“A Science Fiction Writer of the Fifties”

When I glanced at the cover of the April issue of The New Criterion, my eye mistook one line for “A New Poem by Brad Linaweaver”. The second glance corrected me; the poet’s surname was “Leithauser”. It turned out, though, that my mistake wasn’t total, for the “new poem” is titled “‘A Science Fiction Writer of the Fifties’” [link probably works only for subscribers], and I commend it to all SF fans. It tells as much about the attractions of our genre – tales of the extraordinary written by usually rather ordinary men and women – as any laborious study can. The poem is in three parts: first, “When the Smoke Rings Sail”, a contemplation of the night sky by a writer – not a Hugo Award winning big name whose books we read today, but a run-of-the-stars hack – near the last night of his life, “one month before the launch of Sputnik”:

He writes “boys’ books”—or so he’s sometimes told.
Well, true enough, his plots employ their share
Of rocket ships and anti-gravity
Devices, time-machines and -warps, and creatures
Spawned on far planets.
......................................Boys’ books? He won’t argue
The term, in any case, except to say,
Who knows—maybe the kids have got it right?
* * * *
Whatever his books were, he wrote them fast,
A new one every year, with luck—and yet,
For all his speed, hardly enough to keep him
In pencils, carbon paper, pipe tobacco.
Invasion of the Mantis Men—that’s his,
And Time’s Knock; Old Earth’s Torn Mantle; The Gears
Of History. Although they were his children,
He rarely glanced backward; no, his way was
The alligator’s—lay your clutch of eggs,
Kick some loose sand on top of them, move on.
* * * *
Things have turned hard for him. Tonight he walks
Through his adopted hometown of Urbana,
Streets dark, stars bright (it’s very late—two, three,
The unwatched hours he always has loved best,
When the mind’s gravity loosens a little),
And what’s a man to do with such a sky
But launch a couple smoke rings that resemble
Little life-vests (he wrote down that one, too),
For little lives afloat on Time’s great waters?

The second part, “When the Smoke Clears”, picks up the gimmick of his favorite among his novels,

The one where scientists learn to project
Human-sized intellects into the brains
Of animals—a bear, a camel, even
Spiders and termites—only to discover
That these emancipated creatures, while
Keen to communicate among themselves,
Still want nothing to do with mankind

– and launches a series of metaphors for what science fiction writers (and other speculators) do:

The mind, that rambling bear, ransacks the sky
. . . . .In search of honey,
Fish, berries, carrion. It minds no laws …
As if the heavens were some canvas tent,
. . . . .It slashes through the firmament
To prise up the sealed stores with its big paws.

Lastly, “After All”, some reflections from a contemporary reader who finds matter for thought in the forgotten tales of a dead author:

He wrote boys’ books and intuitively
Recognized that the real
Realist isn’t the one who details
Lowdown heartland factories and farms
As if they would last, but the one who affirms,
From the other end of the galaxy,
Ours is the age of perilous miracles.

There’s no Hugo category that fits pieces like this. A pity (though I’m not lobbying for another one). I've quoted only a small part. For those who are reluctant to buy a rather pricey magazine for the sake of a single poem, let me note that this issue also contains an evisceration of the “crunchy con” movement (conservatives who think that Edmund Burke would have preferred granola to beefsteak) and the usual great columns by Mark Steyn and James Bowman, as well as other delights.

Addendum: Also of stfnal interest in an unexpected venue is John Wilson’s Weekly Standard obituary of Stanislaw Lem, who died on March 27th. I’ve never been a Lem aficionado, but this succinct appreciation tempts me to pick up a volume.