Germany: A Science Fiction by Laurence A. Rickels
Let me say something about how I came to this book. Editor and publisher
D.Harlan Wilson sent me a few books early in the Corona-cation that I
have been reading between pressing books that have the three-week
library deadline. I knew nothing about this book except for years I had
on my list because the title and the cover made me curious. I also trust
Professor Wilson with the work he publishes because so far I have
enjoyed all of it. An AOP release is one I am going to read.
So
here is the thing. I never read the description or back cover. I wanted
to go into this book cold. I read the preface and it mentioned lots of
classic Science Fiction I am interested in. All I knew about Rickels was
that he had written an entire book about Philip K Dick. (who I have
devoted two years of doing a podcast to the study of) So I was not
entirely surprised that he was interested in PKD but I was shocked that
he seemed very interested in PKD’s novel the Simulacra.
After a
few pages, I felt really stupid when I realized that this was not a
novel but a collection of essays devoted to Science Fiction that came in
the wake of WW II. That in itself is an interesting idea as the genre
was really just hitting puberty when Hitler marched across Europe. The
Hugo Gernsbecks and John W. Campbells of the world that were trying to
shape the genre through the pulps and was faced with side effects of
having trouble getting paper. At the same time Their stories were also
the escape from the horrors of the war and carried in the anti-fascist
armies.
It could be argued That the Catherine (CL) Moore, Henry
Kuttner and AE Van Vogts of the world were doing the shaping during the
war but Rickels is more interested in the aftermath. This message of
this book is not spelled out in a 2+2 formula. Rickels is not being
definitive and exhaustingly hitting the point through every single
example. These are separate essays that follow his muse. He seems to be
just flowing with the books he is most interested in and sometimes they
hit the theme like a bullseye either way for fans of the critical theory
of genre there is so much to chew on.
While he does spend time
on important classics like the HG Wells and Day of the Triffids for two
examples Rickels is not interested in the canon. The proof of that is
the time he devotes to minor work of note in the PKD canon. I’ll duck
because I know some Dickheads think it is all-important which is an
opinion, we know even Phil didn’t have.
I enjoyed Rickels’s
attention to pre-apollo space flight and moon shot novels, which is an
era I have really thought about getting into. Much of this is due to
early pulp writers being fascinated by the German V-2 rocket that was at
the center of many of these stories. Damon Knight also wrote about this
in his classic collection of reviews and commentary In Search of
Wonder.
Of course, I enjoyed the time he spent on Spinrad’s Iron
Dream but I can’t see how with this theme how he could miss it. He
points out that the novel in the novel Hitler’s “Lord of the Swastika is
a work in denial of Science Fiction,” in the sense of that the novel is
about Hitler’s pure wish fulfillment. This is a point we discussed on
the Dickheads episode about The Iron Dream but I wish I had this quote
to react to.
I am happy with the short but powerful discussion
of the Iron Dream a novel that spoofed Toliken so savagely. That said it
seems strange to me it didn’t get more time, as it is almost on the
nose of the theme. Also, the reason Rickels is invoking PKD’s Simulacra
is an aspect we talked about but didn’t go deep into our analysis. That
episode featured guest Dickheads Cody Goodfellow and is linked below.
Yeah,
I know how that sounds but it is a novel with 54 named characters and
almost every chapter adds plotlines like a spreading virus. I mean The
Simulacra is odd even in the context Dick’s Career. You have A Russian
telekinetic piano player time travel, Robot presidents and actresses
cast in the role of the ultra-powerful First lady, hyper packed
apartment buildings with class-organized populations, and a Jug-band
with a Martian pet with the power of suggestion. Oh, don't for the dudes
build and Martian shuttle Jalopies and a political revolution.
All
that stuff and that is not the reason Rickels was inspired by it to
write this book. In the novel post WW 2 Germany and future California
are tied together. The actress playing the first lady wants to change
Germany's fate with time travel in exchange for leadership tips. Yeah,
that is a weird book and it got Laurence Rickels thinking.
After
jumping into the commentary Rickels goes deep into the genre, while I
found myself wishing for commentary on the occasional author or editor
not mentioned. I am thinking of Leguin, Brunner, or Boucher who
basically discovered Dick. That is a nitpick. This book is well
researched.
I think the chapters hit me harder were the ones
focused on PKD, Lem, and Spinrad. Those are authors I am deeply
interested in. When Rickels talks about Gravity’s Rainbow or Jules Verne
it is less in my wheelhouse.
I highlighted and dogged eared
many pages but I can’t really get into all my thoughts here, except to
say these tidbits and knowledge will be helpful in doing the podcast.
What more can you ask for in a book about critical theory?
OK,
one negative I have to point out, and I am not happy to do this. On page
58 Rickels does a really good job of discussing PKD’s Novel the Man Who
Japed. The problem he refers to it as PKD’s first novel which was of
course Solar Lottery, Japed was the fourth novel. Rickels makes matters
worse saying he followed it up with Time out of Joint the following
year. Those novels were years apart. These details are so wrong I
wondered if they were intentional although I can’t find any evidence of
that. As a Dick scholar, I found that jarring.
I suppose I should
not be surprised that no one else has reviewed this book on good reads.
You have to be an academic or a deep dive sci-fi theory dork like me.
Shit, this is the kinda book you can implant in my brain. I think the
best compliment I can give it is it is going on the shelf two books down
from Damon Knight’s In Search of Wonder. This is a MUST READ for Sci-fi
theorists and I am glad I did.
Dickheads episode on The Simulacra featuring Cody Goodfellow
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