All posts by Gideon Marcus

Science / Space Race, Science Fiction/Fantasy

[Oct. 31, 1960] Looking both ways (October wrap-up, November preview)

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As October draws to a close, it is worth taking a pause and reflecting on all the things that did and didn't happen this month before moving on to a preview of November.

In the battle of the digests, The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction came out the clear winner with an aggregate rating of 3.5 stars.  IF was the middle child, with a perfect 3 star score.  Analog took up the rear, at 2.75 stars, despite having a pair of the best stories of the month, largely due to the quackish non-fiction articles. 

But the biggest loser of the month was the fairer sex: not a single woman author is credited in any of the Big Three magazines.  Perhaps they made appearances in one of the few remaining others.

Only two new books came out this month, and I only read one of them: the 2.5 star clunker Starfire.  One of the Journey's most vocal fans (by monicker of TRX), however, has stepped up to the role of occasional contributor, and his review of Murray Leinster's Men into Space will be forthcoming in just a few days.  Welcome to the team!

The visual media have also been something of a bust this month.  The second season of Twilight Zone has been underwhelming, and I didn't particularly like The Flintstones (though I understand I'm in the minority).  I aim at the Stars, the Wehrner von Braun hagiography isn't playing near me, though I did manage to pick up a copy of the comic book adaptation given out to those who saw the film.  I may review it in November. 

There were four televised Presidential debates, on which I dutifully reported.  I understand that Jack Kennedy is drawing tremendous, adulating crowds while Dick Nixon's audiences, albeit similarly sized, are far more restrained.  It's too soon to draw conclusions from this, though.  It may just be a matter of temperament.

In the Space Race, America launched the first active repeating communications satellite, and if you haven't grasped the significance of that event, you might want to read my article on the launch.  But there were a couple of missteps, too.  The first publicaly acknowledged spy sat, SAMOS 1, didn't make it into orbit on October 11.  The probe reportedly would have returned live TV pictures of Soviet installations.  I'm very curious to see if the technology works given the issues the Air Force has had with capsule-recovery spy satellites…I mean biological return satellites.  Speaking of which, Discoverer 16 also suffered a launch failure on October 26.  Not a good month for snooping on the Communists from space.

What can we expect for next month?  A few calls to various publishers have brought me to the conclusion that there will be slim pickings for new books.  Of course, there are the Big Three digests, and the election on November 7.  Other than that, it's wide open.

And so I turn to you, my fans.  To paraphrase Senator Kennedy, the Journey is a great column, but it can be better.  What would you like to see in the month of November?  And by the way, if any of you have a subscription to Amazing or Fantastic or any of the other digests, I'm always keen to enlist more contributors…

Happy Halloween!


(Halloween at Drake University, Iowa, in 1954)

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Magazine

[Oct. 30, 1960] Halloween Candy (the November 1960 Fantasy and Science Fiction)

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With Halloween around the corner, one might have thought that there would have been an extra spooky issue of Fantasy and Science Fiction this month.  Nothing doing.  The current issue is nothing extraordinary, if not completely forgettable.  Having covered the end novellette in my last article, it's time to cover the rest of the magazine.

I've never heard of Vance Aandahl before, but his tiny It's a Great Big Wonderful Universe, about a sad Terran who has everything but the planet he hails from, is a good aperitif.  Four stars.

Robert F. Young is up next with his Romance in a Twenty-First Century Used-Car Lot.  It's a weird extrapolation and intersection of two trends: an increased sanction of promiscuity coupled with a perverse need to be armored against the world.  In this story, everybody, but everybody, is expected to wear their own personal automobile at all times.  To go without is to be shunned as a "nudist."  It's all very strange and allegorical, but too silly to be effective.  Once again, it's not up to the standard set by his excellent To Fell a Tree, though I did appreciate that the protagonist was female, and the story's focus on the very real difficulties they face vis. a vis. men and society.  Three stars.

Who dreams of Ivy? is another macabre piece by Will Worthington set in a world marred by institutionalized violence and fear.  I'm afraid I didn't quite get it, or maybe there isn't much to get.  Is there a message to this dark look at election season, where mayors live in constant fear for their lives, and thus take this fear out on their citizens?  I feel as if Sheckley's Ticket to Tranai did it better and more humorously.  Three stars.

Next up is an old old reprint, Funk, by John W. Vandercook.  It's a well-written if somewhat pedestrian tale of dark magic on the steamy coast of West Africa.  What happens when you build a bank vault right square on the spot where the Crocodile God slithers to devour its periodic sacrifices?  Nothing good, I assure you.  The closest we get to a seasonal ghost story.  Three stars.

I did quite enjoy Combat Unit, from newcomer Keith Laumer, in which a damaged but still-sentient robot tank finds itself behind enemy lines.  This is a fine portrayal of metallic, sexless intelligence.  Four stars.

Yes, we have no Ritchard, by Bruce J. Friedman (normally a writer for the slicks), is a cute tale about an usual afterlife situation.  There is a Heaven and a Hell, but no one goes to Heaven, and Hell isn't so bad.  So how does one distinguish the good from the bad?  And what happens to the ego of a good man in such a demoralizing predicament?  Three stars.

Finally, we have Isaac Asimov's latest non-fiction piece, The Element of Perfection.  As one might gather from the title, it's on the discovery of Helium (and, incidentally, the other noble gases).  It's one of my favorite articles from the good doctor–educational and entertaining.  Five stars.

No surprises this month: an F&SF that finishes slightly on the positive side of three stars.  You won't regret the expenditure of 40 cents (quite reasonably, really), but I suspect you won't find yourself returning to this issue very often, either.

Tomorrow, a sneak preview at the month of November!

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Magazine

[Oct. 28, 1960] Point of Inflexion (The Future of Plenty)

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Science fiction is not prediction.  It is extrapolation.  No one can see the future, but a gifted writer can show you, dramatically, what will happen "if this goes on." 

It's no surprise that science fiction writing has enjoyed a boom since 1950.  Never has our world been on the brink of so many exciting and dangerous potentialities.  On the positive side: space travel, automation by computers and robots, atomic energy.  On the negative side: pollution, global warming, and atomic annihilation. 

As a species, we stand on the edge of superabundance created by fewer and fewer people.  It used to be that the vast majority of us made our living through subsistence farming.  By the end of World War 2, the percentage of Americans employed in farming of all kinds was down to 14%, and since then, it has declined to about 8%. Over the next few decades, thanks to mechanization, the profession of farmer as we know it may cease to exist.  We can expect the same trend to happen globally as the poorer parts of the world catch up. 

What have we been doing now that we don't have to farm?  Building things.  By the end of the War, Blue-collar workers made up 40.7% of the labor force.  As of 1959, they were down to 37%.  This seems like a small dip, but the decline is consistent.  Automation is getting cheaper every day, and it is pretty certain that the industrial sector will experience the same downturn as the agricultural sector. 

Well, then, what is everyone else doing?  White-collar workers, the professionals, the managers, the clerks, and those in sales, have grown in percentage of the work force from 35% in 1947 to around 42% last year.  Moreover, service workers, both domestic and for-hire, have gone up from 10.4% to 12.2%.  In other words, fewer people are using their hands and their backs to produce things.  More are using their brains to produce…or entertain.

That's a snapshot at this place and time.  What happens "if this goes on?"–when everyone has all the food and goods they need, what will people want?  At what profession will people work?  Will we all take turns serving each other at restaurants (until robo-waiters come into vogue)?  Will we all write sonnets and paint pictures for each other in a sort of round-robin gift economy (until machines write songs and craft art better than we can)?  Will we all become citizen-scientists, pioneering the limits of knowledge (before computers figure out ways to do it better and faster)?  Or will we all ultimately end up loose-mouthed in a torpor watching endless robot-created television programs?

I just reread George Orwell's 1984, a tale of crushed free will in an ultra-totalitarian post-nuclear England.  In his world, the people in power reason that the obstacle to their retention of power is superabundance.  Once everyone has all they need, they reason, class distinctions disappear.  Thus, the Party takes control and diverts all surplus production (and much besides) to the waging of a futile, endless war.  Orwell essentially dodges the question–the road to plenty is nipped in the bud for the sake of a greedy few.

On the other side of the coin, we have Mack Reynolds' Russkies Go Home!, which appeared in this month's (November 1960) Fantasy and Science Fiction.  Mr. Reynolds reportedly just returned from a trip behind the Iron Curtain, which explains the multitude of Russia-related stories he's recently turned out.  Clearly, the trip impressed the writer, as the stories all posit a Soviet Union that fulfills Senator Kennedy's nightmare prophecies by surpassing the United States in prosperity by 1970.

Russkies takes place furthest along of all the stories, chronologically.  While it is never explicitly stated, we can assume it is somewhere around 1990.  The USA is suffering from chronic unemployment since no one will buy our products.  This is because the USSR, forced by USA-led trade embargoes in the 50s and 60s, has become self-sufficient superproducer.  Now they can dump exports on the world market at a fraction of the price of products made in the "Free World."  And dump they do, not because they need imports from other countries, but to obtain foreign currency. 

Because the tourism bug has hit big in the Soviet Union.  No longer penned in by the secret police, and no longer eager to defect the abundance at home, the Communists now have a driving urge to see the world during their overlong work vacations (the Soviets, with their command economy, do not have unemployment, but they do have awfully short work weeks!)


from here

And so, Russian tourists swarm the world, spending freely, drinking heavily, and generally making raucous nuisances of themselves.  This is the new hedonism.  Meanwhile, the Americans want to regain customers for their trade products, but they can't so long as the Soviets are undercutting.  The story's protagonist hits upon the idea of promulgating a religion of moderation, hoping that such will keep the Communists at home and allow the Americans some breathing room to restore trade connections.  And perhaps address their juvenile delinquency problem; unemployed, unmoderated folks have lots of time on their hands to make trouble.

The funny thing is that it seems to work, this command economy religion (generated from scratch with an enormous outlay of government funds).  And the Soviets, far from being upset by this development, ask if they can help–it seems they want to do something about the tens of millions of Chinese tourists they've been dealing with lately…

It's a silly story, and while the first half is rather excellent, the rest is barely an outline.  Moreover, I think Reynolds' fundamental premise, that Communism will somehow surpass Capitalism, is flawed, though I did particularly like his observation that the "Free World" includes places like Spain, Formosa, and Saudi Arabia. 

But that doesn't matter.  The root of the story is our impending superabundance and the potentially devastating consequences for society.  This is a subject I don't see addressed very often, in part because it's just so damned hard to guess what the world will look like after the labor sector transformation is complete.  It is coming, though, and it's probably best we work out how we're going to deal with it sooner rather than later. 

In short, what will we do when there's nothing we need to do?

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TV

[Oct. 25, 1960] Great Expectations (the second season of The Twilight Zone

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When does the New Year start?

Your first instinct might be to say "January 1, of course!"  But that's simply the beginning of the calendar year.  Think of all the other days that kick off the next 365-year cycle.  For Jews, New Year is in September.  If you run a company, your fiscal year has a good chance of not matching the calendar.

And if you're a student, a football fan…or a television viewer, you know viscerally that the New Year starts right after Labor Day.

Last TV year, writer/producer Rod Serling stunned his audiences with the exciting new anthology show The Twilight Zone.  Featuring half-hour episodes with science fiction/fantasy/horror themes, it was some of the best material the small screen had to offer.

It's no surprise that Twilight Zone was renewed for 1960-61, but can the new season match the expectations set by the first?

So far, the answer is… no.  Let me go through the four episodes that have come out thus far, and then I'll discuss the common elements that have been their undoing.

First up is King Nine will not Return, about a World War II bomber pilot who wakes up in the wreck of his plane stranded somewhere in North Africa.  The rest of his crew is gone, and his memory only gradually returns.  A nice hook, but it goes nowhere.  For 20 minutes, we get to watch the Captain laugh, cry, gibber, and run around.  Then he wakes up in a hospital, and it turns out it was all a battle-fatigue induced nightmare.  Except that his shoes are full of desert sand.

Then we have The Man in the Bottle, a prosaic little genie-grants-wishes story.  This episode is particularly maddening as the plot relies on the utter stupidity of the wishers (the genie, despite his rather sinister demeanor, is quite generous as genies go).  Granted four wishes, a near-bankrupt antique storekeeper and his wife wish: 1) That their display case glass be mended, 2) That they get a million dollars, 3) That they be unimpeachable rulers of a contemporary nation, 4) and (when #3 doesn't work out), that they be restored to their former state.

The catch to their windfall of cash is the Internal Revenue Service, which claims most of the income.  Since (in a nice bit) the generous storekeepers give away about $60,000 right away, after taxes they are left with just $5.  As for the gratification of wish #3, you just knew the storekeeper was going to end up as Adolf Hitler on April 30, 1945.  And after #4, the storekeeper breaks the display case repaired by wish #1.  A complete reset.

Except, of course, that his neighborhood is $60,000 richer!  This isn't touched upon, and it is a shame.  I would have liked to see the storekeepers' community, now aflush with funds and overflowing with gratitude, helping to make their shop a success. 

Or, you know, for the storekeepers to make better wishes in the first place.

Nervous Man in a Four Dollar Room

A two-bit hood spends the episode in a dingy hotel room literally wrestling with himself after being given his first murder contract.  In the end, his suppressed nobler self takes control and turns away from a life of crime. 

And is subsequently gunned down by the mob.  Ah, my mistake.  That didn't happen, or at least, it was not shown in the episode.  It's a logical conclusion, however.

I actually probably enjoyed this episode the most, but that's not to say it was good; merely that it was not horrible.  Joe Mantell turned in a pretty good performance as the pathetic "Jackie."

Finally, we have A Thing about Machines, which my daughter and I were able to preview before it airs this Friday (in three days).  A martinet of a writer in a palatial estate finds fault with all of his mechanical devices: his television, his radio, his typewriter, his phone.  So they all plot their revenge.  The typewriter composes an eviction notice (somehow, the thing magically replenishes its paper store).  The television and phone harangue him.  His electric shaver slithers after him like a snake.  Ultimately, his car chases him into a swimming pool, where he dies of a heart attack.  The acting, cinematography and music are fine.  Shame about the story.

My daughter told me recently, "Last season, Twilight Zone was creepy with a twist.  Now it's just creepy."  She's right.  Each story starts with a premise and then goes nowhere, developmentally speaking.  We're back to that padded middle, crazy fellow screaming pattern that dogged the worst episodes of the first season. 

What's the common element?  Rod Serling wrote them all.

In fact, Rod Serling, who previously only showed up in the previews for next episodes now walks onto the set at the beginning of every story.  I don't mind when Hitchcock does it, but it rather breaks the flow in this show.  As for the quality of writing, the stories Serling provided last season were among the weaker entries, and he's no better this season.  I have a great deal of admiration for Serling as a producer and a raconteur, but he's got to let other folks contribute some screenplays.

Perhaps I'm being overly harsh.  It may well be that Serling is writing under strict budgetary guidelines, which limits his sets and number of actors (not to mention hiring out guest writers).  Between Serling and his restrictions, I don't know that the show will survive the year.

On the other hand, next week's episode is by Charles Beaumont.  That bodes well.

See you in two days with this month's Fantasy and Science Fiction!

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Fashion, music, politics, sports

[Oct. 22, 1960] Frice said and done.  (The fourth Kennedy/Nixon debate)

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Contrary to the Bard's assertion, one can have too much of a good thing; I'm not sure that the fourth Nixon/Kennedy debate entertained anyone, except perhaps the Trumanesque moderator, ABC's Quincy Howe.

That is because the candidates had exhausted themselves of platitudes and nitpicky facts, leaving naught but tired repetitions of previous debate points. Here's a brief summary of what was addressed at last night's all-foreign policy debate.

Both candidates fairly squandered their opening statements. Communism as the main enemy of the United States was the theme of Nixon's preamble. He repeated his assertion that 600 million souls had fallen behind the Iron Curtain during Truman's administration while virtually none had during the Eisenhower administration. Kennedy preempted the speech he'd planned to give to respond to Nixon's charge, and he dredged up the same points he'd made in the last debates: that Eisenhower let Cuba fall to Communism, and that a neglected Africa is on its way, too.

The debate did have a few interesting highlights, however. Nixon was asked if he was only taking such a strong stance on the defense of Quemoy and Matsu (two insignificant islands off the coast of Red China currently claimed by Formosa) just because his opponent has not. The Vice President said that the accusation was totally false…and then said he'd drop the whole matter if Kennedy changed his position. Kennedy declined.

On the topic of Cuba, Nixon endorsed a queerly dovish policy: embargo Cuba, and the people will eventually topple Castro, he said. Kennedy strongly disagreed, and he urged active American support of anti-Castro Cubans, domestic and exiled.

On the issue of national prestige, Nixon assured his audience that American is doing just fine, and that any blows to our country's image are Kennedy's fault for being so unbalanced in his attacks. With regard to the space race, Nixon may be right–we've had, as he said, 28 successful space shots to the Soviet's 8. We just never achieve the spectacular first. I guess, 'Being #2, we try harder.' But when the Vice President talked about our high prestige in Latin America, well, color me unconvinced. The rocks and eggs which pelted Nixon when he visited Peru and Venezuela in 1958 weren't flowers.

Kennedy countered simply, "I look up and see the Soviet flag on the moon." He may be referring to Luna 2, or he may be predicting that the Communists will get there first. Either event points up a Soviet superiority in boosters (i.e. missiles), at least for the moment.

When asked which region of the world would receive stronger focus in his administration, the Senator suggested Eastern Europe. This surprised me given his calls for greater ties with Africa and Latin America, but perhaps he meant 'in addition' to those regions he'd already mentioned. Specifically, Kennedy singled out Poland as a possible candidate for pulling from the Soviet grasp. Truth to tell, I did not know that Poland was vulnerable to such endeavors given that they share a border with the Soviet Union. I was impressed by the Senator's articulation on this point.

I was not, however, impressed with Nixon's "me too" reply or his subsequent closing statement. Just appearing sincere is now too much of an effort for the Vice President, and he's given it up. I think he couldn't wait for this whole debate fiasco to be over.

And fiasco it has been. Going into the debates, Senator Kennedy was struggling with an image of immaturity. Vice President Nixon was considered the better speaker, the more experienced candidate. Now we've seen four contests between the two, and Kennedy has come out the winner in at least three (in my opinion). More importantly, Nixon began and ended the series with weak performances, whereas Kennedy has only looked more and more presidential.

I don't believe that these debates are the linchpin to the election, but they have made it much more of a horse race. What was the Vice President's election to lose is now anyone's game.

Next up: the second season of The Twilight Zone!

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Magazine

[Oct. 20, 1960] Fiction > Non-fiction… sometimes (the November 1960 Analog)

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Each month, I lament what's become of the magazine that John Campbell built.  Analog's slow decline has been marked by the editor's increased erratic and pseudo-scientific boosting behavior.  Well, I just don't have the heart to kick a dog today, and besides, the fiction is pretty good in this month's (November 1960) issue.  So let's get right to it, shall we?

"Mark Phillips" (Randall Garrett and Laurence M. Janifer) have a new four-part serial in their Malone series.  Set in the 1970s, the series details the adventures of a couple of federal agents, who are helped in their cases by a telepath who believes herself (and may actually be) Queen Elizabeth I.  I won't spoil the details of this one, Occasion for Disaster, but I've liked the previous novels, so I suspect Occasion will also be pleasant reading.

Heading off the magazine's short stories is a fun piece by Theodore L. Thomas, half of the pseudonymous duo that previously brought us a fascinating study into the world of copyright, The Professional Touch.  Crackpot continues in that vein, featuring a brilliant old scientist (Prof. Singlestone… get it?!) who convinces the world that he's gone senile.  His aim?  To make his work so disreputable that no government agency will want it, so that no university will employ him, so that he can for the first time in his life enjoy working as a truly free agent.  So that when his invention proves to be utterly unignorable, he will be the master of its fate.  Cute stuff.  Three stars.

Next up is E.C. Tubb's The Piebald Horse.  It starts out well enough with a Terran spy trying to escape a repressive alien world with his brain full of sensitive knowledge.  The jig seems up for him when the aliens employ telepaths as mind-screen agents, but they are foiled when the protagonist pickles himself continuously until he can depart the planet.  I'm pretty sure I just saw this tactic in Fred Pohl's Drunkard's Walk.  2 stars.

These two stories are followed by a pair of execrable "non-fiction" articles.  Captain, MSC, US Navy H.C. Dudley, PhD (he must be authoritative–look at all the titles!) has the first: The Electric Field Rocket.  He maintains that the Earth's electrostatic field can be used to assist rocket launches; he implies that the Soviet's lead in the Space Race is attributable to their taking advantage of said phenomenon.  Not only is the article unreadable, but I suspect the science is bunk.  Time will tell.  1 star.

Speaking of which, Editor Campbell contributes the second article: Instrumentation for the Dean Drive.  I'm not even going to dignify with a review this next piece in an endless series on Dean's magical inertialess engine.  He needs to knock it off already.  1 star.

Blessedly, the rest of the issue is quite good.  The reliable Hal Clement is back with Sunspot, an exciting, if highly technical, account of a group of spacemen who ride a comet around the Sun.  What better shielding exists for a close encounter with a star than billions of cubic tons of ice?  Four stars.

At last, we come to H. Beam Piper's Oomphel in the Sky.  The set-up is great: a Terran colony world in a binary star system courts disaster when the planet makes a close approach to the usually far-away sun.  This triggers unrest amongst the natives, threatening Terran and native interests alike.  I'm an unabashed fan of Piper, and this is a good tale, although he does get a little patronizing toward the do-gooder but ineffective Terran government.  I like the strong anthropological bent, and I appreciate the respect with which he treats the natives and their interests.  Four stars.

In sum, the November 1960 Analog (I almost typed "Astounding") is quite decent, fiction-wise.  Campbell needs to do what Galaxy's Gold has done and hire a ghost editor, and a real non-fiction author.  I can't believe there isn't another budding Asimov or Ley out there champing at the bit to be published…

The fourth and last Kennedy/Nixon debate is tomorrow night!  I hope you'll all watch it with me, but if you can't bring yourself to sit through another hour of sparring, I'll give you the full details the following day.

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Book

[Oct. 17, 1960] Aiming Low (Robert Buckner's Starfire)

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Is dumbed-down science fiction a gateway or an embarrassment?

I commonly hear the complaint that our genre, namely science fiction and fantasy, is not taken seriously.  Despite the contributions of such luminaries as Ted Sturgeon, Zenna Henderson, Isaac Asimov, Robert Heinlein, etc., our field is generally considered to comprise purely low-brow fare.

Is it really a surprise?  When is the last time you watched an accurate science fiction movie?  How often do lurid pictures of steel-brassiere clad women grace the covers of our magazines, regardless of the content therein?  How distinguishable are these covers from those of the comic books?

Things are getting better, I think.  The number of science fiction magazines has dwindled to a manageable half-dozen or so, and in a sort of literary Darwinism, their stories are of superior caliber (generally).  Every month, several genre books are published; some of them really push the envelope both in writing and subject matter.

Which is why it's disappointing when I come across a throwback like Robert Buckner's Starfire, published this month by "Permabook."

The cover should have been warning enough.  The blurb advertises, "The Hilarious Exploits of a Bashful Scientist and a Creature Gorgeous Enough to Send any Man into Orbit," and the mostly naked redhead in the astronaut's arms is classic pulp cheesecake.  Still, there isn't much coming out this month, and I needed something to read on the flight to Seattle last week. 

At a bare 139 pages of big print, it didn't last half the journey.  Apparently, the book originally appeared as a serial for the Saturday Evening Post, which explains its vapid, layman-friendly style.

Giving credit where credit is due, the first forty pages are actually pretty good.  We are acquainted with a spaceman, Charlie, his orbital mission in progress.  He's in some kind of capsule, and this is a test flight for a trip around the moon.  There is a good deal of exposition explaining the basics of spacecraft mechanics and recovery, no doubt to catch up the uninitiated general reader.  Only after the mission is complete do we learn that Charlie is a chimpanzee, and that the ape was "man-rating" the spacecraft.  It was a nice touch, and had the story ended there, it would have made a fine novella for a science fiction digest… oh, about ten years ago.

But then the story continues.  The protagonist is Captain Richmond Talbot, the chimp's handler.  A pleasant, unprepossesing type, he is shanghaied into piloting the next flight of the spaceship: a Moon mission scheduled just five days hence!  Talbot is to be given no training.  He has trouble with airsickness.  He doesn't want to go.  Hilarious, right?

Talbot does manage to secure a few days leave to visit his family.  On the way there, he encounters Lyrae, a beautiful young redhead with truly alien manners: she doesn't wear make-up, pluck her eyebrows, or wear a bra (steel or otherwise)!  Oh, and she does speak with a slight accent.  She attempts to warn Talbot that his flight will be fatal unless he wears a special helmet and coats the rocket with rubidium alloy.  This is corroborated externally; after returning from space, it turns out that Charlie's exposure to "proton radiation" has driven him insane.  Hijinks ensue when Talbot assumes Lyrae is a Russian spy and the FBI gets involved.  For a while, Talbot becomes a virtual prisoner of the G-Men during their investigation.

Of course, it turns out Lyrae really is an alien (and all those flying saucers and cigars?  Those are real aliens, too).  The FBI agents are no match for the girl, who turns out to be telepathic and something of a teleport.  She frees Talbot, and they run away together in a race against time to fix the rocket before liftoff.  Along the way, Talbot falls in love with Lyrae, of course.  This turns out to be a bit of a foregone conclusion; prescience is also one of Lyrae's many talents, and she's known since the start that Talbot is her future husband.  Hence why she is so keen on seeing him make his Moon trip successfully.

Everything ends well.  Talbot gets his helmet and his fixed-up rocket.  On his way to the Moon, he is intercepted by Lyrae and whisked off to interstellar parts unknown.  Finis.

Now, I don't want you to get the impression that the book is unmitigatedly awful.  It's not.  It's a bit brainless, and it aims quite a bit lower than those of us in the F&SF crowd (or even the Analog crowd) prefer.  But I like the satirical brush with which Buckner paints the book's politicians and officers, and the beginning was solid.  All in all, Starfire is rather well-written and diverting, even if it doesn't do our genre much credit.  Could it be a gateway book?  Perhaps.  I'd certainly classify it as a juvenile if it hadn't been written for a general adult audience. 

What does that tell you about the general adult audience?

2.5 stars out of 5 (mediocre).

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Fashion, music, politics, sports

[Oct. 14, 1960] Side by Side (the third Presidential debate)

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Submitted for your consideration, a logistical nightmare.

Imagine you are a television producer hosting the first ever series of TV Presidential debates.  Both candidates of the two parties that matter have agreed to spar on a weekly schedule, and each event promises to be a ratings bonanza.  Your first two shows live up to expectations, and you lick your chops in heady anticipation of number three.

And then you learn that your special guests are busy campaigning on opposite sides of the country that day. 

What do you do?  The show obviously must go on!  Thank goodness for Bill Bradshaw of Cincinnati's WKRC and his stunning invention, "Split Screen."  You may have seen examples of this technique in recent episodes of Howdy Doody; two completely different images are stitched together, live, so that they can be seen at the same time by the viewer.

As a result, even though last night Jack Kennedy was in Los Angeles, and Dick Nixon was in New York, through the miracle of Split Screen, the two were closer to each other than ever before.  The third debate was quite a spectacle.

Interestingly, though the presentation was wildly different from the previous debate, the format was identical.  Neither candidate was allowed an opening or closing statement.  Rather, they were once again grilled by a panel of professional grillers, two from the networks, and two from print media.

Here's what the candidates had to say:

If the Formosan islands of Quemoy and Matsu made a guest appearance in the last debate, they were full-fledged co-stars in this one.  In the last debate, these two pieces of real estate just a few miles off the coast of Red China, ownership disputed by Chiang Kai Shek and Mao Tse Tung, were dismissed as indefensible by Senator Kennedy and declared the frontline for Democracy by Vice President Nixon. 

The third debate opened up as if the second had never stopped with a question of Senator Kennedy: "You've called the Vice President 'Trigger Happy' over Quemoy and Matsu; are you willing to stand up for West Berlin?"

Without blinking an eye, Kennedy asserted that, as President, he would stand by all of our allies whose sovereignty we had guaranteed by treaty, particularly West Berlin.  Nixon, flustered, assured his audience again and again that Republicans are not "Trigger Happy," and that it was the Democrats who had led us into war the last three times.

At this point I fished around my junk drawer for some twine to wrap around my face, my jaw having fallen quite open.  It was an awfully silly move to suggest that American involvement in the two World Wars and Korea were somehow bellicose acts, and to imply that a Republican would have sat idly by and watched 1) the Kaiser smash the Allies, 2) Hitler enslave Europe while Japan enslaved Asia, and 3) Communism triumph over the entire Korean peninsula. 

In response to the next question, the Vice President refused to detail the level of response to which he would commit over Quemoy and Matsu.  He had difficulty articulating why his desire to defend the islands was so much greater than President Eisenhower's. 

The Senator noted that Quemoy and Matsu did not fall under the ambit of the 1955 Treaty under which America guaranteed the defense of Formosa.  Nixon countered that Kennedy had been one of the few Senators to oppose an amendment to that treaty which expressed a resolution to defend the islands, nevertheless. 

But then the Vice President suggested that the loss to Mao of two small spits of earth would be tantamount to Chamberlain's appeasement of Hitler.  Kennedy lunged in with a cutting jab (I paraphrase): "I can't see why the Vice President is so concerned over Quemoy and Matsu, five miles from Red China, when he showed so little concern over the Communist takeover of Cuba, 90 miles from Florida."

When the Vice President later defended the Eisenhower administration's record on stopping the spread of Communism, specifically in Indochina, Senator Kennedy once again singed his opponent noting that Communism hadn't been stopped in Tibet, Budapest, Laos, Guinea, Ghana, or Cuba. 

In the last debate, Kennedy stated that America should not attempt another summit with the Soviet Union until the nation was militarily stronger so as to have a better position from which to negotiate.  When asked in this debate to articulate his point further, the Senator stated that our airlift capacity needed to be immediately improved so that we could more quickly come to the aid of beleaguered allies.  He also urged rapid deployment of the Minuteman and Polaris nuclear missile systems.  Kennedy encouraged a stronger push toward disarmament discussions and an end to above-ground nuclear testing. 

Nixon's response was characteristically (for this debate) weak, echoing Kennedy's points but mostly saying that Eisenhower hadn't been sitting on his thumbs when it came to defense and pushing for disarmament.

Domestic issues were the subject of about half of the debate.  Kennedy proposed granting the executive office more methods to resolve labor disputes.  The Vice President wanted to keep a largely hands-off approach.  The Senator discussed reviewing and potentially reducing depletion allowances, tax credits offered to energy companies.  Nixon asserted that these credits were vital to the nation's economy. 

Speaking of the economy, the Vice President wants to accelerate its growth was to lower taxes, reduce racial discrimination, and stimulate higher education.  Kennedy noted that the Republicans had blocked every attempt to pass legislation that would do those things. 

On the issue of reducing the trade imbalance, which is depleting our nation's gold reserves, Nixon said he would balance the budget, increase exports, and encourage other countries to support the poor countries in Latin America and Africa.  Kennedy said "ditto" (though he took much longer to do so) and added that he would try to get other nations to eliminate tariffs on American goods.  Neither candidate was particularly strong in this segment.

A nice moment came when Kennedy was asked what he thought of the Ku Klux Klan Grand Wizard's declaration that he was voting for Nixon.  The Senator graciously defended the Vice President, insisting that in no way should Nixon be identified with the racist group.  The Vice President took the opportunity to declaim racial discrimination, repeating his first debate point that it is not only wrong and economically debilitating, but makes us look bad in front of the Russians.

Speaking of first debate echoes, Kennedy again maintained that his budget was balanced despite the emphasis on new programs.  Nixon called Kennedy's plan a "mirror game," and that it must unbalance the budget.  He went on to criticize the Senator's suggestion that the national debt might be reduced through inflation.  That's not quite what Kennedy had said, however (Kennedy noted that he did not recognize his proposals when paraphrased by Nixon).  Rather, the Senator had proposed interest rates be lowered to reduce the interest burden on the debt. 

The debate wrapped up with a question on how one might measure the prestige of the United States, which Kennedy insists is on the decline.  The Senator proposed four methods: 1) counting the number of countries trying Communist rather than Democratic governments, 2) gauging the success a superpower has in outer space, 3) Gallup polling, 4) and tabulating support for U.S. initiatives in the United Nations. 

Nixon's response was that it was defeatism and the giving up Quemoy and Matsu that would lead to a loss of national prestige.  Otherwise, we're doing just fine.

And there the contest ended.  I don't know about you, but it was definitely the Senator's night.  Kennedy came off feisty and detailed; Nixon was stuttering and vague.  I imagine that, if you are fine with the policies of the current administration and think Nixon will continue with more of the same, you'll be happy to cast your ballot for the Vice President.  But if presentation sways you at all, I suspect you drifted just a little bit to the Left last night.

Up next: fiction reviews!

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Conventions/Performances

[Oct. 12, 1960] For the Girls (a mini-convention in Seattle)

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There's no question about it–conventions are here to stay.

Remember the first "Worldcon," when a whopping nine fans (all men) showed up in New York?  Now the annual event always draws hundreds of attendees, and I suspect someday soon it will break the thousand-fan barrier.  Since the War, a number of regional conventions have also sprung up: Westercon, Boskone, Eastercon, Disclave, Midwestcon, Lunacon…

And those are just the big formal ones.  There are plenty of smaller events–irregular gatherings associated with local clubs or movements. 

One that I've enjoyed over the past several years is a little Seattle event run by a gang of highly motivated and talented female fans.  These are ladies who have seen the 90/10 split between male and female authors (on a good day) and want to see things improve.  As always, the shindig was a great opportunity to engage in intellectual discussions, meet like-minded fans, and learn about up-and-coming female science fiction and fantasy talents.

Perhaps the most valuable episode, for me, was a group conversation regarding liking and recommending fiction that contains troubling elements.  For instance, what do you do when your favorite author includes demeaning depictions of certain races in her/his story?  Or when a creator turns out to be a horrible person in private life?  To what length can you diassociate yourself from the bad parts to continue enjoying the good?  And do you mention the bad bits when recommending the works to your friends?  Do you not recommend them at all?  It's a highly nuanced issue.

In the end, the consensus was that everybody has their breaking point (for me and Randall Garrett, for instance, it was Queen Bee), but up to that point, we can enjoy what we enjoy without feeling guilt.  If something really bothers us, we can write letters to the authors and editors and urge them to alter their practices.  And when it comes to recommendations, honesty is the best policy.  Even if you worry that mentioning some teensy-weensy little thing will poison someone's perception of an entire work, it is important that: 1) the recommendee know what s/he is getting into, and 2) that it is understood that you are not blind to the troublesome issue.

On that philosophical note, here are some photos from the gathering!

It's still World War 2 in some places:

(smallsleepingroyal)

Disney remains a perennial source of popular costumes:

Here's an interesting take on the "Bat-girl":

And a rather dapper fellow from another era:

Here are some attendees who came in their street clothes (more or less):

There was even a tiny dealer's hall!

(Becky and James Hicks of Little Vampires; dig their Breakfast at Tiffany's parody!)

(Crystal of Crystal's Idyll)

And, of course, yours truly. 

Thanks to all of you lovely people who made our weekend so enjoyable We will be back next year.

Stay tuned: the third Kennedy/Nixon debate is airing tomorrow.  I hope you'll all join me for this prime-time event so that we can compare notes the next day…

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Fashion, music, politics, sports

[Oct. 8, 1960] Tarnished Images (the Second Presidential Debate)

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Something has been lost, recently.  Call it innocence or naivete.

In ancient times, a national leader was a mythic figure.  The average citizen never caught a glimpse of the sovereign, except maybe as a stylized sculpture or a face on a coin.  This gulf between the commoner and ruler inspired reverence and fear.  The leader was no mere mortal.  In fact, often, the King or Emperor was a God.  A lesser God, perhaps, but still a deity. 

The American President is hardly a God, but the Executive Office yet holds an element of majesty.  Our great leaders are enshrined as statues and on currency.  Even when we disagree with a President's policies, we still pay great respect to the position (if not the person).

I think this is all about to change.  Thanks to the miracle of television, the distance between the electorate and the President is negligible.  Watching Senator Kennedy and Vice President Nixon spar in the second televised debate last night, I felt no sense of awe, no feeling that these were extraordinary people.  I might as well have been watching two fellows compete for the mayorship or a seat on the school board. 

Perhaps this is a good thing.  After all, the President is a human being, and we want a human to represent us, don't we?  Still, I can't help feeling a pang of regret at the close of a (rose-tinted) era.

This may have been exacerbated by the format of the second debate, which was quite different from that of the first.  In the first contest, both candidates were allowed long opening and closing statements.  This afforded them a bit of dignity and gave a detached air to the proceedings.  The second debate was a more impromptu affair–strictly a question and answer session.  The candidates addressed each other far more directly.  They weren't talking to us anymore–they were talking near us. 

The Nixon I saw last night was far more poised and rested than the one I saw just two weeks ago.  Kennedy, on the other hand, seemed a little lost and occasionally shrill.  As for the content of their words, both said a lot of compelling things, but without an army of fact-checkers, it is difficult for me to gauge their value.  Here are some highlights:

Regarding foreign policy, management of which is perhaps the President's greatest duty, Kennedy seemed to take a conciliatory tone toward the East.  He conceded that U2 spy plane flights are necessary for national security, but that lying about the flights caused the recent Summit in Paris to fail.  The Senator also described the Taiwanese islands of Quemoy and Matsu, lying just a few miles off the coast of Red China, as indefensible and that World War Three should not be started over them should Mao make a move to grab them. 

On the other hand, Kennedy stated that America must be militarily and economically stronger before heading back to the Summit table.  Kennedy asserted that our national prestige was at an all-time low, and that we had all but abandoned Latin America and Africa to the Communists.  When President, he promised, he would address these issues. 

Nixon, of course, disagreed vehemently.  He noted that eight Latin American dictators had been toppled during the Eisenhower administration (though what role we had in that, he didn't say).  The Vice President asserted, and I think he's right, that Khruschev never intended to attend the Summit in good faith because the Premier had no chance of getting what we wanted: a resolution of the Berlin issue favorable to the Soviet Union.  Nixon drew a sharp line around Quemoy and Matsu.  He also contended that the situation in Cuba might yet be salvaged.  The Vice President noted that 600 million people had gone behind the Iron Curtain during the Truman Presidency, but during the Eisenhower term, Communism had been stopped in Indochina, in Formosa (Taiwan), and in Lebanon. 

On the issue of Civil Rights, which neither candidate had really discussed in the first debate, Nixon stated that he would pursue equal opportunity employment in government contracts and support federal spurring of education integration.  He urged the end of discrimination not just because it is right, but because it gives fodder to Khruschev to denounce our country. 

Kennedy's response was, essentially, that Nixon and Eisenhower might pay lip service to ending racial discrimination, but neither of them are really serious.  The Vice President replied that his efforts had been hamstrung by a lack of support in Congress, and in any event, Kennedy could not be trusted so long as he retained pro-segregation Lyndon Johnson as his running mate.

On the economy, Nixon's statements were contradictory.  On the one hand, he asserted that the country is not going into a recession, but should it, he would stimulate the private sector with tax cuts without increasing federal spending.  Later, however, Nixon said he would raise taxes, even as early as next year, if he felt it would be necessary to balance the budget.

Kennedy stated, as he did in the last debate, that the key to improving the national economy is federal stimulus.  Medical care for the aged under Social Security.  More financial aid to the poor.  Federal funding of education.  He maintained that his platform would not require increased taxes and that he was opposed to raising taxes in the near future for fear of increasing unemployment and causing deflation.  Nevertheless, the American people, he said, should be prepared to pay more taxes, and to otherwise make sacrifices, to preserve and enhance the nation as a whole.

Distilled to the essence, Nixon touted the record of the Eisenhower administration and promised more of the same: slow, steady progress.  Kennedy castigated the Republicans (while refraining from directly attacking the President) and claimed that only the Democrats could bring real change. 

There are two more debates in this series.  Now that we have seen Kennedy and Nixon on both strong and weak days, I'd be interested to see if the debates sway significant numbers from one camp to another.  Either way, I think the experience of watching the two candidates struggle their way through hours of verbal wrestling has gone a long way toward reducing these would-be Titans to simple humans. 

The Bronze Age of Heroes is over.  The Iron Age has begun.

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