This is the 21st post in my series of vintage generation ship short fiction reviews. While not technically a short story, George Hay’s novel clocks in at a mere 112 pages. I’ve decided to include it in my series. While I have dabbled in the more esoteric as of late, thanks go out to all who have joined some part of my read-through already. I’ve also compiled an extensive index of generation ship SF–expanded from a monograph by Simone Caroti–if you wish to track down my earlier reviews on the topic and any that you might want to read on your own.¹

Previously: Poul Anderson’s “The Troublemakers” (1953)

Next Up: TBD

2/5 (Bad)

In 2019, I made the resolution to read all the pre-1985 science fiction on the theme of generation ships available in English. I’ve made substantial progress, especially on the short story front! Last year I posted the 20th installment of my short story read-through.² I’ve covered authors from John Brunner to Judith Merril. As I mentioned above, I’ve decided to include George Hay’s short novel Flight of the “Hesper” (1952) in my series. Unfortunately, no online copies exist to link.

The English author George Hay (1922-1997) strikes an interesting figure. After an attempt at a career writing science fiction and an extended obsession with L. Ron Hubbard’s Dianetics,³ he shifted to editorial work and the promotion of the respectability and practicality of genre.⁴ He established the Science Fiction Foundation in 1970, with its accompanying journal Foundation: The International Review of Science Fiction. Flight of the “Hesper” is a product of his early, unsuccessful, writing career.

There’s Always Generational Strife

The generation ship Hesper sets with an ill-defined final destination.⁵ The first generation, nearing the end of their life, clash with the second, born within the confines of the ship. The hundred-and-five-year-old Commander Starke, of the original generation, spends years alone in his study, rarely conferring with his staff, in consultation with the mysterious Chart, a super computer that oversees the ship. His second in command Cantow, born on board, attempts to rationalize his membership in the second generation with his duty within the hierarchy. His position is increasingly tested as a faction on board, led by his own wife Ruth, wants to land on any habitable planet. As they circle the planet Heimat, Commander Starke bewilders all by supporting the settlement. He claims the Chart will its. Disaster awaits.

A profound sense of agoraphobia hits the colonists. This leads to a cataclysmic die-off of the second generation. Their children, drugged by their parents, survive (including Cantow’s wife and child). Of the 145 that landed on Heimat, fifty return “sane and comparatively sound” (75). For some, the generation strife dissipates, replaced by a “real desire” to help the survivors (73). They soon discover the sinister Starke knew all along–“the Chart makes no errors” (74). And the crew ire turns on their despotic leader. In the words of the crew psychotherapist: “This is the man they worshipped! This, the very man who has been plotting his lifetime to eliminate very least sign of opposition on board this ship until he achieved the status of absolute dictator” (79). But he has all the tools of psychological control at his finger tips. And he triggers hidden patterns implanted from the beginning. It’s up to Cantow to escape.

As the Conflict Recedes (*spoilers*)

This is an odd book. A product of Hay’s childhood obsession with American science fiction (in this instance Heinlein’s “Universe” (1941) and “Common Sense” (1941) in Astounding), Flight of the “Hesper” attempts to put an original, and deeply post-War II, psychological spin on the generation ship template. Due to rise of fascism abroad in the intra-war period, there was a resurgence of interest among psychologists in the validity of crowd psychology. After the war, psychologists defended social engineering as a means of controlling troubling tendencies made manifest by WWII.⁶ How does Hay fit?

Hay’s muddled novel might be read as critical of the post-War fixation on psychology or, more likely, as a hackneyed metaphor for those who fought and died in the fight against fascism. The generation ship becomes the ultimate psychological experiment replete with brainwashing and hypnotism. Hay’s characters must break free from their mindless worship of the captain, identify the ultimate purpose of the voyage, and confront the despite leader and his mechanical God (the Chart) that controls all. The character of Cantow, a member of the second generation, proves emotionally adaptable in comparison to the first generation, prone to crowd mania. This brings up the issue of generational conflict.

As a thought experiment, there’s something utterly seductive about the generation ship as an arena of generational strife. The first generation, with its nostalgic or fearful memories of earth, must confront the new viewpoints of their children raised entirely within the spaceship. Will they want to depart the ship for a new planet? Will they want to return to an Earth they never experienced? Hay’s take on generational strife, like the profusion of others written in the 50s, cannot be read without a reference to the watershed moment of WWII. In his formulation, the first generation, like the followers of Stalinism or Fascism, utterly buy into the despotism of Captain Starke and his Chart. After realizing their delusion they impulsively and violently attempt to break free without entirely understanding the nature of the problem. It’s an empty act. Instead, those born in the new world of the ship who experienced the catastrophic human impact of their manipulation figure out the true nature of the world. They fight to cast off the ultimate controlling ideology represented by the Chart. For a far more interesting take on strife between the first and second generations, check out John Brunner’s “Lungfish” (1957).

At a more technical level, Flight of the “Hesper” proves hilariously incapable of conveying the wonder of the premise! It’s a generation ship, not a car trip across England (even that would be more wondrous than what transpires). It’s an alien planet, not a depressed back street (even then we might feel the grime or pause to decode some scrawled slogan). Unlike Brunner, Hay includes no specifics of what the ship looks like, the alienness of the planet they land on, or how the second generation would think differently than their elders. Disappointing.

Only recommended for generation ship completists or scholars of British SF in the 50s.

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Notes

1. Simone Caroti’s The Generation Starship In Science Fiction: A Critical History, 1934-2001 (2011). My index indicates my additions with a (*). ↩︎
2. In that time, I also read multiple short stories in collections and a few novels that I did not officially include in the series (don’t ask me why, I don’t know): E. C. Tubb’s The Space-Born (variant title: Star Ship) (1955), Judith Merril’s “Survival Ship” (1951) and “The Lonely” (1963), Samuel R. Delany’s Ballard of Beta-2 (1965), and Harry Harrison’s Captive Universe (1969) ↩︎
3. Hay credited himself as a “founder-member” of Scientology, taught classes, and invited Hubbard to Britain. In 1968, Scientology declared him a “suppressive person” (wikipedia). ↩︎
4. Peter Nicholls took over Foundation from Hay after the May 1974 issue and pushed for more “academic responsibility” (wikipedia). ↩︎
5. The name is a reference to the Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s poem The Wreck of the Hesperus (1842). ↩︎
6. For an American context, check out Ellen Herman’s The Romance of American Psychology: Political Culture in the Age of Experts (1995). Is there a monograph on the British take on psychology at the time? ↩︎

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