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“Consider Her Ways” by John Wyndham

“Consider Her Ways” was first published in the original anthology, Sometime, Never. It is story #22 of 22 for The Best SF Stories of 1956 group read. Unfortunately, I can’t link to a copy of the story to read online, but you might already own one of the many anthologies where it’s been reprinted. I read “Consider Her Ways” in A Science Fiction Argosy edited by Damon Knight. But I also own it in The Science Fiction Century edited by David G. Hartwell. The story was also included in two of Wyndham’s collections:

I strongly urge you to read the story before reading what I have to say. It’s an exceptional yarn, a classic, and I don’t want to spoil your reading fun. “Consider Her Ways” begins with a woman waking up in a hospital and having no memory of who she is or how she got there. That mystery continues for many pages, and I never guessed the cause.

Let me say, “Consider Her Ways” is a feminist utopian tale that most will consider a dystopia. But what defines a better society? If you’ve read and enjoyed Herland by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, you might want to read “Consider Her Ways.”

“Consider Her Ways” is a very old-fashioned science fiction, reminding me of Looking Backward by Edward Bellamy, When the Sleeper Wakes by H. G. Wells, Brave New World by Aldous Huxley, and Beyond This Horizon by Robert A. Heinlein. John Wyndham uses his story to speculate about a future society while commenting on our present society. Referring to these books should give you enough of a clue to the plot of “Consider Her Ways.”

Especially in the 19th century, and to a degree in the 20th century, writers who wanted to write about traveling to the future but without resorting to a time machine, had their present-day characters going into a deep sleep and waking up in the future. John Wyndam invents a drug, chuinjuntin, from South American jungles, which causes a young 20th century woman to project her soul into the body of a woman in the future. Wyndam, solved the problem of return travel by using the same drug again. Mostly sleepers into the future are stuck there unless the story is only a dream. Heinlein had Dan Davis travel to the future via cold sleep in The Door into Summer, but then used a time machine to get him back to 1970.

I won’t go into the society Wyndham creates, other than to say its without men. Jane Waterleigh, our time traveler, does not like the feminist utopia she’s visited and tries to prevent it when she returns to her own time. I’ll call this future, the pink future, since its decor is often painted pink. The pink future Wyndham imagines for women is obviously horrifying from our perspective, but Laura and the other women of the future were completely satisfied with it, even proud of their society. I wasn’t sure I wanted Jane to destroy it. I think each reader will have a different take on Wyndham’s imagined future. Utopia is so hard to define. I don’t think a perfect utopia is possible, but the pink future in “Consider Her Ways” has no violence, lack, ugliness, or apparent unhappiness. However, it has an ant-like social structure. Jane finds herself in a huge body of a woman, a class called mothers. They produced broods of babies, four at a time, and are treated very well.

Wyndham’s missed one point. Jane claims the pink future has no love and romance, and thus a depressing dystopia. What about lesbian love, romance, and sex? Wyndham assumes without men; women wouldn’t have romantic relationships. Even in 1956, that should have been obviously wrong.

We all read stories differently, using fictional clues to customize our versions of the story, based on different assumptions, reactions, wants, and conclusions. Here’s what my friend Mike wrote to me about “Consider Her Ways.”

Ever since I first read The Day of the Triffids back in the sixties, I've been taken with John Wyndham's work. His beautiful prose describes deeply unsettling situations and events.

In "Consider Her Ways," a woman "...who had no idea who I was, or where I was..." is confronted with this vision: "In front of me stood an outrageous travesty, an elephantine female form, looking more huge for its pink swathings."

Only Wyndham could conjure up this disturbing description:

"And this delicate face, this little Fragonard, was set upon that monstrous body: no less outrageously might a blossom of freesia sprout from a turnip."

What transpires is an elaborate hallucination or the future (or one of a number of alternate futures). Jane is confronted with a civilization devoid of men. Her long conversation with the historian Laura could be considered an info dump, but is fascinating and adds considerable depth and nuance to the story. Even after more than sixty-five years it resonates with the reader.

Wyndham never allows us to feel comfortable. Are we dealing with a woman's bad drug trip? Have we had a glimpse of the future? And what do we think about that future? We're left with a jumble of emotions all wrapped up inside of Wyndham's masterful writing.

Mike is open-minded, leaving several possibilities available. I took a different reading route. I accepted Jane’s tale as an actual time travel story. Mike left open the possibility it was all a hallucination, and Jane murdered innocent Dr. Perrigan in an insane delusional state. But Wyndham makes it more complicated. In the end, Dr. Hellyer, Jane’s colleague who gave her the psychoactive drug to test, and Jane’s lawyer, discuss getting Jane off from the murder charge based on insanity. But they wonder if her story is true. Then the lawyer points out that Dr. Perrigan had a son who was also a Ph.D. researcher in the same area as his father. What if Jane’s story is true, but she killed the wrong person?

The story could be a hallucination. The time travel story could be true, but it can take two forms. One, Jane changes, the future, but two, she doesn’t. All the possibilities make “Consider Her Ways” a compelling story. It allows Wyndham to play with several time travel tropes in one tale. Such bendiness makes for great writing.

James Wallace Harris, 1/16/23

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“Anything Box” by Zenna Henderson

“Anything Box” was first published in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, October 1956. Sometimes reprinted as “The Anything Box.” You can read it on Archive.org. It is story #21 of 22 for The Best SF Stories of 1956 group read. “Anything Box” was a selection for Judith Merril’s SF:’57: The Year’s Greatest Science Fiction and Fantasy. It’s been reprinted a fair amount, but usually considered fantasy. “Anything Box” has the most citations of Zenna Henderson stories in our citation database, but with just three citations. In other words, she’s not that well remembered.

“Anything Box” is a story about a teacher who has a special student, Sue-lynn, who appears to have an invisible box that lets her see into magical worlds. At first the teacher thought Sue-lynn was just having a bit of normal childhood imaginary fun, but then another teacher suggested that Sue-lynn might be mentally disturbed. Her father was caught robbing a gas station and jailed, so there is reason. Sue-lynn’s teacher, our first-person narrator then begins to wonder if the anything box might be bad for Sue-lynn. Over the course of the story, we go back and forth trying to decide if the anything box is real, imaginary, or dangerous. You should read the story yourself, it’s lovely.

Zenna Henderson is most famous for writing stories about The People, collected in 1995 as Ingathering: The Complete People Stories. They are gentle tales about children and adults who have special powers. Like Superman, they come from another planet. The People look like us, but have extra abilities, like being able to fly. The People stories are light and moving. Over the decades I’ll read a few and think how wonderful Zenna Henderson is as a writer. But I always go on to read somebody else rather quickly. Unfortunately, her stories suffer from a kind of sameness. You need to read them occasionally, at the right moments in your life. Then they can be magical.

“Anything Box” is a story that can mean a lot to a reader. To me, the Anything Box is a stand in for books, and in my case science fiction books. When I was growing up, science fiction let me cope with a bumpy upbringing. Dave Hook, one of our group members said in his comment, “For me, this is SF, not fantasy.” I can see that, but I’m not sure I see it in the same way Dave does. Maybe Dave assumed the story is about a kid with a real alien artifact with special powers.

I don’t think Zenna Henderson’s magic worked with my friend Mike. He wrote this about this story:

"The Anything Box" is a wisp of a fantasy story. Its gossamer framework is too slight to support any metaphorical baggage we might want to heap on it.

A young girl has a mysterious Anything Box (which today would be known as an iPhone). Her teacher gets a chance to peer into the wonderful Anything Box. The girl loses the box and it eventually turns up in the teacher's desk drawer. The teacher gives it back to her.

No epiphanies. No tragic outcome. Calm is quickly restored. We are left wanting something more substantial.

Mike is right, the story is gossamer light, but I can find all kinds of heavy metaphorical meanings in it. When I was ten, I discovered the Oz books by L. Frank Baum at the Homestead Air Force Base Library, a magical place in my memory. Years later, I read an article from the 1950s, about how librarians had started removing Oz books off the shelves because they thought they gave children unrealistic expectations about life. That article could have come out around the time Zenna Henderson wrote “Anything Box,” because the worries of the teachers in the stories are the same kind of worries expressed by the librarians. At the time I read that article, and it was back in the 1980s, I was outraged that librarians would ban books.

But do you want to know what’s hilarious? Those librarians were right. The Oz books gave me tons of unrealistic expectations about life. Whether we need escapist fantasies to cope with living is another issue. Now, in my old age, as much as I embrace Zenna Henerson’s sentiment in “Anything Box,” I know the dangers of an anything box are all too real.

If I had not used my anything box growing up, I might have been more realistic, and successful in life. But might, is the key word. I might not have survived. I know about my life-long addiction to an anything box. I also understand my unrealistic expectations toward reality. But it is, what it is.

James Wallace Harris, 1/13/24

These are the Zenna Henderson paperback books I own. They are how I remember her:

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“Stranger Station” by Damon Knight – Fourth Reading

“Stranger Station” was first published in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, December 1956. You can read it on Archive.org. It is story #20 of 22 for The Best SF Stories of 1956 group read. “Stranger Station” was a selection for Judith Merril’s SF:’57: The Year’s Greatest Science Fiction and Fantasy and Asimov/Greenberg’s 1988 anthology The Great SF Stories # 18 (1956). It’s often reprinted. This is my fourth reading of the story, and the third for the Facebook SF short story reading group. It was tied for fourth place for the most cited SF short story of 1956 in our citation database.

I’ve reviewed “Stranger Station” before.

I think it’s important to note that Damon Knight published two of the most remembered science fiction short stories of 1956: “The Country of the Kind” and “Stranger Station.” I think it’s also important we should note that both were about hate. We must ask, “Were they positive or negative?”

I’m a big believer in rereading fiction, but can a story be reread too much? With this fourth reading, I got even closer to what Knight was creating. In the first half of the story, I marveled at Knight’s hard science setup. The story was more vivid than my previous readings. I admired everything Knight wrote, and I was quite impressed. The second half of the story, especially the ending, still puzzles me. Had Paul Wesson truly figured out the motives of the aliens from Titan? Was his reaction, right? Was Wesson’s solution supposed to leave us feeling ambiguous about what Wesson figured out?

The basic plot is Paul Wesson, an astronaut working on a space station near Earth volunteers to spend months on a distant space station, called Stranger Station, reserved for meeting an alien from Titan every twenty years. Both aliens and humans have trouble being near each other. Nearness causes a deep sense of psychological dread in each species. However, it also causes the aliens to exude a golden liquid from their bodies that humans have discovered has life extending properties for our species. The aliens agree to meet every two decades at a space station far from earth. Just one human and one alien. The fear of being around humans causes the alien to sweat longevity chemicals which they freely give to the humans. But what do the aliens get in return? That’s a mystery.

There is a cost to the human who volunteers for this mission. They go crazy, losing the ability to communicate, and change physically in horrible ways. It might be a form of adapting to the aliens. But Wesson doesn’t know that. It’s another mystery. But all of humanity gets to live another twenty years longer. This reminds me of Le Guin’s “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas.”

Paul Wesson’s only companion is an AI he calls Aunt Jane. The creation of Aunt Jane was brilliant speculation by Damon Knight in 1956. Paul tries to learn as much as possible about his fate from Aunt Jane, but she is restricted by what she can tell. This relationship slowly reveals the mysteries, and maybe the solutions. However, in the end, we’re not sure what happened to Paul. It appears he’s about to die. And he’s killed the alien. It also implies that humanity’s longevity serum supply will be cancelled. Was Paul Wesson, right? Did he save humans from a fate worse than death, or merely act on his own hatred and xenophobia?

Wesson believes the aliens are fighting us with love because they know we’ll eventually overrun the solar system, go interstellar, and destroy them in the process. Paul believes the aliens give the humans their golden sweat to make us addicted, thus protecting themselves. Wesson then assumes hate is the only way to fight back.

I’m still not sure what philosophical stance Knight makes in this story? Is he saying xenocide is ethical? Or that cooperation or even a symbiotic relationship with aliens is evil? Is he promoting human purity, a kind of interstellar racism? Up until the arrival of the alien at the station, the story is very pro-space, pro-technology, pro-future. Then it gets weird. Is hate the solution, or just Wesson’s solution, or even Knight’s solution?

My friend Mike didn’t have much to say about the story, but he sums it up precisely:

“Stranger Station” has a pervasive underlying element of apprehension and dread. I think Knight is forcing us to confront the stark reality of alien contact. He discards the facile Hollywood model and thrusts us into the bewilderment and dread and menace that will surround an alien contact event. The stakes will be enormous; our survival as a species will be at risk.

Personally, I don’t believe we can have contact with aliens of any kind. I assume that each evolved planetary biological ecosystem will be deadly to all other planetary ecosystems. That was the same conclusion as The World of the Worlds by H. G. Wells and more recently by Kim Stanley Robinson in his novel Aurora. Knight doesn’t seem to be worried about deadly microbes, only of hating each other. Knight is suggesting that there will be psychic barriers that will keep us separate from beings from other worlds. But again, is that Paul Wesson, or Damon Knight?

I tend to think it’s not Knight, but Knight suggesting it’s true about us.

James Wallace Harris, 1/11/23

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“And Now the News…” by Theodore Sturgeon

“And Now the News…” was first published in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, December 1956. You can read it on Archive.org. It is story #19 of 22 for The Best SF Stories of 1956 group read. “And Now the News…” was a selection in Asimov/Greenberg 1988 anthology devoted to the best SF of 1956. It’s often reprinted. This is my second reading of the story.

This story has quite a punch, so go read it. Be warned. I’m going to give away the ending.

“And Now the News…” isn’t really science fiction, nor fantasy. It’s about a man named MacLyle who was addicted to the news. To break that addiction, his wife sabotaged the radios and televisions, and destroyed his newspaper. MacLyle divorced his wife, moved out into the woods, and forgot how to use language. His wife hired a psychiatrist who tracked him down and “cured” him. On the way home, he went berserk, killed four people before he was killed himself.

For a story that came out in 1956, it feels quite relevant to 2024. I haven’t read much by Sturgeon, a couple of novels, maybe a dozen stories. He wrote much more. I’d love to read a biography about him. Wikipedia says Sturgeon wrote a bit of an autobiography, Argyll: A Memoir, which was an 80-page pamphlet. Abebooks.com and eBay.com list no copies for sale.

Wikipedia said Sturgeon was married three times and had two other long-term relationships and fathered seven children. He worked at many kinds of jobs. And his stories reflect a certain strangeness. Sometimes I wondered if he led a Beat life or was some kind of bohemian. Other times, because psychiatry is so often mentioned in his stories, I wonder if Sturgeon didn’t have mental problems.

If you read “And Now the News…” I think you’ll also wonder about his mental state. The story seems to be an attack on psychiatry, and even mundane life. Go read it, to see what I mean.

My friend Mike had a lot to say about the story. He hoped I had answers. I don’t. Mike summarizes stories much better than I do, so I won’t repeat what Mike gave me. I’m trying to get Mike to become a blogger because he’s good at reviewing fiction.

I might as well come clean and admit that I don't understand "And Now the News..." I can't fit the pieces together.

The story can be divided into three acts.

Act One

In the first act, we are introduced to MacLyle:

"He had habits and he had hobbies, like everybody else and (like everybody else) his were a little different from anybody's. The one that annoyed his wife the most, until she got used to it, was the news habit, or maybe hobby."

It seems that MacLyle is obsessed with the news and justifies his preoccupation by quoting Donne: "...any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind..."

Sturgeon takes pains to emphasize that "...MacLyle was, outside his peculiarity, a friendly and easygoing character. He liked people and invited them and visited them..." At this point, it feels a little like a Clifford D. Simak story.

Then MacLyle's wife Esther decides to sabotage the radios and tv sets so MacLyle can't access the news. When he asks for the newspaper, Esther confesses that she "...hadn't ordered it and wouldn't again." She reveals what she has done and "...realized too late that the news was so inextricably part of her husband that in casting it out she cast him out too."

So the end of Act One results in MacLyle leaving home and going to an attorney to arrange support for his wife and children. The lawyer "...might have entertained fears for MacLyle except for the fact that he was jovial and loquacious throughout, behaving like a happy man..."

Act Two

MacLyle is now on his own. Suddenly, when he tries to read the morning paper, he realizes that he can no longer read. Soon, he realizes he can't speak and can't understand speech. What are we to make of this? Is this a metaphorical transformation? Is it an actual physical manifestation? Why? 

MacLyle retreats to a remote cabin and builds a new life.

Act Three

Esther's psychiatrist tracks down MacLyle. He finds him playing his ophicleide, "...the craziest-looking man he had ever seen." Before long however "...the warm good humor and genuine welcome on MacLyle's sunburned face drove away fright and even caution..." MacLyle shows the psychiatrist his cabin, replete with his paintings and sculptures. It's obvious that MacLyle has worked very hard to build a new life in this remote setting.

"Watching him, the psychiatrist reflected suddenly that this withdrawn and wordless individual was a happy one, in his own matrix..."

The psychiatrist is appalled and realizes that he must "...find a way to communicate with MacLyle, and when he had found it, he must communicate to him the error of his ways." Is the psychiatrist a straw man? Is society the real force that cannot tolerate difference, cannot abide alternatives? Is this a commentary on psychiatry or society?

Eventually, the psychiatrist secretly drugs MacLyle and then injects him with a cornucopia of drugs. In a drugged haze, MacLyle is spirited away by the psychiatrist. MacLyle regains the ability to read and speak. 

MacLyle tells that psychiatrist that "Damn foolishness diminishes me because I am involved. People all the time pushing people around diminishes me. Everybody for a fast buck diminishes me...I just had to get uninvolved with mankind before I got diminished altogether, everything mankind did was my fault. So I did and now here I am involved again." Why did MacLyle think that what mankind did was his fault? What led him to that conclusion? Why is he diminished by the actions of others?

Finally, MacLyle reveals "Why, I'm going out there and diminish mankind right back." We learn that "He killed four people before they got him." How do we connect the dots? Throughout the story MacLyle has been described as kind and easygoing and genuine. Now he's suddenly a rampaging murderer? Is Sturgeon trying to make a broader statement about societal forces that warp perceptions? Does MacLyle represent nonconformity, while the psychiatrist represents the hidebound cultural norms that constrict our lives? 

Too many questions. Not enough answers. I'm hoping Jim has some answers.

Theodore Sturgeon has something philosophical to say in “And Now the News…” but I’m not sure what it is. At first, we think of the title referring to MacLyle’s early addiction to the news, but what if the story we’re reading is the news Sturgeon is tell us?

What if Theodore Sturgeon felt like I do now when I look out at the world? When I was young, I read several biographies of Samuel Clemens (Mark Twain) and I was troubled by how bitter Clemens became in old age. I told myself back then that I didn’t want to become embittered by life like Clemens. However, now that I’m old I realize my attitude toward humanity is far from positive. I can only assume “And Now the News…” is Sturgeon having a Mark Twain moment, and this story could be included in Sturgeon’s own collection of stories that could also be titled Letters From the Earth. Maybe the John Donne quote was written when Donne was young, and Sturgeon was sneering at it. I don’t know.

I have a tremendous interest in Philip K. Dick because he was a tortured soul. There’s not enough written about Sturgeon to really say, but I get the feeling that Sturgeon and Dick had a lot in common. I’ve lost count of the number of biographies written about PKD. I think if serious biographies were written about Sturgeon, he might be more famous, and his fiction would get more attention.

James Wallace Harris, 1/10/24

p.s. Sorry for slowing down on reviewing these stories. I’m just running out of energy. However, we’re almost done. Just three more to go.

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“2066: Election Day” by Michael Shaara

“2066: Election Day” was first published in Astounding Science Fiction, December 1956. You can read it on Archive.org. It is story #18 of 22 for The Best SF Stories of 1956 group read. “2066: Election Day” was a selection for Dikty’s SF anthology covering 1956-57 published in 1958 and for Asimov/Greenberg 1988 anthology devoted to the best SF of 1956. It’s also been reprinted in several interesting theme anthologies.

I read Michael Shaara’s famous novel about the civil war, The Killer Angels back in the 1970s, so I’m surprised to see his name here. However, I have discovered other famous writers who got their start writing science fiction. Shaara published several SF stories before moving on.

“2066: Election Day” is about a future America where we elect the president by selecting the most qualified person using a network supercomputer called UNCLE SAM. Anyone can take the test to see if they qualify. The story is about the 2066 election when SAM considers no one qualified.

I’ve always wondered why we don’t have more requirements for the job of United States President other than being a natural born citizen that is at least 35 years old. When I was in my early twenties, I took and passed a civil service test to get a temporary job at the IRS as a data entry clerk. I genuinely doubt Donald Trump could have passed that test, or any civil service exam.

I’ve always thought we should have more qualifications for the job of president. I would suggest either a law degree, or a doctorate in political science or history, and having served at least one term as a state governor, or two terms as a U.S. senator, or a minimum of ten years as a major of a U.S. city with a population over one million.

In “2066: Election Day,” Shaara has the requirement of taking a test that covers knowledge in many subjects, including economics, taxes, military, political science, etc. I’m not sure book learning should be the sole qualification, but meeting minimum scores on such tests could be part of the requirements too.

“2066: Election Day” doesn’t have much of a plot, being mainly an essay about an idea, but Shaara does show Harry Larkin going through a few different emotional states. That’s a big plus for this story.

I was surprised by Shaara repeatedly stating the process was aimed at finding the best “man” for the job. No mention of women. That would have shown more foresight. (There is a hint that women could be president, because there’s a little old lady is taking the tests at the beginning of the story.)

My friend Mike told me he didn’t think this story had anything worth discussing. And it is the kind of science fiction story where the author contorts the short story form to express ideas they want to promote. But to paraphrase that adage, “If you have a message, use Western Union.” I would say, “If all you’ve got is an idea, write an essay.” Shaara added a minimal story as a wrapper for his ideas.

For “2066: Election Day” to be a genuine short story, we’d have to experience Harry Larkin going through a struggle, developing as a person while overcoming obstacles. A good short story should produce a cathartic emotional reaction in the reader, even an epiphany. I thought Shaara tried but didn’t make it. Everything came to Harry Larkin, he never worked for anything in the story.

James Wallace Harris, 1/6/24

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                             

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“The Last Question” by Isaac Asimov – 2nd Review

“The Last Question” was first published in Science Fiction Quarterly, November 1956. You can read it on Archive.org. It is story #17 of 22 for The Best SF Stories of 1956 group read. “The Last Question” was a selection for Asimov/Greenberg anthology devoted to the best SF of1956 — but I’ve got to wonder, if it was at Asimov’s request? He’s often said “The Last Question” is his favorite among his own stories. I’ve reviewed the story before, for when the group read The Big Book of Science Fiction.

We’ve had two Isaac Asimov stories from 1956 – “The Last Question” and “The Dead Past.” I thought “The Dead Past” was flawed but I was impressed with Asimov’s ambition to write an emotional story. I know other people who consider it Asimov’s best short story. Neither are my favorites.

On one hand, “The Last Question” is a famous, often loved, science fiction story. On the other hand, it’s a gimmick story without traditional story elements. It’s more of an essay disguised as a short story. I’ve gotten tired of reading gimmick stories, and I’ve gotten tired of reading “The Last Question.” Once you know it, it’s not much fun to reread. I like stories where I get behind a character who is struggling to overcome an emotional problem. And I like stories that get better on rereading. “The Last Question” isn’t that kind of story. I’m thinking that Asimov wasn’t big on writing that kind of story either. However, I need to reread “The Ugly Little Boy.” If I remember right, it does have character development and an emotional punch to the gut.

This morning, I got a text from my friend Mike about the story, he wasn’t too kind:

I think that “The Last Question” is a gimmick story with cardboard characters. But this story is beloved, so I guess that leaves me out in the cold. I don’t really want to dump on Asimov, but I don’t think much of his favorite story.

It has the repetitive plot and thin characters of “Compounded Interest.” I’ve never been a fan of gimmick stories. I need characters that I care about.

I have to say I completely agree with Mike. “The Last Question” is a gem of a story for a gimmick story, but a letdown for when you’re wanting a vicarious emotional experience. I had the same problem with “Compounded Interest” by Mack Reynolds. However, as I mentioned in my review, I found another Mack Reynolds story from 1956 that had all the elements I love in a good dramatic short story. Read: “After Some Tomorrow.”

The genre has room for all kinds of stories, but I’m getting old and sappy, and want to be moved by what I read. I must wonder if the twenty-two stories we’ve selected to read from 1956 are mostly remembered because of their ideas and gimmicks. I wonder if there are loads of emotional stories that weren’t well remembered because they had ordinary science fictional ideas, but ones I would like better for their emotional and dramatic qualities — that is, if I could find them, like I did with “After Some Tomorrow.”

James Wallace Harris, 1/4/24

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“The Doorstop” by Reginald Bretnor

“The Doorstop” was first published in Astounding Science Fiction, November 1956. You can read it on Archive.org. It is story #16 of 22 for The Best SF Stories of 1956 group read. “The Doorstop” was a selection in both the Merril and Asimov/Greenberg anthologies devoted to the best SF of1956, but the story hasn’t been widely anthologized otherwise.

I believe Reginald Bretnor is most famous for his Ferdinand Feghoot pun stories. He wrote three books about science fiction, and besides writing a fair number of science fiction short stories, also liked to write about weapons and war. See his ISFDB entry.

“The Doorstop” is a pleasant mood piece about a country doctor discovering an alien artifact, one his wife bought to use as a doorstop. The story doesn’t have much of a plot, mainly a discussion by scientists and military men, a cliche for science fiction stories and movies, especially in the 1950s. However, what stands out in this story is the doctor’s state of mind. Dr. Cavaness stands between the old world where stars were romantic lights in the sky, with life having a certain order, and a new paradigm, something much different, even threatening and horrifying. (I’m reminded of the Fredric Brown title, The Lights in the Sky Are Stars. I might need to read it.)

Writing “The Doorstop” in 1956, I can imagine Bretnor worrying about all those ordinary people who were about to experience the sense of wonder that science fiction readers and writers cherished. He recognized the mental state of the world was changing, and imagined for many, it might not be wanted.

My friend Mike emailed me his notes for the story, and he was quite taken with it — as was I.

On the surface, the plot of "The Doorstop" is very simple. 

Ellie, the wife of Dr. Cavaness, buys a doorstop: "Oh, that. I got it today from Mrs. Hobbs. It's...well, it's a doorstop."

Cavaness soon realizes that the doorstop "...was no simple artifact. Alien to him and strange, it was a mechanism, a machine." 

Cavaness takes the doorstop to Ted Froberg, "...an electronics engineer working behind the ramparts of Security." Froberg reveals the doorstop "...wasn't made in any country here; it wasn't even made on Mars or Jupiter. It's from the stars."

But there is another story to be considered, an existential drama that unfolds in the mind of Dr. Cavaness. He desperately longs for an ordered existence, a carefully circumscribed life. His mind is comforted by the "...pages of the past, pages of friends and fishing trips, or midnight calls to childbirth, hypochondria, surgery--pages of precious trials and triumphs and routines. That was his life, the busy hours, the days succeeding days, the months, the seasons, the gently moving years, all encompassed by his family, his patients, and his town."

He clings fiercely to his English garden world and calls "...on God to drive the mystery out, extinguish it..." Cavaness poignantly prays:

"Voicelessly, in a despairing language without words, he prayed to a parochial God to make this all untrue, to wipe it out, to let his world remain as it had been. Oh God, preserve these small peripheries against all things incomprehensible; I am my world; its limits limit me; allow the stretches of eternity, the darknesses, to stay unreal; oh, God, deny this living proof that life unthinkable teems in those depths and distance, that they exist--"

Finally, when it's made clear to Cavaness that the doorstop is alien, "...he stared straight ahead--facing the majesty of God, facing a new maturity for man, facing the open door."

What Bretnor doesn't reveal is what comes next for Cavaness. Does he accept the new reality, or does turn away and retreat into his walled city?

I like that “The Doorstop” is about a coming change in our group mind and questions the genre I grew up with and love. It’s not a particularly well-written story, yet I like it quite a lot. But that fondness is for the story’s central insight. I wonder how many people now would like to go back to a pre-SF world where we didn’t think about aliens, an infinite multiverse, and all the other insights science fiction has given us, to when the universe was only as big as The Old Testament?

James Wallace Harris, 1/3/24

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“Compounded Interest” by Mack Reynolds

“Compounded Interest” was first published in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, August 1956. You can read it on Archive.org. It is story #15 of 22 for The Best SF Stories of 1956 group read. “Compounded Interest” was a selection in both the Merril and Asimov/Greenberg anthologies devoted to the best SF of1956, but the story hasn’t been widely anthologized otherwise. I considered “Compounded Interest” an entertaining enough story for a magazine issue but considered it disappointing to read it in a best-of-the-year anthology. It’s a time travel story, yet it’s never been anthologized in any time travel themed anthology, and there have been many. That might tell us something.

The story is rather simple, a time traveler arrives back in the early days of Venice and deposits ten gold coins in a bank with special instructions. He returns every century with new instructions. If you wish to know what happens, read the story. The whole story is merely a fun little idea, with a somewhat punchy ending, so I won’t spoil it. However, the story does have a big “which came first, the chicken or the egg” problem.

“Compounded Interest” is so slight I almost didn’t write about it. Mack Reynolds was a rather prolific science fiction writer. Sadly, I’ve never read much of his work. I have a vague memory of reading a couple of his stories, and reading about Reynolds in Wikipedia, which I just did again. He sounds like an interesting guy, and I’d like to read more of his science fiction. It’s just that his work isn’t remembered. Like I said, I have a rather vague memory of reading one of his stories and sort of liking it, but just can’t remember what it was.

I’d want to think there were dozens of science fiction stories better than “Compounded Interest” published in 1956 yet to be discovered. I just don’t have the time to go read over a hundred issues of SF magazines to find them. And so far, no one else in our reading group has found any forgotten gems either. I’m tempted to go read the five other SF stories Reynolds published in 1956 just to test the waters:

  • “After Some Tomorrow” – If (June)
  • “The Triangulated Izaak Walton” – Fantastic (June)
  • “Case Rests” – Science Fiction Quarterly (August)
  • “Fair Exchange” – Fantastic (August)
  • “Dog Star” – Science Fiction Quarterly (November)

Maybe Reynolds didn’t hit his stride until the 1960s. I remember seeing him a lot in Campbell’s Analog during that decade. Even when I was subscriber back then, I passed over his stories. Reynolds never hooked me, but like I said, reading about him in Wikipedia shows he had a fascinating life and should have written at least a few interesting stories.

“Compounded Interest” is the kind of story that’s just okay. Evident Judith Merril and Asimov and Greenberg, but not T. E. Dikty found it just interesting enough to reprint in their best of 1956 anthologies. But is it padding? My guess, few years produce enough stories to fill an anthology with exceptional stories.

By the way, Mr. Mike wasn’t too kind to this story either, but he was less verbose than I in saying it:

Compounded Interest is a tissue paper thin story with a repetitive plot and uninteresting characters. 

As soon as Professor Alan Shirey is introduced toward the end of the story we realize that he must be the mysterious Mister Smith.

It's a nonsensical and tedious story.

James Wallace Harris, 12/31/23 – Happy New Year

UPDATE:

I just read “After Some Tomorrow” in the June If. Now, this is the Mack Reynolds story that Merril, Asimov/Greenberg, and Dikty should have collected as one of the best of 1956. Follow the link to read it online. It’s about gender role reversals after the apocalypse. And the plot has some nice twists. Plus, it’s quite gritty for a magazine aimed at young readers. Rating: ****+

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“A Work of Art” by James Blish

“A Work of Art” was first published in Science Fiction Stories, July 1956 as “Art – Work.” You can read it on Archive.org. It is story #14 of 22 for The Best SF Stories of 1956 group read. Asimov and Greenberg picked “A Work of Art” for The Great SF Stories #18 (1956). It was widely reprinted. Its quality is inferred by the fact that I own “A Work of Art” in seven anthologies:

  • Science Fiction Showcase (1959) edited by Mary Kornbluth
  • The Worlds of Science Fiction (1963) edited by Robert P. Mills
  • The Best of James Blish (1979)
  • Science Fiction of the Fifties (1980) edited by Martin H. Greenberg and Joseph Olander
  • The Great SF Stories #18 (1956) (1988)
  • The Science Fiction Century (1997) edited by David G. Hartwell
  • Masterpieces: The Best Science Fiction of the Century (2001) edited by Orson Scott Card

“A Work of Art” is James Blish’s third most cited story in our database after “Surface Tension” and “Common Time.” James Blish isn’t very well known today, but he had a fair reputation when I was growing up in the 1960s. Among writers who knew Blish, he was remembered for being a scholarly intellectual writer. Older science fiction fans know him for the novel A Case of Conscience and the series Cities in Flight.

I first encountered Blish with his paperback series that converted the original Star Trek episodes into short stories. That was fun reading when I was a teen watching the show back in the 1960s, but it gave me the wrong impression that Blish was a hack writer. It took me decades to throw off that prejudice. “A Work of Art” offers me new hope for Blish.

It’s funny how we start off in our adolescence following a few writers as our favorites, and then years or even decades later, we learn that we should have read more of their contemporaries. Heinlein, Asimov, and Clarke dominated my formative years of science fiction reading. Now in my fading years, I’m discovering the 1950s and 1960s had other interesting science fiction writers — ones I should have been reading.

“A Work of Art” is the first story by Blish that backs the reputation I’ve gotten from reading about Blish. I’ve read A Case of Conscience twice, but I never considered it great, just particularly good. And I never liked the Cities in Flight stories. I keep hoping to discover more by Blish that matches the reputation he has with other readers. I’ve bought Black Easter and The Day After Judgment but haven’t read them yet. I’ve read “A Work of Art” twice and feel it’s closer to Aldiss and Ballard, which makes me want to try harder at finding the better Blish stories.

My friend Mike has been emailing me his thoughts on the Best SF Short Stories of 1956 and I’ll quote his comments to describe “A Work of Art” because I think he’s done a better job than I would have of summing up the story.

In James Blish's "A Work of Art," the mind sculptor Dr. Barkun Kris has "...superimposed memories..." of Richard Strauss onto Jerom Bosch, who "...had no talent for music at all..." 

At first, "A Work of Art" seems little more than Blish's satirical take on modern music. For Strauss (Bosch), "Music was, he quickly began to suspect, a dying art, which would soon have a status not much above that held by flower arranging back in what he thought of as his own century." Composers "...openly used a slide-rule-like device called a Hit Machine..."

Strauss composes a new opera with the intention to "...strike out afresh..." and not depend on his "...old tricks..."

During the opera's premiere, Blish introduces an epiphany for Strauss, who realizes during the performance that there "...was nothing new about the music. It was the old Strauss all over again--but weaker, more diluted than ever."

Strauss's anguish is palpable: "Being brought to life again meant bringing to life as well all those deeply graven reflexes of his style."

"His eyes filled; his body was young, but he was an old man, an old man. Another thirty-five years of this? Never."

The audience is ecstatic about the result of the mind sculpture. But Jerom Bosch has a depth of understanding that Dr. Kris never suspects. Bosch knows that the Strauss that Kris created "...was as empty of genius as a hollow gourd. The joke would always be on the sculptor, who was incapable of hearing the hollowness of the music..." 

Bosch's moment of epiphany adds depth and dimension to the story by creating a nuanced character who will soon be returned to his regular life even though he feels that "I am Richard Strauss until I die, and will never be Jerom Bosch, who was unable to carry even the simplest tune." We feel his grief when Kris "...turned to him to say the word that would plunge him back into oblivion..."

One reason I like “A Work of Art” is it deals with an alternative to mind downloading that I think might be vaguely possible. Mind downloading/uploading has been a popular theme in SF for several decades, but I’ve never thought it possible. However, I’ve wondered if we could create an AI personality based on all the works of a famous person. In “A Work of Art” Dr. Kris sculpts minds in living people. I guess it’s a kind of temporary brainwashing. I don’t think that’s possible, but it’s a good enough idea for the story.

“A Work of Art” gives Blish the opportunity to show off his knowledge of classical music, something I know next to nothing about, but always wished I did. And Blish gets to speculate about the nature of personality, both real, and copied. Richard Strauss’ artificial personality struggles to create a new opera but is faced with two problems. The first is he’s old and has done everything already, so he tends to repeat himself. But the second, and the revelation of the story, is because he’s a copy his creativity is limited by what’s known about him. It begs the question: Can creative work be used to be creative? That’s pertinent today regarding LLM AIs.

Now Mike focuses on something I missed, or something Mike has added to the story. He sees Bosch as being a participant in this mind sculpting artwork. I didn’t. I assumed Bosch had temporarily left the building, so to speak, while the Strauss personality occupies it. Mike evidently saw mind art as a blend of the two. Mike assumes Bosch had the final epiphany, while I think the Strauss personality had it before it was erased.

Even though I disagree with Mike’s take, I like the idea of Bosch being there all along too, being part of the art. I’ll need to read “A Work of Art” for a third time to see if I see clues for that. That’s the fun thing about exceptional stories, that they can be interpreted in diverse ways.

James Wallace Harris, 12/28/23

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“Horrer Howce” by Margaret St. Clair

“Horrer Howce” was first published in Galaxy Science Fiction, July 1956. You can read it on Archive.org. It is story #13 of 22 for The Best SF Stories of 1956 group read. Asimov and Greenberg picked “Horrer Howce” for The Great SF Stories #18 (1956) and it was also included in Galaxy: Thirty Years of Innovative Science Fiction, which was our Group Read #9. You can read our original discussion thread here.

I know nothing about Margaret St. Clair. Except for reading “Horrer Howce” before in the Galaxy anthology, I can’t recall reading any of her other stories. Wikipedia reports she wrote over 130 fantasy and science fiction stories, and ISFDB,org lists quite a few. She only has two books and five stories cited in CSF, with none getting more than two citations. I once owned a copy of this Ace Double, but I got it for the Philip K. Dick story. St. Clair has been reprinted in a several anthologies devoted to rediscovering women science fiction writers, such as The Future is Female! edited Lisa Yaszek, which I own, but haven’t read.

Unfortunately, I didn’t think much of “Horrer Howce.” The story is about a man named Freeman who tries to sell exhibits to amusement parks featuring haunted houses. He’s having trouble selling his exhibits because they drive his potential clients mad with fear, or even kills them. At first, I thought this might be an oddball fantasy like those Shirley Jackson wrote, but “Horrer Howce” appears to have a science fictional basis. Although, at one point, Freeman consults books like a conjurer. Even after two readings, I was never sure if Freeman was opening gateways to other dimensions or using magic to open fantasy portals. In either sense, I didn’t think such gateway/portals were suitable for amusement parks. The early ones were just scary dark holes, but Freeman expected visitors to enter the world of the Vooms, and it was much too big to be a fake thrill ride.

I can see where “Horrer Howce” has a certain appeal but just not to me. I thought it reasonably good enough for a magazine story, but I find it disappointing for a best of the year or retrospective anthology. My friend Mike summed it up nicely in an email:

Margaret St. Clair's "Horrer Howce" is an effective horror story. It invokes feelings of fear, dread, and dismay. 

We shouldn't ask "Horrer Howce" to be anything more. Examining the characters and plot seems like a fool's errand. We enjoy the creepiness of the Vooms and are left wishing that we could see Freeman's future tableau: A Horrer Howce for the Voom.

I didn’t feel fear, dread, or dismay. I could see how St. Clair worked to create those responses, but her efforts seemed too basic or simple to me. Because of the horror angle, it was out of place in Galaxy — at least for me. I thought it would have been more suited for F&SF, Fantastic, or Fantastic Universe.

I should give Margaret St. Clair another chance. Does anyone know of a better story of hers to recommend?

James Wallace Harris, 12/26/23