Review Pt 1 - Healy & McComas
Anthony Nance
first in a series of incremental reviews of the anthology
_Adventures In Time And Space_, edited by Healy & McComas.
My copy of this anthology is copyrighted 1957 and is called the
Modern Library Edition by the editors. The copyright page also
dates the first edition as 1946.
Out of curiosity, I purchased this from the SFBC, so perhaps someone
(Andrew Wheeler? anyone?) can tell me the significance (if any) of
a short segment of masking tape inside the front jacket/cover on which
'0305' is handwritten. There's an obvious guess or two, but for me at
least, they're just that - guesses.
On today's docket are merely the two editor introductions. The story
reviews will be uniformly shorter per story, but the intros get a lot of
verbiage here because I found them both to be very interesting. They
give little glimpses at the times in which they were written. Even the
issues they choose to address (or ignore) help reveal the state of
"science-fiction" (which is how Healy & McComas write the term)
at the time.
The first intro is called "Introduction to First Edition" and is
credited at the end as being from Los Angeles, 1945. It was clearly
written after Japan had surrendered, and the tone smacks of nearly
giddy enthusiasm in a post-war mindset.
They open the introduction with the intent of addressing whether
science-fiction is literature or prophecy (they eventually make a
case for both), but that quickly gives way to a burst of unrestrained
enthusiasm, starting in the middle of paragraph two with
".... The atomic explosions have destroyed more than Japanese
cities; they have broken the chains that have held man earthbound
since his beginning. The universe is ours. ..."
Given the cicumstances, it is no surprise that the high excitement
is couched in terms of possession, or even domination. "The universe
is ours." Indeed, later they write "Space, time, robots, atomic power
- all these are shaping and will shape the world to come....Who will
dominate such a world?"
In context, the previous quote is used to lead to a discussion of where
mankind is headed, with a serious consideration given to man's possible
mutation/development into homo superior, or super-men. They mention
the inevitable war between super-men and ordinary men, noting that
A.E. van Vogt's _Slan_ is an excellent story to read, regrettably too
long to be included in this anthology.
So is the entire introduction simply a war-influenced gush of enthusiasm?
Certainly not, and I don't want to leave that impression. Amongst other
things, they mention some of the history and development of the field
of science-fiction, giving highest marks to Verne and Wells.
Verne gets the first mention, and reverently so, but Wells gets a
better nod, including the following: "In spite of any inaccuracies
of scientific thought, however, to Wells goes the credit for giving
form, logic and an intellectual approach to this field." In other
words, accurate science is good, but you need to tell a good story, too.
(They echo this idea in the second introduction.)
A new thing for me was their claim that the great astronomer
Kepler wrote one of the first science-fiction novels (in Latin),
his travelers going to the moon in the arms of a "daemon".
Anybody know what they're referring to?
To close out their intro, Healy & McComas agreeably acknowledge
that they will be simultaneously accused of the sins of commission
and omission with respect to their story choices. They briefly explain
that "masters such as Wells, Verne and Stapledon were not included"
because they'd been re-published and anthologized countless times,
and that they wanted to focus on _modern_ as taken "almost exclusively
from the magazine field".
That last quoted phrase makes for a good transition to the
second introduction, so on we go.
The 2nd intro is called "Introduction to Modern Library Edition",
and is credited at its end as being from Los Angeles and Orinda,
California, 1957.
In terms of tone, it is still very positive, but more tempered than
their first introduction. Over a decade has passed, and they look
a bit more in the rear view mirror with a wider perspective in this
one. They state that science-fiction is beyond the Golden Age, and
they sound slightly wistful (if not wishful) about it all.
At this point, science-fiction has exploded as a field, and
Healy & McComas largely attribute this to the efforts and
influence of John W Campbell. Indeed, the first half of the
intro is basically a tribute to Campbell.
They see the explosion in very positive terms, but do relate one
interesting counterbalancing comment. Pointing one more time
to how highly regarded A.E. van Vogt was, they take time in this
second introduction to specifically lament that van Vogt is not writing
new material, speculating that he has no financial incentive to create
new works due to so many reprints and reissues. Closing that
paragraph with a nice "And who can blame him?", they move on.
Consistent with their assertion that the Golden Age has passed,
they say ".... Today...we are -- self-consciously perhaps --
preoccupied with our prose and too neglectful of the imaginative
potential in our science." This is followed some pages later by
"Generally <today's writers> write first class fiction.
Stylistically, they're better artists than some of the people
we've included in this volume. Yet even the best of them is
not on a par with Heinlein, say, in the breadth and depth of
their speculations about man and his universe."
However, this is a momentary contrast to their enthusiasm for the
current (1957) state of the field. They cite the following younger
writers as worthy to stand beside the heroes of the Golden Age:
Chad Oliver, Arthur C Clarke, James Blish, Cyril Kornbluth,
Robert Sheckley, Richard Matheson, Zenna Henderson.
That's a nice list! They had a pretty good idea of what and who
would stand the test of time in 1957, and I think it speaks not only to
how well these two knew the field, but also that the readers of 2005
can further trust the choices Healy & McComas made for the anthology
in hand.
So this is too long again, but I think the editor introductions are
special features of this classic anthology. The next increment will
start the stories (reviews will be uniformly shorter per story" recall!),
including at least Heinlein's "Requiem", Don A Stuart's "Forgetfulness",
and Lester Del Rey's "Nerves".
Tony
wth...@godzilla.acpub.duke.edu
>
> A new thing for me was their claim that the great astronomer
> Kepler wrote one of the first science-fiction novels (in Latin),
> his travelers going to the moon in the arms of a "daemon".
> Anybody know what they're referring to?
The story is titled "Somnium", Latin for "Dream".
There doesn't appear to be a Gutenberg version
though I understand that it has been translated
into English.
William Hyde
EOS Department
Duke University
Andrew Wheeler
>
> Out of curiosity, I purchased this from the SFBC, so perhaps someone
> (Andrew Wheeler? anyone?) can tell me the significance (if any) of
> a short segment of masking tape inside the front jacket/cover on which
> '0305' is handwritten. There's an obvious guess or two, but for me at
> least, they're just that - guesses.
I don't really know, but I'll throw out some guesses.
A few years ago, some books (generally those from the professional clubs
of the "Doubleday Select" group, which also were generally purchases
from publishers rather than books we printed ourselves) often had
masking tape on their *back* covers, with our order code written on it.
That was, I presume, put in my the warehouse staff to speed up
stock-picking (though writing out all of those labels couldn't have been
quick). I haven't seen those in a while (not since we went to a new
computer system in April 2004, at least -- and maybe longer), and those
were five-digit numbers, anyway. Sometimes those numbers were on slips
of paper tucked into the front endpapers, too.
The odd thing is that "0305" is in the style we use to indicate cycles
(since the club has seventeen "months" in a year, we need something more
complicated than the names of the months). 0305, if it was a cycle
number, would have mailed sometime in March or April of 2002.
Neither of those possibilities entirely makes sense in this context, though.
--
Andrew Wheeler
--
"You know, you never truly appreciate how handy living next to a creek
is until you are on fire."
-James Nicoll, rec.arts.sf.written, 1/25/05
Peter D. Tillman
na...@math.ohio-state.edu (Anthony Nance) wrote:
>
> On today's docket are merely the two editor introductions. The story
> reviews will be uniformly shorter per story, but the intros get a lot of
> verbiage here because I found them both to be very interesting. They
> give little glimpses at the times in which they were written. Even the
> issues they choose to address (or ignore) help reveal the state of
> "science-fiction" (which is how Healy & McComas write the term)
> at the time.
>
Another anthology you should seek out is "The Eureka Years: Boucher &
McComas's F&SF, 1949-54" <http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/pw.cgi?410a6f>
-- which, besides a fine selection of stories, has a bunch of cool
editorial material, such as what one T. Sturgeon describes as "the only
airmail, special delivery postcard I have ever seen":
Dear Ted:
I love you.
You write such beautiful stories.
Tony
Highly recommended.
Happy reading--
Pete Tillman
Nightfall
McComas's F&SF, 1949-54" <http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/pw.cgi?410a6f>
-- which, besides a fine selection of stories, has a bunch of cool
editorial material, such as what one T. Sturgeon describes as "the only
airmail, special delivery postcard I have ever seen":
I can remember seeing this paperback on the store shelf and buying it. It
finally fell apart in my hands just last year. I must have taken 4 or 5
stories from it and copied them at work to pass along to friends to read.
Other stories I added to books by the writers on my shelf. Well worth the
price.
Rande...
Anthony Nance
Andrew Wheeler <acwh...@optonline.com> wrote:
>Anthony Nance wrote:
>>
>> Out of curiosity, I purchased this from the SFBC, so perhaps someone
>> (Andrew Wheeler? anyone?) can tell me the significance (if any) of
>> a short segment of masking tape inside the front jacket/cover on which
>> '0305' is handwritten. There's an obvious guess or two, but for me at
>> least, they're just that - guesses.
>
>I don't really know, but I'll throw out some guesses.
>
>A few years ago, some books (generally those from the professional clubs
>of the "Doubleday Select" group, which also were generally purchases
>from publishers rather than books we printed ourselves) often had
>masking tape on their *back* covers, with our order code written on it.
>That was, I presume, put in my the warehouse staff to speed up
>stock-picking (though writing out all of those labels couldn't have been
>quick). I haven't seen those in a while (not since we went to a new
>computer system in April 2004, at least -- and maybe longer), and those
>were five-digit numbers, anyway. Sometimes those numbers were on slips
>of paper tucked into the front endpapers, too.
>
>The odd thing is that "0305" is in the style we use to indicate cycles
>(since the club has seventeen "months" in a year, we need something more
>complicated than the names of the months). 0305, if it was a cycle
>number, would have mailed sometime in March or April of 2002.
>
>Neither of those possibilities entirely makes sense in this context, though.
It is possible that the latter explains it, at least on my end.
I don't remember exactly when I purchased my copy. I do remember
wanting to buy it while it was still available from SFBC, knowing
full well I wouldn't read it for a good while. (Large TBR pile;
went through a short fiction hiatus for 3-5 years; maybe more.)
Thanks for the insights.
- Tony
Anthony Nance
More clearly said, that's "a hiatus on short fiction", as in
"I've been reading novels".
Ugh, that was poorly expressed.
- Tony