunge an X-80 through (for instance, if the scientists who drew up Allison's flight plan all wanted to go back to their own time, how can Allison use that plan to get back to 1960?).  The special effects are of the crudest sophistication.  I can take or leave the "atomic testing will doom us" plot.  I find that reviewers often praise a movie for its moralizing messages, but this one falls flat for me.

But the citdael is lovely, with a fine unifiying triangular motif.  I have since learned that the "set" was actually a model city of the future built for the Texas State Fair in Dallas last year.  There are two female characters of note: the truly lovely and charming Trirene and the canny Russian pilot, Markova.  I thought the scenes depicting the mutant attack were effective, though my daughter cared too little about the citizens to be disturbed by their grisly deaths.  I appreciated the lack of antagonists through much of the movie. 

My daughter called the film "mediocre."  She may be right, but the film won't be a total waste of your evening, particularly if the popcorn is extra tasty.

I'm off to Japan, tomorrow!  Expect updates to be slightly delayed, but with exciting photographic supplements.

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Book, Magazine

[July 21, 1960] Intoxication in Two Parts (Drunkard's Walk)

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Thanks to Galaxy's new oversized format, we can read serials over just two issues rather than seeing them spread across three or four.  Of course, there's a longer gap between installments now that Galaxy has gone bi-monthly.

As a result, I'd completely forgotten that Fred Pohl had left Drunkard's Walk half-finished as of the end of the June 1960 issue.  It's a good thing magazines provide synopses!

Actually, it all came back to me reasonably quickly.  Drunkard's Walk is a good read, like much of what issues from Pohl's pen.  Here's the skinny:

About a century from now, Earth has become comfortably overcrowded.  College-level education courses are universally available, via television programming, but only a very few may actually attend universities and subsequently apply their knowledge in any meaningful way.  Outside the rarefied campus setting, the average person lives in relative squalor, though free from significant wants.  Disease and hunger have been eradicated.  Space is at a premium, on the other hand, with significant populations inhabiting artificial off-shore platforms called "texases."

That's the backdrop.  The story is a fairly straightforward thriller.  A brilliant professor, by name of Cornut, finds his life in great peril as, whenever he is on the verge of waking, he is compelled to attempt suicide.  Since there is nothing wrong with Cornut's life (quite the opposite), he comes to the conclusion that someone or some group wants him dead.  It turns out that Cornut is just one of many under insidious attack. 

Who would want Cornut dead?  How is the compulsion conveyed?  And why are there reported outliers to the normally flawless "Wolgren Equation," which determines the maximum possible age of the members of any given group of people? 

Well, I certainly won't spoil it for you…

I will say that Pohl spotlights a lot of interesting questions, but he doesn't quite explore them fully, preferring to focus on the page-turning aspects of his story.  Also, there seems to be a gap of some 20-30 pages about two thirds through the story, perhaps edited for space.  Maybe we'll see them again if the story is novelized.  Still, Drunkard's Walk kept me interested, through both of its parts. 

Four stars (of five).

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Magazine

[July 19, 1960] A New Breed (August 1960 Galaxy)

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Last year, Galaxy editor Horace Gold bowed to economic necessity, trimming the length of his magazine and slashing the per word rate for his writers.  As a result (and perhaps due to the natural attrition of authors over time), Galaxy's Table of Contents now features a slew of new authors.  In this month's editorial, Gold trumpets this fact as a positive, predicting that names like Stuart, Lang, Barrett, Harmon, and Lafferty will be household names in times to come.

In a way, it is good news.  This most progressive of genres must necessarily accept new talent lest it become stale.  The question is whether or not these rookies will stay long enough to hone their craft if the money isn't there.  I suppose there is something to be said for doing something just for the love of it.

As it turns out, the August 1960 issue of Galaxy is pretty good.  I'm particularly pleased with Chris Anvil's lead novelette, Mind Partner.  It's a fascinating story involving a man paid to investigate a most unusual addictive substance, the habit of which its victims are generally unable to kick.  Those that manage to break free retreat into paranoid near-catatonia or explode into random streaks of violence.

Chris is a fellow who has churned out reliably mediocre tales for Astounding (now Analog) for years, yet I've always felt that he was capable of more.  Just as a good director can coax a fine performance out of an actor, perhaps Anvil just needs a better editor than Campbell.

William Stuart is up next with, A Husband for My Wife, a rather conventional, but not unworthy, time travel story involving the heated competition for affection and success between two friends/nemeses, one exemplifying brains, the other brawn.  The brainy one jumps off into the future with the brawny one's girlfriend leaving the latter stuck with the brainy one's domineering wife.  But the meathead and the shrew will be waiting when the brain returns… 

Stuart was the new author who penned the pleasant (though ultimately dark) Inside John Barth in the last issue.  His sophomore effort is not quite as good, but I can definitely see why Gold keeps him around, and he clearly has time to write!

Non-fiction writer Willy Ley is back to his old standard, I think, with his article on the origin of legends: How to Slay Dragons.  I was particularly interested to learn that the mythical dragon, at least in the West, only goes back to the Renaissance.  Apparently the notion of winged lizards cavorting with medieval princesses is anachronistic.

Back to fiction, The Business, as Usual is Jack Sharkey's second story in Galaxy, and it's about as bad as his first.  Set in 1962, it portrays, satirically, the top brass of our nation figuring out what to do with a new stealth aircraft.  It's all a set-up for a groan-worthy last line.

Sordman the Protector is an interesting, ambitious novella by serviceman Tom Purdom about a class of psychically gifted "Talents" who are both prized and reviled for their abilities.  The story is praiseworthy both for its innovative portrayal of future culture and the taut whodunit it presents.  It is clear that the author put a lot into developing the tale's background universe.  I wonder if he intends to expand it into a novel.

Neal Barrett's first tale, To Tell the Truth, has a cute title and an interesting set-up.  In an interstellar war where security is of paramount importance, combatants are given pain blocks against torture and suicide triggers that trip if their owners are on the verge of divulging sensitive information.  This provides strong protection for secrets when soldiers get captured.  But what if the secrets were never true to begin with?

Finally, we've got L.J. Stecher's An Elephant for the Prinkip, a rather delightful piece about the difficulties of transporting pachyderms across the stars.  It's one of those stories that shouldn't work, being all tell and no show (literally–its narrator is a salty old captain recounting the tale at a bar), but it does.  But then, I've always had a soft spot for stories involving interstellar freight.

That leaves the second and final part of Fred Pohl's short novel, Drunkard's Walk… but I'll cover this one separately.

Stay tuned!

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Movies

[July 17, 1960] Lost Time (The Lost World)

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Let's play a name association game.  When I say "Sir Arthur Conan Doyle," what comes to mind?  Sherlock Holmes, I'll wager.  But did you know that, in addition to being a quite accomplished non-fiction writer (his The War in South Africa: Its Causes and Conduct won him a knighthood), Conan Doyle was also a science fiction writer?  Contemporary with Edgar Rice Burroughs, Conan Doyle wrote a series of adventures starring the irascible Professor Challenger.

The first one, The Lost World, involves a trip to a remote South American plateau where dinosaurs still thrive.  This was the sort of conceit one could get away with in Edwardian times, back when there were still blank areas on the map where dragons might reside.  Burroughs, for instance, placed an entire mini-continent in the Pacific Ocean, also populated with dinosaurs, in his Caspak series.

With giant lizards festooned with costume accoutrements now a fad (e.g. Journey to the Center of the Earth), it is no surprise that Hollywood is looking for vehicles to showcase this new advancement in special effects.  Hence, The Lost World has found its way onto the silver screen.

Now, I'd been looking forward to this flick, in large part because I mistakenly thought it was going to be a movie about Burroughs' Pellucidar series (sort of an updated Journey to the Center of the Earth).  I don't know where I got that impression.  Nevertheless, Lost World is in color, and it's a lovely Cinemascope production, so I kept my cinema tickets and, with little difficulty, enticed my daughter to join me for a night at the movies.

Would that I could turn back time.

Every movie starts with a reserve of good will.  In this case, Lost World had its esteemed provenance and an exciting premise going for it.  It then proceeded to squander this reserve by engaging in an interminable scene in which Professor Challenger announces his discovery of dinosaurs in Amazonia and his intention to launch a second expedition.  This takes up nearly a tenth of the movie.

At first, the Professor rejects the few volunteers he receives, with the exception of Lord John Roxton, a (putatively) British adventurer with a California accent.  Challenger is later induced to accept reporter Ed Malone at the urging of Malone's editor, who offers $100,000 to fund the expedition.  Challenger's plummy associate, Professor Summerlee, also tags along.

This meager group is augmented upon arrival in South America by the craven, bearded Costa, and the suave Manuel Gomez (Fernando Lamas).  Gomez, despite his unconvincing guitar-playing skills (which the movie showcases as often as it can), is easily the most compelling character in the movie.

The Challenger expedition also expands to include Malone's editor's two children, Jennifer and David Holmes.  As in Journey to the Center of the Earth, much is made of Jennifer's gender.  Sadly, unlike the strong female lead in last year's movie, Jennifer is largely relegated to mooning over Roxton, falling in love with Malone, and generally ending up in distress.

Thus completed, the party embarks on a helicopter trip to the prehistoric plateau.  Thankfully, the vehicle is far larger on the inside than on the outside, and also whisper-quiet, so the expedition suffers few of the difficulties of associated with air travel.

Upon arriving, we learn that Jennifer has brought along a companion, which my daughter immediately dubbed "Gertrude."  Once again, this character compares poorly to its Journey counterpart, the plucky waterfowl that was several times the Lindenbrook Expedition's salvation.  Gertrude the dog is just an accessory, like a purse or scarf.

That night, Challenger's camp is assaulted by a rampaging "Brontosaurus," which looks suspiciously iguana-esque.  Gomez' helicopter is destroyed, stranding the expedition on the plateau.  This does little to dampen Challenger's spirits, however, and the next morning, he leads his party deep into the jungle in search of more prehistoric beasts.

His search soon leads to fruition, though I am beginning to doubt Professor Challenger's academic credentials.  I am reasonably certain, for instance, that dinosaurs were not lizards.

Soon after, Challenger finds a lovely native girl.  She is, of course, captured by the party, presumably for later dissection and display, or perhaps as insurance against when provisions are exhausted.  The native falls in love with David, though there is never an indication as to why.

The plot thickens slightly upon the discovery of evidence that another expedition preceded Challenger's.  It turns out that Roxton was a member of that party, which had come to the plateau in search of the famed treasure of El Dorado.  All but Roxton perished in the endeavor, including a fellow named Santiago.  It seems Roxton abandoned Santiago, with whom Gomez had a strong connection.  The helicopter pilot even carries a locket with Santiago's picture.  At first, I thought this was going to be a particularly daring film, but it later develops that Gomez and Santiago were brothers.

The remainder of the film is a sequence of unrelated, action-filled vignettes of unbearable length.  First, we are treated to an interminable clash of dinosaurs, exhausting any remaining hopes the audience might have entertained that anything resembling a real dinosaur would appear in the film.

Then, the party is captured by cannibals, who imprison them in their cave pending an invitation to dinner. 

The party escapes with the aid of the smitten native girl as well as a member of Roxton's first expedition, who turns up alive but blind.

But they're not out of the woods yet.  First, the party must spelunk endlessly through the chambers of an active volcano.

And then, on the brink of safety, Gomez brandishes his pistol and vows to avenge his brother.  The Argentine is easily subdued, but the party is then visited by another saurian attack.  Costa is gobbled up, but Roxton saves Gomez from a similar fate.  The balance books now even, Gomez sacrifices himself for the good of the party, killing a dinosaur with a handy lava flow.

The party seems less than aggrieved by the loss of its latin companions.  Rather, they delight in having escaped with their lives, a significant number of roughcut diamonds, and a newly hatched "Tyrannosaurus."  The End.

It really is fascinating to compare Lost World to Journey.  On the surface, they are surprisingly similar films.  Yet the level of craftsmanship is so poor in Lost World, with the possible exception of the cinematography.  It just goes to show that "A" status is no guarantee of a movie's quality, just as "B" status does not necessarily reflect an unworthy effort (e.g. The Wasp Woman).

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Fashion, music, politics, sports

[July 15, 1960] Controlled Chaos (The 1960 Democratic Convention)

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Democracy is strange, particularly as exercised by the Democratic Party.

Six months ago, it was anyone's guess who might be picked to have the privilege of running for the Presidency of the United States under the Democratic Party banner against Vice President Richard Nixon.  Hopefuls included perennial candidate Adlai Stevenson, fiery liberal senator Hubert Humphrey, affable ex-Air Force chief Stuart Symington, and ruler of the Senate roost Lyndon Johnson.  Oh, and a young, good-looking senator with a Harvard accent and a hidden set of rosary beads named Jack Kennedy.

Each candidate had his planned path to the nomination.  Stevenson, Johnson, and Symington stayed out of the primary fracas, hoping to curry favor at the convention proper.  Kennedy and Humphrey, on the other hand, took their causes directly to the people.  There were actually very few primaries this season, but Kennedy won all the important ones.  After delivering Humphrey a surprise upset in Wisconsin, right next door to Humphrey's native Minnesota, Kennedy went on to a victory in West Virginia, proving that a Catholic can win over the general public.  Humphrey took the loss graciously, bowed out of the race, and went on to stump for his former rival.

The convention was a horse of an entirely different color.  While many of us saw the external glitter of the event, the dancing girls, the cheers, the smoke, the banners, we were not privy to the last-minute back-dealing going on inside the dark corridors of the Los Angeles Biltmore Hotel.  At first, it seemed Adlai Stevenson's star was rising.  Thousands of supporters crammed the hotel (including my new friend Rachel, who went straight from Comic-Con to the Biltmore) and shouted endless chants of "Stevenson!  Stevenson!" 

But we don't live in the Roman Empire, and a mob is insufficient to laurel a leader these days.  Rather, it takes supreme organizational skills and the kind of political connections Kennedy has cultivated over many years.  It was a tense wait as the states pledged their fealty in alphabetical order during the first vote on the 13th, but it was all over when the last on the list, Wyoming, pushed Kennedy over the required 760 delegate limit.  There would be no second ballot, no free-for-all on the convention floor.  The senator from Massachusetts was the clear winner.

Thus, the drama then turned to the speculative choice for Vice-President, that much maligned but occasionally crucial second banana role.  Favored candidates included Symington and Washington senator Henry Jackson.  And yet, the name announced yesterday morning was Lyndon Johnson.

On the face of it, this seems a rational choice.  After all, while the South may be a Democratic stronghold for decades to come, cool and erudite Kennedy seems hardly the fellow to rally their support.  Johnson, on the other hand, is a good ol' boy from Texas, and a master of politics.  If Kennedy wants to change his address to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue come November, picking Johnson is a canny decision.

On the other hand, I can't imagine that the two will work together very well, being so different in nature and background.  Moreover, it's hard to believe that Johnson would give up running the Senate for what is generally considered a lesser position.  This is one of those moments in history that won't be clarified until many years have passed.

Tonight, Kennedy is scheduled to give his acceptance speech.  I've heard the man before, and there's no doubt he will be riveting and poetic.  I'm sure we'll all stay up late tonight to watch him on the television or hear him on the radio.

The Republican convention, starting on the 25th, will not be as outwardly dramatic.  It's a foregone conclusion that Nixon will be nominated, no one else having thrown his hat into the ring.  But there will be turmoil behind the scenes.  Anyone following the news knows that New York governor Nelson Rockefeller has been doing his utmost to influence what gets written into this year's Republican platform.  He may also be angling for the Vice Presidency.  We'll just have to wait and see.

Of course, I haven't forgotten the primary function of this column–to keep you abreast of all the latest science fiction and fantasy in film and print.  Stay tuned for the dope on the August 1960 Galaxy!

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Conventions/Performances

[July 12, 1960] Pages Come to Life! (Comic-Con '60)

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Two conventions in as many weeks!  What as I thinking?  And yet, despite the undoubted difficulty of the undertaking, it was well worth it.  San Diego's intimate little science fiction and comic book convention, aptly titled "Comic Con," was the most fun I've had at a convention in 1960. 

There was plenty to see and do, including a well-stocked exhibit hall, fascinating panels with opportunities to meet creators–like the new Marvel (formerly Atlas) Comics hotshot, Stan Lee, and, of course, people in costume.  There was a refreshing number of female and juvenile attendees–and not just Millie the Model fans, either! 

One could say that D.C. (Detective Comics) ruled the roost, with big exhibits devoted to perennial favorites like Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman, though there are rumbles that Marvel Comics may return to superhero comics next year.  I remember the brief revivals of Sub-Mariner, The Human Torch, and Captain America with fondness, so here's hoping they can pull it off.

Now, they say that a picture is worth a thousand words, so let's take a look at these lovely (color!) photos I took at the convention, speedily developed for my eagerly awaiting fans.

Note: On a lark, the convention organizers printed all of the badges to say "2015" on them.  I suppose that's appropriate for a science fiction convention!

There was the contingent that came dressed in their everyday clothes:

These included a few of comic book creators:

Eric Shanover, creator of a comic retelling of the Trojan War.

Todd Nauck, an exciting new artist.

Joe Phillips, an artist of the "blue" variety.  Not for children…

Then you had the attendees who came in elaborate outfits.  Some were inspired by the pulps of the '30s and '40s:

Others came from a variety of venues–see if you can recognize them all!

And possibly the specialist of guests, Latin American revolutionary Che Guevarra!

Finally, we have The Traveler, himself:

It was lovely meeting so many like-minded fans, and I hope to run into all of you again in the years to come!

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Magazine

[July 10, 1960] Eye of the Storm (August 1960 Analog)

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Once again, I find myself on vacation in my home town.  San Diego is hosting two science fiction conventions back to back this July, and this second one promises to be the larger of the two.  Of course, neither of these conventions holds a candle to the big one starting in Los Angeles tomorrow, the one that will determine our next Democratic candidate for President of the United States.

But that's a topic for another article.  You came here to find out about this month's fiction, right?

John Campbell is continuing his magazine's slow transitioning of names from Astounding to Analog.  Both names are still on the cover of this month's issue, superimposed upon each other in a confusing mess, but the spine now unequivocally says Analog, so that's how I'll refer to it from now on.  R.I.P. Astounding.  Here's to 24 years of an influential, if not entirely consistent, existence.

It's not a bad mag.  Poul Anderson's The High Crusade continues to be excellent, if wholly implausible.  This story of a 14th Century English village transformed into a nomadic band of universe-conquering marauders is played completely straight, with lovely characterization and an authentic ear for the language.  I find it hard to imagine that I won't enjoy it through all three parts at this point.

The magazine fares less well in its shorter pieces.  The lead novella, Mack Reynold's Adaptation, for instance, doesn't quite work.  A galactic Terran federation is trying to bring old, backward human colonies into the fold, but first, these wayward settlements must be brought to modern status sociologically and technologically.  Two planets are the subject of a 50-year project, one of which has reverted to a European-style feudalism, the other emulating Aztec culture and advancement.  Of course, the inhabitants all speak English and are descended from American stock. 

The team dispatched to elevate the planets to galactic standard splits in twain.  They determine that a healthy competition is in order, one of them championing a controlled economy a la the Soviet Union.  The other employs capitalism.  While both divisions manage to raise the economic output of their charge planets, they are accompanied by serious growing pains, and it is not clear which course is better (or if either be optimum). 

The set-up is terribly forced, but I just pretended the contact team was really trying to improve the lot of a couple of real cultures from the past, perhaps in alternate timelines.  The characterization is largely incidental, and there are no female characters at all.  Still, Reynolds does get you from point A to B, and he does get you invested in the outcomes of the experiments.

Next up is Pushbutton War by brand-newcomer Joseph P. Martino, and it reads like someone's freshman work.  It's the story of an Air Force pilot, who zips around at Mach 25 in a rocket-powered anti-missile interceptor.  Not only is the concept silly, but the story alternates between walls of actionless dialogue and soulless action.  And yet, despite this, it's not horrible.  I'd have suggested a rewrite or two, however.


by John Schoenherr

John Brunner has the exceedingly slight, Report on the Nature of the Lunar Surface, a few-pager that exists solely to set up the punchline.  In short (as there is no long), a technician's sandwich ends up on the Moon, the result of carelessness around a lunar probe.  The bacteria in the dairy products thus introduced to Earth's celestial companion result in a transformation of the Moon's crust of a decidedly viridian and odorous nature…

Since the magazine is now Analog Science Fact and Fiction, it is apt that there are two science articles in this issue.  One is a comprehensive summary on Venus by R.S.Richardson, the fellow who recently wrote a similar piece on Mars in a recent issue.  The current scientific consensus seems to be that we still really don't know much about "Earth's Twin" save that it has an impenetrable veil of clouds.  As we get better at radar studies, and once we send a spacecraft out to the solar system's second planet, perhaps the Goddess of Love will reveal her secrets.

The other article is an interesting, if dry, essay by Alastair Cameron on how elements heavier than helium were formed in the universe.  The popular theory these days is that everything north of atomic weight two on the Periodic Table formed amidst the unimaginable pressures existing in the center of stars.  The idea that our bodies are composed of the remains of long-dead suns is a romantic, mind-boggling one, I think.

Last up is Christopher Anvil's A Taste of Poison, about a canny businessman who convinces a set of alien would-be invaders that the inhabitants of Earth are a far tougher conquest than our comparatively primitive technologies might indicate.  A typical Anvil story that might pass the typical editorial filters of Campbell.

All told, it's a 3-star issue buouyed by the Anderson and the non-fiction articles and shackled by the pedestrian shorter fiction.  Still, that's two thirds of a winning combination.  If Campbell manages to get a decent new set of writers, he could pull his magazine out of its recent nosedive.

See you very soon with a gallery of photos from "Comic Con."  Don't let the name fool you–it's a general science fiction/fantasy convention.

Stay tuned!

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Book

[July 7, 1960] Frankenstein's Timeline (Brian Aldiss' Galaxies like Grains of Sand)

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Themed collections, a book containing stories by the same author in a common universe, are interesting things.  Isaac Asimov's Foundation is one of the more famous examples, and when a collection of Zenna Henderson's The People stories comes out, that will be one of the best ever.

Sometimes, an author is tempted to shoehorn a number of unrelated stories into a single timeline.  Then the stories can be re-released as a "novel" rather than as just a compiled group of shorts (of the type Sheckley releases). 

It can work, but not always.  Every story is written with a set of assumptions in mind, and it is often difficult to do a polished rewrite such that the original assumptions can be masked.

Galaxies Like Grains of Sand is a new book from seasoned young British writer Brian Aldiss.  It contains eight previously published stories stitched together in timeline chronological order with italicized linking text.  The book ostensibly covers some forty million years of future history.  It's a cute conceit, but does it really hold up under scrutiny?  Let's look at each of the parts and see if the whole is greater than their sum (it should be noted that I hadn't read most of these stories before since they came out primarily in British mags):

The War Millenia was originally published as Out of Reach in Authentic Science Fiction.  In this first story, humanity is in the midst of atomic destruction and has burrowed into shelters deep beneath the Earth where they convalesce in a narcotic dream haze most of the time.  On the eve of the global war, Earth is visited by a race of advanced humanoids called "Solites", who take a keen interest in salvaging as much of Earth's creatures and cultures as possible.  One Solite even marries a human and transports him to the Solite world, a futuristic but bleak place.  Tired of being kept in the dark as to the true nature of the secretive Solites, he hijacks a matter-transmitter and beams himself back to Earth, where he ends up in a dream house for therapeutic treatment.  The kicker to the story (and it's easily predicted) is that the Solites are not aliens–they are simply evolved humans from thousands of years in the future. 

In The Sterile Millenia, (All the World's Tears, published in Nebula Science Fiction), it is four thousand years after the war described in the first tale.  The "color war" is over, and the "Blacks" have won.  But only just.  The Earth is largely a wasteland, and breeding is strictly, coldly controlled by committee.  Emotionless logic (with the occasional stimulated bout of hatred to promote vigor) characterizes human personality.  One prominent politician has a daughter who is a throwback: not only does she feel, but she's an albino to boot.  Her abortive affair with another throwback ends abruptly and fatally, genetic freaks being equipped with bombs to preclude their breeding.

Flash forward countless thousands of years to The Robot Millenia (Who Can Replace a Man from Infinity Science Fiction), my favorite story of the book.  Humanity has been on a continuous decline since the war, increasingly supported by vast networks of more-or-less sentient robots.  When it is rumored that the last human has died (at least on Earth–the stitching text describes an exodus to the stars) the robots attempt to strike out on their own.  They make something of a hash of it.  Aldiss captures the conniving relationships of an emotionless race quite nicely.

This is followed by The Dark Millenia (Oh Ishrail! in New Worlds Science Fiction).  It is not specified when this takes place, but it is some time after the Solite period of ascendancy described in the first story.  The tale revolves around Ishrail, a fellow banished to Earth by the interstellar confederation of galactic colonies.  At least, we're led to believe it is Earth, recolonized by one of the diasporic groups. 

Close on this story's heels, chronologically, is The Star Millenia (Incentive in New Worlds Science Fiction), in which an emissary of the aforementioned confederation visits the Earth, on a whim changes its name to "Yinnisfar", and teaches us "Galingua", a universal language that not only allows mutual intelligibility throughout the galaxy, but also instant interstellar travel.

This proves problematic, however, in The Mutant Millenia (Gene-Hive or Journey to the Interior in Nebula Science Fiction) when it turns out that too much facility with Galingua leaves one vulnerable to assimilation into a cancerous mutation of humanity that tries to absorb everyone it touches.  Per the subsequent interstitial explanation, baseline humans win by giving up Galingua.

That takes us to The Megalopolis Millenia (Secret of a Mighty City in Fantasy and Science Fiction, which I do remember reading).  This story is really a satire of the modern television industry, in which the work of a visionary filmmaker/anthropologist, who exposes the seamy underside of a sprawling megacity, becomes the subject of a new show twenty years later–with all the meaningful bits removed.  Of all of the stories that make up the book, this one's inclusion feels the most contrived, and it is probably not a coincidence that it is preceded by the most new linking material.

Finally, we have The Ultimate Millenia (Visiting Amoeba or What Triumphs from Authentic Science Fiction).  It turns out that the energy of our galaxy is slowly dwindling toward heat death, though its inhabitants are unaware of this decay.  It also develops that the human diaspora went beyond our galaxy, and humanity's children exist in other island collections of stars.  One of them contrives to assemble a large fleet on the edge of the Milky Way, blast his way spectacularly to old Earth, and deliver the message that humanity, at least all of us in our home galaxy, are doomed.  Thanks.  So ends forty million years of history.

Does it work?  I have my reservations.  The style is inconsistent throughout.  Sometimes Aldiss takes care to create alien lexicons and names.  Others, he seems to fall on 20th Century convention.  There is no chronological rhyme or reason to his choices.  Also, I feel as if baseline humanity stays awfully human throughout–except when we evolve into unbelievably different creatures as described in the Mutant and Ultimate Milennia. 

So, as a whole, it isn't a complete success.  As for the pieces, with the exception of story #3 (and perhaps #7), I found the book to be something of a difficult bore to plow through.  And while I find it admirable that Aldiss includes non-Whites as protagonists in some of his stories (a thread that disappears by story #4), women are virtually absent. 

2.5 stars.  As always, your mileage may vary, and I welcome your thoughts.

I'm off to another convention this week, but I am taking my trusty typewriter with me.  Expect pictures and more fiction reviews in a few days!

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Conventions/Performances

[July 4, 1960] Coming Home (Westercon SD convention)

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What is it that makes a con?  Is it the chance to meet published authors and prominent fans?  Is it the spirited discussion of high-minded concepts deep into the night?  Is it the opportunity to engage in salacious activities? 

Ultimately, what a convention all comes down to is building a community.  We all live in disparate locations around the country, and even with the gleaming new interstate system that allows us to travel in minutes what used to take hours, the density of fans in any given location is not particularly high.  So we all congregate in one place so that, for a brief shining instant, we can imagine a world where the fan is the norm.

It's a beautiful (and sometimes frightening) idea.

The convention I just came back from was Westercon SD (not to be confused with the "true" Westercon, currently still going on in Boise, Idaho and known this year as "Boycon").  All of the traditional con activities were present: the filk sings, the masquerade, the dance (a sock-hop, of course). 

I was present at none of these, however.  Instead, I simply ambled back and forth between the Dealers' Hall and the Hospitality Suite, occasionally dropping in on a panel.  I really go to cons just to meet people, and it's great to strike up conversations on esoteric topics with total strangers.  And you can, at a con, because you know that any given attendee will share several of your interests.  Mine, as my readers know, include increasing the inclusiveness of our clique, thus increasing the diversity of our membership; being something of a legal maven, the issues involved in copyrights are also near and dear to my heart. 

There were also many conversations on these three perennial topics:

1) "It's not as good as it used to be."

2) "Where did you buy that?"

3) "How do we get more people to be fans?"

As I stated above, a convention is all about its attendees, so let's have a look at some of the folks who comprised Westercon SD's short-lived but happy community:

This lovely gentleman is Doug Richards, that rare breed of writer who has made the big-time.  We met in line for registration, and we quickly became fast friends.  A really great fellow.

Ben has been attending Westercon virtually since its inception.  No fan like an old fan!

Here's Stuart, sampling the wares at the Dealers' Hall.

The brand new character, Supergirl!

Gotta love Tone's style!

Not to mention Her Majesty (perhaps inspired by this story?)

Another dapper gentleman tending booth.

Jennifer makes an amazing Morgan le Fay…

Cindy, selling first edition Oz books.

This is Chris, an historian and aeroplane enthusiast.

Gabrielle, again, as well as Kit (the merchant), and the lovely Janice.

Here is Janice again.  I was so taken with her, that I invited her to come home with me.  Of course, it was something of a sure thing–we've been married nearly twenty years!

And the Traveler, himself. 

See you soon with a load of print fiction reviews.  And then… off to the movies!

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