Cyril JuddBesprekingen

A rocketing, sensational exposé of sin in space: a story about a drug deadlier than heroin, more vicious than morphine, this was the Martian narcotic that drenched a planet in crime and perversion.

This was the blurb that screamed from the back cover of the Galaxy re-publication of the novel written by husband and wife writing team Cyril M. Kornbluth and Judith Merril which was originally serialised in 1951. The blurb in this case is totally misleading as I have rarely read such a 'grown up' thoughtful novel from this era of pulp fiction.

Sin in Space was the 1961 reprint, but the original story had the title of Mars child, then [Outpost Mars]. The story starts with a difficult birth of a child in a struggling close knit human colony on the planet Mars: not so many science fiction books would have started with a birth scene. Tony Hellman is the doctor in attendance and he is also part of the democratically elected ruling committee of the community of Sun Lake. It is a community that prides itself on its complete sexual equality and is desperately trying to be self sufficient so that it can loosen its ties with an overcrowded and corrupt planet earth. The birth of a child is a big event in the colony which relies on drugs to enable them to breathe a rarefied atmosphere. The community receives a visit from the nearby Brenner Pharmaceutical corporation: an industrial concern that manufacture the addictive drug Marcaine. Brenner accuses the community of stealing a shipment of his drugs and demands that a search be carried out for the guilty culprit. Brenner knows that such a search would cause the release of radioactive material which could destroy the colony. The arrival in the twice yearly rocket supply ship from earth of journalist Douglas Graham, who is planning a feature book on the life of the planet, becomes a focal point for the struggle between the colony and the industrialists.

This is a well written story that also describes the hard grind of a relatively new colony trying to forge its own future on a planet where life is difficult, but whose participants have sacrificed everything to escape from planet earth. The birth of the Mars child proves to be a significant event in the life of the community and in accordance with the aims of the community the novel provides equal opportunity for both women and men to play significant roles. It is pulp fiction, but still a refreshingly good read and so 4 stars.

paperback

review of
C. M. Kornbluth & Judith Merril (writing as Cyril Judd) 's
Gunner Cade
by tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE - December 16, 2011

This was probably written in the same yr as Kornbluth & Pohl's The Space Merchants & published as a bk before The Space Merchants was. & while the approach to the story-telling is substantially different, there're significant correlations between the 2.

In both bks, the main character is a dupe of the ruling elites - benefiting in some respects from their unquestioning servitude. In both cases, the main character somewhat haphazardly plunges into realities that they were previously unaware of & eventually have to come to terms w/ in order to recreate their relation to the world. In both cases, these characters resist facing reality as long as they can - only incrementally being disabused of their delusions. In both, they eventually become heros of forces that they previously didn't understand at all. AND, in both there's another planet that's ultimately the hope of resistance to tyranny. In the case of The Space Merchants that planet is Venus; in the case of Gunner Cade that planet is Mars.

As I've gradually become more aware of C. M. Kornbluth, I've been particularly interested to learn of his collaborations w/ Merril. It's somewhat to my discredit as a hypothetical scholar that I'm not more aware of the many pen names that authors that I'm interested in have written under. The name "Cyril Judd" has some transparency insofar as "Cyril" is Kornbluth's 1st name & "Judd" is an abbreviation of Merril's 1st name. But if I'd previously seen a "Cyril Judd" novel somewhere I might've passed it over as by someone I'm not familiar w/. & I have to wonder: How many good bks have I missed this way? I, of all people, shd be hyperaware of multiple name use given that I might have as many as 60 names myself - & how many people know them all? Noone that I know of.

I've been interested in Merril for a long time b/c when I 1st started reading SF in the early 1960s I knew of few or no women involved. Then I discovered & read Merril's 1961 editing of the 6th Annual Edition The Year's Best S-F & was happy to find something both edited by a woman & including women writers. This was certainly one of the earliest SF anthologies I ever read & I remember being very impressed by it. As such, Merril stuck in my mind as someone to watch for. Nonetheless, I've read very little by her since! Having just now read her Wikipedia bio, I'm once again astounded that I hadn't previously learned more about her. Her activities as a political activist alone are enuf to strongly endear her to me.

Again, as in The Space Merchants, Gunner Cade presents history & language distorted for propaganda control purposes. People are taught that the world(s) had been created 10,000 yrs before & that an Emperor & a particular political system had been served throughout. Creationism anyone? Page 10: a teacher 'explains' that: "'They must be always occupied with fiddling details' - I should perhaps explain that a fiddle was a musical instrument; fiddling hence means harmonious, or proper." The joke here being that at the time Gunner Cade was written "fiddling details" wd've meant 'trivial, little, petty, worthless, insignificant' details - in other words, something to keep the dupes busy to keep them from thinking about anything important.

Another instance of this is on page 18: "'Always assume mankind is essentially merciful; nothing else explains why crooks are regularly returned to office.' If you know as little of Philosophy as you do of decency, Brother, I should explain that a crook is an implement formerly used by good shepherds and in this case stands, by a figure of speech, for the good shepherd himself." Ha ha!!

Making this whole tale even more poignant for me is that much of it takes place in Baltimore (my home town), Aberdeen (the military weapons testing area north of Baltimore), & Washington DC (similarly nearby in the South). These are, indeed, highly significant locations for American militarism. The society of this story is a future one so these locations are described circuitously: eg: the Pentagon is a ruin called the Caves of Washington.

As Gunner Cade, the title's character, becomes less naive re what's actually going on around him, a respected military figure is found to be completely cynical. Cade learns that wars that he'd fought in were at heart divide-&-conquer strategies to keep the masses disunited. WWI anyone? As a "Gunner" Cade is to keep absolute distance from women. Look to the more militaristic culture of Papua, New Guinea (& most other places) for contemporary parallels. But it takes contact w/ one of these dreaded creatures for Cade to finally learn about history - a very dangerous subject indeed.

All in all, the bk's slant is pro-technology wch is to say pro-science wch is to say pro-progress - a slant that I suspect that Merril probably came to qualify as its more destructive ramifications became increasingly apparent after WWII. According to Wikipedia, "From the mid-1970s until her death, Merril spent much time in the Canadian peace movement, including traveling to Ottawa dressed as a witch in order to hex Parliament for allowing American cruise missile testing over Canada." Wch isn't to say that technology is only cruise missiles - wch is to say that an unquestioned support of technology will most certainly include such things as cruise missiles & even worse.

Both Gunner Cade & The Space Merchants end on an optimistic romantic note: the women are the ones who know what's going on from the get-go & the men are the ones who are gradually converted by love to apply their power to less slavish ends. If the implication is that this is generally the case between the 'sexes' then I probably disagree. Nonetheless, this was yet another good subversive novel written at a time when such things were very important - just as they are now.

There are a least three SF books written by Cyril Judd. The authors are really Judith Merril and Cyril Kornbluth. Both were successful pulp magazine short story writers in the "Golden Age" of SF.

Judith Merril is known as one of the best science fiction anthology editors of the period. She wrote a couple of novels solo and three with Kornbluth.

Cyril Kornbluth was a prolific SF writer selling dozens of short stories to the pulps. Along with his collaborations with Merril he co wrote at least 5 novels with Frederik Pohl and some solo novels. The Judith Merril and Frederik Pohl were married at that time so working with both of them was easy.

Unfortunately the Cyril Judd novels were average fair for the period. This book is the most popular and has some very good writing. The overall story is week. I will not read another of the Cyril Judd books. There are too many great SF novels waiting to be read.

Indeholder "1. Slagets morgen", "2. Giften i glasset", "3. Hun kommer", "4. Dræb ham med dine hænder", "5. I pigernes hus", "6. Den lille tyv", "7. Kamp og flugt", "8. Rædselens hule", "9. Skrevet med blod", "10. Den første gud falder", "11. Autoriseret mord", "12. Cade går under jorden", "13. Manden med jernansigtet", "14. Den store sammensværgelse", "15. - og hun læste digte", "16. Rumskib - start", "17. I luftkamp", "18. Det første kys", "19. Var alt forgæves?", "20. Krigen på Mars".

Cade er en blandt mange "Skytter" som siden 11-års alderen er opdraget til at tjene Kejseren blindt. Historien foregår tusinder af år ude i fremtiden, men soldaterne slås med pistoler og skyder fx ikke på fjenden fra luften. Under et angreb på en rebelsk stormester, bliver Cade taget til fange på mystisk vis og bortført. En kvinde forsøger at hjælpe ham, men han er overbevist om at hans "De Våbenføre Mænds Orden" vil klare alting at han afslår hendes hjælp med hån. Han bliver forsøgt hypnotiseret til at dræbe stormesteren, men undslipper. Han bliver fanget igen og opdager at han er i Baltimore, selv om han blev taget til fange i Frankrig. Pigen hjælper ham igen og igen afslår han og får dem begge to arresteret. Det går op for ham, at alle tror at menig Cade er død, dræbt under kampene i Frankrig. Desuden har han ingen af Ordenens kendetegn på sig og ingen vil derfor tro ham over en dørtærskel. Det lykkes for ham at flygte sammen med en tyv, en lærer i Klin-filosofien ved navn Fledwick. De bliver forfulgt som dødsfjender af kejseren, men når alligevel frem til den øverste Skytte, en mand ved navn Arle. Han er dog ikke det dydsmønster, som Cade er opdraget til at tro på, men ser ud til at holde en skøge ved navn Moia, og desuden er han ikke til at stole på. Arle giver Fledwick en benådningsskrivelse, men i virkeligheden får han ham henrettet.
Arle sender også en snigmorder efter Cade, men denne har lugtet lunten og dræber snigmorderen.
Cade sniger sig væk og har opsnuset nok lærdom hos Fledwick til at komme til Aberdeen og det bordel, hvor han har mødt pigen før. Her opholder han sig et par uger, mens han leder efter pigen. Det er forgæves og hans næste plan er at opsøge kejseren selv. Han opdager at det kræver bestikkelse at komme i audiens og opsøger i stedet den Øverste Skytte. Det har han held med, fordi vagten genkender ham og er en af hans kammerater. Vagten Kendall tager ham med til Magtens Mester og bliver dræbt for sin hjælpsomhed, da Magtens Mester har brug for at ingen ved hvem Cade er. Magtens Mester lægger planer for at bruge Cade, men de bliver ødelagt, da en ung kvinde, kejserens niece, Lady Jocelyn dukker op. Hun er den unge kvinde, der to gange tidligere har forsøgt at hjælpe Cade, men da var hun forklædt. Nu afslører hun sin hemmelige identitet og hjælper Cade til flugt.
Hun har brug for ham som pilot på et rumskib til Mars, men han krydser hendes planer ved at tage hende med på rumskibet. De nedkæmper tre rumskibe, der bliver sendt efter dem og ankommer sikkert til Mars, hvor de afleverer 6 store kasser med håndvåben til patrioterne på Mars. Det hele er dog ved at slutte der, for de bliver angrebet af Magtens Mesters mænd. Mod alle odds tager marspatrioterne kampen op og med Cade som overordnet leder af kampene vinder de faktisk, for jordboerne havde ikke regnet med kamp. Faktisk er selve Magtens Mester en af de døde og Lady Jocelyns plan om at få nedlagt hele systemet med Ordenen af Våbenføre Mænd og Magtens Mester kan nu lade sig gennemføre. De seneste tre kejsere, inklusive hendes egen onkel, har skjult forsøgt at bane vejen for netop dette, for hele systemet har virket dræbende på alt initiativ indenfor kunst og videnskab. Resourcemangel gør en stor indsats for at finde nye muligheder desperat nødvendig.

Nogenlunde lykkelig slutning. Cade og Jocelyn erklærer hinanden deres kærlighed og går videre med deres planer for Mars og Jorden.

Historien er svær at tro på, for Cade er virkelig naiv samtidig med at han har øjnene med sig. Det hænger ikke helt sammen, men hvis man sluger den præmis, så er historien ellers skruet godt sammen. Bogen er skrevet af Judith Merril og Cyril M. Kornbluth på kun seks uger, fordi de var fattige som kirkerotter og havde hårdt brug for honoraret. Den er derfor skræddersyet til at passe med hvad John W. Campbell syntes om.

Un'altra riscoperta, questo romanzo del grande Kornbluth coadiuvato da Judith Merril, fu pubblicato a puntate sulle pagine della mitica "Urania Rivista" nel lontano 1952 e da allora mai più ristampato. Di quella edizione abbiamo mantenuto anche le illustrazioni originali.
Quaranta anni sono trascorsi da quando i primi colonizzatori - circa tremila in tutto - atterrarono su Marte. Gli abitanti della città dì Sun Lake è una cooperativa senza mire industriali. I suoi membri sono composti di ogni categoria dì individui, dagli operai ai tecnici specializzati, e hanno tutti una idea in comune, cioè che la Terra sia finita come pianeta di abitazione.
A Sun Lake è nato un bambino da Jim e Polly Kandro. Al bambino viene applicata una speciale maschera di ossigeno, dato che i neonati e i bambini fino a quattro o cinque anni non assorbono la pillola OxEn, enzimi di ossigeno necessari alla respirazione su Marte....