Sense of Wonder: A Century of Science Fiction (217 page)

The dreams of Man and galactic span

Are equal and much the same.”

What was he thinking of? Make your own choice. I think I came close to knowing him, at that moment, but until human beings turn telepath, no man can be sure of another.

He shook himself like a dog out of cold water, and got into his bunk. I got into mine, and after a while I fell asleep.

* * * *

I don’t know what MacReidie may have told the skipper about the stoker, or if he tried to tell him anything. The captain was the senior ticket holder in the Merchant Service, and a good man, in his day. He kept mostly to his cabin. And there was nothing MacReidie could do on his own authority—nothing simple, that is. And the stoker had saved the ship, and…

I think what kept anything from happening between MacReidie and the stoker, or anyone else and the stoker, was that it would have meant trouble in the ship. Trouble, confined to our little percentage of the ship’s volume, could seem like something much more important than the fate of the human race. It may not seem that way to you. But as long as no one began anything, we could all get along. We could have a good trip.

MacReidie worried, I’m sure. I worried, sometimes. But nothing happened.

When we reached Alpha Centaurus, and set down at the trading field on the second planet, it was the same as the other trips we’d made, and the same kind of landfall. The Lud factor came out of his post after we’d waited for a while, and gave us our permit to disembark. There was a Jek ship at the other end of the field, loaded with the cargo we would get in exchange for our holdful of goods. We had the usual things; wine, music tapes, furs, and the like. The Jeks had been giving us light machinery lately—probably we’d get two or three more loads, and then they’d begin giving us something else.

But I found that this trip wasn’t quite the same. I found myself looking at the factor’s post, and I realized for the first time that the Lud hadn’t built it. It was a leftover from the old colonial human government. And the city on the horizon—men had built it; the touch of our architecture was on every building. I wondered why it had never occurred to me that this was so. It made the landfall different from all the others, somehow. It gave a new face to the entire planet.

* * * *

Mac and I and some of the other crewmen went down on the field to handle the unloading. Jeks on self-propelled cargo lifts jockeyed among us, scooping up the loads as we unhooked the slings, bringing cases of machinery from their own ship. They sat atop their vehicles, lean and aloof, dashing in, whirling, shooting across the field to their ship and back like wild horsemen on the plains of Earth, paying us no notice.

We were almost through when Mac suddenly grabbed my arm. “Look!”

The stoker was coming down on one of the cargo slings. He stood upright, his booted feet planted wide, one arm curled up over his head and around the hoist cable. He was in his dusty brown Marine uniform, the scarlet collar tabs bright as blood at his throat, his major’s insignia glittering at his shoulders, the battle stripes on his sleeves.

The Jeks stopped their lifts. They knew that uniform. They sat up in their saddles and watched him come down. When the sling touched the ground, he jumped off quietly and walked toward the nearest Jek. They all followed him with their eyes.

“We’ve got to stop him,” Mac said, and both of us started toward him. His hands were both in plain sight, one holding his duffelbag, which was swelled out with the bulk of his airsuit. He wasn’t carrying a weapon of any kind. He was walking casually, taking his time.

Mac and I had almost reached him when a Jek with insignia on his coveralls suddenly jumped down from his lift and came forward to meet him. It was an odd thing to see—the stoker, and the Jek, who did not stand as tall. MacReidie and I stepped back.

The Jek was coal black, his scales glittering in the cold sunlight, his hatchet-face inscrutable. He stopped when the stoker was a few paces away. The stoker stopped, too. All the Jeks were watching him and paying no attention to anything else. The field might as well have been empty except for those two.

“They’ll kill him. They’ll kill him right now,” MacReidie whispered.

They ought to have. If I’d been a Jek, I would have thought that uniform was a death warrant. But the Jek spoke to him:

“Are you entitled to wear that?”

“I was at this planet in ‘39. I was closer to your home world the year before that,” the stoker said. “I was captain of a destroyer. If I’d had a cruiser’s range, I would have reached it.” He looked at the Jek. “Where were you?”

“I was here when you were.”

“I want to speak to your ship’s captain.”

“All right. I’ll drive you over.”

The stoker nodded, and they walked over to his vehicle together. They drove away, toward the Jek ship.

“All right, let’s get back to work,” another Jek said to MacReidie and myself, and we went back to unloading cargo.

* * * *

The stoker came back to our ship that night, without his duffelbag. He found me and said:

“I’m signing off the ship. Going with the Jeks.”

MacReidie was with me. He said loudly: “What do you mean, you’re going with the Jeks?”

“I signed on their ship,” the stoker said. “Stoking. They’ve got a micro-nuclear drive. It’s been a while since I worked with one, but I think I’ll make out all right, even with the screwball way they’ve got it set up.”

“Huh?”

The stoker shrugged. “Ships are ships, and physics is physics, no matter where you go. I’ll make out.”

“What kind of a deal did you make with them? What do you think you’re up to?”

The stoker shook his head. “No deal. I signed on as a crewman. I’ll do a crewman’s work for a crewman’s wages. I thought I’d wander around a while. It ought to be interesting,” he said.

“On a Jek ship.”

“Anybody’s ship. When I get to their home world, I’ll probably ship out with some people from farther on. Why not? It’s honest work.”

MacReidie had no answer to that.

“But—” I said.

“What?” He looked at me as if he couldn’t understand what might be bothering me, but I think perhaps he could.

“Nothing,” I said, and that was that, except MacReidie was always a sourer man from that time up to as long as I knew him afterwards. We took off in the morning. The stoker had already left on the Jek ship, and it turned out he’d trained an apprentice boy to take his place.

* * * *

It was strange how things became different for us, little by little after that. It was never anything you could put your finger on, but the Jeks began taking more goods, and giving us things we needed when we told them we wanted them. After a while,
Serenus
was going a little deeper into Jek territory, and when she wore out, the two replacements let us trade with the Lud, too. Then it was the Nosurwey, and other people beyond them, and things just got better for us, somehow.

We heard about our stoker, occasionally. He shipped with the Lud, and the Nosurwey, and some people beyond them, getting along, going to all kinds of places. Pay no attention to the precise red lines you see on the star maps; nobody knows exactly what path he wandered from people to people. Nobody could. He just kept signing on with whatever ship was going deeper into the galaxy, going farther and farther. He messed with green shipmates and blue ones. One and two and three heads, tails, six legs—after all, ships are ships and they’ve all got to have something to push them along. If a man knows his business, why not? A man can live on all kinds of food, if he wants to get used to it. And any nontoxic atmosphere will do, as long as there’s enough oxygen in it.

I don’t know what he did, to make things so much better for us. I don’t know if he did anything, but stoke their ships and, I suppose, fix them when they were in trouble. I wonder if he sang dirty songs in that bad voice of his, to people who couldn’t possibly understand what the songs were about. All I know is, for some reason those people slowly began treating us with respect. We changed, too, I think—I’m not the same man I was…I think—not altogether the same; I’m a captain now, with master’s papers, and you won’t find me in my cabin very often…there’s a kind of joy in standing on a bridge, looking out at the stars you’re moving toward. I wonder if it mightn’t have kept my old captain out of that place he died in, finally, if he’d tried it.

So, I don’t know. The older I get, the less I know. The thing people remember the stoker for—the thing that makes him famous, and, I think, annoys him—I’m fairly sure is only incidental to what he really did. If he did anything. If he meant to. I wish I could be sure of the exact answer he found in the bottom of that last glass at the bar before he worked his passage to Mars and the
Serenus
, and began it all.

So, I can’t say what he ought to be famous for. But I suppose it’s enough to know for sure that he was the first living being ever to travel all the way around the galaxy.

* * * *

Copyright © 1959 by Street & Smith Publication, Inc.

Author’s Note: If the English title appears in italics, the book has been translated into English. If the English title appears in parenthesis, than the story has never been translated into English.

* * * *

Western Europe enjoys a long and rich science fiction tradition dating from the earliest publications of the genre. It was here, in the modern era, that science and industry advanced most quickly. Many readers responded to literature that addressed the broader ethical and existential implications of rapid societal and technological change. Literary historians have traced the origins of science fiction to fantastic travel literature such as Jonathan Swift’s
Gulliver’s Travels
(1726), Ludwig Holberg’s
Niels Klim’s Underground Travels
(Nicolai Klimii Iter Subterraneum, 1742), and Romantic literature such as German E.T.A. Hoffmann’s
The
Sandman
(Der Sandmann, 1816). Considered by many scholars to be the first science fiction publication, Mary Shelley’s
Frankenstein
appeared in London in 1818.

Prior to World War II, the best science fiction came from Europe. Great Britain and France dominated before World War I, with Germany joining in the interwar years (Wollheim xii). At this time, European immigrants also contributed to a growing scene in the United States. Hugo Gernsback, for instance, the founder of the first American science fiction magazine Amazing Stories in 1924, hailed from Luxemburg. Only after World War II did Anglo-American publications begin to dominate in Western Europe. Since the seventies, translations have made up 90 percent of the market in some countries (Wollheim xiii, Rottensteiner viii).

Unfortunately, many of the best science fiction stories from Western Europe are inaccessible to those who speak only English. Much science fiction writing remains untranslated or is only translated into languages other than English. One excellent example is the German anthology of science fiction short stories from the European Union entitled
Eine Trillion Euro
(A Quintillion Euros, 2004). This collection includes some of Europe’s very best, current authors, yet precious few have appeared in English. A primary reason for the lack of translations is the sheer dominance of Anglo-American science fiction translations, which leave little market share for homegrown writers. In addition, there is little demand for foreign science fiction today in the United States. A number of anthologies of European science fiction appeared in the late seventies and early eighties with the resurgence in popularity of the genre in the United States and in Europe. For instance, Richard D. Nolane edited the Terra SF series
The Year’s Best European Science Fiction
(1981, 1983). Others include the collections by Rottensteiner and Wollheim. In the past ten years, a number of new anthologies in English have also been published (See Rottensteiner, Bell and Molina-Gavilán). In order to provide a quick overview, this essay is focused primarily on science fiction from Western Europe that is available in English, but it certainly is not an exhaustive survey.

Undoubtedly, the first and foremost writer of science fiction, or “scientific romance” as it was termed in the nineteenth century, was France’s great storyteller Jules Verne (1828–1905). His
voyages extraordinaires
series alone comprises fifty-four novels. The most famous of these are
From the Earth to the
Moon
(1865),
20,000 Leagues
Under the Sea
(1869), and
Around the World in Eighty Days
(1873). These stories combine new and imagined technologies such as the spaceship, submarine, and hot air balloon, respectively, with the genre of travel literature. His works are a veritable encyclopedia of locations, technologies, and places.

Verne is also notable because his stories represent one of the early examples of novels published for mass consumption. The term
voyages extraordinaires
became its own brand. It helped to establish this science fiction as a commercially viable genre not only in France, but also in Germany, for instance, where stories were sold “in the style of Jules Verne” (Innenhofer 13).

In the twentieth century, science fiction developed into a substantial tradition in France as well as in French-speaking Belgium and Switzerland. Its annual science fiction prize is the Rosny-Aîné award. Outside of France, Pierre Boulle is perhaps the most famous as the author of the book Planet of the Apes (La Planète des singes, 1963) upon which the film series was based. Two of its most prominent science fiction authors are New Wave writers Jean-Pierre Andrevon (b. 1937 pseudo. Alphonse Brutsche) and Gérard Klein (b. 1937 pseudo. Gilles d’Argyre). Considered by Rottensteiner to be one of France’s most innovative writers (248), Andrevon has published more than eighty books. An artist by training, his writing is very visual, and he often helps to illustrate his own work. His most recent, La Maison qui glissait (The House That Slid, 2010), contains elements of the picaresque and pointed social critique. Klein started writing at a very young age and published some thirteen books between 1958 and 1975. A number of his novels were translated into English during the early seventies, when Anglo-American interest in foreign science fiction was at its height. These include The Day Before Tomorrow (Le Temps n’a pas d’Odeur, 1972), Starmasters’ Gambit (Le Gambit des Étoiles, 1973) The Overloads of War (Les Seigneurs de la Guerre, 1973) and The Mote in Time’s Eye (Les Tueurs de Temps, 1975). Both of these authors have also since edited science fiction anthologies. This practice is common in European countries where a successful author will work to cultivate a national science fiction tradition.

In Spain, we find a rich assortment of science fiction literature. Here, the genre really began in the post-war period since Spain had no leading writer to nurture other potential contributors. Andrea Bell and Yolanda Molina Gavilán identify Milo María Fabra as Spain’s first science fiction visionary. He was a journalist with a pre-war faith in science and technology (4). See his “On the Planet Mars” (1890) in Cosmos Latinos. One other early example is Nobel-prize winning neuroscientist Santiago Ramón y Cajal (1852–1934), who published Vacation Stories (Cuentos de vacaciones) in 1905 under the pseudonym of Dr. Bacteria. Ramón y Cajal was so afraid that his stories would ruin his reputation that he waited twenty years to publish them. (In many European countries, science fiction has not been considered literature, but rather labeled pulp fiction, a lowbrow escape from reality. This perception has persisted despite numerous quality books and the fact that many prominent scientists have been inspired to pursue science due to an early interest in science fiction [Jha and Rutherford].)

During the Franco regime from the 1950s to the 1970s, science fiction writers were limited by a nationalistic ideology that restricted cultural production. However, science fiction is a literature of the fantastic, which means that its propensity to bend reality enabled authors to employ allegory and hide political critique in another space and time. It also allowed for readers, limited by dictatorship, to travel virtually. For instance, during this time Pascual Enguídanos Usach (1923–2006, pseudo. George H. White ) developed an incredibly imaginative space opera
The Saga of the Aznars
(La saga de los Aznar, 1953–1958), which is made up of fifty-four novels. Its first hero, aviator Miguel Angel Aznar de Soto, is cast from one time period to another where he experiences various adventures in a very well developed utopian future society. The saga was awarded the distinction of Best Science Fiction Series at the Eurocon in Brussels in 1978.

Contemporary Spanish science fiction writers include Elia Barceló. She is widely read throughout the Latin American world, and has published three science fiction novels:
Sagrada
(Sacred, 1989),
El mundo de Yarek
(Yarek’s World, 1994), and
Consecuencias naturales
(Natural consequences, 1994). Barceló has also won the Ignotus prize, Spain’s primary science fiction award (Bell and Molina-Galiván (235). Her stories often touch upon issues of racism, immigration, and post-colonial Europe. Barceló is a professor of Hispanic Studies and teaches in Austria. Ricardo de la Casa (1954– ) and Pedro Jorge Romero (1967– ) are two good examples of writers who have developed from within fan circles. De la Casa co-founded the fanzine
BEM
and Romero has written many pieces for a number of Spanish-language fanzines (271). Romero is also a major translator of Anglo-American science fiction into Spanish. Both have also published science fiction in their own right. A co-written short story named “The Day We Went Through the Transition” is available in English in
Cosmos Latinos
.

Portugal also produces science fiction, but the stories are overshadowed by Brazilian publications. One author of interest, João Manuel Rosado Barreiros (b. 1952, pseudo. José de Barros), writes satirical dystopias. Several of his short stories have appeared in English, including “Synchronicity” and “The Test.” Luís Filipe Silva (1969– ) has published “Still Memories” in English. These stories are available in the e-zine Fantastic Metropolis. Both authors are also popular in Brazil.

Italy’s science fiction pioneer was Emilio Salgari (1862–1911), also a writer of action-adventure tales in a vein similar to Jules Verne. While none of his science fiction is available in English, several of his Pirates of Malaysia (Sandokan) series are, including its first,
The Mystery of the Black Jungle
(1895). It should also be remembered that a contemporary of Salgari’s, scientist Giovanni Schiaparelli (1835–1910), laid the groundwork for one of science fiction’s most long-standing themes: speculation about life on Mars. His 1877 observation of “canali” on Mars fired the imaginations of many an author and filmmaker.

More recent Italian writers include Italo Calvino (1923–1985) and Valerio Evangelisti (1952– ). Calvino, a much-celebrated “mainstream” writer in Italy, is famous for his playful surrealism and use of allegory. His choice of narrator alone often presents reality askew. For instance,
The Castle of Crossed Destinies
(Il castello dei destini incrociati, 1969) is made up of stories told by mute travelers who meet by chance at a forest castle and conduct a Tarot reading. His two
Cosmicomics
(Cosmicomiche, 1965) and
t zero
(Ti con zero, 1967) are fantastical short stories narrated by a being or essence known as Qfwfq. Calvino himself was a longtime member of the Italian Communist Party, but was forced to leave it after the uprising in Hungary in 1956. Valerio Evangelisti is one of Italy’s most popular contemporary writers and also a political scientist. His Eymerich series, Metal Hurlant series, and Nostradamus Trilogy all have been translated into French, German, Portuguese, and Spanish. He has had many stories published in Urania, Italy’s primary science fiction magazine.

Germany, Austria, and German-speaking Switzerland belong to the same book market. Kurd Lasswitz (1848–1910) was this region’s science fiction pioneer. A preparatory school teacher with a doctorate, he began to write “modern fairy tales” early in his career. He published playful, self-reflective short stories in science magazines, which was a common format for the time. Lasswitz is best known for his socialist utopian epic
On Two Planets
(Auf zwei Planeten, 1897) that relates the first contact between humans and Martians. Mars now has a crater named Lasswitz.

Coincidentally, Lasswitz was a teacher where Hans Dominik was a pupil and inspired the latter to write (Fischer 180). Dominik became Germany’s first mass marketed science fiction author, and wrote one novel a year between 1922–1939. The majority of his novels were spy thrillers and militaristic adventures that glorified German superiority in science and technology. Still read today, Dominik’s stories are now interpreted as having contributed to the culture of German chauvinism that led to the rise of National Socialism. His stories have not been translated into English.

Thea von Harbou (1888–1954), the screenwriter for the famous German film director Fritz Lang, was responsible for writing
Metropolis
(1927), perhaps the most famous and influential science fiction film, and its lesser successor,
Women in the Moon
(Frau im Mond, 1929). Rather than adapting existing stories, von Harbou wrote new fiction specifically for the medium of silent film (Nagl 167). Von Harbou has been largely forgotten due to the fact that she stayed on to write for early sound film in National Socialist Germany, while Fritz Lang emigrated to Hollywood and contributed to the American
film noir
genre of the 1940s and 1950s.

In the postwar period, Austrian Herbert W. Franke (1914– ) has been the most influential within the Western German-language sphere both as a writer and an editor of the German Heyne science fiction series. His more notable works include
The Orchid Cage
(Der Orchideenkäfig, 1961), which explores where human evolution might lead and includes references to virtual reality, and
The Mind Net
(Das Gedankennetz, 1961), where machines create human thoughts. Of Czech birth, Wolfgang Jeschke (1936– ) took over Franke’s role as editor at Heyne. Jeschke’s
The Last Day of Creation
(Der letzte Tag der Schöpfung, 1981) is set on Earth five and a half million years ago just as a nuclear war takes place. The extensive space opera saga
Perry Rhodan also continues to evolve. K.H. Scheer and Clark Darlton first started this series in 1961. Since then, it has spun off into many sub-series written by a variety of authors. It is the most successful science fiction series ever written, selling more than one billion copies worldwide in the form of the pulp booklet.