Tag Archives: Brian W. Aldiss

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[July 16, 1964] Un-Conventional (August 1964 Galaxy)

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by Gideon Marcus

All Together Now

Out in San Francisco, in the humorously named "Cow Palace", the GOP are having a convention.  Their goal is to pick the fellow they feel most adequately represents the convictions of the party of Lincoln, of Roosevelt, of Eisenhower. 

To all accounts, they have settled on Arizona Senator Barry Goldwater, a nativist, opponent of the Civil Rights Act, and advocate for expanded use of nuclear weaponry.  Despite a last-ditch attempt by Republican moderates Scranton, Rockefeller, and Romney, nothing can stop General Goldwater from tilting against LBJ in November.

Whether or not Barry wins the general election (I don't believe he can), his candidacy has reshaped the Republican Party into something regressive, "Primitive".  God help us if someone with his platform actually ascends to the Presidency…

Politics takes center stage in the latest issue of Galaxy, too, and like the Cow Palace convention, most of the names between the covers of this magazine are heavy hitters, known to all.  Let's see if we get a better result from Mr. Pohl (editor of Galaxy) than we did from Mr. Morton, Chair of the GOP convention:

The Issue at Hand


by John Pederson, Jr.

The Dead Lady of Clown Town, by Cordwainer Smith


by Gray Morrow\

Over the past decade and a half, Cordwainer Smith has woven a tapestry of tales, telling the thousands year history of The Instrumentality, technocratic oligarchy spanning much of the galaxy (except for the longevity-drug-growing Norstrilia, the wealthy and proud remnant of the British Commonwealth).  This domain is run by true humans and maintained by underpeople, animals cast in the rough images of people but with no inherent rights.  In recent tales, we learned of the revolt of the underpeople that tore down the Instrumentality.  This latest story tells of the first abortive attempt that set the seeds for the successful rebellion.

At the center of Lady is Elaine, an embryo germinated and dispatched, by accident, from Earth to Fomalhaut III to serve as a physician.  The problem is that none of the humans there needed medical attention, thus rendering Elaine's life fruitless and frustrating.  But her coming was prophesied by Lady Panc Ashash, long deceased but imprinted on a Fomalhautian computer.  The Dead Lady introduces Elaine to D'Joan, a young dog person, who is to be the martyr who gives life, love, and hope to the underpeople.  Together, Joan and Elaine lead the first movement against the Instrumentality.  The measure of its success depends entirely upon the time frame in which its effects are gauged.

Lady presents a quandary for me.  On the one hand, I adore Cordwainer Smith, and his fairytale, off-center approach to science fiction is usually far more effective than it has any right to be.  This time around, however, I felt the format had gotten stale.  The story is laden with portentous language, like a tale from a religious text, but events are presented as overdetermined, inevitable, and none of the characters makes a conscious decision.  In particular, the "love scene" between Elaine and 'The Hunter', a telepathic human with mind control powers who sides with the underpeople is not only perfunctory but disturbing (smacking of rape).

In the end, this is a redundant story, one that did not need to be told.  And Smith's poetic style is more grating than compelling this time 'round.

2.5 stars (half stars being permissible for novellas and novels).

For Your Information: A Century of Fossil Man, by Willy Ley

This month's non-fiction is about the historical and current state of physical anthropology — the study of human fossils.  Willy is back to his recent mode: informative but brief and dry.  I miss Ley of the early '50s, the one who convinced me to subscribe to Galaxy in the first place.

Still, not bad.  Three stars.

Jungle Substitute, by Brian W. Aldiss


by Jack Gaughan

Deep in the heart of a decaying city, robots and humans live a symbiotic relationship of despair.  People no longer have meaningful jobs, their lives guided by endless superstition and taboo; the machines are slowly breaking down.  One young man, Robin, discovers a government project to declare him and his family obsolete — but is the Government Investigation Bureau what it seems to be?  And what can he make of the resourceful GIB agent, Gina, who seems to know far more about the city and its condition than anyone else?

With Jungle, Aldiss paints as good a dystopian vision of the man/machine world as I've ever seen, as exciting and evocative as the first stages of his Hothouse series.  This is the kind of quality that won him the Best Promising Author Honorable Mention in 1959.

Five stars.

The Watchers in the Glade, by Richard Wilson


by Jack Gaughan

Somewhat less effective (but no less vivid) is this story by pulp-veteran Richard Wilson.  In Watchers, four journalists and two medics are banished to an uncharted world after a ship's mutiny.  To survive, they must murder and feed upon the only edible matter on the planet — sentient, telepathic beings.

All six of them go mad in their own ways, living with their daily crime while they wait on the slender hope that rescue will someday come for them. 

A solid three stars.

Neighbor, by Robert Silverberg


by Jack Gaughan

Silverberg pens another intimate piece, on the most local of politics: the rivalry between two neighbors.  On a planet of vast holdings, old McDermott builds an enormous tower in full view of the Holt estate.  For decades, Holt amasses a huge arsenal, waiting for the chance to get even.  But when the opportunity finally presents itself, can he take it?

The author described it to me as "a pretty good character study."  It's told with a certain degree of style, anyway.  Three stars.

The Delegate from Guapanga, by Wyman Guin


by Virgil Finlay

Lastly, we have Wyman Guin's first piece in eight years.  It's really been too long — this is a wonderful piece.  Guin presents us an alien culture (if not an alien race) on the eve of election time.  Only the telepathically capable, the elite and the "cupra" half-breeds, are franchised; the two dominant parties are the conservative Mentalists, favoring peace, polygamy, and interbreeding of the telepathically gifted and ungifted, and the Matterists, who value work, monogamy, moral purity, and the invasion of Earth.

It's a most appropriate story for our politically fraught year of 1964, and the storytelling and worldbuilding are quite good.

Four stars.

Summing Up

All told, even with the inferior Cordwainer (and it's not horrible), I imagine you could get a lot more pleasure out of the latest Galaxy than a trip to San Francisco's convention.  It's cheaper, too. 

Anyone want to lay odds on the next issue versus the DNC convention?

[Come join us at Portal 55, Galactic Journey's real-time lounge! Talk about your favorite SFF, chat with the Traveler and co., relax, sit a spell…]




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Magazine, Science Fiction/Fantasy

[February 17, 1964] Breaking Taboos (April 1964 Worlds of Tomorrow)

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[Due to an oversight (clearly!), Galactic Journey was not included on Locus' Awards Ballot this year.  If you're a fan of the Journey, we be grateful if you'd fill us in under Fanzine!]


by Victoria Silverwolf

Until a decade or so ago, science fiction rarely dealt with erotic themes in an open way.  That began to change with Phillip José Farmer's famous story The Lovers (1952), which deals with a love affair between a man and a female humanoid.  Her alien reproductive system, described in detail, is the key to the plot.

Equally groundbreaking was The World Well Lost (1953) by Theodore Sturgeon.  This gentle, beautifully written story depicts homosexuality in a sympathetic way.

SF writers are now free to look inside the bedroom.  But are they ready to peer into the bathroom?  The lead novella in the latest issue of Worlds of Tomorrow represents a first step inside.


Cover by Paul E. Wenzel

The Dark Light-Years, by Brian W. Aldiss

By sheer chance, humans and aliens arrive at almost the same time on an uninhabited world.  The aliens look like hippopotamuses with six limbs and two heads.  The humans kill most of the aliens at first sight, taking two prisoners.  (Right away, we know that the author is going to depict the human species as violent and xenophobic.) Not only are the aliens repulsive to human eyes, their behavior is offensive in the extreme.

(Sensitive readers may wish to skip the rest of this review.)

The aliens live in their own excrement, considering this the most important part of their culture and religion.  All attempts to communicate with the aliens fail, partly due to the disgust they elicit from their captors.

The plot is more complicated than I've made it sound, starting with a man who has lived on the aliens' home world for many years.  A long flashback describes the first encounter between the two species.

The point of view shifts to that of the aliens, and we learn their history.  The climax returns to the beginning, and ends in tragedy. 

This sounds like a very grim story, but it's also full of satire and dark humor.  The author offers a couple of scatological puns.  It would be easy to dismiss this as a schoolchild writing naughty words on a blackboard, but the intent is more serious than that.  Despite a jumpy narrative technique, the story powerfully portrays the impossibility of understanding between radically different beings.

Four stars.

Package Deal, by James Stamers

A married couple retire to another planet.  Their alien hosts provide what they need in the form of boxes that change into everything from booze to houses.  Things don't work out well.

That's all there is to the plot.  The absurd concept is played for laughs, and doesn't achieve any.  The two women in the story are a fat, nagging shrew and a teasing sexpot.

One star.

The Apprentice God, by Miriam Allen DeFord

In free verse, the author describes how a tentacled being accidentally damaged a tiny world while studying it.  The knowledge that it contained sentient creatures leads to profound remorse.  Although the outcome of the poem is inevitable, the style is elegant and stately.

Three stars.

The Urban Hell, by Tom Purdom

This article describes the ways in which large cities might exist in the future, and compares this to science fiction's visions of tomorrow's metropolises.  Giant residential skyscrapers surrounded by parks?  Horizontal cities designed for automobiles?  Downtowns consisting of low buildings, with a mixture of houses, shops, and factories?  All of these ideas are presented in an interesting and informative way.

Four stars.

Name of the Snake, by R. A. Lafferty

A Catholic priest journeys to a planet of aliens who claim to be without sin.  (I wonder if this is a response to James Blish's 1958 novel A Case of Conscience, which has the same theme.) He admits they lack human vices, but discovers they have new evils of their own.

The author manages to create a serious theological fable that is also full of wit.  The ending, in particular, makes use of a cliché from magazine cartoons in a new and meaningful way.

Four stars.

Under the Gaddyl, by C. C. MacApp

Alien invaders have ruled Earth for many years.  Most human beings are slaves.  A privileged few are free, allowed to struggle for survival in primitive conditions.  When escaped slaves steal an alien weapon, even free humans are in danger.  The hero and his family make a hazardous journey to escape the vengeful aliens.  Mutant humans show up at one point.  They play an important role in the story, but seemed forced into the plot.

This is a typical science fiction adventure story.  It is competently told and holds the reader's attention, but there is little new to be found here. 

Three stars.

Summing Up

Publishing a story that is certain to offend many readers shows boldness on the part of editor Frederik Pohl.  The other contents of the magazine are far less daring, although most of them are worth reading.

Those of you with sharp eyes will notice that Day of the Egg by Allen Kim Lang, announced on the front cover, does not appear.  That's not the only error.  My copy has many of the pages in the wrong order, making reading a chore.  I hope the habits of the aliens in the Aldiss piece didn't shock the designers and printers into forgetting how to do their jobs.




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Book, Magazine

[January 28, 1964] Beatles, Prisons and Doctors ( New Worlds, February 1964)

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by Mark Yon

London Calling

Hello again!

The Winter rolls on here in Britain. I must admit that last month’s news about New Worlds has left me here in a bit of a blue mood. I’ve realised that with the loss of the two remaining British magazines there’s not a lot of opportunities for British s-f left. As much as I enjoy reading your American issues, even the ones fellow travellers don’t like (when I can get them), I do feel that we’re missing a trick here. The loss of such a laudable attempt to reinvent the genre means that we are lesser for it. Even when I don’t like all the attempts to push the envelope. 

In this month’s “Beatle-Watch”, the mop-tops have continued their reign of madness and world domination. They are now playing concerts outside Britain, most recently in Paris.  I understand that they may well be heading back to your fair shores by the end of February, so keep an eye out if you want an idea of what their fans here are going mad about.

Since we last spoke, I did get chance to go with the family to see The Sword in the Stone over the holiday season. It was fun, but there’s not too much of Mr. T. H. White’s original novel left beyond the basic outline. The youngsters in the cinema seemed to enjoy it, though, especially with the added musical numbers. 

I’m very pleased that Doctor Who has continued to go from strength to strength. As fellow traveller Jessica has said, the latest serial, The Daleks, is a real triumph. It is scary and exciting. I can’t wait to see what happens next. 

The Issue at Hand

To the magazine, then – the February 1964 New Worlds:

I’ll not say much about the cover this month, other than it is orange.

possible worlds of the mind, by Mr. L. H. Barnes

Intriguingly, but perhaps expectedly, this is heralded as “the last in our series”. Mr. Barnes examines the role of s-f in today’s society. After suggesting a number of possibilities – escapism, the continuity of myth, for an insight into the possible extensions of technology – Mr. Barnes concludes with the idea that the mainstreaming of s-f contributes to modern man coping with a world-in-flux. It is an effective summary of editor Mr. John Carnell’s aims as you could expect.

Onto the stories!

open prison, by Mr. James White

I guess that this could be the last serial to be published in New Worlds, but as is usually the case with Mr. White’s work, it’s an interesting tale, though very different to Mr. White’s Sector General stories. This one tells of a planet that is used as a prisoner-of-war camp and the prisoners upon it. What makes it interesting is that we have tension created between those prisoners who have given up and decided to make the best of their new lives and those who feel that it is their duty to escape. It seems to be really a comment on social class and the order and discipline of the military life. Well told, if hardly original. Even the tagline suggests that this is an old-fashioned war story transmuted into a future prison escape story.  4 out of 5.

counter-feat and one-way strait, by Mr. Brian W. Aldiss

Next, we have two short stories back-to-back from the redoubtable Mr. Aldiss. They are simply short logic puzzles in a science-fictional setting. Goofy fun, typical Aldiss, but relatively minor work from this well-loved author. 3 out of 5.

the unexpected martyr, by Mr. R. W. Mackelworth

This story looks at a revolution through the eyes of an anarchist recordkeeper in a future surveillance society. Could they be thinking of a future Russia, perhaps? I liked this one – a nice tone with a pleasing style in the manner of Orwell’s 1984 – in that it shows how important the minor characters are in moulding and changing society, though it seems to suggest that trusting your female descendants is not advisable. 4 out of 5.

the time dweller, by Mr. Michael Moorcock

Mr. Moorcock’s latest is, like his story Flux in the July 1963 issue, a story that deals with time. Set in a far future wilderness, the story tells of the journey made by a warrior, The Scar-faced Brooder. Whilst travelling this barren wasteland the Brooder discovers that he can travel through time, in the timestreams, based on his own will. It repeats an idea proposed by Mr. Moorcock before, that the notion of Time is a state of mind and will change depending upon context. Echoing both Mr. Jack Vance and Mr. Edgar Rice Burroughs, I found this tale to be vividly imaginative, very similar to Mr. Moorcock’s Elric tales. It is also a salutary lesson in the dangers of obsessing about keeping to time. 4 out of 5.

die and grow rich, by Mr. John Rackham

Like Mr. Mackelworth’s story, Mr. Rackham’s tale is another piece utilizing computerization this month. die and grow rich is a story for anyone fed up with filling out insurance applications, set in a future where insurance policies are computerized. When the computer seems to malfunction, one of Mr. Rackham’s ‘X-persons’ is brought in to help sort it out. It becomes, basically, an insurance scam in a very unusual manner. This seems to be an extreme method to obtain money for research, even when the research involves bringing dead people back to life. More worryingly, it is another story whose underlying message seems to be “Don’t trust women”. 3 out of 5.

Lastly, this month’s Book Reviews.  Mr. Leslie Flood looks at the books this time around. It is a very positive set of reviews this month. Mr Brian Aldiss’s The Dark Light Years shows an author reaching his “literary maturity” and is thoroughly recommended. The story collection Spectrum III edited by Messers. Amis and Conquest is ”a splendid collection” and Mr. Flood cannot praise too highly Mr. Damon Knight’s ambitious project A Century of Science Fiction, a useful summary for the aficionado and “a masterly and knowledgeable introduction to science fiction for the new convert.“

The Upshot

In summary, there’s a couple of strong stories here that I really liked and Mr. White’s serial has potential. New Worlds may be going, but it is clearly determined not to go without a fight. 

Until next month.




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Book

[January 10, 1964] Journey to the Stars, Journey into the Self (Starswarm, by Brian Aldiss)

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by Jason Sacks

From many, one

Few things are more of a mixed blessing to a science fiction fan than a themed collection.

In the right hands – as with the epochal Foundation, The City and Martian Chronicles – the single-author themed collection tells a fascinating story in three dimensions, providing heft to an impact that even a full novel can’t always attain. Brian Aldiss’s new offering Starswarm doesn’t quite reach the levels of Asimov, Simak, or Bradbury but it is nevertheless an intriguing collection well worth reading.

With Starswarm, Aldiss delivers a different type of anthology than the above authors delivered. He explores inner landscapes as much as he does the alien worlds his characters inhabit. While each of these stories seems widely diverse in terms of exploring the complexity of the Starswarm, they nevertheless explore common themes of the dream of freedom, the need to break away from family, and the joy of exploration. In doing so, he makes the alien familiar. No matter how odd these characters may seem on the outside, Aldiss seems to be saying, they nevertheless share very human characteristics. This book helps bolster the assertion that Aldiss has grown into one of the foremost science fiction authors of ideas.

In Aldiss’s imagining, the Starswarm is a confederation of “two hundred and fifteen thousand planets” (as he says) and has lasted for eternities — long enough, in fact, for societies to have evolved in unique and unpredictable ways. This imaginative back-story promises a myriad of intriguing setups for readers, such as the complexities of managing such a diverse collection of planets and the unique biological imperatives of each one.

A look inside

“A Kind of Artistry” is written in a dense, ornate style which aims to approximate its alien argot. I often found the tale tough wading due to the large number of obscure words, but I responded to its powerful themes. This story tells the tale of Derek Ende, who hopes to stay with his Mistress (later shown to also be his mother) in his ancestral home but who is forced to explore the sentient planet the Cliff. In one key moment, the Cliff metaphorically takes Derek into its womb. In his emergence, Derek experiences a metaphorical rebirth made manifest in the story’s haunting final lines. The story can thus be read as a parable about the breakaway to adulthood as much as a tale of space exploration.

“Hearts and Engines” is a story of military conquering, as a brutal invading military force gives its soldiers drugs which turn them into a kind of berserker force abe to fight until their hearts burst. The other twist to this tale is that, as Aldiss writes, “they allow no weapon that cannot be carried by one man.” These warriors transform into other beings, but in doing so they brutalize their planet, their enemy and themselves. This is a thrilling tale which kept me on the edge of my seat as it went along, straight to its tragic ending.

“The Underprivileged” seemed the most clichéd story in the collection to me, a tale whose twist I figured out long before Aldiss turned the metaphorical tiger’s tale. Yet despite that, I found this story powerful. Tinged with disappointment yet with an odd level of sweetness and naïveté, this tale had an oddly intriguing resonance in light of our current post-colonial era in Africa.

“The Game of God” inverts the classic story of an explorer who has gone native with the story of “Daddy” Dangerfield, a man whose rocket ship crashes onto a primitive planet and who has been portrayed in popular fiction of the era as a kind of Tarzan-style adventurer. But Dangerfield is far from the hero people want him to be. This interesting story adroitly contrasts the myths of the heroic adventurer with the reality of a scared, scrawny man who refuses to learn anything about the planet he chooses to inhabit. A reader has to wonder if Aldiss is playing with the cliché of the great explorer, attempting to show that Western man is not fated to be the savior of every culture which seems inferior — a powerful and subtle statement. Aldiss also does an excellent job in this tale of creating a complex alien culture which feels very different from anything most readers can imagine — exactly what science fiction is great at.

“Shards” is easily the most dissonant and difficult story in this collection, a deliberately obscure and off-putting tale with a tiger’s tale ending that aims to redeem it. Though the story didn’t work for me, I admired Aldiss’s commitment to his narrative and the experimental way he explores the nature of human freedom in a world where genetic engineering transforms people into beings God could never have created.

“Legends of Smith’s Burst” is an odyssey of sorts, almost heroic fantasy, encompassing hidden castles, dogged heroes and endless wandering. Interestingly there is no female character at the center of this tale begging to be saved from the arch-villain, but the hero’s drive to succeed permeates everything. There are echoes of Tolkien and Lieber in this tale, though with an interesting science fiction twist.

“A Moon of my Delight” also highlights the selfishness of its protagonists, a ragged band of landholders and traders on a barren moon who are much more concerned with their sexual fulfillment than more spiritual ends. Though not at all sexually explicit, this is a story about adults — how they use and discard each other, how they ignore the things that don’t help them, and how they reluctantly find themselves forced into unwanted heroism. There’s a shocking death near the end of this story which took my breath away with its casual unfeeling style — a powerful moment in a subtly powerful story.

This collection wraps up with “Old Hundredth”, a meditative tale of mentors and mentees, end of lives and the power of music. It’s metaphorical and oddly powerful despite its sometimes obscure style.

Greater than the sum of its parts?

Several years ago my fellow writer Gideon Marcus wrote on this site about Brian Aldiss’s prior themed collection, Galaxies like Grains of Sand. He declared that “the style is inconsistent” and the book “[not] a complete success.” Several GJ commentators wrote in response to Mr. Marcus’s review, “there’s just something missing for me” and “I want to like this collection, and Brian Aldiss as a writer, more than I actually do.”

Perhaps this slim new volume, weak in physical coherence but strong in thematic power, will change the minds of some of my companions on this Galactic Journey. Aldiss takes us on a different journey than Simak, Asimov or Bradbury followed. I found my trip to the Starswarm to be fascinating.

4 stars.




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Magazine

[June 16, 1963] Blues for a Red Planet (August 1963 Worlds of Tomorrow)

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by Victoria Silverwolf

The planet Mars and its inhabitants have long been favorite themes for science fiction writers, from The War of the Worlds to The Martian Chronicles.  Will the age of space travel put an end to our wildest fancies about that alluring world?

The Soviet spacecraft intended to study Mars have all failed.  NASA's Mariner program, so successful in studying Venus, is not scheduled to turn its attention to Mars until next year.  Because the red planet is still something of a mystery, authors are free to use their imagination for a while yet. They may create a world where humans can live, or depict Martian canals and the civilization that created them.

The third issue of Worlds of Tomorrow upholds this tradition, with the first section of a major new novel set on Mars.

All We Marsmen (Part 1 of 3), by Philip K. Dick

The latest work from the author of last year's critically acclaimed alternate history novel The Man in the High Castle (which got only a mixed review from our esteemed host) is set on a traditional version of Mars.  There are humanoid Martians (called Bleekmen), although they are a dying people.  There are canals, although they are in a poor state of repair.  Humans can survive on the planet, but only under harsh conditions.

By the end of this century, human colonies exist on Mars.  Founded by Earth countries, businesses, or labor unions, they are under the control of the United Nations.  Against this background, the reader is introduced to several characters.

Silvia Bohlen is a housewife and mother.  She takes barbiturates to sleep and amphetamines to wake up.  Her husband Jack is a repairman.  While flying out on an assignment to fix a refrigeration unit, he gets a call from the UN to aid a group of Bleekmen dying of thirst.  During this errand of mercy he meets Arnie Kott, head of an important union, whose own helicopter flight has been interrupted by the emergency.  Kott despises the Bleekmen, and argues with Jack about the need to help them.  Despite this disagreement, he comes to respect Jack's skill, and hires him for an important repair.  In a flashback sequence, we learn that Jack came to Mars after an episode of schizophrenia.

Norbert Steiner and his family live next to the Bohlens.  He works as a health food manufacturer, and secretly imports forbidden luxury foods from Earth.  His son Manfred is severely autistic, and lives at a special facility for children with mental or physical disabilities.  A shocking event involving Steiner leads to a crisis for his family and his neighbors.

There are many other characters I haven't mentioned and multiple subplots.  It's not yet clear what direction this novel is going.  There are hints that schizophrenics and autistics have precognitive abilities, and I believe this will be a major theme.

Some readers may be dismayed by the lack of a simple, linear plot.  Others will find the novel depressing, as so many of its characters are unhappy with their lives.  The picture it paints of a Mars inhabited by a large number of humans by the 1990's is likely to seem unrealistic.  However, the author appears to have created a complex, serious work of literature, worthy of careful reading.  Four stars.

A Hitch in Space, by Fritz Leiber

In a distant solar system, two men are aboard a spaceship on a routine mission.  One of the men develops a bizarre psychosis.  He imagines that his partner, the narrator, is really two people.  When he's around, he calls him Joe, and thinks of him as a hero.  When he's gone, he speaks to the imaginary Joseph, and insults him.  The narrator puts up with this weird delusion, but when he goes outside the ship, the situation becomes dangerous.

This story combines psychological drama with a technological puzzle that could have appeared in the pages of Analog.  As you'd expect from this author, it's very well written.  The situation is interesting, if somewhat artificial.  Three stars.

To the Stars, by J. T. McIntosh

A manufacturer of starships is blackmailed, on the basis that his ships are more dangerous than others.  He disposes of this threat easily enough, with evidence that they cause no more deaths than any other ships.  What is kept secret, however, is the fact that his ships are vulnerable at a particular moment during their time of use.  When his daughter leaves on her honeymoon aboard one of his ships during this hazardous time, he takes measures to prevent a possible disaster.

I found the plot of this story contrived and inconsistent.  The female characters are more fully realized than usual for this author.  Unfortunately, the effect is ruined by an irrelevant paragraph explaining that women will never be equal to men in the business world, even two centuries from now.  The reasons given are "women never trusted women" and "women didn't really want equality."  Two stars.

The New Science of Space Speech, by Vincent H. Gaddis

This article discusses research into ways to communicate with extraterrestrials.  It covers a lot of ground, from radio telescopes to dolphins, and from artificial languages based on mathematics to unexplained radio echoes.  Some of this material is interesting, but the author covers too many subjects in a short space to do more than offer a taste of them.  Two stars.

A Jury of Its Peers, by Daniel Keyes

A professor of physics invents a small computer that has consciousness.  During a lecture he tells the students that the computer can think, forgetting that the state has passed a law against making such a claim in the classroom.  A trial follows, with the computer itself called as a witness.

This scenario is clearly based on the famous Scopes Trial of 1925, which tested the law against teaching human evolution in Tennessee schools.  Ironically, the law against teaching machine intelligence is in New Jersey, and the lawyer defending the professor is from Tennessee.

If this were merely an allegory for academic freedom, the story would be only moderately effective.  However, the author has more in mind.  The professor must face his own limitations, as well as those of the computer, when it gives its testimony.  Although not the masterpiece one might expect from the creator of Flowers for Algernon [If he had a nickel for every time a reviewer said this…(Ed.)], this is a fine story with depth of characterization.  Four stars.

The Impossible Star, by Brian W. Aldiss

Four astronauts explore the region of space beyond the Crab Nebula.  A problem with their spaceship strands them on a small, rocky planetoid near a star of such immense mass that not even light can escape from it.  (This may seem fantastic, but in recent years physicists have speculated that an object of sufficient size could produce a gravitation pull so strong that this could happen.) The men struggle with the bizarre effects of the black star.  The stress of their situation soon has them at each other's throats.  The concept is an interesting one.  Even in an issue full of downbeat stories, this is a particularly bleak tale.  Three stars.

Until the Mariner project takes away our dreams of glittering Martian cities, rising from ruby sands along emerald canals, let's keep reading about that fascinating world in the pages of our Earthling magazines.

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Magazine

[June 4, 1963] Booked passage (July 1963 IF)

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by Gideon Marcus

How quickly the futuristic becomes commonplace.  Just two years ago, I marveled about how fast one can cross the oceans by jet.  Now, on the eve of another trip to Japan (we really have joined the Jet Set, haven't we?) I look at the flight itinerary and grumble.  Why must we stop in Hawaii?  That adds several hours to the trip — it'll take more than half a day to get from LAX to Haneda.

Spoiled rotten, I tell you.

Speaking of travel stories, a fresh crop of science fiction digests has hit my mailbox.  Many of them will be joining me on my trip to the Orient, but I finished one of them, the July 1963 IF, pre-flight.  All of them feature some element of star-hopping, and so this issue sets a fine mood as we embark on our latest journey:

That Notebook Again, by Theodore Sturgeon

I find it interesting that editor Fred Pohl has gotten Ted Sturgeon to write his editorials for him.  I'm not complaining — it's always nice to see Sturgeon in print in any capacity.  This time around, he treats us to a number of technological proposals, a wishlist of inventions that should be right around the corner, given a little interest and effort.  I found his idea for a home TV-tape camera and player particularly titilating (and not farfetched — my nephew already audio-tapes television shows onto reel-to-reel).

The Reefs of Space (Part 1 of 3), by Jack Williamson and Frederik Pohl

A good third of the issue is given to a new serial (illustrated on the cover — EMSH is big in this issue, though I also like the work of Nodel, who is new to me).  Hundreds of years from now, Earth's population is highly regimented, its economy utterly socialized, under the authority of The Machine and its master Plan.  Dissent is punished by incarceration and the forced wearing of an explosive ring around one's neck.  Further disobedience results in one's "salvage" (dissasembly into component body parts for the use of others). 

Steve Ryeland is an experimental physicist, a touchy job to have when scientific advancement poses both boon and risk for the Plan.  At Reef's beginning, he has been a prisoner for three years, unaware of his crime, but consistently questioned about "spacelings," "fusorians," "reefs of space," and "jetless drive" — terms about which he knows nothing.  Adding to his confusion is a three-day gap in his memory.

And then comes the urgent summons — the Machine will have Ryeland discover the secret of the reactionless drive, and soon, or be sent to the Body Banks.  For at the edge of the solar system lies a biological construct, the tremendous analog of a coral reef created by organisms that live on interstellar hydrogen.  Not only does this alien structure pose a hypothetical threat to the Plan, but it affords sanctuary to a more existential opponent — the revolutionary-in-exile, Donderevo.  Can Ryeland accomplish his mission in time to save his hide and human society?  Is such a goal even worth fighting for?

It's an interesting concept for a novel, but the execution leaves a bit to be desired.  It suffers from the same plodding repetitiveness as Simak's concurrent serial in Galaxy, but betrays none of Simak's literary expertise.  The writing is simple, uninspired, and the scientific concepts (including Hoyle's steady-state theory, which I find uncompelling) feel dated.  Two stars, but with cautious hopes for the next installment.

The Faces Outside, by Bruce McAllister

Here is a short tale of a married couple, the last of humanity, mutated to live in a large alien aquarium with a host of other terrestrial life forms.  The Terrans have the last laugh when the male of the pair develops psychic powers and compels the aliens to commit mass suicide.

McAllister is the first and weaker of the two new authors featured in this issue.  His writing shows potential, though.  Two stars, trying hard for three.

Mightiest Qorn, by Keith Laumer

Another IF, another Retief story.  This time, the omnipotent but much-suffering Terran agent is tapped to investigate the sudden reappearance of the fearsome Qorn, a race of dreadnought-wielding, glory-seeking warriors who appear to have the power of teleportation.

Unfortunately, the Retief shtick is starting to wear thin (arguably, it raveled a while ago), and it's really time Laumer focused his attention to the more worthy efforts we know he's capable of.  The bright spot is that Retief's nominal boss, Magnan, is now pretty game to do whatever his "underling" says.  Some might call that progress.  Two stars.

In the Arena, by Brian W. Aldiss

Given up?  Take heart — it's all better from here.  Prominent British writer, Aldiss, gives us another man-and-woman pair in the thrall of aliens.  In this case, it is two gladiators performing for a race of insectoids who have conquered the Earth (but not all of humanity).  Call it Spartacus for the 30th Century.  It's a nicely written trifle.  Three stars.

Down to the Worlds of Men, by Alexei Panshin

14-year old Mia Havero is part of a society of human space-dwellers, resident of one of the eight galaxy-trotting Ships that represent the remains of Earth's high technology.  She and 29 other young teens are dropped on a primitive colony as part of a rite of passage.  There is always an element of danger to this month-long ordeal, but this episode has a new wrinkle: the planet's people are fully aware (and resentful) of the Ships, and they plan to fight back.  Can Mia survive her coming of age and stop an insurrection?

Panshin hits it right out of the park with his first story, capturing the voice of a young almost-woman and laying out a rich world and an exciting adventure.  Finally, I've got something I can recommend to the Young Traveler.  Four stars, verging on five.

The Shadow of Wings, by Robert Silverberg

The last story introduces Caldwell, an expert in the dead language of Kethlani.  He is called back from a family vacation when a real live Kethlan shows up, bearing the banner of peace.  Can the linguist overcome his revulsion of the alien's form and forge a partnership between the two species?

This piece could have been a throwaway save for Silvergerg's careful drawing of the Caldwell's personality.  I found myself wishing the story had been longer — certainly, it could have taken some of the pages away from the stale stories of the first half.  Four stars.

Like my impending vacation, this month's issue starts with a hard slog but ends with great reward.  I'd say that's the right order of things.  See you in Tokyo!

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[May 18, 1963] (June 1963 Fantasy and Science Fiction)

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by Gideon Marcus

Every so often, you get a perfect confluence of events that makes life absolutely rosy.  In Birmingham, Alabama, the segregationist forces have caved in to the boycott and marching efforts of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference.  Two days ago, astronaut Gordo Cooper completed a day-and-a-half in orbit, putting America within spitting distance of the Russians in the Space Race.  And this month, Avram Davidson has turned out their first superlative issue of F&SF since he took the editorial helm last year. 

Check out the June 1963 Fantasy and Science Fiction and see if you don't agree:

No Truce With Kings, by Poul Anderson

Centuries after The Bombs Fell, the North American continent has scratched its way back to the early 20th Century, technology-wise, but enlightened feudalism remains the order of the day.  Kings begins on the eve of civil war in the Pacific States of America after a coup has placed an expansionist government in charge in San Francisco bent on reestablishing Manifest Destiny.  Colonel McKenzie of the Sierra Military Command must fight to preserve the old confederacy in the face of superior forces as well as the belligerent "neutrality" of the Esps — communal mystics who seem to have developed terrible psychic weapons.

Don't worry — the story really does belong in this magazine, and not Analog!

Anderson, of course, has been a pleasure to read for many years (since his inexplicable dip in the late '50s.) Kings is a nuanced, character-driven war story filled with lurid descriptions of battles and strategic considerations.  It's a bit like The High Crusade played straight, actually.  Four stars for the general reader, five if combat is your bag.

Pushover Planet, by Con Pederson

This piece starts well enough, with a pair of dialect-employing space miners landing on an uncommonly idyllic world and meeting an uncommonly friendly alien.  The ending, on the other hand, is pure ironic corn, and on the whole, the story feels like an idea Bob Sheckley rejected as not worth his time to write.  I don't know who Pederson is any more than Davidson does (apparently, the Editor doesn't even know where to send payment for this story written nearly a decade ago).  In any event, I don't think the magazine got its money's worth.  Two stars.

Starlesque, by Walter H. Kerr

About an alien stripper who takes it all off.  Not worth your time.  Two stars.

Green Magic, by Jack Vance

Oh, but Vance's latest work absolutely is!  Dig this: beyond our world lie the realms of White and Black magic, each featuring the powers and denizens you might expect.  But beyond them, and possessing powers more abstract and strange are the realms of Purple and Green magic (and further still, those of the indescribable colors, rawn and pallow).  One Howard Fair would follow in his Uncle Gerald's footsteps to become adept in the wonders of Green magic, no matter the warnings from a pair of its citizens.

A brilliant, unique piece that lasts just long enough and grips throughout.  Five stars.

The Light That Failed!, by Isaac Asimov

The Good Doctor continues with his series on the luminiferous ether, this time discussing the famous Michelson-Morley experiment.  This test was supposed to show Earth's "absolute speed" through the cosmic medium.  Instead, it disproved the ether's existence and set the stage for Einstein's and Planck's modern conceptions of the universe.  Vital stuff to know.  Four stars.

The Weremartini, by Vance Aandahl

Young Vance Aandahl (no relation to Jack Vance) has produced his first readable story in a long time, about an epicurian English professor whose alternate form is exactly as it says on the tin.  Weird, disturbing, but not bad.  Three stars.

Bokko-Chan, by Hoshi Shinnichi

A barkeep builds the perfect assistant — a beautiful but empty-headed robot woman to occupy the attentions (and tabs) of the tavern's patrons.  Billed as the first Japanese SF story to appear in English, it reads like a barbed children's story.  I suspect it's better in the original language (and I'd love to get a copy, since I could read it — I actually was aware of Hoshi-san before he appeared in these pages), but it's not bad, even in translation.  Three stars.

Tis the Season to Be Jelly, by Richard Matheson

Only Matheson could successfully manage this tale of post-atomic, mutated hicks.  Stupidly brilliant, or brilliantly stupid.  You decide.  Three stars.

Another Rib, by John J. Wells and Marion Zimmer Bradley

Just 16 men, the crew of humanity's first interstellar expedition, are all that remain of homo sapiens after catastrophe claims our mother star.  All hope seems lost for our species…until a native of Proxima Centauri offers to surgically alter some of the spacemen, expressing their latent female reproductive organs.

Rib is an interesting exploration of what it means to be a man, and the varying degree of push required (if any!) for a person to transition from one gender to another.  A bold piece.  Four stars.

There Are No More Good Stories About Mars Because We Need No More Good Stories About Mars, by Brian Aldiss

Things wrap up with a bitter poem about how science has ruined Mars for SF, but who cares — we'll always have Barsoom.  Three stars.

The resulting issue is a solid house made of the finest bricks albeit rather low quality mortar.  Good G-d, even Davidson's editorial openings are decent now.  Maybe he reads my column…

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[April 25, 1963] A Brighter Future?  New Worlds, May 1963

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by Mark Yon

Last month I decided I would try and NOT mention the English weather in future transmissions. But I’m a Brit, and it’s become a tradition! So, suffice it to say that the commute to work has been easier this month and, since we last spoke, the weather has been more typically Spring. 

As the weather has improved, so has my mood. Another cause for cheer has been the radios being full of Britain’s latest pop sensation, The Beatles. Some of our other Travellers have mentioned their continuous rise.  Their third single, From Me to You is something we can’t really avoid. 

Thankfully, I do like it a lot. It’s got a great beat and terrific harmonies. I can only see these boys from Liverpool continue to dominate the charts here if they keep this up.

Mind you, the cinema also seems to be determined to dispel the bleak Winter. Britain’s answer to Mr. Elvis Presley, Mr. Cliff Richard, has recently been filling our cinemas with a cheerily bright and colourful musical, Summer Holiday!

It’s very popular and might just chase those Winter Blues away. We may not be quite there yet, but at least we can see that brighter times are ahead, even when the news is somewhat bleaker. The newspapers here are full of stories about marches against nuclear weapons, which seem to be growing year on year:

Onto this month’s New Worlds.

Can you see a problem with that cover? No, not the bright daffodil-yellow colour, nor the lack of author photographs, although that is disappointing. Look at the title of the Mr. Aldiss novella. See it? Such mis-spellings are shoddy and frankly embarrassing. A big minus mark for Mr. John Carnell this month. Does he really care about this magazine?  It’s a shame, because there’s a lot to like in this issue. There’s even a common theme, as many of the stories this month seem to look at the conflict between order and chaos, between discipline and dissent. This also applies to the Editorial! 

From The Edge of the Pond, by Mr. Lee Markham

Australian Mr. Markham has been a regular contributor to the stories of late and here in the capacity of Guest Editor he brings a forthright summary of the ongoing debate on the state of s-f. He doesn’t mince words, though.

“I don’t think any of us were surprised when some of the opinions expressed turned out to be, in turn, introspective, belligerent, and, in the case of John Rackham and Brian Aldiss, personally prejudiced and blandly indifferent.”

Well, I guess that’s telling us! For all that, it’s an interesting summary to this (still) ongoing discussion, made impressive by the sheer number of other authors and works used to argue its case.

Speaking of Mr. Aldiss, it is his novella (with the mis-spelling!) that holds prime position on the cover this month, albeit back at the rear of the magazine again.  More later…

To the other stories.

Confession, by Mr. John Rackham

Like last month’s story from Mr. Rackham, another tale of ‘supermen,’ here called an ‘X-person,’ which even the story banner admits has “slan-like” similarities. Despite this unoriginal concept, Confession was more enjoyable than last month’s effort. It’s set on a nicely imagined thixotropic (ketchupy) world, but really examines the tension created between discipline and intelligence when in a military situation, which was nicely done. Three out of five.

The Under-Privileged, by Mr. Brian W. Aldiss

The return of Mr. Aldiss to New Worlds is a welcome one, especially after his recent success with his Hothouse series in the United States. Mr. Aldiss himself celebrates this return with his usual sense of humour in an inside-cover Profile:

The Under-Privileged is a fine story of immigration and alien resettlement which, under its positive tone, left me with a certain degree of unease, as I suspect is its goal. As ever from Mr. Aldiss, it is a story of social s-f rather than the traditional, but the style and the underlying nuances of the plot suggest a superior piece of work. It’s not Hothouse, but I enjoyed it.  Four out of five.

The Jaywalkers, by Mr. Russ Markham

Mr. Markham’s tale is another reasonable effort in the Galactic Union Survey stories, this time on a planet which is not what it seems. It’s based around a nice idea, but it almost drowns in its scientific gobbledegook explanation towards the end. Three out of five points.

I, the Judge, by Mr. R. W. Mackelworth

I really liked Mr. Mackelworth’s debut in New Worlds in January, but this one is even better. I, the Judge is a story of future law and order, in a style very different from his first story. Shocking and revelatory, I, the Judge, in terms of its literary style and its complexity of concept, dazzled. I felt that it even put Mr. Aldiss’s effort in the shade. Rather made me think of the stories of Mr. Harlan Ellison, and echoes this month’s running theme of discipline and disorder , by highlighting the value of defiance against obedience. This may be the future of s-f. It is one of the most memorable plots I’ve read in recent months. Four out of five, my favourite story of the issue.

Window On The Moon, by Mr. E. C. Tubb

The second part of this serial moves things on-apace, as it should. Our hero, Felix Larsen, tries to get to the bottom of things, whilst others pick up a mysterious means of communication leaked from the British base, which leads to a visit from the Americans. There’s a rather unpleasant parochial part about how the Brits ‘see’ Americans and vice versa, but that aside, it was surprisingly exciting, to the point where I’m going to increase last month’s score from three-out-of-five to four this month. Really looking forward to the conclusion next time.

At the back of the issue there is the return of the Postmortem letters section, although there is only one, admittedly lengthy, letter, where Mr. John Baxter eviscerates Mr. Lan Wright for his Editorial in the December 1962 issue. It makes entertaining reading, if rather painful.

There’s also another The Book Review this month from Mr. John Carnell. There’s reviews of the “interesting revival” of Mr. Robert Heinlein’s Orphans of the Sky, Mr. William Tenn’s Time in Advance and the “thoroughly enjoyable, non-cerebral” entertainment of Mr. Mark Clifton’s “wonderfully witty” When They Come from Space. Mr. Eric Frank Russell’s collection of his early work, Dark Tides is rather less polished than his latest efforts, but still recommended.

In summary, the erroneous cover belies an issue that is much better than that typo would suggest. Whilst some stories seem to be marking time, some are great, making this one of the strongest issues I’ve reviewed so far. The future may be bright. However, I am beginning to question Mr. Carnell’s editorship, particularly after the efforts of Mr. Moorcock last month. I am starting to feel that his attention is elsewhere or, just as bad, that he is rather too stretched to focus on producing a quality magazine. This is a concern.




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Magazine

[January 10, 1963] (February 1963 Galaxy)

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[if you’re new to the Journey, read this to see what we’re all about!]


by Gideon Marcus

The Traveler family has now been on the island of Kaua'i (in the newest state of the Union, Hawai'i) for five days, and I can feel the shackles of the mainland loosening.  We are staying in a vacant worker cottage on the Waimea Sugar Plantation, guests of one of the manager's, and it's just lovely.  Timeless beauty surrounds us.  There's no question but that this state is destined to be a tremendous tourist attraction some day – but I hope this island never loses its virgin charm.

It's hard to describe the relaxation that comes with visiting this sub-tropical paradise.  In the main room of our three-room cottage, the Young Traveler plucks away at her ukelele, singing Elvis' recent Hawai'ian hit, I can't help falling in love with you, and then the apt Jamaican Farewell popularized by Belafonte not long ago.  Last night, we were guests of the Gaylord family at their Kilohana estate.  After a sumptuous meal of meticulously prepared fish and delectable desserts (including a half-coconut), we dallied in the Sitting Room as one of the family played Scott Joplin tunes on the piano. 

Of course, even in this Westernmost bastion of America, modern civilization is encroaching.  We flew into the new small but international airport at Lihue (and commerce is already relocating from its traditional center here at Waimea to that burgeoning mini-city).  The grocery chain, Safeway, is building a supermarket on the island. 

And then there are the relics of the Mainland we've brought with us in the form of the books packed in our suitcases.  The Young Traveler has been devouring Dale Carnegie's classic, How to Win Friends and Influence People (Watch out World!), while I have just finished this month's Galaxy.

Its editor, Fred Pohl, has spilled much ink over the role of the science fiction writer.  He insists that our job is not to predict the future, and indeed, we're pretty bad at such things, statistically speaking.  Rather than saying, "This is what will happen," we really say, "This is what will happen if."

The timing is no coincidence.  The February 1963 Galaxy is filled with "what will happen ifs," — have a look:

Home from the Shore, by Gordon R. Dickson

Dickson's story asks, "What will happen if the nascent trend of undersea living is carried to its logical conclusion?"  The result is, as we've seen previously explored in The Underwater City, a nation of humans living underwater.  Living in Castle-Homes and Small-Homes on the ocean floor, some six million people, enhanced by genetics and technology, thrive alongside their dolphin companions.

It is an uneasy existence, the Landers resenting the independence of their former brethren (who they'd hoped to use primarily as stock for space exploration).  As Home from the Shore begins, one of the sea people's leaders, Johnny Joya is defecting from the astronaut corps to rejoin his people.  It turns out that the precipitous action is the spark that provokes war between the Landers and the mermen.  Willy-nilly, this fight will catapult the sea people to the next phase of their existence.

Dickson pens a vivid piece, but it feels more prologue than complete tale, and the details are a bit too oblique to follow in places.  In particular, I'm never quite sure just how life underwater works or how it's sustainable.  I found myself stalling at the beginning a number of times.  I think Shore earns three stars, but just barely.

Think Blue, Count Two, by Cordwainer Smith

This latest tale of the "Instrumentality," Smith's unique far future, explores the ramifications of centuries-long space flight given an unchanging temperament for humans.  How will we keep our sanity, our morality, when faced with the yawning vastness of space, divorced from the society that keeps us civilized.

Think Blue, Count Two is a sequel, of sorts, to The Lady who Sailed the Soul, which introduced us to the concept of interstellar sailing ships and deep frozen passengers.  This latest edition stars an ingenue colonist, chosen solely for her beauty, and details how she manages the increasingly neurotic attentions of her two male co-passengers.

It's another beautiful Smith tale, but Think Blue is less about what the protagonist does but what happens around and to her.  Riveting but somehow unsatisfying stuff.  Four stars.

For Your Information: First Flight by Rocket Power, by Willy Ley

To project where we're going, one has to know where we've come from.  This month's science department traces down the very first rocket powered human flight and then describes the important ones since.  Three stars.

(Anyone want to lay odds on whether the Russians will beat Gordo Cooper to be the first person in space in 1963?)

Comic Inferno, by Brian W. Aldiss

Aldiss makes a bold prediction in this story of robots and people: As life gets easy, our breeding instinct will wane, and a hundred years from now, the world will be a fraction as populated.  Mechanical people will fill in the gaps, being our servants and our underclass.  But what if the romen tire of their inferior position?

There are great concepts in here, but Comic Inferno is rather rough sledding, what with its Extremely British satirical style.  Much like the Dickson, it takes time to get into, but in retrospect, the trip was rewarding.  Three stars.

Pollony Undiverted, by Sydney J. Van Scyoc

Here is another journey into an indolent future, in which all needs are met save for the ones that matter most – those that give us emotional satisfaction.  Van Scyoc gives us a tale from a feminine perspective that captures the frivolity of existence and the fleeting nature of happiness in a world made infinitely small by teleportation.  Three stars.

Day of Truce, by Clifford D. Simak

Did you just put up a fence to keep tykes from riding their bicycles and scooters on your property?  Maybe a menacing "No Trespassing" sign?  What if these are the first unplanned shots in an escalating war between the Homeowners and the Punks?

Simak writes a fun, barbed story about a battle deep in the course of the conflict at a time when a man's home is truly a castle, and the teenage delinquents are armed with time bombs and Molotov cocktails.  Four stars.

The Bad Life, by Jerome Bixby

You may remember Bixby from his The Twilight Zone story, It's a Good Life.  His latest story shares no similarities but for the titles and the overwhelming sense of feeling trapped in a hellish situation.

John Thorens is a do-gooder, a Hand of the Helping Hands dispatched to the Jovian artificial moon/penal colony called Limbo to bring solace to the criminals living there.  The extrapolation in this piece is, "How would a first generation Australia in space treat a well-meaning vistor?" 

Not well.  An intellectual among boors, a civilized man among animals, Thorens is hounded and beaten to the point of insanity. 

This is a brutal story, difficult to read, made compelling by Bixby's sheer "writerliness" (as one of my readers might put it).  Not recommended for the easily disturbed, and perhaps Bixby overdoes the writing by 10%.  But it'll sure stay with you.  Three stars. 

And that's that.  A dense read, a hard read at times, but in many ways a rewarding one.  None of the futures depicted are pleasant ones, but they offer valuable signposts of potholes to avoid on the path of progress.

Next up – John Boston and this month's Amazing!

[P.S. If you registered for WorldCon this year, please consider nominating Galactic Journey for the "Best Fanzine" Hugo.  Check your mail for instructions…]




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Magazine

[September 18, 1962] On the Precipice (October 1962 Fantasy and Science Fiction)

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[if you’re new to the Journey, read this to see what we’re all about!]


by Gideon Marcus

Are the times changing?

Summer threatens to change to Fall, and the kids are going off to high school and college.  Is this just another turn of the wheel, or are we on the verge of something different, what Historian of Science Thomas Kuhn might call a new "paradigm?"

I had this feeling once before.  In '53, right after Korea, and after Stalin died, America seemed poised on the edge of an unprecedented era of stability.  Well, really stagnation.  The pendulum had swung heavily in the direction of conservatism.  Black soldiers had come home from the war and were being treated worse than ever.  Ditto women, who had for a while gotten to enjoy some of the rights of men while they were off to war.  The swing music from the prior two decades had gotten overripe and shmaltzy, only somewhat mitigated by the western, blues, and latin music I was able to tune into on nights with clear reception.  The one truly bright spot was science fiction, which had been booming since the late '40s.

Then rock and roll hit, and boy was it a breath of fresh air.  Sure, you couldn't hear Black songs on White stations, but there's no color bar on the airwaves.  Fragile 78 records gave way to durable 45s.  The vacuum tube started to step aside for the transistor.  We were building the missiles that would soon blast us to orbit.  At the same time, sf started to wane.  We went from forty magazines to six over the course of the decade. 

This, then, has been the recent paradigm.  Here we are nine years later, but Elvis and the Everley Brothers still dominate the airwaves.  A new President has asked us what we could do for our country, not what it could do for us; tasking us to go to the Moon before the decade is out, but Black men must still fight even for the right to go to school or ride a bus in much of the nation.  There are now ten thousand Russian troops in Cuba and ten thousand American soldiers in South Vietnam, but are these transitory brush fires or the tip of a belligerent iceberg?

Are the 1960s going to be a continuation of the 1950s?  Or are we overdue for a new epoch?  You tell me.  I'm no soothsayer. 

I suppose in one way, the shift has already happened.  The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction has become quite different since new editor Avram Davidson took over earlier this year.  It's not bad, exactly, but it has meandered even further into the literary zone.  This has rendered one of my favorite mags almost unreadable on occasion.  The October 1962 issue does not have this problem, for the most part, but it's not great.

Enough dilly-dallying.  Here's the review:

A Kind of Artistry, by Brian W. Aldiss

The son of a baroque and decadent far future Terra journeys across the galaxy to make contact with a most unusual alien intelligence.  Upon his glorious return, he must decide if he has the strength to break the stultifying conditioning of his inbred upringing.

Aldiss wishes he were Cordwainer Smith, and he just isn't.  Nevertheless, despite some rough patches, there are some good ideas here.  The extraterrestrial has a wildly implausible biochemistry, but the meeting of species is genuinely gripping.  Three stars.

There Was an Old Woman Who Lived in a Shoe, by Robert F. Young

Overpopulation continues to be the theme of many of our current science fiction stories.  A common concept is the idea that excess population can be shipped to the stars, but as any student of history knows, neither England, Spain, France, Portugal, nor any other country ever became empty as a result of colonization.  We can't expect spaceships to change that equation. 

Neither does Young.  His story is cute, if one-note, holding our interest for as long as the idea can be stretched.  Three stars.

Twenty-Four Hours in a Princess's Life, With Frogs, by Don White

What if all the fairy-tale princesses were pals, all living together in Hans Christian Andersonville with intersecting storybook plotlines?  Aurora, Cinderella, Snow White, Rapunzel… the whole neurotic gang of them.  Don White explores that possiblity in a clever, funny piece that makes me hope that Disney never tries to combine its franchises.  What a mess that would be!  Four stars.

Inquest in Kansas (A Modern American Ballad) by Hyacinth Hill

The unknown Ms. Hill (I understand she may be Virginia Anderson) has a poetic piece about a woman seduced from her home and family by a unicorn.  Whether you find it horrifying or liberating depends on how you infer her life history.  Two stars, as it didn't grab me.

Measure My Love, by Mildred Clingerman

What a fascinating, almost excellent, but ultimately disappointing piece this was.  Dodie is a youngish spinster whose actress cousin, Althea, has a penchant for melodramatic love affairs.  When Althea's irresistible romantic nature meets the immovable, unwinnable affections of a married man, Dodie takes her cousin to the local witch, Maude, to cure her of her of broken heart.  Turns out the "witch" is more than meets the eye, but it's an open question whether or not her panoply of equipment can remedy Althea's condition. 

Clingerman is one of the most seasoned veterans our field, and her work has a pleasantly old-fashioned tone to it — appropriate both for the era (just post-war) and the protagonist portrayed.  The story moves you along the plot, slowly unfolding things to maintain your interest.  What hurt Measure for me was that, near the end, Maude mentions that she might also be able to cure Dodie's "little problem," hitherto undiscussed but strongly hinted at.  But then the problem turns out to be something completely different from what I expected (given the close relationship of the cousins, and Dodie's unending patience where things Althea-related are concerned). 

I wonder if I guessed wrong, or if the ending was changed at the editor's insistence for being a bit too…unconventional.  Either way, it turned a four-star story into a three-star one.  I'm probably being unfair, but unsatisfying endings sit poorly with me.

Slow Burn, by Isaac Asimov

The Good Doctor touches on one of my favorite scientific topics — the theory of Phlogiston and how its research eventually led to the discovery of oxygen.  It's one of those fascinating models that almost but not quite got things right, like impetus theory in the 13th Century ultimately led to the concept of momentum.  I mentioned Kuhn's "paradigms" earlier, and Phlogiston is a perfect example of the concept.  Four stars.

The Unfortunate Mr. Morky, by Vance Aandahl

One of my readers once said that Mr. Aandahl really wants to be Ray Bradbury.  Surely, there must be loftier goals.  In any event, this incomprehensible piece about the connection between time travel and the profusion of milquetoast personalities isn't worth your time.  On the other hand, it's only a few pages, so you might as well see why I gave it only one star (and perhaps you'll disagree with me).

The Journey of Joenes (Part 1 of 2), by Robert Sheckley

At long last, Bob Sheckley has come back to us.  It's my understanding that he's been writing mainstream mysteries and such, which probably pays better than sf.  His latest work, which Editor Davidson says is a hacked up version of the novelized form due out later this year, follows the adventures of Joenes, an American ex-power engineer raised in Polynesia.  His pilgrimage to the Mainland to find his destiny is a series of satirical vignettes told from a foreign and futuristic perspective that turns the story into a kind of dark Canterbury Tales.

It's a fun read, though I hope there's light at the end of the tunnel.  Sheckley is better at short stories than novels, so the format plays to his strengths.  I do have to wonder why F&SF prints chopped up novels to fill up half of two consecutive magazines.  I expect that of Ace Doubles, not a high-end digest.  Three stars so far.  We'll see what happens.

And so we find ourselves on the other side of another issue.  On the face of things, it seems to reinforce the trend that F&SF is in a new and duller era.  Will we soon have enough data points to know if the larger world has changed, too?

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