{"id":9905,"date":"2019-03-02T15:20:31","date_gmt":"2019-03-02T15:20:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/?p=9905"},"modified":"2019-05-01T12:52:56","modified_gmt":"2019-05-01T12:52:56","slug":"astounding-science-fiction-v31n05-july-1943","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/?p=9905","title":{"rendered":"Astounding Science-Fiction v31n05, July 1943"},"content":{"rendered":"

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ISFDB link<\/a>
\nArchive.org link<\/a><\/p>\n

_____________________<\/p>\n

Editor, John W. Campbell Jr.; Assistant Editor, Catherine Tarrant<\/p>\n

Fiction:
\nHunch <\/em><\/strong>\u2022 novelette by Clifford D. Simak –
\nUnthinking Cap<\/em><\/strong> \u2022 short story by John R. Pierce \u2217<\/strong>
\nThe Great Engine<\/em><\/strong> \u2022 novelette by A. E. van Vogt \u2217<\/strong>\u2217<\/strong>
\nThe Renegade<\/em><\/strong> \u2022 short story by Lester del Rey [as by Marion Henry] \u2217<\/strong>\u2217<\/strong>\u2217<\/strong>
\nGleeps <\/em><\/strong>\u2022 short story by P. Schuyler Miller –
\nGather, Darkness!<\/em><\/strong> (Part 3 of 3) \u2022 serial by Fritz Leiber \u2217<\/strong>\u2217<\/strong>\u2217<\/strong>\u2217<\/strong><\/p>\n

Non-fiction:
\nCover <\/em><\/strong>\u2022 by William Timmins
\nInterior artwork<\/em><\/strong> \u2022 by A. Williams (x3), Paul Orban (x3), Elton Fax (x3), Frank Kramer (x5)
\nSo It\u2019s Impossible\u2014<\/em><\/strong> \u2022 editorial by John W. Campbell, Jr.
\nThe Analytical Laboratory: May 1943<\/em><\/strong> \u2022 story ratings
\nIn Times to Come
\nThe World of 61 Cygni C<\/em><\/strong> \u2022 science essay by R. S. Richardson
\nBrass Tacks<\/em><\/strong> \u2022 letters<\/p>\n

_____________________<\/p>\n

Hunch <\/em><\/strong>by Clifford D. Simak has as its protagonist a man called Chambers, chairman of the Solar Control Board. He is blind and \u201csees\u201d by telepathically sharing the sight of Hannibal, an enigmatic alien\u2014although only when the latter isn\u2019t dreaming of home.<\/p>\n

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Chambers meets\u00a0Allen, head of the Solar Secret Service, and they discuss the developing problem of men going mad (or \u201cbatty\u201d as this unsophisticated story occasionally describes it) in the various colonies of the solar system:<\/p>\n

For years now there had been a breakdown of human efficiency. It had started gradually, a few incidents here, a few there. But it had spread, had progressed almost geometrically; had reached a point now where, unless something could be done about it, the Solar System\u2019s economic and industrial fabric would go to pot for lack of men to run it and the power plants and laboratories, the mills, the domed cities, the communication system men had built on all the planets encircling the Sun would crumble into dust.
\nMen were better trained, better equipped mentally, more brilliant than ever before. Of that there was no question. They had to be. Hundreds of jobs demanded geniuses. And there were geniuses, thousands of them, more than ever before. Trouble was they didn\u2019t stay geniuses. They went insane.\u00a0 p. 11<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The two men then speak about an asylum on one of the system\u2019s asteroids, the Sanctuary, free of charge to those that need treatment. Little is known about this shadowy organisation, and Allen\u2019s agents have not been able to gather any intelligence.
\nAt this point the story cuts to various scenes that set up elements that appear later in the story: a socialite loses her alien jewels at a party but, after screaming about it, seems to ignore the matter; a Plutonian scientist called Kemp walks in on Johnny Gardner and finds he has gone insane\u2014the man goes to Sanctuary; an archaeologist called Monk is thinking about a Martian translation he has completed and the information it reveals about a fifth planet when he gets a delivery. This latter package is the stolen asteroid jewels. He hears a screeching violin play when he opens the box and dashes the jewels against a cabinet. He gets a glimpse of something like a crippled fairy before it vanishes.
\nAt this point in the story none of this makes any sense, but matters become clearer as the story plods on. It eventually becomes (spoiler) a tale about an alien threat to Earth from the former inhabitants of the fifth planet, who the Martians (a dead race of whom Hannibal is one) destroy, turning their planet into the asteroid belt. Some of the natives survive as jewels however, their \u201cencysted\u201d form, and later find their way to Sanctuary, using it as a front to brainwash Earthmen. This threat is later revealed by Kemp who is sent there along with Hannibal by Chambers.<\/p>\n

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The last part of the story (Kemp escapes from Sanctuary and raises the alarm but goes mad) involves a message to Chalmers saying that some people have accurate hunches, and that this is a new or returning instinct that is developing in the human race. What this has to do with the madness and alien jewels, etc., I have no idea, and it sounds like one of Campbell\u2019s hobby horses randomly stuffed into the story.
\nIn conclusion, this is a terrible, clunky piece that has too many ideas, all ploddingly explained, and which Simak struggles to marshal efficiently. It reads like a poor story from 1938, and what is perplexing is that other writers who were producing similar material (Bond, Cummings, Williams, Rocklynne, etc.) are mostly or entirely gone from the pages of Astounding<\/em>. Was Campbell short of material? Was Simak a friend? All I know is that, based on this and an earlier story, Simak was a pretty poor writer at this point in his career.1<\/sup>
\nI note in passing that the prose is as clunky as the story, and that there are two clumsy\/ungrammatical sentences on the first page: \u201c. . . brought about by Hannibal\u2019s frequent thinking of the place\u201d and \u201cVisual communication the picturing of actualities, yes\u2014\u201d. Should this be \u201cfrequent thoughts\u201d and \u201cVisually communicating\u201d? On the next page there is \u201cGeniuses is our trouble\u201d followed at the end of the same paragraph with \u201cAnd geniuses are screwy\u201d. Only one of these can be right. I know this is dialogue, but still. . . .
\nUnthinking Cap<\/em><\/strong> by John R. Pierce is a forgettable squib about a man extracted from the present and used as a test subject in the future. To reward him for his service in that time the liaison man allows him to take an artefact back with him. The item he chooses is a cap that, when you press the attached button, makes the wearer forget a remembered memory or current thought.<\/p>\n

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Once back in his own time he experiments with the device and, (spoiler) while thinking about the machine, he accidentally presses the button and forgets what it does. He presses the button again and forgets everything. This latter step (multiple memory loss) doesn\u2019t make much sense.
\nThere is a coda that implies that the liaison man knew this would be the outcome (and there is a \u201cborogove\u201d reference in the last line, which presumably means something).
\nThere is the kernel of a good story here\u2014what would you forget if you could, and would you?\u2014but this version just doesn\u2019t work.
\nThe Great Engine<\/em><\/strong> by A. E. van Vogt is the first of the \u2018Pendrake\u2019 series and starts with him finding a strange engine that has fallen out of the sky in into the countryside. Pendrake examines the machine, and nearly loses his one remaining arm when he pokes a branch into the maw of the machine and is thrown up into the air by the force of the branch\u2019s subsequent rotation. The branch remains in the machine spinning rapidly.<\/p>\n

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Pendrake subsequently recovers the machine to his house, and we get some backstory: it is 1948, there are no stories in the paper about its loss of the machine, and there is mention of a failed relationship with a neighbour (we find out later that this is his estranged wife).
\nThe rest of the story runs along two tracks: the first details Pendrake\u2019s attempt to use the machine, which involves replacing the branch with a metal rod and then commissioning a machine shop to build a clutch so he can use the machine to power an aircraft; the second involves his rapprochement with his wife, something that begins when he goes to the bank for a loan to build the clutch and discovers that she secretly transferred most of their properties and money to him after they separated.
\nMatters become more complicated when, after flying his aircraft for the first time (how he does this with one arm is not explained) he is held up by four men on landing, and who give him money to cover his expenses before flying the plane away. Pendrake goes to the police but gets nowhere, so he contacts an old friend. By the time the latter and an Air Force contact turn up at Pendrake\u2019s house, he has had threats about his wife\u2019s safety, so he says nothing. Pendrake then goes to her and explains what has happened; she suggests that, as the machine is obviously an atomic engine, they research the whereabouts of current atomic scientists.<\/p>\n

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At this point what has been a relatively intriguing story turns into something much less convincing. Pendrake burgles a scientist\u2019s office and, acting on information found there, and equipped with a flesh mask and an artificial arm, he and his wife infiltrate an organisation looking for farm settlers. They are drugged during the application process and put on a spaceship to Venus. Pendrake, however, is injected in his artificial arm so he recovers quickly after the launch. As he looks around he sees several engines, and realises they are acting as anti-gravity drives. He soon has control of the ship.<\/p>\n

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This story is an enjoyable and intriguing read until the last part with its far-fetched idea of press-ganging people to Venus.
\nPossibly of note is the emotional state that Pendrake exhibits throughout the story (his estrangement from his wife is on his mind throughout, and he tries on more than one occasion to reconcile with her before being successful). This particular theme is something I haven\u2019t noticed in van Vogt\u2019s fiction so far, and I believe it is also a feature of a forthcoming story, The Storm<\/em> (October 1943).
\nLester del Rey\u2019s impressive debut story The Faithful<\/em> (Astounding<\/em>, April 1938) was an \u2018Uplift\u2019 story2<\/sup> about intelligent dogs and gorillas in a post-apocalypse Earth: The Renegade<\/em><\/strong> revisits this theme:<\/p>\n

Harvey Lane squatted just inside the door of the chief\u2019s thatched hut, his outward attention divided between the chief\u2019s laborious attempts to sew on a button belonging to Lane\u2019s only pair of shorts and the life in the village itself. Outwardly, it was little different from that of any other inland African community, though the cleanliness and the absence of a constant confused babble were strange, as was the lack of yapping cur dogs underfoot. But to anyone else, the huge females busy at their gardening or making the crude artifacts possible with the material at hand, the playing young, and the bulky guards squatting in the lower branches around would have been distinctly not normal.
\nLane was used to it. In eight years a man can become completely accustomed to anything, even the sight of some hundreds of gorillas busy at work that would normally be men\u2019s. He knew every one of the hairy, heavily muscled apes out there, so well that he no longer saw their faces as ugly things, but as the individual countenances of friends and students.
\nNow he leaned further back, brushing against a muscular shoulder while one of the bulls in the hut flicked a fan back and forth to keep the flies off his hairless hide until the chief finished the sewing and he could put on his tattered shorts again.
\nAjub, the chief, had been thinking; now he picked up the conversation again, his voice thick and slow, and the consonants sometimes distorted; but his speech in the English for which they had so gladly exchanged their own primitive, [inexpressive] tongue was no worse than could be found in parts of the larger man-cities. \u201cIt was about fifty years ago, I think, when we decided to come here and build a village away from all the blacks; we\u2019d been trying to learn from them before that for maybe a hundred years, but all they showed for us was hatred, fear, and a desire to kill us and eat us, so we gave it up as hopeless; the harder we tried, the more afraid of us they became. And the one white man we\u2019d seen before you came, hadn\u2019t been exactly friendly; he killed several of our tribe before we were forced to eliminate him and his group. Beyond that, our memory and our poor speech give no clue.\u201d\u00a0 p. 87-88<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

There is then some backstory about Lane\u2019s history, his dissolute life in civilisation, and how he was lost in the jungle until he stumbled upon the uplifted apes. They took him back to their village and nursed him back to health. Little Tama, one of the younger apes, interupts his reverie and comes with news of books he has found in a drifting canoe. Lane goes to inspect the canoe and finds various items including a woman\u2019s shoe. This disturbs Lane\u2019s equilibrium, and memories of human life crash down on him. He gets in the canoe and leaves, much to Little Tama\u2019s anguish.<\/p>\n

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The subsequent trip downriver is fraught with danger and, even though Lane avoids various hazards, he is almost killed when pursued by three canoes full of spear throwing black men. Only the intervention of an unseen group saves him, but during the battle he is knocked unconscious.
\nHe eventually comes around to find himself in civilization, where an elderly white woman is nursing him. She tells him that he has had a fever for a week. Later, he overhears the woman and a man speaking about him, and that he has been missing for eight years and has been declared legally dead. At the end of their discussion Lane discovers he has revealed the secret of the apes\u2019 village during his fever, and that an expedition is setting off to hunt and trap the apes. Lane dresses and leaves with the intention of warning the tribe, but soon realises he will find it difficult to get back unaided. Just as he is beginning to despair, Ajub appears from the undergrowth. The ape knows all about the expedition, and has sent one of the other gorillas home with a warning. He also reveals that apes from the tribe have watched over him since he left, and that they were the ones that saved him in the canoe attack.<\/p>\n

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Ajub offers to take Lane back home\u2014the ape\u2019s intention is to take him to his sick quarters\u2014only to have Lane tell him that his home is to the north, where the tribe live.
\nThis has a relatively slight plot but it is a smartly put together one and, if you like animal stories, or uplift stories where animals manifest humanity\u2019s better virtues, then you\u2019ll like this.
\nGleeps <\/em><\/strong>by P. Schuyler Miller starts with a couple of pages of waffle where the narrator describes (at over much length) an alien called Gleeps:<\/p>\n

It seems there were two Martians, Xnpqrdt and Tdrqpnx. Or maybe it was two Venusians\u2014or even two Irishmen. You know how the thing goes as well as I do.
\nSo these two Martians meet on a street somewhere\u2014let\u2019s say it was on Main Street in Plnth\u2014and Tdrqpnx says to Xnpqrdt: \u201cWho was that cysystk I seen you with last night?\u201d
\nAnd Xnpqrdt\u2014if it was Xnpqrdt\u2014turns bright pea-green and answers: \u201cThat was no cysystk\u2014that was Gleeps.\u201d\u00a0 p. 99<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The rest of the story involves the narrator, who is an astrogator joining a tramp liner\/spaceship for a cruise. He meets an old Martian friend on his arrival at the ship and promptly gets drunk with him (as you would when you are away to take off). He then gets in to trouble when he appears drunk in front of the captain with the calculations for the warp jump.<\/p>\n

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When the captain eventually engages the warp drive it causes a series of incomprehensible events, naked blondes, gun fights, etc., which the narrator then spends the last two or three pages explaining (apparently this is all caused by Gleeps, who can change shape).
\nThis is all told in an irritatingly juvenile voice, and is structurally a mess. It is absolutely awful, and if I could give it negative stars I would.
\nGather, Darkness!<\/em><\/strong> by Fritz Leiber ended last issue with the Goniface, the Archpriest of the fake religion that rules a future Earth, planning a Revival to quell the rioting fomented by the Witchcraft, a resistance movement dedicated to the church\u2019s overthrow. This instalment begins with a restive crowd, pacified with parasympathetic rays, watching the churchmen arrive. For the first time in the novel we get a detailed idea of the extent and structures of the church:<\/p>\n

The high doors of the Cathedral swung outward, and there issued forth, four abreast, a procession which incarnated the pomp and power of the Hierarchy. First two high-ranking priests, bearing censers. Then a contingent of black-robed deacons. Next, a column of First Circle priests, whose scarlet robes were without emblazonment. Tall, young men, and handsome. Their shaven heads imparted a strange unearthliness to their beauty. It was easy for their relatives in the crowd to forget\u2014or almost forget\u2014that these young demigods had ever been Commoners.
\nFollowing them, the higher circles. The crowd recognized them by their emblazonments, although they did not know the true significance of those emblazonments, thinking them mystic symbols confirming the frightening supernatural powers of their wearers.
\nHand giving a blessing and at the same time grasping a stylus\u2014emblazonment of the Second Circle. The circle of pastoral priests, clerks, minor confessors, minor technicians, minor everything else.
\nDiagram in silver and gold of the intertwined nervous and circulatory system\u2014\u201cthe little bush,\u201d the Commoners called it\u2014emblazonment of the Third Circle of doctors, confessors, hypnotists and psychiatrists.
\nLightning-and-coil\u2014the insignia of the Fourth Circle. Very competent looking, clear-eyed priests, these. They were the technicians, engineers, and lesser managers who kept the scientific heart of the Hierarchy ticking. From this circle the ranks of the Seventh and the Apex were largely recruited.
\nAnd all the while, as they marched in stateliness and dignity from the Cathedral, circling the space the deacons had kept clear, before drawing up in ranks around the reviewing stand, the music strengthened and swelled, the original somberness brightened with the skirling of flutes and the clash of cymbals, enriched with the throaty tones of woodwinds and strings, as if the Great God were proceeding with the creation, and sun and stars and lush green grass were showing forth.
\nAtomic probe entwined by a reading tape\u2014the Commoners thought it a rod and serpent\u2014 the Fifth Circle of research scientists, scholars, historians and professional artists. At this point the size of the contingents decreased sharply.
\nHuman brain encircled by stylized equations in psycho-sociology\u2014the Sixth Circle. These were the shrewd ones, the knowing ones. Experts in propaganda and social control. Research psychologists and psychiatrists.
\nClenched fist with lines of force radiating from it\u2014and that meant the same thing in any symbols. Power. The Seventh Circle of supervisors, major executives, general managers.
\nAnd as the priests marched, as the music grew ever more rich and warm and dazzling\u2014as if it were climbing like the sun to the top of the sky\u2014they seemed to tread under their feet all evil, all darkness, all rebellion, any and everything that presumed to lift its head against the Hierarchy.\u00a0 p. 121-122<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

After this impressive arrival matters start to spiral out of control. First, there is the puzzling smell of goat and then, when the Great God bends over the crowd to bestow his manna upon the masses:<\/p>\n

Slowly the Gargantuan hands stretched out over the Square, palms upward, in a gesture of tital generosity.
\nThen, from the right hand, ten thousand tiny fountains suddenly sprayed, while from the left cascaded down a rain of crusty flakes and tiny cubes.
\nA greedy, happy, excited, quite involuntary cry rose from the crowd, as the food and drink began to sprinkle them.
\nOne second. Two. Three. And then the cry changed abruptly to a strangled spewing, and there swept through the massed ranks of the priests and across the reviewing stand a hideous stench that seemed compounded equally of putrid meat, rancid butter, moldy bread, vinegar and embalming fluid.
\nAs from one giant throat, the crowd gargled, retched and spat. And still the noisome rain and noxious snow continued irrevocably to fall, drenching them, plastering them. Hands were ducked, hoods-pulled up. Those who had spread sheets crowded under them, while a few of those who had held up bowls now inverted them and clapped them on their heads. And still the dreadful stuff rained down, so thickly that the farther side of the Square was murkily obscured.
\nSnarls then, and angry cries. First a few, then more. Here and there the fringes of the crowd surged forward against the double line of deacons.\u00a0 p. 124-125<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

After this there is rioting, and the priests who intervene to help the deacons find their repulsion fields have been reversed and they all clump together. Angels take to the sky but one crashes into the crowd, heralding the arrival of their Witchcraft equivalents.<\/p>\n

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At one point during the turmoil Brother Jarles realises that the voice of the Archpriest Sercival, leader of the Hierarchy\u2019s Fanatic faction, is the same as the one he heard at the Coven\u2014the hard-liner Sercival is Asomodeus, leader of the Witchcraft! Jarles fires his wrath-ray at him.
\nThis chapter is an excellent set piece (albeit one that gets off to a slow start) but is spoiled a little when Goniface interrogates the dying Sercival, his questions more explanations of many of the story\u2019s recent events, the way they spoiled the food, the pain in his hand during a previous interrogation of witches, etc., etc.
\nAt the end of this cross-examination Sercival\/Asomodeus dies.
\nThe rest of this instalment (after a semi-comedic chapter where Mother Jujy finds an exhausted Dickon in the tunnels and feeds him) revolves around the (spoiler) telepathic influencing\/hypnotising of Jarles and Goniface via their recently born familiars. The first of these is described in another long chapter where Jarles undergoes a mental struggle, sees visions, etc., that cause him to revert to his earlier self.<\/p>\n

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Later on in the story the same subliminal telepathic contact is used on Goniface while he is at the Web Center supervising operations against the Witchcraft. As the battle ebbs and flows he enters a heightened state of awareness, and comes to the conclusion that the Hierarchy is at its peak and will soon start to fail. He daydreams about his childhood and starts hearing a phrase \u201cCome back, Knowles Satrick\u201d (his former name). He then gets a message from one of his operatives that his voice has been heard in his apartments, so he leaves to investigate.
\nOn his arrival there Goniface finds Naurya\u2014along with the ghosts of all the people he murdered on his journey to the top of the Hierarchy. When he gets another message from the centre about the battle, he tells them to stop all counter attacks until tomorrow\u2014the Witchcraft have finally managed to use these induced visions to manipulate him into making a fatal error in the fight against them.
\nApart from moving the story on this chapter provides a convincing description of Goniface\u2019s life, an effective account that creates a portrait of fully realised character. It is quite unlike the usual material you normally find in Astounding<\/em>.
\nThere are a couple of other points of interest in this last instalment. The first occurs between the chapters where Jarles and Goniface are telepathically manipulated by their familiars, where Jarles and others go to rescue the Black Man and the rest of the witches. This scene has a light-sabre (wrath ray) duel between The Black Man and Cousin Deth:<\/p>\n

A door across the corridor opened and through it stepped Cousin Deth. In the next moment he proved Goniface\u2019s wisdom in having chosen him as chief agent in matters requiring quick thinking. With almost incredible swiftness he recognized the situation and directed his wrath rod at the Black Man and Jarles.
\nBut a familiar\u2019s reactions are swifter than a man\u2019s. In a blur of movement Dickon scuttled at him across the floor.
\nDeth\u2019s sallow face was contorted suddenly with a fear that had only been there once before\u2014when he fled panic-stricken from the haunted house.
\n\u201cThe thing in the hole!\u201d he cried hollowly. \u201cThe spider!\u201d
\nA moment more and he had realized his misapprehension, had regained control of himself, as the violet needle of his wrath ray was swinging down at Dickon.
\nBut the Black Man had gained time to act. His own wrath ray lashed out, swished into that of Cousin Deth\u2019s.
\nSince the two rays were mutually impenetrable, unable to cross through each other, Deth\u2019s was fended off from Dickon.
\nLike two ancient swordsmen, then, the warlock and the deacon dueled together. Their weapons were two endless blades of violet incandescence, but their tactics were those of sabreurs\u2014feint, cut, parry, swift riposte. Ceiling, walls, and floor were traced with redly glowing curlicues. Paralyzed deacons, seeming like spectators frozen in amazement, were burned down where they stood or stooped or sat.\u00a0 p. 140-141<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

This Star Wars<\/em>-esque light sabre duel may have been common in the pulps of this time, but it is the first one I have come across, and I wondered if this is where George Lucas got the idea for his movie.
\nThe other thing I found interesting occurs in the last (washup) chapter. I\u2019ve previously mentioned a couple of similarities between Leiber\u2019s novel and van Vogt\u2019s work, and I think that the ending may be another example. In this section Leiber opens out the story onto a much larger canvas: when a space ship arrives from Luciferopolis, the angels it discharges are black, and they are on the side of the Witchcraft. They come from colonies on Venus and Mars, and we learn that it was an interplanetary war that caused the Blasted Heath and almost destroyed the Golden Age. A story that has, until now, mostly played out in the capital of the Hierarchy suddenly spans the Solar System! (cf. \u201cThis is the race that will rule the Sevagram!”\u2014the bootstrapping last line from van Vogt’s The Weapon Makers<\/em>.)<\/p>\n

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The final scene of the novel describes the destruction of the Great God\u2019s statue, and its head falling into the street (a missed opportunity for a great illustration).
\nThis is a very good novel, and highly entertaining.3<\/sup> I thought it better than Conjure Wife<\/em>, and think it\u2019s possibly one of the best things I\u2019ve read in Astounding<\/em> so far. If you haven\u2019t read this yet I recommend that you do so.<\/p>\n

The Cover<\/em><\/strong>, as ever in this period, is by William Timmins\u2014one of his average efforts I think (it is a bit muddy for my taste). My favourites among this issue\u2019s Interior artwork<\/em><\/strong> are two of the illustrations by A. Williams for the Simak story, and the third of Elton Fax\u2019s illustrations for the van Vogt: this latter looks very much like something John Schoenherr could have produced years later. Paul Orban\u2019s work is okay (I liked the first of his for the del Rey) but I\u2019m beginning to find Kramer\u2019s work lacking\u2014it seems a little crude and is not improving unlike, say, Kolliker, who seems to have upped his game, as shown by recent work here and Unknown<\/em>.
\nSo It\u2019s Impossible\u2014 <\/em><\/strong>by John W. Campbell, Jr. is a short science article about the development of a twenty million volt betatron (this produces very high energy electrons that are\u00a0used in the likes of X-ray machines etc.) by Donald Kerst at the University of Illinois.4<\/sup>
\nThe Analytical Laboratory: May 1943<\/em><\/strong> was discussed in the review of that issue.5<\/sup>
\nIn Times to Come<\/em><\/strong> discusses C. L. Moore\u2019s new novel (a two-part serial) at some length:<\/p>\n

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The World of 61 Cygni C<\/em><\/strong> by R. S. Richardson starts off with the news that a planet has been found in the system of 61 Cygni C. There then follows half a dozen pages of material on telescope observations using micrometers that I found impenetrable (I even looked on the web for explanations but didn\u2019t find much help) so I jumped to the section discussing the nature of the newly discovered planet. When I got to the part where its stated density was substantially different to anything then known I checked Wikipedia to find that modern observations have disproved the existence of a planet in that system\u2014so an out of date article as well as a mostly unreadable one.6<\/sup><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Brass Tacks<\/em><\/strong> has a number of interesting letters this month. Robert C. Lee-Hanna, Washington, D. C., writes praising Mimsy Were the Borogoves<\/em> and asking for a sequel based on the third verse of Jabberwocky<\/em>. Frank Hobby, San Francisco, CA, asks why Campbell is referred to as \u201cDon A. Stuart\u201d in Boucher\u2019s Rocket to the Morgue<\/em>, and Campbell reveals that it is his pen name (was this the first release of this information to the wider SF public?) C. Hidley (a serviceman, so the magazine doesn\u2019t print an address) says he used to preserve all his magazines with \u201cmaniacal care\u201d, but his current footlocker can barely hold four issues\u2014so he removes and keeps\u00a0only the best material. That said, he finishes with this:<\/p>\n

An issue that could remain intact after a sample of this new routine must really be something; \u201cMimsy Were the Borogoves,\u201d \u201cMan in the Moon,\u201d and the two serials accomplished that feat for their issue\u2014it was really superior with only one blank. The covers are good by this new man and the pix still float along in old, bad fashion. I also saved \u201cNo Graven Image,\u201d \u201cThe Hat Trick,\u201d Bok\u2019s poem and the editorials, and was rather shocked to omit \u201cWet Magic\u201d and \u201cThe Witch\u201d [all from the February 1943 issue of Unknown Worlds<\/em>,7<\/sup> Astounding<\/em>\u2019s companion magazine] from my new portfolio. Speaking of the master\u2014Bok, of course\u2014I should like to enter one more vote for his recent novel [in the December 1943 issue of Unknown Worlds<\/em>7<\/sup>], an item not in his usual and best style, but mighty acceptable\u2014even if it did not fit the mood of the mag. And his illustrations should prove to you that here is an artist who works to the meaning of the mag; why not drop the barrier and let Hannes in\u2014and let the majority of the others out.\u00a0 p. 115<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

There is also a letter from Harold T. Kay of London, which Campbell prefaces with the comment \u201cScience-fiction under difficulties\u201d:<\/p>\n

This letter is taking a lot on trust, I know. Maybe you no longer hold the old office, maybe there is not even a magazine, but still, here is a word of greeting from England for you. That and a request that you would slip in ASF a note that any of the old gang, especially SFA members who get posted in or near Westminster, will be very welcome if they get in touch with me.
\nWhen taking part in \u201cthe next war,\u201d one finds little time for relaxation, and, in any case, the only new mags that we see are the slashed British editions which Atlas produces now and then. For which much thanks.
\n\u201cBarrier\u201d I remember as a good idea, but do I miss the serials!
\nRemember our old squabbles over the \u201cpurpose of SF\u201d? Personally l am sure that all that racket, stories, discussions, howls\u2014even the Mitchelists [Michelists?], have had some value. They helped to give me an idea of what the world could be like, and even of how to change society to achieve that state.
\nYou may have noticed that in our own mad way we are starting doing things over here already. As you were so fond of saying in editorials, SF is steadily becoming fact.
\nYours for Union Now and damnation to all Huns of all colors.\u00a0 p. 115<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The column ends with a couple of positive comments about the new size from Bill Stoy of New York, and Harold Rogovin, also from New York. Rogovin has this about the format change:<\/p>\n

To the improvement in make-up of the large size\u2014which was its only virtue\u2014you have added this extra attraction\u2014small size! I hope you never go back to the old inconvenient large size: it was annoying to carry around, annoying to hold in your hand and read, annoying because of the terrific amount of wasted paper\u2014each letter was a mile away from its neighbor, the borders were enormous, and there was a gigantic amount of blank space. It was also hard to file away in a bookcase or anywhere else, and the pages, being larger, ripped more easily.
\nThis new issue is simply a masterpiece! Swell make-up, convenient small size, good stories, and no paper waste.\u00a0 p. 117<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Rogovin also puts the boot into Raymond F. Jones\u2019 story Pacer<\/em>:<\/p>\n

Why is it that some people, such as the author of this mass of drivel, are permitted to continue living? Perhaps the most nauseating part of it is the ridiculous attempt to depict the father-son relationship, in a most unnatural and inconceivable manner. For eighteen years the son is a human being, in two years of training he becomes a military moron, and becomes human again after two minutes of tension. Believable, yes? NO! Not only that, but it was, to say the least, slightly overdone, and also rather hackneyed.
\nIn addition, the plot itself was as vile a costume western as I ever had the misfortune of glancing over. I couldn\u2019t bear it sufficiently to be able to read it thoroughly; just enough so that I could tell you what I thought of it.\u00a0 p. 117<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Stoy and Rogovin\u2019s letters are almost mirror images of each other: they both like the new format and Leiber\u2019s Gather, Darkness!<\/em>, and both disliked Jones\u2019 Pacer<\/em>.<\/p>\n

This would be a pretty weak issue if it wasn\u2019t for Leiber\u2019s serial.\u00a0 \u25cf<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

_____________________<\/p>\n

1. Simak appeared in the March 1943 Astounding<\/em><\/a> with Shadow of Life<\/em>, another story involving inimical aliens that is mediocre at best. Rim of the Deep<\/em> appeared in the May 1940 Astounding<\/em><\/a> and is awful. Rule 18<\/em> in the July 1938 Astounding<\/em><\/a> is the one good early Simak story I\u2019ve read so far.
\nWhatever Campbell saw in Simak it would soon pay off: in 1944 the first four \u2018City\u2019 stories would appear.<\/p>\n

2. Lester del Rey\u2019s The Faithful<\/em> is reviewed here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

3. Given that Leiber\u2019s novel has a tyranny\/resistance story, light sabre duels, a comedy witch, and familiars (house-elves) you rather wonder why Hollywood hasn’t snapped up the rights.<\/p>\n

4. The Wikipedia page<\/a> for the Betatron.<\/p>\n

5. The Analytical Laboratory<\/em> results for this issue appeared in September:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

I think the del Rey (Henry) story should have ranked higher than the Simak and van Vogt ones.<\/p>\n

6. The Wikipedia page<\/a> for 61 Cygni C.<\/p>\n

7. The February 1943 issue of Unknown Worlds<\/em> is reviewed here<\/a>; the December 1942 issue is reviewed here<\/a>. \u00a0\u25cf<\/p>\n\"rss\"<\/a>\"rss\"<\/a><\/span>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

ISFDB link Archive.org link _____________________ Editor, John W. Campbell Jr.; Assistant Editor, Catherine Tarrant Fiction: Hunch \u2022 novelette by Clifford D. Simak – Unthinking Cap \u2022 short story by John R. Pierce \u2217 The Great Engine \u2022 novelette by A. E. van Vogt \u2217\u2217 The Renegade \u2022 short story by Lester del Rey [as by […]<\/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":[15],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9905","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-astounding"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6Pcj7-2zL","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9905","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=9905"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9905\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10192,"href":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9905\/revisions\/10192"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9905"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9905"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9905"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}