Old Bestsellers: The House of Mirth, by Edith Wharton

Old Bestsellers: The House of Mirth, by Edith Wharton

a review by Rich Horton

When I say I'm reviewing an "Old Bestseller", the usual implication is that I'm looking at a book, probably from the first half of the 20th Century, that has met the fate of most books, even bestsellers, and has been forgotten. But sometimes even great novels become bestsellers. Edith Wharton, indisputably a great novelist, had two books end up on Publishers' Weekly's list of the ten bestselling novels of their year: The House of Mirth (1905) was 8th in 1905 and 9th in 1906; while The Age of Innocence (1920), which (somewhat controversially*) won the Pulitzer Prize, was 3rd in 1921.

Wharton was born Edith Newbold Jones in 1862 to a wealthy New York family. She was raised much in the manner of wealthy young women of her time, plenty of travel, a private education (tutors and governesses), and the expectation of an appropriate marriage. She rebelled to an extent, writing from an early age (she tried a novel at 11, completed a novella when 15, and published a translation of a poem anonymously at 15). She married an older man, Edward ("Teddy") Wharton, when she was 23. The marriage foundered, largely, it appears, because of Teddy's mental illness. They divorced in 1913, but Edith had begun an affair with Morton Fullerton several years earlier. She lived primarily in France from about 1908, and she died in 1937.

Wharton published a few short stories and poems in the '80s and '90s. Aside from a privately printed collection of poems, her first book was non-fiction: The Decoration of Houses, in 1897, which is indeed about interior decoration. Eventually she published quite a number of books of that nature, and also travel books. Her first book length fiction was a novella, The Touchstone, in 1900. Another novella and a full-length novel appeared before The House of Mirth, which was her first major success. Wharton was, obviously, from an extraordinarily privileged background, yet finances were often a difficulty for her, no doubt in part because of her husband's illness and their eventual divorce; also no doubt because her style of life was expensive. Thus, the fact that her books sold well, and that one could get paid quite nicely for magazine publications as well in those days was important.

I wrote in a previous blog post that I sometimes, when trying major writers, shy away from longer works. So it was with Wharton -- many years ago I read her 1911 novella Ethan Frome. And I liked it immensely, though I soon realized it is quite uncharacteristic of her body of work. Ethan Frome has a curious place in her oeuvre -- it was, it seems to me, definitely her most famous book when I was growing up. One assumed, or at least I did, that it was her masterpiece. But of course it is not -- in the most technical sense, that is The House of Mirth, which is her first fully accomplished novel. And there are two more novels that stand head and shoulders above Ethan Frome in the consensus estimation: The Custom of the Country (1913) and The Age of Innocence (1920). For all that I never did try another Wharton novel until now, though I did see the well-regarded 1993 Martin Scorcese film of The Age of Innocence. (The House of Mirth was also made into a movie, in 2000, directed by Terence Davies, starring Gillian Anderson as Lily Bart.)

On my sadly unplanned trips back and forth to my parents' home in Naperville, IL, last month, I was looking for something to read on our iPad (because I can't read my Kindle, or a paper book, in the dark).  Various classic novels are available for free from iBooks, and I lit on The House of Mirth. When we got back home I looked up a print version, eventually settling on a used copy of the Scribner Library of Contemporary Classics trade paper edition, complete with detailed underlining and notes from, one imagines, a college student. Scribner's, by the way, serialized the novel first (in Scribner's Magazine), and also published the first book edition. (For that matter, I have a bound volume of Scribner's Magazine for 1902, which includes some of Wharton's writing on travel and gardens, and also a poem of hers. I had carelessly assumed she was a major writer condescending to publish occasional pieces when I first saw that, but actually this work came quite early in her real career.)

The House of Mirth opens with Lawrence Selden unexpectedly encountering Lily Bart in Grand Central Station. She accompanies him for tea in his quarters (at that time, probably 1895-1905, this was faintly scandalous), and we gather that she and Lawrence are attracted to each other, but that he isn't quite rich enough for her, and anyway perhaps he is a bit shy of marriage. She hints that she has her eyes on Percy Gryce, a very rich young man, also a straitlaced crashing bore. Soon she is heading to the country house of her friend Judy Trenor for a visit, where she expects to bring Percy around.

We soon learn Lily's real situation: she was born into the highest social class, but her father's financial errors and her mother's character faults have left her impoverished, but unable to imagine any life other than to be the wife of a sufficiently rich man of her class. Her parents are dead, and she lives with a fussy old aunt, when she's not staying at her friends' houses, doing little social chores for them as a sort of rent. Lily Bart is amazingly beautiful, but she is 29, having already refused a couple of offers of marriage. She senses on the one hand that she is trained only to be a man's ornamental wife and social director; but she has a certain native intelligence, and taste, and independence, and so she, at the least opportune times, tends to kick up her traces. Which is what happens at the Trenors' house party -- she stands up Percy Gryce in favor of a walk with Lawrence Selden, who has turned up unexpectedly; and before she knows it Gryce is snared by another girl. And Lily, her finances truly strained, and unable or unwilling to ask her aunt for help (in part because one of her issues is gambling debts), has agreed to let Gus Trenor give her some financial "tips" ...

At about this time I realized I was reading something truly special. Part of it is Wharton's prose, which is carefully controlled and perfectly elegant. Part of it is her wit -- this is a tragic novel but at times it is quite comic. Much of it is Wharton's precise view of her characters, from both the inside and the outside. The descriptions are dryly ironic, and wholly believable even as the characters act in ways that we find curious today. I'll content myself with one quote, from later in the novel, Selden criticizing (to himself) Lily's resignation to striving in society: "It was before him again in its completeness -- the choice in which she was content to rest: in the stupid costliness of the food and the showy dulness of the talk, in the freedom of speech which never arrived at wit and the freedom of act which never made for romance."

Lily Bart is a remarkable character. In many ways she is reprehensible: she is uneducated, she is scornful of people of other classes, she is complicit in the cynical behavior of her set even though she sees how wrong it is, she is financially careless. You could say she deserves, in a sense, what she gets. But we still root for her, we still hope she can find happiness. Wharton makes us believe in her beauty, and believe that there is a real Lily Bart who deserves that happiness, even as she is contrasted with perhaps her closest friend, plain Gerty Farish, an old maid who is unfailingly loyal, and also charitable and honest and able to live within her limited means.

The novel, from one point of view -- quite a sensible one -- is about a woman trapped by society's rules, and particularly their unfair impact on women, especially single women. But even within those constraints, Lily Bart is something of a special case, for she could have married very well any number of times, and she could have married for love and lived comfortably enough, and she could even have saved herself and gotten a well-deserved revenge on a bad woman ... but was too honorable to do so. In a way, even as she rebels against her class's notions of proper behavior (to an extent), she also obeys them more completely than the more conventionally successful people in her circle. This makes her fall the more moving, even as we can still see that she too is at fault.

Spoilers will follow ...

So Gus Trenor's "investments" give Lily financial freedom for a short while, until she realizes that in fact Trenor had just given her the money, and that he expects a sexual quid pro quo in exchange. She rejects him, and determines to repay him, ironically losing another chance at real intimacy with Selden when he assumes the worst of her relationship with Trenor at the very moment she is rejecting him. Meanwhile Lily is pursued by Simon Rosedale, a Jewish man whose wealth has given him an uncertain entree into society. He hopes on the one hand that a beautiful and socially established wife will ease his way -- on the other hand he truly seems to love Lily. But she cannot love him, nor see an arrangement with him as anything but a crude business contract -- as, really, all her marriage proposals have been, which is probably why she has rejected them all. (The portrayal of Rosedale is the one unpleasant aspect of this book -- it is rather anti-Semitic in tone, for sure, though mitigated in a few ways: for one, it is an accurate (as far as I know) depiction of how people of that society really felt about Jewish people; for two, Wharton seems to recognize that a big part of Rosedale's character and attitudes are formed in reaction to prejudice; for three, most of the rest of New York society gets treated as harshly as Rosedale. But ... but ... there are still some distinctly anti-Semitic passages, especially when Rosedale's character is regarded as characteristic of his "race" -- again, that's no doubt what a socialite of Lily Bart's class would have felt, but it does jar one.)

Lily ends up fleeing to Europe in the company of Bertha Dorset, who wants her to distract her husband while she pursues an affair with a young poet. Lily fulfils her role admirably, and is shocked when Bertha betrays her by falsely accusing her of adultery as a way of getting leverage to prevent her husband from divorcing her. This precipitates Lily's essential banishment from society, which is only exacerbated when Lily returns home to find that her aunt has died and also that she has been disinherited because of her aunt's disgust at the rumors of adultery. The rest of the novel describes Lily's further descent: a couple of attempts at rehabilitation by taking up with people from a rung or two below her on the social ladder, only to have these torpedoed either by Bertha Dorset's vindictiveness or by Lily's own scruples. Things get worse and worse, and when Simon Rosedale offers her a final way out she is tempted, but (wholly justifiable) revenge against Mrs. Dorset is an important aspect of this offer, and even though that would be wholly just it would still be mean in a way Lily can't quite manage, and the end comes, arguably a bit melodramatic but to my mind fully and honestly prepared for, and quite moving. And we are given no surcease ... no one, not Gerty, not Lawrence, ever knows of the proof of Bertha's wickedness, nor of Lily's essential innocence of most of the sins laid at her door.

Really, I loved this novel. I don't feel that I've done it justice ... so I just suggest you read it.

* As for the "controversial" Pulitzer to The Age of Innocence -- apparently the Pulitzer committee wanted to give it to Sinclair Lewis for Main Street, but the President of Columbia University overruled them. Wharton was the first woman to win the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, which seems important in itself, but more to the point, I would think that posterity has ruled: Wharton is, to my mind, a more interesting and lasting writer than Lewis, and The Age of Innocence seems -- not having read it, I ought to emphasize! -- intrinsically more interesting than Main Street.

Ace Doubles: Falcons of Narabedla/The Dark Intruder, by Marion Zimmer Bradley

Ace Double Reviews, 44: Falcons of Narabedla, by Marion Zimmer Bradley/The Dark Intruder and Other Stories, by Marion Zimmer Bradley (#F-273, 1964, $0.40, reprinted as #22576, 1972, $0.95)

Back to an old Ace Double review, which I'm reprinting partly because I learned some interesting new things about the origin of the novel here. Plus of course there are some interesting but distressing new biographical details on the author.

Marion Zimmer was born in 1930 in Albany, NY. She was a very active SF fan from the late '40s, and she published several fanzines as well as numerous exuberant letters in the letter columns of the pulps of the day (I have several issues of old magazines with her letters). She married Robert Bradley in 1949, and they had one son, David, who became a writer, and died in 2008. (MZB's brother, Paul Zimmer, was also an active fan whose letters are easy to find in old SF magazine lettercols, and who later became a reasonably accomplished writer.) The Bradleys divorced in 1964, and Marion married Walter Breen, a fellow SF fan and a noted numismatist, within a month. Breen was already well known as an advocate of pederasty, and MZB certainly knew of his proclivities, and indeed Breen had been banned from at least one SF convention in that time period. Breen had been convicted of pederasty-related crimes as early as 1954, and continued to have trouble with the law, finally going to jail after another conviction in 1990. MZB managed to dodge serious consequences of her husband's activities throughout her life, and she died in 1999. In 2014 her daughter, by Breen, Moira Greyland, accused her of sexual abuse, and in retrospect it seems to me that it should have been clear all along that Bradley was at least negligently complicit in her husband's crimes, certainly aware of them, and now it appears more likely than not that she was a participant herself. (Though I suppose I must add that damning and convincing as the accusations seem, Bradley never did have a chance to defend herself against those that came after her death, though some of her own testimony given during Breen's legal troubles is chilling enough.) This has understandably had a devastating effect on her reputation -- and she was not really a good enough writer to make it likely that her work will long survive the posthumous stain. Jim Hines briefly discusses this, with links to more direct information, in a good blog post here.

That said, a lot of writers are less than exemplary moral creatures (as with a lot of folks in any profession). It's still worth looking at Bradley's work for its intrinsic value -- she was quite popular, eventually she sold very well, she was a Hugo nominee for her novel The Heritage of Hastur, and her feminist Arthurian fantasy The Mists of Avalon was very well received in some circles. She also edited a magazine, Marion Zimmer Bradley's Fantasy Magazine, as well as two long running anthology series (one consisting of stories set in her world Darkover, the other featuring feminist-oriented stories, Swords and Sorceresses). In her role as editor, she very actively encouraged (and paid!) new writers, and she also gave a lot of advice. To my mind, her advice, and her editorial taste, were of mixed value: she had (I think) limited ideas of proper story construction, and also her fair share of crotchets (for example a dislike of pseudonyms, even though she herself used a number of pseudonyms early in her career, mostly for Lesbian porn); but for all that, she quite sincerely championed new writers, and ushered many of them into publication, some of whom went on to have nice careers. (Though again I must add, I found fairly little of real worth in the many Swords and Sorceresses anthologies I read.)

And what about her fiction? Her most famous series was a long set of SF novels about a lost colony planet called Darkover, where humans developed significant psi powers (to the extent that the novels read a lot like fantasy). I read all the Darkover novels through those that appeared in the mid-'70s, by which time it seemed to me that they grew longer and longer to an excessive point, and also moved in political and psychosexual directions that didn't interest me, and that her skills as a writer did not really uphold. But the early Darkover novels remain good fun -- minor works in context, but fine adventure stories with a romantic cast. By about the mid-60s she was primarly focused on Darkover, but up to that point she wrote a variety of SF novels, mostly similar in tone to the Darkover books (and occasionally she incorporated parts of her early non-Darkover novels into later Darkover stories, even in the case of this book, much of which ended up in The Winds of Darkover).

She was a fairly prolific Ace Double contributor, with 9 Ace Double halves in 7 separate books (not counting this book's later reprint). The book at hand backs her first novel with a story collection. The novel, Falcons of Narabedla, first appeared in full in 1957 in Other Worlds. It is about 41,000 words long, apparently identical to the Other Worlds version or very nearly so. What I didn't know until very recently was that most of Falcons of Narabedla (an early version of it) first appeared in Harlan Ellison's fanzine Dimensions, in 1953 and 1954. (It was to be a five part serial, but Ellison stopped publishing Dimensions before the serial could be completed.) The stories collected in The Dark Intruder total about 37,000 words.

My copy is the second Ace Double edition, from 1972, with covers by Mitchell Hooks and Kelly Freas. The 1964 edition featured these covers, possibly by Jack Gaughan (at least the one for The Dark Intruder looks like him, and he did do the interiors):


What follows is what I wrote about this book a number of years ago.

Falcons of Narabedla is on the one hand a very pulpy short novel, with a hackneyed basic premise (man snatched out of time into another world), and such standard features as anachronistic sword-fighting, aristocratic societies and rebellion, and an overly rapid conclusion. On the other hand, there are some pretty intriguing ideas that could have stood further development, and the book as a whole reads rapidly and excitingly. In the end it was kind of frustrating -- it could have been decent stuff, but it really isn't very good.

It opens with Mike Kenscott camping in the Sierra Madres with his younger brother. Mike is an electrical engineer who has been acting strangely since he had an accident with some equipment he was working, and he has had occasional odd "memories" of strange birds and the like. Suddenly he finds himself waking in a strange tower, looking over a much changed Sierra skyline, with two suns in the sky. The people with him call him "Adric", and he has no idea who they are. And a look in the mirror shows a much different man.

Slowly he learns that he is in the body of a man named Adric, far in the future. Adric seems to have been an ambitious lord of this land called Narabedla, but he has been under the sway of a beautiful woman called Kamary. The people who have woken him, a veiled androgynous figure called Gamine and an ancient man called Rhys, seem somehow opposed to Kamary, and there is also talk of the Dreamers, and of a man named Narayan. Further encounters with Adric's jealous brother Evarin, a "Toymaker", and then with Kamary and her zombie-like slaves, only serve to increase the confusion. And the partial return of Adric's memories and even consciousness helps little.

Eventually he agrees to join a mission to the Dreamer's Keep, where by some horrifying means the aristocrats of Narabedla gain power from the sleeping, imprisoned, Dreamers linked to them. But on the way he is kidnapped by Narayan, and comes to in Narayan's rebel camp, along with the beautiful Cynara, an apparently sympathetic woman who had accompanied the group heading for the Keep. Narayan and Cynara turn out to be brother and sister, and it transpires that Adric and Narayan were close friends -- indeed, Narayan was Adric's linked Dreamer, and the source of his power. But Adric had chosen to free Cynara and then Nayaran, an act which precipitated Kamary's taken control of him, and indeed her sending his consciousness into the past. Now Michael Kenscott is in charge, and he agrees to help Narayan's people in their quest to free the caged Dreamers and overturn Kamary's group. But then Adric's consciousness returns to control, and he has reverted to the brutish lord who wishes to return Narayan to his prison. Pretending to be Kenscott, he leads Narayan's group into a trap -- and only the sudden (and quite unexplained) appearance of Kenscott's physical body for Kenscott to return to makes it possible to resist him.

I've skipped a few details such as the title birds, huge falcons that are mentally controlled by the aristocrats. I've also glossed over something that annoyed me but probably wouldn't bother lots of people -- Bradley's character names just seem stupid. One character has three short first names (Mike Ken Scott). One is named after a famous Indian writer (Narayan). One name seems a description: Gamine. (I suppose it would be unfair to mention that another name seems like a Toyota, as there were no Camrys when this book was written.) But no matter. The story is resolved fairly predictably, and too rapidly. The characters are neatly paired off, the bad guys are only punished a little, there is new hope for Narabedla, etc. etc. Ultimately a pretty minor book, but it does hint at some of what made the best of Bradley's Darkover novels pretty good stuff.

Marion Zimmer Bradley's short fiction career has a slightly odd shape. She first made her name as a fan, writing colorful letters to magazines like Thrilling Wonder Stories, using pseudonyms like Astara. In 1953 she sold two stories to the very low end and short-lived magazine Vortex, and beginning in 1954 she started selling more regularly to better magazines (though very rarely to the top magazines). By the late 50s she was writing novels, and her short stories ceased in 1963 as she focused on her Darkover books. She began writing more short fiction in 1973, a Tolkien pastiche called "Letter to Arwen", then in the 80s produced a number of short stories, seemingly mostly in support of her projects such as the Friends of Darkover books, as well as Thieves' World stories.

The Dark Intruder and Other Stories, then, appearing after her first run of short fiction had ceased, serves as a documentation of that phase of her career. Except for the title story, these are fairly short pieces, definitely SF and not Fantasy, turning on cute and sometimes mordant ideas.

"The Dark Intruder" (15,000 words) (Amazing, December 1962, as "Measureless to Man", a far better title) -- Under its original title, this story appears on my list of stories with titles from "Kubla Khan". It's set on Mars. Andrew Slayton is part of the third archaeological expedition to the deserted ancient Martian city called Xanadu. The members of the previous two expeditions died violently. Andrew stumbles into the desert near the city and finds himself possessed by the mind of an ancient Martian. Somehow, due to his own strength and the restraint of his possessor, he retains his sanity. He learns a secret about the dying Martian race, and must try to find a solution for their unique problem. Not a bad story.

"Jackie Sees a Star" (1900 words) (Fantastic Universe, December 1954) -- a young boy is in telepathic contact with a young alien on a distant star. OK for its length.

"Exiles of Tomorrow" (2700 words) (Fantastic Universe, March 1955) -- in the future criminals are punished by exiling them to the past, where they are to live alone. One couple manages to arrange to be exiled to the same time, and they have a child. The boy grows up and meets a very unusual man ... leading to a shock ending that didn't work for me. Nice basic idea, though.

"Death Between the Stars" (6800 words) (Fantastic Universe, March 1956) -- also uses an idea from "The Dark Intruder" -- aliens "possessing" humans somewhat benignly. A woman needs to take a starship back to human space, but the only berth is with an alien. The aliens are hated by humans and any contact with them is regarded as vile, for totally unconvincing reasons. The alien is mistreated by the crew and the woman must overcome her misgivings to try to save him. As the title hints, not successfully -- except in an unexpected way. Too much of the motivating force of this story was auctorially engineered, very implausibly, to work for me.

"The Crime Therapist" (3700 words) (Future, October 1954) -- criminals can be cured of the psychological problems that lead to their crimes by acting them out, as for example a potential murderer can kill an android made up to look like his intended victim. In this story, a husband who wants to kill his wife is allowed to kill an android looking like her -- and after all the consequences of that act occur, he is indeed no longer a danger to society. Silly.

"The Stars Are Waiting" (4100 words) (Saturn, March 1958) -- India has closed its borders and destroyed its weapons. The CIA needs to know what's going on, and now their spy has returned, unable to talk coherently. At the cost of his life, they finally hear what he has learned. The solution is wish-fulfillment to the max.

"Black and White" (3900 words) (Amazing, November 1962) -- After the holocaust, the last man on Earth is black, and the last woman on Earth is white. Can they possibly marry and further the species? That would be too silly for words, but MZB is a little better than that -- the real conflict is that the black man is also a Catholic priest, struggling with his celibacy vows, and using race as an excuse. Then they encounter one more man -- unfortunately he's a moronic Southerner, and the results are bitter. Not too bad of a story, especially for the time.

Overall, a collection of middle-of-the-road pieces, the work of a competent pro who doesn't really seem to have been at her best at shorter lengths. Nothing here is as good as the early Darkover novels (which I enjoyed until the Brain Eater seemed to strike around the time of The Mists of Avalon and the Free Amazon books).

Ace Doubles: Our Man in Space, by Bruce W. Ronald/Ultimatum in 2050 A. D., by Jack Sharkey

Ace Double Reviews, 92: Our Man in Space, by Bruce W. Ronald/Ultimatum in 2050 A. D., by Jack Sharkey (#M-117, 1965, 45 cents)

a review by Rich Horton

Ace Doubles again. Most of the previous Ace Double reviews I've done feature books I've chosen because I had at least some interest in one of the writers. This one was a lot more random -- basically, it was inexpensive and it was available at a dealer's table at a recent convention (can't remember which -- Sasquan, Archon, or Windycon). I had never heard of Bruce Ronald, and while I know Jack Sharkey's name well, from any number of stories in early 60s magazines, he's never been a particular favorite of mine. I actually have another (the only other) Sharkey novel, The Secret Martians, as part of an Ace Double I bought for a more usual reason: the other side is by one of my favorites, John Brunner. I'll get around to reviewing it eventually.

Bruce W. Ronald was an advertising man, born in 1931 in Dublin, Ohio, and still alive as far as I (or the Science Fiction Encylopedia) know. He published only this one novel, and no further stories; but he did write the book for a musical, in collaboration with Claire Strauch and the well-known SF/historical writer John Jakes. This was Dracula Baby!, in 1970. (The SFE says that Ronald was also an actor.)

So it turns out Jack Sharkey had another slight connection with Bruce Ronald: he became a playwright and one of his plays was called Dracula, the Musical?, which on the face of it sounds like it might resemble Dracula Baby! in more ways than having an unexpected punctuation mark at the end of the title. Sharkey wrote four short novels, three of them (including Ultimatum in 2050 A. D.) serialized in Cele Goldsmith's magazines, Amazing/Fantastic. He published about 60 stories in the field, almost all between 1959 and 1965. It may be that Goldsmith/Lalli's departure as editor influenced Sharkey's decision to switch fields -- she bought the great bulk of his stories. (She published no fewer than a dozen of his stories in 1959 alone!) His most famous story might be "Multum in Parvo", from Gent in 1959, and reprinted in Judith Merril's Fifth Annual Year's Best SF. He also wrote an Addams Family tie-in novel.

Our Man in Space is a very minor work of SF, but for much of its length it's amusing enough, before a somewhat too extended ending. It's about an actor, Bill Brown, who is hired as a spy for Earth, because of his acting skill and his resemblance to an Earth diplomat, Harry Gordon, who has been killed. Brown's job is to impersonate Gordon, and to travel to Troll, where Harry Gordon has been hired by the officials of Troll to find out when overpopulation pressures will cause Earth to explode. It seems that the Council of 16, a group of local planets, has refused new Galactic member Earth the right to colonize any planets.

Brown goes to Troll, on the way meeting a beautiful Galactic woman. (It seems that most of the planets in the Council of 16 have nearly fully human residents -- certainly sex is possible between these species.) On Troll he manages to complete his assignment, and also to make time with the beautiful Galactic, who eventually dumps him ... and Bill finds out as well that his superiors have betrayed him, and he will be killed. He escapes and kills a few Trollians, before sneaking onto a spaceship and heading for Grendid, a monarchy that it turns out is the leader of the aliens who are voting against Earth's pleas for colonization rights. On Grendid he again eludes attempts on his life, and again makes time with beautiful aliens, including a spy from a Matriarchy world, and against all odds he finds a way to save the King of Grendid from an assassination attempt, which should improve Earth's odds in the upcoming vote. But then we witness the Council of 16's deliberations, and more treachery is in store, from multiple planets, and it's up to Bill Brown to implausibly save the day again. And by the way meet up again with the first beautiful Galactic woman, for a passionate but all too brief reunion.

OK, this is really silly stuff. It doesn't make sense on any level at all -- scientific, political, plot plausibility, sociology, characterization. But it isn't really trying, and for a while it's pretty good fun, though it does wear out its welcome rather. (There are a few seeming nods to Heinlein -- the basic plot bears some points of resemblance with Double Star, and one character is called the local "Citizen of the Galaxy", and a character reminded me just slightly of Star, Empress of the Twenty Worlds ...)

As for Ultimatum in 2050 A.D., in the end it may be even sillier. It was first published in Amazing, in the June and July 1963 issues, under the title The Programmed People. Surprisingly, it has been reprinted recently, in 2010, as part of a Double Novel from an outfit called Armchair Fiction. (The other novel is Slaves of the Crystal Brain, by "William Carter Sawtelle" (a pseudonym for Roger Phillips Graham, who usually published as Rog Phillips).) The Armchair Fiction Double Novels seem to consciously imitate Ace Doubles (for example, with a similar color scheme), and also to concentrate on works at the pulpier end of the spectrum. The cover art for the Armchair Fiction edition of The Programmed People is the same as used for the June 1963 Amazing, by Ed Emshwiller, and not to my mind one of his better efforts. (Belatedly, I'll add that the covers for the Ace Double at hand are by John Schoenherr (for the Sharkey novel) and Ed Valigursky (for the Ronald novel).)

Anyway, Ultimatum in 2050 A. D. is set in the title year in "the Hive", a sort of arcology, a huge building in which 10,000,000 people live. Life is apparently good there, except for the strict rules about "readjustment", whereby one can be sent to the hospital for such things as voting the wrong way, not voting at all, or minor injuries. Lloyd Bodger is a normal young man, engaged to Grace Horton (nice name that!), occasionally in trouble for missing a vote or two ... despite being the son of the Secondary Speakster, the number two man of the Hive. One night he almost misses a vote, until a girl gives him her place in line. Shortly later it becomes clear that the girl is wanted for treason ... and against his better instincts, Lloyd decides to help her. Before long he finds himself embroiled in a resistance movement against the rulers of the Hive ... the girl, Andra, and her fellow conspirators Bob Lennick and Frank Shawn, make such crazy claims as that "Readjustment" simply means incineration -- to keep the population at the maximum 10,000,000.

So it goes for the first half of the book -- some frantic running around as Lloyd and Andra and the unwillingly roped in Grace try to avoid detection by Lloyd's father and his boss, the Prime Speakster Fredric Stanton. There is some treachery, some narrow escapes, and some loopy but almost fun ideas like the "Goons", robots that enforce the Hive's rules, and "Ultrablack", a scientifically implausible induced absolute darkness. There's a bit of sexual tension -- Andra seems a real potential rival for Grace, who loves Lloyd but who Lloyd seems unsatisfied with.

Then I think Sharkey got bored, or wrote himself into a corner, or something. The second half of the novel begins with a long piece of pure exposition, explaining in the most politically and scientifically absurd ways how the election of 1972 (only a decade or so after the novel was written!) led swiftly to the creation of the Hive, and to the establishment of it quasi-religious ruling structure and strict rules. After that there is the denouement, which never surprises except by the silliness of the action and resolution. I won't give away what happens, though, as I said, it's not really surprising at all. In the end quite a weak story.

Old Bestsellers: The Morals of Marcus Ordeyne, by William J. Locke

Old Bestsellers: The Morals of Marcus Ordeyne, by William J. Locke

a review by Rich Horton

Returning again to the very center of my vision for this blog, books that were huge bestsellers sometime in (mostly) the first half of the past century. William J. Locke was an immensely successful popular writer in the first couple of decades of the Twentieth Century, with novels in the Publishers' Weekly lists of ten bestselling novels of the year for 1909, 1910, 1014, 1915, and 1916. The Morals of Marcus Ordeyne didn't make that list, but it was his first major success, appearing in 1905 when the author was 42 and had been publishing for over a decade.

Locke was born in 1863 in Barbados, to English parents. He was raised mostly in England and in Trinidad. He attended Cambridge, studying Mathematics, despite his dislike for the subject, which he called "that utterly futile and inhuman subject". He became a schoolmaster, though apparently he was not happy in that profession. His first novel, At the Gate of Samaria, appeared in 1894. Despite his extreme popularity in this life, I feel fairly confident in declaring him nearly forgotten, but perhaps not entirely: one of his short stories was made into a film as recently as 2004, Ladies in Lavender, starring Judi Dench and Maggie Smith. (The book at hand, The Morals of Marcus Ordeyne, was made into at least three films, two silents and one talkie, the latter in 1935 starring Ian Hunter and Lupe Velez.)

The Morals of Marcus Ordeyne opens with the title character announcing his intention to recount the history of his "extraordinary adventure" mostly by transcribing his diaries. He begins by telling of the seventh anniversary of his "release from captivity" -- that is, the time when he was able to resign his hated position as a schoolteacher of mathematics, due to the death of most of his relatives, at which time he became a baronet, now Sir Marcus Ordeyne, and inherited a modest fortune. Since then Ordeyne has lived a quiet and well-ordered life, working on a scholarly book about the history of Renaissance morals, contributing occasional articles to scholarly publications, and visiting his mistress Judith Mainwaring. (Whether his and Judith's relationship is sexual is a question politely dodged by the book, though on balance I suppose it is.) Occasionally he is importuned by his relatives to marry, in order that the title can be passed on to future generations, but he sees no benefit in such an action.

All this changes one day when he stumbles across a very young woman, Carlotta, weeping in a London park. It seems she has been abandoned by the young man she ran away with ... from Alexandretta, in Syria, where she was the stepdaughter of a Turkish official, her English mother's second husband. Her Turkish stepfather meant to marry her to an unpleasant old man, so she ran off with a foolish English man. And now she has nowhere to go.

Marcus, seeing no alternative, takes her home. But soon he is at a loss as to what to do with her. He cannot take her to his relatives -- too much scandal. Judith wants nothing to do with her -- indeed, she is quite jealous. But Marcus' butler and his French cook quite take to Carlotta, and before long the story is looking rather like its near contemporary, George Bernard Shaw's play Pygmalion. Carlotta is taking instruction from a governess sort ... but she is also declaring her intention to marry "Seer Marcous", as she calls Ordeyne. But Marcus is not convinced the girl even has a soul -- and anyway, he has no intention of ever marrying. Besides, there's Judith.

Things come rather to a head when Carlotta's stepfather shows up in London ... and other complications ensure. There is for example Marcus' friend, and former student, Pasquale, who all of a sudden seems rather more interested in Carlotta than is appropriate. And of course there is the question of Judith Mainwaring, who has been conveniently away in Paris for a while. Various questions need an answer: Does Carlotta really love Marcus? Can she love anyone? Why have Judith and Marcus never married? What is Judith's dark secret? And where does Pasquale fit in? And is Carlotta's stepfather a real threat?

All is worked out, in the end, more or less as one might have guessed from the start, but not without some tragedy, and some true maturation, not just for Carlotta, who is clearly and understandably immature, but for Marcus, and for that matter for Judith. The ending is not a surprise, then, but the route to it is interesting enough, and fairly effectively deals with some knotty issues, most importantly perhaps Marcus' treatment of Judith. (Though there is a whiff of convenience about the way some things work out.)

I really quite enjoyed the novel, though with obvious reservations. One of these is the blatant Orientalism of the portrayal of Carlotta's stepfather, and of the way she was brought up. The other reservation is one that applies to many popular novels -- the generally happy ending is facilitated in great part by some pretty fortuitous events. But those aside, it's a fun read. The main character's voice is ironic and amusing. The moral issues at the heart of things are resolved with some acknowledgement of their force. And, yes, I like Sir Marcus and Carlotta, and I rooted for them.

(I'll add a small personal note -- this is the novel I was reading as I sat vigil at my father's deathbed. I can only place one other work in a similar context -- I was reading Wallace Stevens' long poem "The Comedian as the Letter C" in the hospital while my wife was in labor with my daughter.)

Old Bestsellers: Alice Blythe Somewhere in England, by Martha Trent

Old Bestsellers: Alice Blythe Somewhere in England, by Martha Trent

a review by Rich Horton

A little while ago a I wrote about a "boy's book", The Space Pioneers,  part of a series of books written under a house pseudonym, for which the actual writer is difficult to determine. How about a "girl's book", part of a series written under a house pseudonym (probably), the actual writer of which is perhaps impossible to determine?

Well, why not? Alice Blythe Somewhere in England is one of a set of 6 books published in 1918/1919 by the Goldsmith Publishing Company of Cleveland, OH; and also by Barse & Hopkins of New York. The copyright is held by Barse & Hopkins, so I don't know how Goldmith got involved, though my copy has their logo. Goldsmith do appear to have been occupied publishing a number of series of books for girls.

The series of which Alice Blythe is part of is collectively called the "Somewhere in" series. The books are, in order, Helen Carey Somewhere in America, Marieken De Bruin Somewhere in Belgium, Valerie Duval Somewhere in France, Alice Blythe Somewhere in England, Lucia Rudini Somewhere in Italy, and Phoebe Marshall Somewhere in Canada. They are all linked to an extent -- for example, Alice Blythe's brother meets Marieken (and seems to fall in love, but as she is just 14 they will have to wait), and Alice becomes good friends with Helen Carey.

It is not at all clear who "Martha Trent" actually was. Most likely the books were written by an employee (or a few) of Barse & Hopkins, probably from a centrally produced series outline (though inconsistencies between volumes did crop up). The books have gotten a certain mild amount of attention in latter years, generally from historians looking at World War I stories and propaganda.

So what about the book itself? Alice Blythe is a teenaged girl (perhaps 16) living with her "aunts" (actually I think more distant relatives) in rural England in about 1917. Her parents are busy in London as a doctor and nurse. Her brother is at the front. Her "cousin" Peter has joined the Royal Flying Corps, and is just itching to go to France, but has only just reached the age where he can go.

Alice is described in very tomboyish -- indeed almost androgynous -- terms, and that seems to have been a general theme throughout this series. And she has boyish (for that time) talents and interests: she is a good driver, Peter has taught her to fly a plane, and she is a terrible knitter. When Peter at last departs for France, Alice determines that she must contribute to the war effort as well, and after a small contribution on the home front (denouncing a pacifist), she heads to London to convince her parents to let her go to Belgium.

Once there she starts to serve in a hospital, though not as a nurse (remember, no "feminine" skills) -- rather as a sort of janitor. There she meets the American girl Helen Carey. But her instinct for adventure, and her driving skills, get her involved with a crashed aeroplane, its pilot, a secret message, and eventually a German spy. Of course she saves the day, more or less, and by the by meets Marieken de Bruin, her brother, and Peter. And gets sent back to England as a reward.

I think my tone sounds a bit more snarky than the book really deserves. Don't get me wrong, it's no great shakes, and terribly implausible. But it's a swift read, and on its terms enjoyable enough. I suspect it served its market well enough, back in the day. I mentioned the Tom Corbett books above -- I have to say that, taken in context, this book is better done, less offensive to the intellect, than the Tom Corbett book I read. Which is faint praise to be sure, but there you are.

(I should briefly note as well that it is illustrated, by Chas. L. Wrenn, and pleasantly enough.)

Eulogy for my Father

This one is particularly personal, and perhaps only of interest to family and friends. This is the prepared text (with modest revisions) of the eulogy I delivered for my father, John Richard ("Dick") Horton, (3/7/1931- 12/11-2015). My contributions here are modest -- this was written by all of his living children (there are six of us: myself, Jim, Bill, Paul, Ann, and Patrick) in concert, and the voice is not mine, but that of all of us in amalgam.

It is said that St. Francis of Assisi said “Preach the Gospel. Use words if necessary.”

Here’s all you need to know about my Dad. Back when we were living in the house on Tupelo, a knock came on the door late at night. He could have cursed at the noise, ignored the knock and gone back to sleep. But he didn’t. He answered the door, and welcomed into our home … a panicked, rough looking young man. The man stood there bleeding from his arm and begging for assistance. So Dad administered first aid, gave him something to drink and gave him a ride home. After returning home, Dad called the police. Turns out, there was an attempted robbery down the street, where the man had cut his arm breaking a window. We’ll never know if Dad’s compassion and trust turned this man’s life around, but it certainly had an impact on those of us who heard the story. Dad saw God everywhere, and Jesus in everyone.

Now I ask you, if this is how he treated a criminal, imagine what he would do for his friends! Before you answer that question, you need to understand what it took to be his friend. And the answer is … nothing. He never met a stranger, as they say. I remember driving down the street with him on more than one occasion, and watching as he waved at a passerby. “Who was that?” I would ask. “I don’t have any idea” he would say. Going to church, the hardware store or anywhere else with him was a lengthy affair as he knew everyone and would spend time afterward talking, while we were anxious to get home and play.

If you’ve read his obituary, you already know the specifics, the impressive litany of a life of service. To his country, first of all, as he served honorably in Korea. To his company – at Argonne Lab where he worked for more than 30 years. To his community, wherever he went. To his church. And of course to Mom and us kids – to whom he provided the kind of idyllic upbringing and family life that seem all too rare these days, but which are certainly never easy, no matter what generation you represent. That takes work, and talent, and love – all of which he had in spades. 
 

It dawned on me that I had not appreciated how much of a leader he was. President of this, founding member of that, on the board of something else. There were so many things he did for the community and he never asked for credit. As we looked through his papers, we found myriad letters of appreciation, several begging that he not leave some position that, typically, he had been asked to assume - as his contributions were irreplaceable.

One post he could have easily avoiding taking was in the army. He was in college, and virtually guaranteed not to be drafted. But then he did something strange. He knew if he stayed in college he wasn’t going to get drafted. And his mother wasn’t going to let him enlist. So he dropped out of school to ensure he would be drafted. He went to Korea and served with distinction. Being at war is no picnic, obviously. Yet he loved it. I think what he loved was the camaraderie. The friendships with his brothers in arms. And the knowledge that he was fulfilling his duty.

After coming home, he completed his degree, and found and married the love of his life, our dear Mom; they started a family and settled in Naperville, where they have lived ever since.

The other day, my brother found a letter of recommendation that his former boss sent to a prospective new employer. It read, in part, “John Horton was one of the finest men I ever had the pleasure of working with. I know of no man that I could recommend more highly than John. He is the clean living type of young man that would be a credit to your [company].”

Now how many referral letters like that do you see these days?

I will remember all the little things my father did. He was all of us boys’ first baseball coach. There was a baseball team photo displayed at the visitation yesterday, where Dad was dressed in the standard baseball manager’s uniform of creased slacks and wing-tipped shoes. You don’t always appreciate it when you’re a kid, but he obviously had hurried straight from work to the baseball field so he wouldn’t miss practice. He and Mom made it to every one of our games and with 6 children that took a lot of time; somehow, one thing he always had for us was the most precious commodity we possess – time.

One of his daughters-in-law told of his insistence on taking her to a medical appointment, and waiting there with her for four hours, so my brother wouldn’t have to take off work. This was the sort of thing he did all the time. Because he loved spending time with his family, and he always thought of helping others whenever he could.

I’ll remember his unique laugh that built up silently inside him until he shook with furious effort, trying to keep from exploding. And a twinkle in his eye that let you know he didn’t take himself too seriously. He was, one might say, merry.

I think the thing that brought him the most happiness was “doing life” with our Mom. He felt so much joy doing things for her and making her happy, and often bragged about her behind her back. He enjoyed her company more than anyone else’s. We find comfort today knowing that he died while they were out, enjoying life together, and that Mom and all of his children were with him in the hospital at the very end.

He leaves behind our dear mother, his loving wife of 57 years; six grown children – among you here today; four daughters-in-law, one son-in-law, and fourteen grandchildren – who are perhaps his proudest legacy. (He enjoyed nothing so much as visiting his grandkids, going to a school play, an athletic event or a graduation.) And of course all of you, a small sample of his endless circle of friends.

I know he will now get to finally meet again his beloved daughter Peggy, who preceded him in death by forty-eight years and to whom he has prayed every day since. And he will at long last be in the one place where everyone and everything is as friendly and welcoming as he has always been.

St. Peter at the pearly gates will surely not need my advice. But were I asked, I would say to him, “I know of no man that I could recommend more highly than John. He is the clean living type of young man that would be a credit to Heaven.”

Ace Double: Rocannon's World, by Ursula K. Le Guin/The Kar-Chee Reign, by Avram Davidson

Ace Double Reviews, 10: Rocannon's World, by Ursula K. Le Guin/The Kar-Chee Reign, by Avram Davidson (#G-574, 1966, $0.50)

by Rich Horton

Ace Doubles have a fairly declassé image. One doesn't tend to look for all time classics or Hugo candidates among them. Though as previous reviews in this series have shown, there were first rate novels and novellas published as Ace Double halves, such as Jack Vance's Hugo winner "The Dragon Masters". (That was, however, a reprint.) But even so, seeing that Ursula K. Le Guin's first novel was an Ace Double came as a mild surprise to me, some time back when I encountered this pairing. Since then I've realized that that wasn't really that rare, for example, Samuel R. Delany also had early novels published as Ace Doubles, as did many other great writers.

 Rocannon's World is about 44,000 words long. It was expanded from a 7700 word story, "Dowry of the Angyar", which was in the September 1964 Amazing. This story appears unchanged as the prologue to Rocannon's World (called here "The Necklace"), and it has latterly been reprinted by itself under Le Guin's preferred title, "Semley's Necklace".

If Ursula Le Guin is a mild surprise as an Ace Double author (her second novel, Planet of Exile, was also an Ace Double half), so too might be Avram Davidson. Though it should be noted that Davidson's early novels were fairly routine, rather pulpish, not terribly characteristic of his best work. The Kar-Chee Reign is a 49,000 word novel, a prequel to his 1965 Ace novel (not an Ace Double half!) Rogue Dragon. Rogue Dragon itself was nominated for a Nebula Award, but The Kar-Chee Reign, a lesser work, to my mind, was not. The two novels were reprinted together in 1979, in a volume bannered "Ace Double", but not a true Ace Double. That is, it was not published in dos-a-dos format, and not part of a regular series. Rather, Ace essentially put out a few single author "omnibus" editions of two novels at about that time, and called them Ace Doubles in a nod to their past. (I have another such book pairing A. Bertram Chandler's Into the Alternate Universe and Contraband From Otherspace.)

In retrospect, Rocannon's World is a curious novel. It is a "Hainish" novel, thus fitting into Le Guin's main "future history", but it doesn't seem wholly consistent with novels like The Left Hand of Darkness and The Dispossessed. What it mainly is is a fantasy novel with SF trappings. Except for the prose, which is excellent as one might expect from Le Guin, it feels strikingly pulpish. The plot and feel would not have been out of place in an early 50s issue of Planet Stories. Perhaps the influence of Leigh Brackett or Andre Norton can be detected. The ultimate effect is mixed -- the plot is just not terribly plausible in places, and some of the setting and trappings are a bit old hat. But as I said the prose is fine, and the romantic and melancholy overtones are extremely effective.

Fomalhaut II is a planet which has only been lightly explored by the League of All Words (in later novels, the Ekumen). The League does not even know how many intelligent races live there -- three for sure, but perhaps two more. One non-humanoid race is not even encountered in the book. The main races are the Liuar (basically "humans"); and the now split Gdemiar (Clayfolk -- dwarf-analogues) and Fiia (elf-analogues). The League has been promoting the advancement of the Gdemiar to an industrial society, and extracting taxes from them and the Liuar, but after the ethnologist Rocannon encounters Semley (an aristocrat of the Liuar) in the prologue, he decides the world is not well enough understood, and he mounts an expedition to study it. But disaster strikes -- an enemy race is there as well, and they find and destroy Rocannon's spaceship, marooning him with none of his equipment.

He then must travel, with the help of Semley's grandson and a small band of locals, to the mysterious Southwest continent where the enemy is located, hoping to find an ansible and call for help. Their journey, mostly on rather unlikely flying "horses", or windsteeds, is full of adventure -- they encounter various different sorts of outlaws, and danger from the weather, and a scary quasi-intelligent race, and finally an unconvincing "Old One" who grants Rocannon special powers, helping him finally accomplish his mission. All this is entertaining but as I have said faintly pulpish and not very plausible. But the final resolution is achingly bittersweet, deeply romantic and very melancholy. Certainly a novel worth reading, though of course Le Guin has done much better things.

I haven't read The Kar-Chee Reign in some little time, so the following summary may be a bit lacking. It is set far in the future. Humans have colonized other stars, and have forgotten Earth. Earth itself is, as Davidson puts it "flat, empty, weary and bare". A few humans remain, apparently living a low-tech style of life. Then the insectlike aliens the Kar-Chee come, to mine the Earth for its remaining metals, with the help of huge beasts called Dragons by the humans. The Kar-Chee hardly care about humans, displacing them without much thought or worry. Humans have come to cower away from the Kar-Chee, avoiding them in hopes of escaping notice.

The Rowan family lives in fair comfort on an isolated island that the Kar-Chee have not yet reached. When the aliens finally do come, certain of the locals seem to have forgotten the policy of avoiding them at all costs, and a series of attacks are mounted. These attacks meet with initial success, but then the Kar-Chee are irritated, and reprisals occur. But a group led by one Liam decides to continue to take the fight to the Kar-Chee. It will not be a great surprise that they are eventually successful, and Liam becomes a celebrated hero. The Kar-Chee depart, but they leave some of the Dragons behind (setting up Rogue Dragon, set some time further in the future). There is also an indication that contact with the human-colonized worlds will resume, and that Earth itself will be revitalized.

It's far from a great novel, and it's far from Davidson at anything like his best. Still, I do recall enjoying it, though I thought the action in general routine (and sometimes confused), and much of the setup a bit silly. The prose shows only hints of pure Davidson.