{"id":2657,"date":"2017-03-16T12:20:07","date_gmt":"2017-03-16T12:20:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/?p=2657"},"modified":"2018-12-15T16:59:09","modified_gmt":"2018-12-15T16:59:09","slug":"science-fantasy-75-august-1965","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/?p=2657","title":{"rendered":"Science Fantasy #75, August 1965"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/p>\n

ISFDB link<\/a><\/p>\n

Other reviews:
\nJohn Boston and Damien Broderick: Strange Highways: Reading Science Fantasy, 1950-67<\/em> (p. 256 of 365) (Amazon UK<\/a>)<\/p>\n

_____________________<\/p>\n

Editor, Kyril Bonfiglioli; Associate Editor, J. Parkhill-Rathbone<\/p>\n

Fiction:
\nThe Desolator<\/em><\/strong> \u2022 short story by Eric C. Williams
\nChemotopia<\/em><\/strong> \u2022 short story by Ernest Hill \u2217<\/strong>
\nIdiot’s Lantern<\/em><\/strong> \u2022 short story by Keith Roberts \u2217<\/strong>\u2217<\/strong>\u2217<\/strong>+
\nParadise for a Punter<\/em><\/strong> \u2022 short story by Clifford C. Reed \u2217<\/strong>\u2217<\/strong>
\nA Way with Animals<\/em><\/strong> \u2022 short story by John T. Phillifent [as by John Rackham] \u2217<\/strong>\u2217<\/strong>
\nGrinnel <\/em><\/strong>\u2022 short fiction by Dikk Richardson –
\nThe Furies<\/em><\/strong> (Part 2 of 3) \u2022 serial by Keith Roberts \u2217<\/strong>\u2217<\/strong><\/p>\n

Non-fiction:
\nCover<\/em><\/strong> \u2022 by Keith Roberts
\nEditorial<\/em><\/strong> \u2022 by Kyril Bonfiglioli<\/p>\n

_____________________<\/p>\n

This issue reprises last month\u2019s contributions from Keith Roberts: he provides the cover plus a serial instalment and a short story. I think the Cover<\/em><\/strong> may be an illustration of the wasp nests from the final part of his serial, but I wouldn\u2019t put money on it.
\nIn this second instalment of The Furies<\/em><\/strong> the story has the same episodic form as the last. The wasps deliver Bill Sampson and the rest of the lorry load of survivors to a camp and leave them, more or less, to their own devices. Later, they start to get themselves organised, and the wasps escort them out of the camp on runs to gather food and provisions. On one of these trips they pick up a cockney girl called Pete, who has a badly torn face and isn’t expected to survive but does.
\nThere are also non-Carnell sleeping arrangements:<\/p>\n

Julie and Maggie made a point of spending every other night with one of the men. Julie told me they\u2019d worked out a rota; I\u2019ve never been sure whether to believe that or not. She said she\u2019d put me on it; there was something undeniably attractive about a night with a raw-boned, enthusiastic blonde but I turned the offer down. I don\u2019t exactly know why; I think it was to do with Jane.  p. 103<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The thing that struck me most about this middle section of the novel was how markedly working class the characters are\u2014I have vague memories that in other British disaster novels the protagonists are usually doctors or professors or the like. As well as Pete\u2019s broad East London\/Cockney accent, the rest of the camp inmates come from a Ken Loach movie, which makes a change for this kind of story:<\/p>\n

Most of the first lorryload had in fact been hauled from Bristol; Harry West was a piano tuner who\u2019d survived a wasp attack on one of the suburbs, Freddy Mitchell a scaffolding erector who\u2019d been working on the redecoration of a ballroom. Owen, the Welshman, was a chef from one of the big hotels there. Len Dilks, the two girls Julie and Margaret, Dave the guitarist and some three or four more were the remnants of a Beatnik colony.  p. 66<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

After the camp has fallen into a routine of sorts Len manufactures a crossbow with Bill\u2019s help, and a breakout is discussed with the rest of the hut. During this, Harry West the piano tuner disagrees with the plan and is shot by Pete before he can warn the wasps. The rest then break out and head for the hills.
\nThe last half of this instalment is set in the caves at Chill Leer in the Mendips. Here we get a few pages of spelunking before they set up camp and begin waging a guerrilla war on the wasps. When winter comes the wasps die off naturally, which makes you wonder why they bothered with hit and run attacks in the first place. They then start a winter hunt for the hibernating queens to prevent any future colonies.
\nTowards the end there is a scene that has a drunk Pete holding a queen Fury captive\u2014rather than having killed it outright Pete has taken it for \u2018interrogation.\u2019 Bill finds her, bayonet in hand, with the wingless, legless queen strapped to a board. She tells Bill how her parents died during the attack by the Furies and reveals aspects of her life before the invasion, another section that you probably wouldn’t have found in the Carnell version of the magazine:<\/p>\n

She said wildly \u201cThey all knew me, in Westrincham. You ask anybody, did they know Jan Peterson. You\u2019d have got a real laugh. That\u2019s the biggest laugh of all. Din\u2019t I ever tell you what I was Bill, din\u2019t I say?\u201d
\n\u201cI\u2019m more interested in what you are now. What you\u2019re doing to yourself . . .
\nHer voice had developed a thin edge of hysteria. She said \u201cI was a whore, Bill. Common muckin\u2019 prostitute. Best ride in town . . .\u201d She wiped her forehead with the back of her hand. \u201cNow look shocked. Now tell me I\u2019m a bleedin\u2019 barbarian again . . .\u2019\u2019
\nI didn\u2019t speak.
\nShe said \u201cI were the old black sheep. That\u2019s the laugh. I were the one that wadn\u2019t no good. Dad used to tell me. \u2018Never come to no good you won\u2019t, my gal,\u2019 that were what he used to say. \u2018Never come to no good . . .\u2019 But when they come, they took him orf instead. Him and Mum and the kids. That\u2019s the joke, they left me . . .
\n\u201cI used to work three nights a week at the flicks. Used to get a lot o\u2019 trade from that. Rest o\u2019 the time I was on the streets. I used to do all right. I\u2019d got this place I went to, this pub. They didn\u2019t care. Everybody knew about it. The old man knew. They all knew Jan Peterson. I was at it up in the smoke only Dad didn\u2019t know then. But you couldn\u2019t keep things quiet in Westrincham. It wadn\u2019t the same . . .  p. 124-125<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

This comes over as somewhat overdone melodrama, although the cruel treatment of the Fury queen gives it a visceral edge.
\nAfter this, Bill decides he has had enough of Chill Leer: he grabs a car and drives off to the coast. He runs into the army who open fire on him when he won\u2019t stop. The car crashes, and he loses consciousness.
\nThe story that Keith Roberts also contributes to this issue is Idiot’s Lantern<\/em><\/strong>, an \u2018Anita the Witch\u2019 story, and it is probably one of the best of that series.
\nAnita arranges for a TV to be installed in the cottage to entertain both the witches during the dark winter nights and, after some initial resistance, Granny Thompson is captivated.
\nAnita later tires of the device when she discovers that it interferes with her other senses: this leads to the loss of some of her favourite wildlife when she isn’t there to defend them. She later sees a chance to get rid of the TV when Granny Thompson applies to be a contestant on a quiz show.1<\/sup> They are accepted and travel to London, but when they eventually end up on air, it does not go well:<\/p>\n

The quizmaster introduced them as \u201cMrs. and Miss Thompson, from Northamptonshire\u201d and asked for \u201ca big hand\u201d for some obscure reason. Applause pattered like gunfire and Granny looked startled. She muttered to Anita, \u201cWe ent done nothink yit . . .\u201d
\nThe machines caught the words and flung them out on the air. The audience roared delightedly and Granny Thompson\u2019s lips set in a thin line. Anita began exultantly planning the best escape route. Everything was working out just as she\u2019d thought it would. It was one thing to watch this show from an easy chair at home but quite another to be up on stage helping provide the kicks. That wasn\u2019t quite so damn funny . . .
\nThe compere beamed. \u201cBut you will do something, Mrs. Thompson, you will. We\u2019re all quite sure of that. Now, this really most delightful girl, would you step forward a little, please, my dear, that\u2019s it, let all the folks have a good view. Now this is your granddaughter you tell me, Mrs. Thompson, that is correct is it not?\u201d
\nGranny turned from glaring at a camera that was very obviously examining Anita\u2019s cleavage. She opened her mouth, considered, then closed it again like a rat trap. She said frostily, \u201cNo, has a matter hof fact . . . she ent. She \u2019eppens ter be the daughter hof a third cousin. Hon me mother\u2019s side . . .\u201d
\n\u201cBut you have brought her up?\u201d
\n\u201cYis . . .\u201d
\n\u201cAnd very charmingly too if I may say, yes very charmingly . . . For the benefit of his audience the compere rolled his eyes and appeared about to drool. \u201cVery nicely too . . . And you\u2019re going to answer questions on, let me see, on folklore, isn\u2019t it, that is correct, folklore?\u201d
\n\u201cOm orlready tole<\/em> yer twice,\u201d muttered Granny fiercely. \u201cYou blokes do goo on, dunt yer?\u201d  p. 32<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Things continue to deteriorate during the first question and finally fall apart when the compere asks the second:<\/p>\n

Now for two pounds, two pounds, can you tell me three old-time cures for rheumatism? Any three you can think of now, any three at all . . .\u201d
\nAnita thought she was going to burst. This was it, this just had to be it . . .
\n\u201cToads,\u201d snarled Granny. \u201cRound yer neckit usually though yer can stick \u2019em practic-ly anywheer. I dunt \u2019old with \u2019em though. Sheep jollop’s best, that kent \u2019ardly be beat ..
\nThe compere\u2019s face changed abruptly. Up above, someone began a frantic signalling. \u201cYer dries it,\u201d bellowed Granny inexorably. \u201cThen rubs it uwer anythink wot \u2019urts. That gen’rally answers. But if it dunt<\/em>, try dugs\u2019 wotsits . . .\u201d
\nThe quizmaster was aghast. The audience convulsed. \u201cOnly they ent so easy come by ner more,\u201d explained Granny. \u201cThey\u2019re the things though\u2014\u201d
\n\u201cMrs. Thompson, please\u2014\u201d
\n\u201cYou \u2019as ter spell \u2019em up,\u201d screeched the old lady. \u201cBile \u2019em. I kent tell yer the spells \u2019cos they\u2019re a trade secret but if yer teks my advice\u2014\u201d
\nThe compere was trying to hustle them away from the mikes. He no longer looked suave. \u201cI ent‍ finished<\/em>,\u201d fumed Granny. The great man spoke between his teeth. \u201cYou have, lady, by God you have . . .\u201d
\n\u201cDunt you blaspheme in my presence,\u201d shrieked the elder Thompson. The stick was up at last, beating the air. Faint blue crackles emerged from its tip. \u201cTek yer \u2019ands orf<\/em>,\u201d snarled Granny. She swung round. \u201cAn\u2019 stop pokin\u2019 that thing down our gel\u2019s frock<\/em> . . . The camera received a full charge from the spellstick, whistled backward and began making thunderous circuits of the stage.  p. 34<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

After they escape to their cottage Granny Thompson takes her revenge. The last line is as appropriate today as it was fifty years ago.
\nThe rest of the fiction is a very mixed bag. The Desolator<\/em><\/strong> by Eric C. Williams2<\/sup> is a pretty dreadful time-travel story that involves a man from a grim future time-travelling back to the past to make his fortune and live comfortably. . . Until the police catch up with him that is. It is clich\u00e9d, and has clunky science explanations too.
\nChemotopia<\/em><\/strong> by Ernest Hill is, I suppose, a satire about the treatment of three teenage droogs, sorry, delinquents who are picked up from a police station and taken for medical treatment after the murder of an old woman. The doctor and nurse chat away dispassionately during their further transgressions, e.g. bad language, exposing themselves, etc. After medicating them they go home and do the same to themselves. This one reads a little like a B-movie version of A Clockwork Orange<\/em>.
\nParadise for a Punter<\/em><\/strong> by Clifford C. Reed is a fantasy about a man at a racecourse getting particularly good odds from the bookies for the favourites, and he can’t quite understand why. The ending (spoiler) reveals that he is dead. That said, it is well enough done, if obvious.
\nA Way with Animals<\/em><\/strong> by John T. Phillifent has a man in police custody explaining why there was a fire in his flat. It materialises that while on holiday at his aunt\u2019s he freed a dragon that was trapped in a cave. Subsequently, it came back to his flat to live with him, or more accurately on the flat roof of his building, although it pops in every now and then\u2014hence the fire. This is a readable enough story and better than it sounds.
\nGrinnel <\/em><\/strong>by Dikk Richardson3<\/sup> is a short-short which starts off like this:<\/p>\n

Shelley had never liked Granville. Now, he had been pushed too far.
\nLooking Granville straight in the eye, he said ”Grinnel.\u201d
\n\u201cI beg your pardon,\u201d said his boss, an outraged look on his face.
\n\u201cGrinnel,\u201d repeated Shelley. \u201cGrinnel. Grinnel.\u201d
\n\u201cAre you swearing at me?\u201d demanded Granville.
\n\u201cGrinnel,\u201d said Shelley again, making it obvious that he was not. \u201cGrinnel. Grinnel. Grinnel.\u201d
\n\u201cDon\u2019t be a bloody fool.\u201d
\n\u201cGrinnel.\u201d
\n\u201cShelley!\u2014Damn it, man, stop!\u201d  p. 58<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

. . . and continues in a similar manner for another couple of hundred words. Another TBSF (typical Bonfiglioli space filler).<\/p>\n

This issue\u2019s Editorial<\/em><\/strong> sees Kyril Bonfiglioli discuss SF and science in the 1930s and the differences between then and now. This will give you a flavour:<\/p>\n

But the s.f. of the 30s was not an inferior form of the art so much as something different altogether. No one took seriously the cardboard masks of the heroes and heroines of the space sagas. They were the masks behind which we became, in imagination, what we thought we should be. We felt our imperfection and we still had the idea that, somehow, perfection could be reached by striving, by will-power, by self-control. Such s.f. had something of the qualities of a myth or fairytale and became part of our experience. We participated in it and it changed us a little.
\nIn a curious way, we have all grown up: even teenagers seem much more mature than they were. Perhaps the need for a myth has vanished. Anyhow, we have substituted illusions about ideals for illusions about ourselves being disillusioned, and get the kind of s.f. we deserve.  p. 3<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

A rather dreary issue with little of note bar Roberts\u2019 Idiot’s Lantern<\/em><\/strong>. \u25cf<\/p>\n

_____________________<\/p>\n

1. I think the quiz in Roberts\u2019 story is based on Double Your Money<\/em>, which was hosted by Hughie Green. I can remember watching it as a kid\u2014if you are of a similar age and viewing experience to me you\u2019ll get even more out of the story.<\/p>\n

2. The majority of Eric William\u2019s output was several novels for Robert Hale but he also published a number of short stories in three distinct batches. The first batch included three pieces to Amateur Science Stories<\/em> in the late 1930s. Later, in the mid to late sixties, just before he got started on his novels, he published half a dozen more (sold to, believe it or not, five different editors: John Carnell, Michael Moorcock, Kyril Bonfiglioli, Harry Harrison\u2014maybe that one was Keith Roberts\u2014and Philip Harbottle). There was a final tranche of short stories around the beginning of the century. More at ISFDB<\/a>.<\/p>\n

3. I am informed by David Redd (personal email 15th<\/sup> December 2018) that Grinnel<\/em> was first published in Graham Hall\u2019s one-off fanzine Doubt<\/em> (October 1964), and that, more confusingly, \u201cI discover[ed] on the web . . . that Graham sometimes borrowed Dikk Richardson’s name. However Doubt<\/em> stated \u2018NONE OF THE FAN-FICTION IS UNDER PEN-NAMES\u2019.\u201d
\nI personally do not think that either this Richardson story, or another squib, A Funny Thing Happened . . .<\/em> (New Worlds SF<\/em> #152, July 1965) were Hall’s work (contrast and compare these two with the latter\u2019s vastly superior Sun Push<\/em> in New Worlds SF<\/em> #170).  \u25cf<\/p>\n

Edited 15th<\/sup> December 2018: Footnote 3 about Richardson’s <\/em>Grinnel added. Formatting changes.<\/em><\/p>\n\"rss\"<\/a>\"rss\"<\/a><\/span>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

ISFDB link Other reviews: John Boston and Damien Broderick: Strange Highways: Reading Science Fantasy, 1950-67 (p. 256 of 365) (Amazon UK) _____________________ Editor, Kyril Bonfiglioli; Associate Editor, J. Parkhill-Rathbone Fiction: The Desolator \u2022 short story by Eric C. Williams Chemotopia \u2022 short story by Ernest Hill \u2217 Idiot’s Lantern \u2022 short story by Keith Roberts […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2657","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-science-fantasy"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6Pcj7-GR","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2657","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2657"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2657\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9306,"href":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2657\/revisions\/9306"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2657"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2657"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2657"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}