[Young People Read Old SFF] The Ballad of Lost C'Mell

[James Nicoll]

The Ballad of Lost C'Mell by Cordwainer Smith

http://youngpeoplereadoldsff.com/story/the-ballad-of-lost-cmell
--
My reviews can be found at http://jamesdavisnicoll.com/
My Livejournal at http://www.livejournal.com/users/james_nicoll
My patreon is at https://www.patreon.com/jamesdnicoll

[Kevrob]

Q) Who wears a tuxedo to work?
A) Some waiters and US diplomats?

That Mikayla is a special little snowflake, isn't she?

"Tying romantic love to humanity dehumanizes aromantic people....."

Aromantic? Is that a thing, now, like "asexual?" There have always been
people who derogate romantic love, but such folks can be as sex mad as
anybody. {Sex is real, love's an illusion, might be their motto.)

That a main-line human could love one of the underpeople, and
vice versa, shows that there's no "under" about those people.

Kevin R

(Who always got a chuckle, when visiting a girlfriend who lived
in Milwaukee's Bay View neighborhood, that I had to pass by
"Linebarger Terrace," named after the Linebarger family farm
by C Smith's dad, Paul M. W. Linebarger."

[Scott Lurndal]

Kevrob <kev...@my-deja.com> writes:
>On Thursday, January 19, 2017 at 10:03:43 AM UTC-5, James Nicoll wrote:
>> The Ballad of Lost C'Mell by Cordwainer Smith
>>
>> http://youngpeoplereadoldsff.com/story/the-ballad-of-lost-cmell
>> --
>> My reviews can be found at http://jamesdavisnicoll.com/
>> My Livejournal at http://www.livejournal.com/users/james_nicoll
>> My patreon is at https://www.patreon.com/jamesdnicoll
>
>Q) Who wears a tuxedo to work?
>A) Some waiters and US diplomats?
>
>That Mikayla is a special little snowflake, isn't she?

What is a snowflake in this context?

[Kevrob]

Snowflake =~ "unique individual," but taken to extremes.

Helen (Elastigirl) Parr: Everyone is special, Dash.
Dashiell(The Dash) Parr: That's just another way of saying no one is.

- The Incredibles

Kevin R

[Dimensional Traveler]

A derogatory term for someone who's sensibilities are offended extremely
easily, usually in context of extreme political correctness. (A
snowflake would be offended by a romance story written in the 1930s that
didn't include a transgender non-Caucasian, for example, and go onto to
social media to call for a boycott of that writer's work.)

--
Running the rec.arts.TV Channels Watched Survey.
Winter 2016 survey began Dec 01 and will end Feb 28

[Stephen Graham]

On 1/19/2017 10:31 AM, Dimensional Traveler wrote:
> On 1/19/2017 9:59 AM, Scott Lurndal wrote:
>> Kevrob <kev...@my-deja.com> writes:
>>> That Mikayla is a special little snowflake, isn't she?
>>
>> What is a snowflake in this context?
>>
> A derogatory term for someone who's sensibilities are offended extremely
> easily, usually in context of extreme political correctness.

Thus, we know that Mikayla is not a special little snowflake. She has a
perfectly reasonable point: female portrayals in 1950s science fiction
tend to suck.

[Default User]

On Thursday, January 19, 2017 at 9:03:43 AM UTC-6, James Nicoll wrote:
> The Ballad of Lost C'Mell by Cordwainer Smith
>
> http://youngpeoplereadoldsff.com/story/the-ballad-of-lost-cmell

One of the problems with the reviews in this case is that it's difficult to really understand one of the Instrumentality stories in isolation. It's much better to read them all to really get the themes that Smith was trying to bring forth. It's especially easy to get distracted by some of the trees and miss the forest in this case.

I will say that "The Ballad of Lost C'mell" was not one of my favorites, and for some of the reasons mentioned by the reviewers. A more powerful story, in my estimation, was "The Dead Lady of Clown Town". That covered some of the same ground from an earlier perspective.

At the time he was writing, shorter works were the norm to a large extent, certainly much more so than now. If he were writing today, it would probably be a series of long novels covering the territory.


Brian

[Kevrob]

I wonder how'd she'd react to, let us say, Jane Austen? Her women
aren't modern-era "strong, capable women" but some of them are more
admired for their intelligence and good sense than their physical
attributes. They still go husband-hunting, though.

Kevin R

Kevin R

[Dorothy J Heydt]

In article <148acd80-b0ed-4f7d...@googlegroups.com>,

Kevrob <kev...@my-deja.com> wrote:
>On Thursday, January 19, 2017 at 10:03:43 AM UTC-5, James Nicoll wrote:
>> The Ballad of Lost C'Mell by Cordwainer Smith
>>
>> http://youngpeoplereadoldsff.com/story/the-ballad-of-lost-cmell
>> --
>> My reviews can be found at http://jamesdavisnicoll.com/
>> My Livejournal at http://www.livejournal.com/users/james_nicoll
>> My patreon is at https://www.patreon.com/jamesdnicoll
>
>Q) Who wears a tuxedo to work?
>A) Some waiters and US diplomats?
>
>That Mikayla is a special little snowflake, isn't she?
>
>"Tying romantic love to humanity dehumanizes aromantic people....."
>
>Aromantic? Is that a thing, now, like "asexual?" There have always been
>people who derogate romantic love, but such folks can be as sex mad as
>anybody. {Sex is real, love's an illusion, might be their motto.)

Actually, in classical times, romantic love was considered a
curse. Maidens prayed to be delivered from it. The attitude
appears to have been that if A falls in love with B, and B
doesn't love back, then A will go into a ferocious rage and
destroy utterly. (Since A in most of the stories is a god, you
can see how this would be a problem.)

--
Dorothy J. Heydt
Vallejo, California
djheydt at gmail dot com

[David Johnston]

"dehumanizes aromantic people" is not a reasonable point.

[Dorothy J Heydt]

In article <I77gA.3196$pR2....@fx01.iad>,

Somebody whom the person speaking considers WAY too sensitive.

[Dimensional Traveler]

Many were quite progressive _for the period they were written in_.
Another aspect of a "snowflake" is judging all cultures and history by
the current standards of a sub-set of Western culture.

[Stephen Graham]

On 1/19/2017 1:03 PM, Dimensional Traveler wrote:

> Many were quite progressive _for the period they were written in_.
> Another aspect of a "snowflake" is judging all cultures and history by
> the current standards of a sub-set of Western culture.

Double-check the review series this is from and think about why it exists.

[Stephen Graham]

Why not?

[Richard Hershberger]

The husband-hunting is (except in the case of Emma) economic necessity. Taking the best known example of Elizabeth Bennet, her father's estate was entailed such that when he died it would go to Mr. Collins, a distant relative with whom they had no personal connection. Mr. Collins would be within his rights to turn the lot of them out of the house when the time came, and even if he didn't they would be poor relatives living on his charity.

When he turns up and offers to marry Elizabeth he is doing the right thing. Not only is he, by virtue of his parish, of a suitable socio-economic class for her, but when he inherited the estate, she and her immediate family would maintain their position by right, not by charity. It was grossly irresponsible for her to turn him down, putting the well-being of her mother and sisters at risk.

The radical feminism of Eliza Bennet was that she refused to accept her role as bride to an economically suitable husband. She refused him on the grounds of his character. Her father approved, but then again he wasn't the one at risk of being thrown onto the street. Her mother quite sensibly appreciated the enormity of Elizabeth's refusal. It was sheer dumb luck that she found a rich guy who also rejected the idea of marriage as an economic tool.

So within her cultural context, she displayed considerable agency--recklessly so, in fact. Sure, a modern pseudo-historical novel might have her strapping on a sword and go swashbuckle or canvas for female sufferage or something, but that (even granting that there were rare instances of women doing those sorts of things) would be an entirely different character. Austen's Eliza Bennet operated within the boundaries of her culture, but made full use of her free will within these boundaries.

Richard R. Hershberger

[Richard Hershberger]

On Thursday, January 19, 2017 at 2:38:36 PM UTC-5, Stephen Graham wrote:

Furthermore, I don't see the grounds for complaining about her observation. If one considers romantic love an inherently human trait, then it follows that anyone uninterested in romantic love is inherently less human. I have no idea whether or not the story actually does this, but stipulating that it does, her critique is perfectly reasonable.

Richard R. Hershberger

[Kevrob]

It's insider jargon. Those of us on this groups, even if we are part
of the great "plain vanilla*" majority or plurality of sexual identities,
are probably likelier to have heard of such a word, or can figure out
a meaning from context than the public as a whole. It still is a bit
weird that people slice the salami that thin.

I haven't been in a romantic relationship in a long time. I have had
them, enjoyed them, and given my druthers would do so again. So, I'm
certainly not "aromantic." I can understand people who think it is
too much fuss to go chasing one, and that's even described me, from time
to time. Declaring oneself to be that uninterested in the whole magillah
very early in life seems to me to be an unnecessary narrowing of one's
horizons.

Kevin R

[David Johnston]

That romance is something people do does not mean that all people do
romance.

[David Johnston]

On 1/19/2017 2:33 PM, Richard Hershberger wrote:
> On Thursday, January 19, 2017 at 2:38:36 PM UTC-5, Stephen Graham
> wrote:
>> On 1/19/2017 10:31 AM, Dimensional Traveler wrote:
>>> On 1/19/2017 9:59 AM, Scott Lurndal wrote:
>>>> Kevrob <kev...@my-deja.com> writes:
>>>>> That Mikayla is a special little snowflake, isn't she?
>>>>
>>>> What is a snowflake in this context?
>>>>
>>> A derogatory term for someone who's sensibilities are offended
>>> extremely easily, usually in context of extreme political
>>> correctness.
>>
>> Thus, we know that Mikayla is not a special little snowflake. She
>> has a perfectly reasonable point: female portrayals in 1950s
>> science fiction tend to suck.
>
> Furthermore, I don't see the grounds for complaining about her
> observation. If one considers romantic love an inherently human
> trait, then it follows that anyone uninterested in romantic love is
> inherently less human.

No it doesn't. I believe the name for that logical fallacy is "illicit
affirmative". That something is claimed to be an exclusive trait of
people doesn't mean all people do it.

[Dorothy J Heydt]

In article <214814b2-9630-46e1...@googlegroups.com>,

Well, the society they lived in pretty much demanded it. A woman
who remained unmarried past marriagable age (say, twenty-five)
was doomed to be a peniless dependent of her relatives.

[hamis...@gmail.com]

Yeah, that's absolutely the typical usage.

[Michael R N Dolbear]

"Dorothy J Heydt" wrote

>>I wonder how'd she'd react to, let us say, Jane Austen? Her women
>>aren't modern-era "strong, capable women" but some of them are more
>>admired for their intelligence and good sense than their physical
>>attributes. They still go husband-hunting, though.

> Well, the society they lived in pretty much demanded it. A woman
who remained unmarried past marriagable age (say, twenty-five)
was doomed to be a peniless dependent of her relatives.

Not every female was penniless if unmarried.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angela_Burdett-Coutts,_1st_Baroness_Burdett-Coutts

Three years later, when she was 67, she shocked polite society by marrying
her 29-year-old secretary, the American-born William Lehman Ashmead
Bartlett, who became MP for Westminster on 12 February 1881. Her new husband
changed his surname to Burdett-Coutts. Because of her husband's American
birth a clause in her stepgrandmother's will forbidding her heir to marry a
foreign national was invoked and Burdett-Coutts forfeited three-fifths of
her income to her sister.[1]
==

--
Mike D

[Robert Carnegie]

Or - far worse - to work for a living.

And careers for women were quite limited.

I think the Bennet family's embarrassing poor
relations own a shop, or something; not that /they/
work there, but owning it is quite bad enough.

[Moriarty]

Not quite. There were two sets of relations that were lower on the social ladder than the Bennets:

Mr and Mrs Gardiner. Mr Gardiner, Mrs Bennets brother, is "in trade", which could mean almost anything, and moderately wealthy out of it.

Mr and Mrs Phillips. Mr Phillips is a lawyer who inherited his practice after marrying his boss's daughter, Mrs Bennet's sister.

-Moriarty

[Robert Carnegie]

Well... in-story, the argument that people make is:
the underpeople do not experience romantic love,
therefore their masters should not worry about
respecting human rights; they are not human, but
just animals.

And at the end, we are told that, in fact, C'mell
/was/ in love, so the argument in favour of slavery
collapses, as they tend to do.

See also "exceptionalism", "consciousness", that
sort of thing.

[David DeLaney]

On 2017-01-19, Kevrob <kev...@my-deja.com> wrote:
> Aromantic? Is that a thing, now, like "asexual?" There have always been
> people who derogate romantic love, but such folks can be as sex mad as
> anybody. {Sex is real, love's an illusion, might be their motto.)

Yeah, the young'uns have realized that lust/sex/gettin' it on isn't actually
unseparably bound to flirtin'/wooing/dating/romantic gestures with a rose in
one's teeth, etc. Some folks are asexual - it just doesn't DO anything for
them, regardless of who with - but still interested in romance; some are the
opposite. Most do have it at least somewhat correlated tho - but technically
they're different axes of preference.

Obligatory webcomic: http://www.discordcomics.com/category/comic/shades-of-a/

Dave
--
\/David DeLaney posting thru EarthLink - "It's not the pot that grows the flower
It's not the clock that slows the hour The definition's plain for anyone to see
Love is all it takes to make a family" - R&P. VISUALIZE HAPPYNET VRbeable<BLINK>
gatekeeper.vic.com/~dbd - net.legends FAQ & Magic / I WUV you in all CAPS! --K.

[Lawrence Watt-Evans]

On Thu, 19 Jan 2017 16:23:33 -0800 (PST), Robert Carnegie
<rja.ca...@excite.com> wrote:

>I think the Bennet family's embarrassing poor
>relations own a shop, or something; not that /they/
>work there, but owning it is quite bad enough.

Yeah, we have a family legend about an Irish ancestor (female) who was
disowned for running away with an Englishman. It wasn't that he was
English; it's that he was "in trade," i.e., he worked for a living.

Since the story came from my grandfather Watt it's probably not true,
but it does accurately reflect the attitudes of the time.

(My grandfather had lots of family legends; of the ones we've been
able to check out, not a single one was true. This is clearly where I
got my knack for fiction. We've only ever found one provably false
story on the Evans side, though that was a really good one, but on the
Watt side? All fiction.)





--
My webpage is at http://www.watt-evans.com

[Quadibloc]

On Thursday, January 19, 2017 at 1:05:26 PM UTC-7, Default User wrote:

> One of the problems with the reviews in this case is that it's difficult to
> really understand one of the Instrumentality stories in isolation.

I know that while I had read several of Cordwainer Smith's Instrumentality of
Man stories, based on the ones I had read, it seemed to me that he was largely
condoning the Instrumentality's existence, even while acknowledging its
cruelties but praising the individuals within it who did what they could within
the system to ease the burden of its rules (as happened in 'The Ballad of Lost
C'Mell').

So this time I can't be too harsh with Mikayla, although I strongly criticized
one of her previous reviews... condemning an early feminist author as though
she was John Norman was too much for me.

John Savard

[Joe Bernstein]

On Thursday, January 19, 2017 at 2:32:08 PM UTC-8, hamis...@gmail.com wrote:

> On Friday, January 20, 2017 at 5:32:11 AM UTC+11, Dimensional Traveler wrote:

> > On 1/19/2017 9:59 AM, Scott Lurndal wrote:

> > > Kevrob <kev...@my-deja.com> writes:

> > >> That Mikayla is a special little snowflake, isn't she?

> > > What is a snowflake in this context?

> > A derogatory term for someone who's sensibilities are offended extremely
> > easily, usually in context of extreme political correctness.

> Yeah, that's absolutely the typical usage.

Is it? I thought a "special snowflake" was someone with a particular
kind of entitlement, someone who took for granted that the world
would always enable their particular preferences to be respected.
That certainly *implies* the manic PC-ness, as one case, but I
thought it went well beyond that. I've used it of myself in that
broader sense; last year I postponed a story I still haven't actually
written, and called it "special snowflake writing behaviour". Surely
everyone has worked with special snowflakes in this sense, probably
even before the term (which I think mocks 1980s parenting shibboleths).

Meg Ryan's character in <When Harry Met Sally> could be called, by
any of the waitresses with whom she interacts, a special snowflake.

-- JLB

[James Nicoll]

In article <2f9f65a9-62de-431a...@googlegroups.com>,

Kevrob <kev...@my-deja.com> wrote:
>
>I haven't been in a romantic relationship in a long time. I have had
>them, enjoyed them, and given my druthers would do so again. So, I'm
>certainly not "aromantic." I can understand people who think it is
>too much fuss to go chasing one, and that's even described me, from time
>to time. Declaring oneself to be that uninterested in the whole magillah
>very early in life seems to me to be an unnecessary narrowing of one's
>horizons.

You know what people universally love to hear? "Your sexual orientation
is just a phase."

[Ahasuerus]

On Thursday, January 19, 2017 at 3:05:26 PM UTC-5, Default User wrote:
> On Thursday, January 19, 2017 at 9:03:43 AM UTC-6, James Nicoll wrote:
> > The Ballad of Lost C'Mell by Cordwainer Smith
> >
> > http://youngpeoplereadoldsff.com/story/the-ballad-of-lost-cmell
>
> One of the problems with the reviews in this case is that it's
> difficult to really understand one of the Instrumentality stories in
> isolation. It's much better to read them all to really get the themes
> that Smith was trying to bring forth. It's especially easy to get
> distracted by some of the trees and miss the forest in this case.

[snip]

As I recall, my take on Smith was "frequently impressive, occasionally
brilliant, sometimes enjoyable".

[Kevrob]

On Saturday, January 21, 2017 at 10:13:48 AM UTC-5, James Nicoll wrote:
> In article <2f9f65a9-62de-431a...@googlegroups.com>,
> Kevrob <kev...@my-deja.com> wrote:
> >
> >I haven't been in a romantic relationship in a long time. I have had
> >them, enjoyed them, and given my druthers would do so again. So, I'm
> >certainly not "aromantic." I can understand people who think it is
> >too much fuss to go chasing one, and that's even described me, from time
> >to time. Declaring oneself to be that uninterested in the whole magillah
> >very early in life seems to me to be an unnecessary narrowing of one's
> >horizons.
>
> You know what people universally love to hear? "Your sexual orientation
> is just a phase."

I don't go around telling individuals that.

People do change their minds about a lot of things between, let us
say, puberty* and flatlining. Why sexual orientation wouldn't or
even couldn't be be one of those things, I couldn't say.

People who live by default heterosexual mores into mid-life
can, and do, decide that they are actually not that straight,
and adopt gay or bisexual behavior. In retrospect, could they
not they call their "plain vanilla," straight sexuality of their
youth "a phase?" I'd be foolish to tell a 40-something person
who had "switched teams" that they were having a dalliance, and
would inevitably return to their previous behavior.

Kevin R

* The folk wisdom that sexual identity is unalterably fixed,
even before puberty, strikes me as a polemical point that
those fighting for equality for those with the non-standard
impulses have been selling as a "noble myth." I suspect it
is more fluid than that, but wouldn't want to go back to
the days of trying to force physiological makes into squares
and physiological females into circles. I have no moral or
religious stake in making people conform to those expectations.