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[April 4, 1966] A Bookstore to Remember (City Lights)

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by Victoria Lucas

I will never forget that afternoon when I first saw Lawrence Ferlinghetti.


Lawrence Ferlinghetti

It might have been a weekend, but I spent many evenings after work in North Beach, either going to see The Committee (improv) at 622 Broadway, a movie at an independent moviehouse, or volunteer at the Playhouse theater.  So I would often pass his bookstore, walking from my apartment (now at Army and 25th) or taking the cable car. It was still light, in any case. He was surrounded by a crowd, but I had a height advantage from the lay of the land at the off-grid intersection of Columbus and Broadway, and he could see me and I him. It seemed to me that our eyes locked and my world changed. (Cue romantic music.)


Cary Grant, Deborah Kerr in "Affair to Remember"

But not for long. (Music stops abruptly with the sound of a needle scratching a record.) He went off with some people and that was that. End of story. My affair to remember (thank you very much, Cary Grant and Deborah Kerr, but no thanks) was with the bookstore and not with the poet. (In any case, I'm now seeing someone, and we're moving in together.)

As for the books, I should admit that I was a virgin when it came to political bookstores. This was my very first time coming into contact with leftist publications and ideas beyond Ramparts Magazine and Stop-the-War demonstrations. That was only foreplay to the heavy breathing of anarchism and leftward utopianism, and the airy sparkle (or existential wail) of life among the poets.


One of Ferlinghetti's books from City Lights Publishers

This is particularly heavy for me since I'm currently working for a band of lawyers who are creating this type of bank card like the Diner's Club or gasoline or department store cards. (They call it "MasterCard," including Crocker Bank.) I am learning far too much about both how lawyers operate (meetings for which I type minutes but that never happened) and how Xerox machines work (some days I'm just all over black plastic dust that doesn't come off easily–one has to stir the stuff occasionally, you see) and how the frequent repairmen do too.

I'm not entirely sure which is the real me, the junior legal secretary or the beatnik-in-waiting. But I'm pretty sure it's the beatnik; like the Zen koan of the man dreaming he's a butterfly vs. the butterfly dreaming he's a man, I think I'm the butterfly.

So walking into that bookstore is an experience both warm and scary, both imaginary and real, the lights glinting off the windows, the chairs all occupied before I get there, the discussions I hear, and the erotic feel of the books themselves. I've learned it's the only all-paperback bookstore, that City Lights became a publisher 2 years after Ferlinghetti opened the bookstore, and that (with the help of the ACLU) Ferlinghetti beat a rap after publishing Allen Ginsberg's "Howl" for the first time ("obscenity"–when even I know it's the government that's the obscenity). (Oops, sorry, did I just violate a norm? It must be the butterfly fluttering inside me.)


The "obscene" book

My affair will only end (and maybe only temporarily?) when I leave San Francisco. I keep coming back to California: born in LA, move to Tucson, move to San Francisco. What's next? Only time will tell.

I digress. I love North Beach. I wander around there every weekend. I think my new boyfriend and I will settle here for a spell close by. And then maybe I can spend even more time wandering from the Spaghetti Factory to City Lights to the Playhouse to The Committee and beyond.


The "obscene" bookstore

In the meantime, I sometimes take the cable car (and/or I walk) to City Lights. After seeing that there was no pressure to buy (an important part of the experience, given my still impecunious state), I take advantage of what appears to be a policy that no one bothers people who read the books or even the magazines. They also have great bulletin boards with notices of readings, concerts, plays, everything that's Going On. The more people inside the windows in the brightly lit store, reading, the more come in from outside–and maybe buy something. I don't buy very much at City Lights, but I am becoming familiar with a lot of titles, a lot of poetry, and a lot of polemics, politics, Asian and Indian religions, new ideas.

As I caress the new ideas, and they sweet-talk me, I still find an analytical spirit within me that doubts that their ideas of the future are any more valid than other promises I've heard. I resist the temptation to embrace them fully, even though I am also pushed into the arms of the left by Pacifica Radio (KPFA/KPFB with studios in SF & Berkeley) and its reports from the Vietnam front sent by intrepid reporters from the Christian Science Monitor who manage to elude the US government and find out what's really happening there. I try to be clear-eyed about what I swallow, but sometimes it's not so easy to avoid becoming emotional about the fate of the human species.

And then there's my new boy friend. Mel is an insurance inspector (steam boiler) who has spent much of his life at sea, a graduate of the Merchant Marine Academy. While having a girl in every port, he became seriously leftist and went to meetings of the Communist Party at one time. (He finally rejected the Party as being too reactionary.) We have both decided, I think, that the only hopeful politics are radical, but nonviolent and seriously sexual.


Sometimes I feel like the City Lights logo

We met because he is a sometime actor and poet who wants to make films. So do I, and we met in such a group–but I want to write for them. In the group we met a filmmaker who only lacked a camera. Marks that we were, we bought him a camera, believing that we would be working together. Guess who absconded with the camera–it wasn't us. So we bonded over the loss and resolved to be less gullible. But we still believe in each other and try not to believe everything we read or hear (or everyone who asks for money).

So Mel has had to put up with my affair with the bookstore–after all, we aren't married (yet). He reads, but he's not in love with print as I am. Meanwhile, please excuse me while I get back to my copy of The Berkeley Barb, for which I occasionally write.




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Magazine, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Serial

[April 2, 1966] Hidden Truths (May 1966 IF)

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Don't miss tomorrow's exciting Adventure-themed episode of The Journey Show, taking you to the highest peaks, the deepest wildernesses, the coldest extremes, the vacuum of space, and the depths of the sea.  April 3 at 1PM — book your (free) ticket for adventure now!)


by David Levinson

They’re on our side (I believe)

There’s no question that French President Charles de Gaulle has a larger-than-life, albeit rather prickly, personality. It stood him in good stead through the War and in midwifing the Fifth Republic a few years ago. It’s also a big part of what underlies his “politics of grandeur”. Alas, it also makes him a sometimes troublesome partner on the world stage. As early as 1958, he was urging a greater role for France in NATO, kicking against the traces of the Anglo-American “special relationship”. In 1959, he pulled the French Mediterranean fleet and air defenses from NATO command and banned the United States from positioning nuclear weapons in France. A year later, he even tried to renegotiate the NATO treaty, but no other member nation supported him. He was fairly quiet during the Kennedy administration and showed great solidarity during the Cuban Missile Crisis, but he’s up to his old tricks again.


French President Charles de Gaulle announcing that France will go her own way.

In February, de Gaulle declared that the changed world order has “stripped NATO of its justification” and demanded French control of all foreign troops and bases in France when the current NATO agreement ends in 1969. Apparently, he decided that was too far in the future. On March 7th, he ordered all foreign troops and equipment removed from France by next year. Two days later, France formally withdrew its officers from the NATO unified command, assumed full control of the 70,000 French troops in Germany and announced that they will close all allied bases that don’t surrender to French control. President Johnson appears to have taken all this with the poise of a matador performing a verónica, with the faith that de Gaulle can be brought around in a time of need, though there is a rumor he instructed Secretary of State Dean Rusk to ask if that withdrawal includes the thousands of American war dead in French cemeteries. “De l'audace, encore de l'audace, et toujours de l'audace.”

Unearthing the past

Oftentimes, what we think we know about the past and how we got where we are is simply wrong. Learning the truth may make us change our course, shatter our identity or turn the whole world upside down. Quite a lot of this month’s IF features characters facing the consequences of just such a revelation.


Supposedly from Silkies in Space. Silkies don’t need spacesuits. Art by Schelling

Silkies in Space, by A. E. van Vogt

Nat Cemp is a Silkie, a genetically engineered human who can adapt his body so that he can live underwater or in space as easily as he can on land. While walking down the street, he encounters a man who appears to be his twin and delivers an ultimatum to Nat. All Silkies are to end their association with humans and return to the nation of Silkies or be deemed traitors. Around one fifth of all Silkies have had a similar experience at roughly the same time. The Silkie nation is traced to a planetoid that travels from outside the orbit of Neptune to inside that of Mercury, and Nat is sent to investigate. What he discovers will have enormous consequences, not only for the 2,000 Silkies of Earth, but for the entire planet.


Gregor Samsa… er, Nat in spacegoing form enters the mysterious planetoid. Art by Gaughan

This is a direct sequel to “The Silkie” from a couple of years ago. While this story largely stands alone, it might make more sense if the first story is fresh in your mind. Parts of it are quite good, other parts (mostly when Nat starts using his mental powers) rather confused and nonsensical. As we’ve discussed many times here at the Journey, van Vogt is a polarizing writer. Oddly, I find myself in both camps. There are stories I like a lot, but I’m also put off by his long fascination with supermen and his strong association with dianetics. There are bits here, like the “logic of levels” where I wonder if I’m being spoonfed Hubbard’s nonsense, and it detracts from the whole. The story goes completely off the rails at the end, as well. I’m waffling on the score, but I think I liked it just enough. Barely three stars.

The Historian, by Carroll J. Clem

We open with a chapter from a history book telling us that as humanity spread to the stars, no intelligence was found to equal man’s own. A few vignettes of humans engaging in the worst forms of colonization and oppression follow. The story concludes with the historian discussing his work with the people who commissioned it.

Clem is this month’s new writer. Stylistically, it’s decent and it’s short, but it’s also fairly obvious. Again, I find myself wavering on the score, but the fact that the author felt compelled to spell out the ironic twist is a mark against it. A high two stars.

The Hide Hunters, by Robert Moore Williams

Ed Grayson is exploring the Amazon, looking for the next big psychedelic drug. When the old chief of the tribe he is staying with begs the use of Ed’s rifle to kill the hide of his dead grandson, Ed is appalled. Later, he finds the chief skinning his grandson and horrified by the strange white filaments connecting the skin to what is inside it. His partner McPherson returns by helicopter and is worried by Ed’s behavior. Ed is going to return to civilization with the helicopter, but a poison dart attacks and kills the pilot. McPherson tries to fly them out and instead crashes near some ancient ruins, where they find Egyptian hieroglyphs and something much more disturbing.


An injured Grayson waits for his partner’s return. Art by Adkins

If Weird Tales were still publishing, this would have fit right in. The story clearly shows Williams’ roots in the pulp days, but is reasonably well updated for today, apart from the Egyptian hieroglyphs. Why not something Incan? One the whole, this is a decent representative of stories of this kind. Too bad the attack on the pilot makes absolutely no sense. Still, it’s three stars.

An APA For Everyone, by Lin Carter

Building on his look at fanzines last month, Carter takes a look at amateur press associations, an idea that goes back nearly a century. Unlike fanzines, which will send a copy to anybody willing to pay the postage, APAs limit circulation to a limited group of contributors who must submit a certain number of pages every month. There are even waiting lists for people to join. Carter examines some of the bigger APAs in fantasy and science fiction, as well as what drives someone to contribute to them. His breezy style is slightly tempered from last time, but it still grates. Three stars.

Mountains Like Mice, by Gene Wolfe

Dirk is being prepared for his Retreat by Otho the Captive. If he can avoid being found for the two months it will take for the dye to wear off, he will become a Master. That night, Otho leads him to the spot where his Retreat will begin at sunrise. Later, he sees what he thinks is Otho being captured by the gyrda, a race of people half the height of a normal person. He tracks them into the mountains with the plan of rescuing Otho. In the end, things known to Dirk are revealed to the reader, and he gains deeper insight.


A captive of the gyrda. Art by Lutjens

Wolfe is unknown to me, but after some digging I see that he had one previous sale to the “gentlemen’s” magazine Sir!. If he can write like this so early in his career, I foresee big things. He’s clearly in love with language and words, and every sentence is beautifully crafted. I don’t claim to really understand the metaphor of the title or the implications of the final paragraph, but the journey there is incredibly beautiful. Four stars.

Golden Trabant, by R. A. Lafferty

A man enters Patrick T. K.’s store to sell a huge lump of greenish gold, clearly of extraterrestrial origin. We then learn of the unscrupulous men seeking the legendary golden asteroid and the consequences of their success.

This is an unusually traditional story for Lafferty, but it still has his unique touch. Of course, it’s largely a retelling of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Diamond as Big as the Ritz without the romance and with a few Lafferty-esque bits. This might be a good starting point for someone who has never read Lafferty and is concerned about some of the things they’ve heard. Three stars.

Earthblood (Part Two of Four), by Keith Laumer and Rosel G. Brown

Last time, Roan, a purebred Terran who grew up among aliens, was forced to join an interstellar circus. There he met the beautiful Stellaraire and rescued her from the villainous Ithc. Now he has hatched a plan for the two of them to escape so that he can make his way back to his mother and then find lost Terra. Those plans are thwarted when Iron Robert, the rock creature who was Stellaraire’s only friend, is grievously injured in a fight. At Roan’s insistence, Robert is brought aboard the ship and nursed back to health, rather than being left behind to die.

En route to another stop, the ship is attacked by the pirate Henry Dread. Many are killed when the ship enters emergency acceleration, and the rest are gunned down by Dread’s crew. Roan is spared, because he is fully human, as is Iron Robert again at Roan’s insistence. But Stellaraire was killed, crushed by a falling beam. Dread views the world divided into three groups: Terrans, Gooks, who are humanoid and may have some Terran in them, and Geeks, the rest of the aliens. And for him only Terrans matter, so he takes Roan under his wing.

Dread takes Roan along on a raid of the old imperial capital of Aldo Cerise. Roan saves Dread’s life and afterward Dread reveals that he is actually a member of a group calling themselves the Terran Navy, supposedly formed from the remnants of the old navy thousands of years ago. He inducts Roan and explains that he’s on a long mission recruiting and financing. Eventually, they find a Niss ship and Dread’s hate leads him to make a foolish attack. Roan winds up killing Dread in an attempt to save Iron Robert, but in the end, Robert must be left behind on the dying ship while Roan leads a desperate raid on the Niss ship, their only hope for survival. To be continued.


Iron Robert meets his match. Art by Wood

Well, that didn’t go how I expected. After last month, I was sure I could see the course of this story. The circus ship would prove to be an extremely powerful warship that Roan would use to break the Niss and Stellaraire would prove not to be a sterile mule. Instead, she’s dead and the ship was about as effective in combat as a Greek trireme against an Iowa-class battleship. In fact, almost everyone who ever supported Roan is dead. His father, Stellaraire, Iron Robert (presumably) and Henry Dread.

Last time, I also expressed concern about the human superiority that was expressed. Some of that is there again, but it’s more clearly an ugly thing. Roan lashes out once at Iron Robert with the vile language Dread uses, but immediately regrets it, and his constant support of Iron Robert shows his real attitudes. I’m more hopeful.

I still don’t see much Laumer here, other than in names (Groaci and Aldo Cerise this time) and the presence of Bolos. And it looks like Wally Wood is indeed the artist for the illos. Three stars.

Summing up

Not as good an issue as last month, certainly. But Earthblood looks like it will be much more than I expected, and we have an interesting new voice in Gene Wolfe. If he can hone his craft a bit more and keep his beautiful language, he may be a force to be reckoned with.


No hype at all for next month? That’s not a good sign.




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Magazine

[March 31, 1966] Shapes of Things (April 1966 Analog)

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by Gideon Marcus

Change

Out in the world of music, there's a change brewing. One can hear it in the experimentation of the Beatles' Rubber Soul album or the otherworldly tinge of The Yardbirds' latest hit, Shapes of Things. I've been long planning to write an article on the musical scene, and I'd best get it done quickly before the landscape changes entirely!

My friend and associate, Cora Buhlert, has noted that although the Stones and Beatles are popular in Germany, the number one hit right now is the syrupy Schlager tune by Roy Black, "Ganz in Weiß" (All in white). In other words, even in times of great flux, conservative forces remain steadfast, like stubborn boulders in a stream.

Oh look — it's time to review the latest issue of Analog.

Stagnation


by Kelly Freas

Moon Prospector, by William B. Ellern

It would be hard to find a more emblematic story of the reactionary SF outlet that is Analog than this, the lead story in the April issue. Set early in E.E. Smith's Lensman series, it apparently got the full blessing of "Doc" Smith just a few days before he died! That's pretty remarkable.

The story, however, isn't. A lunar prospector in is semi-sentient "creeper" gets a distress call. Turns out an old buddy has been buried in the aftereffects of a meteor shower, and ol' Pete has to dig him out. But what was the fellow doing out in that quadrant of the Moon to begin with, and does it have anything to do with a centuries-old missile base abandoned around there?


by Kelly Freas

There's no water on the Moon, so I suppose it's appropriate that the story, itself, is dry as a bone. Perhaps it would have been more exciting if I'd had some stake in the universe. Maybe I'd have thrilled at the mention of the Solar Patrol being evolved into a Galactic Patrol. The fact is, I didn't care for Doc Smith's stories much when I was a kid, so they evoke no nostalgia for me now.

Two stars.

Rat Race, by Raymond F. Jones


by Kelly Freas

A century and a half in the future, when a completely computer-planned economy has resulted in plenty for all of humanity, a fellow decides to recreate the hobby of model train running (though not in the destructive manner of the Addams family, more's the pity).

This hobby runs the fellow afoul of the Computer, for when he tries to make his own trains, he is accused of attempting his own production, which will upset the finely balanced economy and lead to scarcity. Our protagonist must find a way to satisfy the human urge to create while not upsetting the economic apple cart. The story ends with the suggestion that do-it-yourselfism will spread and eventually topple the current order.

It's a pleasant-enough story, and I suppose the "stick-it-to-communism" sentiment appealed to editor Campbell. On the other hand, while I appreciate that some folks really like to build things even when they could just be bought (and I have to think that hobbyist building would not break a planned economy), the notion that we've become too centralized and folks should all be able to be self-sufficient, making a living from the land, is unworkable.

The fact is, we've long since populated the Earth beyond its ability to sustain a society of independent farmers. The great island cities, the vast modern nations, they only support their teeming millions through coordinated and interconnected systems. The writer in the air-conditioned apartment, who bangs out a paean to independent living before catching a television show and then popping off to the deli for dinner, is a dreamer, not a visionary.

Three stars.

The Easy Way Out, by Lee Correy


by John Schoenherr

Aliens conduct a survey of planet Earth, evaluating its species for aggressive tendencies. After coming across a grizzly bear and a wolverine, and then the human family that has adopted the latter, they decide Earth is more trouble than it's worth.

Typical Campbellian Earth-firsterism. Two stars.

Drifting Continents, by Robert S. Dietz


by John Holden

If it's a crackpot theory that flies in the face of the scientific establishment, chances are you'll read about it in Analog. But sometimes a theory is crackpot, flies in the face of the scientific establishment, and is probably right. As someone born in earthquake country, I've probably heard more about "continental drift" than many. It's the idea that the continents very slowly move around the globe. It's why the coasts of South America and Africa seem like edges of the same torn newspaper. It explains why there are similar fossils at similar depths across continents that are nowhere near each other…today.

It's a theory I found little reference to in my science books of the 50s, including Rachel Carson's seminal The Sea Around Us. But damned if Dietz doesn't make some very compelling arguments. I would not be surprised if continental drift, as has happened recently with the Big Bang Theory and global warming, did not become thoroughly accepted this decade.

Five stars.

Who Needs Insurance?, by Robin S. Scott


by Kelly Freas

Pete "Lucky Pierre" Albers has always been blessed with good fortune. Twenty years a pilot, he has always managed to avoid even the slightest injury, despite 8500 hours of flying time. He first suspected that his lucky streak was not completely due to chance after a harrowing mission over Ploesti left his B-24 with just one working engine. That tortured device not only held together all the way back to Libya, but it spun with the 800 horsepower needed to keep the plane in the air. After the crash landing, Albers found a little gray box attached to the driveshaft.

Twenty years later, over Vietnam, Colonel Albers was in a bullet-riddled Huey whose engine somehow held together long enough to get him and his charges back to base. Sure enough, a little box was installed on the engine.

Clearly someone, or something, has taken an interest in Albers' survival. It's up to Albers and his closest friends to discover the secret.

I really enjoyed this story, told in narrative fashion. It's a fun mystery, the details are evocative, and I like when a piece includes a competent woman scientist (in this case, Marty the programmer, with her pet 2706).

Four stars.

A Sun Invisible, by Poul Anderson


by Domenic Iaia

With this latest installation in the adventures of David Falkayn, the momentum gained by the magazine comes to a shuddering halt. Anderson's writing is of widely varying quality, and the adventures of this troubleshooting young protogé of Nicholas van Rijn are among the worst.

The plot takes forever to develop, but it's something about a planet of Germanics looking to take on the Polesotechnic League by working with the belligerent Kroaka. The trick is that Falkayn has to figure out where the would-be enemies make their home. By getting the female leader of Neuheim drunk and talkative, Falkayn learns enough astronomical clues to deduce the star around which the insurgents' planet revolves. Falkayn stops the threat and gets the girl.

I do like the astronomy Anderson weaves into these stories and I also appreciated the seamless way he introduced a new pronoun for an alien race with three sexes. Other than that, it's a deadly dull story, and smug to boot. Falkayn is like a boring, Sexist Retief.

Two stars.

Computation

After all that, the conservative reef that is Analog finishes near the bottom of the pack, though that is as much due to the relative excellence of the other mags that came out this month. Campbell's mag clocks in at a reasonable 3 stars, beating out the truly bad, all-reprint Amazing (2.3).

Above Analog, starting at the top, are Impulse (3.5), Galaxy (3.4), IF (3.3), New Worlds (3.1), and Fantasy and Science Fiction (3.1).

It was something of a banner month for SF mags, actually. Enough worthy stuff was printed to fill two full-size mags (and if you take out Amazing, that means a full third of everything printed was four stars and up). Also, women produced 11.5% of the new fiction published this month, the highest proportion I've seen in a long time. We'll see if this trend holds out.

That's it for March! April is a whole new ballgame, starting with the next issue of IF. I'm very keen to see how that magazine does now that the excellent Heinlein serial has ended (I've high hopes for the Laumer/Brown novel.)

Until then, all we can to is keep trying to discern the pattern of Shapes of Things to Come…

Don't miss the next exciting Adventure-themed episode of The Journey Show, taking you to the highest peaks, the deepest wildernesses, the coldest extremes, the vacuum of space, and the depths of the sea. April 3 at 1PM — book your (free) ticket for adventure now!)




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Science Fiction/Fantasy, TV

[March 28, 1966] Typhoid Doctor (Doctor Who: The Ark)

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By Jessica Holmes

Spring has sprung, and rather than going outside to look at the flowers, I’ve been on my settee watching science fiction serials. All is as it should be. So, what do we have this month? Let’s take a look at The Ark, written by Paul Erickson and Lesley Scott. Going by my records, we've never had a woman writer credited on Doctor Who before. Hopefully Lesley Scott will be the first of many!

A monoid. The creature has leathery skin and long, shaggy hair. It has a single eye, which is clearly held in the mouth of the actor.
I will admit it's clever to get the actors to hold their 'eyes' in their mouths.

THE STEEL SKY

We open in a lively forest, various critters scampering about. There’s a lizard, a toucan, a weird cyclops-thing in a bad wig… the usual rainforest menagerie, basically.

There’s even a Dodo.

The new addition to the crew of the good ship TARDIS is the first out the door, taking her sudden change of surroundings entirely in stride. After all, they’re only a little way outside London.

London, well known for its population of Indian elephants. Dodo presumes they’re in a zoo enclosure. That would make sense if not for the ugly chap with the table tennis ball in his mouth.

I think they might have just gone through the entire production budget for the series. It's not often we see real live creatures on Doctor Who, much less actual elephants. Perhaps they went to the zoo and snuck a camera in the picnic hamper?

Steven pets an Indian elephant as Dodo looks on.

The Doctor notices that this jungle seems to be missing something vital: the sky. Add that to the trembling ground and the unusual buildings in the distance, and the full picture becomes clear. They’re not at the zoo. They’re not even on Earth. They’re on a spaceship!

I’d say that’s nothing to sneeze at, but Dodo can’t seem to stop. The Doctor immediately gets to do some surrogate grandfathering and scolds her for not using a handkerchief, then proceeds to ask just what in the world she’s wearing.

I think the doublet and mismatched stockings ensemble looks quite good on her, in an odd way. It’s like a medieval spin on the Mod look. Very Twiggy.

Their presence hasn’t gone unnoticed though, and one of the creatures (‘Monoids’ being the correct nomenclature) informs their human bosses of the intruders. Baffled, the humans decide to bring the travellers in for questioning.

The Doctor talks down to Dodo as Steven also looks down at her.

Back in the forest, the Doctor has moved on from critiquing Dodo’s fashion sense to nagging her about her improper English. Well I’m sorry Doc, but we can’t all talk in perfect RP. Snob.

The Monoids round up the wayward group, and bring them to the humans. The Doctor doesn’t criticize their fashion sense, though he should. They look like they’re wearing party streamers. Also, they aren't around for long so I didn't bother writing down their names. It's really not important.

I take an immediate dislike to the leader of the humans, who explains that they’re in a spaceship carrying the Earth’s population to a new world, as the old Earth is soon to be engulfed by the dying Sun. As for the Monoids, they came as refugees to Earth from a similar situation, offering their service in exchange for their survival. The humans took them up on the offer, which strikes me as exploitative, and the leader's smarmy attitude makes me wonder if this service is at all voluntary.

The commander of the Ark with a smarmy look on his face.
It's hard to capture smarminess in a still image, but I think this epitomises it.

Unfortunately for both the humans and the Monoids, the Doctor and company have brought more than just well-wishes. You see, other than having to flee the Earth, life for the future humans is pretty good, annoyances like the common cold having long since gone the way of the dodo…

And now the Dodo's back.

She keeps sneezing away as the leader of the humans has a nice chat with the Doctor. This is a generation ship, its journey expected to last seven hundred years. Why so long? They’re picky.

The new planet, Refusis II (catchy) is the only one they can find which has a climate just like Earth’s. I hope it’s mostly like the Mediterranean. I wouldn’t fancy living on the Planet Of The English Drizzle.

They’ve loaded the whole of Earth’s population onto this ship, down to the last ant. What with all the peoples of the world on this ship, it’s funny that every single human they’ve encountered is white (and going by accent and language, English). Funny, that.

A wall lined with many drawers.

It’s a touch more complicated than that, though. Obviously it’s impractical to have billions of people running about a spaceship, so most of the population have been shrunken to microscopic size and stored in trays, while a small group remains full sized, guiding the ship to its destination. Ah, so the reason that the ship seems to have nobody but white Brits (and aliens) onboard is that they’re in charge and everyone else is… luggage.

I see.

It’s not all fun and games and dubious implications, however! The Guardians have even found time for a bit of art. They’re working on a colossal statue of homo sapiens, begun on Earth and expected to be completed around the end of the voyage. The projected design is really…something.

A diagram of a human male from the front and from the side, holding an orb.

Something like a giant half-naked Beatle holding a grapefruit, that is.

The idea’s nice at least.

All’s not well aboard the Ark, alas. It seems a strange disease is spreading among the crew of the ship, all the way to the very top of the chain of command. When a Monoid dies and the commander of the ship is taken ill, the Doctor and company are arrested.

Dodo really should have brought her hankie.

The commander collapses against a control panel. His daughter and Dodo kneel before him as Steven and the Doctor look on. There are other people in the background of the shot.

THE PLAGUE

Fearing that they’re all doomed, the Guardians imprison the Doctor and his companions. The Doctor reassures an upset Dodo that if it’s anyone’s fault, it’s his, as she had no way of knowing about the danger. Steven wonders aloud if this is the first time this has happened, spreading a disease to a vulnerable population. Could it be that the Doctor is a time-travelling Typhoid Mary?

The Doctor’s verdict is to try and not think about that too much. See, this is why you should always get your jabs before travelling, and quarantine where necessary. Time travel responsibly, chums.

The virus rages through the ship, afflicting the Monoids worst of all. The Guardians’ microbiologists are at a loss, as all data on the common cold was lost in a war long ago.

The commander lies in bed. His daughter, wearing a face mask, leans over him.

At death’s door, the commander tells his daughter to make sure the voyage goes ahead. Even on the brink of death he seems smarmy. Perhaps he’s just an over-actor.

Following the funeral of the first Monoid to die of the disease, the Guardians commence with the trial, calling Steven to give evidence.

They accuse him of coming to spread the disease on purpose, suspecting the travellers of being natives of Refusis II, come to sabotage their mission.

Oh, so Refusis II is inhabited, is it? What exactly is the plan when the Guardians arrive? Are they going to ask nicely for a place to stay, or will we just have colonialism in space?

Steven looks through the bars of a cell. He is noticeably shiny.

Steven starts to look rather sweaty under the interrogation, but methinks that’s nothing to do with the grilling they’re giving him.

The Guardians almost come around to believing Steven when he says it was an accident, but then disaster strikes. A Guardian has died of the fever. With one of their own dead, the Guardians readily find Steven and his friends guilty, not even allowing his advocate, the commander’s daughter, a word in edgeways. Just once it’d be nice if the Doctor and company ended up somewhere with a decent judicial system.

The Guardians rule that the group shall be ejected from the ship, and Steven picks the perfect moment to faint. It would seem that he too has come down with the fever.

The Doctor begs to be allowed to try and save Steven and all the other afflicted, and the Guardians initially refuse his offer, until the commander, who has been watching all this unfold from his sickbed, orders them to let the Doctor go and give him everything he needs.

To be on the safe side, they make the Doctor use Steven as his guinea pig. Well, better him than hurting a real guinea pig, I say.

The Doctor adds an ingredient to a test tube as a Monoid looks on.

The Doctor comes up with a plan to recreate the old vaccine (as unlikely as a vaccine for the common cold sounds), for which he’ll need some ‘animal membranes’. The Monoids collect what he needs, and help the Doctor as he perfects the formula. As he mildly condescendingly puts it, they’re more knowledgeable than most people realise.

I’m not sure being smart makes their indentured servitude (or worse) any less wrong.

The Doctor tests his cure out on Steven, and rather than waiting to see if it cures or kills him, he immediately goes and starts treating other patients. He’s just asking for a malpractice lawsuit.

It takes an hour, but eventually the medicine kicks in and Steven, the commander and everyone else who got sick are on the mend.

With the commander back on his feet, the journey can continue, and the Doctor prepares to depart. It looks like everything is going to be okay.

The Doctor and the humans gather at the feet of the unfinished statue.

Or is it?

The TARDIS dematerialises, only to rematerialise in what appears to be the same spot. However, upon leaving the ship to investigate, the group find the ship deserted. One look at the now-completed statue tells them how long they’ve been gone: seven hundred years.

It seems they’ve missed a lot in the interim.

I don’t know about you, but I’m pretty sure that massive statue wasn’t meant to have a Monoid’s head.

The head of the statue, which is modelled after a Monoid.

THE RETURN

After some searching, the group finally find what’s become of the passengers of the Ark. The Monoids are now on top, the humans having become their slaves.

Oh, and the Monoids can talk now. That’s handy, though I had rather enjoyed an alien race who communicated through signing.

They soon run into a Monoid, who takes them to the leader of the Monoids, One. Finally, some names I can actually remember.

From One, they learn that although they did cure the initial outbreak of the fever, a mutated form developed, which ended up weakening the Guardians enough for the Monoids to overthrow and subjugate them.

The Doctor, Dodo and Steven stand surrounded by other humans in a kitchen

Rumour soon spreads among the enslaved Guardians that there are time travellers onboard, but not everyone believes it. However, it’s soon proven true when the Monoids bring the time travellers to the, uh, ‘security kitchen’.

Well, could be worse. They could have been dumped in the lavatory jail.

With their guests having been shown to their accommodations, the Monoids discuss their plans for when they land on Refusis II. One is planning to destroy the Guardians when they land. Not really sure why. Probably spite.

In the kitchen, Dodo asks why the humans haven’t fought back. Wow, gosh, I bet they never thought of that (!)

A man lies dead on the floor.

One’s second in command, the creatively-named Two enters the kitchen, and the Guardians try to snatch his heat gun away. However, Three comes in moments later and shoots one of the Guardians, foiling the attempt. Two orders the Doctor and Dodo to come with him. They’ll be part of the landing party, and Steven will remain here, to ensure that the others behave themselves.

They head down in a pod with Two and another Guardian, and find a world both verdant and completely empty…or so it would appear.

Unseen to both the audience and the characters, something enters the ship, sits down, and fiddles with the controls before leaving again. The only sign that they’re there is a slight depression in the cushion of the seat, and some moving levers.

A seat, with the cushion slightly depressed.
On reflection, it might have been a mistake to try and show you something invisible.

Unable to find any signs of habitation, the Doctor declares that the colonisation can go ahead. Two, subtle as a brick, laughs and says it might not take as long as the Doctor expects.

He might as well have thrown back his head and done a dramatic cackle.

Moving a little further afield, the Doctor spots a castle in the distance, and wonders why none of the inhabitants have shown up. The group investigate the castle, finding it to be in excellent condition, but deserted. Two is convinced the Refusians are hiding, and like the monster he is he knocks over a vase of flowers. What did the flowers ever do to him?!

The Doctor tells him to behave himself, and an unseen voice concurs, before an invisible force sets the flowers back in their proper places.

A man watches a television which displays two Monoids in conversation.

Back on the ship, One and Three discuss their plans to deal with the humans, and find the most roundabout way possible of saying they’re going to blow up the ship with an atom bomb. And guess where it is? It’s in the statue.

They go on loudly discussing it, not realising that one of their human servants is watching everything on the ship’s surveillance cameras. He rushes to the kitchens to report what he saw, though the rest of his species aren’t best pleased to see him. It would seem he’s a collaborator. However, Steven advises that they should hear him out, and he tells them all about the bomb, but alas he couldn’t see from his viewpoint where it was hidden. They’ll have to find the bomb themselves.

The Doctor sits at a table opposite an empty chair. Dodo is in the background.

Down on the planet, the Doctor’s having a nice chat with his new invisible friend. The people of Refusis II have known about the coming of the Ark for a while, and built facilities for the humans to use. A solar flare rendered the inhabitants of Refusis II invisible and incorporeal, and they’re lonely, unable to interact with one another. Essentially, it’s a planet of ghosts.

That seems a bit convenient. It’s basically just sidestepping any discussion of the ethics of settler colonialism, which would be very interesting to cover in a science fiction setting.

Two goes to report back to the Ark, and realising the Monoids’ plans for humanity, his human servant attacks him, trying to stop him from warning the others about the native inhabitants. However, he loses the fight, dying what appears to be an agonising death.

Two starts to make his report using the pod’s communications equipment, and then something goes a little bit wrong.

The pod blows up.

The Doctor has his hand on Dodo's shoulder. There is smoke in the air.

THE BOMB

Rather than sending another scouting party to find out what happened to Two, One decides to go ahead with the landing. However, some of the other Monoids have reservations about this whole plan for colonisation.

The Doctor and Dodo meet back up with their invisible friend. The Refusians blew up the pod because they’re a peaceful bunch. Mostly. They don’t much fancy handing their planet over to the Monoids, given that they made such a bad first impression.

The Refusians are still open to the humans living on their planet, as long as the humans manage to regain control of the Ark.

A man hides around the corner as two Monoids stand by a doorway.

They’ll need to get out of the kitchen first. Luckily, they have a plan for that. When the Monoid collaborator returns one of the Monoids’ eating trays to the kitchen, one of the Guardians sneaks out the door behind him. Once he’s gone, the Guardian on the outside opens the door for the rest of the group.

Well, that was simple. I’m surprised they didn’t try that sooner. You’d think there’d be guards.

The Monoids prepare to head off, setting their bomb to detonate in twelve hours– more than enough time for some escaped humans to find it. I wonder why they left such a long timer. Did they leave themselves a little extra time in case they get down to the planet and realise they forgot to bring their toothbrushes?

The Monoids find the remains of Two’s pod on Refusis II, and the Doctor and Dodo observe from a distance as Four discusses his plans to confront One and return to the Ark. After they go, the Doctor and Dodo steal aboard the pod and use its communication equipment to talk to Steven. The Doctor promises to send the landing pods back to the ship so that the humans can escape, and he’ll also find out where the bomb is hidden. How? Well, his invisible friends can help with the former, and for the latter, the Doctor does what he does best: he has a little chat.

The Doctor and Dodo face Monoids One and Seventy-Seven and another Monoid, with their backs to the camera.

One starts to interrogate the Doctor, but Four throws a spanner in the works as he picks his moment to confront One. Four fears that One has led them to certain doom, and wants to return to the ship. However, One taunts him that he’ll have a hard time getting the bomb out of the statue, so it’s not as if he has any choice. Undeterred, Four heads off with a few of his own allies, and One takes his forces to pursue the errant subordinate, leaving the Doctor and Dodo behind.

One of the pods makes it back to the Ark, and Steven comes up with a plan. They can’t all fit in the pod, so half the Guardians will go down to Refusis II to help the Doctor, and the others will look for the bomb. Practically daring fate to hand him an ironic death, the collaborator says he’s not going to risk his life searching the ship, so the others agree he can go down to Refusis II.

Down on the planet, One and his allies confront the defectors, engaging in a firefight that leaves a number of them dead. The Guardian pod lands in the middle of the skirmish, and the collaborator is the first one out.

A monoid fires his weapon. Monoid Three also brandishes a weapon.

…And the first one gunned down.

The Monoids continue to fight, and the other Guardians sneak out of the ship and have the good sense not to go running up to the nearest Monoid, so they manage to find the Doctor and Dodo and distract their guard.

Four is the last Monoid standing by the time they make it back to the pod. He doesn’t even bother to stop them. He looks exhausted, which is quite impressive acting given that he’s mostly made of rubber. Casting his weapon aside, he allows them to pass.

The group race back to the Ark, the Doctor sending Steven a message on the way there. But how are they going to get the bomb out of the statue?

The statue tips out of the ship into outer space.

Well, apparently the Refusians are immensely strong space ghosts. Our invisible friend picks the statue up as if if were made of polystyrene, and launches it out of the ship, there to safely detonate.

So, all’s well that ends well. The Refusians insist that the humans and Monoids must live together in peace, and the Doctor beats us over the head with the aesop of the story: don’t make a whole group of people second-class citizens, or they might rise up and return the favour.

It’d be a bit stronger if the narrative treated the Monoids as equal to the humans, but I don’t think it does. We don’t really get any Monoids to sympathise with. They don’t even have real names, only numbers. We don’t really get an explanation from the Monoids themselves about what made them rise up (other than ‘because they could’). What’s more, their leadership is shown to be worse than the human leadership, and the humans end up back on top in the end anyway. The Doctor’s little speech at the end gives the illusion of balance to a script which, when you step back and look at the whole thing, is quite solidly on the Guardians’ side.

And the speech does feel a little patronising too, like the Monoids were a bunch of children the Guardians were meant to be looking after.

The Doctor stands with all the other human characters around him, his hands on his lapels.
You can tell it's an important speech because he's doing the thing with his lapels again.

Little speech given and lessons learned all around, the Doctor and company depart, leaving the Guardians to start building their new world, and from the way they’re talking about the Doctor, they might be about to start a cult.

Aboard the TARDIS, Dodo changes into some more normal apparel, and then something quite odd happens.

The Doctor fades away with a sneeze, before vanishing entirely. He’s still around– at least, his voice is. But the man himself is nowhere to be seen! It would seem that the time travellers are in mortal peril.

…Again.

The Doctor in the TARDIS, handkerchief in hand, translucent.

Final Thoughts

I'm not sure there's much else to say on The Ark that I haven't already covered (she said, then continued for another few hundred words). The production value is quite impressive, with large sets and the procurement of live animals, but the costuming doesn't match up.

The politics of the story would appear to have a colonialist bent, what with the humans heading for an inhabited world and just assuming they can move straight in. Then there's the matter of the human-Monoid relationship, which I already mentioned, but it ties back into the colonialist sentiments, the sense of paternalism even promoted by the Doctor himself. With the sun setting on the British Empire, perhaps we ought to turn a more critical eye to these imperialist attitudes and narratives.

I don't feel qualified to speak further on the matter, so I'll leave it to you to discuss.

We've not seen enough of Dodo for me to make any real judgements on her. She doesn't have much to do in the story, besides setting the whole chain of events in motion. Still, that's not even by any deliberate action of hers. It's a simple matter of biology. That's not what I'd call an active contribution to the plot. I also didn't much like how  critical the Doctor was of her. I know he's pretty much desperate for another Replacement Susan, but they've only just met and he's already scolding her on her dress and diction. Steven seemed to warm up to her a bit by the end of the serial, but he wasn't exactly welcoming at first.

A thought did occur to me as I was typing up this conclusion. I was pondering how the argument between Steven and the Doctor seems to have been dropped. I realised that it hasn't. This serial is a direct response to the last. Steven pointed out the Doctor's lack of regard for the people left behind at the end of their adventures, and this serial reinforces his point. It's effectively two stories in one. There's the story of the plague, and then the consequences that the Doctor isn't normally around to see.

Other than that, the story is just… decent? The Doctor would scold me for saying so, but that's the most apt word for it. It's not boring, but it's not really anything extraordinary. Well, they can't all be winners.

[Text] Next Episode: THE CELESTIAL TOYROOM [End of text]

3 out of 5 stars




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Magazine, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Serial

[March 26, 1966] Steam Tractors and Ballardian Mind Games Impulse and New Worlds, April 1966

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by Mark Yon

Scenes from England

Hello again!

Well, after last month’s rather enthusiastic response from me – most unusual, honestly! – with the emergence of Impulse, “The NEW Science Fantasy”, I was very interested to see if it could keep up the standard of last month’s issue.

Having graced us with a cover from Mrs Blish last month, this month’s Impulse cover is back to the usual of late by using a Keith Roberts cover to illustrate his latest story in this magazine. Well, as the recently-promoted Mr Roberts is now the Associate Editor, why not? Presumably there’s a discount for using all these elements…

Kyril, the Editor, is in pensive mood this month. He professes that after two years he is still not sure what to write in the Editorial, but then goes on to give brief descriptions of this month’s stories before mentioning that he has concentrated on four longer stories this time, which has led to less “typically Bonfiglioni space-fillers”.

To this month’s actual stories.

Pavane: The Lady Anne, by Keith Roberts

I really liked Keith’s alternate history story last month, despite the odd ending. It has been hinted that this was the first of a series, and here is the second, now elevated to prime position in the magazine. As I said last time, and is made explicit this month, the premise is that Elizabeth I was assassinated in 1588. As a result, Protestantism has not taken hold in England and Roman Catholicism still dominates the world. With the Roman Catholic view of science being one of suspicion, and innovation suppressed, inventions have not as developed as they have been here today.

This time the story focusses on a life on the road, being centred around the Lady Anne, a steam tractor that moves goods from settlement to settlement along the roads of the predominantly rural Britain. It’s not an easy life – the cover suggests one of the challenges! – but there’s a real feeling of a way of life that is not dissimilar to that of the ancient mariner or the locomotive driver of Edwardian England. Keith’s vivid imagination describes what life could be like in this alternate history in a way that made me feel like I was there. Although there’s a rather clumsy attempt to tell of a doomed and unrequited relationship between Jesse the tractor driver and a woman in the town of Swanage which sits uneasily, this is a good start. 4 out of 5.

A Last Feint , by John Rackham

Another regular. John was last seen in the January issue of Science Fantasy with his Weird Tales-type story The God-Birds of Glentallach. This time the story is a much lighter one, about an inventor who attempts to invent a cheap vest and foil for fencing electronically but inadvertently creates a weapon that can slice things in half. This month’s silly story in Impulse, and the weakest. 3 out of 5.

Break the Door of Hell, by John Brunner

Having mentioned in New Worlds last month how much more we’re seeing of John Brunner of late, here’s a novella from the man. And whilst last month’s serial in New Worlds was OK (more about that later), this one is terrific.

Break the Doors of Hell is a fantasy story about a nomadic traveller, who has many names, who seems to be journeying from place to place and at different times to bring Order in an eternal battle between Law and the forces of Chaos.  It is a great idea. I could see Mike Moorcock liking it, for it has that same mythical tone to it that the Elric stories have.

To bring Order, the Traveller travels across the All, giving people what they ask for, although the first part of the story shows that the result is often not what the requester wishes for.

Most of Break Down the Doors of Hell is about the Traveller visiting the once proud and pretty city of Ys, which now seems to be a place of decay where the inhabitants live a life of amoral decadence and decline. Led by Lord Vengis, they blame this decline on the city’s founders and wish to contact them, though long dead, to reprimand them. This does not go well.

Break the Doors of Hell is extravagant in its portrayals of decline and excess, giving vivid descriptions of the setting and the characters therein. There are cannibal babies, hints at bestiality and shriekingly awful lords and ladies in positions of power, none of which are particularly nice, but which also means that their come-uppance at the end is perhaps more satisfying.

Imaginative and definitely odd, this is quite different from the Brunner work I usually read, and different again from the other Brunner I've read this month. 4 out of 5.

Homecalling (Part 1 of 2) by Judith Merril

A few months ago I mentioned that both Moorcock and Bonfiglioli had said that as a result of talks at the London Worldcon we could expect fiction from Ms Merril in both Science Fantasy and New Worlds soon. And here it is. Kyril in his Editorial claimed that it is perhaps the best story in the issue.

Unfortunately, my own excitement was tempered by the fact that this is not “new” fiction but a reprint from Science Fiction Stories back in November 1956. Even more annoyingly, although the back cover claims that it is a complete short novel, it is actually only the first part of the story, to be continued next month. It is perhaps understandable, though. Ms Merril currently spends most of her time currently dissecting books in her reviews in The Magazine of Fantasy and SF. and The Year’s Best SF anthologies and presumably has little time to write new fiction.

We begin with what appears to be a family – mother Sarah, father John, daughter Deborah (also known as Dee) and baby Petey. However, their spaceship crashes on a strange planet and Dee is left with Petey to survive. After some exploring, Dee finds the home of the insect-like Lady Daydanda, who lives in a hive-like colony. After First Contact, Dee and Petey are persuaded by telepathy to be rescued by Daydanda’s hive, who take them back to their home. Daydanda as a Mother and a Lady of a Household is fascinated by them, especially as they seem to have travelled beyond the skies. The end of this first part leads to Dee and Daydanda meeting and, despite Dee’s initial and understandable reluctance, communicating with each other.

The character of Dee is lovely – a nine-year old who is brave, strong and resourceful in a way that I usually only see Heinlein achieving. She is no child prodigy, though, and Merril does well to make her seem like a nine-year old and not a child wunderkind. However, the triumph of this story is that through Daydanda, Merril manages to create aliens whose thoughts and concepts are logical and yet definitely alien. Daydanda’s initial mistaken ideas about Dee and Petey are understandable given the nature of her race, but much of the latter part of the story shows her resourcefulness, bravery and intelligence as she tries to both look after the orphaned children and understand them.

The story’s definitely worth reading, but like the reprint of Arthur C Clarke’s Sunjammer story in New Worlds in March 1965, it takes up space that could perhaps be better filled with new material. Therefore, although it is, as Kyril suggests, one of the best stories in the issue, I have removed one mark from my original score to make it 3 out of 5.

Summing up Impulse

The stellar group of authors in last month’s issue have been superceded by a smaller group of more varied and less well-known writers.

This could be seen as a return to normal, of going back to basics, and as a result a bit of a let-down. It doesn't help that the Merril is half of a reprint.

However, despite there only being four stories in this issue, I am impressed by the quality of what’s on offer. At least three out of the four are great, whilst the Rackham is a little bit of a placeholder, I’m afraid. Nevertheless, this is a good issue.

Onto this month’s New Worlds

The Second Issue At Hand

Editor Mike Moorcock does not have Kyril’s crisis of confidence this month. He spends his time talking about the difference between ‘truth’ and ‘untruth’, which for most sf writers is difficult, involves total intellectual and emotional detachment and discipline. The reason for this musing is to allow Moorcock to suggest (again) that the best of the ‘new SF’ does this, unlike the ‘old’, and then use that point to say how good JG Ballard’s story in this issue is. That cover is awful, though.

To the stories!


Illustration by Unknown

The Assassination Weapon, by J G Ballard
After his book reviewing in New Worlds and his story in Impulse last month, we have a return to fiction by Ballard in New Worlds.

There has been an interesting trend in the New Wave fiction in recent months. Moorcock’s done it as James Colvin, referencing Eva Braun and Adolf Hitler in a story in the September 1965 issue, and Richard Gordon brought the Marquis de Sade back to a trial in the November 1965 issue. Here JG manages to use JF Kennedy, Harvey Oswald and Malcolm X in a much darker story, connecting them together in his usual cut-up disparate fashion.

My understanding of the story may be unclear. I get the vague impression that this one may even be beyond me, but Moorcock in this month’s Editorial summarises the story by saying that Ballard ”questions the validity of various popular images and modern myths which remain as solid and alive as when they were first given concrete form in the shape of the three assassinated men who continue to represent so much the atmosphere of their times. Ballard does not ask who killed them, but what killed them – and what combination of ideas and events created and then destroyed them?”

To do this Ballard writes a number of short paragraphs from different perspectives, all evoking people we ‘know’ and sometimes images Ballard has used before – the terminal beach, decaying cars, cityscapes – in a dazzlingly assembled group of seemingly disconnected elements which together form a patchwork of a story.

Personally, I am torn between admiration of such a bold idea and a feeling that the story is just taking American culture and trying to shock. The fact that Moorcock has to explain to me what the story is about, rather than me being able to work it out for myself, is a minus.

Despite this,  Ballard has imagined a deliberately controversial story here that will confuse many (like me) yet at the same time make the reader think. Therefore typical Ballard, on form. 4 out of 5.

Skirmish, by John Baxter

The return of Australian John Baxter, last seen in these pages back in February 1965 with More Than A Man. This is the story of a hopelessly damaged spaceship, the Cockade, and the remaining crew’s attempts to finish their mission and survive against the alien Kriks. Well written but predictable Space Opera. It’s a bit of a relief after the intense Ballard, frankly. 3 out of 5.

No Guarantee, by Gordon Walters

We’ve met Gordon before with his story Death of an Earthman in New Worlds in April 1965. You may know him as George Locke. No Guarantee is a comical attempt to publish a monograph about the Moon landing but along the way discusses Literature and the members of the “Leicester Literary Longhairs”. The overall point of the story to me seems to be “Don’t go to the Moon!” It is written almost as a stream of consciousness, part comedy, part horror story, but the combination seems forced and it doesn’t really work for me. 3 out of 5.


Illustration by James Cawthorn

House of Dust, by Norman Brown

Yet another new name. Another post-apocalyptic tribe story about a group’s struggles to eventually return to the deserted city of their past. Not particularly original. 3 out of 5.


Illustration by Douthwaite

The Ruins, by James Colvin

James’s first story since the serial The Wrecks of Time, which started really well but disappointed me in the end. Here Maldoon is wandering in a set of ruins. He seems to encounter a city with cars, people and cafes, and then stranger things but in reality all of this seems to be hallucinations experienced whilst in the ruins as his mind breaks down. More drug related allegory that didn’t really mean a lot to me. Again, Colvin's story isn’t really bad but fails to excite. 3 out of 5.

Cog, by Kenneth Harker

A new writer to me. The title suggests something that is part of bigger machinery, but actually the word Cog is short for “cognito-handler”. Or at least I think so. Through this story there are a number of alternatives suggested – Chaser of Gloaming, Chance Orbit Gambler, Clerk Ordinary Grade, even Castor Oil Gargler. It is a mildly amusing joke that overstays its welcome and attempts to cover up the fact that this is an overworked satire. 3 out of 5.

Eyeball, by Sam Wolfe

Another new writer. A short but deliberately lyrical story about an Earthman from planet Alpha 762 who is the involuntary host of an invading Martian spaceship inside their body – actually, in one of his eyeballs – to gain intelligence before invasion.

There’s some wonderfully florid descriptive passages here. Try the first few lines as an example: ”Irritation surrounds the glowing softness, the jelly mass light sponge crisping in the raw sunlight attack. The red streaked itch and harsh grains of invisible sand dust. Ganglion strands sucking away protective juice,” which I suspect you will either love or, like me, feel that it is a little overworked. A story of style over substance, perhaps. 3 out of 5.


Illustration by James Cawthorn

Consuming Passion, by Michael Moorcock

A story about a man known as “Pyro Jack”, who can set off fires at will and does so across London for fame and triumphant recognition by the police and public – a sort of pyromaniac Jack the Ripper! He is arrested but escapes to a library, determined to make his last act memorable. Wonder what Ray Bradbury would make of this one? 3 out of 5.

The Evil That Men Do (Part 2)), by John Brunner

The second part of Brunner’s creepy story now. If you remember, Godfrey Rayner’s party-piece was that he is a hypnotist. When he puts reluctant Fey Cantrip into a trance she talks of a nightmare involving a white dragon. We found at the end that Rayner’s psychiatrist friend Dr. Laszlo has a patient with what sounds like the same dream.

This month Godfrey tries to get more about Fey’s background in order to help her. He talks to her few acquaintances and meets the patient Alan Rogers in Wickingham Prison. Through hypnosis Rogers reveals a sad and perverted background that seems to be centred on a pornographically explicit book, The Harder Dream by Duncan Marsh. To try and get to the bottom of the issue and help Fey, Godfrey travels to Fey’s original home in rural Market Barnabas, where we find that Fey has also had access to this book. The story ends in a fury of Weird Tales-ian psychosexual violence.

Last month I said that this is OK and read easily. This month the point of the story is revealed, as a sexual tale designed to shock. Whilst undeniably violent and sexually intense, It is still readable, but I much preferred the other Brunner on offer this month. 3 out of 5.

Articles and Book Reviews

First this month is an article from Bill Butler, he being the author of the poem From ONE in last month’s issue, which talks of William Burroughs and his work. As you may have noticed, since Moorcock’s uptake as Editor in New Worlds there has been a fairly regular indulgence in the deification of William Burroughs. We continue this here. Whilst I realise that there may be new readers to the magazine who may not have read this before, the long-term readers (of which I see myself as one), will recognize it.

Two points sprang to mind after reading this – one, the first part of the review does little more than summarize what J G Ballard said in issue 142, which, although relevant, rather bores those of us who have been here before, and second, it’s never a good idea to spend paragraphs explaining why Burroughs is deliberately obtuse and then berate fans of his work for not understanding his writing. I appreciate the enthusiasm of the article, but this feels like what you Americans call “a puff-piece” and so undoes the promotion that it seems to be trying to do.

George Collyn then continues this look at New Wave writers by examining the work of Kurt Vonnegut. Because I haven’t read this before, although it is not the first time Mr. Vonnegut has been mentioned lately in this magazine, I was more interested. Collyn points out that if Ballard is the British version of New Wave the Vonnegut is the American. Personally, I disagree (I think Zelazny, Ellison, and Samuel Delany fit the description, myself), but I understand the point he is trying to make. Like Ballard, Vonnegut plays with form and writes in a way that is not what most people may think of science fiction, even when there are elements within. Reading this article further I’m fairly sure Vonnegut doesn’t think he writes science fiction, either. The rest of the essay is expectedly rather gushing.

Assistant Editor Langdon Jones, under the intriguing title ‘Wireless World’ Strikes Again reviews Voices from the Sky by Arthur C Clarke. As one of the old guard of writers, and as this is a book of non-fiction essays, I was rather expecting these trendy reviewers to denigrate the book. I am pleased to read that they are surprisingly complimentary. “Only Clarke (with the possible exception of Asimov) could write about Space Flight and the Spirit of Man without descending into dreadful pseudo-poetry and bathos.” It sells the book well, which may be the point.

There are no Letters pages AGAIN this month, though we are promised letters on Science vs Religion next time.

Summing up New Worlds

In this 161st issue of 160 pages, there’s a lot to like, despite the dodgy cover. Moorcock has (deliberately, I think) gone for a wide range of stories, often from new writers. This was part of his mission statement a few months ago, and it is pleasing to see him keep to his word.

Unfortunately, whilst appreciating the chance to read new writers, many of the stories are clearly work from writers still learning their craft and frankly they are not always that good. The Colvin disappoints, the Moorcock is good, though a minor piece. The Ballard is the selling point this month, but one story does not make an issue. There’s a lot here that seems to be simply trying too hard, which is why I liked rather than loved this issue. It was a little ironic that I felt at the end that New Worlds had more “typically Bonfiglioni space-fillers” this month.

Summing up overall

Less of a difficult choice this month. Whilst both magazines still seem to be blazing a trail, and all the better for it, the relative inexperience of the work in New Worlds and the quality of the Keith Roberts and John Brunner in Impulse means that Impulse has my vote this month.

Next month, the return of Bob Shaw, a name we’ve not seen for a while, in New Worlds!

Until the next…



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Movies, TV

[March 24, 1966] Dark Comedy and Birthday Wishes (a Tony Randall double feature)

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by Lorelei Marcus

Spring is here

The month of spring is upon us, and with it comes the withdrawal of the frigid cold, swaths of buds peeking from their branches, and the boisterous emergence of new life. It's a wonderful time of year, warming the earth until "California Dreaming" is no longer necessary, and promising renewal in general. Yet the most important part of March is not the spring equinox, or another green-centric holiday, or good weather, or flowers, or the fresh start of life.

The most important part of March is the fact that it contains my birthday.

And it just so happened that my special day fell right between two old movie reruns, each of them starring the love of my life, Tony Randall.

I couldn't have asked for a better gift.

Many Happy Buryings

Of course my obligation to consume every piece of media Randall has ever been in is what drove me to watch an obscure TV special of Arsenic and Old Lace . It took that initial incentive, because I have been wary of Arsenic and Old Lace since I'd previously had to watch it (the 1944 film with Cary Grant) in my drama class. Needless to say, the experience was both exasperating and unpleasant. Luckily, this version was neither of the above, and had me hooting with laughter throughout the program.

For those who are unfamiliar with the show, Arsenic and Old Lace is a dark comedy about two sweet old ladies who murder for fun, and their poor nephew, Mortimer Brewster, who discovers their nasty habit and tries to clean up the whole mess. Further conflict arises when Boris Karloff- I mean Jonathan Brewster, Mortimer's brother and a notably malicious murderer, returns home to hide out for a while. As you might imagine, insanity ensues.


The Brewster sisters

I was pleasantly surprised by just how funny this rendition of the classic chaotic plot was. I have to credit the sublimity of the production to three main parts: the acting, the script, and the pacing. I would round off my praise with compliments to the set design as well, but my TV sadly went on the fritz that evening, and I could hardly see what was happening through the snow. Apparently there are still problems the magic of color television cannot fix.


(Not) Boris Karloff and his associate, Dr. Einstein

Yet I still managed to enjoy the show, thanks to some excellent casting choices. Dorothy Stickney and Mildred Natwick play Aunt Abby and Martha Brewster perfectly, with just the right amount of sweetness and charm to build sympathy for these lovely old women, despite their homicidal tendencies. Their banter with each other and their nephews is hysterical, and the contrast of their outwardly harmless appearance with their dark secret is very fun.


Our hero

Boris Karloff is, of course, excellent in his dark, monstrous role. He plays a great foil to the aunts, defining the line between true evil and simply misunderstood. The ladies murder for the claimed benefit of their victims, and they take great delight in their charity work. Jonathan, instead, clearly murders out of spite and has no redeeming qualities whatsoever. The difference is key in establishing who the audience should root for; the homicidal aunties seem a touch less bad and un-relatable when compared with a literal scourge of the Earth.


Sibling rivalry

Though the rest of the cast is marvelous, I'd have to say Tony Randall gives the best performance as Mortimer Brewster, the straightman nephew. You may believe I have a slight bias in favor of Randall at this point, and that's probably true, but I think it's also fair to say that his execution of Mortimer ties the whole show together. Mortimer is a complex balance of a character, always in between being both capable and yet on the edge of a nervous breakdown. If he falls too far in either direction he's either unfunny, annoying, or both. This was the downfall of the first version of Arsenic and Old Lace that I'd watched. That Mortimer was too excitable to get anything done, and spent the entire show whining and floundering around insufferably. Randall was the complete opposite.

He struck the perfect equilibrium of distressed yet productive that made his character both likable and hilarious. The scene where he tries to call his boss to alert him that he can't come into work had me rolling with laughter. I may be severely biased, but here, Randall is deserving of the praise.


Tom Bosley has a humorous turn as Teddy Roosevelt.

The other two great aspects of the show go hand in hand. The dialogue is witty, fun, and delightfully self-aware. I found all the jokes about Jonathan looking like Boris Karloff particularly funny and ironic (given that they got Karloff to play Jonathan!) Alongside the script was the masterful direction, which ensured that the jokes never fell flat and the pacing never dragged. The presentation was very tight and complemented the other positive aspects perfectly. Overall, this version of Arsenic and Old Lace was a splendid time watching the wild antics of the nutty but charming Brewster family. There's not a single flaw that I can find, just a great time, therefore I give it five stars.

Down to New Orleans

The second film, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn , aired a week later as the local Saturday night movie. It kept in keeping with the theme of dark yet funny classics. Based on the 1884 novel of the same name, the film follows a young Huckleberry Finn as he runs away from his abusive father and takes a raft down the Mississippi with his friend and runaway slave, Jim. Finn and Jim encounter a variety of obstacles on their journey, including a feuding family, slave hunters, and a couple of cunning swindlers who rope them into their con. Eventually, they get through it all thanks in part to Finn's ability to lie through his teeth, and the story ends bittersweetly as the traveling pair must seperate and pursue their own paths.


A pensive Huck contemplates a world without shoes

I definitely enjoyed the movie, though I think I would rather read the novel if I would ever consume the story of Huck Finn again. The pacing drags at the beginning, probably due to some poor direction choices and Eddie Hodges' (Huck Finn) stiff acting. Both improve as the show goes on, but the first hour could benefit from being about 20% shorter.


Jim convinces Huck to board his raft

This also may have been a case where Tony Randall's superb acting skills actually hurt the production. Randall plays "The King of France," the brains of the two grifters who force Finn to play along in one of their plots. Unfortunately, he gives the role such charisma and personality that it took me nearly the whole movie to realize his character was supposed to be the villain! Perhaps in hindsight the child-threatening and attempted gold theft should have tipped me off, but truly, who can hate a man that competent at what he does? (Especially one that looks like Tony Randall)


The villain?

My favorite part of the movie was the nuanced way it conveyed its abolitionist themes. Despite explicitly stating several times how "freeing slaves is wrong," the story develops Jim just enough that we empathize with him and hope that he acquires his freedom. Archie Moore's lovable performance also aids in building rapport and getting the audience to root for Jim, especially in heart-wrenching scenes like when he tearfully describes regret at hitting his daughter. This subtle antiracism is a bit new to me, compared all the (justified) current protests and riots that are explicitly denouncing unequal treatment of the black community. It gives me hope that perhaps art like this can be used to bridge the gap of understanding to those who insist on marching in white sheets.


Poignant stuff — who can but wince when seeing a man in chains?

The film is also fairly amusing, with a few solid jokes, and some good physical comedy and dialogue. The funnest part was seeing all the crazy tall tales Finn comes up with to get out of tight situations. I found it very funny that Finn ultimately never gets punished for any of his fibs, subtly implying that the only way to successfully get through life is to flat out lie all the time. I personally haven't read The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn , so I don't know if this theme is an artifact of Mark Twain's writing, or just some poor script and direction choices. Despite its flaws, the movie successfully told the story and conveyed the messages it was trying to, all while being fairly entertaining along the way. I give it three stars.


Bittersweet parting

Seventeen candles

And with that, my birthday festivities have come to a close. I think it's time I step away from the silver screen and instead take a walk outside and appreciate the dawning spring. The experience of another year has granted me new wisdom, and I'd like to see what life has to offer outside the artificial television set.

At least, until the next Tony Randall movie comes along.

This is the Young traveler, signing out.




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Magazine

[March 22, 1966] Summer in the sun, winter in the shade (April 1966 Fantasy and Science Fiction)

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by Gideon Marcus

Time of (no) change

Seasons don't mean a whole lot in San Diego.  As I like to say, here we have Spring, Summer, Backwards Spring, and Rain.  All of these are pretty mild, and folks from parts beyond often grumble over the lack of seasonality here.

I grew up in the Imperal Valley where we had a full four seasons: Hot, Stink, Bug, and Wind.  San Diego is a step up.

Judith Merril, who writes the books column for F&SF these days asserts that there is a seasonality to science fiction as well, with December and January being the peak time of year in terms of story quality.  If it be the case that the solstice marks the SF's annual zenith, then one might expect the equinoxes to exhibit a mixed bag.

And so that is the case with the latest issue of The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, which contains stories both sublime and mediocre.  Trip with me through the flowers?

Spring is here


by Jack Gaughan

We Can Remember It for You Wholesale, by Philip K. Dick

Given the prolificity with which Dick produces SF these days, one can hardly believe there was a long time when he'd taken a hiatus from the genre.  This latest story fuses his recent penchant for mind-expanding weirdness with the more straight science fiction characteristic of his work in the 50s. 

To wit, Douglas Quail is a humdrum prole who dreams big.  Specifically, he really wants to go to Mars, but such privilege is reserved to astronauts and high grade politicians.  Luckily, there is an organization whose business is literally making dreams come true…or perhaps I should say Rekal Incorporated makes true come dreams.  They inject their clients with artificial memories, lard them with convincing physical ephemera, and so a dream becomes reality — at least for the customer.

But when Quail is put under for the procedure, it turns out that he already has memories of a trip to Mars, which have been imperfectly wiped.  In short order, Quail becomes the center of a spy thriller, pursued by countless government agents.

On the surface, this is a fun gimmick story, but knowing Dick, I'm pretty sure there's a deeper thread running through the plot.  Indeed, clues are laid that make the reader wonder if the entire story is not the phantom adventure, deepening turns and all.  As with many recent Dick stories, the question one is left with is "What is reality?"

Four stars.


by Gahan Wilson

Appoggiatura, by A. M. Marple

A flea with an amazing tenor and the music-loving but otherwise talentless cat on which he resides, get swept into the world of urban opera.  Can their friendship withstand sudden fame?

This silly story by newcomer Anne Marple shouldn't be any good, but the whimsy of it all and the utter lack of explanatory justification keeps you going for a vignette's length.

Three stars.

But Soft, What Light …, by Carol Emshwiller

Spring is the time for romance, and so a fitting season for this piece, a love story between a computer with the soul of a poet, and the young woman who wins its heart.

Lyrically told, avante garde in the extreme, and just a bit naughtier than the usual, But Soft makes me even more delighted to see Carol Emshwiller return to the pages of this magazine.

Five stars.

The Sudden Silence, by J. T. McIntosh

The city of New Bergen on the planet of Severna goes silent, and a rescue team is dispatched from a nearby world to find out what could suddenly quiet the voices of half a million souls.

This novelette would be a lot more tolerable if 1) the culprit were more plausible and 2) McIntosh didn't have two of the male members of the team more interested in seducing their crewmates than saving lives. 

It's a pity.  McIntosh used to be one of my more favored authors.  These days, his stuff is both disappointing and difficult to read for its shabby treatment of women (though at least he includes them in his futures, which is uncommon).

Two stars.

Injected Memory, by Theodore L. Thomas

The latest mini-article from Mr. Thomas is about the promise of skills and experiences induced with genetic infusions.  It's a neat idea, lacking the usual stupid execution the author includes at the end of these. I don't know if the article's inclusion in this issue alongside the Philip K. Dick story mentioned above was serendipitous or deliberate, but I suspect the latter.

Three stars.

The Octopus, by Doris Pitkin Buck

Time is an octopus, tearing us in both directions.

Decent poem.  Three stars.

The Face Is Familiar, by Gilbert Thomas

I had to look this story up twice to remember it, which should tell you something.  A Lovecraftian tale of terror recounted by one man to another in Saigon.  The latter has seen real horror.  The former saw his wife preserved after death in an…unorthodox manner…which just isn't as shocking or interesting as is it's supposed to be.

Some nice if overwrought storytelling, but not much of a story.  Two stars.

The Space Twins, by James Pulley

There was a hypothesis going around for a while that long term exposure to weightlessness would have not just adverse physical but psychological impacts.  In this piece, two astronauts on their way around Mars revert to their time in the womb and have trouble returning.

Clearly written before Gemini 6, it comes off as both quaint and facile.

Two stars.

The Sorcerer Pharesm, by Jack Vance

Continuing the adventures of Cugel the Clever in his quest to bring back a magic item to the wizard Iucounu, this latest chapter sees the luckless thief happen across an enormous carved edifice.  Its goal is to entice the TOTALITY of space-time into the presence of the great sorcerer, Pharesm.

Of course, nothing goes as planned for Pharesm or Cugel.  Clever byplay, some good fortune, lots of bad fortune, and a bit of time travel ensue.

Vance strings nonsense words and scenes together with enviable talent, but the shtick is honestly running a bit thin.

Three stars.

The Nobelmen of Science, by Isaac Asimov

Instead of a science article, the Good Doctor offers up a comprehensive list of Nobel Prize winners by nationality.  Seems a bit of a copout, though I imagine it'll be useful to someone.

Three stars.

Bordered in Black, by Larry Niven

Lastly, Niven returns with an effective story of two astronauts who head to Sirius and encounter a clearly artificially seeded world.  Is it merely an algae farm planet, or is there something more sinister going on, associated with one of the continents, fringed with an ominous black ring?

Niven is great at building a compelling world, and the revelation at the end is pretty good.  It's a bit overwrought, though.  Also, I'm not sure why Niven would think Sirius A and B are both white giants when Sirius B is famously a dwarf star.

Anyway, four stars, and a good way to end an otherwise unimpressive section of the magazine.

Spring comes finally

And with the equinox, I turn the last page of the issue.  In the end, the April F&SF is a touch more good than bad, which is appropriate given the now-longer days.  Will the magazine obey the seasonal cycle and turn out its best issue in June (at odds with Ms. Merril's predictions)?

Only time will tell!


Spring is also the time for new beginnings — a fitting season to release its new daughter magazine, P.S.!

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Book, Science Fiction/Fantasy

[March 20, 1966] Two of A Kind (March Galactoscope #2)

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by Mx. Kris Vyas-Myall

Whilst the comedy double act has been popular since the days of music hall, they seem to be having a moment on British Television.

Morecambe and Wise

Eric Morecambe and Ernie Wise are probably the biggest draw, with their ATV series Two of a Kind being more widely known simply as Morecambe and Wise.

Mike and Bernie Winters

Whilst the BBC’s primary double act are Mike and Bernie Winters who have just concluded Blackpool Night Out and we will soon be getting The Mike and Bernie Show.

Peter Cook and Dudley Moore

There are, however, others coming up as well. In particular, the irreverent Peter Cook and Dudley Moore are currently in the second season of Not Only… But Also, which has been getting great acclaim, as well as a strong following among younger viewers.

The format tends to work on having a funny man and a straight man, in order to play off against each other. The books from two British Veterans I picked up looked like they could be their own comedic duo, however they might end up getting booed off the stage:

The Not-so Funny Man:

The Richest Corpse in Show Business by Dan Morgan

The Richest Corpse in Show Business

The outside of this books gives next to no detail about the plot. The Keith Roberts cover sketch of a bearded man gives nothing away. Instead, we get a warning notice on the front:

WARNING! Earnest students of SCIENCE FICTION who deprecate hilarity on the subject should avoid this book like the plague.

Is this a marketing ploy? Absolutely! But an intriguing enough one to catch my attention.

At the same time Dan Morgan had always been one of the stronger of Carnell’s set but he is also much less prolific than many of his counterparts. As such I usually look forward to whenever he finally does publish something.

So, what would Mr. Morgan be writing? Perhaps a madcap adventure, like a cross between Jerry Cornelius and Bill the Galactic Hero? A comedy about a zombie who becomes a pop star? Disappointingly the whole affair is rather more pedestrian.

It tells of Harry Trevey, the producer of Just Folks at Amalgamated Tel. This seems to be a kind of documentary show following real-life subjects throughout their entire lives. This is an incredibly important part of Amalgamated Tel’s line-up as there is currently a long-fought and bitter actors' strike going on, meaning that scripted programming is not available.

At the start the terrible news emerges that their current star, door-to-door salesman Carmody Truelove has died of a heart attack. However, the biggest initial concern is he died off-camera, and no one seems to know him well enough to try to do a memorial show afterwards. Now, Carmody would appear to be the titular “Richest Corpse” and it would seem that the story was going to be about finding out his past. But this plot turns out to be only so much pre-amble for the main story and frustratingly just fizzles out about a third of the way through the book.

It turns out the meat of the story is actually about what will fill Just Folks after Truelove’s demise. They decide to use a hunter (the fellow pictured on the cover), who has a licence to hunt down humans and get him to announce his next victim on the show. Things finally appear to be going Trevey’s way until he is selected as the victim and has to fight for his life against one of the most skilled killers in the world. He will be paid incredibly well, though, for being the star of the series, making him The Richest Corpse in Show Business.

Anyone who has read Robert Sheckley’s Seventh Victim will probably recognise this plot. Morgan does attempt to put his own spin on it by using it to skewer the media’s desire for increasingly sensational content (also demonstrated by the character of Dick Gordon, who is trying to setup his own network of pornographic stations) but it is all done very bluntly and clumsily.

It also doesn’t help much that everyone in it is very unpleasant, although Trevey himself most of all. At one point he even attempts to rape the main love interest. This happens for no good reason I can fathom other than to justify the claim on the back that it contains a:

…a deliciously amoral line in sex…

I know there are still some fans that like this kind of thing. For example, John Christopher’s much praised Death of Grass features a gratuitous rape scene that seem to be there mainly to show how bad the world is. Or in Robert A. Heinlein’s Let There Be Light the protagonist forces a women into a literal shotgun wedding.

William F. Temple wrote an editorial in New Worlds saying that having women in SF stories directly was the problem:

Bring women into it, and they gum up the works.
The solution, as I see it, is to try one’s best to leave women, as characters, out of the plot if possible.

I would disagree with both of these sentiments. The issue with the women in The Richest Corpse is not that they are present; it is the fact that Morgan writes them in cliches and uses them as tools for Trevey’s story, instead of showing them as people in their own right. Even Isaac Asimov (who is infamous in fan circles for his treatment of women) managed to create the wonderful Susan Calvin. If people like Mr. Morgan are scratching their head, why not just try talking to a woman and asking her opinion on a scene? Even if you lack female friends or work colleagues, maybe you have a wife, a mother or a sister you could go visit and listen to?

But, perhaps, the biggest issue is I simply didn’t find it funny. From everything involved in the promotion of the book I expected it to be a laugh fest but it doesn’t even appear to be written as such. Maybe it could be said to try to raise a smile, like The Midas Plague, but even in this aspect it doesn’t really achieve its goal.

Overall, it is just a mid-level satire of the entertainment industry. Not truly terrible but certainly not destined to be the next Space Merchants either.

Two Stars

The Wobbly Straight Man:

The Crystal World by J. G. Ballard

Crystal World JG Ballard

This story may be familiar to SFF magazine readers as this was previously published as Equinox in New Worlds in 1964.

Equinox New Worlds

Although, confusingly, the second part of the Equinox serial from New Worlds is named The Illuminated Man in the book format, which is the name of a similar story in F&SF in the same month, also about a petrified forest and likely set in the same world. This has led some people to conclude this is actually a fix-up story. However, this is not the case as far as I can tell.

Putting them side by side my copy appears to just be an expanded version of Equinox. Specifically, with additional conversations throughout and two new chapters:

Chapter Three – Mulatto on the Catwalk: A chase scene in Port Montarre.
Chapter Eleven – The White Hotel: Whilst staying in the chalet they become acquainted with an abandoned hotel and former leper colony.

I would not be surprised if these were simply excised for space from the New Worlds version as neither add anything more to the conclusion of the tale.

Ballard Books

The Crystal World seems to be part of his continued look at elemental catastrophes. We had air in The Wind From Nowhere, water in The Drowned World and fire in The Drought, so it makes sense to complete the set with an earth based catastrophe (or crystalline at the very least).

Genocides Earthworks

These seem to be somewhat in vogue right now, as Disch’s debut novel The Genocides is about a tree-based apocalypse and Aldiss’ Earthworks is about an environmentally damaged Earth. Is it a sign of increasing environmental awareness since The Silent Spring was published? Or does the New Wave just not like nature?

Anyway, the text itself. As those of you who read the New Worlds serial or Mark’s excellent write ups will probably recall it concerns Dr. Sanders and his running around a crystalline landscape near Mont Royale getting into various scrapes and lots of discussing what it is all about. In less skilled hands this could be a terrible book. But as this is Ballard, he manages to pull this one off…just.

Predominantly this is because this is not so much a book about ideas and events as one about atmosphere. The mystery of why the jungle is crystallizing and the gun toting antics are not why you should read. Rather it is for the dream-like and magical feeling you get as you go through this environment, along with the word-for-word quality of Ballard’s writing. For example:

In a few places the affected zone had crossed the highway, and small patches of the scrub along the roadside had begun to vitrify. Their drab leaves gave off a faint luminescence. Suzanne walked among them, her long robe sweeping across the brittle ground. Sanders could see that her shoes and the train of her robe were beginning to crystallize, the minute prisms glancing in the moonlight.

Few other writers can create an atmosphere as beautiful and written with such style as J. G. Ballard and it is why he remains a master of the field.

Heart of Darkness Things Fall Apart

We have to address the big elephant in the room when it comes to this story, colonialism. Ballard seems to have taken a lot of influence from Conrad’s Heart of Darkness. However, he is taking on many of the mistakes Chinua Achebe critiqued in his modern classic Things Fall Apart.

The African characters seem to be treated as incidental to what is happening and throughout rarely even have names, referred to instead with terms such as “The Mulatto” “The Negro” or “Natives”.

I don’t think it is beyond the scope or capability of contemporary western science fiction writers to address these kinds of themes with more thoughtfulness. After all, they are able to handle making critiques of colonialism through extra-terrestrial cultures, such as in Aldiss’ The Dark Light Years or MacLean’s Unhuman Sacrifice. So how about we make sure to use the same care and attention when writing about real people on our own planet?

Overall, I think that this is a readable but flawed and unnecessary publication. It is still better than a lot of science fiction out there, but one I would only recommend for Ballard completists.

Three Stars




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Science / Space Race

[March 18, 1966] Taking Gemini for a Spin (Gemini 8)

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by Kaye Dee

As the race for the Moon heats up, the Gemini program is moving forward at a cracking pace –three months ago, Gemini VII completed its record breaking long-duration mission and NASA’s latest manned space mission, Gemini VIII launched just two days ago on March 16 (US time). By co-incidence, this was right on the 40th anniversary of the first successful launch of a liquid-fuelled rocket by American physicist Dr. Robert Goddard.


Goddard and his first liquid fuel rocket, launched forty years to the day before Gemini VIII. Developing a liquid-fuelled rocket was the necessary first step to making spaceflight a reality

But are things moving too fast? This latest Gemini flight was one of NASA’s most ambitious to date, slated for a 3-day mission to carry out the first rendezvous and docking and the United States’ second spacewalk. However, it was prematurely cut short after about 10 and a half hours, due to an in-flight emergency.

What was Supposed to Happen

Gemini VIII was intended to carry out the four rendezvous and docking manoeuvres originally planned for Gemini VI (the goals of that mission had to be changed due to the loss of its Agena target vehicle and instead it rendezvoused with Gemini VII). Being able to rendezvous and dock two spacecraft is a technique that is vitally important for the success of the Apollo programme, so NASA needs to be sure that it can reliably carry out these manoeuvres.


Gemini VIII approaches its Agena target vehicle in preparation for docking, practicing one of the crucial technologies of the Apollo programme

NASA also needs to gain more experience with extra-vehicular activity (EVA), or spacewalking, which is another crucial technique needed for Apollo. So far, the Gemini programme’s only EVA has been the one carried out by Ed White during the Gemini IV mission in June last year. Astronaut David Scott was scheduled to perform an ambitious spacewalk of over two hours, operating at the end of a 25-foot tether. He was supposed to retrieve a radiation experiment from the front of the Gemini's spacecraft adapter and activate a micrometeoroid experiment on the Agena target vehicle. Then it was planned to test a space power tool by loosening and tightening bolts on a work panel attached to the Gemini.

The most exciting part of the spacewalk would have taken place after Mission Commander Neil Armstrong undocked from the Agena for the first time. Major Scott would have tested an Extravehicular Support Pack (ESP), which contained its own oxygen supply and propellant for his Hand-Held Manoeuvring Unit. A 75-foot extension to his tether would have enabled Scott to carry out several manoeuvres in conjunction with the Gemini and Agena vehicles, while separated from them at distances up to 60 feet.

Very Experienced Rookies


Neil Armstrong (front) and David Scott departing the suit up trailer on their way to the launch pad. Behind Scott is Chief Astronaut Alan Shepard, the first American in space.

Gemini VIII’s crew are both first-time astronauts, but they have a wealth of flight experience between them. Mission Commander Neil Armstrong is the first American civilian in space, and a highly experienced test pilot. Before being selected for NASA’s second group of astronauts, Mr. Armstrong was a Naval aviator during the Korean conflict and then an experimental test pilot with NASA’s predecessor the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics, which he joined in 1955. He developed a reputation as an excellent engineer, a cool-headed clear-thinker, and an outstanding test pilot with nerves of steel, all of which helped him survive a number of dangerous flight-test incidents. Included in his experience are seven flights aboard the X-15 hypersonic research aircraft.

Gemini VIII Pilot David Scott is a major in the US Air Force, and the first member of the third astronaut group to make a spaceflight. Scott saw active duty in Europe before gaining both a Master of Science degree in Aeronautics/Astronautics and the degree of Engineer in Aeronautics/Astronautics from MIT in 1962. He joined the US Air Force Test Pilot School at Edwards Air Force Base in 1962 and was selected as an astronaut in October 1963. 

A Spectrum of Objectives


Gemini VIII's mission patch. Look closely at the spectrum to see the text.

Now that mission patches seem to have become a standard part of each Gemini flight (after being introduced by the Gemini V crew), Armstrong and Scott designed their mission patch to feature a colour spectrum, which is shown as being produced by the light of two stars – Castor and Pollux, the two brightest stars in the constellation of Gemini – refracted through a prism. The spectrum symbolises “the whole spectrum of objectives” that they planned to accomplish on Gemini VIII, which included various science and technology experiments in addition to the docking and spacewalking activities. Looking closely at the spectrum, you can see that its lines have been drawn to represent the astronomical symbol for the constellation Gemini, as well as the Roman numeral VIII.

Things Go to Plan

The original Gemini VIII plan was for a three-day mission and at first everything seemed to be going perfectly. One hundred minutes before Gemini VIII, an Atlas rocket lifted off from Launch Pad 14 at the Cape carrying the Agena target vehicle. Unlike Gemini VI, this time the launch was successful, placing the Agena into a 161 nautical-mile circular orbit. Once it was certain that the Agena was safely in orbit, Gemini VIII lifted off from the nearby Pad 19: its launch, too, went without any problems.


A composite image combining the lift-off of the Atlas Agena and Gemini VIII

After an orbital “chase” of more than three and a half hours, Armstrong and Scott had their target in sight: they could visually spot it when they were about 76 nautical miles away. Then, at 55 nautical miles, the computer completed the rendezvous automatically.

Before docking with the Agena, the astronauts spent 35 minutes visually inspecting it, to ensure that it had suffered no damage from the launch. Then Armstrong started to move towards the Agena at 3.15 inches per second. In a matter of minutes, the Agena’s docking latches clicked: the first docking by a manned spacecraft had been successfully completed! Mission Commander Armstrong described the docking as “a real smoothie” and said that the Agena felt quite stable during the manoeuvre. NASA has now proved that it can achieve a critical technique needed for the Apollo Moon landings.

Things Don’t Go to Plan

The docking may have been a smoothie: however, what followed was anything but! Mission Control seems to have had some suspicions that the Agena's attitude control system could malfunction (my friends at Woomera say there was a possibility that the Agena’s onboard computer might not have the correct program stored in it), because the crew were reminded of the code to turn off the Agena’s computer and advised to abort the docking straight away if there were any problems with the target vehicle.


A close-up view as Gemini VIII approaches its Agena target vehicle.

As Gemini VIII lost radio contact with Houston (in a part of its orbit where it was out of range of any of the tracking stations on the ground), the Agena began to execute one of its stored test programs, to turn the two docked spacecraft. That’s when the emergency began! While the full details of the emergency are not yet known, it seems that the Agena started to roll uncontrollably, causing the docked spacecraft to gyrate wildly, making a full rotation every 10 seconds. The situation seems to have been pretty desperate, to judge from some communications picked up by monitors at the Radio Research Institute of the Japanese Postal Services.

Armstrong has reported that he used the Gemini capsule’s orbital attitude and manoeuvring system (OAMS) thrusters to stop the tumbling, but the roll immediately began again. As he struggled to control the rotating vehicles Armstrong noticed that the OAMS fuel dropped quickly, hinting that perhaps the problem was with the Gemini, rather than the Agena.


Diagram showing the location of the OAMS thrusters and the Re-entry Control System thrusters (incorrectly identified as "Reaction Control System")

Then They Get Worse!

Armstrong and Scott decided to undock from the Agena, apparently concerned that the high spin-rate might damage the spacecraft or possibly cause the Agena, still loaded with propellant, to rupture or explode. It turns out, though, that the Agena’s mass must have been actually damping the rotation, because as soon as Gemini VIII undocked it began to tumble even more rapidly, making almost a full end over end rotation per second! The issue was definitely with the spacecraft, and it was an extremely dangerous one. At that rate of spin, the astronauts’ vision became blurred and they have said they were in danger of blacking out!


CapCom Jim Lovell (left) and astronaut Bill Anders following reports from Gemini VIII during the crisis

It was only at this point that Gemini VIII came back into contact with Mission Control, via the tracking ship USNS Coastal Sentry Quebec, stationed southwest of Japan. Armstrong sure is a quick thinker, though. He disengaged the OAMS system and used the re-entry control system (RCS) to finally halt the spin and regain control of Gemini VIII. However, doing this used up almost 75% of the re-entry manoeuvring fuel.

Emergency Abort!

Gemini mission rules dictate that a flight has to be aborted once the RCS is activated for any reason. With so much of the RCS fuel already consumed, and with no guarantee that the tumbling might not occur again, Flight Director John Hodge (on his first mission as Chief Flight Director, too!), quickly decided to abort the mission and bring Gemini VIII back to Earth.

Hodge decided to bring Gemini VIII home after one more orbit, so that secondary recovery forces in the Pacific could be in place. Re-entry occurred over China, out of range of NASA tracking stations, but US Air Force planes spotted the spacecraft as it descended towards its landing site about 430 nautical miles east of Okinawa. Three para-rescuers were dropped to attach a flotation collar to the capsule and stay with the astronauts until the recovery ship arrived. 


Armstrong, Scott and their para-rescuers waiting for the arrival of the recovery ship

Initial reports are that, though exhausted, the crew were in good health when they landed, and they opened the Gemini hatches, ate some lunch, and relaxed in the sun with the para-rescuers while waiting for the recovery ship Leonard F Mason to arrive. Maybe the lunch wasn’t such a good idea, as I’ve heard that the crew and their rescuers were all a bit seasick by the time the ship reached them three hours later.

NASA officials met with the Gemini VIII crew in Japan for a preliminary debriefing, and Armstrong and Scott, together with Gemini VIII are now on their way back to the US. Hopefully, an accident investigation will soon reveal exactly what went wrong and why, causing NASA’s first in-flight emergency. But what we already know is that Armstrong and Scott behaved with cool competence in an extremely stressful and dangerous situation and NASA’s emergency procedures enabled the astronauts to be brought home quickly and safely. Everyone involved should be congratulated for demonstrating that even a crisis can be an important stepping-stone on the road to the Moon! 


Safe and sound aboard the U.S.S. Leonard F. Mason




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Science Fiction/Fantasy, TV

[March 16, 1966] Sometimes Older is not Better (Mystery and Imagination)

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by Mx. Kris Vyas-Myall

Will He Get It, Son?

And we’re off! We are officially in general election season as British Prime Minister Harold Wilson hopes to gain an increased majority for his Labour government.

Harold Wilson meeting miners
Harold Wilson meeting miners in the ’64 election campaign

Wilson is touting his achievements of helping to bring about social equality by such measures as the repeal of the rent act, moving towards comprehensive education and the race relations act.
Heath, on the other hand, has been concentrating “equality of opportunity” proposing to put more restrictions on unions to strike, reforming welfare to target the most in need, controlling immigration and entering the EEC.

Labour is, however, also using their budget preview to make the economic case for getting an increased majority, pushing for an increase in exports, making it easier for people to get mortgages and a plan to introduce decimal coinage by 1971.

Edward Heath campaigning in his own constituency
Edward Heath campaigning in his own constituency

The Conservative’s main objection is that these measures will likely result in a weakening in pound sterling which should be the government’s first priority.

The other main flash point is over the Rhodesian crisis. Whilst Heath wants to resume talks with Ian Smith’s government and stop economic sanctions, Wilson believes that only keeping up pressure will end their racist policies.

Honor Blackman, campaigning for Liberal candidates in London
Former Avenger, Honor Blackman, campaigning for Liberal candidates in London

The biggest question remains what will happen to the Liberal vote that seems to be in decline. With in-fighting and a lack of funds a survey has suggested up to 35% of voters are now undecided. Will these middle-of-the-road and anti-establishment voters be more interested in Mr Wilson’s interventionism or Mr. Heath’s free market approach?

Mr. Heath doesn’t appear to be helping himself so far on the campaign trail, not being able answer legitimate criticism. For example, when asked about one of his candidates being accused of taking funds from a racist organization and making inflammatory speeches, the Conservative leader simply responded that he had made his views clear and local MPs were allowed their own opinions.

Christopher Soames, Conservative MP for Bedford, (L) & Brian Parkyn, Labour candidate (R)
Christopher Soames, Conservative MP for Bedford, (L) & Brian Parkyn, Labour candidate (R)

For myself I am out campaigning for Labour candidate Brian Parkyn to attempt to unseat Conservative Christopher Soames. All of us in the local party know it will be an uphill struggle. Soames is Shadow Foreign Secretary and Bedford has been almost continually Conservative since 1922 with a brief one term Labour MP during the 1945 landslide winning by just 288 votes.

But we still all fired up for this campaign. For many of us it is about trying to move the country forward whilst the current Conservative policies seem more interested in returning us to Victorian era.

This brings me to ABC’s latest television series, which is distinctly Victorian and is definitely not the better for it.

Mystery and Imagination

Mystery & Imagination Titles
Mystery & Imagination Titles

The idea behind Mystery and Imagination seems obvious. ABC’s Armchair Theatre has been a successful fixture of the ITV lineups for the last ten years showcasing a number of great plays (including the pilot of Out of This World). However, it can only run for so many episodes a year and something needs to fill the slot for the other half of the year. Last year we had a combination of mystery and suspense anthology series, none of which seemed to capture the public’s imagination.

SFF anthology series such as Out of the Unknown and import The Twilight Zone have been critical successes. Even Doctor Who to a certain extent works on an anthology format, simply having the regulars go into totally new situations each week thanks to the TARDIS. At the same time gothic horror is doing well at the cinema thanks to Hammer and Amicus productions.

Fontana’s tie-in Mystery & Imagination Anthology
Fontana’s tie-in Anthology

And Mystery and Imagination seems to have been a ratings success, with a second set of stories commissioned for later in the year. They even have released a book with a selection of stories related to the series.

However, as an audio-visual experience it was terrible. I found it even less watchable than ABC’s SF thriller, Undermind, they aired last summer (one of the few pieces of British speculative television I gave up on before the conclusion). This had all the ingredients to make something I would adore. So, let us look at the ways it went wrong:

Failure of Imagination 1: Richard Beckett

David Buck as Richard Beckett in Fall of The House of Usher
David Buck as Richard Beckett in Fall of The House of Usher

The use of a regular character to go through the series is, in itself, not a bad idea. Much like with Doctor Who, it allows for a connective thread and a reason to keep watching week to week.

The problem in this show is they do not seem to know what to do with him. Sometimes he arrives and is a passive observer of what happens, sometimes he gets involved, others he just does a Rod Serling style frame to the tale. None of these arrangements prove satisfactory. It possibly doesn’t help that David Buck does not have magnetism of either Serling or Hartnell to draw us through the tale.

But perhaps a bigger problem is that he is not allowed to develop from his adventures. Whilst The Doctor is not the same person in Ancient Rome as he is when he is trying to murder a caveman, Beckett feels like he is cut from the same cloth throughout these episodes. He is merely a foppish idiot stumbling between weird circumstances and adds nothing whether he is in the tale or merely introducing it.

Failure of Imagination 2: Poor Direction

The Open Door
The Open Door

Whilst this may be a series of plays, I think it is the role of a great television director to bring us into the story and make us feel like we are seeing into the world that the characters inhabit. For a fantasy tale this is even more important, in order that we can have a willing suspension of disbelief.

Unfortunately, I was so far outside of these tales, I almost wondered if it was a Brechtian experiment. The shots are arranged like they are on a stage, all the actors' performances are generally pitched far too over the top (even for a gothic tale) and the pacing is glacial without being intriguing.

I was surprised to find this was a significant issue as many of the directors have done work on The Avengers which has always been very good at making the action exciting and the world seem to be more expanded than the three walls of a studio set.

Failure of Imagination 3: No Atmosphere

The Lost Stradivarius
The Lost Stradivarius

When making gothic horror, the most important feature is surely atmosphere. Few people would read The Castle of Otranto if it was just the mystery of death by a giant helmet. Rather it is the atmosphere that Walpole creates which makes for an intriguing reading experience.

Unfortunately, Mystery & Imagination has little to none of that. The setup feels more like I am watching an episode of Code of the Woosters, wondering if it is meant to be played for laughs. The only acknowledgement for horrific setup is the music, which is near-constant, blaring and more distracting than anything else.

Rather than terror, the only emotion it evoked in me is boredom.

Failure of Imagination 4: Unimaginative Reinterpretation

Corman Usher

Mystery & Imagination Usher
Roger Corman’s version of House of Usher vs. Mystery & Imagination’s interpretation

Perhaps the biggest issue of all is that no real effort seems to have been made in reinterpreting these stories for the screen. The original pieces are usually very short, rich on atmosphere but not so on character and plot. If you are not able to do any good with the direction or feel, you at least need to make sure there is enough happening to fill up the 50 minutes we are meant to be paying attention. Instead characters regularly repeat themselves, wander around the same sets and just seem to be killing time until the next occurrence in the script.

By comparison Roger Corman has been spending this decade adapting Poe’s stories, but he has been combining them, changing them and giving us new ideas based on the texts whilst still staying true to their spirit. Hammer has also been at its best when it is willing to take risks with its monster stories rather than slavishly following the originals. Maybe the writers of Mystery & Imagination could try taking some lessons from the silver screen?

Neither Mysterious nor Imaginative

And so I remain fully unsatisfied by this run of episodes. Beckett will be returning later this year to lead us through another set of gothic tales, but I do not believe I will be watching. Saturday evening we will instead turn off the box after Morecambe and Wise and settle in with some good books.

Other Horror Books

May I suggest people pick up M. R. James’ original Ghost Stories of an Antiquary or Panther’s collection Tales of the Supernatural? Try reading read some of the original masters of horror and hopefully these books will scare you with quality writing, rather than merely deafen you with blaring music!

The Journey is once again up for a Best Fanzine Hugo nomination — and its founder is up for several other awards as well! If you've got a Worldcon membership, or if you just want to see what Gideon's done that's Hugo-worthy, please read his Hugo Eligibility article! Thank you for your continued support.




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