What pre-1985 science fiction are you reading? + Update No. XXIX

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What pre-1985 science fiction adventures have you started this summer? Any great reads? Disappointing ones? Intriguing discoveries? Here’s the April installment of this column.

  • A selection of read volumes from my shelves

In a conversation on Blueksy, someone asked for my history of science fiction recommendations (including a few general surveys). I scoured my shelves and came up with an all-too-large pile (with some notable volumes I wanted to include but could not find) of favorite histories of science fiction. See photo below. I tried to include monographs that were not studies of single authors.

As I am a historian by training and trade who holds on to some of my disciplinary ticks and hangups, I also included works by trained academics with two major exceptions 1) Mike Ashley’s multi-volume study of science fiction magazines (but no other recent works exist and they’re really good for the nuts and bolts of genre magazines) and 2) Alec Nevala-Lee’s approachable and well-researched group biography  Astounding: John W. Campbell, Isaac Asimov, Robert A. Heinlein, L. Ron Hubbard, and the Golden Age of Science Fiction (2018). Both should be read.

  • A photo of a few of my history of science fiction recommendations

I deliberately avoided works by science fiction authors like Damon Knight, Brian W. Aldiss, and Frederik Pohl. They’re great sources and I own and have read many of them but…. they are not histories by trained scholars. I do not mean for this to come off as elitist. Rather, my personal remit for my list—I needed to winnow down the hundreds and hundreds I own–was deliberately narrow! I read and use sources widely. Remember, these are my favorites — they might not be the best but they got me thinking and reading and writing. And that’s what we all should be doing, reading what makes us happy.

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Exploration Log 14: Anti-Racism in Chandler Davis’ “Stereotypes Are Dangerous” (1950)

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  • John Grossman’s cover for vol. 1 of the fanzine Futurist, ed. Redd Boggs (Spring 1950)

“Write a story that will give a few bigots the jolt they need. Write a story that will open the eyes of the unconsciously bigoted” (8).

Chandler Davis (1926-2022) strikes a fascinating figure. He was a communist activist, science fiction author, fanzine editor, a Professor of Mathematics at the University of Michigan, and political prisoner. He was fired from the University of Michigan in 1954 and imprisoned for six months in 1960 on charges of contempt of Congress leveled by HUAC.1 Between 1946 and 1970, he published 12 short stories. One additional story, a casualty of Harlan Ellison’s infamous unpublished Last Dangerous Visions, appeared in 1994.2 I reviewed three of his 1940s short stories on the theme of nuclear war back in 2023: “The Nightmare” (1946), “To Still the Drums” (1946), and “The Aristocrat” (1949). He’s certainly an author I need to return to on the merits of his article “Stereotypes Are Dangerous” (1950).

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Short Fiction Review: Clifford D. Simak’s “Madness from Mars” (1939) and “Hermit of Mars” (1939)

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The following review is the 37th installment of my series searching for “SF short stories that are critical in some capacity of space agencies, astronauts, and the culture which produced them.” Some stories I’ll review in this series might not fit or are poor quality. And that is okay. I relish the act of literary archaeology. I’ve added an extra Simak story to round out the post.

I’m on another Clifford D. Simak binge!

Previously: John Wyndham’s “The Man From Beyond” (variant title: “The Man from Earth”) (1934)

Up Next: TBD

  • Howard V. Brown’s cover for Thrilling Wonder Stories, ed. Mort Weisinger (April 1939)

3/5 (Average)

Clifford D. Simak’s “Madness from Mars” first appeared in Thrilling Wonder Stories, ed. Mort Weisinger (April 1939). You can read it online here.

In the 1941 article “The Future of Science Fiction,” Clifford D. Simak described the transformative effect of Stanley G. Weinbaum’s “A Martian Odyssey” (1934) (and a handful of other stories) on the development of science fiction.1 He uses the story to explain how SF has achieved “realism” by moving beyond “wooden plots” plot by incorporating a “scientific basis of the story.” I’d suggest “Madness from Mars” is Simak’s attempt to craft a scientifically-grounded and truly alien alien in the Weinbaum mold. I will feature Simak’s early commentary on the genre in a future Exploration Log post. 2

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Book Review: Clifford D. Simak’s The Worlds of Clifford Simak (1960)

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  • Richard Powers’ cover for the 1961 paperback edition

3.25/5 (collated rating: Above Average)

At this point in my reading adventure, I approach Clifford D. Simak’s science fiction with a clear intention to expand my understanding of his economic, political, and technological critiques of American society. This culminated in 2024 with my article “’We Must Start Over Again and Find Some Other Way of Life’: The Role of Organized Labor in the 1940s and ’50s Science Fiction of Clifford D. Simak.” Since then, albeit at a slower pace, I’ve continued to cover his science fiction, speeches, and additional interviews I’ve been able to track down. I find him a deeply fascinating author who’s often pigeonholed as “bucolic” or “pastoral” with no real attempt to read beyond his tendency to set a few of his narratives in a rural simulacrum of his childhood corner of America.

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Updates: Recent Science Fiction Purchases No. CCCL(Jack Vance, Adolfo Bioy Casares, Thom Keyes, and Kenneth Bulmer)

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Which books/covers/authors intrigue you? Which have you read? Disliked? Enjoyed?

1. Jack Vance’s Galactic Effectuator (1980)

  • David Mattingly’s cover for the 1981 edition

From the back cover: “Meet Miro Hetzel, Galactic Effectuator. He’s part gentlemen, part detective, part fraud, and his trail of exploits cuts through some of the more improbably civilizations in the universe. Join him in a trip to the planet Maz, whose natives are so fierce that they’ll fight three battle before lunch and then dine on the enemy–a planet that only a man with Miro Hetzel’s steely nerve would dare to visit at all.”

Initial Thoughts: This is a fix-up novel containing “The Dogtown Tourist Agency” (1975) and “Freitzke’s Turn” (1977). I previously reviewed “Freitzke’s Turn” (1977) and did not classify it amongst Vance’s best. As many know, I’ve soured a bit on Vance in the last decade. That said, I still think novels like Wyst: Alastor, 1716 (1978) and Emphyrio (1969) are worth the read.

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Short Book Reviews: Polly Toynbee’s Leftovers (1966) and Lewis Gibbs’ Late Final (1951)

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Note: My read but “waiting to be reviewed pile” is growing. Short rumination/tangents/impressions are a way to get through the stack before my memory and will fades. My website partially serves as a record of what I have read and a memory palace for future projects. Stay tuned for more detailed and analytical reviews.

1. Polly Toynbee’s Leftovers (1966)

  • Paul May’s cover for the 1969 edition

2.5/5 (Bad)

After reading a monograph on the history of science fiction I inevitably find a handful of works that I must track down (more as an act of data collection than a quest for literary genius). Andrew Hammond’s Cold War Stories: British Dystopian Fiction, 1945-1990 (2017) contained a wealth of lesser-known works that immediately dented my pocketbook.1

Polly Toynbee’s Leftovers (1966) fits into Hammond’s analysis of a British Empire irrevocably weakened by WWII and growing US supremacy in the Cold War. Toynbee’s novel, and in even more severe terms Lewis Gibbs’ Late Final (1951) discussed below, with its focus on a handful of self-absorbed survivors of an apocalyptic event depicts a nation “irrelevant to the geopolitical present and as unrecognizable to its own past.”2 Intriguing ideas aside, debilitating flaws sink Leftovers. I found it interesting only as a lens for the moment — youth culture and rebellion in the mid-60s. As a literary and reading experience, Leftovers leaves a lot to be desired. Toynbee would soon abandon her literary career for a famous career in journalism from a leftist perspective.

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Book Review: Knut Faldbakken’s Sweetwater (1976, trans. Joan Tate, 1994)

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Preliminary note: This review originally appeared in the inaugural issue of Rachel S. Cordasco’s new magazine Small Planet: The SF in Translation Magazine. You can read the entire issue for free here! I plan on contributing one review of pre-1985 SFF in translation for each issue. In addition to my review, there’s a fantastic range of other articles and interviews.

  • Iain Stuart’s cover for the 1994 edition

4.5/5 (Very Good)

Knut Faldbakken (1941-), a prolific Norwegian novelist, wrote a science-fictional duology titled Sweetwater early in his career. The first volume, Twilight Country (1974, trans. Joan Tate, 1993), followed an odd collection of refugees from a disintegrating urban metropolis, the titular Sweetwater, as they cast off the entangling membranes of lost paths and the weight of melancholy souls and attempt to chart a new beginning in the city Dump.

In volume two, Sweetwater (1976, trans. Joan Tate, 1994), a deathly equilibrium is reached. In an obliquely hinted at dystopia, the city slowly withers and depopulates due to the effects of global warming, industrialization, and malignant societal decay. As the city dies, less and less refuse enters the Dump. The community of outcasts, who inhabit a collection of huts around a camper and crumbling home with small garden plots surrounded by refuse, can no longer scavenge for supplies and food. They must abandon the uncertain topography of the Dump and return to the city. 

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Updates: Recent Science Fiction Purchases No. CCCXLIX (Aldous Huxley, Joyce Thompson, John Collier, and an anthology of stories from The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction)

/ Joachim Boaz / 15 Comments

Which books/covers/authors intrigue you? Which have you read? Disliked? Enjoyed?

1. The Best from Fantasy and Science Fiction, 8th Series, ed. Anthony Boucher (1959)

  • Ed Emshwiller’s cover for the 1963 edition

From the back cover: No summary blurb.

Contents: C. S. Lewis’ “Ministering Angels” (1955), Poul Anderson’s “Backwardness” (1958), Kit Reed’s “The Wait” (1958), Isaac Asimov’s “The Up-to-Date Sorcerer” (1958), Fritz Leiber’s “A Deskful of Girls” (1958), Damon Knight’s “Eripmav” (1958), Brian W. Aldiss’ “Poor Little Warrior!’ (1958), Shirley Jackson’s “The Omen” (1958), Jules Verne’s “Gilt Braltar” (1887), Avram Davidson’s “The Grantha Sighting” (1958), C. M. Kornbluth’s “Theory of Rocketry” (1958), John Shepley’s “Gorilla Suit” (1958), Zenna Henderson’s “Captivity” (1958), and Alfred Bester’s “The Men Who Murdered Mohammed” (1958)

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Short Story Review: Richard Wilson’s “Strike” (1953)

/ Joachim Boaz / 8 Comments
  • Milton Luros’ cover for Future Science Fiction, ed. Robert W. Lowndes (July 1953)

3.25/5 (Above Average)

“One by one the cargo-liners blew up, most conveniently for I.C. in its squabble with the union. In fact, these accidents were too convenient…”

Richard Wilson’s “Strike” (1953) first appeared in Future Science Fiction, ed. Robert W. Lowndes (July 1953). You can read it online here.

“Strike” is the third story in the “Dateline Mars” sequence by Richard Wilson (1920-1987). To the best of my knowledge, this sequence follows the investigative career of Reporter Scott Warren, chief of the Iopa bureau of the Galactic News Service on Mars.1 I am unsure how many stories appeared in this sequence as they have not yet been grouped as a unit on The Internet Speculative Fiction Database.2 Regardless, there’s an appealing simplicity to the general framework of the series — how news agencies attempt to provide objective reporting in a future in which humanity has settled Mars. “Strike” also clocks in as an unabashedly pro-labor union tale. From the stories I’ve gathered so far, this is somewhat rare for the 1950s.

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