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Fantasy Commentator, v. 1, issue 11, Summer 1946
Page 301
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FANTASY COMMENTATOR 301 tells of a drug that makes musical artists relive one of their performances whenever a record of it is played. Since the time is that of the first phonograph boom it quickly drives all the great singers and concert artists mad, ruining the opera entirely. In the end, the whole affair proves to be a hoax, however. Argosy's sole representative of the genus fantasia ten years later is Fred MacIsaac's anonymously-written "Great Commander," a four-part serial beginning in the July 3, 1926 issue. In this novel---which sounds as if it portrayed 1946 instead of 1933---King J. Nelson, having secured financial control of America, plots of become its ruler by initiating a series of strikes; when the country is thus paralyzed he plans to step in, be granted dictatorial powers, and be crowned by a grateful public after weathering the crisis. However, his daughter and an opposition congressman with whom she is in love successfully conspire with others to kidnap King and foil the scheme. Very entertaining! The July 18, 1936 Argosy begins a four-part serial by Patrick Lee; in "North of the Stars" we encounter the usual combination of a hidden Arctic land, its beautiful queen, dastardly, gold-greedy Russians, and the young Mountie who foils the villains and, of course, gets the girl. In the August 8 issue is Dale Clark's unusual ghost story, "The Devil in Hollywood," which is quite well done. A week later A. H. Carhart tells in "Buccaneers International" of the period following the second world war, when munition makers attempt to conquer a disarmed world, and are defeated. The same number carries Robert E. Howard's short voodoo tale, "The Dead Remember," while on September 19 an old acquaintance returns in the three-part "Tarzan and the Magic Men." It is inferior Burroughs, sadly. ---oOo--- The Far Future of Science-Fiction---concluded from page 285 probably all but disappear, as two-dimensional time presents more interesting possibilities and avoids the necessity of getting around the grandfather argument. If sidewise-in-time stories increase in popularity, tales of backward-and-forward travel in two-dimensional time will tend to accept the infinite-valued possibility theory rather than the one whereby a single new line of events splits off from the old one through the activities of the time-traveller. Finally, the unmixed might-have-beens offer a fertile field which has perhaps been explored more outside the usual domain of fantasy than within it; for example, speculations about the course of history if Jesus had pursued different tactics ("Hosanna"), or if the Germans had won in 1940. And finally, there is the little fantasy in which one sees the world as it would have been if all the "results" of a certain past occurrence were removed. Naturally, new extrapolations must be found to be replace obsolescent ones. There was a time when a man could take all knowledge for his province, and become outstanding in a number of fields. Needless to say, that time is long gone. At present, ideally, everyone is given the rudiments of all sciences, arts and history. Science-fiction is written to get past the mind with this basic education, and an author doesn't worry much if he knows that what he's suggesting is proved impossible by a recent discovery in a specialized field. What will be the consequence if the total amount of available knowledge continues to increase we can only conjecture. The significance of the discoveries in "Venus Equilateral" is a warning: they may be perfectly clear to technically trained men, but we embyro artists, merchants, lawyers and ditch-diggers have to read the story carefully to spot even one of the potential results. If science evolves into a stratosphere where the importance of new discoveries is not apparent to the average man, stories based on extrapolations of these discoveries may not be able to describe changed living conditions which would affect the ordinary citizen. When that evil day comes, science-fiction for the masses will be in the decline. It may be at its zenith right now.
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FANTASY COMMENTATOR 301 tells of a drug that makes musical artists relive one of their performances whenever a record of it is played. Since the time is that of the first phonograph boom it quickly drives all the great singers and concert artists mad, ruining the opera entirely. In the end, the whole affair proves to be a hoax, however. Argosy's sole representative of the genus fantasia ten years later is Fred MacIsaac's anonymously-written "Great Commander," a four-part serial beginning in the July 3, 1926 issue. In this novel---which sounds as if it portrayed 1946 instead of 1933---King J. Nelson, having secured financial control of America, plots of become its ruler by initiating a series of strikes; when the country is thus paralyzed he plans to step in, be granted dictatorial powers, and be crowned by a grateful public after weathering the crisis. However, his daughter and an opposition congressman with whom she is in love successfully conspire with others to kidnap King and foil the scheme. Very entertaining! The July 18, 1936 Argosy begins a four-part serial by Patrick Lee; in "North of the Stars" we encounter the usual combination of a hidden Arctic land, its beautiful queen, dastardly, gold-greedy Russians, and the young Mountie who foils the villains and, of course, gets the girl. In the August 8 issue is Dale Clark's unusual ghost story, "The Devil in Hollywood," which is quite well done. A week later A. H. Carhart tells in "Buccaneers International" of the period following the second world war, when munition makers attempt to conquer a disarmed world, and are defeated. The same number carries Robert E. Howard's short voodoo tale, "The Dead Remember," while on September 19 an old acquaintance returns in the three-part "Tarzan and the Magic Men." It is inferior Burroughs, sadly. ---oOo--- The Far Future of Science-Fiction---concluded from page 285 probably all but disappear, as two-dimensional time presents more interesting possibilities and avoids the necessity of getting around the grandfather argument. If sidewise-in-time stories increase in popularity, tales of backward-and-forward travel in two-dimensional time will tend to accept the infinite-valued possibility theory rather than the one whereby a single new line of events splits off from the old one through the activities of the time-traveller. Finally, the unmixed might-have-beens offer a fertile field which has perhaps been explored more outside the usual domain of fantasy than within it; for example, speculations about the course of history if Jesus had pursued different tactics ("Hosanna"), or if the Germans had won in 1940. And finally, there is the little fantasy in which one sees the world as it would have been if all the "results" of a certain past occurrence were removed. Naturally, new extrapolations must be found to be replace obsolescent ones. There was a time when a man could take all knowledge for his province, and become outstanding in a number of fields. Needless to say, that time is long gone. At present, ideally, everyone is given the rudiments of all sciences, arts and history. Science-fiction is written to get past the mind with this basic education, and an author doesn't worry much if he knows that what he's suggesting is proved impossible by a recent discovery in a specialized field. What will be the consequence if the total amount of available knowledge continues to increase we can only conjecture. The significance of the discoveries in "Venus Equilateral" is a warning: they may be perfectly clear to technically trained men, but we embyro artists, merchants, lawyers and ditch-diggers have to read the story carefully to spot even one of the potential results. If science evolves into a stratosphere where the importance of new discoveries is not apparent to the average man, stories based on extrapolations of these discoveries may not be able to describe changed living conditions which would affect the ordinary citizen. When that evil day comes, science-fiction for the masses will be in the decline. It may be at its zenith right now.
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