SF&F encyclopedia (C-C)CABELL, JAMES BRANCH (1879-1958) US writer, mostly of mannered, witty and in later life sometimes rather enervated fantasies set in a Land of Fable Europe and elsewhere; in some cases long after they were first published, he assimilated a large number of these fantasies as episodes in the Biography of the Life of Manuel. The imaginary kingdom of Poictesme is a central thread running through the more than 20 volumes of the series, and ties the whole - however arbitrarily - into a consistent purview. The stated (but not chronologically consistent) proper ordering of the sequence is: Beyond Life (1919); Figures of Earth (1921); The Silver Stallion (1926); The Music from Behind the Moon (1926) and The White Robe (1928), both assembled along with The Way of Ecben (1928) as The Witch-Woman (omni 1948); The Soul of Melicent (1913; rev vt Domnei 1920); Chivalry (1909; rev 1921); Jurgen (1919); The Line of Love (coll of linked stories 1905; rev 1921); The High Place (1923); Gallantry (1907; rev 1928); Something about Eve (1927); The Certain Hour (1916); The Cords of Vanity (1909; rev 1920); From the Hidden Way (1916; rev 1924); The Jewel Merchants (1921); The Rivet in Grandfather's Neck (1915); The Eagle's Shadow (1904; rev 1923); The Cream of the Jest (1917); The Lineage of Lichfield (1922); Straws and Prayer-Books (1924). A second series - Smirt (1934), Smith (1935) and Smire (1937), assembled as The Nightmare has Triplets (omni 1972) - carries the eponym (who is three in one) ever downwards, through universes and incarnations: the effect is ironical.JBC suffered from over-attention after the prosecution of Jurgen (most implausibly) for obscenity, and after his subsequent fame and neglect his more recent advocates - like James BLISH, who was for some time editor of the Cabell Society journal Kalki - perhaps argued too strenuously for his rehabilitation. By now, however, his place in US fiction is secure though not central. His relevance to sf proper derives from his engagingly haughty use of sf tropes - alternate worlds, DYSTOPIAS and UTOPIAS, TIME TRAVEL, and even the building of planets. [JC]Other works: Taboo (1921 chap); These Restless Heads (1932); The King was in his Counting House (1938); Hamlet had an Uncle (1940); The First Gentleman of America (1942); There Were Two Pirates (1946) and a linked tale, The Devil's Own Dear Son (1949).About the author: James Branch Cabell (1962) by Joe Lee Davis; James Branch Cabell: A Complete Bibliography (1974) by James N. Hall , which includes A Supplement of Current Values of Cabell Books by Nelson BOND ; James Branch Cabell: Centennial Essays (anth 1983) ed M. Thomas Inge and Edgar E. MacDonald.See also: FANTASY; GODS AND DEMONS; SWORD AND SORCERY. CABOT, JOHN YORK [s] David Wright O'BRIEN. CADIGAN, PAT Working name of US writer Patricia Oren Kearney Cadigan (1953- ), who began publishing sf with "Death from Exposure" for SHAYOL in 1978; this SEMIPROZINE, which she edited throughout its existence (1977-85), was remarkable both for the quality of stories it published and for its production values. She later assembled much of her best shorter work in Patterns (coll 1989), where its cumulative effect is very considerable; later stories appear in Home by the Sea (coll 1992) and Dirty Work (coll 1993). From the beginning, PC has been a writer who makes use of her venues - usually NEAR-FUTURE, usually urban, and usually Californian though often intensified by a sense of windswept, prairie desolation - as highly charged gauntlets which her protagonists do not so much run as cling to, surviving somehow. It was an effect also to be found in the stories assembled in Letters from Home (coll 1991 UK) with Karen Joy FOWLER and Pat MURPHY, each contributing her own tales.Unfortunately PC's first novel, Mindplayers (fixup 1987), failed to sustain the intensity of her shorter work, treating in simplistic fashion a vision of the human mind as constituted of sequences of internal psychodramas into which a healer may literally enter, given the proper tools. The idea, which had been intensely and punishingly examined by Roger ZELAZNY in THE DREAM MASTER (1966), is not in any sense sophisticated by the can-do METAPHYSIC underlying the premise as PC described it 20 years later. Her next novel, Synners (1991), on the other hand, takes full advantage of its considerable length to translate the street-wise, CYBERPUNK involvedness of her best short fiction into a comprehensive vision-racingly told, linguistically acute, simultaneously pell-mell and precise in its detailing - of a world dominated by the intricacies of the human/ COMPUTER interface; it won the ARTHUR C. CLARKE award in 1992. The plot, which is extremely complicated, deals mainly with a disease of the interface, where computer viruses which pass for AIs are beginning to cause numerous human deaths. Like William GIBSON's cyberpunk novels - and unlike Bruce STERLING's - Synners offers no sense that the CONCEPTUAL BREAKTHROUGHS that proliferate throughout the text will in any significant sense transform the overwhelming urbanized world, though there is some hint that the system may begin to fail through its own internal imbalances. But at the heart of Synners is the burning presence of the future. PC's third novel, Fools (1992) - which won the Arthur C. Clarke award in 1995, the first time it has been awarded twice to one writer - exercises a virtuoso concision on similar material, through examining a near future environment in which memories are marketable and promiscuously insertable, and individual brains become arenas in which various selves engage in agonistic fugues with each other. One of the most acutely intelligent of 1980s writers, PC currently seems to be learning from everything. [JC]Other works: My Brother's Keeper (1988 IASFM; 1992 chap).See also: MACHINES; PSYCHOLOGY. CADY, JACK (ANDREW) (1932- ) US writer, almost exclusively of horror, although one novel, The Man who Could Make Things Vanish (1982), is a genuine sf DYSTOPIA set in a very bleakly conceived NEAR-FUTURE right-wing USA; and "The Night We Buried Road Dog" (1992) won a NEBULA award for Best Novella. [JC]Other works: The Well (1980); The Jonah Watch (1981); McDowell's Ghost (1981); Inagehi (1994); Street (1994). CAIDIN, MARTIN (1927- ) US writer, pilot and aerospace specialist, who has written over 80 nonfiction books, some for the juvenile market, mostly on aviation and space exploration, beginning with Jets, Rockets and Guided Missiles (1950; rev vt Rockets and Missiles 1954) with David C. Cooke and continuing with texts like War for the Moon (1959; vt Race for the Moon 1960 UK) and I am Eagle (1962) with G.S. Titov, the Soviet astronaut. MC's own firm, Martin Caidin Associates, was designed to provide information and other services to radio and tv in the areas of his special knowledge; he founded the American Astronautical Society in 1953. He began publishing sf with The Long Night (1956), in which a US city is fire-bombed, and gained considerable success with Marooned (1964), later filmed as MAROONED (1969) with Gregory Peck. Like much of his fiction, Marooned deals with realistically depicted NEAR-FUTURE crises in space, in this case the need to rescue astronauts trapped in orbit; it has been credited with inspiring the 1975 US-USSR Apollo-Soyuz joint mission. Four Came Back (1968) deals with human difficulties (and a mysterious plague) aboard a space platform. A series of CYBORG adventures - Cyborg (1972), Operation Nuke (1973), High Crystal * (1974) and Cyborg IV (1975)-served as inspiration and basis for the successful tv series The SIX MILLION DOLLAR MAN and its spin-off The BIONIC WOMAN ; a later story, ManFac (1981) also presents an enforced intimacy between human and machine in unambiguously positive terms. MC's stories combine considerable storytelling drive with expertly integrated technical information, and tend to be rather more convincing, therefore, than the tv and film derivations they have inspired. [JC]Other works: No Man's World (1967); The Last Fathom (1967); The God Machine (1968); The Mendelov Conspiracy (1969; vt Encounter Three 1978); Anytime, Anywhere (1969); The Cape (1971); Almost Midnight (1971); Maryjane Tonight at Angels Twelve (1972); Destination Mars (1972); When War Comes (1972); Three Corners to Nowhere (1975); Whip (1976); Aquarius Mission (1978); Jericho 52 (1979); Star Bright (1980); Killer Station (1985); The Messiah Stone (1986) and its sequel, Dark Messiah (1990); Zoboa (1986); Exit Earth (1987); Prison Ship (1989); Beamriders! (1989; vt Beamriders 1990 UK); and two Indiana Jones ties: Indiana Jones and the Sky Pirates * (1994) and Indiana Jones and the White Witch * (1994)See also: COMPUTERS; CYBERNETICS; UFOS; UNDER THE SEA. CAINE, [Sir] (THOMAS HENRY) HALL (1853-1931) UK writer of what were enormously bestselling novels in the late 19th century but were almost forgotten by his death. The Mahdi, or Love and Race (1894) depicts a NEAR-FUTURE uprising at the behest of the eponymous leader of the faithful. The Eternal City (1901), printed in a first edition of 100,000, sets a complex near-future intrigue alight in a Pope-dominated Rome. The White Prophet (1909), again marginally displaced into the future, is set in Egypt, where intrigue is rife. A play, The Prime Minister (written c1911; 1918), set in the future, depicts romance threatening policy. [JC] CALDER, RICHARD (1956- ) UK-born writer, in Thailand from 1990, who began publishing sf with "Toxine" in Interzone: The 4th Anthology (anth 1989) ed John CLUTE, Simon Ounsley and David PRINGLE; his early short fiction, almost always densely post- CYBERPUNK in idiom and setting, was assembled as "The Allure" and published, trans Hisashi Asakura, in Japanese (coll 1991 Japan). His first 2 novels-Dead Girls (dated 1992 but 1993 UK) and Dead Boys (1994 UK)-mix horror and sf in depicting a world, loosely connected to that of "Toxine" and others of his stories, which has been transformed by NANOTECHNOLOGY into an over-heated, inordinately complex dazzlement of an environment. Dead Girls centres on a "nanotech doll" or gynoid who generates an AIDs-like disease in the humans she bloodsucks for their genes, and is herself invasively disrupted by a bio-weapon "dust" which scrambles the fractal programmes that enable her to operate. The novel continues with excursions into the "cyberspace" within her deranged brain, and much else; it is funny, ornately erotic, and frequently inspired. Dead Boys, perhaps less sustainedly, continues the examination of a not-unlikely 21st century. [JC] CALDWELL, (JANET MIRIAM) TAYLOR (HOLLAND) (1900-1985) US popular novelist whose first sf novel, The Devil's Advocate (1952), though set in 1970, is in effect a right-wing denunciation of the New Deal of the 1930s. Her second effort, Your Sins and Mine (1955), is fundamentally FANTASY, in that the devastating drought inflicted by the Lord upon the world for its sins can be removed by assiduous prayer. She was also responsible for fantasies like The Listener (1960) and its sequel, No One Hears but Him (1966), and Dialogues with the Devil (1967). The Romance of Atlantis (1975), with Jess Stearn, is based on a novel she first wrote when aged 12; TC claimed that it in turn was based on her childhood dreams of her previous incarnation ( REINCARNATION) as an empress in ATLANTIS. [JC] CALIFORNIA MAN ENCINO MAN. CALISHER, HORTENSE (1911- ) US writer of several MAINSTREAM novels set mostly on the US East Coast. After an sf allegory, "In the Absence of Angels" (1951), which associates the military occupation of the USA with a poet's own imprisonment, came her sf novel Journal from Ellipsia (1965), which depicts a somewhat metaphysical ALTERNATE WORLD where everything - as in E.M. FORSTER's famous dictum - connects with everything, especially the transcendental sex that permeates the narrative. [JC]Other work: Mysteries of Motion (1983). CALKINS, DICK Working name of US COMIC-strip illustrator Richard T. Calkins (1895-1962), who was born in Grand Rapids and studied at the Art Institute in Chicago. In 1929 Philip NOWLAN scripted and DC illustrated BUCK ROGERS IN THE 25TH CENTURY, a comic strip based on Nowlan's "Armageddon: 2419 AD" (1928 AMZ) and "The Airlords of Han" (1929 AMZ), later published together as Armageddon - 2419 AD (1962). Though DC's style was stiff and amateurish by today's standards, the strip was extremely popular in the 1930s and 1940s. Its quality improved when Rick Yager joined him in some of the chores from the 1930s; Yager succeeded DC at his retirement in 1948. The artwork was never sophisticated, but DC's strong, simple lines were well suited to fast-paced narrative. A selection of Buck Rogers adventures has been reissued as The Collected Works of Buck Rogers in the 25th Century (coll 1969; rev 1977) ed Robert C. Dille. [JG/PN]See also: ILLUSTRATION; RADIO. CALLAHAN, WILLIAM Raymond Z. GALLUN. CALLENBACH, ERNEST (1929- ) US environmentalist and writer whose own Banyan Tree Books published his first novel, Ecotopia: The Notebooks and Reports of William Weston (1974 American Review as "First Days in Ecotopia"; exp 1975), after it had been refused by several professional houses; it was reported in the mid-1980s to have sold more than 300,000 copies, which should come as no surprise given the reasoned seductiveness of the UTOPIA premised in its pages. As of 1999, Washington, Oregon and Northern California have been in secession from the rest of the USA for almost two decades. The reporter William Weston is allowed within the borders to make contact with (and if possible to subvert) the Ecotopians. He finds irresistible the balance of life there, the manner in which the new state has tamed the juggernaut of TECHNOLOGY, and the refusal of its citizens to cost the world more than they give the world; and he, too, becomes an Ecotopian. Ecotopia Emerging (1981) is both a prequel and a kind of sequel to the previous book - a prequel in its long and persuasively detailed presentation of the Ecotopian route to secession, and the enormous power engendered by the (sf-like) discovery of a cheap solar-energy catalyst; but a "sequel" by virtue of treating the earlier book as being itself the inspiration for the emergence, in our world, of a "real" Ecotopia. Unfortunately for what may be guessed to have been EC's real-life hopes, a decade has passed since his second attempt at arousal.Nonfiction texts which elaborate on some of the procedures and theories of the fiction include The Ecotopian Encyclopedia for the 80s: A Survival Guide for the Age of Inflation (1980) and A Citizen Legislature (1985). [JC] CALVERT, THOMAS [s] Thomas Calvert MCCLARY. CALVERTON, V(ICTOR) F(RANCIS) (1900-1940) US writer whose sf novel, The Man Inside: Being the Record of the Strange Adventures of Allen Steele Among the Xulus (1936), describes some strange hypnotic experiments conducted in darkest Africa. [JC] CALVINO, ITALO (1923-1985) Italian novelist, born in Cuba, active since the end of WWII, at first with realist works but soon with GOTHIC, surrealist romances of great vigour and impact like Il Visconte dimezzato (1952) and Il Cavaliere inesistente (1959)-trans together by A. Colquhoun as The Non-Existent Knight and The Cloven Viscount 1962 UK) - and Il Barone rampante (1957; trans A. Colquhoun as Baron in the Trees 1959 UK), three thematically linked fables later assembled as I nostri antenati (omni 1960; in the Colquhoun trans as Our Ancestors 1980 US). A more recent venture in the same idiom is Il Castello dei Destini incrociati (coll of linked stories 1973; trans William Weaver as The Castle of Crossed Destinies 1977 US). Beneath the FABULATION-drenched protocols of these stories - the nonexistent knight, for instance, being an empty suit of armour with a "passion" for the formalities and ceremonies that keeps it "alive"- lies a concern for fundamental problems of being. IC's works closest to sf are the two linked volumes Le Cosmicomiche (coll of linked stories 1965; trans William Weaver as COSMICOMICS 1968 US) and Ti con zero (coll of linked stories 1967; trans William Weaver as t zero 1969 US; vt Time and the Hunter 1970 UK); both volumes feature and are told by the presence called Qfwfq, who is the same age as the Universe. The various stories express in emblematic form speculations and fables about the nature of life, EVOLUTION, reality and so forth; they are witty, moving and, after their strange fashion, effectively didactic. One of the stories in The Watcher and Other Stories (1952-63; coll trans William Weaver 1971 US), "Smog" (1958), a remarkable POLLUTION tale, is sf. Le citta invisibili (1972; trans William Weaver as Invisible Cities 1974 US) frames fragmented versions of Marco Polo's narrative of his voyages with a remarkable set of meditations ostensibly triggered by the distant, surrealistic CITIES he visits. Se una notte d'inverno un viaggiatore (1979; trans William Weaver as If on a Winter's Night a Traveler 1981 US) stunningly transfigures the conventions and momentums of narrative into a Bunuelesque labyrinth. IC's powers of invention were formally ingenious; at the same time he was an extremely lucid writer. His use of sf subjects and their intermixing with a whole array of contemporary literary devices made him a figure of considerable interest for the future of the genre. [JC]Marcovaldo ovvera le stagioni in citta (1976; trans William Weaver as Marcovaldo; or the Seasons in the City1983 US); Gli, amori difficili (coll 1984; trans William Weaver and others as Difficult Loves 1984 US); Sotto il sole giaguaro (coll 1986; trans William Weaver as Under the Jaguar Sun 1988 US).See also: COSMOLOGY; ITALY; ORIGIN OF MAN; OULIPO. CAMERON, BERL House name used for sf novels published by CURTIS WARREN and written by John S. GLASBY, Brian HOLLOWAY, Dennis HUGHES, David O'BRIEN and Arthur ROBERTS. [JC] CAMERON, ELEANOR (BUTLER) (1912- ) Canadian-born US writer whose career has been exclusively devoted to children's literature, and who received the National Book Award in 1974 for one of her finer fantasies, The Court of the Stone Children (1973); its sequel was To the Green Mountains (1975). She remains perhaps best known for the sf Mushroom Planet sequence with which she began her career: The Wonderful Flight to the Mushroom Planet (1954), Stowaway to the Mushroom Planet (1956), Mr Bass's Planetoid (1958), A Mystery for Mr Bass (1960) and Time and Mr Bass (1967). At the heart of the series is Mr Bass, whose mysterious filter permits his young friends - who have built him a SPACESHIP for the purpose of travelling there - to perceive the planet Basidium. Though perhaps slightly wholesome, the adventures of Bass and his companions on Basidium became, with justice, extremely popular. [JC]Other works: The Terrible Churnadryne (1959); The Mysterious Christmas Shell (1961); The Beast with the Magical Horn (1963); A Spell is Cast (1964); Beyond Silence (1980), a timeslip fantasy. CAMERON, IAN Pseudonym of UK writer Donald Gordon Payne (1924- ), author of The Lost Ones (1961; vt The Island at the Top of the World 1974 US) and The Mountains at the Bottom of the World (1972 US; vt Devil Country 1976 UK). The former, under what became as a result the later UK vt, was filmed by Disney in 1973. The mechanics of IC's plots derive from LOST-WORLD conventions generally - and, in the case of the second novel, from Conan DOYLE specifically. Star-Raker (1962), as by Donald Gordon, is a straightforward adventure. With George Erskine, he wrote two Counter Force tales, Beware the Tektrons (1988) and Find the Tektrons (1988). Payne has also written mainstream fiction as James Vance Marshall. [JC/PN]Other work: The White Ship (1975). CAMERON, JAMES (1956- ) US film-maker. Originally a special-effects man and art director with Roger CORMAN's New World - where he worked on BATTLE BEYOND THE STARS (1980), ANDROID (1982) and several others including ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK (1981) for which New World did the special effects - JC made an inauspicious debut as director with Piranha II: Flying Killers (1981; vt Piranha II: The Spawning; PIRANHA). However, he made a major impression with his second film, The TERMINATOR (1984), a TIME-TRAVEL thriller with a killer ROBOT. This low-budget success secured JC - and his then wife and producer-writer partner Gale Anne HURD - the plum assignment of ALIENS (1986), the follow-up to Ridley SCOTT's ALIEN (1979). Having improved on the original - especially in his 150min director's cut, later released on video - with this humanistic action movie of alien warfare, JC achieved a free hand with The ABYSS (1989), the most expensive of several underwater sf movies released at that time, and managed four-fifths of an excellent film before fumbling with a climactic deep-sea close encounter; it was a box-office disappointment. The half-hour longer The Abyss: Special Edition director's cut, (1992) is not notably superior. Following this JC separated personally from Hurd - who had in the meantime produced ALIEN NATION (1988) and TREMORS (1990) - although the couple stayed together to direct and produce TERMINATOR 2: JUDGMENT DAY (1991), a huge-budgeted box-office success, perhaps the most violent pacifist movie ever made. Critical response to Cameron's comedy thriller True Lies (1994), not sf but again starring Arnold Schwarzenegger, was mixed. [KN/PN]See also: CINEMA; HORROR IN SF. CAMERON, J.D. A house name used by BPVP ( Byron PREISS) for the Omega Sub sequence of post- HOLOCAUST military-sf adventures about the crew of a nuclear sub which survives the final war. The series comprises Omega Sub #1: Omega Sub * (1991) by Mike JAHN, #2: Command Decision * (1991) by David ROBBINS, #3: City of Fear * (1991) by Jahn, #4: Blood Tide * (1991) and #5: Death Dive * (1992) and Raven Rising (1992), all by Robbins. [JC] CAMERON, JOHN (1927- ) US writer. His borderline sf novel, The Astrologer (1972), like The Child (1976) by John Symonds (1914- ), deals with a new Virgin Mary and a new Virgin Birth, in this case discovered via astrological means ( ASTRONOMY; MESSIAHS). [JC]See also: PSEUDO-SCIENCE; RELIGION. CAMERON, JULIE Lou CAMERON. CAMERON, LOU (1924- ) US illustrator and writer, active in comic books in the 1950s. His sf, which was unremarkable, included two Swinging Spy tales-The Spy with the Blue Kazoo (1967) and The Sky who Came in from the Copa (1967) - as by Dagmar, and Cybernia (1972), as LC, which expresses COMPUTER paranoia through the tale of a town in the grips of a mad brain. The Darklings (1975), as by Julie Cameron, is fantasy. [JC] CAMPANELLA, TOMMASO (1568-1639) Italian philosopher, admitted into the Dominican order at the age of 15. Like Francis BACON he attacked the reliance of contemporary science on the authority of Aristotle, advocating observation and experiment as the proper routes to knowledge in Philosophia Sensibus Demonstrata (1591; in Latin). His important UTOPIA, Civitas Solis (1st MS 1602; 2nd MS 1612; 1623 in Latin; 3rd MS 1637; cut trans Henry Morley as The City of the Sun in Ideal Commonwealths, coll 1885, ed Morley) was written while he was imprisoned by the Spanish Inquisition, accused of having led a revolt in his native Calabria, then under Spanish rule. The book describes a city with seven concentric circular walls which is ruled by a philosopher-king, the Hoh or Metaphysicus; property is held in common and the elements of science are inscribed on the walls for educational purposes; flying machines and ships without sails are mentioned in passing. [BS]See also: CITIES; FANTASTIC VOYAGES; ITALY. CAMPBELL, CLYDE CRANE [s] H.L. GOLD. CAMPBELL, DAVID [s] Leonard G. FISH. CAMPBELL, H(ERBERT) J. (1925- ) UK research chemist, writer and editor. He was active during the early 1950s as a fan. After writing some science articles he gradually branched out into the world of sf, as well as selling line drawings to many magazines, including Amateur Photographer and Television Weekly. He scripted the Daily Herald cartoon series Captain Universe and served as technical editor and then editor 1952-6 of AUTHENTIC SCIENCE FICTION, contributing many scientific articles to the magazine, which in general improved under his editorship. He also edited Tomorrow's Universe (anth 1953), Sprague de Camp's New Anthology (coll 1953 UK), Authentic Science Fiction Handbook (1954 chap), mostly containing definitions of scientific terms, and Authentic Book of Space (anth 1954), which last was a mixture of articles and stories. Increased pressure of research work forced him to leave the field in 1956; he gained a PhD in Chemistry in 1957, and from that point concentrated on writing textbooks.His own fiction was not, perhaps, of substantial interest, but his work was never incompetent. Novels published under his own name include The Last Mutation (1951), The Moon is Heaven (1951), a RECURSIVE tale which includes a portrait of Arthur C. CLARKE, World in a Test Tube (1951), Beyond the Visible (1952), Chaos in Miniature (1952), Mice - Or Machines (1952), Another Space - Another Time (1953), Brain Ultimate (1953), The Red Planet (1953) and Once Upon a Space (1954). Under the house name Roy SHELDON he wrote the Magdah sequence - Mammoth Man (1952), Two Days of Terror (1952), Moment out of Time (1952) and The Menacing Sleep (1952) - and the Shiny Spear sequence - Atoms in Action (1953) and House of Entropy (1953). It is probable, though not certain, that he also wrote most or all of the remaining Roy Sheldon novels (with the exception of The Metal Eater, 1954, which was by E.C. TUBB): Gold Men of Aureus (1951), Phantom Moon (1951), Energy Alive (1951), Beam of Terror (1951), Spacewarp (1952) and The Plastic Peril (1952). [SH/MJE]See also: ENTROPY; GREAT AND SMALL. CAMPBELL INSPIRES John W. Campbell, the well-known editor of AstoundingStories and Astounding Science Fiction, was also well-known for planting story ideas in the minds of his authors.Isaac Asimov said that Campbell gave him the idea for "Nightfall," one of the most famous stories in science fiction. He also creditsCampbell with codifying the Three Laws of Robotics. Campbell also gave Robert Heinlein some good advice. Heinlein's first novel,Sixth Column, is based on an idea of Campbell's.After becoming editor of Astounding in 1937, Campbell retired from his own writing career. When asked why he didn’t continue to write his own science fiction stories, Campbell replied that he had a dozen stories in progress all over the world. They weren’t written by him but, in many ways, they were his. CAMPBELL, JOHN W(OOD) Jr (1910-1971) US writer and editor who took a degree in physics in 1932 from MIT and Duke University. JWC was a devotee of the SF MAGAZINES from their inception, and sold his first stories while still a teenager, beginning with "Invaders from the Infinite" to AMAZING STORIES; however, the manuscript was lost by editor T. O'Conor SLOANE, so it was his second sale, "When the Atoms Failed" (1930), that became his first published story.In the early 1930s JWC quickly built a reputation as E.E. "Doc" SMITH's chief rival in writing galactic epics of superscience. The most popular of these was the Arcot, Morey and Wade series, in which the heroes faced a succession of battles of ever-increasing size fought with a succession of wonderful weapons of ever-decreasing likelihood. Initially published in various magazines from 1930, they were put into book form as The Black Star Passes (fixup 1953), Islands of Space (1931 Amazing Stories Quarterly; 1957) and Invaders from the Infinite (not his first, lost story) (1932 Amazing Stories Quarterly; 1961); all were assembled as A John W. Campbell Anthology (omni 1973). Also well received was The Mightiest Machine (1934 ASF; 1947), but three sequels featuring its hero Aarn Munro were rejected by ASF's editor F. Orlin TREMAINE, eventually appearing in The Incredible Planet (coll 1949).The second phase of JWC's career as a writer began with "Twilight" (1934), a tale of the FAR FUTURE written in a moody, "poetic" style, the first of a number of stories, far more literary in tone and varied in mood, published under the pseudonym Don A. Stuart. From now on, JWC wrote little sf under his own name, preferring to concentrate on the highly popular Stuart stories; exceptions included the Penton and Blake series published in TWS in 1936-8 and collected in The Planeteers (coll 1966 dos), and, on one occasion, the use of the name Karl Van Campen for a story in an issue of ASF that already contained a Stuart story and part of a JWC novel. He was by now becoming closely identified with Tremaine's ASF, where all the Stuart stories appeared; these included the Machine series: "The Machine", "The Invaders" and "Rebellion" (all 1935). In 1936 he began, under his own name, a series of 18 monthly articles on the Solar System, and from 1937 he also published a number of articles as Arthur McCann. The climax of his popularity came with a Stuart effort, The Thing from Another World (1938 ASF as "Who Goes There?"; 1952 chap Australia), a classic sf horror story about an Antarctic research station menaced by a shape-changing ALIEN invader, which was first filmed, without the shape-changing, as The THING (1951), and later, also as The THING (1982), with the basic premise restored. Far more famous under its original title than under the film-influenced book retitling, "Who Goes There?" was perhaps the climax of his fiction-writing career, and close to its end; Don A. Stuart's last stories appeared in 1939. Two collections were assembled to take advantage of that fame: Who Goes There?(coll 1948; vt The Thing and Other Stories 1952 UK; vt The Thing from Outer Space 1966 UK) and - with differing contents - Who Goes There? (coll 1955). In September 1937 JWC was appointed editor of Astounding Stories, a post he would retain until his death (the magazine being retitled ASTOUNDING SCIENCE-FICTION in 1938 and Analog in 1960); henceforth he wrote almost no fiction.JWC brought to his editorial post the fertility of ideas on which his writing success as both JWC and Don A. Stuart had been based, together with a determination to raise the standards of writing and thinking in MAGAZINE sf. New writers were encouraged and fed with ideas, with remarkable success. By 1939, JWC had discovered Isaac ASIMOV, Lester DEL REY, Robert A. HEINLEIN, Theodore STURGEON and A.E. VAN VOGT, though the two latter writers had already been publishing for some time in other genres. L. Sprague DE CAMP, L. Ron HUBBARD, Clifford D. SIMAK and Jack WILLIAMSON, already established sf writers, soon became part of JWC's "stable". Henry KUTTNER and C.L. MOORE became regular contributors from 1942. These were the authors at the core of JWC's " GOLDEN AGE OF SF" - a period corresponding roughly to WWII - when ASF dominated the genre in a way no magazine before or since could match. Most of these authors, and many others, acknowledged the profound influence JWC had on their careers, and the number of acknowledged sf classics which originated in ideas suggested by him would be impossible to assess. Asimov persistently credited JWC with at least co-creating the articulation of the Three Laws of Robotics ( Isaac ASIMOV; ROBOTS). A startling example of the pervasiveness of his influence can be found in The Space Beyond (coll 1976); it contains a hitherto unpublished JWC novella, "All", which forms the basis of Robert A. Heinlein's Sixth Column (1949).In addition to editing ASF, JWC initiated the fantasy magazine UNKNOWN, which from its birth in 1939 to its premature death (caused by paper shortages) in 1943 was equally influential in its field.Although the writing had been on the wall ever since about 1945, the period of ASF's dominance can be said to have ended, quite abruptly, with the appearance of The MAGAZINE OF FANTASY AND SCIENCE FICTION in 1949 and GALAXY SCIENCE FICTION in 1950. By this time JWC's domineering editorial presence had become restricting rather than stimulating and several of his central authors had left the stable (sometimes acrimoniously); comparatively few major writers after 1950 began their careers in his magazine. Nevertheless, between 1952 and 1964 he won 8 HUGO awards for Best Editor. Much of his interest and energy became focused in his editorials, many of which showed an essentially right-wing political stance. Some are reprinted in Collected Editorials from Analog (coll 1966) ed Harry HARRISON; and the characteristic flavour of his mind comes across, perhaps even more clearly, in The John W. Campbell Letters, Volume 1 (anth 1986) assembled by Perry A. CHAPDELAINE, Tony Chapedelaine and George HAY. He flirted with various kinds of PSEUDO-SCIENCE, notably Hubbard's DIANETICS, which was loosed on an unsuspecting world through an article in ASF. The bellicose appetite for knowledge of his early years, and the revelation that Competent Men might be able to figure the world's plumbing, narrowed into an incapacity to brook dissent. However, the magazine remained popular and commercially successful, winning 7 HUGO awards under JWC's editorship. His death in 1971 was marked by an unprecedented wave of commemorative activity: two awards were founded bearing his name (the JOHN W. CAMPBELL AWARD and the JOHN W. CAMPBELL MEMORIAL AWARD), a memorial anthology was published - Astounding: John W. Campbell Memorial Anthology (anth 1974) ed Harry Harrison - and an Australian symposium about him - John W. Campbell: An Australian Tribute (anth dated 1974 but 1972) ed John Bangsund - appeared. Such a response was justified; although in later years he had turned his back on most developments in sf, during the first two decades of his career he had created two significant writing reputations under two separate names, and had come to bestride the field as an editor. More than any other individual, he helped to shape modern sf. [MJE]Other works: The Moon is Hell! (coll 1951; later UK edns contain only the title story); Cloak of Aesir (coll 1952); The Ultimate Weapon (1936 ASF as "Uncertainty"; 1966 dos); The Best of John W. Campbell (coll 1973 UK) and - with different contents - The Best of John W. Campbell (coll 1976).As Editor: From Unknown Worlds (anth 1948); The Astounding Science Fiction Anthology (anth 1952; with 8 stories cut, vt in 2 vols as The First Astounding Science Fiction Anthology 1954 UK and The Second Astounding Science Fiction Anthology 1954 UK, these 2 vols being reissued with all cuts restored, 1964 and 1965 UK; with 15 stories cut 1956 US, this version being reissued, vt Selections from the Astounding Science Fiction Anthology 1967; with 15 stories and an article cut, vt Astounding Tales of Space and Time 1957 US); Prologue to Analog (anth 1962), Analog 1 (anth 1963) and Analog 2 (anth 1964), all three assembled as Analog Anthology (omni 1965 UK); Analog 3 (anth 1965; vt A World by the Tale 1970); Analog 4 (anth 1966; vt The Permanent Implosion 1970); Analog 5 (anth 1967; vt Countercommandment and Other Stories 1970); Analog 6 (anth 1968); Analog 7 (anth 1969); Analog 8 (anth 1971).About the author: The Magic That Works: John W.Campbell and the American Response to Technology (1994) by Albert I.Berger.See also: ANTHROPOLOGY; AUTOMATION; COMPUTERS; CRIME AND PUNISHMENT; DEFINITIONS OF SF; DISASTER; DISCOVERY AND INVENTION; ECONOMICS; EDISONADE; END OF THE WORLD; ESP; EVOLUTION; FASTER THAN LIGHT; HEROES; HISTORY OF SF; HYPERSPACE; INVASION; JUPITER; MACHINES; MARS; MONSTERS; MOON; NEAR FUTURE; NEW WORLDS; NUCLEAR POWER; OPTIMISM AND PESSIMISM; OUTER PLANETS; PARANOIA; POLITICS; PSI POWERS; RELIGION; SF MAGAZINES; SCIENTIFIC ERRORS; SEX; SOCIAL DARWINISM; SOCIOLOGY; SPACE OPERA; STARS; STREET & SMITH; SUPERMAN; TABOOS; TECHNOLOGY; THRILLING WONDER STORIES; UTOPIAS; VENUS; WAR; WEAPONS. CANADA 1. Sf in English. The first serious Canadian sf work was James DE MILLE's posthumously published A Strange Manuscript Found in a Copper Cylinder (1888 US). In this UTOPIAN satire, set in a LOST WORLD, Western values are inverted (criminals are regarded as diseased, the ill are imprisoned, dying is deemed more desirable than living). Successors of De Mille were Grant ALLEN and Robert BARR (the latter Scottish-born), expatriate Canadian writers who published early sf in London and New York rather than in Montreal or Toronto.Many major Canadian literary figures have written some fantasy or sf. Sir Charles G.D. ROBERTS was the author of In the Morning of Time (1919 UK), a well presented prehistoric romance. In "The Great Feud", assembled in Titans, and Other Epics of the Pliocene (coll 1926 UK), E.J. Pratt (1882-1964) created a long narrative poem set in prehistoric Australasia. The popular humorist Stephen LEACOCK included short sf SATIRES in The Iron Man and the Tin Woman, with Other Such Futurities (coll 1929 US) and Afternoons in Utopia (coll 1932 US). A curious and powerful critique of modern society by Prairie novelist Frederick Philip GROVE is Consider Her Ways (written 1913-23; 1947), which describes the march of 10,000 worker ants across the North American continent, including how they spend their last winter in the poetry section of the New York Public Library.Among Canadian contributors to US PULP MAGAZINES were H. BEDFORD-JONES, John L. Chapman, Leslie A. Croutch (1915-1969), Chester D. Cuthbert, Francis FLAGG, Thomas P. KELLEY and Cyril G. Wates. Import restrictions during WWII created a climate for the so-called CanPulps - original and reprint pulp magazines with idiosyncratic editorial features. A.E. VAN VOGT, the Manitoba-born mainstay of the GOLDEN AGE OF SF, wrote 600,000 words of sf (notably "Black Destroyer", the Weapon Shops stories and SLAN) in Canada before moving to Los Angeles in 1944. Other notable expatriates are Laurence MANNING and Gordon R. DICKSON.Contemporary MAINSTREAM authors have contributed fantastic literature. Irish-born Brian MOORE published sf in Catholics (1972 UK), fantasy in The Great Victorian Collection (1975) and supernatural horror in The Mangan Inheritance (1979). William Weintraub dramatized the plight of Montreal's Anglophone minority in a sovereign Francophone Quebec in his biting satire The Underdogs (1979). Hugh MACLENNAN's Voices in Time (1980) is an ambitious, impressive, multi-levelled study of social breakdown in post- HOLOCAUST Montreal. DISASTER remains the sole theme of Richard ROHMER, lawyer, commissioner, general and author of fast-moving novels about near-future threats to national sovereignty, ecology, etc.Gwendolyn MacEwen (1941-1987), Margaret ATWOOD and Phyllis GOTLIEB, in addition to writing memorable prose, have composed vivid sf poems ( POETRY) tinged with fantasy and horror; in particular, MacEwen's poetry collection The Armies of the Moon (coll 1972) deserves an international readership, as do her stories assembled in Noman (coll 1972) and Noman's Land (coll 1985). Atwood's THE HANDMAID'S TALE (1985), diffidently filmed by director Volker Schlondorff in 1990 ( The HANDMAID'S TALE ), is the most influential and internationally known sf novel written by a Canadian. But "Canada's premier sf novelist" during the 1960-80 formative period in the genre's growth, according to critic David KETTERER, was Phyllis Gotlieb. Her first novel, Sunburst (1964 US), appears on high-school curricula, and mainstream anthologists have reprinted her short fictions, notably those in Son of the Morning and Other Stories (coll 1983 US); yet she remains better known at home as a poet. One reason is that her prose is demanding, intricate and psychologically probing; it frequently focuses on the problems of telepathic beings and intelligent animals.High artistic and professional standards were set in the 1970s by immigrants to Canada: Michael G. CONEY, Monica HUGHES and Edward LLEWELLYN from the UK, and William GIBSON, Crawford KILIAN, Donald KINGSBURY, Judith MERRIL, Spider ROBINSON and Robert Charles WILSON from the USA. Merril, the country's leading "sf personality", has been active in promoting FEMINISM (a sense of gender) and sf (a SENSE OF WONDER) among mainstream writers and educators (see also MERRIL COLLECTION OF SCIENCE FICTION, SPECULATION AND FANTASY).The first national sf anthology was Other Canadas (anth 1979) ed John Robert COLOMBO; it gives historical representation to stories, novel excerpts, poems, film scripts and criticism. John Bell and Lesley Choyce anthologized past and present fiction from the Atlantic region in Visions from the Edge (anth 1981). Merril edited Tesseracts (anth 1985), the first collection of current Canadian sf writing in English with some translations from French; Phyllis Gotlieb and Douglas BARBOUR compiled Tesseracts(2) (anth 1987), and Candas Jane DORSEY and Gerry Truscott Tesseracts(3) (anth 1990). In the main, Canadian sf in English is more literary, concerned with COMMUNICATION, and less high-tech than most US sf. Characters and settings specifically identified as Canadian began to appear in genre fiction in the 1980s, a development notable in the novels of fantasists like Charles DE LINT, Guy Gavriel Kay and Tanya Huff. The Bunch of Seven, a Toronto-based group including Huff and expanded to nine writers in all, is most notable for the fiction, including SHARED-WORLDS fiction, of Shirley Meier, Karen Wehrstein and S.M. STIRLING. Among the Toronto (and Ontario) sf writers of achievement are Wayland DREW, Terence M. GREEN, Robert J. SAWYER and Andrew WEINER. Especially active in Alberta are Candas Jane Dorsey and J. Brian Clarke. Among the critics in Montreal who contribute to SCIENCE-FICTION STUDIES are Darko SUVIN, David Ketterer, Robert M. PHILMUS and Marc Angenot. Other influential critics include Douglas Barbour of Edmonton, the late Susan WOOD of Vancouver and the expatriate John CLUTE.Toronto has hosted two world sf CONVENTIONS, in 1948 and 1973. Each year the designated national convention hosts the Canadian Science Fiction and Fantasy Achievement Awards, known as Caspers 1980-90 but then retitled the Auroras to avoid further association with Casper the Friendly Ghost, a US cartoon character. The first Casper - nicknamed the Coeurl because of its catlike appearance - was awarded to A.E. van Vogt, in whose "Black Destroyer" (1939) the original Coeurl appeared. The Speculative Writers Association of Canada, founded by Dorsey and others in Edmonton in 1989, issues a bimonthly newsletter called SWACCESS. Ketterer's Canadian Science Fiction and Fantasy (1992 US) surveys the field as a whole, covering both French- and English-language literatures. In it he estimated that there were in all about 1200 works of Canadian sf and fantasy. [JRC]2. Sf in French. The great majority of Francophone sf authors live in Quebec; there are very few in other provinces. Quebec sf can be divided into two periods. Before 1974 there was no sf published under that label, although Jules-Paul TARDIVEL's Pour la Patrie (1895; trans as For My Country 1975) was a UTOPIA set in a 1945 Quebec. Some established MAINSTREAM authors (like Yves Theriault [1915- ] and Michel Tremblay [1942- ]) occasionally touched on the themes of GENRE SF and FANTASY. Such works ranged from 19th-century voyages extraordinaires in the Jules- VERNE tradition to adventure novels with sf trappings; some juvenile sf was also published in the 1950s and 1960s. Despite these, no true sf tradition existed and no lasting sf FANDOM had been established.In 1974 Norbert Spehner began publishing the FANZINE Requiem, which rapidly grew into a literary magazine centred on sf and fantasy, publishing fiction as well as essays and reviews and becoming the focus for a nascent sf milieu. In 1979 Requiem became SOLARIS, while another important magazine, imagine . . ., was created by Jean-Marc Gouanvic, followed as editor by Catherine Saouter, Gouanvic again and, in 1990, Marc Lemaire. Meanwhile, in 1983, Spehner had passed SOLARIS on to a collective led by E CANDAR PUBLISHING CO. SATURN. CANNING, VICTOR (1911-1986) UK writer, two of whose many thrillers are borderline sf. In The Finger of Saturn (1973) a group of individuals who claim to have come from space attempt to return there. The Doomsday Carrier (1976) features an escaped chimpanzee infected with an artificially induced contagion. The Crimson Chalice, an Arthurian FANTASY sequence, comprises The Crimson Chalice (1976), The Circle of the Gods (1977) and The Immortal Wound (1978), all assembled as The Crimson Chalice (omni 1980). [JC] CANTWELL, ASTON Charles PLATT. CANTY, THOMAS (1952- ) US illustrator known for his pale, delicate style, for the Art-Nouveau-inspired, ethereal women he often paints, and for his use of stylized costume details. His fame is out of proportion to the amount of work (mostly book covers) he has published, though he works also under pseudonyms. Although he has often been nominated for the HUGO and regularly scores highly in the LOCUS poll, his work is almost exclusively FANTASY. [PN/JG]See also: ILLUSTRATION. CAPEK, JOSEF [r] Karel CAPEK. CAPEK, KAREL (1890-1938) Czech writer whose copious production included plays, novels, stories, imaginative travel books and at least two volumes written to publicize President Tomas Masaryk (1850-1937) of Czechoslovakia in his formidable old age. After publishing several volumes of stories (not all translated), including Trapne povidky (coll 1921; trans Francis P. Marchant, Dora Round, F. P. Casey and O. Vocadloas as Money and Other Stories 1929 UK), he began to produce the plays for which he remains perhaps best known, in particular R.U.R. (1920; trans as R.U.R. (Rossum's Universal Robots): A Fantastic Melodrama by Paul Selver with Nigel Playfair 1923 UK; US trans Paul Selver alone 1923 differs) and, with his painter/writer brother Josef (who died in Belsen in 1945), Ze zivota hmyzu (1921; trans Paul Selver as And So Ad Infinitum (The World of the Insects) 1923 UK; selected vt trans Owen Davis as The World We Live In 1933 US; most commonly known as The Insect Play). R.U.R. introduced the word ROBOT (at Josef's suggestion) to the world. In Czech it means something like "serf labour", and in the play it applies not to robots made of metal, as we have come to think of them, but to a worker-class of persecuted ANDROIDS. The play itself, if understood as a lurchingly hilarious vaudeville, can nearly transcend its portentous symbolism and the neo-Tolstoyan bathos of its life-affirming conclusion. In The Insect Play, which is far more adroit, various arthropods go through vaudeville routines explicitly related to cognate activities on the part of humans, to scathing effect. But it is only with the new translation by Tatian Firkusny and Robert T. Jones of Act Two in unexpurgated form-in Toward the Radical Center: A Karel Capek Reader (coll 1990 US) ed Peter Kussi - that the reader can begin to assess the full impact of this extraordinary work. A further play, Vec Makropulos (1922; unauthorized trans Randal C. Burrell as The Makropoulos Secret 1925 US; authorized trans Paul Selver of rev textThe Macropoulos Secret 1927 UK), similarly cloaks in comic routines the terrifying story of the alluring, world-weary, 300-year-old protagonist, the secret of her longevity, and her ambivalently conceived death (a new translation, by Robert T. Jones and Yveta Synek Graff, also in Toward the Radical Center, does something to reveal the frightening pace of the play). The work is most familiar as the basis of an opera by Leos Janacek (1854-1928). A later collaboration with Josef, Adam stvoritel (1927; trans Dora Round as Adam the Creator 1927 UK), was less successful; and Bila nemoc (1937; trans Paul Selver and Ralph Neale as Power and Glory 1938 UK; new trans Michael Henry Heim as "The White Plague" in Cross Currents 7, 1988 US) has been available to an English-speaking readership in anything like its original form only since 1988.Of greater interest to the sf reader was the first of KC's sf novels, Tovarna na absolutno (1922; trans Sarka B. Hrbkova as The Absolute at Large 1927 UK/US), like most of his fiction a deceptively light-toned SATIRE. A scientist invents the Karburator, an atomic device which produces almost free power through the absolute conversion of energy, a process which unfortunately also releases the essence of God, causing a spate of miracles and other effects; ultimately there is a devastating religious WAR. Its immediate successor, Krakatit (1924; trans Lawrence Hyde 1925 UK; vt An Atomic Phantasy: Krakatit 1948), hearkens back to the fever-ridden brio of his stories and plays from the early 1920s, and serves to culminate this first - and in some ways most energetically dark - period of KC's creative life. Krakatit is both a quasi-atomic explosive and - by analogy - the sexual abyss into which its inventor, Prokop, topples. Neither the world nor Prokop emerges unscathed from the consequent acid bath of reality - reality-to-excess. These novels are set in middle Europe, and the teasing of apocalypse so conspicuous in them works to transmit some sense of KC's sensitive political consciousness, identifiably Central European in its inherent assumptions about the precariousness of institutions and the dubiousness of their claimed benevolence.This almost allergenic awareness of the fragility of 20th-century civilization is perhaps best summed up in KC's last sf novel, Valka s Mloky (1936; trans M. and R. Weatherall as WAR WITH THE NEWTS 1937 UK; new trans Ewald Osers 1985 UK), in which a strange, apparently exploitable sea-dwelling race of "newts" is discovered in the South Pacific - where Rossum's robots also "lived". The newts are immediately enslaved by human entrepreneurs; but the resulting dramas of class struggle and social injustice are rendered with a high ashen ambivalence, for the newts, having gained the necessary human characteristics and a "newt Hitler" to guide them, turn against their masters and flood the continents in order to acquire lebensraum. It is the end for Homo sapiens. The book, told in the form of a chatty, typographically experimental feuilleton, chills with its seeming levity (and with its prefigurations of the end of Czechoslovakia two years later).In the end, KC is perhaps less memorable for his sf innovations - they are indeed slender - than for the heightened humaneness that so illuminates his tales of displaced and ending worlds. [JC]Other works: Though it has been listed as sf, Povetron (1934; trans as Meteor 1935 UK), is neither sf nor fantasy; Tales from Two Pockets (coll cut trans 1932 UK; full trans Norma Comrada 1994 US) assembles Povidky z jedne kapsy ["Tales from One Pocket"] (coll 1929) and Povidky z druhe kapsy ["Tales from the Other Pocket"] (coll 1929). Further stories are collected in Devatero Pohadek (coll 1932; trans as Fairy Tales 1933 UK; new trans Dagmar Herrmann, vt Nine Fairy Tales1990 US), for older children, and Kniha apokryfu (coll 1945; trans Dora Round as Apocryphal Stories 1949 UK).About the author: Karel Capek (1962) by William E. Harkins.See also: AUTOMATION; CZECH AND SLOVAK SF; HISTORY OF SF; IMMORTALITY; MACHINES; MUSIC; POWER SOURCES. CAPEK'S ROBOTS Machines that seem like humans....that's been a theme of science fiction since its earliest days. But the word “robot” wasn’t coined until 1920.Karel Capek, a Czech writer, published a play called R.U.R., which stands for "Rossum's Universal Robots." The word "robot" comes from "robota," which means "work" in Czech. Although Capek's robots were near-human creatures who were exploited for their labor value, "robot" went on to signify machines in human form.The word didn't catch on in English until the 1930s, and the first use of the word "robot" in the United States was probably in Eando Binder's 1935 story, "The Robot Aliens"... which may also be the first story in which the word "alien" is used to describe an extraterrestrial. CAPOBIANCO, MICHAEL (1950- ) US writer whose most significant work has been in collaboration with William BARTON (whom see for details). His solo novel, Burster (1990), examines the stresses afflicting those aboard a GENERATION STARSHIP which has left an Earth that was possibly at the brink of destruction. [JC] CAPON, (HARRY) PAUL (1911-1969) UK writer who also worked for many years as an editor and administrator in film and tv production, ending his career as head of the Film Department of Independent Television News. From 1942 he wrote fairly copiously in various genres, including detective stories. His first sf was the Antigeos trilogy - The Other Side of the Sun (1950), The Other Half of the Planet (1952) and Down to Earth (1954) - some parts of which were serialized on BBC RADIO. The sequence deals with the discovery of an Earth-like planet, hidden directly behind the Sun, whose UTOPIAN life leaves itself open to exploitation by villainous humans. Into the Tenth Millennium (1956) concerns three people who travel into the future utilizing a drug which slows down body metabolism; they emerge into a utopian world of great charm and interest - Capon's utopias are less stuffy and preachy than most - but the woman cannot make the necessary psychological adjustment. Most of PC's sf was for children, including The World at Bay (1953), The Wonderbolt (1955), Phobos, the Robot Planet (1955; vt Lost, a Moon 1956 US) and Flight of Time (1960). PC wrote well and created unusually solid future worlds. [PN]See also: CHILDREN'S SF; PHYSICS CAPRICORN ONE Film (1977). Capricorn One Associates/Associated General/ITC. Dir Peter Hyams, starring Elliott Gould, James Brolin, Brenda Vaccaro, Sam Waterston, O.J. Simpson, Hal Holbrook. Screenplay Hyams. 124 mins. Colour. The premise of this PARANOIA movie - made at a time, in the wake of Watergate, when secret-political-conspiracy films had become commonplace - is that a supposedly manned mission to Mars cannot carry a crew because of a malfunction in the life-support system. Fearing a public-relations disaster and a cut in funding, NASA decides to fake the mission: an unmanned craft is sent and a remote film-set is used in place of Mars, the "astronauts" being blackmailed into taking part in the deception. But, after the real spacecraft burns up in the atmosphere on its return to Earth, the astronauts are officially "dead", and will probably be murdered to keep them quiet. Escapes, desert chases and confusions follow. The provocative theme of appearance vs reality in a media-dominated world could have been interesting, but Hyams raises the issue only to ignore it in favour of routine spectacle. That NASA should have cooperated in making the film is mystifying. Unusually, the film was novelized twice: in the USA as Capricorn One * (1977) by Ron GOULART, and in the UK as Capricorn One * (1978) by Bernard L. Ross (Ken FOLLETT). [JB/PN] CAPTAIN FUTURE US PULP MAGAZINE, 17 issues Winter 1940-Spring 1944, quarterly (but Fall 1943 missing). Published by Better Publications; ed Leo MARGULIES with Mort WEISINGER (1940-41) and Oscar J. FRIEND (1941-4). A companion magazine to STARTLING STORIES and THRILLING WONDER STORIES, CF was an attempt to establish a SPACE-OPERA equivalent to the popular SUPERHERO pulps ( DOC SAVAGE MAGAZINE and the like). Each issue ran a complete novel about tall, cheerful, red-headed Curt Newton, alias Captain Future, "Wizard of Science" or "Man of Tomorrow" according to the magazine's successive subtitles. With his trio of assistants, "Grag, the giant, metal robot; Otho, the man-made, synthetic android; and aged Simon Wright, the living Brain", he thwarted a succession of evil (and, more often than not, green) foes. All but two of the novels were written by Edmond HAMILTON (whom see for details), twice under the house name Brett STERLING. They were later reprinted in paperback form. After CF had become a casualty of WWII paper shortages, the character continued to appear intermittently in Startling Stories to 1946, and again 1950-51. CF also serialized some abridged reprints from WONDER STORIES and published a few short stories, including Fredric BROWN's debut, "Not Yet the End" (1941). Like its companion magazines at that period, CF was unabashedly juvenile in its appeal. [MJE/PN] CAPTAIN HAZZARD US PULP MAGAZINE; 1 issue, May 1938, published by Ace Magazines; no editor named. The (short) novel contained in this issue, "Python-Men of the Lost City", was by Chester Hawks. Hazzard, an imitation of Doc Savage ( DOC SAVAGE MAGAZINE) with great mental powers and a similar group of assistants, combats a master criminal. The lead novel was reprinted in facsimile in 1974 by Robert E. WEINBERG. [FHP] CAPTAIN JUSTICE The hero of a long-running series of boy's stories ( BOY'S PAPERS) written by Murray Roberts (the pseudonym of Robert Murray Graydon) and published in Modern Boy, a weekly magazine published by Amalgamated Press through the 1930s. Very British, CJ wore white ducks, smoked cigars and worked out of Titanic Tower in the mid-Atlantic. In the course of battling for good he survived robots, giant insects, runaway planets and an Earth plunged into darkness. His exploits deeply affected the impressionable mind of a young Brian W. ALDISS, among others of that generation. Some CJ stories, including The World in Darkness (1935), were republished as issues of the Boys' Friend Library. [PN] CAPTAIN MARVEL US COMIC-book character. Created and initially drawn by C.C. Beck, CM first appeared in 1940 in Fawcett's Whiz Comics (1940-53) and then contemporaneously in Fawcett's Captain Marvel Adventures (1941-53); Jack KIRBY and Mac Raboy were among its many illustrators. Foremost among its scriptwriters was Otto Binder ( Eando BINDER), who developed CM's distinctive whimsical humour. Newsboy Billy Batson, on speaking the magic word "Shazam!" - an acronym for Solomon, Hercules, Atlas, Zeus, Achilles, Mercury - becomes CM, an invincible SUPERHERO. CM was successful enough in the late 1940s to be given a whole Marvel Family, including CM Jr, Mary Marvel (CM's sister), Uncle Marvel and even Hoppy the Marvel Bunny.CM bore some resemblance to SUPERMAN, and thus became the subject of a lawsuit brought by National Periodical Publications (later DC COMICS); this was contested until, for financial reasons, Fawcett capitulated in 1953. In the UK the reprints of CM published by L. Miller had been sufficiently successful to warrant continued independent publication under a new name, Marvelman (346 issues, 1954-63), drawn by Mick Anglo Studios; the hero had a new crew-cut hairstyle and a new magic word, "Kimota!" ("Atomik!" backwards). The series was reprinted in the first 5 issues of Miracleman (beginning 1985). Artists included Don Lawrence, Ron Embleton and George Stokes. Under this new name, the character much later ran into difficulties when Quality Communications obtained permission to resurrect him in Warrior, with an adult script by Alan MOORE (1984). MARVEL COMICS threatened legal action because of the use of the word "Marvel" in the title. So Marvelman was renamed Miracleman, otherwise continuing unchanged and subsequently appearing in the USA from Eclipse, for whom he is currently (1991) scripted by Neil GAIMAN.Earlier a small company called Lightning Comics had tried to revive the original CM character but, owing to National's assumed ownership of the copyright, had found it necessary to rework the concept, first as Todd Holton, Super Green-Beret (1967; magic word turns boy into soldier) and then, more amazingly, as Fatman the Human Flying Saucer (1967; magic word turns boy into UFO), this latter being drawn by C.C. Beck, who had created the original CM. Neither character lasted long; however, the incident served to apprise both DC National and Marvel that there was a dilemma. Marvel quickly created another Captain Marvel in Marvel Superheroes #12 (1968); this was a more conventional superhero. As long as Marvel continued to publish the exploits of this character, Marvel reasoned, DC could not revive their own 1940s CM without causing an undesirable confusion. However, this prospect did not deter DC, who resurrected the original CM in a comic called Shazam! (1972-8), later continued as Shazam: The New Beginning (1987). Nevertheless, Marvel Comics continue to maintain a token CM simply in order to stop DC publishing a comic book with the word "Marvel" in the title; thus, even though Marvel's CM was killed off in the GRAPHIC NOVEL The Death of Captain Marvel (graph 1982) written and drawn by Jim Starlin, yet another CM was created to replace him.There was, very briefly, a further CM. Captain Marvel Presents the Terrible 5 (MF Enterprises 1966) was one of the worst comics of all time. This CM's magic word was "Split!", the saying of which caused a part of his body to detach itself. Needless to say, writs flew. [RT] CAPTAIN MIDNIGHT (vt Jet Jackson, Flying Commando) US tv series (1954-6). Screen Gems/CBS. Prod George Bilson. Pilot episode dir D. Ross Lederman, written Dana Slade. 25 mins per episode. B/w.Richard Webb played Captain Midnight (or Jet Jackson, depending on where the series was shown) in this early children's tv series; Sid Melton played his bumbling assistant, Ikky; Olan Soule played his scientist friend Tut. Midnight was a super-scientific crime-fighter who each week would zoom in his sleek jetplane from his mountaintop HQ to combat a new evil. The first episode concerned the theft of a powerful radioactive element by foreign agents; they are spotted by a member of Midnight's network of juvenile helpers, the Secret Squadron, and he tracks them down using a Geiger counter. The scripts were poor even by the juvenile standards of the mid-1950s, and CM was visually ludicrous. Storylines often featured atomic weapons and radioactivity, this being very much a product of the Cold-War period. CM is not to be confused with the 15-episode 1942 Columbia film serial (based on a RADIO serial) of the same name; this too had sf elements. [JB] CAPTAIN MORS See Der LUFTPIRAT UND SEIN LENKBARES LUFTSCHIFF. CAPTAIN NEMO AND THE UNDERWATER CITY Film (1969). Omnia/MGM. Dir James Hill, starring Robert Ryan, Chuck Connors, Nanette Newman, Luciana Paluzzi. Screenplay Pip and Jane Baker, R. Wright Campbell, based on the character created by Jules VERNE. 106 mins. Colour.Towards the end of the 19th century a ship sinks in a violent storm. A few survivors find themselves on board a mysterious underwater vessel, the Nautilus, under the command of the legendary Captain Nemo. They are taken to Nemo's underwater city (likeably Victorian in design), where his oxygen-creator transmutes rocks into gold as a side-effect. A morality tale about greed ensues. This UK film is distinctly inferior to Disney's 20,000 LEAGUES UNDER THE SEA (1954). [PN/JB] CAPTAIN SCARLET AND THE MYSTERONS UK tv series (1967-68). A Century 21 Production for ITC. Created Gerry and Sylvia ANDERSON. Prod Reg Hill. Script ed Tony Barwick. Writers included Barwick (most episodes), Shane Rimmer. Dirs included Brian Burgess, Ken Turner, Alan Perry, Bob Lynn. One season, 32 25min episodes. Colour.This was the 5th sf tv series made by Gerry and Sylvia Anderson in SuperMarionation - i.e., with puppets. Not quite as good as THUNDERBIRDS, report people who were 11 years old at the time, but pretty exciting all the same, and the most sophisticated of all in terms of both narrative and special-effects techniques. Captain Scarlet and his colour-coded Spectrum agents fought against the Martian Mysterons, who could kill and then resuscitate people as Martian agents. Captain Scarlet himself had, as a result of an early brush with Mysterons, developed the ability to regenerate after death. CSATM is rather darker than other Anderson series because of the need to work a death into the plot each week. Eight episodes were cobbled together to make two made-for-tv feature films, Captain Scarlet vs The Mysterons (1967) and Revenge of the Mysterons from Mars (1981). [PN] CAPTAIN VIDEO 1. US tv serial (1949-53 and 1955-6). DuMont. Prod Larry Menkin. DuMont was a New York tv company; in the early years of tv many programmes came from New York. CV, a 30min children's programme that went out 5 nights a week, was the first sf on tv. Written by Maurice Brockhauser, it starred Richard Coogan (replaced in 1950 by Al Hodge) as Captain Video, who 300 years from now, with the aid of his Video Rangers, battled various threats from outer space. Many early scripts were written by Damon KNIGHT, C.M. KORNBLUTH and Robert SHECKLEY.CV was shot live in a small studio and on a low budget, with the result that much of the spectacle had to be provided by the imaginations of young viewers; it also incorporated filmed material, such as short Westerns and cartoons, which were introduced by the Captain himself. In 1953 the serial format was dropped; CV was retitled The Secret Files of Captain Video and became a weekly adventure with self-contained stories, but it folded that same year. In 1955 Hodge returned as Captain Video in a weekly 60min children's show, which he also produced. Though still wearing his uniform, which looked like a cross between a marine's and a bus driver's, he merely acted as the show's host, introducing stock adventure-film footage and undemanding shorts of an "educational" nature which he would then discuss with the studio audience of children. In 1956 CV ended his career with Captain Video's Cartoons, the Master of Time and Space reduced to announcing the funnies. There was a comic book based on CV.2. In 1951 Sam Katzman produced a cinema serial of 15 parts based on the tv serial. Dir Spencer Bennet, Wallace A. Grissell, written by Royal K. Cole, Sherman L. Lowe, Joseph F. Poland, George H. Plympton, it starred Judd Holdren in the title role and contained robots. [JB] CAPTAIN ZERO US PULP MAGAZINE; 3 bimonthly issues, Nov 1949-Mar 1950, published by Recreational Reading Corp., Indiana, ed anon Alden H. Norton. Each issue contained a novel written by prolific pulp author G.T. Fleming-Roberts. As a result of a radiation overdose, Captain Zero (alias "The Master of Midnight") becomes involuntarily invisible at night; he uses his unwanted gift to operate against the underworld. When invisible he speaks in italics. This, the last of the hero pulps, was closer to detective fiction than sf. An almost identical edition was published simultaneously in Canada. [FHP/MJE] CARAKER, MARY (? - ) US writer who began writing sf with, for ASF in 1983, "The Vampires who Loved Beowulf", a story which makes up part of her first novel, Seven Worlds (fixup 1986), whose protagonist, a tough female Space Exploratory Forces agent, is entrusted with the task of improving COMMUNICATIONS between humans and other species. The sequel, The Snows of Jaspre (1989), written for young adults, places that protagonist into a political and ecological crisis on the eponymous planet. Water Song (1987) and The Faces of Ceti (1991), singletons, likewise examine planets in crisis. I Remember, I Remember (1991 chap), a novella, recounts the sensations of a woman who awakens on a "coldship" without any memory of how she entered SUSPENDED ANIMATION. [JC] CARAVAN OF COURAGE The EWOK ADVENTURE. CARD, ORSON SCOTT (1951- ) US writer who exploded onto the sf scene with his first published story, "Ender's Game" for ASF in 1977; it was nominated for a HUGO and served as the germ for the Ender series, the first two volumes of which, published 1985 and 1986, each won both Hugo and NEBULA, the first time the two major prizes had been swept in successive years by one author. After a highly promising start at the end of the 1970s - he won the 1978 JOHN W. CAMPBELL AWARD - he entered a period during the early 1980s when his career seemed to be drifting; but by the end of 1986 he had clearly established himself as one of the two or three dominant figures of recent sf. That dominance remains (1992) unshaken.No secret lies behind this success, for OSC has always been entirely explicit about the two factors which have shaped his career. The first is Mormonism. The gift of faith, in his case, has been a complex offering. Born and raised as a Mormon, OSC came to adulthood in a family-oriented, tight-knit community whose sense of historical uniqueness was confirmed in various ways: by recurrent persecution from without, while being intermittently threatened by scandal within; by The Book of Mormon, a holy book constructed as a nest of mythopoeic, justificatory narratives through which are expounded a pattern of truly unusual historical hypotheses rich in storytelling potential, not least among these the belief that Native Americans are the Lost Tribes of Israel; and by a tradition - both written and oral - dominated by messiah-like figures of great charisma who lead their people from exile into a promised land. It is perhaps not surprising, then, that OSC's tales have concerned themselves from the first with matters of family and community in narratives constructed so as to unfold a mythic density at their hearts, and featuring lonely and manipulative MESSIAH-figures who - if they die - die sacrificially. The second factor behind OSC's career is the compulsion to tell stories. If he has a genius, it is for that. (And, if he has a fatal flaw, it resides in that compulsion.) Like Stephen KING, whose capacity for hard work he shares, he is a maker of tales.Unlike King, however, OSC did not begin as a natural writer of novels, most of his pre-sf work being in the form of short plays for Mormon audiences and much of his early work at book length being expansions of short stories. "Ender's Game" and the other stories assembled in Unaccompanied Sonata (coll 1981) - not to be confused with the release of the title story alone as Unaccompanied Sonata (1979 Omni; 1992 chap) - demonstrate a compulsive rightness of length (though at times the chill cruelty of the telling unveils a sadism over which the author seemed to have little control), but the first novels were incoherently told, if absorbing in parts. Because of OSC's habitual reworking of his early work, the bibliography of his first sequence, the Worthing Chronicle, is complex. Some of the stories in Capitol: The Worthing Chronicle (coll of linked stories 1979) are journeyman work, and appear only in that first volume; both Capitol and its companion, Hot Sleep (fixup 1979), were withdrawn from circulation only a few years later in order to make market room for The Worthing Chronicle (1983), a text which reworked beyond recognition the earlier material. Finally, in The Worthing Saga (omni 1990), The Worthing Chronicle (apparently unchanged) was assembled along with 6 of the 11 stories originally published in Capitol plus 3 previously uncollected tales. Of all these versions, the most unified is very clearly the 1983 novel, which presents the long epic of Jason Worthing as a sequence of dreams - or scriptures - transmitted by Jason himself to young Lared, who transcribes them for his fellow colonists on a planet which, ages before, their ancestors settled under Worthing's guidance. These dreams - which are in fact some of the contents of the earlier versions of the long tale, here contoured and condensed into myth-like parables - tell Lared of Jason Worthing's pain-racked and interminable life as messiah and godling. Lared also learns why Jason removed all capacity to experience deep pain from his "children", and why, now, he has given them pain once more. Compact, multi-layered, mythopoeic and ultimately very strange, The Worthing Chronicle of 1983 remains one of OSC's finest and most revealing works.A Planet Called Treason (1979; rev vt Treason 1988) is a much inferior singleton, though its protagonist is illuminatingly similar to Jason Worthing; but Songmaster (fixup 1980; rev 1987) is a fine rite-of-passage tale whose protagonist, a typical OSC child, is alienated from his family, is blessed with an extraordinary talent (in this case MUSIC), and grows into a messianic role for which he seems preordained.OSC's career then seemed to drift. Hart's Hope (1983) was a FANTASY, obscurely published; The Worthing Chronicle appeared without much notice; and A Woman of Destiny (1984; text restored vt Saints 1988) was a historical novel about the founding of Mormonism which, in the cut 1984 version, seemed misshapen. Finally, however, the Ender books began to appear. The series comprises ENDER'S GAME (1977 ASF; much exp 1985), Speaker for the Dead (1986), both volumes being assembled as Ender's War (omni 1986), plus Xenocide (1991), with a fourth volume projected. As the sequence begins, Ender Wiggin is a young boy who, along with his siblings, is the result of an experiment in eugenics ( GENETIC ENGINEERING) authorized by the government of Earth, which is apprehensive that the ALIEN Buggers will return from interstellar space and continue what seems a xenocidal assault upon humanity, and is convinced that only humans with superior abilities will be capable of defeating the foe. Ender is taken to a military academy, where he is subjected in the Battle Room to an escalating sequence of challenges to his extraordinary tactical and strategic abilities; eventually, at what seems to be a final game (the tale does here prefigure much of the VIRTUAL-REALITY imagery brought to the fore in the 1980s by writers under the influence of CYBERPUNK), Ender defeats the "imaginary" foe only to find that he has in fact been guiding genuine human space-fleets into enemy territory, and that by winning absolutely he has committed xenocide on behalf of the human race.When it is discovered that the Buggers had long comprehended that humans were sentient beings and had had no intention of continuing any conflict, the grounds for Speaker for the Dead are laid. In the company of his chaste sister (his demagogic brother meanwhile takes over the government of Earth), and carrying a cocooned Bugger Hive Queen (the last of all her race), Ender travels from star to star for thousands of planetary years (except in Xenocide OSC, unusually, obeys Einsteinian constraints on interstellar travel) as a Speaker for the Dead, a person who sums up a dead person's life in a terminal ceremony, and by so doing heals the community of his or her death. The action takes place on the planet Lusitania, and concentrates upon the local alien race, the Pequeninos, whose strange BIOLOGY is not yet understood - its unravelling of which is fascinatingly prolonged. The novel concludes with the Pequeninos seemingly understood, the Hive Queen happy in a cave where she will breed Buggers, and Ender seeming to have expiated xenocide and become a messiah; but the human Galactic Federation is preparing to destroy Lusitania for fear of a deadly plague. Xenocide carries the plot onwards, though not to a conclusion, introducing many new characters, including a talkative AI in love with Ender. The plot of these two novels is much complicated by OSC's attempt, not fully successful, to envision a complex Lusitanian family for Ender to transform, and has frequent recourse to PULP-MAGAZINE-style highlighting of eccentricities to distinguish one sibling from another; nor is his depiction of a Chinese world - run by MUTANTS dominated by artificially induced obsessive-compulsive disorders - fully convincing. But even incomplete, and despite its not infrequent dependence upon trivializing tricks of plot, the Ender saga stands as one of the very few serious moral tales set among the stars. It is also enthrallingly readable.OSC's third sequence - the Tales of Alvin Maker comprising Seventh Son (1987), Red Prophet (1988) and Prentice Alvin (1989), all assembled as Hatrack River (omni 1989), and with at least three further volumes projected - returns to Earth, to an ALTERNATE-WORLD version of the USA. On the basis of the first three volumes, it seems to come as close as humanly possible to the telling of an sf tale as Mormon parable, for the life of Alvin Maker clearly encodes the life of Joseph Smith (1805-1844), the founder of the Mormon Church. The early 19th-century USA in which he grows up has never experienced a Revolution; certain forms of MAGIC are efficacious; and Alvin may become a Maker, one who can delve to the heart of things and transform them. As the sequence progresses, the Indian Nations set up a demarcation line, which is observed, along the Mississippi; and Alvin seems due to become a Maker. Of greater sf relevance are Wyrms (1987), another rite-of-passage tale about the assumption of role and set on a planet of some interest, The Folk of the Fringe (coll of linked stories 1989), a moderately heterodox vision of a Mormon post- HOLOCAUST civilization; The Abyss * (1989), which very effectively novelizes The ABYSS (1989); the Homecoming sequence, comprising The Memory of Earth (1992), The Call of Earth (1993), The Ships of Earth (1994) - the first 3 vols being assembled as Homecoming: Harmony (omni 1994) - Earthfall (1995) and Earthborn (1995). In its use of religious motifs to characterize the start of its protagonists' return to Earth 40,000,000 years after the last humans had left their home planet, this latter is a tale whose Mormon subtext extends very close to the surface. Later stories are collected in Cardography (coll 1987), and almost all OSC's independent short work, some of it written as Byron Walley, is assembled in MAPS IN A MIRROR: THE SHORT FICTION OF ORSON SCOTT CARD (coll 1990; with the 5th section cut, vt in 4 vols asThe Changed Man (coll 1992), Flux (coll 1992), Monkey Sonatas (coll 1993) and Cruel Miracles (coll 1993).In a little less than 2 decades, OSC has written enough work for a lifetime, has transformed pulp idioms into religious myth with an intensity not previously witnessed in the sf field, and has created a dozen worlds it would be impossible for any reader to forget. If he has had a significant failing - beyond a cruel insistence upon the moral strictures of his faith, writing at one point that adultery and homosexuality were equal (and dreadful) sins - it resides in his strengths. The surety of faith, the muscle of a honed storytelling urgency which has led him to write at times as though he genuinely believed that clarity and truth were identical, the bruising triumphalism of sf as a mode of knowing: all have led this extraordinarily talented author to sound, on occasion, as though he thought the fictions he wrote were scooped from the mouth of a higher being. [JC]Other works: Eye for Eye (1987 IASFM; 1991 chap dos); Lost Boys (1992); the proposed Mayflower trilogy with Kathryn H. Kidd, of which Havelock (1994) has appeared.As editor: Dragons of Light (anth 1980); Dragons of Darkness (anth 1981); Future on Fire (anth 1991) with (anon) Martin H. GREENBERG.Nonfiction: Characters and Viewpoints (1988); How to Write Science Fiction and Fantasy (1990) - winner of the 1991 Hugo for Best Nonfiction Book.About the author: In the Image of God: Theme, Characterization and Landscape in the Fiction of Orson Scott Card (1990) and The Work of Orson Scott Card: An Annotated Bibliography & Guide (1995), both by Michael R. COLLINGS.See also: ARTS; CHILDREN IN SF; CRIME AND PUNISHMENT; DESTINIES; GAMES AND SPORTS; HEROES; HIVE-MINDS; ISAAC ASIMOV'S SCIENCE FICTION MAGAZINE; OPTIMISM AND PESSIMISM; PARANOIA; SLEEPER AWAKES; SUSPENDED ANIMATION; UNDER THE SEA; WRITERS OF THE FUTURE CONTEST. CAREY, DIANE (L.) (1954- ) US author of several STAR TREK ties including Dreadnought! * (1986) and its direct sequel Battlestations! * (1986), Final Frontier * (1988) and Star Trek, the Next Generation: Ghost Ship * (1988). [JC] CAREY, PETER (1943- ) Australian writer, once in advertising, an experience that pervades his work. PC's high reputation is mainly for mainstream novels like Oscar and Lucinda (1988), which won the Booker Prize. However, a streak of ironic FANTASY has run through his work from the beginning, occasionally taking the form of sf. Bliss (1981) and Illywhacker (1985) can both be regarded as fantasies (if you believe their unreliable narrators), the first about a man who dies and goes to Hell (much like Earth), the second a funny and touching picaresque which, although it is told by a liar, may in part be true; he practises INVISIBILITY and claims to span a century of Australian history, bits of which he recounts. And both The Tax Inspector (1991) and The Unusual Life of Tristran Smith (1994) - which is set in an imaginary country - are FABULATIONS. PC's sf fabulations in short forms, droll, morbid and scarifying by turns, are contained in two early collections, The Fat Man in History (coll 1974) and War Crimes (coll 1979); a selection from both was published, confusingly, as The Fat Man in History (coll 1980 UK; vt Exotic Pleasures 1981 UK). Among them, "Do You Love Me?" has a world subject to reality leakages, "The Chance" features a "Genetic Lottery" in which humans can get new bodies while keeping their memories, and "Exotic Pleasures" has ALIEN birdlife which transmits pleasure when touched and may destroy us all. [PN] CARLSEN, CHRIS Robert P. HOLDSTOCK. CARLSON, WILLIAM K. (? - ) US writer who began publishing sf with "Dinner at Helen's" in Strange Bed Fellows (anth 1972) ed Thomas N. SCORTIA. His first sf novel, Sunrise West (1981), features an attempt by multispecies commune-dwellers to survive in a post- HOLOCAUST USA. Elysium (1982), set thousands of years later, expounds a moderately LIBERTARIAN view of the perils of allowing ECOLOGY-minded liberals too long a hegemony. [JC] CARLTON, ROGER Donald Sydney ROWLAND. CARMODY, ISOBELLE (1958- ) Australian author of sf for adolescents. Her novels are set in post- HOLOCAUST venues. The first two belong to the still unfolding Obernewtyn Chronicles: Obernewtyn (1987) and The Farseekers (1990). The third and most challenging is separate from this series: Scatterlings (1991). IC writes vigorously and colourfully, but the sf ideas are all very familiar: teenaged misfit heroines with PSI POWERS learn about themselves while pitted against unfeeling, dictatorial societies. Each story revolves around a CONCEPTUAL BREAKTHROUGH as the true nature of the world unfolds. [PN]See also: CHILDREN'S SF; PASTORAL. CARNAC, LEVIN [s] George GRIFFITH. CARNEIRO, ANDRE [r] LATIN AMERICA. CARNELL, (EDWARD) JOHN (1912-1972) UK editor, anthologist and literary agent who worked usually as John Carnell and sometimes as E.J. Carnell; he was known to his friends as Ted. A prominent member of UK FANDOM, JC took over the editorship of NOVAE TERRAE , an early FANZINE, in 1939, retitling his issues (#29-#33) New Worlds. He began his professional career as editor in 1946 when NEW WORLDS was revived as a professional SF MAGAZINE. After only 3 issues the publisher failed, but JC with help from fandom was able to renew the title in 1949 with his own company, Nova Publications; he also took over from Walter GILLINGS as editor of the Nova Publications title SCIENCE FANTASY from #3 onwards. The third Nova Publications title, also ed JC, was the UK reprint edition of Larry SHAW's SCIENCE FICTION ADVENTURES. The first 5 UK issues of this, Mar-Nov 1958, were all US reprints, but from the Jan 1959 issue it became an original UK magazine. It ceased publication with the May 1963 issue, but the other two titles continued under JC until mid-1964, when they were taken over by Roberts & Vinter under new editors. JC then established a series of original ANTHOLOGIES, NEW WRITINGS IN SF, comprising New Writings in SF 1 (anth 1964), #2 (anth 1964), #3 (anth 1965), #4 (anth 1965), #5 (anth 1965), #6 (anth 1965), #7 (anth 1966), #8 (anth 1966), #9 (anth 1966), #10 (anth 1967), #11 (anth 1967), #12 (anth 1968), #13 (anth 1968), #14 (anth 1969), #15 (anth 1969), #16 (anth 1970), #17 (anth 1970), #18 (anth 1971), #19 (anth 1971), #20 (anth 1972), and #21 (anth 1972), the last being published after his death. Nine volumes of this series, with contents differing from those in the UK numeration, were published in the USA by BANTAM BOOKS 1966-72. JC, who formally set up the E.J. Carnell Literary Agency in 1964, was agent for most UK sf writers. He was cofounder of the INTERNATIONAL FANTASY AWARD. He was scrupulous, worked hard and profited little. His contribution to UK sf was enormous. For over a quarter of a century he was an early and often first publisher of an entire generation of UK and Irish sf writers. Although his own preference was for conservative HARD SF and sf adventure - he published a lot of it by writers such as John CHRISTOPHER and later Kenneth BULMER and E.C. TUBB - he also gave active encouragement to many of the writers who were later to become strongly associated with Michael MOORCOCK's NW, writers of the NEW WAVE including Brian W. ALDISS, J.G. BALLARD, John BRUNNER and Moorcock himself, whose succession to the editorship of NW JC supported. JC also edited a handful of reprint anthologies: Jinn and Jitters (anth 1946), No Place Like Earth (anth 1952), Gateway to Tomorrow (anth 1954), Gateway to the Stars (anth 1955), The Best from New Worlds Science Fiction (anth 1955), Lambda 1 & Other Stories (anth 1964 US; with 1 story dropped and 2 added 1965 UK), Weird Shadows from Beyond (anth 1965) and Best of New Writings in SF (anth 1971). [PN] CARNE PER FRANKENSTEIN FRANKENSTEIN. CARNOSAUR JURASSIC PARK. CARO, DENNIS R. (1944- ) US writer who began publishing sf with "Cantaloupes and Kangaroos" in Clarion III (anth 1973) ed Robin Scott WILSON. His first sf novel, The Man in the Darksuit: A Futuristic Mystery (1980), depicts with concise and surrealistic hilarity a mean-streets urban future and a mystery concerning the owner of the eponymous INVISIBILITY-conferring outfit. Devine War (1986), set on a colony planet, even more complicatedly spends considerable energy on interstellar POLITICS and on a malevolent AI called Heathcliffe, as the eponymous female agent tries to bring her husband's killer to justice. DRC is an author who does not deserve obscurity, though the edgy, foregrounded cleverness of his work may continue to limit his success. [JC] CARPELAN, BO [r] FINLAND. CARPENTER, CHRISTOPHER Christopher EVANS. CARPENTER, ELMER J. (1907-1988) US writer in whose Moonspin (1967) a foreign power gains control of Earth's weather. An earlier novel, Nile Fever (1959), is not sf. [JC] CARPENTER, JOHN (1948- ) US film-maker. At USC Film School JC collaborated with writer-actor-director Dan O'Bannon on DARK STAR (1974), a student effort expanded successfully into a feature that attracted attention for its ABSURDIST humour and classical suspense, following the adventures of a spaceship crewed by near-insane astronauts and dangerously unstable sentient bombs. That calling card enabled JC to make Assault on Precinct 13 (1976), a very accomplished "urban Western", and to sell his (eventually rewritten) script for The Eyes of Laura Mars (1978); this in turn won him an assignment to write and direct Halloween (1978), an enormously influential "stalk and slash" movie. JC is usually classed as a HORROR director, his supernatural work including The Fog (1980), Christine (1983) from Stephen KING's novel, and Big Trouble in Little China (1986), but - perhaps influenced by Nigel KNEALE, who wrote HALLOWEEN III: SEASON OF THE WITCH for JC - he often mixes elaborate sf concepts with GOTHIC horror.JC's sf films as a director include: ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK (1981), a cynical futuristic adventure; The THING (1982), a remake of the 1951 Howard Hawks production that returns to John W. CAMPBELL's paranoid original story for its creature-clogged theme; STARMAN (1984), a mellow and impersonal mix of The Sugarland Express (1973) with The MAN WHO FELL TO EARTH (1976), Jeff Bridges starring as a benign ALIEN visitor; PRINCE OF DARKNESS (1978), a horror movie cross-breeding quantum physics and demonology, whose credits acknowledge Kneale; THEY LIVE (1989), a witty and socially conscious pastiche of 1950s alien-invader motifs; and MEMOIRS OF AN INVISIBLE MAN (1992), from the 1987 novel by H.F. SAINT, a bland comedy thriller in the mould of Starman, distinguished by state-of-the-art INVISIBILITY effects. Since then JC has directed the first two parts of a three-part tv horror anthology miniseries, Body Bags (1993). In 1994 a new JC film,In the Mouth of Madness, was premiered at a film festival; this horror film somewhat in the manner of H.P. LOVECRAFT is due for general release in 1995. He is credited with contributions to The PHILADELPHIA EXPERIMENT (1984) and Black Moon Rising (1986), both based on scripts he wrote in the 1970s. A composer, JC has worked on the scores for most of his films, some of them rather good. [KN]Further reading: Order in the Universe: The Films of John Carpenter (1990) by Robert C. Cumbow.See also: CINEMA; MEDIA LANDSCAPE; MONSTER MOVIES. CARR, CHARLES (1905-1976) UK writer whose Colonists in Space (1954) and its sequel, Salamander War (1955), routinely deal with colonizing humans and their conflicts with the original salamander inhabitants of the planet Bel. [JC] CARR, JAYGE Pseudonym of US writer Marj Krueger (1941- ), a former nuclear physicist for NASA who began to publish sf with "Alienation" for ASF in 1976, and whose major work to date is probably her first novel, Leviathan's Deep (1979), in which star-travelling Terrans (much like 1950s Americans, particularly in their sexual politics) confront a female from a technologically primitive but culturally sophisticated humanoid race whose males are genuinely inferior. The ALIEN protagonist, in whose voice the tale is told, is depicted with flair, sympathy and a sense of her real differences from a human woman ( WOMEN AS PORTRAYED IN SCIENCE FICTION). The Rabelais sequence - Navigator's Sindrome (1983), The Treasure in the Heart of the Maze (1985) and Rabelaisian Reprise (1988), with a fourth volume, Knight of a Thousand Eyes, projected - begins with a mildly humorous adventure, with added moral bite, about the search for a female interstellar Navigator lost on the planet Rabelais, where the powerful play out decadent fantasies on quasi-slaves bound to them by "contractual obligation". The series continues in much the same vein. In the late 1980s, JC began to appear occasionally in best-of-the-year collections with such stories as "Chimera" (1989), a hard-edged tale of revenge and genetic manipulation set in a nightmarish future heavily influenced by CYBERPUNK. While she is not the most inventive of recent writers, JC's stories are solidly crafted, well characterized and readable. [NT] CARR, JOHN DICKSON (1906-1977) US writer, for long periods resident in the UK, where many of his famous early detective novels, such as The Three Coffins (1935 US; vt The Hollow Man 1935 UK), Death Watch (1935) and The Ten Teacups (1937) as by Carter Dickson, and others are evocatively set (although a number of his noteworthy early borderline-fantasy detections, such as The Waxworks Murder [1932], are set in France). After his inspiration regarding intricate locked-room mysteries and the like began to flag, and after a pious biography of DOYLE, The Life of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (1949), JDC began to write mysteries of a fantastic coloration, in several of which modern detectives are transferred (by a form of TIME TRAVEL) into the England of an earlier era, where they are involved in murders. These books are The Devil in Velvet (1951), set in the 17th century, Fear is the Same (1956) as by Carter Dickson, set in the 18th, and Fire, Burn! (1956), set in the 19th. An earlier novel, The Burning Court (1937 UK), does not entirely rationalize the supposition that reincarnated beings lie at the heart of the mystery. Some of the tales in The Department of Queer Complaints (coll 1940) and The Door to Doom (coll 1980) are fantasies. [JC] CARR, JOHN F(RANCIS) (1944- ) US writer who began publishing sf with The Ophidian Conspiracy (1976), an unpretentious SPACE OPERA which demonstrated considerable imagination but a stylistic gaucheness; both characteristics mark his subsequent novels, The Pain Gain (1977) and Carnifax Mardi Gras (1982 Fantasy Book as "Dance of the Dwarfs"; exp 1982), though the latter shows a saving exuberance. Memorial work on H. Beam PIPER resulted in his editing The Worlds of H. Beam Piper (coll 1983) and writing a continuation in novel form of Piper's Paratime Police/Lord Kalvan sequence, Great King's War * (1985) with Roland J. GREEN.From the beginning of the 1980s, most frequently in association with Jerry POURNELLE, JFC has been most active as an editor. With Pournelle, he edited (not always with title-page credit) Black Holes (anth 1978); the Endless Frontier sequence, comprising The Endless Frontier (anth 1979), Volume 2 (anth 1985) and Cities in Space (anth 1991); The Survival of Freedom (anth 1981); the There Will Be War sequence of military ANTHOLOGIES, comprising There Will Be War (anth 1983), Vol II: Men of War (anth 1984), Vol III: Blood and Iron (anth 1984), Vol IV: Day of the Tyrant (anth 1985), Vol V: Warrior (anth 1986), Vol VI: Guns of Darkness (anth 1987), Vol VII: Call to Battle (anth 1988), Vol VIII: Armageddon! (anth 1989) and Vol IX: After Armageddon (anth 1990); The Science Fiction Yearbook (anth 1985) with Jim BAEN and Pournelle; the Far Frontiers original anthology series, with Baen and Pournelle (JFC uncredited), comprising Far Frontiers (anth 1985), #2 (anth 1985), #3 (anth 1985), #4 (anth 1986), #5 (anth 1986), #6 (anth 1986) and #7 (anth 1986); and the Imperial Stars reprint anthologies, Imperial Stars, Vol 1: The Stars at War (anth 1986), Vol 2: Republic and Empire (anth 1987) and Vol 3: the Crash of Empire (anth 1989).Also with Pournelle, JFC created and edited the War World sequence of SHARED-WORLD anthologies: War World, Volume 1: The Burning Eye * (anth 1988) with Roland J. Green, Volume 2: Death's Head Rebellion * (anth 1990) with Green, and Volume 3: Sauron Dominion * (anth 1991); Codominium: Revolt on War World * (anth 1992) is set prior to the main sequence. These volumes, which carry Pournelle's CoDominium sequence into broader waters, have proved one of the more effective examples of a shared-world enterprise. As editor of the SFWA BULLETIN (1978-80), JFC devoted an entire issue (vol 14, #3) to a series of studies of "Science-Fiction Future Histories". [JC]See also: HISTORY IN SF; WAR. CARR, ROBERT SPENCER (1909-1994) US writer, whose first (teenage) stories appeared in Weird Tales, beginning with "The Composite Brain" (1925), which is sf. He is the author of one fantasy novel filled with an erotic nostalgia for death, The Room Beyond (1948), and of Beyond Infinity (coll 1951), four warmly realized stories set on Earth in the mid-20th century but with sf content. [JC] CARR, TERRY (GENE) (1937-1987) US writer and editor. He became an sf fan in 1949 and, throughout the 1950s (and later), enjoyed a long and prolific career as such; one of his fanzines, FANAC, co-edited with Ron ELLIK, won a HUGO in 1959, and TC eventually won his second Hugo as Best Fan Writer in 1973. Some of this writing was assembled as Fandom Harvest (coll 1986) and Between Two Worlds (coll 1986 chap dos), the latter being published with similar material by Bob SHAW.In the early 1960s TC began to work as an editor and to write fiction, his first story being "Who Sups with the Devil" in 1962 for FSF, where most of his early stories appeared; most of it was assembled in The Light at the End of the Universe (coll 1976). He was never prolific as a fiction writer, but the stories in that collection are thoughtful and distinctive. They include "Brown Robert" (1962), a neat TIME-TRAVEL variant, "The Dance of the Changer and the Three" (1968), an ambitious attempt to render an ALIEN culture by telling one of its myths, and "Ozymandias" (1972), which draws an effective parallel between modern CRYONICS techniques and the funeral practices of ancient Egypt. There were also two minor novels - Invasion from 2500 (1964) with Ted WHITE under the joint pseudonym Norman EDWARDS, and Warlord of Kor (1963 chap dos) - as well as one ambitious and substantial work, Cirque (1977), a religious allegory, elegiac in mood, set in the FAR FUTURE. Because he was not very prolific, TC's writing is in general somewhat undervalued.It was as an editor that he became and remained best known. In 1964-71 he worked with Donald A. WOLLHEIM at ACE BOOKS, where he was responsible for the highly successful Ace Special series, whose most famous original publications were probably R.A. LAFFERTY's Past Master (1968) and Ursula K. LE GUIN's THE LEFT HAND OF DARKNESS (1969), and which included several further titles of strong merit. He co-edited seven annual best-of-the-year ANTHOLOGIES with Wollheim (whom see for titles), beginning with World's Best Science Fiction: 1965 (anth 1965; vt World's Best Science Fiction: First Series 1970 UK), and initiated the UNIVERSE series of original anthologies (see listing below) with Universe 1 (anth 1971). After leaving Ace and becoming a freelance editor, TC continued to produce a best-of-the-year anthology on his own in competition with Wollheim's, commencing with The Best Science Fiction of the Year (anth 1972) and continuing through 1987 (see listing below); during its run, this series was generally regarded as the best of the annual compilations. Universe continued, although it changed publishers more than once; and with The Year's Finest Fantasy (anth 1978) TC started a FANTASY annual (see listing below), which was less successful. Of a wide variety of reprint and original anthologies, the most notable was perhaps The Ides of Tomorrow (anth 1976), with fine stories by Brian W. ALDISS, George R.R. MARTIN and others.In the 1980s TC returned to Ace Books on a freelance basis to edit a second series of Ace Specials, this time restricted to first novels. The impact of this sequence was perhaps even greater than the first, for it included in its first 18 months William GIBSON's NEUROMANCER (1984), Kim Stanley ROBINSON's THE WILD SHORE (1984), Carter SCHOLZ's and Glenn Harcourt's Palimpsests (1984), Lucius SHEPARD's Green Eyes (1984), Michael SWANWICK's In the Drift (1985) and Howard WALDROP's Them Bones (1984). In 1985-6 he won his third and fourth Hugos, both as Best Editor. What perhaps marked TC most distinctively was his quite extraordinary capacity to commission or purchase work which, once published, seemed inevitable. His authors seemed to speak to the heart of their times. [MJE/JC]Other works as editor: Science Fiction for People who Hate Science Fiction (anth 1966); The Others (anth 1969); On Our Way to the Future (anth 1970); This Side of Infinity (anth 1972); An Exaltation of Stars (anth 1973); Into the Unknown (anth 1973); Worlds Near and Far (anth 1974); The Fellowship of the Stars (anth 1974); Creatures from Beyond (anth 1975); Planets of Wonder (anth 1976); The Infinite Arena (anth 1977); To Follow a Star: Nine Science Fiction Stories about Christmas (anth 1977); Classic Science Fiction: The First Golden Age (anth 1978); Beyond Reality (anth 1979); Dream's Edge (anth 1980); A Treasury of Modern Fantasy (anth 1981) with Martin H. GREENBERG; 100 Great Fantasy Short Short Stories (anth 1984) with Isaac ASIMOV and Greenberg; The Science Fiction Hall of Fame, Volume 4 (anth 1986).New Worlds of Fantasy: New Worlds of Fantasy (anth 1967; vt Step Outside Your Mind 1969 UK); #2 (anth 1970); #3 (anth 1971).Universe: The sequence continued with Universe 2 (anth 1972), #3 (anth 1973), #4 (anth 1974), #5 (anth 1975), #6 (anth 1976), #7 (anth 1977), #8 (anth 1978), #9 (anth 1979), #10 (anth 1980), #11 (anth 1981), #12 (anth 1982), #13 (anth 1983), #14 (anth 1984), #15 (anth 1985), #16 (anth 1986) and #17 (anth 1987), plus The Best from Universe (anth 1984).Best Science Fiction of the Year: The sequence continued with The Best Science Fiction of the Year 2 (anth 1973), #3 (anth 1974), #4 (anth 1975), #5 (anth 1976), #6 (anth 1977), #7 (anth 1978), #8 (anth 1979), #9 (anth 1980), #10 (anth 1981), #11 (anth 1982), #12 (anth 1983), #13 (anth 1984; cut vt Best SF of the Year #13 1984 UK), Terry Carr's Best Science Fiction of the Year #14 (anth 1985; vt Best SF of the Year #14 1985 UK), Terry Carr's Best Science Fiction of the Year #15 (anth 1986; vt Best SF of the Year #15 1986 UK) and #16 (anth 1987; vt Best SF of the Year #16 1987 UK).Finest Fantasy: The sequence continued with The Year's Finest Fantasy #2 (anth 1979), #3 (anth 1981), #4 (anth 1981) and #5 (anth 1982).Best SF Novellas: The Best Science Fiction Novellas of the Year #1 (anth 1979) and #2 (anth 1980).See also: CITIES; INVASION; LINGUISTICS; MILFORD SCIENCE FICTION WRITERS' CONFERENCE; MYTHOLOGY; RELIGION; SCI FI. CARREL, FREDERIC (1869-? ) UK writer, active as late as 1929. Paul le Maistre (1901) is not sf, the invention at the heart of the book being an improved plough, but 2010 (1914) is a racist and reactionary UTOPIA with high technologies (amply described), a comet, a sterility-inducing plague and a future WAR in which Oriental invaders are defeated when the plague is redirected at their women. It was published anonymously. [JC] CARREL, MARK Lauran Bosworth PAINE. CARRIE Film (1976). Red Bank/United Artists. Dir Brian De Palma, starring Sissy Spacek, Piper Laurie, John Travolta, Amy Irving, Nancy Allen. Screenplay Lawrence D. Cohen, based on Carrie (1974) by Stephen KING. 98 mins. Colour.This was the breakthrough film for a director who had worked with fantastic subjects before, notably with Sisters (1972) and Phantom of the Paradise (1974). Only borderline sf, more centrally a HORROR film, C tells of a repressed and innocent child (Spacek), just entering puberty, whose powers of TELEKINESIS awaken partly in response to the dreadful religious bigotry of her mother and specifically to brutal teasing at high school. Widely praised and commercially successful, C is pyrotechnically directed, especially in those scenes where Carrie strikes back at her tormentors. Undoubtedly impressive, the film is, however, more simplistic about its fantasy of impotent-victim-becoming-potent-avenger than was its source novel. De Palma went on to make another film about PSI POWERS, The FURY (1978). [PN]See also: CINEMA. CARRIGAN, RICHARD (1939-1978) and NANCY (1933-? ) US writing team in whose sf novel, The Siren Stars (1971), the first intelligent messages from another star present a dire challenge. Rather ponderously, a clean-cut team of Earth scientists deals with the problem. The book-length sequel was "Minotaur in a Mushroom Maze" (1976 ASF). [JC]See also: CYBERNETICS. CARRINGTON, GRANT (1938- ) US writer who began publishing sf with "Night-Eyed Prayer" for AMZ in 1971, though his later "After You've Stood on the Log at the Center of the Universe, What is There Left To Do?" (1974) was more notable. Time's Fool (1981) is an unremarkable though moderately appealing sf adventure. [JC] CARROLL, LEWIS Pseudonym of UK mathematician and writer Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (1832-1898), whose famous children's stories, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (1865) and Through the Looking Glass and What Alice Found There (1871), an early example of the novel whose "moves" are based on a game of chess, have had a profound impact on a wide range of writers. It has been argued by Brian W. ALDISS, among others, that the underlying logic of these "nonsense" adventures has provided a significant model for much of sf's typical reorderings of reality - certainly in most sf novels whose heroes' PARANOIA about reality turns out to be justified. Both novels were assembled much later, and very usefully, as The Annotated Alice: Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass (omni 1960 US; rev vt More Annotated Alice 1990 US) ed Martin GARDNERGilbert Adair's Alice Through the Needle's Eye * (1984) was, interestingly, not a Wonderland parody but a genuine continuation.LC's mathematical and logical fantasies, as found in A Tangled Tale (1886), have also had repercussions in sf. [JC]Other works include: Phantasmagoria and Other Poems (coll 1869); The Hunting of the Snark: An Agony in Eight Fits (1876 chap), Sylvie and Bruno (1867 Aunt Judy's Magazine as "Bruno's Revenge"; exp 1889) and its sequel (also derived from the story), Sylvie and Bruno Concluded (1893); The Wasp in a Wig (1977 chap), a portion of Through the Looking-Glass cut at proof stage and lost until 1977.About the author: The Life and Letters of Lewis Carroll (1898) by Stuart Dodgson Collingwood; Victoria through the Looking-Glass (1945; vt Lewis Carroll 1954 UK) by Derek Hudson; Aspects of Alice (1971) ed Robert Phillips.See also: FANTASTIC VOYAGES; HOLLOW EARTH; MATHEMATICS; VIRTUAL REALITY. CARS THAT ATE PARIS, THE Film (1974). Salt Pan/Australian Film Development Corp/Royce Smeal. Written and dir Peter Weir, starring Terry Camilleri, John Meillon, Kevin Miles. 88 mins. Colour.From a director who later made several impressive fantasy films, including Picnic at Hanging Rock (1975) and The Last Wave (1977), both of which edge close to sf at points, TCTAP is an idiosyncratic exploitation movie about a small town in which young people drive murderously redesigned cars (some covered in spikes) up and down the roads at high speed, rapidly disposing of any visitors via crashes and then cannibalizing the wreckage; any survivors are turned over to the local mad doctor who uses them as experimental subjects. An air of automotive apocalypse is produced, as in Jean-Luc Godard's otherwise very different WEEKEND (1967). In TCTAP, a witty, smaller-scale work, the town that lives by the car dies by the car. TCTAP points forward to the MAD MAX movies, also Australian, which similarly feature killer cars, gladiatorial sports and diseased societies. [PN] CARTER, ANGELA (OLIVE STALKER) (1940-1992) UK writer best known for her work outside the sf field, though all her novels and tales are characterized by an expressionist freedom of reference to everyday "reality" which often emerges as fantasy. She won the John Llewelyn Rhys Memorial Prize for her second novel, The Magic Toyshop (1967), and the Somerset Maugham Award for Several Perceptions (1968). Her first tale to engage in a recognizably sf displacement of reality, HEROES AND VILLAINS (1969), does so with a similar freedom, for AC was one of the few UK writers of genuine FABULATIONS, of POSTMODERNIST works in which storytelling conventions are mixed and examined, and in which the style of telling is strongly language-oriented. HEROES AND VILLAINS is set in a post- HOLOCAUST England inhabited by (a) dwellers in the ruins of cities, whose society is rigidly stratified into Professors and the Soldiers who guard them and, (b) Barbarians who live in the surreal mutated forests that cover the land. Like much of her work, the novel uses GOTHIC images and conventions to examine and to parody the concerns of its protagonists and the desolate world they inhabit. In the story of Marianne, a Professor's daughter, who leaves the ruined city for a Barbarian life where she undergoes a violent erotic awakening, AC definitively entangles sex and decadence (or female freedom).Erotic complexities, shamans and deliquescent urban landscapes proliferate in such later novels as The Infernal Desire Machines of Doctor Hoffman (1972; vt The War of Dreams 1974 US), which is a quest into dream, The Passion of New Eve (1977), which is a baroque picaresque through a holocaust-enflamed USA, and Nights at the Circus (1984), in which a grandly fabulated, densely conceived phantasmagorical world surrounds the tale of a "deformed" woman performer whose wings are real, whose womanhood is no deformity. AC's stories were collected as: Fireworks (coll 1974; rev 1987), assembled with the non-genre Love (1971; rev 1987) as Artificial Fire (omni 1988 Canada); The Bloody Chamber (coll 1979), a series of contes dissective of female sexuality; and Black Venus (coll 1985; rev vt Saints and Strangers 1986 US), which includes Black Venus's Tale (1980 chap). Though she was never associated with the sf NEW WAVE, it was perhaps through the widening of the gates of perception due to that movement that readers of sf were induced to treat AC's difficult but rewarding work as being of interest to a genre audience. She died very much too young. [JC]Other works: Moonshadow (1982 chap) with Justin Todd, a juvenile; Come unto These Yellow Sands: Four Radio Plays (coll 1985); The Virago Book of Fairy Tales (anth 1990; vt The Old Wives' Fairy Tale Book 1990 US); The Second Virago Book of Fairy Tales (anth 1992); Expletives Deleted (coll 1992), nonfiction.As translator:The Fairy Tales of Charles Perrault (trans 1977); Sleeping Beauty and Other Favourite Fairy Tales (trans and ed 1982).See also: ANTHROPOLOGY; DISASTER; FANTASTIC VOYAGES; FANTASY; HISTORY OF SF; MYTHOLOGY; PERCEPTION; PSYCHOLOGY; SUPERNATURAL CREATURES; WOMEN SF WRITERS. CARTER, BRUCE Pseudonym of UK military historian, novelist and editor Richard (Alexander) Hough (1922- ) for his stories and nonfiction books for juveniles, beginning with an sf title, The Perilous Descent into a Strange Lost World (1952; vt Into a Strange Lost World 1953 US). Other sf novels for older children have included The Deadly Freeze (1976) and Buzzbugs (1977). Nightworld (1987) is an animal fantasy. [JC] CARTER, CARMEN (1954- ) US writer who has been primarily associated with STAR TREK, writing one solo tie for Star Trek itself, Dreams of the Raven * (1987), and three for Star Trek, the Next Generation, The Children of Hamelin * (1988), with Michael Jan FRIEDMAN, Peter DAVID and Robert Greenberger, Doomsday World * (1990) and Devil's Heart * (1993). Earlier she published a short fantasy fable, The Shy Beast (1984 chap). [JC] CARTER, DEE Dennis HUGHES. CARTER, LIN Working name of US writer and editor Linwood Vrooman Carter (1930-1988), most of whose work of any significance was done in the field of HEROIC FANTASY, an area of concentration he went some way to define in his critical study of relevant texts and techniques, Imaginary Worlds (1973). Much of his own heroic fantasy derives, sometimes too mechanically, from the precepts about its writing which he aired in this book. As an editor, he was most active about 1969-72, when as consultant for BALLANTINE BOOKS he conceived their adult FANTASY list and presented many titles under that aegis, bringing to the contemporary paperback market writers such as James Branch CABELL, Lord DUNSANY and Clark Ashton SMITH. With Cabell, he merely reprinted some titles; but with H.P. LOVECRAFT, Dunsany and Smith he reassembled material under his own titles (for details see their entries). Most of his criticism has been closely linked to his strong interest in fantasy of this sort; it includes Tolkien: A Look Behind "The Lord of the Rings" (1969) and Lovecraft: A Look Behind the "Cthulhu Mythos" (1972). LC began publishing sf with "Masters of the Metropolis" for FSF in 1957 with Randall GARRETT; and with L. Sprague de Camp he adapted and expanded many stories, especially Conan infills, like Conan the Swordsman * (1978) and Conan the Liberator * (1979), which Robert E. Howard had left unpublished or unrealized, and created others (for further details L. Sprague DE CAMP; Robert E. HOWARD).As an author in his own right, LC tended to concentrate on pastiches of the kind of heroic fantasy to which he was devoted. His first novel, The Wizard of Lemuria (1965; rev vt Thongor and the Wizard of Lemuria 1969), begins a long and (as it turned out) typical series of fantasies about the exploits of Thongor in various venues, continuing with Thongor of Lemuria (1966; rev vt Thongor and the Dragon City 1970), Thongor Against the Gods (1967), Thongor in the City of Magicians (1968), Thongor at the End of Time (1968) and Thongor Fights the Pirates of Tarakus (1970). Like succeeding series (see listing below), the Thongor tales represent a swift though somewhat exiguous fantasizing of routine pulp protocols. Though these fantasies were often set (like Edgar Rice BURROUGHS's) on various florid worlds, and could be thought of as PLANETARY ROMANCES, they were not in any committed sense sf in tone; LC's output of sf proper is relatively scant. The Great Imperium sequence - The Star Magicians (1966 dos), The Man without a Planet (1966 dos), Tower of the Medusa (1969), Star Rogue (1970) and Outworlder (1971) - comes attractively closer; and the Mars series - The Man who Loved Mars (1973), The Valley where Time Stood Still (1974), The City Outside the World (1977) and Down to a Sunless Sea (1984) - has moments of poignance where sf and SCIENCE FANTASY grant perspectives by overlapping. Overproduction blurred LC's image (though illness slowed him down considerably in later years), giving weight to the feeling that he sometimes paid inadequate attention to the quality of his products or to assuring their individuality. His work as an editor eclipses his own writings in importance. [JC]Other works:Series: The Thoth sequence, comprising The Thief of Thoth (1968 chap) and The Purloined Planet (1969 chap dos), which is sf; the Chronicles of Kylix, comprising The Quest of Kadji (1971) and The Wizard of Zao (1978); the Gondwana Epic, comprising The Warrior of World's End, (1974), The Enchantress of World's End (1975), The Immortal of World's End (1976), The Barbarian of World's End (1977), The Pirate of World's End (1978) and, first published but the concluding volume, Giant of World's End (1969); the Callisto sequence, comprising Jandar of Callisto (1972), Black Legion of Callisto (1972), Sky Pirates of Callisto (1973), Mad Empress of Callisto (1975), Mind Wizards of Callisto (1975), Lankar of Callisto (1975), Ylana of Callisto (1977) and Renegade of Callisto (1978); the Green Star Rises sequence, comprising Under the Green Star (1972), When the Green Star Calls (1973), By the Light of the Green Star (1974), As the Green Star Rises (1975), In the Green Star's Glow (1976) and As the Green Star Rises (1983); the DOC SAVAGE-like Zarkon sequence, comprising Zarkon, Lord of the Unknown, in The Nemesis of Evil (1975; vt The Nemesis of Evil 1978), Zarkon, Lord of the Unknown, in Invisible Death (1975; vt Zarkon, Lord of the Unknown and his Omega Crew: Invisible Death 1978), Zarkon, Lord of the Unknown, in The Volcano Ogre (1976; vt Zarkon, Lord of the Unknown and his Omega Crew: The Volcano Ogre 1978), Zarkon, Lord of the Unknown, in The Earth-Shaker (1982) and Horror Wears Blue (1987); the Zanthodon sequence, comprising Journey to the Underground World (1979), Zanthodon (1980), Hurok of the Stone Age (1981), Darya of the Stone Age (1981) and Eric of Zanthodon (1982); the Terra Magica sequence, comprising Kesrick (1982), Dragonrouge (1984), Mandricardo (1986) and Callipygia (1988).Singletons: Destination Saturn (1967) with David Grinnell (Donald A. WOLLHEIM); The Flame of Iridar (1967 chap dos); Tower at the Edge of Time (1968); Beyond the Gates of Dream (coll 1969); Lost World of Time (1969); Outworlder (1971); The Black Star (1973); Time War (1974); Dreams from R'lyeh (coll 1975 chap), poetry; Tara of the Twilight (1979); Lost Worlds (coll 1980); Kellory the Warlock (1984); Found Wanting (1985).As Editor: Dragons, Elves and Heroes (anth 1969); The Young Magicians (anth 1969); The Magic of Atlantis (anth 1970); Golden Cities, Far (anth 1970); The Spawn of Cthulhu (anth 1971); New Worlds for Old (anth 1971); Discoveries in Fantasy (anth 1972); Great Short Novels of Adult Fantasy (anth 1972) and Great Short Novels of Adult Fantasy II (anth 1973); the Flashing Swords series, comprising Flashing Swords 1 (anth 1973), #2 (anth 1973), #3: Warriors and Wizards (anth 1976), #4: Barbarians and Black Magicians (anth 1977) and #5: Demons and Daggers (anth 1981); the Year's Best Fantasy series, comprising The Year's Best Fantasy Stories 1 (anth 1975), #2 (anth 1976), #3 (anth 1977), #4 (anth 1978), #5 (anth 1980) and #6 (anth 1980); Kingdoms of Sorcery (anth 1976); Realms of Wizardry (anth 1976); the Weird Tales series, comprising Weird Tales 1 (anth 1980), #2 (anth 1980), #3 (anth 1981) and #4 (anth 1983).Nonfiction: Royal Armies of the Hyborean Age: A Wargamer's Guide to the Age of Conan (1975 chap) both with Scott Bizar; Middle-Earth: The World of Tolkien (1977) with David Wenzel (1950- ), pictures with captions.See also: ATLANTIS; DAW BOOKS; SWORD AND SORCERY. CARTER, NICK Fictional sleuth, and house name for many of the titles in which he appears. Created by John Russell Coryell (1848-1924) in The Old Detective's Pupil, or The Mysterious Crime at Madison Square Garden (1886) on the model of Allan Pinkerton (1819-1884), founder of the famous detective agency, NC featured in many subsquent US dime novels, including several of sf interest ( DIME-NOVEL SF) by Frederick Van Rensselaer Dey (1861-1922) writing as Chickering Carter - the name of one of Carter's numerous assistants - published in the New Nick Carter Weekly in 1907, the most notable being "The Index of Seven Stars, or Nick Carter Finds the Hidden City", "An Amazonian Queen, or Nick Carter Becomes a Gladiator" and "The Seven-Headed Monster, or Nick Carter's Midnight Caller". Other authors of Nick Carter tales before WWII included John Chambliss, Philip Clark, William Wallace COOK, Frederick William Davis, George Charles Jenks (1850-1929), whose normal pseudonym was W.B. Lawson, Johnston McCulley (1883-1958) and Eugene Taylor Sawyer. Magazines such as the Nick Carter Detective Library were supplemented by radio, film and tv incarnations, over the course of which Carter himself became noticeably tougher and more murderous, his resemblance to Sexton Blake being correspondingly less marked in more recent years. The Nick Carter series of soft-porn thrillers from the 1960s rarely slipped into sf, and never with much point; typical of titles verging on sf were (all as by Nick Carter) The Human Time Bomb: A Killmaster Spy Chiller (1969),The Red Rays (1969) by Manning Lee STOKES, Living Death (1969) by Jon Messmann, Operation Moon Rocket (1970) and The Death Strain (1971). It is understood that among the authors about this time were, in addition to Messmann, Michael AVALLONE, Dennis LYNDS, Martin Cruz SMITH and Richard WORMSER. A decade later, a further batch of sf titles was produced, again all as by NC, including The Doomsday Spore (1979) by George Warren, The Q-Man (1981) by John Stevenson, The Solar Menace (1981) and Doctor DNA (1982), both by Robert E. VARDEMAN, The Last Samurai (1982) by Bruce Algozin and Deathlight (1982) by Jerry AHERN. [JC] CARTER, PAUL A(LLEN) (1926- ) US social historian and writer who began publishing sf with "The Last Objective" for ASF in 1946. His occasional stories over the next decades showed that, had he wished, he could have made writing his primary career. In The Creation of Tomorrow: Fifty Years of Magazine Science Fiction (anth 1977) he demonstrated an intimate and sophisticated knowledge of the field. With Gregory BENFORD he has published a short novel, Iceborn (1989 in Synergy 3 ed George ZEBROWSKI, as "Proserpina's Daughter"; exp 1989 chap dos). [JC]See also: POLITICS. CARTER, R.M.H. [r] ROBERT HALE LIMITED. CARTIER, EDD Working name of US illustrator Edward Daniel Cartier (1914- ). After graduation in 1936 from the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, New York, EC was hired by STREET & SMITH to work on their PULP MAGAZINES, notably The Shadow. His skills were noticed by John W. CAMPBELL Jr, who began using him in the new magazine UNKNOWN, for which EC did many black-and-white interiors from #1 onwards and, from Dec 1939, five covers. For many readers EC's combination of whimsy and menace summed up the quality of that magazine. He quickly became very popular, perhaps because the humorous feel of his work was then so unusual in sf ILLUSTRATION. He left in 1941 to fight in WWII, was wounded in the Battle of the Bulge, and returned to illustration in 1946. Thereafter his main markets were ASTOUNDING SCIENCE-FICTION, DOC SAVAGE MAGAZINE, OTHER WORLDS and the SMALL PRESSES, like FANTASY PRESS and GNOME PRESS, which often reprinted ASF material in book form. EC later went back to college, graduated in fine arts, and left sf illustration around 1954 to work in graphic design. He will be remembered for the wit and boldness of his black-and-white work for the Street & Smith magazines. [JG/PN]See also: COMICS; FANTASY. CARTMILL, CLEVE (1908-1964) US author and journalist; co-inventor of the Blackmill system of high-speed typography. His early work appeared in Unknown, including his first story, "Oscar" (1941), and several short FANTASY novels; one of these, "Hell Hath Fury" (1943), was featured in the George HAY anthology of the same title (1963). During the 1940s he was also active in US sf magazines, publishing in all about 40 stories, including the Space Salvage series in TWS, later collected as The Space Scavengers (coll of linked stories 1975). He is remembered for a famous story in ASF, "Deadline" (1944), which described the atomic bomb a year before it was dropped. US Security subsequently descended on ASF but was persuaded (truthfully) by John W. CAMPBELL Jr that CC had used for his research only material available in public libraries. CC's prediction made sf fans enormously proud, and the story was made a prime exhibit in the arguments about PREDICTION in sf. In this NEAR-FUTURE fable the evil Sixa (i.e., Axis) forces are prevented from dropping the Bomb, and the Seilla (Allies) decline to do so, justly fearing its dread potential. [JC]About the author: "The Manhattan Project's Confrontation with Science Fiction" (1984 ASF) by Albert Berger.See also: NUCLEAR POWER; RELIGION. CARVER, JEFFREY A(LLAN) (1949- ) US writer who began publishing sf with ". . . Of No Return" for Fiction Magazine in 1974. His first novel, Seas of Ernathe (1976 Canada), showed early signs of a love of plot and thematic complexity which would take him some time, and several novels, to control. Star Rigger's Way (1978), for instance, combines quest routines, new starflight technologies, various planets and transcendental ALIENS in a tale whose final effect is incoherent, though promising; nor is Panglor (1980) significantly better behaved. But The Infinity Link (1984) is a large and ambitious recasting of his abiding material-space epic venues, striving human protagonists in transcendental communion with aliens or AIs - into the tale of a human woman telepathically linked with a passing interstellar race. The Rapture Effect (1987) brought the ARTS into the mix, suggesting in the end that a secret war between a human-built AI and its distant alien counterpart might be resolved, finally, through the mediation of some ambitious human artists. And in the Starstream sequence - From a Changeling Star (1989) and Down the Stream of Stars (1990) - JAC created at last a galactic environment of sufficient richness to contain a still somewhat overexuberant imagination. In the first volume, a "starstream" has opened up between Earth space and the centre of the Galaxy, allowing for intercourse and settlement; the plot, which is extremely complicated, involves its protagonist in a quest inwards to regions where stars are numerous, by the end of which, killed and rekilled and reborn, he is saved by the overseeing AI which narrates the second volume. NANOTECHNOLOGIES are described; poetries and epiphanies and space wars proliferate. Dragons in the Stars (1992), and its sequel Dragon Rigger (1993), return to the Star Rigger universe; and a new series, the Chaos Chronicles begins with Neptune Crossing (1994), in which another AI enlists a lone human to save Earth from a comet whose course is only predictable through the AI's use of Chaos Theory. JAC seems to be thoroughly enjoying his worlds. [JC]Other work: Roger Zelazny's Alien Speedway #1: Clypsis (1987).See also: MUSIC. CASANOVA DE SEINGALT, GIACOMO (1725-1798) Venetian writer, variously employed; best known for his Memoires (posthumously published in 12 vols 1826-38), the single-mindedness of which caused his name to pass into the language . He wrote primarily in French, the language of his FANTASTIC-VOYAGE novel, Icosameron, ou Histoire d'Edouard et d'Elizabeth Qui Passerent Quatre-Vingte Un Ans chez les Megamicres Habitans Aborigenes du Protocosme dans l'Interieur de Notre Globe (1788; cut trans Rachel Zurer as Casanova's "Icosameron" or the Story of Edward and Elizabeth who Spent Eighty-One Years in the Land of the Megamicres, Original Inhabitants of Protocosmos in the Interior of the Globe 1986 US). The protagonists spend 81 years in a world in the HOLLOW EARTH inhabited by the androgynous and oviparous Megamicres ("big/littles" - small in stature and large in spirit), who have been there from before the Fall - this land being an analogue of Eden - avoiding Original Sin, but soulless (cf James BLISH's A CASE OF CONSCIENCE, 1958). They describe their society to the two shipwrecked wanderers at some length (the novel occupies 5 vols, each 350pp or more), and the wanderers (brother and sister, though they mate in the Eden they discover) in turn tell their tale, in dialogue form, to a group of English aristocrats; they have left millions of descendants inside the Earth, and transformed society there. The book is quite realistic in tone, and contains a great deal of scientific speculation and anticipation, notably about electricity, and a fair amount of social SATIRE. It was probably influenced by VOLTAIRE's Micromegas (France 1752), and more directly by Ludvig HOLBERG's Nicolaii Klimii Iter Subterraneum (1741 in Latin; trans as A Journey to the World Underground 1742). [JC/PN]See also: FRANCE; ITALY. CASARES, ADOLFO BIOY [r] Adolfo BIOY CASARES. CASE, JOSEPHINE YOUNG (1907-1990) US writer of a remarkable book-length sf poem, At Midnight on the 31st of March (1938), set in a New England village suddenly isolated by some unidentified DISASTER from the rest of the USA, and consequently cast upon its own closely observed resources. What seemed, on its 1990 republication, to read as tocsin nostalgia for an impossible rapport with mythic roots may have read in 1938 as a clarion call. [JC] CASEWIT, CURTIS W(ERNER) (1922- ) US writer born in Germany and educated in different countries (hence multilingual), resident in the USA from 1948. He has published in various fields, his first sf story, "The Mask" (1952), appearing in Weird Tales. His sf novel, The Peacemakers (1960), depicts conflicting societies after WWIII; a former soldier tries to become dictator. [JC] CASEY, RICHARD House name used on the ZIFF-DAVIS magazines 1943-8 by Leroy YERXA and others. CASPER AWARDS; CANADA. CASPER, SUSAN (1947- ) US editor and writer, married to Gardner DOZOIS. She began publishing sf with "Spring-Fingered Jack" for Fears (anth 1983) ed Charles GRANT. Her fiction in collaboration with Dozois was assembled in Slow Dancing through Time (coll 1990), which includes a collaboration with both Dozois and Jack M. DANN. Also with Dozois, she edited Ripper! (anth 1988; vt Jack the Ripper 1988 UK). [JC]See also: CRIME AND PUNISHMENT. CASSIDAY, BRUCE (BINGHAM) (1920- ) US editor and writer, who worked as editor with various PULP-MAGAZINE publishers before going freelance in 1954, usually publishing under pseudonyms. His sf works are ties: "Gorgo" * (1960) as by Carson Bingham, "Flash Gordon 4: The Time Trap of Ming XIII" * (1974), as by Con STEFFANSON, "Flash Gordon 5: The Witch Queen of Mongo" * (1974) as by Bingham and Flash Gordon: The War of the Cybernauts * (1975) as by Bingham. The first, based on the film GORGO (1959), is notable for the added sex scenes, a custom of Monarch's film adaptations. Additional titles include Nightmare Hall (1973) as by Annie Laurie McMurdie, and Queen of the Looking Glass (1978) as by Annie Laurie McAllister. Under his own name, he adapted for the US market Dieter Wuckel's Science Fiction: eine illustrierte literaturgeschichte (1986 Germany; trans Jenny Vowles as The Illustrated History of Science Fiction 1989 US). His Modern Mystery, Fantasy, and Science Fiction Writers (anth 1993), a compilation of critical responses to 88 authors, was not very thorough. [PN/JC] CASSUTT, MICHAEL (1954- ) US writer who began publishing sf with "A Second Death" for AMZ in 1974, and whose numerous tv credits include serving as staff writer for The TWILIGHT ZONE in 1986 and story editor for MAX HEADROOM in 1987. His sf novel, Star Country (1986), set in a balkanized post- HOLOCAUST USA, competently dovetails two stories, one concerning an escaped ALIEN, the other a commune which has attempted to turn its collective back on the world. His Who's Who in Space: The First 25 Years (1987; exp vt Who's Who in Space: The International Space Year Edition 1993) provides biographies of a wide range of people involved in the first years of humanity's move off-planet. Sacred Visions (anth 1991) with Andrew M. GREELEY is an anthology, by no means pious, of sf about and/or reflecting RELIGION. [JC]Other works: Dragon Season (1991), a fantasy. CASTERET, NORBERT (1897-1987) French speleologist and writer whose sf novel, Mission centre terre (1964; trans Antonia Ridge and rev as Mission Underground 1968 UK), sends explorers several miles into the Earth in a specially designed craft. [JC]Other works: La terre ardente (1950); Muta, fille des cavernes["Muta, Daughter of the Caverns"] (1965)and Dans la nuit des temps ["In the Night of Time"] (1966), two prehistoric romances. CASTILLO, GABRIEL BERMUDEZ [r] SPAIN. CASTLE, DAMON Richard REINSMITH. CASTLE, J(EFFERY) LLOYD (1898- ) UK writer whose first sf novel, Satellite E One (1954), deals awkwardly with the scientific details surrounding the construction of a space satellite. His second, Vanguard to Venus (1957), identifies UFOS as the ships of descendants of spacefaring ancient Egyptians. [JC] CASTLE, ROBERT [s] Edmond HAMILTON. CATASTROPHE DISASTER; END OF THE WORLD; HOLOCAUST AND AFTER. CAVALIER, THE US general-fiction PULP MAGAZINE published by the Frank A. MUNSEY Co., ed Robert H. Davis. It evolved from The SCRAP BOOK and appeared monthly Oct 1908-Jan 1912, became The Cavalier Weekly, 6 Jan 1912-9 May 1914, then merged with All-Story Weekly to form All Story Cavalier Weekly ( The ALL-STORY ). Although comparatively short-lived, TC published two celebrated sf works: Garrett P. SERVISS's The Second Deluge (1911-12; 1912) and George Allan ENGLAND's Darkness and Dawn (1912-13 as 3 separate novels; fixup 1914; in 5 vols with editorial changes 1964-7). Among the numerous short stories were works by Edgar FRANKLIN, J.U. GIESY (with Junius B. Smith) and John D. Swain. Several stories from TC were reprinted in FAMOUS FANTASTIC MYSTERIES and FANTASTIC NOVELS. [JE] CAVALIER WEEKLY The CAVALIER . CAWTHORN, JAMES (1929- ) UK illustrator, critic and writer. He entered sf around 1954, early becoming friendly with Michael MOORCOCK through a shared interest in Edgar Rice BURROUGHS, and working with him on Tarzan Adventures, a COMIC book ed Moorcock. As Philip James he wrote The Distant Suns (1969 The Illustrated Weekly of India; exp 1975) with Moorcock. As JC he wrote book reviews for NW, but was best known as an illustrator, his work appearing often in NW but also in comics and on occasional book covers. At his best his naive, rough lines work vividly; sometimes they simply seem too crude. His SWORD-AND-SORCERY illustration is uneven. Books in GRAPHIC-NOVEL form are Stormbringer (graph 1975), The Jewel in the Skull (graph 1978), The Crystal and the Amulet (graph 1986), all existing works by Moorcock adapted by JC, the latter based on Sorcerer's Amulet (1968; rev 1977; vt The Mad God's Amulet), the second of the Runestaff books. He co-scripted with Moorcock the 1975 film The LAND THAT TIME FORGOT . The critical book Fantasy: The 100 Best Books (1988) by JC and Moorcock is, according to Moorcock's Introduction, mostly by JC, and is notable for the heavy emphasis it places on early FANTASY, only 24 of the 100 works discussed being post-1955. [PN] CAXTON [s] W.H. RHODES. CECH, SVATOPLUK [r] CZECH AND SLOVAK SF. CHABER, M.E. Kendell Foster CROSSEN. CHADWICK, P(HILIP) G(EORGE) (1893-1955) UK author whose only novel, The Death Guard (1939), was virtually forgotten until its 1992 reissue. It describes the development of the "Flesh Guard", a race of laboratory-created vegetal humanoids, at the time of the emergence of a fascist dictatorship in the UK, and depicts a future WAR as the Earth's major nations react to the horror of such an army in the hands of an extremist government. The book contains several themes later developed by L. Ron HUBBARD and James BLISH, and is at times reminiscent of William Hope HODGSON. [JE]See also: POLITICS. CHAIRMAN, THE The MOST DANGEROUS MAN IN THE WORLD . CHALKER, JACK L(AURENCE) (1944- ) US writer and editor, though now very much better known for his fiction. He was active as a fan from an early age, and producer of a successful FANZINE, Mirage. As editor, he founded and edited the MIRAGE PRESS, which specialized in sf scholarship. His own work in that area began with The New H.P. Lovecraft Bibliography (1962 chap; rev vt The Revised H. P. Lovecraft Bibliography 1974 chap with Mark OWINGS) and In Memoriam: Clark Ashton Smith (anth 1963 chap), continuing with some studies and guides with Owings, who is sometimes listed as a pseudonym of JLC, a confusion arising from his sole crediting for The Necronomicon: A Study (1967 chap), which was in fact collaborative. They also worked together on Mirage on Lovecraft (1965 chap) and The Index to the Science Fantasy Publishers (1966 chap; rev vt Index to the SF Publishers 1979 chap). After the solo An Informal Biography of $crooge McDuck (1971 Markings; 1974 chap), JLC moved his attention to fiction, only returning to his earlier interest 20 years later with a new edition of his 1979 Index, which though technically a revision of the earlier work was in fact 10 times its length, and can logically be treated as either a vt or a new title: The Science-Fantasy Publishers: A Critical and Bibliographic History (1991; with subsequent various unascribed revs), still with Owings; the similarly identified The Science-Fantasy Publishers: Supplement One, July 1991-June 1992 (1992) and the Science-Fantasy Publishers: Supplement One: July 1991- June 1993 (1993) continue the coverage (see also BIBLIOGRAPHIES).His first novel, an ambitious singleton SPACE OPERA, A Jungle of Stars (1976), proved typical in that its opposing aliens (who are both ex-gods) represent in their conflict a form of populist argument about alternative utopian worldviews, and in that its plot concentrates on members of mortal races who have been recruited to do the superbeings' fighting for them in a kind of world-arena. This underlying articulacy and the plot-device of recruitment also mark his most successful single novel, Dancers in the Afterglow (1978), a complex and melancholy tale of oppression and enforced metamorphosis on a conquered colony planet, in which questions of power and morality are again asked with some ease, and the human need for freedom is answered (and at the same time deeply assaulted) by transformation tropes out of SCIENCE FANTASY and nightmare. Dancers contains in embryo almost all of the next decade or so of JLC's prolific career, most of which has been given over to the construction of large series. The first, the Well World sequence, begins with his second fiction title, Midnight at the Well of Souls (1977), and continues with The Wars of the Well - in 2 vols: Exiles at the Well of Souls (1978) and Quest for the Well of Souls (1978)-The Return of Nathan Brazil (1980), Twilight at the Well of Souls: The Legacy of Nathan Brazil (1980), , Echoes of the Well of Souls (1993), Shadow of the Well of Souls (1994) and Gods of the Well of Souls (1994). In this series the dominant pattern of the JLC multi-volume tale can be seen. Into a world which reveals itself in the shape of a game-board disguised as a DYSTOPIA, recruited and metamorphosed mortals are introduced to find their way, usually stark-naked, to the heart of the labyrinth, where wait the godlings, and, perhaps, as a reward, the true form they have always secretly wished to assume (the 1990s volumes of the sequence replicate this pattern). It is a pattern open to facile abuse (several of JLC's fantasy series, as listed below, exhibit a strange monotony) but which remains exhilarating and innovative in his other major sf series, The Four Lords of the Diamond (omni 1983), which assembles Lilith: A Snake in the Grass (1981), Cerberus: A Wolf in the Fold (1982), Charon: A Dragon at the Gate (1982) and Medusa: A Tiger by the Tail (1983). The Quintara Marathon sf series - Demons at Rainbow Bridge (1989), The Run to Chaos Keep (1991) and The Ninety Trillion Fausts (1991) - further rehearses this material. Of JLC's infrequent singletons, The Identity Matrix (1982) and Downtiming the Night Side (1985) perhaps stand out; his short fiction, also infrequent, is represented by Dance Band on the Titanic (coll 1988). JLC is a novelist of considerable flair, with an ear acutely attuned to the secret dreams of freedom mortals tend to dream, but is prone to gross and compulsively repetitive overproduction. He will not be remembered for his second thoughts. [JC]Other works: The Soul Rider science-fantasy sequence, comprising Spirits of Flux and Anchor (1984), Empires of Flux and Anchor (1984), Masters of Flux and Anchor (1985), The Birth of Flux and Anchor (1985) - an sf prequel - and Children of Flux and Anchor (1986); the Dancing Gods sequence, comprising The River of Dancing Gods (1984), Demons of the Dancing Gods (1984), Vengeance of the Dancing Gods (1985) and Songs of the Dancing Gods (1990); the Rings of the Master sequence, comprising Lords of the Middle Dark (1986), Pirates of the Thunder (1987), Warriors of the Storm (1987) and Masks of the Martyrs (1988); the Changewinds fantasy sequence, comprising When the Changewinds Blow (1987), Riders of the Winds (1988) and War of the Maelstrom (1988), which JLC claims make up a single long novel; an ALTERNATE-WORLDS detective series, G.O.D. Inc, comprising The Labyrinth of Dreams (1987), The Shadow Dancers (1987) and The Maze in the Mirror (1989).Singletons: The Web of the Chozen (1978); A War of Shadows (1979); And the Devil Will Drag You Under (1979); The Devil's Voyage (1981), mainly about the ship that carried the A-bomb used on Hiroshima to its rendezvous and which was subsequently sunk and its crew eaten by sharks, but also about the security scare caused by Cleve CARTMILL's "Deadline", published in 1944 in John W. CAMPBELL's ASF; The Messiah Choice (1985); The Red Tape War: A Round-Robin Science Fiction Novel (1991) with Michael RESNICK and George Alec EFFINGER; Hotel Andromeda (anth 1994), as editor.See also: GODS AND DEMONS; INVASION; PARANOIA; POCKET UNIVERSE; SMALL PRESSES AND LIMITED EDITIONS; TIME TRAVEL; VIRTUAL REALITY. CHALLENGE GAMES AND TOYS. CHALLIS, GEORGE Max BRAND. CHALMERS, GARET [r] ROBERT HALE LIMITED. CHAMBERLAIN, HENRY RICHARDSON (1859-1911) US writer and newspaper editor of considerable political sophistication, which shows itself in the conclusion to his sf novel, 6,000 Tons of Gold (1894). After the eponymous treasure trove has unbalanced the world's finances, and only dubiously assisted the needy, a cabal of the wise decides to dump it into the deep sea. [JC]See also: MONEY. CHAMBERLAIN, WILLIAM (1903-1969?) US writer whose two borderline sf novels, Red January (1964) and China Strike (1967), both feature US pre-emptive strikes against the enemy - in the first case Cuba, about to blackmail the USA, and in the second China, on the verge of dropping a cobalt bomb on her. Neither gets away with it. [JC] CHAMBERS, ROBERT W(ILLIAM) (1865-1933) Popular US writer, author of over 70 novels in various genres, for the first decade or so of his career mostly fantasies, thereafter mainly historical and romantic works. His first successful work was The King in Yellow (coll 1895; cut vt The Mask 1929). The eponymous "King in Yellow" is not a person but a verse play in book form, which (not unlike several much discussed works of recent sf) drives its readers to despair, madness and even suicide ( PSYCHOLOGY). Of the four King in Yellow tales in the book, "The Repairer of Reputations" is of particular sf interest, being set in 1920, after a war, in a USA that has legalized suicide. Several other volumes featuring connected stories followed, including The Maker of Moons (coll 1896; title story only 1954 chap) and two sf collections, In Search of the Unknown (coll of linked stories 1904) and its thematic sequel, Police!!! (coll of linked stories 1915), in each of which a philandering zoologist searches for unknown beasts ( BIOLOGY), finds them and loses them, along with various girls. The Gay Rebellion (1911 Hampden Magazine; coll of linked stories 1913) consists of comical SATIRES in which women revolt but reform and marry properly. RWC's use of sf material is slick and casual, though nightmares sometimes intrude; a teasing, tamed decadence that had marked RWC from the beginning became routinized in his later work, which was presented with professional polish but little conviction. [JC]Other works: The Mystery of Choice (coll 1897); The Tracer of Lost Persons (coll of linked stories 1906); The Tree of Heaven (coll 1907); Some Ladies in Haste (1908); The Green Mouse (1910); The Hidden Children (1914); Quick Action (1914) and its sequel, Athalie (1915); The Dark Star (1917); The Slayer of Souls (1920); The Talkers (1923); The King in Yellow and Other Horror Stories (coll 1970) ed with intro by E.F. BLEILER.See also: ARTS; SUSPENDED ANIMATION. CHANCE, JOHN NEWTON [r] John LYMINGTON. CHANCE, JONATHAN John LYMINGTON. CHANDLER, A(RTHUR) BERTRAM (1912-1984) UK-born writer who served in the Merchant Navy from 1928; in 1956 he emigrated to Australia, where he commanded merchant ships under Australian and New Zealand flags until his retirement in 1975. This long professional experience permeated his writing, and many of his novels feature SPACESHIPS and flotillas whose command structures are decidedly naval. ABC began publishing stories in ASF in 1944, on John W. CAMPBELL's invitation, with "This Means War", and concentrated on short fiction for almost two decades, often under the pseudonym George Whitley (in the USA and the UK), less frequently as Andrew Dunstan and S.H.M. (both only in Australia). But he published no books during this time, and maybe for that reason he was until the 1960s less well known than he perhaps deserved, even though some of his best stories date from this period. For some time he was known mainly as the author of "Giant Killer" (1945), a POCKET-UNIVERSE tale which dominates the work posthumously assembled in From Sea to Shining Star (coll 1990), and whose solitary prominence suggests that - although he published nearly 200 stories - ABC was not entirely comfortable in shorter forms.After reaching the rank of chief officer, ABC stopped writing for some time. He began again with a spate of tales in the late 1950s, and finally published his first novel at the beginning of the new decade. Thereafter he concentrated on full-length, albeit short, books, most of which have dealt, directly or indirectly, with his central venue, the various Rim Worlds set like isolated islands along the edge of the Galaxy ( GALACTIC LENS; RIMWORLD) during a period of human expansion. Not all these novels are serially connected, though all have a common background (which includes terminology and a set of frequently mentioned planets, like Thule and Faraway); John Grimes, the protagonist of the central sequence, appears also in some non-series novels. The two Derek Calver books - The Rim of Space (1961 US), ABC's first novel, and The Ship from Outside (1959 ASF as "The Outsiders" ; exp 1963 dos US) - make up a kind of trailer for the more numerous stories grouped about the figure of Grimes. In these books, Calver, following something like the same course Grimes will, comes to the Rim Worlds, eventually becomes captain of his own starship, Lorn Lady, loses her, sails on other star tramps, and engages in far-flung adventures.Grimes is mentioned in this short series, and the John Grimes/Rim World series massively expands upon a very similar career and life. Grimes himself dominates two main sequences. The first chronologically (though most of it was written later) traces his career in the Federation Survey Service up to and beyond the point that he shifts loyalties to the Rim. Their internal order is as follows: The Road to the Rim (1967 dos US); To Prime the Pump (1971 US); The Hard Way Up (coll 1972 dos US), which also appears with the first novel as The Road to the Rim (omni 1979 US); False Fatherland (1968; vt Spartan Planet 1969 US); The Inheritors (1972 dos US), which involves GENETIC ENGINEERING; The Broken Cycle (1975 UK); The Big Black Mark (1975 US); The Far Traveller (1977 UK); Star Courier (1977 US); To Keep the Ship (1978 UK); Matilda's Stepchildren (1979 UK); Star Loot (1980 US); The Anarch Lords (1981 US); The Last Amazon (1984 US); The Wild Ones (1984); Catch the Star Winds (coll of 1 novel and 1 story 1969 US). The second sequence advances Grimes further into his second career with the Rim Runners and the Rim Worlds Naval Reserve. Begun earlier and not written with any internal order in mind, it includes, in order of publication: Into the Alternate Universe (1964 dos US) and Contraband from Other-Space (1967 dos US), both assembled as Into the Alternate Universe (omni 1979 US); The Rim Gods (coll of linked stories 1969 dos US) and The Dark Dimensions (1971 dos US), both assembled as The Dark Dimensions (omni 1978 US); Alternate Orbits (coll 1971 dos US), assembled with False Fatherland as The Commodore at Sea (omni 1979 US); The Gateway to Never (1972 dos US) - crudely reassembled out of sequence as The Inheritors (omni 1978 US), having been originally published dos-a-dos with the novel of that title-and The Way Back (1976 UK). Through these books Grimes's somewhat melancholy temperament and con-sistent ingenuity often remind one of C.S. FORESTER's Horatio Hornblower, an influence ABC acknowledged (though Grimes's sexual forthrightness strikes a new note); but it is of course more than Hornblower's character that is drawn from the earlier genre. The Grimes/Rim World sequence is very clearly a transposition - much more directly than is usually the case - of ships into spaceships, seas into the blackness between the stars, and ports into home-planets. Much of the warmth and detail of ABC's work derives from this direct translation of venues, and Grimes himself establishes a loyalty in his readers rather similar to that felt by readers of Hornblower. Indeed, ABC's SPACE OPERAS are among the most likeable and well constructed in the genre, and his vision of the Rim Worlds - cold, poor, at the antipodean edge of intergalactic darkness, but full of all the pioneer virtues - are the genre's homiest characterization of that corner of space opera's galactic arena.Two singletons merit some notice. The Bitter Pill (1974) sourly depicts a totalitarian DYSTOPIA on Earth, and the ultimately successful attempts its leading characters make to wrest Mars free of oppression; and Kelly Country (1976 Void; exp 1983) places a war for Australian independence in a PARALLEL-WORLDS setting.ABC received the Australian Ditmar ( AWARDS) in 1969, 1971, 1974 and 1976. [JC]Other works: Bring Back Yesterday (1961 dos US); Rendezvous on a Lost World (1961 dos US; vt When the Dream Dies 1981 UK); The Hamelin Plague (1963 US); Beyond the Galactic Rim (coll 1963 dos US); the Christopher Wilkinson novels, comprising The Coils of Time (1964 dos US) and The Alternate Martians (1965 dos US); Glory Planet (1964 US); The Deep Reaches of Space (1946 ASF as "Special Knowledge"; rev 1964 UK), whose protagonist is ABC's main pseudonym, George Whitley; the Empress series of space operas, placed in an ALTERNATE-WORLDS universe similar to Grimes's and comprising Empress of Outer Space (1965 dos US), Space Mercenaries (1965 dos US) and Nebula Alert (1967 dos US); The Sea Beasts (1971 US); Up to the Sky in Ships (coll 1982 chap dos US); To Rule the Refugees (1983 Japan); Frontier of the Dark (1984 US); Find the Lady (1984 Japan).About the author: Arthur Bertram Chandler, Master Navigator of Space: A Working Bibliography (latest edn 1989 chap) by Gordon BENSON Jr.See also: AUSTRALIA; COLONIZATION OF OTHER WORLDS; FASTER THAN LIGHT; GALACTIC EMPIRES; GREAT AND SMALL; ROBERT HALE LIMITED. CHAPBOOK In the early 19th century this term described a pamphlet on any of a wide range of subjects - from sermons to sensational tales, often illustrated with woodcuts - sold not through bookshops but by "chapmen", who hawked their wares. In the later 19th century, the term began to acquire a contrived antiquarian air, and was used to designate a small book or pamphlet produced for collectors. Although the fake antiquarianism attached to the term has since faded, chapbooks in the sf field are usually produced by SMALL PRESSES as limited editions containing a short story or novella - although the short stories produced as individual volumes by PULPHOUSE PUBLISHING are clearly intended to appeal to a readership beyond merely collectors. In this encyclopedia ( How to Use this Book [pages xxxi-xxxiv] for further details) we have arbitrarily and for the sake of convenience used the abbreviation "chap" to designate any book of fewer than 100 pages. [JC] CHAPDELAINE, PERRY A(NTHONY) (1925- ) US writer, mathematician, research psychologist and director of an author's publishing co-op. His first published sf was "To Serve the Masters" for If in 1967. His first sf novel, Swampworld West (1974), routinely explores a COLONIZATION scenario involving problems between native ALIENS and Earth colonists. His more recent books, The Laughing Terran (1977 UK) and Spork of the Ayor (1969 If; fixup 1978 UK), like their predecessor, suffer from awkward prose and sf stereotypes. In the 1980s he began with George HAY an enormous project in The John W. Campbell Letters; published to date is The John W. Campbell Letters, Volume 1 (coll 1986) and The John W. Campbell Letters with Isaac Asimov and A.E.Van Vogt (coll 1993). [JC/PN]See also: DIANETICS. CHAPIN, PAUL [s] Philip Jose FARMER. CHAPMAN, SAMUEL (? -? ) US writer whose sf novel, Doctor Jones' Picnic (1898), published in San Francisco, takes the doctor on a BALLOON trip to the North Pole; en route he cures cancer. [JC]See also: DISCOVERY AND INVENTION. CHARBONNEAU, LOUIS (HENRY) (1924- ) US writer and journalist who, after writing some radio plays at the end of the 1940s, took an MA at the University of Detroit and taught there for some years before beginning to publish sf novels with No Place on Earth (1958), about a coercive DYSTOPIA. He produced sf for several years thereafter, publishing: Corpus Earthling (1960), about invading telepathic Martian parasites who eventually pass on their ESP powers to mankind; The Sentinel Stars (1963), another dystopia, this time about doomed revolts in a regimented future; Psychedelic-40 (1965; vt The Specials 1965 UK); and Antic Earth (1967 UK; vt Down to Earth 1967 US).In all these novels LC tends towards claustrophobic situations in which his rather conventional protagonists explore themselves through action scenarios. LC has written novels in other genres, including Westerns (as Carter Travis Young) and mysteries. [JC]Other works: The Sensitives * (1968), from the filmscript by Deane ROMANO; Barrier World (1970); Embryo * (1976), novelizing EMBRYO (1976); Intruder (1979), marginal sf. CHARBY, JAY [s] Harlan ELLISON. CHARKIN, PAUL (SAMUEL) (1907- ) UK writer, variously employed for many years before writing his three routine sf novels, Light of Mars (1959), The Other Side of Night (1960) and The Living Gem (1963). [JC] CHARLES, NEIL House name used by CURTIS WARREN for sf novels written by Brian HOLLOWAY, Dennis HUGHES and John W. JENNISON. [JC] CHARLES, ROBERT Robert Charles SMITH. CHARLES, STEVEN Charles L. GRANT. CHARLY Film (1968). Selmur and Robertson Associates. Dir Ralph Nelson, starring Cliff Robertson, Claire Bloom, Lilia Skala, Dick van Patten. Screenplay Stirling Silliphant, based on FLOWERS FOR ALGERNON (1966) by Daniel KEYES. 106 mins. Colour.Enthused with the idea of playing a character who goes from subnormality to super-genius and then back again, Cliff Robertson formed his own production company and, after setbacks, made C and won an Academy Award for his excellent performance. Much of the pathos of the original is evoked in 30-year-old Charly's progression, after experimental surgery, from amiable idiocy to high INTELLIGENCE, his falling in love with his teacher (Bloom), his further development to genius, and the horror of his final regression. But it is a sentimental story to start with, and Nelson milks it for all it is worth, both happiness (glamorized like a tv commercial) and sadness, and Charly's genius phase is severely marred by the platitudes about society that Silliphant's script requires him to speak. Nonetheless, C seriously addresses ideas about intelligence and feeling, and is more ambitious than most sf films of its time. [JB/PN] CHARNAS, SUZY McKEE (1939- ) US writer and former teacher, with an MA in that field. She began publishing sf with a series the first two vols of which were later assembled as Walk to the End of the World, and Motherlines (omni 1989 UK): WALK TO THE END OF THE WORLD (1974), Motherlines (1978) and The Furies (1994). The first volume presents an elaborately structured, neurotic, urban, post- HOLOCAUST, misogynist DYSTOPIA in which women ("fems") serve as scapegoats for humanity's near self-destruction. The second offers a feminist ( FEMINISM) alternative beyond the city, a matriarchal high-plains world where women on horseback ride free and scapegrace. In the third volume, the continuing protagonist of the sequence leads a band of "free fems" back to the disintegrating dystopia, where revenges are exacted, and a maturely ambivalent conclusion offers neither the solace of easy forgiveness between the sexes, nor hope for any simplistic solution to the problem of human violence between the sexes and in other spheres. The books aroused considerable interest for the extreme clarity of the positions argued. This extremity, it soon became clear, stemmed from an habitual failure to repeat herself which perhaps cost SMC some market security, though her next book was extremely successful: Vampire Tapestry (coll of linked stories 1980) recounts the life and thoughts of a vampire anthropologist whose experiences, in the end, lie within the human range; the third of the stories thus assembled, "Unicorn Tapestry", won the 1980 NEBULA award. Dorothea Dreams (1986) is a ghost story in which modern Albuquerque, New Mexico (where SMC lives), intersects with Revolutionary France, bringing its protagonist sharply into an awareness of her human obligations to the world. The Sorcery Hall trilogy - The Bronze King (1985), The Silver Glove (1988) and The Golden Thread (1989) - features juvenile protagonists banded together to protect mundane reality from the malefic otherworld; it is a traditional theme, but crisply told, and further underlines the clear lines of thought - and moral persuasiveness-permeating her work. A short story, "Boobs", won the HUGO for 1989. [JC]Other works: Listening to Brahms (1986 Omni; 1991 chap); Moonstone and Tiger Eye (coll 1992 chap); The Kingdom of Kevin Malone (1993), a complex fantasy for younger readers.About the author: "Utopia at the End of a Male Chauvinist Dystopian World" by Marleen Barr in Women and Utopia (anth 1983) ed Barr; Suzy McKee Charnas; Octavia Butler; Joan D. Vinge (1986) by Marleen Barr.See also: ISAAC ASIMOV'S SCIENCE FICTION MAGAZINE; MONSTERS; SUPERNATURAL CREATURES; UTOPIAS; WOMEN AS PORTRAYED IN SCIENCE FICTION; WOMEN SF WRITERS. CHARTERIS, LESLIE (1907-1993) US writer born as Leslie Charles Bowyer Yin in Singapore, educated in the UK, legally changed his name to LC in 1928, and became a US citizen in 1946. He remains known almost exclusively for the Saint novels featuring Simon Templar, a long series which began - after a few previous heroes had been discarded - with Meet the Tiger (1928 UK; vt The Saint Meets the Tiger 1940 US). Of these only The Last Hero (1930 UK; vt The Saint Closes the Case 1941 US) features any device or displacement of an sf nature, though several short stories featuring Templar are sf; these have been assembled as The Fantastic Saint (coll 1982) ed Martin Harry GREENBERG and Charles G. WAUGH. LC edited The Saint's Choice of Impossible Crime (anth 1945). [JC]About the author:The Saint: A Complete History in Print, Radio, Film and Television of Leslie Charteris' Robin Hood of Modern Crime, Simon Templar, 1928-1992 (1993) by Burl Barer. CHARYN, JEROME (1937- ) US writer who was born and educated in New York, which city he gradually transformed in his fiction into a MAGIC-REALIST venue whose mythopoeic resonances and exorbitant happenings hover at the edge of generic displacements (and beyond), and strongly prefigure the fabulated New Yorks of writers like John CROWLEY and Mark HELPRIN. Few of his 20 or so books are actually fantasy or sf, though most are FABULATIONS; but Darlin' Bill (1980) creates an almost totally imaginary West and Pinocchio's Nose (1983) carries its stymied protagonist into the 21st century, where he finally learns to relax, though the world itself is battered. [JC]Other works: The Magician's Wife (graph 1986 Belgium; first English version 1987 US) with Francois Boucq, a fantasy in GRAPHIC-NOVEL form; Billy Budd, K.G.B. (graph trans Elizabeth Bell 1991) with Boucq. CHASE, ADAM Pseudonym used usually by Milton LESSER alone, but once in collaboration with Paul W. FAIRMAN on The Golden Ape (1959), based on "The Quest of the Golden Ape" (1957 AMZ) as by Adam Chase and Ivar JORGENSEN, the latter being a house name associated in that spelling with Fairman. [JC] CHASE, ROBERT R(EYNOLDS) (1948- ) US writer initially associated with ASF for stories like his first, "Seven Scenes from the Ultimate Monster Movie" in 1984. He began to publish novels with the Game sequence of sf adventures set in a feudalized interplanetary venue: The Game of Fox and Lion (1986) and Crucible (1991). Intrigues, GENETIC ENGINEERING, and a dash of RELIGION generate a moderately engaging narrative. Shapers (1989), about an amnesia victim who awakens in a strange world, also invokes sf tradition. [JC] CHAUCER, DANIEL Ford Madox FORD. CHAVIANO, DAINA [r] LATIN AMERICA CHAYEFSKY, PADDY Working name of US writer Sidney Aaron Chayefsky (1923-1981), most famous for his work as a tv dramatist; Marty (produced 1953) marks for many a culmination (and a sign of the passing) of the Golden Age of US tv drama. The Tenth Man (theatrical production, 1959) was a Dybbuk fantasy. His sf novel, Altered States (1978) ( METAPHYSICS), propounds the highly dubious Lamarckian concept ( EVOLUTION; PSEUDO-SCIENCE) that a person's altered consciousness would alter her/his genetic makeup, in this case re-invoking an inward primordial being (see also APES AND CAVEMEN); it was filmed in 1980 as ALTERED STATES. [JC]See also: DEVOLUTION. CHAYKIN, HOWARD V(ICTOR) (1950- ) US writer/illustrator, mainly of COMICS. HC's first professional work (1973) was the art for MARVEL COMICS's War of the Worlds (a sequel to H.G. WELLS's novel!) and DC COMICS's Sword of Sorcery (which featured Fritz LEIBER's Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser). Much of his work has been sf. He was writer/artist on Cody Starbuck and Iron Wolf before drawing the bestselling adaptation of STAR WARS for Marvel in 1976. HC teamed up with Samuel R. DELANY to produce the GRAPHIC NOVEL Empire (graph 1978), and the following year he worked with Michael MOORCOCK on The Swords of Heaven, the Flowers of Hell (graph 1979), a story in Moorcock's Eternal Champion series. The first vol of his graphic-novel version (adaptation by Byron PREISS) of Alfred BESTER's Tiger! Tiger! (1956; vt The Stars My Destination US) appeared as The Stars My Destination Vol 1 (graph 1979); the second vol, though advertised, was not in fact published until it appeared, with the contents of the first, in The Stars My Destination (graph 1992). After working on Marvel's Micronauts, HC painted a number of covers for sf and fantasy paperbacks, returning to comics in 1983 as writer/artist for First Comics's AMERICAN FLAGG! - perhaps his major work - and later on Time(2). He revitalized The Shadow for DC (some critics, such as Harlan ELLISON, disapproving of his innovations) in 1986 and Blackhawk in 1988. After the pornographic Black Kiss (1988-9) HC increasingly concentrated on writing, as in Twilight for DC and Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser for Marvel. Moorcock speaks of HC's "considerable intelligence and . . . excellent eye". [RH]See also: HEAVY METAL. CHEREZ TERNII - K ZVYOZDAM (vt Per Aspera ad Astra) Film (1980). Maxim Gorki Studio. Dir Richard Viktorov, starring Elena Metyolkina, Vadim Ledogorov, Uldis Lieldidzh, Vatzlav Dvorzhetsky. Screenplay Kir BULYCHEV, Viktorov. In 2 parts, 40 min and 78 min. Colour.This pretentious, rather naive, Soviet young-adult sf movie typifies many of Bulychev's themes and approaches. It begins well, with a "space Mowgli"-the alien girl Niia - being found by an Earth expedition on a derelict space station; she is unexpectedly well played by a nonprofessional, Metyolkina, a fashion model. Later we have the grim story of her planet, Dessa, where ecological catastrophe has taken place. The capitalist tyranny on the polluted planet is contrasted with a future communist paradise on Earth, which sends a mission of help at the request of Dessa's "progressive forces": the Ecological Space Ambulance team, very specifically not an armed "brotherly" intervention, but peaceful. The high points of the film are its relaxed humour, something Bulychev is good at, and the impressively devastated landscapes of Dessa. [VG]See also: RUSSIA. CHERRY, DAVID A. (1949- ) US part-time lawyer, part-time illustrator, raised in Oklahoma, brother of sf writer C.J. CHERRYH. Largely self-taught, DAC is a classic realist, working with acrylics and alkyds. He has done a number of book covers, especially for DAW BOOKS, including covers for his sister's work; his art is regularly displayed at sf CONVENTIONS. In 1988 he became President of the Association of Science Fiction/Fantasy Artists (ASFA), and was instrumental in strengthening that struggling organization. He has several times been nominated for a HUGO. A book of his work is Imagination: The Art & Technique of David A. Cherry (1987). [JG] CHERRYH, C.J. Working name of US writer Carolyn Janice Cherry (1942- ), who taught for some years (1965-76) before becoming a full-time writer; she is the sister of David A. CHERRY. Since 1976 - when she won the JOHN W. CAMPBELL AWARD for most promising writer - she has produced more novels than stories, publishing several before her first story, "Cassandra" (1977). Her first novel was Gate of Ivrel (1976), initiating the Morgaine series - continued in Well of Shiuan (1978) and Fires of Azeroth (1979), the trilogy being assembled as The Book of Morgaine (omni 1979; vt The Chronicles of Morgaine 1985 UK), and the much later Exile's Gate (1988) - a romantic HEROIC-FANTASY quest epic whose interplanetary venue and underlying rationality prophetically underpin a hectic and perhaps rather florid imagination.In all her work - which runs a gamut from SHARED-WORLD fantasies to HARD SF - an almost unfailingly creative tension can be sensed between argument and fantastication; and her underlying instinct for construction has been confirmed in the late 1980s by a retroactive and ongoing coordination of more and more of her work - singletons and series both - under the aegis of her sf-grounded Union-Alliance Future HISTORY, which embraces most of the home Galaxy through the third and fourth millennia, during which period the Alliance, structured around the Merchanter cultures which operate the huge interstellar freighters necessary for trade, manages to survive at the heart of the more ruthless, expansionist Union. A third force whose influence is felt throughout human space is Earth itself, hugely populous, dominated by aggressive supra-planetary corporations, still the heartland of Homo sapiens. Unusually, the sequence is not planet-based, much of the significant action of the central texts taking place in artificial environments, including a wide variety of spaceships, Merchanter freighters (each huge vessel housing an autonomous culture), satellites, waystations and self-sufficient habitats. The "Gehenna Doctrine", which prohibits the cultural contamination of newly discovered planets and therefore serves as a vital structuring device for the series, justifies the focus of those central texts while at the same time - for the Doctrine is often honoured in the breach - providing an enormously malleable frame: thus highly disparate tales may be fitted into the overarching sequence - almost to the point where singletons with no apparent connection to the sequence, including some PLANETARY ROMANCES, might still be thought to belong within the whole because their isolation from any other book proves that the Gehenna Doctrine is working.The Union-Alliance structure, rough at the edges as it might be, serves primarily to hold and sort background material - a necessary aid for an author whose better work almost invariably offers too much material, too many ALIEN races intersecting too complexly for easy comprehension, a stricture true even of early novels like Hunter of Worlds (1977), in which three cultures express themselves in harrowing detail in too few pages; a sense of bustling, impatient cognition pervades the otherwise garish tale of an alien mercenary race fatally involved with Homo sapiens. But with her second series - Kesrith (1978), Shon'jir (1978) and Kutath (1979), all three assembled as The Faded Sun Trilogy (omni 1987 UK) - the Union-Alliance dichotomy, here presented late in its history when the antipathetic Union has begun to seem more attractive, works to order the profusion of material. Unlike the great majority of sf writers, the most consistent complaint about her work must be that individual stories are too short, though the Merchanter novels perhaps most central to the overall series use their galactic space-based venues with considerable skill to articulate busy narrative lines. Along with Heavy Time (1991) and Hellburner (1992), a 24th-century pre-Alliance series that currently, in terms of internal chronology, kicks the entire sequence off, these novels - Serpent's Reach (1980), DOWNBELOW STATION (1981), which won the 1981 HUGO, Merchanter's Luck (1982), CYTEEN (1988; vt in 3 vols as The Betrayal 1989, The Rebirth 1989 and The Vindication 1989), which won the 1988 Hugo, and Rimrunners (1989)-are perhaps her best and most central work, generating a remarkable sense of the living density of space-born life. CYTEEN is a book of enormous girth set on the intricate Union home planet and dense with speculative plays on genetics ( CLONES), identity, family and power; while Rimrunners, unusually for CJC, fits into its normal length a shapely closet drama about life and survival below decks on an armed spaceship.Closely associated with these books in tone and hard-edged complexity are Union-Alliance novels like Hestia (1979), Wave without a Shore (1981), Port Eternity (1982), Forty Thousand in Gehenna (1983) and Voyager in Night (1984). The Chanur Saga, made up of The Pride of Chanur (1982; text restored 1987), Chanur's Venture (1984), The Kif Strike Back (1985), Chanur's Homecoming (1986) and Chanur's Legacy (1992), another deft and crowded depiction of alien psyches in a complexly threatened interstellar venue, has also been fitted into the overall series. As the years have passed, individual stories within the structure have tended, very roughly, to shift their concern from honour (a focus typical of the "shame cultures" found in preliterate societies on Earth and endemic to much SPACE OPERA) to the responsibities of power (a problem central to literate "guilt cultures").The lineaments of the Union-Alliance series remain unclear, but the sense grows that for CJC the Universe, and everything imaginable within its particoloured quadrants, is both evanescent and full of marvel; and that sentient species must revere whatever habitats remain to them after the terrible years of species growth and species destruction hinted at in those books set early in the Universe. It is a vision which, after so many busy books, will take some time to settle, though within terms she has already cued us to anticipate. [JC]Other works:Series: The Arafel books, comprising Ealdwood (1981; rev vt The Dreamstone 1983) and The Tree of Swords and Jewels (1983), both assembled as Arafel's Saga (omni 1983; vt Ealdwood 1991 UK); the Merovingen Nights BRAIDED series (several titles being shared-world BRAIDED anthologies ed CJC, and all remotely connected to the Union-Alliance overview), comprising Angel with the Sword (1985), Merovingen Nights #1: Festival Moon * (anth 1987), #2: Fever Season * (anth 1987), #3: Troubled Waters * (anth 1988), #4: Smuggler's Gold * (anth 1988), #5: Divine Right * (anth 1989), #6: Floodtide * (anth 1990) and #7: Endgame * (anth 1991); the Heroes in Hell SHARED-WORLD enterprise, co-created with Janet E. MORRIS and comprising Heroes in Hell * (anth 1985), The Gates of Hell * (1986) and Kings in Hell * (1987), both with Morris, and Legions of Hell * (fixup 1987); the Sword of Knowledge shared-world enterprise (all vols in fact written by the various "collaborators"), comprising A Dirge for Sabis (1989) with Leslie Fish, Wizard Spawn (1989) with Nancy Asire (1945- ) and Reap the Whirlwind (1989) with Mercedes Lackey; the Rusalka sequence, comprising Rusalka (1989), Chernevog (1990) and Yvgenie (1991).Singletons: Brothers of Earth (1976); Sunfall (coll of linked stories 1981); Cuckoo's Egg (1985); Visible Light (coll 1986), which contains the 1978 Hugo-winning "Cassandra"; Glass and Amber (coll 1987); The Paladin (1988).About the author: C.J. Cherryh: A Working Bibliography (1992 chap) by Phil STEPHENSEN-PAYNE.See also: ANDROIDS; CITIES; DAW BOOKS; ESP; GALACTIC EMPIRES; GENETIC ENGINEERING; HIVE-MINDS; LINGUISTICS; The MAGAZINE OF FANTASY AND SCIENCE FICTION ; MONSTERS; WOMEN SF WRITERS. CHESLEY AWARDS AWARDS. CHESNEY, Lt-Col. Sir GEORGE T(OMKYNS) (1830-1895) UK officer, founder in 1868 of the Royal Indian Civil Engineering College at Staines, Member of Parliament from 1892, and author of some fiction, including the famous The Battle of Dorking (1871 chap; principal vt The Fall of England? The Battle of Dorking: Reminiscences of a Volunteer 1871 chap US) published anon. After great success in Blackwood's Magazine, and publication as a small book the same year, this tale virtually founded the future- WAR/ INVASION genre of stories which attained great popularity in the UK as she neared the height of her insecure Empire in the latter years of the 19th century - an earlier and inferior tale, Alfred Bate RICHARDS's The Invasion of England (A Possible Tale of Future Times) (1870 chap, privately printed), had had little effect. GTC's story warns against UK military complacency and incompetence in its bleak narrative of confusion and folly at home while the German army mounts an efficient invasion by surprise attack. The Battle of Dorking was remarkably successful, being immediately reprinted in Canada and the USA, and translated into several European languages, including German, each European nation soon developing its own version of the invasion theme - which saw its greatest popularity, understandably, in the years immediately preceding WWI. A second tale, The New Ordeal (1879), which posited the obsolescence of war through innovations in weaponry and its replacement by tournaments, proved less popular. [JC]About the author: Voices Prophesying War 1763-1984 (1966) by I.F. CLARKE (Chapter 2).See also: ANONYMOUS SF AUTHORS; GAMES AND SPORTS; HISTORY OF SF; NEAR FUTURE; PROTO SCIENCE FICTION; WEAPONS. CHESNEY, WEATHERBY C.J. Cutcliffe HYNE. CHESTER, GEORGE RANDOLPH (1869-1924) US writer whose The Jingo (1912) satirizes simultaneously the lost-race ( LOST WORLDS) story and US know-how in a tale about a salesman selling his modern products to an obscure Antarctic civilization. [PN]Other works: The Cash Intrigue: A Fantastic Melodrama of Modern Finance (1909); The Ball of Fire (1914) with Lillian Chester. CHESTER, WILLIAM L. (1907-? ) US writer known for his series about Kioga, a Tarzan-like Native American raised by bears on an island within the Arctic Circle: Hawk of the Wilderness (1935 Blue Book; 1936); Kioga of the Wilderness (1936-7 Blue Book; 1976); One Against a Wilderness (1937 Blue Book; coll of linked stories 1977) and Kioga of the Unknown Land (1938 Blue Book; 1978). [JC] CHESTERTON, G(ILBERT) K(EITH) (1874-1936) UK writer and illustrator of his own books and many by Hilaire BELLOC - with whom he was long associated, to use George Bernard SHAW's nickname, as The Chesterbelloc. A posthumous collection, Daylight and Nightmare (coll 1986), which assembles fantasy and some sf stories from 1897 through 1931, may demonstrate the range of his emblem-haunted imagination as a teller of tales, but most of his numerous works fall into various other categories - GKC in general exemplified the Edwardian man of letters and wrote on almost everything, in every conceivable form, from poetry through the famous Father Brown detective stories to Catholic polemics on to "weekend" essays and literary criticism and history. His first novel, The Napoleon of Notting Hill (1904), sets the nostalgic, medievalizing, anti-Wellsian, surreally Merrie-Englande tone of most of his sf novels, which tended, in one way or another, to idealize a dreamlike England; in their arguments about its desirability they comprise a series of UTOPIAS, though often only by implication.His finest novel, The Man who was Thursday: A Nightmare (1908), is a fantasy set in the Babylon-like London so alluring to writers of the fin de siecle: various secret agents disguised as anarchists are shown to have been recruited to man the frontiers of the world by their greatest foe, who turns out to be not only their legitimate boss but in fact God. The book - dramatized by his brother's widow, Mrs Cecil Chesterton, and Ralph Neale as The Man Who Was Thursday (1926) - has been an acknowledged influence upon such Catholic writers as R.A. L AFFERTY and Gene WOLFE; and the magic-carpet London so lovingly created by GKC and his confreres arguably marks a significant stepping-stone - along with Robert Louis STEVENSON's New Arabian Nights (coll 1882) - between the world of Charles DICKENS and that of STEAMPUNK. [JC]Other works: The Ball and the Cross (1909 US); The Flying Inn (1914), featuring what seems a Turkish conspiracy (but is actually the scheme of an English politician) to impose Prohibition on England, attended by a Turkish INVASION; The Man who Knew too Much (coll 1922); The Return of Don Quixote (1927); Tales of the Long Bow (coll of linked stories 1925), which culminates in a NEAR-FUTURE revolution; a RURITANIAN novella, "The Loyal Traitor", in Four Faultless Felons (coll 1930); "The Three Horsemen of Apocalypse", in The Paradoxes of Mr. Pond (coll 1937), which Jorge Luis BORGES admired; The Surprise (written c1930; 1952), a play.About the author: The literature on GKC is very extensive. A bibliography is G.K. Chesterton: A Bibliography (1958) by John Sullivan; a recent study is Gilbert: The Man who was G.K. Chesterton (1990) by Michael G. Coren.See also: ALTERNATE WORLDS; CLUB STORY; GODS AND DEMONS; TIME TRAVEL. CHETWODE, R.D. (? -? ) UK writer active at the end of the 19th century. The Marble City: Being the Strange Adventures of Three Boys (1895) features a South Pacific LOST WORLD whose inhabitants boast high attainments. Nevertheless the three heroes soon make their escape, enriched. [JC] CHETWYND, BRIDGET (1910-? ) UK writer in whose Future Imperfect (1946) women run the world, leaving men behind, though romantic elements intervene. [JC] CHEVALIER, HAAKON (MAURICE) (1902-1985) US writer and translator from the French of many works. The Man who Would be God (1959), meant as a self-defence against the accusation (1953) that he had committed treason with Robert Oppenheimer (1904-1967), the "father of the atomic bomb", almost inadvertently addresses the unfortunate megalomania of a nuclear physicist who wishes to save the world from itself. [JC] CHIANG, TED [r] NEBULA; PERCEPTION. CHIKYU BOEIGUN (vt The Mysterians; vt Earth Defense Force) Film (1957). Toho/MGM. Dir Inoshiro Honda, starring Kenji Sahara, Akihiko Hirata, Yumi Shirakawa. Screenplay Takeshi Kimura, based on a story by Jojiro Okami. 89 mins. Colour.This Japanese sf pulp epic is about ALIEN invaders, their own planet destroyed by nuclear holocaust, who land in Japan seeking women for breeding purposes. Its memorable images, best observed at midnight in a drive-in cinema, include a giant birdlike robot crashing out of a mountainside, flying saucers, and lethal rays shooting in all directions. The special-effects extravaganza is by Eiji Tsuburaya, creator of the eponymous monster of GOJIRA (vt Godzilla). The story makes very little sense. As Bill WARREN points out in Keep Watching the Skies! Volume II (1986), Japanese special effects are not meant to be realistic, and they certainly are not here, but in their lurid theatricality they are a satisfying introduction to the world of SPACE OPERA. This was the first Japanese sf film not to be a MONSTER MOVIE. [JB/PN]See also: CINEMA. CHIKYU SAIDAI NO KESSAN GOJIRA; RADON. CHILDER, SIMON IAN John BROSNAN. CHILDERS, (ROBERT) ERSKINE (1870-1922) Irish nationalist, military theoretican and author of The Riddle of the Sands (1903), which describes an exploratory sea journey along the German coast and the uncovering of the secret plans for a German INVASION of the UK. The novel spawned many imitations, none meeting the power of the original, and was made into a lacklustre film in 1979. His warnings to the UK Government were continued later in two nonfiction works which exposed the folly of reliance on cavalry as an effective force against machine guns. EC was executed for treason (he was almost certainly guiltless) by the fledgling Irish Free State. [JE]See also: WAR. CHILDREN IN SF In his essay "The Embarrassments of Science Fiction" (in Science Fiction at Large ed Peter NICHOLLS anth 1976; vt Explorations of the Marvellous) Thomas M. DISCH asserts, tongue only partly in cheek, that sf is a branch of children's literature-because most lovers of the genre begin reading it in their early teens, and because many sf stories are about children. Whether or not sf is essentially juvenile in its appeal, there is no doubt that many of its writers are fascinated by childhood and its thematic corollaries: innocence and potentiality.There are many types of sf story about children, but four particularly popular variants are of special interest. The first is the story of children with benign PSI POWERS. Examples are: A.E. VAN VOGT's SLAN (1940 ASF; 1946), about a nascent community of telepathic SUPERMEN; Theodore STURGEON's The Dreaming Jewels (1950; vt The Synthetic Man), about a strange boy adopted by a carnival, and MORE THAN HUMAN (1953), about a gestalt consciousness composed of children; Wilmar H. SHIRAS's Children of the Atom (fixup 1953); John WYNDHAM's The Chrysalids (1955; vt Re-Birth US), about telepathic MUTANT children after an atomic war; and such later works in a similar vein as Richard COWPER's Kuldesak (1972) and "The Piper at the Gates of Dawn" (1976). The abilities of these children seem benign because the stories are usually narrated from the child's point of view. The societies depicted in these tales may persecute the children, but the latter generally win through and constitute their own, "higher" societies, with the reader's approval.The second type is the reverse of the first: the story of monstrous children, frequently with malign psychic powers. Examples are: Ray BRADBURY's "The Small Assassin" (1946), about a baby which murders its parents; Richard MATHESON's "Born of Man and Woman" (1950), about a hideously mutated boy; and Jerome BIXBY's "It's a Good Life" (1953), about an infant who terrorizes a whole community with his awesome paranormal abilities. J.D. BERESFORD's The Hampdenshire Wonder (1911; vt The Wonder US) is an early example of this sort of story, in that the child prodigy is seen entirely from the outside and thus takes on a frightening aspect. In tales of this type, society is usually threatened by the child and the reader is encouraged to take society's side. Brain Child (1991 US) by George TURNER is difficult to characterize, as its superchildren, created by an INTELLIGENCE-enhancing experiment in biological and psychological engineering, appear as both appalling and attractive. The purely monstrous child became a CLICHE of HORROR fiction, especially in the 1980s, a decade when, perhaps for some as-yet-undiagnosed sociological reason, sf itself showed a distinct falling off in the number of stories devoted to superchildren.The third type, which overlaps the first two, concerns children in league with aliens, to good or ill effect. Examples include Henry KUTTNER's "Mimsy Were the Borogoves" (1943), in which alien educational toys provide two children with an escape route from their parents; Ray Bradbury's "Zero Hour" (1947), in which children side with alien invaders; Arthur C. CLARKE's CHILDHOOD'S END (1953), in which the alien "Overlords" supervise the growth of a new generation, whose capacities are unknowable by ordinary humans and may be exercised among the stars; Edgar PANGBORN's A MIRROR FOR OBSERVERS (1954), in which Martians compete for control of a child's mind; and John Wyndham's The Midwich Cuckoos (1957; vt Village of the Damned 1960 US), about the alien impregnation of Earthwomen and the terrifying powers of the amoral children they bear, and his later novel Chocky (1963 AMZ; exp 1968), about a boy with an alien "brother" living in his head. Zenna HENDERSON's stories about the People, most of which are collected in Pilgrimage (coll 1961) and The People: No Different Flesh (coll 1966), belong here since they are largely concerned with sympathetic aliens who appear to be normal human children (their alien parents usually make only fleeting appearances). Jack WILLIAMSON's The Moon Children (1972) and Gardner DOZOIS's "Chains of the Sea" (1973) also belong in this category. Greg BEAR's Anvil of Stars (1992) features a community of adolescent children - but no adults - on a starship, undergoing tuition by aliens for making war against genocidal superbeings. This novel is interesting in its creation of an all-adolescent culture.The fourth type of story is concerned not so much with a conflict between the child and adult society as with the child's attempts to prove himself worthy of joining that society. Much of Robert A. HEINLEIN's relevant work falls into this "initiation" category-e.g., his early story "Misfit" (1939), about a boy whose prodigious mathematical ability enables him to save the spaceship in which he is a very junior crew member. Most of Heinlein's teenage novels, from Rocket Ship Galileo (1947) to Have Space-Suit - Will Travel (1958), fit this pattern, as does the later Podkayne of Mars (1963). Precocious children, adults before their time, also feature in James H. SCHMITZ's Telzey stories, such as "Novice" (1962), in Alexei PANSHIN's RITE OF PASSAGE (1968), and in much of Samuel R. DELANY's work. Delany's novels - e.g., NOVA (1968) - are characteristically, in Algis BUDRYS's words, about "the progress of the Magic Kid . . . the divine innocent whose naive grace and intuitive deftness attract the close attention of all". The "Magic Kid", who gains the acceptance of adult society through sheer charm (rather than discipline in the manner of Heinlein), has appeared in the work of other writers, as in John VARLEY's "In the Bowl" (1975). More in the Heinlein tradition are a number of 1980s novels by Orson Scott CARD, whose stories regularly feature the transition from a troubled adolescence to a maturity forced by circumstance, most famously in ENDER'S GAME (1977 ASF; exp 1985) and again in The Memory of Earth (1992). However, many of the books listed above in this category feature post-pubertal teenagers rather than children proper. Such protagonists are so common in sf, their rite of passage being one of sf's basic themes, that there is little point in prolonging the list, although it is worth mentioning Doris PISERCHIA, who in books like Earthchild (1977) seems to use sf imagery precisely because it provides objective correlatives for pubertal anguish.As in literature generally, the child's point of view has frequently been used by sf writers because it is a convenient angle from which to see the world anew. Thus, Kingsley AMIS makes good use of his choirboy hero in the ALTERNATE-WORLD novel The Alteration (1976). Ray Bradbury transmutes his own childhood experience into the nostalgic and horrific FANTASY of THE MARTIAN CHRONICLES (1950; vt The Silver Locusts 1951 UK) and Something Wicked This Way Comes (1962). Gene WOLFE repeatedly uses a child's-eye view to haunting effect in such tales as "The Island of Dr Death and Other Stories" (1970), "The Fifth Head of Cerberus" (1972) and "The Death of Dr Island" (1973), and childhood memories haunt and shape the memoir structure of several of his novels such as Peace (1975) and The Book of the New Sun (1980-3). Harlan ELLISON's fantasy "Jeffty is Five" (1977), about a boy who is perpetually five years old, uses the child's viewpoint to make a statement about the apparent decline in quality of US popular culture. William GIBSON's Mona Lisa Overdrive (1988) is at its most successful and moving when filtering the bewildering events of its voodoo-in- CYBERSPACE story through the consciousness of the one of its four protagonists who is an actual child, the Japanese girl Kumiko. There are numerous other examples.An interesting subgenre is the story that opposes a world of childhood and a world of adulthood as if they were, anthropologically, two different cultures whose clash is bound to cause pain. This is the fundamental strategy of much of Stephen KING's horror fiction and also his sf. It forms a particularly grim element in James Patrick KELLY's "Home Front" (1988), in which kids interact, eat hamburgers, and get drafted for an endless, meaningless war occurring offstage.Although sf about children was not especially common in the 1980s in book form, it was popular in the cinema. Obviously relevant films include E.T.: THE EXTRATERRESTRIAL (1982), EXPLORERS (1985), D.A.R.Y.L. (1985), FLIGHT OF THE NAVIGATOR (1986) and a variety of "teen" movies, a number of which are listed in the CINEMA entry.Anthologies devoted entirely to stories about children include Children of Wonder (anth 1953; vt Outsiders: Children of Wonder 1954) ed William TENN, Tomorrow's Children (anth 1966) ed Isaac ASIMOV, Demon Kind (anth 1973) and Children of Infinity (anth 1973) ed Roger ELWOOD, Analog Anthology Number 3: Children of the Future (anth 1982; vt Analog's Children of the Future) ed Stanley SCHMIDT, and Children of the Future (anth 1984) ed Asimov, Martin Harry GREENBERG and Charles G. WAUGH. [DP/PN] CHILDREN OF THE DAMNED (vt Horror!) Film (1963). MGM. Dir Anton M. Leader, starring Ian Hendry, Alan Badel, Barbara Ferris, Bessie Love. Screenplay Jack Briley, based on The Midwich Cuckoos (1957) by John WYNDHAM. 90 mins. B/w.This UK film is not a sequel to the successful VILLAGE OF THE DAMNED (1960); it is a remake, though much more remotely based on Wyndham's novel. This time the setting is urban. Once again, children are born with mysterious powers. They are gathered in London for investigation from different parts of the world. Where in the first film the children were malevolent, here they are treated more sympathetically; they remain children despite their superhuman qualities, and their destruction is a consequence of human fear and ignorance, not any hostile actions of their own. Moody use is made of the shadowy, ruined church where much of the action takes place. Though low-key and made with almost too much UK restraint, COTD is sadder and more pungent than its predecessor in its story of (literal) alienation. [JB/PN] CHILDREN'S SF Sf written with a specifically juvenile audience in mind is almost as old as the genre itself. The Voyages extraordinaires of Jules VERNE, over 60 novels published between 1863 and 1920, were largely marketed as for adolescent boys, though they found an adult readership also. Contemporaneous with Verne's works were the early DIME NOVELS in the USA, also in the main written for children, and it was not long before BOYS' PAPERS with a strong sf content came along, followed by such JUVENILE SERIES as Victor APPLETON's TOM SWIFT stories. The juvenile series written under the floating pseudonym Roy ROCKWOOD, The Great Marvel Series, published much sf between 1906 and 1935. These topics are discussed in greater detail under separate entries in this encyclopedia, as is children's sf written for the COMICS.From 1890 to 1920 at least, and to some extent later on, most children's sf was aimed at boys rather than girls and was largely dedicated to the themes of the LOST WORLD, future WAR and DISCOVERY AND INVENTION (see also EDISONADE). L. Frank BAUM, writer of the celebrated Oz books, wrote an early work in the latter category - The Master Key: An Electrical Fairy Tale (1901) - but of course fantastic inventions had already played an important role in the stories featuring Frank Reade, Jr ( FRANK READE LIBRARY).Children's sf has been and is written for a variety of age groups. Here we generally regard sf written for children of 11 and under as outside our range, although nostalgic reference must be made to the following: the splendidly bizarre Doctor Dolittle in the Moon (1928) by Hugh Lofting; the Professor Branestawm books by Norman HUNTER, beginning with The Incredible Adventures of Professor Branestawm (1933), all featuring the ridiculous adventures of the eponymous eccentric scientist; the minor children's classic My Friend Mr Leakey (coll of linked stories 1937) by the biologist J.B.S. HALDANE, a fantasy combining elements of magic and sf; a better known classic series for younger children, the seven Narnia books by C.S. LEWIS, beginning with The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (1950) and ending with The Last Battle (1956) - these stories are basically religious allegory cum FANTASY, but contain such sf elements as PARALLEL WORLDS and TIME TRAVEL; and The Twenty-One Balloons (1946) by William Pene DU BOIS, an amusing Pacific-island scientific UTOPIA.As noted, the above are primarily for younger children, but they point up a difficulty which exists also in sf stories for older children: the fact that there is little generic purity in children's literature. Much children's fantasy contains sf elements, and conversely much children's sf is written with a disregard for scientific accuracy, whether from hauteur or from ignorance, which effectively renders it fantasy. Time travel, for example, has long been an important theme in children's literature, going back at least as far as The Cuckoo Clock (1877) by Mrs Mary Molesworth (1839-1921), and continuing to the present day, through A Traveller in Time (1939) by Alison Uttley (1884-1976), several of the Green Knowe stories by Lucy Boston (1892-1990) and, perhaps the greatest of such novels, Tom's Midnight Garden (1958) by Philippa Pearce (1920- ); this latter is the moving and subtle story of a boy who travels back in time, always to slightly more recent periods, to find the 19th-century child with whom he falls in love growing older, and away from him; finally, in an overwhelming surprise ending, she meets him in the present day. But in all these examples the time travel is an essentially magic device used in the service of fantasy.Indeed, sadly for sf purists, most sf works of distinction since the 1960s have been at the fantastic end of the sf spectrum. A fine piece of such peripheral sf is Earthfasts (1966) by William MAYNE, one of the best children's writers of the period, in which an 18th-century drummer boy emerges from the ground to be met by a sceptical, scientifically inclined present-day youth.There may be a sociological reason for the comparative scarcity of good HARD SF for children in the recent period, or it may simply be the arbitrary preference of the handful of writers who led the renaissance of juvenile fiction that has taken place since the 1960s. Certainly their creative imagination has fed as fiercely on MYTHOLOGY as on 20th-century breakthroughs in scientific understanding - breakthroughs that in the period of the Cold War, with the ever-present threat of nuclear DISASTER, seemed equivocal in their results. Signs of the renaissance are many: children's books generally and books for adolescents specifically are less patronizing; they more commonly contain a sardonic or even ironic realism; they have become, overall, more subtle, more evocative, more various, more original and more ready to confront problems of pain, or loss, or even sexual love. The new realism is evident even with those writers of HEROIC FANTASY who have followed in the footsteps of J.R.R. TOLKIEN; notable among them are Joy Chant (1945- ) and especially Patricia MCKILLIP, although the latter, whose spectacular debut years were devoted to fantasy, seems to write better the further she keeps her distance from sf. The key theme in children's sf is MAGIC, and several important children's works are discussed in that entry. Sometimes the magic is given a kind of pseudo-scientific rationale, with talk of dimensional gates and so on, as in Andre NORTON's many Witch World books, some of which are among her best work; e.g., Warlock of the Witch World (1967). (Norton has also written many colourful books for adolescents which are towards the hard-sf end of the spectrum, sometimes dealing with relations between ALIENS and humans.) Ursula K. LE GUIN's Earthsea books, beginning with The Wizard of Earthsea (1968), have combined sf and fantasy by making her magic obey such rigorous laws that it may be seen as a kind of IMAGINARY SCIENCE; it adheres, for example, to the law of conservation of energy.Many critics regard the Earthsea books as the finest sf work for children of the postwar period. Some of Alan GARNER's novels would also rank very high. Apart from using teenage protagonists, Garner's Red Shift (1973) is an adult book in every respect, narrating a battle against intellectual and physical impotence considerably more demanding than would be found in most supposedly adult romances. It qualifies as marginal sf through its consistent use, from the title onwards, of scientific metaphor and because it depends structurally on a form of psychic time travel (focused on a neolithic stone axe).More recently the work of Diana Wynne JONES has also been consistently distinguished, more playful than Le Guin's and more ebullient than Garner's, but as fully aware as either of the difficulties of life both for children and for grown-ups. Much of her work, which treats generic boundaries with disdain, is more fantasy than sf. The more sciencefictional books include The Homeward Bounders (1981), Archer's Goon (1984) and A Tale of Time City (1987), which, with varying degrees of sciencefictional rigour, all revolve around causal paradoxes and problems created by travel through time or between alternate worlds, and often with more narrative sophistication than is common in sf for adults. The lunacies of book marketing have never been more clear than in the consignment of such distinguished works as the above, and many others, to what Le Guin has called "the kiddylit ghetto". The paradox is visible in the fact that occasionally US editions of UK children's books have been marketed as for adults, and vice versa.Other important children's sf writers at the fantasy end of the spectrum whose works are discussed in greater detail under their own entries are Susan COOPER, Peter DICKINSON, Tanith LEE, Madeleine L'ENGLE and T.H. WHITE. Australia seems to produce such writers more liberally than it does their counterparts for adults: interesting work has been produced by Isobelle CARMODY, Lee HARDING, Victor KELLEHER and Gillian RUBINSTEIN. Most Kelleher novels are impossible to pigeonhole with any confidence as either sf or fantasy; they have elements of both, and do not appear to suffer as a result. Rubinstein's tone falters - it is a sadly common symptom of writers of sf/fantasy for adolescents - when she approaches pure sf motifs, such as the visiting ALIEN in Beyond the Labyrinth (1988), but her books remain hard-edged and angry.When we turn to hard sf, most work for children has been less distinguished. Carl CLAUDY wrote some exciting books in the 1930s. More recent writers of some quality whose production has been in significant part for children are Paul CAPON, John CHRISTOPHER, John Keir CROSS, Tom DE HAVEN, Sylvia Louise ENGDAHL, Nicholas FISK, Douglas HILL, H.M. HOOVER, Monica HUGHES, Philip LATHAM, Alice LIGHTNER, M.E. PATCHETT, Ludek PESEK, Donald SUDDABY, Jean and Jeff SUTTON, Hugh WALTERS, Robert WESTALL, Leonard WIBBERLY and Cherry WILDER. Between them even these more recent writers span close to 40 years of hard-sf adventure writing for children. Christopher, Engdahl, Fisk, Hoover, Pesek, Westall and Wilder are probably the most important names here, along with Andre Norton. Between them they have written much thoughtful and stimulating work, but the extent of the list is disappointing when set alongside the quantity, range and variety of adult sf from the same period. The difficulty is, of course, that the intellectual level of a book is not necessarily expressed by a marketing label. Much adult sf - the works of E.E. "Doc" SMITH or Isaac ASIMOV, for example - is of great appeal to older children, and is to some extent directed at them. To the degree that older children are able to enjoy adult sf that is well within their reading capacity, the size of the potential market in sf specifically labelled as juvenile obviously dwindles.By far the most celebrated case of the unreal distinction between "juvenile" and "adult" concerns Robert A. HEINLEIN, almost half of whose novels were originally marketed for children. They have been re-released for many years now as if for adults. There are 13 in all, among the best being Starman Jones (1953), The Star Beast (1954) and CITIZEN OF THE GALAXY (1957). Heinlein's direct style, his solid science, the naturalness and ease with which he creates a societal background with just a few strokes, all help to make his juveniles among his best works; but their basic strength comes from the repeated theme of the rite of passage, the initiation ceremony, the growing into adulthood through the taking of decisions and the assumption of a burden of moral responsibility. This theme Heinlein made peculiarly and at times brilliantly his own; his is the most consistently distinguished of all hard sf written for young readers.Heinlein is exceptional in that there was no falling-off in quality when he wrote for children. Other sf writers could not quite manage the trick. Isaac Asimov's Lucky Starr books are well below his best; James BLISH's juveniles are generally disappointing, with the exception of A Life for the Stars (1962), the second of the Cities in Flight tetralogy; Ben BOVA, Arthur C. CLARKE, Gordon R. DICKSON, Harry HARRISON, Evan HUNTER and Robert SILVERBERG all write better for grown-ups, although Hunter's children's books are unusual and interesting. Alan E. NOURSE, on the other hand, seems more relaxed when writing for younger people, and some of his best work is in his future- MEDICINE books.A more recent writer, Robert C. O'BRIEN, wrote two distinguished sf works for children. The witty and sympathetic Mrs Frisby and the Rats of NIMH (1971), about experimental rats which have developed super- INTELLIGENCE, is for younger children, and in the talking-animal line is preferred by some aficionados to Richard Adams's more celebrated Watership Down (1972). O'Brien's Z for Zachariah (1975) is a post- HOLOCAUST novel for older children; humane, touching and sometimes frightening. Also excellent, and very funny, is the Book of the Nomes trilogy by Terry PRATCHETT, beginning with Truckers (1989), about aliens trying to live invisibly in a human world.Certain sf themes crop up again and again in recent sf for adolescents. Post-holocaust stories and stories of rebellion against totalitarian societies (which often practise degrading forms of social engineering) are both very common, as in the work of John Christopher, whose sf for children deservedly won him a new readership when he ceased writing sf DISASTER novels for adults. Stories about contact between humans and aliens are often used to impress on children an attitude of cultural open-mindedness which has a clear bearing on problems of racism, sexism and other isms of the real world. Cherry Wilder's Torin series is of this kind, but Wilder knows better than to preach. This is more than can be said of much modern juvenile sf, which has perhaps become, from the mid-1970s, the most ethically intransigent and propagandist since the juvenile fiction of the Victorian era. The familiar voice of the children's author calling for universal harmony can, paradoxically, come to seem hectoring; the list of "antis" is often and easily extended by many children's authors - nostalgically looking back to the seemingly more self-reliant lifestyles of a past age - to include anti-technology and anti-science ( ANTI-INTELLECTUALISM IN SF).The theme of PSI POWERS is often found in conjunction with work of this sort. It appeals strongly to children, whose sense of weakness and entrapment in a world where they are by and large subject to adult control, whether wisely or not, can be eased by intimations of an inner superiority - and sensitivity - that may be available to them. Typically psi powers (from within) are seen as opposed, and morally preferable, to scientific and technological powers (from without). Isobelle Carmody's Scatterlings (1991), for example, has an urban scientific elite, remnants of those who polluted and nearly destroyed Earth through greed, opposed to the rural, tribalized but radiation-resistant and honest folk descended from the greenies and working-class outcasts the original scientists exploited. ECOLOGY-conscious people versus corrupted technocrats; country versus town; psi powers versus science: these had, by 1990, become the dominant themes of adolescent sf as a whole. The ecology theme now appears almost as a religious motif in sf, and indeed, in the Gaea-worshipping form it sometimes takes, it has already become a secular religion in the real world.An important commercial area of sf publishing for juveniles is series books, often based on films or tv shows. The STAR TREK books and the DR WHO books are two of the longest-running and most successful (the former series is not specifically marketed for children, but the latter is); they contain less hackwork than most of their competition in this sort of area.Some distinguished writers of juvenile fiction, like Philippa Pearce, are not given separate entries in this volume, even though their work may contain some sf imagery: we do not have the space to give comprehensive coverage to children's writers, and our emphasis is on sf rather than fantasy. But many writers of sf for adolescents do receive entries, often because they have also written sf for adults or because, like Alan Garner, their work is likely to have repercussions in adult sf. [PN] CHILE LATIN AMERICA. CHILSON, ROB Working name of US writer Robert Dean Chilson (1945- ). His first sf story was "The Mind Reader" (1968) in ASF.Of his novels, which generally fail to step beyond the routine, As the Curtain Falls (1974) is a FAR-FUTURE adventure with some highly coloured moments, The Star-Crowned Kings (1975) is a SPACE OPERA about a member of a subject race who has latent ESP powers, and Rounded with Sleep (1990) confronts its hero with an Earth in the guise - and under the computerized control - of a fantasy-role-playing game ( GAMES AND TOYS). The Shores of Kansas (1976), perhaps (along with his first) RC's most interesting work, tells of a man with a natural, consciously controlled talent for TIME TRAVEL and his resulting psychological problems. [JC/PN]Other works: Isaac Asimov's Robot City, Book 5: Refuge * (1988); Men like Rats (1989). CHILTON, CHARLES (FREDERICK WILLIAM) (1927- ) UK RADIO producer and scriptwriter whose three sf novels comprise a juvenile trilogy based on his BBC radio serials about Jet Morgan and his companions as they protect Earth against Martians and other menaces ; the books are Journey Into Space * (1954), The Red Planet * (1956) and The World in Peril * (1960). He also wrote further Jet Morgan adventures for a COMIC strip in Express Weekly 1956-7. [JC]See also: MOON; RADIO; SPACE FLIGHT. CHILTON, H(ENRY) HERMAN (1863-? ) Belgian-born UK writer, apparently active as late as 1943. His first sf novel, Woman Unsexed (1892), melodramatically depicts a 1925 world ruined by women's right to work. The Lost Children (1931) visits the LOST WORLD to which the children of Hamelin followed the Pied Piper; there they have founded a UTOPIA. Talking Totem (1938) is a fantasy. [JC] CHINA SYNDROME, THE Film (1979). IPC Films. Dir James Bridges, starring Jane Fonda, Jack Lemmon, Michael Douglas, Wilford Brimley. Screenplay Mike Gray, T.S. Cook, Bridges. 122 mins. Colour.Made by the production company with which Jane Fonda was associated (Indochina Peace Campaign), this is the first of two crusading borderline-sf films starring her, the other being ROLLOVER (1981). Here she plays a tv reporter hoping to do more "hard" news stories who stumbles across an "event" (crisis) caused by cost-cutting engineering in a nuclear power plant; this could (and almost does) lead to meltdown and the radioactive pollution of Southern California. Corporate bosses attempt, violently, to suppress the potential expose. What looked at first like mere science fiction looked a lot more like science fact only weeks later, with the nuclear disaster at Three Mile Island - an apposite if unfortunate coincidence that made TCS a commercial hit. The subgenre of the near-future technological-disaster film (see, for example, ENDANGERED SPECIES and WARGAMES) is a kind of fringe sf, though usually made in the manner of the conspiracy thriller. TCS is well crafted and well acted. [PN] CHINESE SF Chinese literature has a long tradition of the fantastic that prepared the way for, and leads up to, modern Chinese sf. It is believed that the earliest actual sf publication in China was the serialization in 1904 in the magazine Portrait Fiction of "Yueqiu zhimindi xiaoshuo" ["Tales of Moon Colonization"] by Huangjiang Diaosuo. Around 130,000 Chinese words long, this novel describes a group of Earthlings settling on the Moon. Another important sf work of the early period is Xu Nianci's "Xinfalu xiansheng tan" ["New Tales of Mr Absurdity"] (1905), which deals with the separation of body and soul. Lao She's Maocheng ji ["Cat Country"] (1933; reprinted 1947) remains one of the most significant Chinese sf novels; this DYSTOPIA about catlike Martians is in fact a biting satire of the Old China under its reactionary rule. Lao She wrote this novel without being aware of the genre, but at much the same time Gu Junzheng was consciously writing sf, even acknowledging the influence of Jules VERNE and H.G. WELLS. His Heping de meng ["Dream of Peace"] (coll 1940) prints four of his sf short stories. Like Hugo GERNSBACK, Gu Junzheng advocated the popularization of science through sf, and all his stories try to stimulate readers' interest in science and technology.The People's Republic of China was founded in 1949. Soon after that, Soviet sf works were translated into Chinese in great numbers. Also as a result of Soviet influence, the Chinese Youth Press systematically published selections of Verne's sf throughout the 1950s and into the 1960s. From 1949 through the 1960s, almost all Chinese sf stories were for juvenile readers. Representative works include Zheng Wenguang's "Cong Diqiu dao Huxing" ["From Earth to Mars"] (1954), Yu Zhi's "Shizong de gege" ["The Missing Elder Brother"] (1957), Xiao Jianheng's "Buke de qiyu" ["Pup Buke's Adventures"] (1962) and Liu Xinshi's "Beifang de yun" ["Northern Clouds"] (1962).During the 10 years of the notorious "Cultural Revolution" not a trace of sf could be found in China. However, 1978-83 saw a remarkable resurgence of sf creation. Among nearly 1000 titles are Jin Tao's "Yueguangdao" ["The Moonlit Island"] (1980), Tong Enzheng's "Shanhudao shang de siguang" ["Death Ray on a Coral Island"] (1978), Zheng Wenguang's Feixiang Renmazuo ["Forward to Sagittarius"] (1979), Meng Weizai's Fangwen shizongzhe ["Calling on the Missing People"] (1981), Wang Xiaoda's "Shenmi de bo" ["The Mysterious Wave"] (1980), Wei Yahua's "Wenrou zhixiang de meng" ["Conjugal Happiness in the Arms of Morpheus"] (1981) and Ye Yonglie's Heiying ["The Black Shadow"] (1981).Sf during this period also found expression in other media, such as films, tv, radio broadcasts and comic books. In films, Shanhudao shang de siguang ["Death Ray on a Coral Island"], based on Tong Enzheng's story, was released in 1980, and Ji Hongxu's Qianying ["The Hidden Shadow"] in 1982. On tv, "Zuihou yige aizheng sizhe" ["The Last Man who Dies of Cancer"] by Zhou Yongnian, Zhang Fengjiang and Jia Wanchao and "Yinxing ren " ["The Invisible Man"] by Wu Boze were both dramatized in 1980. Xiongmao jihua ["The Panda Project"] by Ye Yonglie was dramatized on tv in 1983. The same author's An dou ["Veiled Strife"] (1981) and Mimi zhongdui ["The Secret Column"] (1981) were broadcast on radio daily as serials in 1981. And in comic books, Ye Yonglie's sf detective series, 12 booklets with 8 million copies printed, was published by Popular Science Press in 1982 under the series title The Scientific Sherlock Holmes.1978-83 also saw widespread publication of foreign sf in China. Among the famous sf writers from many parts of the world who were introduced to the Chinese reading public were Mary SHELLEY, Robert A. HEINLEIN, Isaac ASIMOV, Jack WILLIAMSON, Poul ANDERSON, Michael CRICHTON, Clifford D. SIMAK, Frederik POHL, Arthur C. CLARKE, Brian W. ALDISS, Alexander BELYAEV and Sakyo KOMATSU.However, the 1983 political drive against "spiritual pollution" hurt sf writers so badly that their already small contingent quickly shrank. Since then Chinese sf has developed only slowly. There is just one mainland magazine devoted to sf, Kehuan Shijia ["SF World"]. In Taiwan there is the sf magazine Huanxiang ["Mirage"], ed and published by Dr Zhang Xiguo, a computer specialist who teaches at the University of Pittsburgh in the USA but shows much concern about the development of Chinese sf; there are about a dozen titles under his name. Another major sf writer in Taiwan is Huang Hai, best known for his high literary quality and for his scientific speculation. His first publication, "Hangxiang wuya de lucheng" ["A Boundless Voyage"], appeared in 1968. His best works are reckoned to be 10101 ["The Year 10101"] (1969) and Xinshiji zhelu ["Voyage to a New Era"] (1972).The most productive sf writer in Hong Kong is Ni Kuang, who often writes under the pseudonym Wei Shili. His sf works number about 25 titles, but most are marginal, being SWORD AND SORCERY - indeed, some critics doubt if his works belong to the sf genre at all.There are 15 Chinese members of WORLD SF, whose 1991 annual meeting was held in Chengdu. An introduction to Chinese sf for English readers is Science Fiction from China (anth 1989 US) ed WU DINGBO and Patrick Murphy, which contains several of the stories mentioned above. [WD] CHOSEN SURVIVORS Film (1974). Alpine-Churubusco/Metromedia. Dir Sutton Roley, starring Jackie Cooper, Richard Jaeckel, Alex Cord, Bradford Dillman. Screenplay H. B. Cross, Joe Reb Moffly, based on a story by Cross. 99 mins. Colour.This US/Mexico coproduction is a small-scale, inventive little exploitation movie whose plot-line is purest PARANOIA. In a government test on stress reactions, 11 people are hoaxed into believing that nuclear war is devastating the world. These "chosen survivors" are forced by the army into an elaborate bomb-shelter deep beneath the desert. Once locked in, they learn - this seems not to be part of the experiment - that lethal vampire bats have been trapped inside with them. Character conflicts and bat attacks ensue in an unpretentious piece from a director more commonly associated with tv. [PN/JB] CHOWN, MARCUS (1959- ) UK writer, currently reviews editor for New Scientist, whose sf novels, both in collaboration with John GRIBBIN, are Double Planet (1988), a competent HARD-SF tale about a conflict of political interests over a comet which may or may not be about to strike the Earth, and its remote sequel, Reunion (1991), set 1000 years later, in which the lunar population has come under the influence of a cult claiming to hold the secret of how to replenish the MOON's atmosphere: the book is the story of a woman's fight against this church. [MB]Other works: Stars and Planets (1987), a children's book on astronomy. CHRISTOPHER, JOHN Working name of UK writer Christopher Samuel Youd (1922- ), active as an sf fan before WWII, in which he served; he began publishing sf proper with "Christmas Story" for ASF in 1949, writing as Christopher Youd. His first novel, The Winter Swan (1949), again as by Youd, was a fantasy. His first sf book, The Twenty-Second Century (coll 1954; with 1 story dropped and 1 added, rev 1962 US) as JC, assembles his early work; but, after the success of his first sf novel, The Year of the Comet (1955; vt Planet in Peril 1959 US), and the even greater impact of his second, The Death of Grass (1956; vt No Blade of Grass 1957 US), he concentrated for some years on adult novels, soon becoming perceived as John WYNDHAM's rival and successor as the premier writer of the post-WWII UK DISASTER novel in the decade 1955-65.The disaster which changes the face of England (and of the world) in The Death of Grass (filmed in 1970 by Cornel Wilde as NO BLADE OF GRASS) is, as the title makes clear, an upset in the balance of Nature which causes the extinction of all grass and related food plants, with catastrophic effects. Where Wyndham's novels featured protagonists whose middle-class indomitability signalled to the reader that the crisis would somehow come out right in the end, JC's characters - as witness John Custance's gradual hardening and deterioration of personality in this novel - inhabit and respond to a darker, less secure universe. It is a harshness of perspective characteristic of most of his work at this time: The World in Winter (1962; vt The Long Winter 1962 US), A Wrinkle in the Skin (1965; vt The Ragged Edge 1966 US) and Pendulum (1968 US) all deal decks similarly stacked against political or environmental complacency, and their protagonists concentrate on the grim business of staying alive and making a life fit to live in a post- HOLOCAUST world stripped of culture and security.When JC turned to other kinds of stories his touch was less assured, though Sweeney's Island (1964 US; vt Cloud on Silver 1964 UK) plausibly updates the traditional ISLAND theme as the eponymous tycoon creates a DYSTOPIAN microcosm under stress. However, in 1967 JC successfully inaugurated a fresh phase of his sf career, this time in the juvenile market, with the Tripods sequence: The White Mountains (1967), The City of Gold and Lead (1967) and The Pool of Fire (1968), assembled as The Tripods Trilogy (omni 1980 US); a prequel, When the Tripods Came (1988 US), followed much later. In these books, the alien tripods control all adults. However, the young protagonists avoid their thrall, discover their secret and save Earth (whose adults revert to their distressing old ways). Other juveniles followed: The Lotus Caves (1969), The Guardians (1970) - which appropriately won the Guardian award for best children's book of the year - Dom and Va (1973), much expanded from In the Beginning (1972 chap), a tale for smaller children, Wild Jack (1974 US), Empty World (1977), the Fireball trilogy - Fireball (1981), New Found Land (1983) and Dragon Dance (1986) - set in a PARALLEL-WORLD version of Roman Britain and elsewhere and A Dusk of Demons (1993), set in a post-holocaust Scotland. The Prince in Waiting (1970), Beyond the Burning Lands (1971) and The Sword of the Spirits (1972), assembled as The Swords of the Spirits Trilogy (omni 1980 US; vt The Prince in Waiting Trilogy 1983 UK), is FANTASY. As with his adult sf, most of JC's juveniles are set in a post- DISASTER situation, in which the romantic individualism of young protagonists finds itself pitted against some kind of conformist or even brainwashed system, sometimes symbolized as a struggle between the country and the city. They have been remarkably and deservedly popular. [JC/PN]Other works: The Caves of Night (1958 US), marginal; The Long Voyage (1960; vt The White Voyage 1961 US), a juvenile; The Possessors (1964 US); The Little People (1966 US).About the author: Christopher Samuel Youd, Master of All Genres: A Working Bibliography (1990 chap) by Phil STEPHENSEN-PAYNE.See also: CHILDREN'S SF; ECOLOGY; GREAT AND SMALL; PASTORAL; PUBLISHING; RADIO; SUPERNATURAL CREATURES. CHRYSALIS US original anthology series, 1977-83, 10 vols, ed Roy TORGESON. The first 7 were paperback originals from Zebra Books; the remaining 3 had hardcover first editions from DOUBLEDAY. They were Chrysalis 1 (anth 1977), #2 (anth 1978), #3 (anth 1978), #4 (anth 1979), #5 (anth 1979), #6 (anth 1980), #7 (anth 1980), #8 (anth 1980), #9 (anth 1981) and #10 (anth 1983). Torgeson's editorial policy was eclectic, perhaps too much so; he published sf, fantasy and horror by a mixture of new and established writers. The series title was intended to suggest something developing and changing and about to give birth to beauty. Although C published a number of interesting stories, including four each by Orson Scott CARD and Australian writer Leanne Frahm, it never developed a very strong personality, and it is perhaps surprising (though admirable) that it lasted as long as it did. [PN] CHURCHILL, JOYCE [s] M. John HARRISON. CHURCHILL, R(EGINALD) C(HARLES) (1916- ) UK writer whose A Short History of the Future (1955), like John ATKINS's Tomorrow Revealed (1955), is an imaginary HISTORY, in this case set about AD7000, and similarly draws on genuine contemporary sources, mainly George ORWELL, into an unusually witty accounting of the course of history; in RCC's version, history comes in great cycles. [JC] CICELLIS, KAY Working name of Catherine Mathilda Cicellis (1926- ),French-born writer of Greek descent who writes in English. Her sf novel The Day The Fish Came Out * (1967), which novelizes The DAY THE FISH CAME OUT (1967), is about an H-bomb and the consequences of its loss off a Greek island; it is not up to the standard of her serious work. [JC] CIDONCHA, CARLOS SAIZ [r] SPAIN. CINEFANTASTIQUE US film magazine, specializing in sf, fantasy and horror CINEMA, and occasionally tv; published and ed Frederick S. Clarke from Illinois. Fall 1970-current. It had reached Vol 26, no 4, by June 1995. Slick BEDSHEET format, well illustrated in both colour and b/w. The production schedule has varied from 4 to 6 numbers a year, currently bimonthly. This is by far the most useful US fantastic-cinema magazine, being less juvenile in orientation and (apparently) less dependent on the studios for pictorial material, and thus more independent in its judgments, than magazines like STARLOG. Critical standards range from merely eccentric to excellent. Coverage is good on films with wide theatrical release, but patchy on films that go straight to video release and on tv programmes, with good coverage of tv STAR TREK programmes, rather weak coverage of most other tv shows.. Features range from interviews through articles on production problems and on how special effects are worked to occasional retrospectives (usually good) on famous genre movies of the past. Reviews became briefer and weaker in the 1990s, with many films and tv shows omitted altogether (and many credits misspelled or simply not given), so that C's usefulness as a comprehensive magazine of record was becoming dubious. [PN] CINEMA The basis on which films and film-makers have been selected for inclusion in this volume is discussed in the Introduction.From the outset, the cinema specialized in illusion to a degree that had been impossible on the stage. Sf itself takes as its subject matter that which does not exist, now, in the real world (though it might one day), so it has a natural affinity with the cinema: the illusory qualities of film are ideal for presenting fictions about things that are not yet real. The first sf film-maker of any consequence - indeed, one of the very first film-makers - was Georges MELIES, who used trick photography to take his viewers to the Moon in Le VOYAGE DANS LA LUNE (1902; vt A Trip to the Moon). What they saw there - chorus girls and lobster-clawed Selenites - was not exactly high art, but it was, for the time, wonderful. The ability of sf cinema to evoke wonders, for which it is often criticized as being a modern equivalent of a carnival freak show, is also its strength. Wonders themselves may pall, or be dismissed as childish, but nevertheless they are at the heart of sf; sf, no matter how sophisticated, by definition must feature something new, some alteration from the world as we know it (though of course newness can easily become mere novelty). Film, from this viewpoint, is sf's ideal medium.But from another point of view film is far from the ideal medium. Sf as literature is analytic and deals with ideas; film is the opposite of analytic, and has trouble with ideas. The way film deals with ideas is to give them visual shape, as images which may carry a metaphoric charge, but metaphors are tricky things, and, while the ideas of sf cinema may be potent, they are seldom precise. Also, film is a popular artform which, its producers often believe, is unlikely to lose money by underestimating the intelligence of the public. So, on its surface, sf cinema has often been simplistic, even though complex currents may trouble the depths where its subtexts glide.In fact, sf cinema in the silent period did become surprisingly sophisticated, though to the modern eye, which prefers the illusion of photographic realism, the theatrical Expressionism of much early sf cinema - especially in Russia and Germany - is as strange a convention as having people talk in blank verse. Two important early sf films came from those countries and that convention, AELITA (1924) from Russia and METROPOLIS (1926) from Germany. Nonetheless, Metropolis - the first indubitable classic of sf cinema - is, for all the apparent triteness of its story, striking even today, with its towering city of the future, its cowed lines of shuffling workers, its chillingly lovely female ROBOT. Fritz LANG, who made it, also made one of the first space movies, Die FRAU IM MOND (1929; vt The Woman in the Moon). The debut film of Rene Clair (1898-1981), one day to be a very famous director, was also sf: PARIS QUI DORT (1923; vt The Crazy Ray), but this was an altogether lighter piece, a charming story of Parisians frozen in time.Many people remember the sf-movie booms of the 1950s and the late 1970s, but the first sf boom, that of the 1930s, is often forgotten. Though some sf films were made in Europe at this time, it was in the USA that the most influential were produced: JUST IMAGINE (1930), FRANKENSTEIN (1931), ISLAND OF LOST SOULS (1932), DR JEKYLL AND MR HYDE (1932), KING KONG (1933), DELUGE (1933), The INVISIBLE MAN (1933), The BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN (1935), Mad Love (1935; ORLACS HANDE) and LOST HORIZON (1936). Just Imagine is a forgotten futuristic musical, and Deluge is a DISASTER movie which, like the earlier French La FIN DU MONDE (1931; vt The End of the World), is primarily interested in the effect of apocalypse on human morals. King Kong is of course an early and classic monster movie, with a sympathetic monster. Similarly, Lost Horizon is the most famous LOST-WORLD film, though the theme has never been very important in sf movies.It is interesting that the remainder - all six of them good films, and mostly well remembered - have in common the over-reaching scientist destroyed by his own creation. This theme, which could be called the Promethean theme (after the hero who stole fire from the Gods - a literal parallel in the case of the Frankenstein films, where scientists steal lightning to create new life), remains a central theme in sf cinema today; it is a familiar paradox that much sf cinema is anti-science, even anti-intellectual ( ANTI-INTELLECTUALISM IN SF), and (especially in the 1930s) cast in the GOTHIC mode, which typically sees the limitation of science as being its reliance on Reason in a world of mysteries not susceptible to rational analysis - indeed, most of the SCIENTISTS who appear in the above films are seen as literally mad. This is true also of several European films of the time, including the archetypally Gothic German film ALRAUNE (1930; vt Daughter of Evil). It is, of course, a CLICHE of early sf generally and of sf in the cinema especially that scientists are mad, so much so that we seldom pause to analyse the oddness of this. It is as if these films were telling us that the brain, the seat of reason, is so delicate an instrument that its overuse leads to the very opposite, unreason. Although all these films are undeniably sf, they are generally and rightly categorized as HORROR. Also archetypal of the sf cinema is their clear Luddite subtext: the results of science are terrifying. This pessimistic view gave way to OPTIMISM later in the 1930s, but returned with new vigour when the real-world results of scientific advance - the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki-proved to be so terrifying. The Bomb was the image that was to loom behind the MONSTER MOVIES of the 1950s, especially - not surprisingly - those made in JAPAN.In the later 1930s few sf films were made, the most obvious new theme being SPACE OPERA, though this was mainly confined to cheerful juvenile serials such as FLASH GORDON (1936, with sequels in 1938 and 1940) and BUCK ROGERS IN THE 25TH CENTURY (1939). The one adult film made about the conquest of space, the hifalutin', rhetorical and romantic THINGS TO COME (1936), was from the UK; although it flopped, with hindsight we can see it as a milestone of sf film-making. While ultimately optimistic, its vision of the future has many dark aspects, and in this respect the movie is the inheritor of the DYSTOPIAN theme of Metropolis.The 1940s, by contrast, were empty years for sf cinema, though they started well with the sinister DR CYCLOPS (1940), whose villain shrank people. Medical sf/horror was well represented by The LADY AND THE MONSTER (1944), about a sinister excised brain kept alive by science. More typical was comic sf, mostly weak, as in the ever more slapstick sequels to the Frankenstein and Invisible Man movies, both unnatural beings winding up as co-stars, in 1948 and 1951 respectively, with Bud Abbott and Lou Costello. The PERFECT WOMAN (1949) is a UK comedy interesting in its exploitation of sf to sexist ends: its underclothes fetishism would have been unthinkable had its robot heroine, played by a real woman, been a real woman. Prehistoric fantasy, which continues as a minor genre today, had a good start with ONE MILLION B.C. (1940). There was not much else.The sf-movie boom of the 1950s, which figures largely in our cultural nostalgia today - even among viewers too young to have seen the originals when they first came out - was largely made up of MONSTER MOVIES (which see for details), but the theme of space exploration hit the screens even earlier and was also popular. (There were few monster movies before 1954, the first being The THING in 1951.) The first 1950s space film to be released was ROCKETSHIP X-M, which was rushed out in 1950 to capitalize on the pre-publicity for DESTINATION MOON; it was the latter, however, that was successful. It was followed by such spacecraft-oriented films as The DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL (1951), WHEN WORLDS COLLIDE (1951), INVADERS FROM MARS (1953), IT CAME FROM OUTER SPACE (1953), WAR OF THE WORLDS (1953), RIDERS TO THE STARS (1954), The CONQUEST OF SPACE (1955), THIS ISLAND EARTH (1955), The QUATERMASS XPERIMENT (1955), FORBIDDEN PLANET (1956), and EARTH VS. THE FLYING SAUCERS (1956). In six of these, probably more for budgetary than for ideological reasons, the spacecraft bring ALIENS to Earth; all are monstrous except for the Christlike alien in The Day the Earth Stood Still, who dies and rises again before (in a manner more appropriate to the Old Testament than the New) threatening Earth with destruction if it does not repent its sins. In the remainder the urge for the conquest of space is apparent (as it was coming to be in the real world, with the first orbital satellite, Sputnik 1, launched in 1957), although the religious subtext of much 1950s sf cinema is found also in When Worlds Collide (a Noah's space-ark is used to save a remnant of humanity from God's wrath made manifest as cataclysm) and The Conquest of Space (the captain of a spacecraft goes mad because he believes space travel is an intrusion into the sphere of God). The only full-blooded space operas of the period appeared moderately late on, with This Island Earth and Forbidden Planet, but even in these tales the central image is of the destruction that can be wrought by science.One of the most memorable sf films of the 1950s boom is at first glance not sf at all: the Mickey Spillane film noir KISS ME DEADLY (1955), dir Robert Aldrich (1918-1983), in which the central object is a box which, when opened, emits a fiery light and unleashes destruction on the world. The film effortlessly and pessimistically links by metaphor the petty spites and bestialities that disfigure individuals with the greater capacity for destruction symbolized by the Pandora's Box which, in this case, appears to unbind, like the Bomb, a cleansing radioactivity to greet the fallen world.The monster movie, of course, is even more obviously fearful of science: its text is "science breeds monsters". Political PARANOIA, a quite different theme (and one to be developed further in the 1960s) also found a niche in much 1950s sf, especially in those films in which creatures that look just like us on the outside turn out on the inside to be monsters or alien puppets (often identifiable as metaphoric stand-ins for such other secret worms in the apple of Western society as communist agents). Invaders from Mars (1953), one of the earliest and best of these ( MONSTER MOVIES and PARANOIA for other films on this theme), added a touch of Freudian fear to the paranoid brew by making Mummy and Daddy among the first humans to be rendered monstrous and emotionless by alien control. The most famous example is INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS (1956), in which, as in most of its kind, the slightly diagrammatic fear of communism is surely secondary to the fear of the loss of affect: the monstrous quasi-humans have no emotions; they are like cogs in a remorseless machine. It is interesting that, although with hindsight we see the Eisenhower years precisely as years of conformity, it was fear of that very conformity that played so prominent a role in the US popular culture of those years.Where in the 1940s only a handful of sf films were made, in the 1950s there were 150 to 200, their numbers increasing in inverse proportion to their quality: although the years 1957-9 had more sf movies than the years 1950-56, they were mostly B-movies from "Poverty Row", which, despite the fact that they include such old favourites as ATTACK OF THE CRAB MONSTERS, The INCREDIBLE SHRINKING MAN , QUATERMASS II and The MONOLITH MONSTERS (all 1957) and The FLY , The BLOB and I MARRIED A MONSTER FROM OUTER SPACE (all 1958), leave an overall impression of sf cinema as both sensationalist and tacky. The year 1959, however, while producing genre movies that were mostly forgettable exploitation material, also produced three films which, while obviously intended for a mainstream audience, had an sf theme: JOURNEY TO THE CENTER OF THE EARTH, The WORLD, THE FLESH AND THE DEVIL and ON THE BEACH. At last some sf themes ( LOST WORLDS, the HOLOCAUST AND AFTER and the END OF THE WORLD), it seemed, were sufficiently familiar to general audiences to risk the involvement of big-name stars: James Mason, Harry Belafonte and Gregory Peck. None of these films was especially good, but as sociological signposts each has some importance.Another phenomenon of the 1950s was the rise of Japanese sf cinema, built largely on the success of GOJIRA (1954; vt Godzilla), a monster movie. Many further monster movies followed, nearly all from Toho studios, which began working in the space-opera and alien-invasion genres later, as with CHIKYU BOIEGUN (1957; vt The Mysterians).By the later 1950s the major studios were abandoning genre sf, and most memorable productions of the period were made by such low-budget independent producers as Roger CORMAN; the earlier 1950s, by contrast, had been dominated by studios like Universal, Warner Bros. and Paramount, which had sometimes used specialist producers like George PAL or even, in the case of Universal, developed their own specialist sf director, Jack ARNOLD. For the decades since then it has been arguable that much of the inventive energy of sf cinema has continued to bubble up from the marshes of "Poverty Row".Sf films were quite numerous through most of the 1960s, without many clear lines of evolution being visible, although individual films sometimes showed real creativity (but see below for developments in the cinema of paranoia, and for the new wave of DYSTOPIAN films). Hollywood remained fairly uneventful so far as sf was concerned through the years 1960-67, with silly, colourful films like The TIME MACHINE (1960), The ABSENT-MINDED PROFESSOR (1961) and FANTASTIC VOYAGE (1966). Jerry Lewis made a surprisingly effective sf campus comedy out of the Jekyll and Hyde theme, The NUTTY PROFESSOR (1963). Roger Corman's low-budget, independent sf features became less common, but one of the last was one of the best: X - THE MAN WITH THE X-RAY EYES (1963). By far the best commercial movie in the genre belonged to it only marginally: Alfred Hitchcock's The BIRDS (1963). A revenge-of-Nature film which began a whole trend, this is a particularly surreal monster movie whose paranoid element - intimate sharers of our own world becoming the monsters - showed that the paranoia theme was continuing strongly in sf cinema, as it has ever since, but with a shift in emphasis. In the 1950s the monster movie had been comparatively innocent, and - not surprisingly with the Cold War being at its height and Hollywood itself about to become subject to investigations designed to weed out left-wingers - regularly featured monsters from outside normal experience; foreigners, so to speak. These films often opened with scenes of tranquillity - children playing, farmers hoeing, lovers strolling. The subsequent violence was almost a metaphor for the irrational forces which peaceful US citizens feared might enter their lives, forces beyond their control, such as (in real life) the Bomb or invasion. By contrast, the subtext of The Birds can, with hindsight, be seen as changing the focus of unease away from the alien monster towards the domestic monster. In the 1960s, elements of decay and division in Western society, especially US society, were becoming more obvious, and 1960s sf reflected this. Working like Hitchcock on the margins of sf cinema, John FRANKENHEIMER was perhaps the most distinguished Hollywood director of 1960s politically paranoid sf, with The MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE (1962), Seven Days in May (1964) and SECONDS (1966). Conspiracy-theory paranoia of the most extreme kind is the occasion for black comedy in Theodore Flicker's The PRESIDENT'S ANALYST (1967), in which the Telephone Company is out to rule the world. Even George Pal, of all people, had a very effective exercise in paranoia with The POWER (1967), a story of amoral superhumans disguised as ordinary people. Stanley KUBRICK, working outside the Hollywood system, made his memorably black and funny sf debut with DR STRANGELOVE OR: HOW I LEARNED TO STOP WORRYING AND LOVE THE BOMB (1964), and Hollywood exile Joseph Losey made his nightmare of alienation and radioactivity, The DAMNED (1961), in the UK. In all of these, it is our own society that is frightening, not some alien import.The 1960s were, famously, a decade of radicalism and social change, but the English-speaking cinema was slow to reflect this, being more interested in the miniskirt than in, say, the growing power of young people as a political force. Movies of youth revolution like PRIVILEGE [1967], WILD IN THE STREETS [1968] and GAS-S-S-S [1970] came only at the end of the decade, in a perhaps cynical attempt to cash in on the flower-power phenomenon, and there were never many of them. Spy movies were immensely popular - a phenomenon perhaps reflecting the idea of a society riddled with secrets and conspiracies - but there is nothing remotely radical or even modern about the James Bond series of films inaugurated with DR NO (1962) and going on to include many other borderline-sf films like YOU ONLY LIVE TWICE (1967); indeed, their central image of mad SCIENTISTS out to rule the world derives from the pulp sf of the 1920s and 1930s (see also CRIME AND PUNISHMENT). In Europe, however, especially in France, the so-called New Wave cinema was indeed revolutionizing the medium with lasting effect. Many New Wave directors made marginal sf films, typically incorporating sf tropes into a supposedly future but apparently contemporary setting. These included Chris Marker with La JETEE (1963), Jean-Luc Godard with ALPHAVILLE (1965) and WEEKEND (1968), Francois Truffaut with FAHRENHEIT 451 (1966) and Alain Resnais with JE T'AIME, JE T'AIME (1967), all eccentric and interesting; Truffaut was perhaps the odd man out, as the director least comfortable with future scenarios. The exploitation cinema in Italy had no critical agenda of reform like the New Wave in France, but it had plenty of intelligence and inventiveness, though the results were often extremely uneven; much of the Italian work was HORROR, but this often overlapped with sf, as in Mario Bava's TERRORE NELLO SPAZIO (1965; vt Planet of the Vampires). Further east, both RUSSIA and Czechoslovakia ( CZECH AND SLOVAK SF) made quite a few sf films, including Russia's PLANETA BUR (1962; vt Planet of Storms) and Czechoslovakia's IKARIE XB-1 (1963). The sf business in the UK was normally a matter of low-budget B-movies, but some respectable films emerged - e.g., The DAY THE EARTH CAUGHT FIRE (1961), CHILDREN OF THE DAMNED (1963), QUATERMASS AND THE PIT (1967) and Peter WATKINS's The WAR GAME (1965). This last was made for tv but banned from tv for giving too realistic a picture of nuclear HOLOCAUST; even today it comes across at least as powerfully as The DAY AFTER (1983), made for US tv two decades later.The single most important year in the history of sf cinema is 1968. Before then sf was not taken very seriously either artistically or commercially; since then it has remained, much of the time, one of the most popular film genres, and has produced many more good films. Simply to list the main sf films of 1968 gives some idea of the year's significance: BARBARELLA, CHARLY, NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD, PLANET OF THE APES and 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY. (Less important were COUNTDOWN, The ILLUSTRATED MAN , The LOST CONTINENT and The MONITORS .) George A. ROMERO's Night of the Living Dead is the exception here in being a low-budget, independent production, but, while it was seen by some contemporaries as being merely another milestone in making the cinema of horror more luridly graphic and disgusting - a key moment in the evolution of the SPLATTER MOVIE - its image of humans reduced to deranged, cannibalistic zombies has an undeniable metaphoric power and even a dark poetry, and it was revolutionary in its discomforting refusal to offer any solace throughout, nor any happy ending. The other four films were commercially reputable products, and interesting for different reasons. Barbarella is second-generation, spoof sf, the sort of film that can be made only when genre materials have already been thoroughly absorbed into the cultural fabric. Charly won its financier and star, Cliff Robertson, the first Oscar for Best Actor given to a performance in an sf movie, a good measure of sf's increasing respectability; the film was based on Daniel KEYES's FLOWERS FOR ALGERNON (1959 FSF; exp 1966). Planet of the Apes and 2001: A Space Odyssey are good films - the latter arguably one of the great classics of the genre - both notable for their commercial success and for their use of nonpatronizing screenplays that demanded thought from the audience. Though there were plenty of bad films still to come, sf cinema now had to be taken seriously, definitely by the money-men and to a degree by the critics.To jump ahead for a moment, it would be another decade before the commercial potential of sf cinema was thoroughly confirmed, partly in response to the technical developments in special effects that took place during that period. In 1977 STAR WARS, a smash hit, inaugurated a new boom in space-opera movies, and in the same year CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD KIND also did very well with its blend of sentiment and UFO mysticism, inaugurating the friendly- ALIEN theme which the film's director, Steven SPIELBERG, was to exploit with even greater effect in E.T.: THE EXTRATERRESTRIAL (1982). Another money-maker that began a trend was SUPERMAN (1978), which led to a succession of ever-more-disappointing SUPERHERO movies. These films remain among the most financially successful ever made. In 1971 the cinema of the fantastic (sf, horror, fantasy, surrealism) accounted for about 5 per cent of US box-office takings; by 1982 this figure had risen amazingly to approach 50 per cent, and it remained as high as about 30 per cent in 1990.Though special effects were to usher in a period of sf cinema whose spectacle was more overwhelming than its intelligence, in the late 1960s no vast teenage audience had as yet accumulated to drag down the genre with the commercial demand that it should remain always suitable for kids. A majority of the sf films of 1969-79 were downbeat and even gloomy, and even in the adventure films their heroes were hard pressed just to survive, let alone survive cheerfully. The three main themes were the dystopian, the Luddite and the post- HOLOCAUST.Luddite films included practically everything made or written by Michael CRICHTON, notably WESTWORLD (1973), The TERMINAL MAN (1974) and COMA (1978). He has a gift for cinematic narrative, but his tireless replaying of the theme made him seem something of a one-note director. (John BADHAM, in the 1980s, would be another director to make a career out of Luddite sf movies, with WARGAMES [1983], BLUE THUNDER [1983] and SHORT CIRCUIT [1986].) Other films about the triumph of technology and the subsequent enslavement of humanity (whether actual or metaphorical) included: COLOSSUS, THE FORBIN PROJECT (1969), computer takes over; SLEEPER (1973), machines run amok; KILLDOZER (1974), a bulldozer goes mad; FUTUREWORLD (1976), robots take over; DEMON SEED (1977), computer as rapist and voyeur; The CHINA SYNDROME (1979), nuclear power station almost blows up; La MORT EN DIRECT (1979), intrusive journalist whose eyes are cameras. In DARK STAR (1974), the feature-film debut of John CARPENTER and one of the wittiest sf films yet made, a computerized bomb undertakes phenomenological arguments with the crew of a starship.Dystopian films ranged from the terrible - SILENT RUNNING (1971), we've destroyed all plant life; ROLLERBALL (1975), sport is the opium of the people; LOGAN'S RUN (1976), everyone over 30 is killed - through the interesting if exaggerated - SOYLENT GREEN (1973), overpopulation; The STEPFORD WIVES (1974), robot wives replace human wives - to the excellent - THX 1138 (1970), the debut of George LUCAS; A CLOCKWORK ORANGE (1971), brainwashing; The MAN WHO FELL TO EARTH (1976), the corrupting influence of human society on an alien; STALKER (1979 Russia), alien leavings turn out to be fairy gold in a trash-heap world.Life after the holocaust had been an occasional theme in sf cinema for some time. Stories of survivors and the detritus they live among were becoming more numerous by the 1970s; the iconography of disaster cinema regularly includes a few rusting or ivy-clad ruins of 20th-century civilization, as in GLEN AND RANDA (1971), Logan's Run (1976) or, with more bravura, A BOY AND HIS DOG (1975). The ULTIMATE WARRIOR (1975) fights in the rubble, and BENEATH THE PLANET OF THE APES (1970) mutants live in it. In ZARDOZ (1974) the greater part of the population has reverted to superstitious barbarism. We see this reversion taking place in MAD MAX (1979) and its two entertaining designer-barbarism sequels. Other examples from the 1970s include The BED-SITTING ROOM (1969), NO BLADE OF GRASS (1970), The OMEGA MAN (1971) and DAMNATION ALLEY (1977). This is a theme that suits low-budget movies, which nearly all these are, since the real world produces settings of extraordinary dereliction in profusion.In the 1970s the low-budget, independent exploitation-movie end of the film business was quite busy making sf movies of other kinds, too, usually borderline-sf/ HORROR, including SCREAM AND SCREAM AGAIN (1969), DEATH LINE (1972; vt RAW MEAT), George A. Romero's The CRAZIES (1973), BLUE SUNSHINE (1977), PIRANHA (1978) - a witty partnership between screenwriter John SAYLES and director Joe DANTE - and PHANTASM (1979). But the two outstanding independent directors of exploitation sf in the 1970s (and after) were Larry COHEN and David CRONENBERG. The deeply eccentric social satirist Cohen is the inventor of the monster baby, in IT'S ALIVE (1973), where it is played by a doll pulled along by a string, and the Christ-figure, in GOD TOLD ME TO (1976; vt DEMON), who is an alien-fathered hermaphrodite. Cronenberg, whose biological metamorphoses almost constitute a new cinematic genre, has become perhaps the most important director associated with sf cinema; his work of the 1970s consists of chaotic, horrific comedies, including The PARASITE MURDERS (1974; vt They Came from Within; vt Shivers), RABID (1976) and The BROOD (1979).One of the most complex and moving sf films to date is SOLARIS (1972), the first sf film of Andrei TARKOVSKY, with its delicate meshing of images from inner and outer space. Other films of the decade that at least stimulated discussion - none is outstanding-are SLAUGHTERHOUSE 5 (1972), The DAY OF THE DOLPHIN (1973), The ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW (1975), The BOYS FROM BRAZIL (1978) and STAR TREK: THE MOTION PICTURE (1979). More influential than any of these was the very successful and much imitated ALIEN (1979), the first sf feature by Ridley SCOTT, but this was part of the big-budget sf-feature boom of the late 1970s, discussed above, and belongs in spirit more to the 1980s than the 1970s.An interesting film of 1978, INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS, was a successful remake of the classic 1956 film. Along with KING KONG (1976) this introduced a series of sf remakes in the 1980s which, contrary to cliche, contain a good deal of interesting work. The time was ripe for remakes because, in the post Star Wars period, sf was proving such a hot area of Hollywood movie-making. If you've had a success once, what more natural than to try to repeat it? The two best remakes were probably John Carpenter's The THING (1982) and David Cronenberg's The FLY (1986). Also better than expected were The BLOB (1988) and The FLY II (1989). Others, mostly poor, were BUCK ROGERS IN THE 25TH CENTURY (1979), FLASH GORDON (1980), GOJIRA 1985 (1985; vt Godzilla 1985), INVADERS FROM MARS (1986), LORD OF THE FLIES (1990), NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD (1990) and NOT OF THIS EARTH (1988).A less welcome phenomenon of the 1980s was the number of successful films to which sequels were made almost as a matter of course, almost never as good as their originals, an observation that spans a variety of films including Critters 2: The Main Course, It's Alive III: Island of the Alive, HIGHLANDER II: THE QUICKENING, Bronx Warriors II, 2010, Phantasm II, Re-Animator 2, Robocop 2, Short Circuit 2, Toxic Avenger 2 and Future Cop 2. Indeed, the list includes the most expensive film ever made, TERMINATOR 2: JUDGMENT DAY (1991), which, though quite good, is less uncompromising than its predecessor. Two sequels better than their originals are MAD MAX 2 (1981; vt The Road Warrior) and PREDATOR 2 (1990). As of 1992 there have been five Planet of the Apes films, six Star Trek films and four Superman films (plus SUPERGIRL, etc.) in the cycle begun by Superman (1978). The Japanese, however, probably have the record with their endless Gojira and Gamera films, two series that began in the 1950s ( GOJIRA; DAIKAIJU GAMERA).The disappointment of the 1980s and the early 1990s was that, sf boom or no sf boom, many spectacular productions were the filmic equivalent of fast food, offering no lasting satisfaction. Also, too much US product seemed to more astringent foreign tastes to be suffused with an oversweet sentimentality, especially following the success of Spielberg's E.T. Films tainted in this way, some of them otherwise quite good, included RETURN OF THE JEDI (1983), with its Ewoks, STARMAN (1984), with its Christlike alien, COCOON (1985), with its rejuvenated oldies, EXPLORERS (1985), with its cute alien kids, INNERSPACE (1987), with a wimp finding true manhood with the help of a miniaturized macho astronaut, * BATTERIES NOT INCLUDED (1987), with nauseating baby flying saucers, STAR TREK V: THE FINAL FRONTIER (1989), the nadir of the geriatric-buddy movie, and The ABYSS (1989), whose threatening aliens turn out to be real friendly Tinker Bells.At the very beginning of the 1980s, films of some interest included ALTERED STATES (1980), BATTLE BEYOND THE STARS (1980), especially The EMPIRE STRIKES BACK (1980), ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK (1981), OUTLAND (1981) and MEMOIRS OF A SURVIVOR (1981). But by far the most influential sf film was the superbly designed BLADE RUNNER (1982), Ridley Scott's second sf feature, whose shabby, lively, media-saturated city of the near future was an early manifestation of CYBERPUNK; a more knowing Japanese version of the cyberpunk ethos - by then almost an sf CLICHE - would be found years later in the animated film AKIRA (1990). Curiously, not many commercial films between these two partook full-bloodedly of cyberpunk thinking, though several small independent productions (see below), including VIDEODROME (1982) and HARDWARE (1990), did so. However, the cyberpunk theme of VIRTUAL REALITY - the notion of consensual hallucination, or of humans entering CYBERNETIC systems and reading their networks (or being read by them) not just as maps but as the territory itself - became quite popular in cinema. A far from comprehensive list includes the made-for-tv movie The LATHE OF HEAVEN (1980; based on the 1971 novel by Ursula LE GUIN), TRON (1982), BRAINSTORM (1983), DREAMSCAPE (1984) and The LAST STARFIGHTER (1984).There are many other examples of thematic clusters in the 1980s. Hollywood (and other film centres) had seldom been so narcissistically absorbed - often stupidly - by its own previous productions, with each box-office breakthrough spawning multiple imitations. Hundreds of films featured a slow camera track along a giant spaceship (2001, Star Wars) or an alien parasite bursting bloodily from a human body (Alien).A big hit, starting at the beginning of the decade with SATURN 3 (1980), ANDROID (1982) and RUNAWAY (1984), was the killer-robot movie, mostly after the success of ROBOCOP (1987); examples are Hardware (1990), CLASS OF 1999 (1990), ROBOCOP 2 (1990), ROBOT JOX (1990) and EVE OF DESTRUCTION (1991), but the best by far was The TERMINATOR (1984), which in turn spawned Terminator 2: Judgement Day (1991).More seriously gruesome, but not without soap-opera elements, was the spate of nuclear-death films beginning with The DAY AFTER , SPECIAL BULLETIN and TESTAMENT (all 1983), the first two made for tv. They were followed by, among others, THREADS (1985), also made for tv, and the cartoon feature WHEN THE WIND BLOWS (1986).A subgenre of the 1980s was a bastard form, the teen-sf movie, of which the three best were probably REAL GENIUS (1985), BILL & TED'S EXCELLENT ADVENTURE (1988) and EARTH GIRLS ARE EASY (1988), along with the Back to the Future series (see below). Others were DEAD KIDS (1981), CITY LIMITS (1984), NIGHT OF THE COMET (1984), MY SCIENCE PROJECT (1985), WEIRD SCIENCE (1985), FLIGHT OF THE NAVIGATOR (1986), SPACE CAMP (1986), YOUNG EINSTEIN (1988), MY STEPMOTHER IS AN ALIEN (1988), HONEY, I SHRUNK THE KIDS (1989) and SPACED INVADERS (1989). TIME-TRAVEL movies made a big comeback in the 1980s, many of them ( Introduction) being not technically sf since their means of time travel was fantastic. Among the genuine sf the best are BACK TO THE FUTURE (1985) and its two sequels, all directed by Robert Zemeckis. Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure (1988) and its sequel, Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey (1991), are both charming. Others are the entertaining The PHILADELPHIA EXPERIMENT (1984) and two disappointments, The FINAL COUNTDOWN (1980) and MILLENNIUM (1989).After the success of CARRIE (1976), based on Stephen KING's 1974 novel about a persecuted schoolgirl with PSI POWERS, films about paranormal abilities, though never becoming overwhelmingly popular, nevertheless remained as a persistent subgenre. The best is probably Cronenberg's remorseless SCANNERS (1980). Others include The FURY (1978), The SENDER (1982), The DEAD ZONE (1983), also directed by Cronenberg, and the dire FIRESTARTER (1984).The oddest subgenre was probably the alien-human buddy movie. ENEMY MINE (1985), one of the earlier ones, is set on another planet, but many examples are set on Earth. Not just two but four of them feature partnerships between alien and Earth police: ALIEN NATION (1988), The HIDDEN (1988), SOMETHING IS OUT THERE (1988; a tv miniseries released on videotape as a feature film) and I COME IN PEACE (1989; vt Dark Angel).Other 1980s and 1990s films of interest but not fitting neatly into any of the above categories were HALLOWEEN III: SEASON OF THE WITCH (1983), STRANGE INVADERS (1983), DUNE (1984), BRAZIL (1985), ALIENS (1986), PREDATOR (1987), MONKEY SHINES (1988), TOTAL RECALL (1990) and The ROCKETEER (1991). Aliens and Brazil are the most distinguished of these, the former directed by James CAMERON, the most important sf director to emerge during the 1980s, the latter a perhaps too lovingly designed dystopia. Monkey Shines, also memorable, showed that George A. Romero was still a director of real power.Once again, however, the lesson of the 1970s was in the main repeated. If you want to see what the commercial cinema will be doing next decade, take a good close look at what the low-budget cinema, even the exploitation cinema, is doing right now. For every film as inventive as Blade Runner produced by companies with access to very large sums of money, there are half a dozen thrown up by the shoestring independents. In the latter category, the 1980s produced Scanners (1980), ALLIGATOR (1981), Android (1982), LIQUID SKY (1982), Videodrome (1982), Der LIFT (1983), The BROTHER FROM ANOTHER PLANET (1984), The Terminator, REPO MAN (1984), TRANCERS (1984), The STUFF (1985), RE-ANIMATOR (1985), FROM BEYOND (1986), MAKING MR RIGHT (1987), THEY LIVE (1988) and SOCIETY (1989). If sf cinema were represented by these films alone it would have to be diagnosed as in vigorous health, though somewhat disreputable and threatening in appearance.But, alas, by the late 1980s the increasingly floundering commercial film industries of the USA and the UK seemed caught in a desperate spiral of attempting to recapture past splendours by dint of colourful (and expensive) violence while giving ideological offence to none. Thus even death and destruction become anodyne. By 1990 the commercial sf cinema-especially in the USA - seemed to have lost not just whatever integrity it had had but also its common sense. As grave financial problems began to spread through Hollywood, it seemed possible to predict that 1991 might prove to have been the last year of insanely inflated film budgets. [PN]This indeed proved to be the case. Even the big sf hit of the next few years, Steven Spielberg's entertaining but silly dinosaur theme-park movie, JURASSIC PARK (1993), did not have a stratospheric budget. There were few big sf glamour spectaculars 1992-1994; others included the very watchable STARGATE (1994), and, on a rather smaller scale, several movies about future musclemen, DEMOLITION MAN (1993) with Stallone, TIMECOP (1994) with Van Damme and - a smaller budget again - UNIVERSAL SOLDIER (1992) with Van Damme and Lundgren. Cut-rate spectacle was also the order of the day with Kirk's (William SHATNER's) presumptive last gasp in the STAR TREK movies: STAR TREK: GENERATIONS (1994), and with the once adult Robocop series, now aimed largely at a younger audience on the evidence of ROBOCOP 3 (1993).One continuing paranoiac rivulet of films deals with humans kidnapped by aliens in UFOs; this theme received a shot in the arm back in the 1980s with COMMUNION (1989), based on Whitley STRIEBER's supposedly factual best-seller, and continued with a neat little film called FIRE IN THE SKY (1993), but it was in tv, not movies, that this particular theme had its apotheosis, with the cult success THE X-FILES (1993- ).Despite the long history of failure in this sub-genre, producers insisted on making yet more supposedly humorous sf movies, which included the dire ENCINO MAN (1992, vt California Man), equally unfunny CONEHEADS (1994) and the slightly better HONEY, I BLEW UP THE KID (1992); gentler and funnier than any of these was THE METEOR MAN (1993); there was a slight sense of strain about the mixture of comedy and drama in Joe DANTE'S MATINEE (1993), which examines the cultural roots of sf/horror pics in scary real-life events, in this case the Cuban missile crisis. A successful French black comedy set after the HOLOCAUST was DELICATESSAN (1990).It became obvious in the 1990s that films spinning off from successes in other media, notably GAMES, COMICS and TELEVISION - and even including RADIO - was a growing part of the business, in part nostalgia driven, and unlikely to go away. From radio and the PULPS came The Shadow (1994). From the world of games came SUPER MARIO BROS(1993), and Double Dragon, Street Fighter and Mortal Kombat are on the way. Comics - which had already fed into films with movies like Flash Gordon, deeply influenced or begat many more films in the 1990s, most of them fantasy rather than sf, including the two vastly successful Batman movies, Timecop, The Mask (1994), The Crow, (1994), the Japanese TETSUO (1989) and many Japanese anime, with JUDGE DREDD and Tank Girl having film spin-offs in production as of 1995. From television nostalgia came The Beverly Hillbillies(1993) and The Flintstones (1994), among others; and also, of course, the continuing run of Star Trek movies. One problem with most of these genres is that they have narrative conventions (generally) as rigid and stagey as those of a Japanese noh drama, and this static quality runs counter to what sf does best, which is kinesis: opening out, dealing with change and transformation.Although the exploitation-movie end of the market is often highly inventive, there was not much evidence of this in cheap and bloody futuristic thrillers like AMERICAN CYBORG: STEEL WARRIOR (1992), NEMESIS (1993) and MAN'S BEST FRIEND, or two (rather better) future-prison escape movies, FORTRESS (1993) and NO ESCAPE (1994 , vt Penal Colony, vt The Prison Colony, vt Escape from Absalom).In this period remakes and spin-offs from earlier films included the so-so tv movie ATTACK OF THE 50 FT. WOMAN (1993), the rather good but black BODY SNATCHERS (1993), and for intellectuals who like their action both bloody and operatic, the strange but semi-successful Kenneth Branagh film, MARY SHELLEY'S FRANKENSTEIN (1994).Time travel remained a popular theme - several titles belonging to this category having already been mentioned - and while the weepie melodrama FOREVER YOUNG (1992) may have disappointed, there were two small gems in the period. The first was a small-scale but spirited time-paradox film DISASTER IN TIME (1991, vt Grand Tour: Disaster in Time, vt TIMESCAPE), which proved that not everything made for cable tv is awful. The second was a comedy set in a small American town, GROUNDHOG DAY (1993), an almost faultless and very amusing study in predestination vs free will as mediated by a time-loop. [PN]Further reading: The following reading list is highly selective. An early but still useful reference work on sf cinema is the 3-vol Reference Guide to Fantastic Films: Science Fiction, Fantasy & Horror 1 (vol 1 1972, vol 2 1973, vol 3 1974) compiled by Walt LEE. There is much information, with some rather brief and disappointing capsule comments, in Horror and Science Fiction Films: A Checklist (1972), Vol II (1982) and Vol III (1984) by Donald C. Willis. Although it does not cover as many titles as these two, The Aurum Film Encyclopedia: Science Fiction (1984; rev 1991) ; rev vt The Overlook Film Encyclopedia: Science Fiction 1994 US) ed Phil HARDY is far more than a listing with credits; the best 1-vol guide, it is the fullest coverage of sf cinema to contain detailed description and critical analysis (generally very good), and, with upwards of 1400 films described in the revised editions, covers at least twice as many sf movies as any other critical book on the subject. Even more useful to the researcher is a run of the journal Monthly Film Bulletin, published by the British Film Institute, which gives (even after its incorporation during 1991 into its sister journal, Sight and Sound) full credits for all films it covers (all films released in the UK), and normally more complete critical discussion than anything available in book form; its sf critics include Kim NEWMAN, Philip STRICK and Tom Milne. This was the secondary source most consulted for films from the 1960s onwards in the compilation of this encyclopedia; its critical appreciations of sf films from earlier periods are briefer and far more conservative, and it does not cover the silent period (Hardy's book does). One other reference work extraordinarily useful for its period is Keep Watching the Skies! American Science Fiction of the Fifties: Volume I 1950-57 (1982) and Volume II 1958-62 (1986) by Bill WARREN.The quality of most general discussions of sf cinema in books is not high; many are coffee-table books of little value, or are aimed at a juvenile fan market. An early study of some interest (despite irritating factual errors) is the pioneering Science Fiction in the Cinema (1970) by John BAXTER, the first book to attempt some kind of critical sorting of its subject matter. Science Fiction Movies (1976) by Philip Strick is witty, well informed and critically astute, but does not linger long enough on individual films. John BROSNAN's Future Tense: The Cinema of Science Fiction (1978; rev vt The Primal Screen: A History of Science Fiction Film 1991) contains judgments, albeit at greater length, that will already be familiar to readers of the first edition of this volume, for which Brosnan wrote many of the film entries. Peter NICHOLLS's Fantastic Cinema (1984 UK; vt The World of Fantastic Films US) is an illustrated survey, only partially devoted to sf, which attempts to establish a critical canon for fantastic films. Omni's Screen Flights/Screen Fantasies: The Future According to Science Fiction Cinema (anth 1984) ed Danny Peary is probably the best collection of essays and interviews on sf cinema. Harlan Ellison's Watching (coll 1989) by Harlan ELLISON collects most of his film criticism from 1965 on, much of it about sf movies. Academic and theoretical books on sf cinema - there are not many - have generally disappointed, and occasionally been crippled by a technical jargon that is the reverse of precise, as in some of the essays in Alien Zone: Cultural Theory and Contemporary Science Fiction Cinema (coll 1990) ed Annette Kuhn; a rather more accessible collection of critical essays is Shadows of the Magic Lamp: Fantasy and Science Fiction in Film (coll 1985) ed George E. SLUSSER and Eric S. RABKIN. But of these academic books the most challenging may be Vivian SOBCHACK's Screening Space: The American Science Fiction Film (1986), a radical expansion of her earlier The Limits of Infinity (1980); it is worth persevering with, jargon and all, for the intellectual strength it brings to bear in its attempt to define sf cinema in a POSTMODERNIST context. Finally An Illustrated History of the Horror Film (1967) by Carlos Clarens and Nightmare Movies (1984; rev vt Nightmare Movies: A Critical History of the Horror Film, 1968-88) by Kim Newman are two stimulating books that have a good deal to say, en passant, about sf films. CITIES The city is the focal point of our civilization, and images of the city of the future bring into sharp relief the expectations and fears with which we imagine the future of civilization. Disenchantment with metropolitan life was evident even while UTOPIAN optimism remained strong, and became remarkably exaggerated in DYSTOPIAN images of the future. The growth of the cities during the Industrial Revolution created filthy slums where crime, ill-health and vice flourished, and a new kind of poverty reigned; thus even the most devoted disciples of progress can and do lament the state of the industrial city, which has little in common with such utopian city-states as Tommaso CAMPANELLA's City of the Sun (1637) or the cities of L.S. MERCIER's Memoirs of the Year Two Thousand Five Hundred (1771; trans 1772). Speculative thinkers who were not utopians found the evolution of the great cities a powerful argument against progress - a view strongly advanced in After London (1885) by Richard JEFFERIES, in which the cities have died but their remains still poison the Earth.In much early sf the city is the same place of contrasts that it was in reality, with the rich and poor living in close but separate worlds, architectural grandeur masking squalor. This is evident in Caesar's Column (1890) by Ignatius DONNELLY, in "A Story of the Days to Come" (1897) and When the Sleeper Wakes (1899) by H.G. WELLS, and in Fritz LANG's film METROPOLIS (1926). Wells, the most determined prophet of technological supercivilization, frequently imagined the destruction of the present-day cities as a prelude to utopian rebuilding. (Many of the real-life urban utopian schemes of the late 19th century demanded that cities be built anew, cleansed of their manifest evils.) However, the splendid vision of the city as an architectural miracle which had inspired early utopians was a vision ever-present in early PULP MAGAZINE sf, thanks largely to the artwork of Frank R. PAUL, who was far better at drawing wonderful cities than human beings; his distinctive images contributed much to the flavour of Gernsbackian sf.Modern sf has made extravagant use of three stereotyped images of the future city: one exaggerates the contrast between the city and a surrounding wilderness, often enclosing the city in a huge plastic dome, polarizing the opposition between city life and rural life; a second displays once-proud cities fallen into ruins, decaying and dying; and the third presents a vivid characterization of the future-city environment in which humans move in the shadow of awesomely impersonal and implicitly hostile artefacts.The theme of stories of the first kind - for which E.M. FORSTER's "The Machine Stops" (1909) provided a prototype - is usually that of escape from the claustrophobic, initiative-killing comfort to the wilderness, which offers evolutionary opportunity through the struggle to survive. Simple expositions of the theme include The Hothouse World (1931; 1965) by Fred MACISAAC, The Adventure of Wyndham Smith (1938) by S. Fowler WRIGHT, Beyond the Sealed World (1965) by Rena VALE, From Carthage then I Came (1966; vt Eight against Utopia) by Douglas R. MASON, Magellan (1970) by Colin ANDERSON, Wild Jack (1974) by John CHRISTOPHER, The Crack in the Sky (1976) by Richard LUPOFF and Terrarium (1985) by Scott Russell SANDERS. More sophisticated variants include The City and the Stars (1956; exp from Against the Fall of Night [1948; 1953]) by Arthur C. CLARKE, The World Inside (1971) by Robert SILVERBERG, The Eye of the Heron (1978; 1982) by Ursula K. LE GUIN and Out on Blue Six (1989) by Ian MCDONALD. Interesting inversions of the schema can be found in Harlan ELLISON's "A Boy and His Dog" (1969) and Greg BEAR's Strength of Stones (fixup 1981).Images of the ruined city are often remarkable for their exaggerated romanticism. Early examples include Jefferies's After London, George Allan ENGLAND's Darkness and Dawn (1914) and Stephen Vincent BENET's "By the Waters of Babylon" (1937). The ruins themselves may become charismatic and symbolic, as exemplified by the torch of the Statue of Liberty in The Torch (1920; 1948) by Jack BECHDOLT. There is a surprisingly strong vein of similar romanticism in GENRE SF. Much of Clifford D. SIMAK's work - especially the episodic CITY (1944-51; fixup 1952) - rejoices in the decline and decay of cities, as do Theodore STURGEON's "The Touch of Your Hand" (1953), J.G. BALLARD's "Chronopolis" (1960) and "The Ultimate City" (1976), Charles PLATT's The City Dwellers (1970 UK; vt Twilight of the City 1977 US) and Samuel R. DELANY's DHALGREN (1975). This rejoicing is not usually based on any naive glorification of living wild and free; more often it reflects a hope that human beings will some day outgrow the need for cities. The probable inescapability of city life is, however, ironically reflected in two curious stories of nomadic cultures which must carry their cities with them: Christopher PRIEST's INVERTED WORLD (1974) and Drew MENDELSON's Pilgrimage (1981).The third stereotype involves not merely the representation of city life as unpleasant or alienating but a strategic exaggeration of the city's form and aspects to stress its frightening and claustrophobic qualities. The "caves" of Isaac ASIMOV's The Caves of Steel (1954) are literally as well as metaphorically claustrophobic. Cities which cover the entire surface of planets are commonplace: Asimov's Trantor, in the Foundation trilogy (1942-50; 1951-3), set an important example. The impersonality of the megalopolis is ingeniously exaggerated in such stories as J.G. Ballard's "Build-Up" (1957; vt "The Concentration City") and R.A. LAFFERTY's "The World as Will and Wallpaper" (1973), and stories in this vein are often outrightly surreal-examples are Fritz LEIBER's "You're All Alone" (1950; exp vt The Sinful Ones 1953) and Ted WHITE's "It Could Be Anywhere" (1969). In extreme cases the city may become personalized, as in Robert Abernathy's "Single Combat" (1955), Robert SHECKLEY's "Street of Dreams, Feet of Clay" (1968), Harlan Ellison's "The Whimper of Whipped Dogs" (1973) and John SHIRLEY's City Come a-Walkin' (1980).The stress of life in a crowded environment is the subject of many stories of OVERPOPULATION, notably Thomas M. DISCH's 334 (fixup 1972 UK) and Felix C. GOTSCHALK's Growing Up in Tier 3000 (1975). Such novels tend to visualize the city of the future as a conglomerate of vast tower-blocks. Silverberg dubs these urbmons; Philip K. DICK calls them conapts; more recently the term "arcology" has become widespread. Some writers, however, preserve a more optimistic view of life in such edifices, notably Mack REYNOLDS in The Towers of Utopia (1975) and Larry NIVEN and Jerry POURNELLE in Oath of Fealty (1981).Outside the GENRE-SF establishment, attempts to characterize the city and identify its alienating forces are mostly grimly realistic, but some tend to the fabular; examples include Le citta invisibili (1972; trans as Invisible Cities 1974) by Italo CALVINO, in which Marco Polo offers Kublai Khan an account of the great range of the possible products of civilization, Les geants (1973; trans as The Giants 1975) by J.M. LE CLEZIO, in which the central image is that of the great shopping-centre Hyperbolis, and Alasdair GRAY's stories "The Start of the Axletree" (1979; vt "The Origin of the Axletree") and "The End of the Axletree" (1983).One striking exception - in which the city becomes the symbol of escape and freedom rather than the oppressive environment to be escaped - is in the novels making up James BLISH's Cities in Flight series (omni 1970), in which ANTIGRAVITY devices, SPINDIZZIES, lift whole cities from the Earth's surface to roam the Universe (although even this dream comes to a dead end in one section of Earthman Come Home [fixup 1955], the part first published in 1953 as "Sargasso of Lost Cities"). And the charismatic quality of cities is paid adequate homage in sf stories which celebrate the sleazy decadent grandeur of various imaginary cities. These include: the eponymous cities of Edward BRYANT's Cinnabar (coll 1976) and Terry CARR's Cirque (1977); M. John HARRISON's fabulous city of Viriconium, first glimpsed in The Pastel City (1971) but far more elaborately portrayed in A STORM OF WINGS (1980), In Viriconium (1982; vt The Floating Gods) and Viriconium Nights (coll 1985); and C.J. CHERRYH's Merovingen, displayed in Angel with the Sword (1985). Brian W. ALDISS's The Malacia Tapestry (1976) is similarly ambivalent about the splendour and sickness of cities.The possible futures of specific real cities are sometimes tracked by sf writers with interest and respect; examples include the Chicago of The Time-Swept City (1977) by Thomas F. MONTELEONE and the New York of Frederik POHL's Years of the City (1984). C.J. Cherryh's Sunfall (coll 1981) sets stories in far-futuristic versions of six major cities. Michael MOORCOCK's work - including his non-sf - uses many different images of London.In both sf writing and sf art, the city is one of the most important recurrent images, and carries with it one of the richest, densest clusters of associations to be found in the whole sf iconography. Relevant theme anthologies include Cities of Wonder (anth 1966) ed Damon KNIGHT, Future City (anth 1973) ed Roger ELWOOD, and The City: 2000 A.D. (anth 1976) ed Ralph Clem, Martin Harry GREENBERG and Joseph OLANDER. [BS]See also: AUTOMATION; SOCIOLOGY. CITY BENEATH THE SEA (vt One Hour to Doomsday) 1. Made-for-tv film (1970). 20th Century-Fox TV Productions for NBC TV. Dir Irwin ALLEN, starring Stuart Whitman, Robert Wagner, Joseph Cotton, Rosemary Forsyth, Richard Basehart, Robert Colbert, Sugar Ray Robinson. Screenplay John Meredyth Lucas from a story by Allen. 100 mins, cut to 93 mins. Colour.Released outside the USA as a feature film called One Hour to Doomsday, this was a pilot for a tv series that was never made. In an incoherent jumble of over-familiar sf situations, the citizens of 21st-century Pacifica have to contend with a super-H-bomb to be exploded somewhere within their underwater city, invasion by an "unfriendly foreign power", a sea monster, rebellion, the theft of a shipment of gold from Fort Knox, and imminent destruction by the impact of a planetoid approaching Earth. This is Irwin-Allen plotting at its most typical, foretelling the DISASTER movies which would become his speciality. All ends happily. [JB/PN]2. UK tv serial for children (1962). ABC TV. Written John Lucarotti. Prod Guy Verney. 7 25min episodes. B/w. This told of a reporter and his young sidekick kidnapped to the underwater base of a mad scientist intent on world control.CBTS was the sequel to Plateau of Fear (1961). ABC TV. Written Malcolm Stuart Fellows, Sutherland Ross. Prod Guy Verney. 6 25min episodes. B/w. Thriller set in the Andes where a reporter and young sidekick investigate a strange beast thought responsible for attacks on a nuclear power plant; the true villain is a general who wants the plant for military purposes.The sequel to CBTS was Secret Beneath the Sea (1963). ABC TV. Written John Lucarotti. Prod Guy Verney. 6 25min episodes. B/w. Again in the undersea city of Aegira, the plot revolves around an ex-U-boat commander (from the earlier story) and rare metals vital for space research. [SH] CITY LIMITS Film (1984). Sho Films/Videoform/Island Alive. Dir Aaron Lipstadt, starring John Stockwell, Darrell Larson, Kim Cattrall, Rae Dawn Chong. Screenplay Don Opper, from a story by Lipstadt and James Reigle. 85 mins. Colour.Disappointing exploitation movie from the writer and director of the first-rate ANDROID (1982). Fifteen years after the USA has been almost wiped out by plague, two biker gangs in the sort of trendy post- HOLOCAUST fashions associated with the MAD MAX movies live in the City, basing their culture on comic books. A manipulative quasigovernmental agency attempts to murder the whole of one gang and conscript the other (the sociology of this being wholly unbelievable), but the kids win out with the help of kind old Black man James Earl Jones, so that the City is left safe in the hands of comics-reading Youth. [PN] CLAGETT, JOHN (HENRY) (1916- ) US writer whose first sf novel, A World Unknown (1975), is of some interest for its portrayal of an ALTERNATE-WORLD USA dominated by a Latin civilization that has never been influenced by Christianity - Jesus having never existed. In The Orange R (1978), mutants known as "Roberts" are forced to live in the radioactive wastelands of a DYSTOPIAN future America. [JC] CLAREMONT, CHRIS Working name of US writer Christopher Simon Claremont (1950- ). He first became known through his revitalization from 1975 of MARVEL COMICS's X-MEN, a title which had been temporarily retired but now became the bestselling comic in the field; CC scripted the title until he left Marvel in 1993 to begin work with Dark Horse comics. The series deals with a constantly expanding group of mutant SUPERHEROES, several female, whose relationships and conflicts are densely complicated, and who inspire sympathy both because they are adolescents with typical family problems and because society tends to reject them. CC's style, though consistent with the Marvel Group's experimental house-style, is often rather clumsy, and manifestly represents an earlier phase in the rapid evolution of the comic book than that of GRAPHIC-NOVEL writers like Frank MILLER and Alan MOORE. God Loves, Man Kills (graph 1982) was an original tale; The Uncanny X-Men (graph 1987) was assembled from the comic. The three Nicole Shea novels - FirstFlight (1987), Grounded! (1991; vt Grounded 1991 UK) - cover much of the same emotional and stylistic territory, tracing the adventures of a NASA astronaut in a NEAR-FUTURE Solar System. [NT/JC]Other works: As with many writers and illustrators involved in the fast-moving and hectic world of comics publishing, CC's bibliography is anything but easy to fix; the following titles have been confirmed: Wolverine (1985; graph coll 1988) with Frank MILLER; The Savage Land (graph 1990); and various X-Men graphic presentations, including X-Men: Asgardian Wars (graph 1990); X-Men: From the Ashes (graph 1990); Dragon Moon (1994) with Beth Fleisher, a fantasy. CLARESON, THOMAS D(EAN) (1926-1993) US editor, critic and professor of English. By the time he took his PhD at the University of Pennsylvania, (1956) he had published his first sf criticism (Science Fiction Quarterly 1954). He was perhaps best known for editing EXTRAPOLATION continuously from its founding in Dec 1959 to Winter 1989, at which point he handed over the reins to his then co-editor, Donald M. HASSLER; the rare first 10 years' issues of this journal, the oldest established academic journal about sf, were reprinted in Extrapolation; A Science Fiction Newsletter, Vols 1-10 (anth 1978) ed TDC; although inconveniently packaged - there are no running heads, and pagination is not continuous - its contents remain valuable. He was also a pioneer in editing ANTHOLOGIES of sf criticism in book form: SF: The Other Side of Realism (anth 1971); Voices for the Future: Essays on Major Science Fiction Writers Vol 1 (anth 1976) and its sequels Vol 2 (anth 1979) and Vol 3 (anth 1983), the latter with Thomas L. Wymer; and Many Futures, Many Worlds: Theme and Form in Science Fiction (anth 1977). His SF Criticism: An Annotated Checklist (1972) began a specialist research series which would be continued by Marshall B. TYMN and Roger SCHLOBIN. TDC also edited a story anthology with notes, intended to be used in education: A Spectrum of Worlds (anth 1972).TDC's most important research was in early US sf. He wrote the chapter "The Emergence of the Scientific Romance" in Neil BARRON's Anatomy of Wonder: Science Fiction (1976; rev 1981; rev 1987), revised in later editions as "The Emergence of Science Fiction: The Beginnings to the 1920s". He was general editor of GREENWOOD PRESS's (somewhat incomplete) microfilm reprint series of sf PULP MAGAZINES and, also from Greenwood, the large, wide-ranging collection Early Science Fiction Novels: A Microfiche Collection (coll 1984). Perhaps his two most important works are Science Fiction in America, 1870s-1930s: An Annotated Bibliography of Primary Sources (1984) and Some Kind of Paradise: The Emergence of American Science Fiction (dated 1985 but 1986). The latter - a historical and thematic survey rather than a critical study - is a breakthrough book in an area that was previously codified poorly and erratically; one of TDC's strategies, perhaps necessary in so little known a field, is the inclusion of much plot synopsis. This is precisely the strength of the former book, too, whose annotations are of real use to researchers who may find copies of the original works difficult to locate. In TDC's more recent book, Understanding American Science Fiction: The Formative Period, 1926-1970 (1990), the subject matter is much more familiar.TDC was chairman of the first Modern Language Association Seminar on sf in 1958, and first President of the SCIENCE FICTION RESEARCH ASSOCIATION, 1970-76. In recognition of his services to the academic study of sf he received the PILGRIM AWARD in 1977. [PN]Other works: SF: A Dream of Other Worlds (chap 1973); Robert Silverberg (chap 1983); Robert Silverberg: A Primary and Secondary Bibliography (1983); Frederik Pohl (1987).See also: BIBLIOGRAPHIES; CONCEPTUAL BREAKTHROUGH; CRITICAL AND HISTORICAL WORKS ABOUT SF; FRANCE; HISTORY OF SF; LOST WORLDS. CLARION SCIENCE FICTION WRITERS' WORKSHOP This long-standing workshop enrols beginning writers who are interested in writing sf. It consists of intensive writing and discussion sessions under the direction of known sf writers, who have included Orson Scott CARD, Terry CARR, Samuel DELANY, Thomas M. DISCH, Harlan ELLISON, Karen Joy FOWLER, John KESSEL, Damon KNIGHT, Ursula K. LE GUIN, Tim POWERS, Lewis SHINER and Kate WILHELM. The first three sessions were held at Clarion State College in Pennsylvania in the summers of 1968-70. In 1971 "Clarion East" was held in Tulane University and "Clarion West" in Seattle. Clarion West soon folded, but was later re-established in Seattle (8 sessions to 1991). In 1972 Clarion East moved to Michigan State University, where it remains (as just Clarion; 24 sessions to 1991). Clarion has been more successful than many writers' workshops and has produced notable alumni, including Ed BRYANT, F.M. BUSBY, Octavia E. BUTLER, Gerard F. CONWAY, George Alec EFFINGER, Vonda N. MCINTYRE, Kim Stanley ROBINSON, Lucius SHEPARD and Lisa TUTTLE. The original director of Clarion was Robin Scott WILSON, who also edited the first three anthologies of students' and teachers' work: Clarion (anth 1971), #II (anth 1972) and #III (anth 1973). Clarion SF (anth 1977) was ed Kate Wilhelm; The Clarion Awards (anth 1984) ed Damon Knight covers the previous six years of Clarion. [PN] CLARK, CURT Donald E. WESTLAKE. CLARK, RONALD W(ILLIAM) (1916-1987) UK writer and journalist, active mainly with nonfiction since before WWII. He began publishing sf with "The Man who Went Back" for the London Evening Standard in 1949, but has not been a prolific contributor to the genre. His first sf novel, Queen Victoria's Bomb: The Disclosures of Professor Franklin Huxtable, MA, Cantab. (1967), achieved some success, and was one of the numerous contributions to the subgenre of sf works that exhibit nostalgia for a previous generation's view of the future; it could be regarded as a precursor to STEAMPUNK. The Bomb that Failed (1969; vt The Last Year of the Old World 1970 UK) is a kind of sequel, in which a failed nuclear test at Alamagordo changes history. [JC]Other works (nonfiction): The Huxleys (1968); J.B.S.: The Life and Work of J.B.S. Haldane (1968); Einstein: The Life and Times (1971); The Life of Bertrand Russell (1975), all nonfiction.See also: ALTERNATE WORLDS; NUCLEAR POWER. CLARKE, ARTHUR C(HARLES) (1917- ) UK author, resident since 1956 in Sri Lanka. Born in Minehead, Somerset, after leaving school ACC came to London in 1936 to work as a civil-servant auditor with HM Exchequer. He was active in fan circles before WWII, in which he served (1941-6) as a radar instructor with the RAF, rising to the rank of flight-lieutenant. After WWII he entered King's College, London, in 1948 taking his BSc with first-class honours in physics and mathematics.ACC's strong interest in the frontiers of science was evident early. He was chairman of the British Interplanetary Society 1946-7, and again 1950-53. His first professionally published sf story was "Loophole" for ASF in Apr 1946, though his first sale was "Rescue Party", which appeared in ASF in May 1946. In his early years as a writer he three times used the pseudonym Charles Willis, and wrote once as E.G. O'Brien. These four stories all appeared in UK magazines 1947-51. Four of ACC's early stories, written for FANZINES (1937-42), were reprinted in The Best of Arthur C. Clarke 1937-71 (coll 1973 UK; reissued in 2 vols, 1977, the first being inaccurately titled 1932-1955) ed Angus WELLS; a 1930s poem and essay appear in The Fantastic Muse (coll 1992 chap). ACC also worked as adviser for the comic DAN DARE - PILOT OF THE FUTURE for its first six months in 1950.ACC's early stories are very much GENRE SF, neatly constructed, usually turning on a single scientific point, often ending with a sting in the tail. Some are rather ponderously humorous. His first two novels were published in 1951: Prelude to Space (1951 US; rev 1953 UK; rev 1954 US; vt Master of Space 1961 US; vt The Space Dreamers 1969 US), being GALAXY SCIENCE FICTION NOVEL #3, and The Sands of Mars (1951). Both suffer from the rather wooden prose which ACC later fashioned into a more flexible instrument, though he was never able to escape an occasional stiffness in his writing. They are, in effect, works of optimistic propaganda for science ( OPTIMISM AND PESSIMISM), with human problems rather mechanically worked out against a background of scientific discovery. It was with the science that ACC's imagination flared into life. Islands in the Sky (1952 US) followed the same pattern; it is a juvenile about a boy in an orbital space station.A new note appeared in Expedition to Earth (coll 1953 US). This includes the short story "The Sentinel", which had appeared in 10 Story Fantasy in 1951 as "Sentinel of Eternity". A simple but haunting story, it tells of the discovery of an ALIEN artefact, created by an advanced race millions of years earlier, standing enigmatically on top of a mountain on the Moon. Many years later this story became the basis of 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY (1968), for which ACC wrote the script with Stanley KUBRICK. The novelization, 2001: A Space Odyssey * (1968 US; with 2 related stories added, rev as coll 1990 UK), was written by ACC alone on the basis of the script after the film had been made. An account of ACC's connection with the film can be found in his The Lost Worlds of 2001 (1972 US), which also prints alternative script versions of key scenes.With "The Sentinel" came the first clear appearance of the ACC paradox: the man who of all sf writers is most closely identified with knowledgeable, technological HARD SF is strongly attracted to the metaphysical, even to the mystical; the man who in sf is often seen as standing for the boundless optimism of the soaring human spirit, and for the idea (strongly presented in John W. CAMPBELL Jr's ASF) that there is nothing humanity cannot accomplish, is best remembered for the image of mankind being as children next to the ancient, inscrutable wisdom of alien races. There is something attractive, even moving, in what can be seen in Freudian terms as an unhappy mankind crying out for a lost father; certainly it is the closest thing sf has yet produced to an analogy for RELIGION, and the longing for God.Although this theme is well seen in "The Sentinel", and even better seen in the iconography of the film 2001: A Space Odyssey, at the end of which mankind is seen literally as a foetus, ACC gave it its most potent literary expression in two more books from 1953 which are still considered by many critics to be his finest, and in which he comes closest to continuing the tradition of the UK SCIENTIFIC ROMANCE. They are Against the Fall of Night (1948 Startling Stories; 1953 US; exp and much rev vt The City and the Stars 1956 US) - also assembled with "The Lion of Comarre" (1949 TWS) as The Lion of Comarre and Against the Fall of Night (coll 1968 US) - and CHILDHOOD'S END (1950 NW as "Guardian Angel"; exp 1953 US; rev 1990 UK).Both the original and the longer versions of Against the Fall of Night are readily available. Indeed, the shorter version was republished in Beyond the Fall of Night (omni 1990 US misleadingly credited - since it appears from the cover to be a single novel - to ACC and Gregory Benford; vt Arthur C Clarke - Against the Fall of Night/Gregory Benford - Beyond the Fall of Night UK 1991), along with a sequel, very different in tone and theme, by Gregory BENFORD. The longer version, The City and the Stars, is one of the strongest tales of CONCEPTUAL BREAKTHROUGH in genre sf. Alvin, a young man in the enclosed utopian city of Diaspar, on Earth in the FAR FUTURE, becomes impatient at the TECHNOLOGY-mediated stasis of the perfect life, and after many adventures makes his way outside the city to Lys, another UTOPIA but of a different kind, which stresses closeness to Nature. Ultimately Alvin finds an alien spaceship left behind millennia ago, visits the stars, and finally discovers the true nature of the cosmic perspective which has been hidden from both Lys and Diaspar. The final passages blend a sense of loss and of transcendence with an almost mystical intensity. ACC began working on this story as early as 1937, and it is clearly central to all his thinking and feeling; it is perhaps his most memorable work, and distinctly superior to the more awkward earlier version. It owes something to the evolutionary perspective of Olaf STAPLEDON, whose works ACC greatly admired, as does CHILDHOOD'S END, in which mankind reaches transcendence under the tutelage of satanic-seeming aliens, eventually to fuse with a cosmic overmind which is an apotheosis forever to be denied both to their parents, who are ordinary humans, and to the alien tutors.ACC continued to publish sf with some frequency over the next decade, with Earthlight (1951 TWS; exp 1955 US), Reach for Tomorrow (coll 1956 US), The Deep Range (1954 Star SF #3; exp 1957 US), Tales from the White Hart (coll of linked stories 1957 US), The Other Side of the Sky (coll 1958 US), A Fall of Moondust (1961 US), Tales of Ten Worlds (coll 1962 US), Dolphin Island (1963 US), a juvenile, and Glide Path (1963 US), ACC's only non-sf novel, about the development of radar. The most interesting of these are The Deep Range, about NEAR-FUTURE farming UNDER THE SEA, containing some of ACC's most evocative writing, and A Fall of Moondust, a realistic account - in the light of theories about the Moon's surface now known to have been mistaken - of an accident to a surface transport on a lightly colonized Moon. ACC's "The Star" (1955), a short story of great pathos describing the discovery that the star put in the sky by God to prefigure the Birth at Bethlehem was a supernova that destroyed an entire alien race, won a HUGO.By the 1960s most of ACC's creative energies had gone into writing nonfiction books and articles, many of them - not listed here - about undersea exploration; he was an enthusiastic skin-diver himself, one reason for his residence in Sri Lanka. His popularizations of science, which won him the UNESCO Kalinga Prize in 1962, are closely related to his fiction, in that the stories often fictionalize specific ideas discussed in the factual pieces. His most important nonfiction works, interesting still though some are rather out-of-date, are: Interplanetary Flight (1950; rev 1960), The Exploration of Space (1951; rev 1959; original text with new intro 1979), The Exploration of the Moon (1954), The Young Traveller in Space (1954; vt Going into Space US; vt The Scottie Book of Space Travel UK; rev with Robert SILVERBERG vt Into Space 1971 US), The Making of a Moon: The Story of the Earth Satellite Programme (1957; rev 1958 US), Voice Across the Sea (coll 1958 UK; rev 1974 UK; much rev, vt How the World was One: Beyond the Global Village 1992 UK), The Challenge of the Space Ship (coll 1959 US), Profiles of the Future (coll 1962; rev 1973; rev 1984), Man and Space (1964; with the Editors of Life), Voices From the Sky (coll 1965 US), The Promise of Space (1968), Beyond Jupiter: The Worlds of Tomorrow (1972 US; with Chesley BONESTELL), Report on Planet 3 and other Speculations (coll 1972), The View from Serendip (coll 1977 US), 1984: Spring: A Choice of Futures (coll 1984 US) and Ascent to Orbit: A Scientific Autobiography: The Technical Writings of Arthur C. Clarke (coll 1984 US). ACC's early professional experience as assistant editor of Science Abstracts 1949-50, before he became a full-time writer, has amply paid off. The Exploration of Space won a nonfiction INTERNATIONAL FANTASY AWARD in 1952. His science writing is lucid and interesting; his only rival as an sf writer of significance who is also of importance as a scientific journalist is Isaac ASIMOV. ACC became well known all over the world when he appeared as commentator on CBS TV for the Apollo 11, 12 and 15 Moon missions.A good retrospective collection of stories, all but one reprinted from collections listed above, is The Nine Billion Names of God (coll 1967 US). Since 1962 only a small amount of fiction by ACC has appeared in sf magazines, though two of his most interesting stories date from this period: "Sunjammer" (1965; vt "The Wind from the Sun"), which is about the SOLAR WIND, and A Meeting with Medusa (1971 Playboy; 1988 chap dos US), winner of a NEBULA in 1972 for Best Novella, the story of a CYBORG explorer meeting ALIEN life in the atmosphere of JUPITER. Both stories are reprinted in The Wind from the Sun (coll 1972 US; with 3 vignettes added rev 1987 US), his sixth and most recent collection (not counting reprint volumes). The most comprehensive, though by no means complete, selection of ACC's short fiction is the misleadingly titled More than One Universe: The Collected Stories of Arthur C. Clarke (omni 1991 US), collecting Tales of Ten Worlds, The Other Side of the Sky, The Nine Billion Names of God and The Wind from the Sun, with several stories dropped.After the success of 2001: A Space Odyssey, ACC became perhaps the best-known sf writer in the world, and in the USA by far and away the most popular foreign sf writer. A few years later he signed a contract, for a sum of money larger than anything previously paid in sf publishing, to write three further novels. These turned out to be Rendezvous with Rama (1973 UK), Imperial Earth: A Fantasy of Love and Discord (cut 1975; with 10,000 words restored 1976 US) and The Fountains of Paradise (1979 UK; with exp afterword 1989). All were bestsellers; all had a mixed critical reception, though Rendezvous with Rama scooped the awards: the Hugo, Nebula, JOHN W. CAMPBELL MEMORIAL AWARD and BRITISH SCIENCE FICTION AWARD. To what extent the book deserved it, and to what extent the awards merely celebrated the return of a much loved figure to the field after many years' comparative silence is unclear. All the old ACC themes are there in the story of a huge, apparently derelict alien spaceship which enters the Solar System, and its exploration by a party of humans. As an artefact, the spaceship is a symbol of almost mythic significance, enigmatic, powerful and fascinating ( BIG DUMB OBJECTS; DISCOVERY AND INVENTION), and the book derives considerable power from its description. The human characterization, on the other hand, is rather reminiscent of boys' fiction from an earlier era. Imperial Earth tells of relations between Earth and the OUTER PLANETS, and contains a rather meandering intrigue involving CLONES; there are some interesting speculations about BLACK HOLES. Fountains of Paradise, a much better book than Imperial Earth - it won the 1980 Hugo for Best Novel - tells of the construction on Earth of a space elevator 36,000km high, and combines ACC's favourite themes of technological evolution and mankind's apotheosis with moving directness; it is the most considerable work of the latter part of ACC's career.The 1980s and 1990s provided an astonishing coda to all of this. They have - in terms of the number of books appearing with ACC's name on the cover-been unexpectedly productive, unexpectedly because ACC was well into his 60s, and had previously announced that Fountains of Paradise would be his last work of fiction. However, soon there appeared 2010: Odyssey Two (1982 US), a sequel to 2001: A Space Odyssey. This was made into a film directed by Peter Hyams, 2010 (1984). Neither book nor film is as distinguished as the original, but the book is better than the film. It was followed by 2061: Odyssey Three (1988 UK), which being open-ended suggests that the Odyssey saga of alien intervention may not yet be complete. A little earlier ACC had published The Songs of Distant Earth (1986 US), which greatly expands on the story of the same title published in If in 1958. Quietly and without much action it recounts the meeting of an isolated human colony on a remote planet with one of the last spaceships to leave a doomed Earth, and the cultural clashes that follow.In the mid-1980s ACC had developed a debilitating and continuing illness affecting the nervous system, but despite this he maintained considerable literary activity. His illness meant that much of his work was necessarily collaborative. While some of this was found disappointing by the critics, and even reviled, there is considerable gallantry in his having made the effort at all, more especially as the profit, it has been said, is intended to shore up various charitable enterprises ACC has founded, in order to render them financially secure after his death. The collaborative enterprises have included Cradle (1988 UK) with Gentry LEE and, also with Lee, three sequels to RENDEZVOUS WITH RAMA: Rama II (1989 UK), The Garden of Rama (1991 US) and Rama Revealed (1993). Most of the writing seems to have been Lee's, whose style is less compact and more stereotyped than ACC's. All these books have moments of embarrassing prose reminiscent of popular romance, though they are progressively more confidently written. A more interesting partnership was that between Gregory Benford and Clarke, the former (as noted above) writing a sequel to the latter's 1948 novella Against the Fall of Night. ACC has also franchised out ( SHARED WORLDS) the Venus Prime series to Paul PREUSS (whom see for titles), each novel having some basis in an ACC short story. The series begins with Arthur C. Clarke's Venus Prime, Volume 1: Breaking Strain (1987), based on ACC's "Breaking Strain" (TWS 1949). The fact-and-fiction anthology Project Solar Sail (anth 1990 US) has a cover which says it is ed ACC, but a reading of the title page suggests the true ed, here "Managing Editor", was David BRIN.During the period since 1988 there have been, moreover, two books by ACC alone. The first is Astounding Days: A Science Fictional Autobiography (1989), consisting of enjoyable reminiscences of his own literary life, with a good amount of material on other writers, both these topics being often seen in relation to the magazine ASTOUNDING SCIENCE-FICTION. The second, somewhat surprisingly after all the collaborations, was another solo novel, The Ghost from the Grand Banks (1990 UK), an interesting tale of an attempt to raise the Titanic in the early 21st century; it is indubitably Clarkean, though itself a little ghostlike, much of the story pared to the bone, though typically containing a technical (and neatly symbolic) diversion into the mathematics of the Mandelbrot set. The Hammer of God (1992 Time Magazine; exp 1993), which hangs a number of speculations on a thin narrative involving an asteroid bent on colliding with Earth, is also telegraphic in effect.ACC is patron of the SCIENCE FICTION FOUNDATION, and at the ceremony proclaiming the housing of its research collection with the University of Liverpool, he received an honorary doctorate from the University, by videolink. He has received many awards, including the Association of Space Explorers' Special Achievement Award. He has presented a number of tv programmes, including the series Arthur C. Clarke's Mysterious World at the beginning of the 1980s. He received a Nebula Grand Master Award in 1986.For many readers ACC is the very personification of sf. Never a "literary" author, he nonetheless writes always with lucidity and candour, often with grace, sometimes with a cold, sharp evocativeness that has produced some of the most memorable images in sf. He is deservedly seen as a central figure in the development of post-WWII sf, especially in his liberal, optimistic view of the possible benefits of technology (though one that is by no means unaware of its dangers), and in his development of the Stapledonian theme of cosmic perspective, in which mankind is seen as reaching out like a child to an alien Universe which may treat us as a godlike father would, or may respond with cool indifference. [PN]Other works: Across the Sea of Stars (omni 1959 US of 18 short stories from previous colls and the novels CHILDHOOD'S END and Earthlight); From the Ocean, From the Stars (omni 1961 US of The Deep Range, The Other Side of the Sky and The City and the Stars); Prelude to Mars (omni 1965 US of 16 stories from previous collections plus Prelude to Space and The Sands of Mars); An Arthur C. Clarke Omnibus (omni 1965 UK of Childhood's End, Prelude to Space and Expedition to Earth); An Arthur C. Clarke Second Omnibus (omni 1968 UK of A Fall of Moondust, Earthlight and The Sands of Mars); Of Time and Stars (coll 1972 UK), a collection for children, all reprinted from previous collections; Four Great SF Novels (omni 1978 UK); The Sentinel (coll 1983 US), reprints; Tales From Planet Earth (coll 1989 UK) ed anon by Martin H. GREENBERG, the only previously uncollected story being "On Golden Seas" (1987 Omni).Nonfiction: Arthur C. Clarke's Mysterious World (1980) and Arthur C. Clarke's World of Strange Powers (1985), both with Simon Welfare and John Fairley, both tv-series spin-offs largely written by Welfare and Fairley; The Odyssey File (1985 UK) with Peter Hyams, communications exchanged between author and director about the making of the film 2010; Arthur C. Clarke's July 20, 2019: A Day in the Life of the 21st Century (1986 US), illustrated; Arthur C. Clarke's Chronicles of the Strange and Mysterious (1987), again with Welfare and Fairley; The Fantastic Muse (coll 1992 chap), fanzine material from the 1930s; How the World Was One: Beyond the Global Village (coll 1992; vt How the World Was One: The Turbulent History of Global Communications 1993), partially based on Voices Across the Sea (1958 US); By Space Possessed: Essays on the Exploration of Space (coll 1993), mostly assembled from previous books; The Snows of Olympus: A Garden on Mars (1994), which advocates the terraforming of Mars.As Editor: Time Probe (anth 1966 US); The Coming of the Space Age (anth of nonfiction pieces 1967); Science Fiction Hall of Fame, Vol 4 (anth 1981 as ed by ACC; vt Science Fiction Hall of Fame, Vol III: Nebula Winners 1965-69 US 1981 as ed by ACC with Geo W. PROCTOR - Proctor did the actual editing).About the author: Arthur C. Clarke (anth 1977) ed Joseph D. OLANDER and Martin Harry GREENBERG; Arthur C. Clarke: Starmont Readers' Guide No 1 (chap 1979) by Eric S. RABKIN; Arthur C. Clarke: A Primary and Secondary Bibliography (1984) by David N. SAMUELSON; The Odyssey of Arthur C. Clarke: An Authorized Biography (1992) by Neil McAleer.See also: ARTHUR C. CLARKE AWARD; ASTEROIDS; CHILDREN IN SF; CHILDREN'S SF; CITIES; CLUB STORY; COLONIZATION OF OTHER WORLDS; COMPUTERS; DEL REY BOOKS; DIMENSIONS; END OF THE WORLD; ESCHATOLOGY; EVOLUTION; FANTASTIC VOYAGES; FANTASY; FUTUROLOGY; GENERATION STARSHIPS; GODS AND DEMONS; GOLDEN AGE OF SF; GRAVITY; HISTORY OF SF; HIVE-MINDS; HUMOUR; INVASION; LEISURE; LONGEVITY (IN WRITERS AND PUBLICATIONS); MAGIC; MARS; MATHEMATICS; MEDIA LANDSCAPE; METAPHYSICS; MOON; MUSIC; MYTHOLOGY; PASTORAL; PERCEPTION; PHYSICS; POWER SOURCES; PREDICTION; PSI POWERS; RADIO; ROCKETS; SCIENTISTS; SPACE FLIGHT; SPACE HABITATS; SPACESHIPS; STARS; SUN; SUPERMAN; TERRAFORMING; TIME TRAVEL; TRANSPORTATION; VIRTUAL REALITY. CLARKE'S SATELLITE For pulp SF writers of the early 20th century, global communication was just a dream. Then in 1945, Arthur C. Clarke, a 28-year-old radar instructor with the RAF, published a paper suggesting that satellites orbiting the Earth could be used to relay radio signals around the globe.He noted that a satellite orbiting 22,250 miles above the equator would take exactly 24 hours to go around the Earth and would therefore appear to hang motionless in the sky. A satellite in such an orbit could create a communication link between continents and across oceans. Clarke's paper proposed using manned satellites and radios powered by vacuum tubes, although actual communications satellites today are unmanned and use transistors - which were unknown when Clarke wrote his paper.Clarke's imaginative powers were later directed to science fiction, and he went on to become one of the best-known and best-loved writers in SF history. Today he lives on the island of Sri Lanka, connected to the global village through a communications satellite located in what is now called "Clarke Orbit." CLARKE, A(UBREY) V(INCENT) [r] Kenneth BULMER. CLARKE, BODEN Robert REGINALD. CLARKE, I(GNATIUS) F(REDERIC) (1918- ) Intelligence officer and code-cracker during WWII, and retired Professor of English (from 1964) at the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow. His first major publication was the BIBLIOGRAPHY The Tale of the Future: From the Beginning to the Present Day: A Checklist of those Satires, Ideal States, Imaginary Wars and Invasions, Political Warnings and Forecasts, Interplanetary Voyages and Scientific Romances - All Located in an Imaginary Future Period - that have been Published in the UK between 1644 and 1960 (1961; rev 1972; rev 1978); the third edition carries the story to 1976. This work is very useful but not always reliable, being occasionally weak on variant titles and plot summaries, and is far from comprehensive. These weaknesses lie primarily in the period from 1940 on, and IFC-whose work in the earlier period was pioneering-has since publicly regretted the fact that he did not stop at the year 1939.IFC's next important contribution to sf studies was Voices Prophesying War 1763-1984 (1966; rev vt Voices Prophesying War: Future Wars 1763-3749 1992), by a long way the most comprehensive account of the future- WAR story. This was followed by The Pattern of Expectation: 1644-2001 (1979), which ranges widely through the literature of the future from its earliest days to the most recent forecasts of FUTUROLOGY, and takes in much work which tends to be ignored by historians of genre sf. This book broke new ground in the history and sociology of ideas, focusing on the interrelation between differing expectations and PREDICTIONS of the future in different historical periods and the characteristic future images they yielded, in pictures as well as in words. In most respects it supersedes W.H.G. ARMYTAGE's Yesterday's Tomorrows (1967). [PN]See also: CRITICAL AND HISTORICAL WORKS ABOUT SF; DYSTOPIAS; HISTORY OF SF; INVASION; NEAR FUTURE; PILGRIM AWARD; PROTO SCIENCE FICTION. CLARKE, ROBERT Charles PLATT. CLARK PUBLISHING CO. IMAGINATION; OTHER WORLDS SCIENCE STORIES. CLARKSON, HELEN Working name of Helen Worrell Clarkson McCloy (1904-1993), most of whose works are detective novels written as Helen McCloy. Her sole sf work, The Last Day: A Novel of the Day After Tomorrow (1959), tellingly describes a nuclear HOLOCAUST from the viewpoint of an isolated woman, whose island retreat proves in the end no refuge against the consequences of final war. [JC] CLASS OF 1999 Film (1990). Lightning/Original/Vestron. Prod and dir Mark L. Lester, starring Bradley Gregg, Traci Lin, John P. Ryan, Pam Grier, Patrick Kilpatrick, Stacy Keach, Malcolm McDowell. Screenplay C. Courtney Joyner, based on a story by Lester. 98 mins. Colour. In the USA of 1999 most CITIES have no-go "Free Fire" zones ruled by teenage gangs, and many schools are closed. As an experiment, the Department of Educational Defense uses ex-military ANDROIDS for teachers, re-opening a school in Seattle. The androids - even the attractive Black "chemistry teacher from Hell" (Grier) - revert to military conditioning and run amok with disciplinary measures against the drug-taking, gang-warring students, killing many. This violent, amusingly over-the-top exploitation movie features every killer- ROBOT cliche found in movies from WESTWORLD (1973) to The TERMINATOR (1984), but for a low-budget film Eric Allard's mechanical effects are good, and the direction is capable. The sequel is Class of 1999 II: The Substitute(1993), dir Spiro Razatos, screenplay Mark Sevi, starring Sasha Mitchell, Nick Cassavetes, Caitlin Dulany, Jack Knight and Rick Hill, 87 mins. This is a more modest film, quite well made, with an interesting plot twist that calls into question the science fictionality of the whole thing. The story tells, or appears to, of yet another battle 'droid masquerading as a substitute teacher and wreaking havoc among particularly unpleasant and violent high-school students. [PN] CLASS OF 1999 II: THE SUBSTITUTE CLASS OF 1999. CLAUDY, CARL H(ARRY) (1879-1957) US author of some 20 sf stories, all for the magazine American Boy. Four were revised and expanded into a series of juvenile novels with the general heading Adventures in the Unknown: The Mystery Men of Mars (1933), A Thousand Years a Minute (1933), The Land of No Shadow (1933) and The Blue Grotto Terror (1934). This was probably the most vigorous and imaginative juvenile sf book series up to that time. Two of these stories in their original magazine form, together with "Tongue of the Beast" (1939), appeared in The Year after Tomorrow (anth 1954) ed Lester DEL REY, Carl Carmer (1893-1976) and Cecile Matschat. [JE]See also: BOYS' PAPERS; CHILDREN'S SF; JUVENILE SERIES. CLAYTON, (PATRICIA) JO (1939- ) US writer, most of whose work consists of a long series of science-fantasy SPACE OPERAS of extended quests in highly coloured venues. The sequence divides into the Diadem books - Diadem from the Stars (1977), which romantically sets out the epic adventures of a young girl electronically attached to the power-bestowing diadem of the title, as she searches for the planet which is the home of her mother's super-race,Lamarchos (1978), Irsud (1978), Maeve (1979), Star Hunters (1980), The Nowhere Hunt (1981), Ghosthunt (1983), The Snares of Ibex (1984) and Quester's Endgame (1986) - and the volumes dedicated to Shadith's Quest: Shadowplay (1990), Shadowspeer (1990 and Shadowkill (1991). The speculative element in these titles does not significantly figure; but the differing venues, reminiscent of the worlds of Leigh BRACKETT, are depicted with some richness. Shadow of the Warmaster (1988) is an sf novel with thriller elements. [JC]Other works: The Duel of Sorcery books, comprising Moongather (1982), Moonscatter (1983) and Changer's Moon (1985), followed by the connected Dancer's sequence, comprising Dancer's Rise (1993), Serpent Waltz (1994) and Dance Down the Stars (1994); A Bait of Dreams: a Five-Summer Quest (fixup 1985); the Skeen sequence, comprising Skeen's Leap (1986), Skeen's Return (1987) and Skeen's Search (1987); Drinker of Souls (1986), Blue Magic (1988) and A Gathering of Stones (1989), these three assembled as The Soul Drinker (omni 1989), followed by the Wild Magic trilogy, comprising Wild Magic (1991), Wildfire (1992) and The Magic Wars (1993). CLAYTON MAGAZINES ASTOUNDING SCIENCE-FICTION. CLEMENS, BRIAN [r] The AVENGERS . CLEMENS, SAMUEL L. [r] Mark TWAIN. CLEMENT, HAL Working name used for his sf by US writer Harry Clement Stubbs (1922- ); he uses his surname for science articles and paints as George Richard. He holds degrees in astronomy, chemistry and education, and was long employed as a highschool science teacher. From the beginning of his career HC was associated with ASF, where his first story, "Proof", appeared in 1942, at the peak of the GOLDEN AGE OF SF. His work has from the first been characterized by the complexity and compelling interest of the scientific (or at any rate scientifically literate) ideas which dominate each story. He is not noted as a stylist, nor is his interest in character depiction very strong. Many of his books can for pages read like a dramatized exposition of ideas, absorbing though at times disconcerting for the novel reader. This is certainly the case with Needle (1949 ASF; exp 1950; vt From Outer Space 1957), his first novel, a rather ponderous alien- INVASION story with detection elements and a juvenile protagonist in a tale where the invader is a police-parasite chasing another (malign) parasite that has possessed the boy's father; the boy, with the good alien in tow, helps to drive the bad alien from his Dad. It is a highly loaded theme, but is told without any of the necessary resonance, nor does its sequel, Through the Eye of a Needle (1978), written as a juvenile, manage to cope any better with the human implications of its material.HC's most famous - and far better - work is contained in his main series, a loose sequence consisting of MISSION OF GRAVITY (ASF 1953; cut 1954; text restored with additions and 1 added story, as coll 1978), Close to Critical (1958 ASF; 1964) and Star Light (1971). The third volume is a direct sequel to the first, while some of the characters in the second appear in the third as well, Elise ("Easy") Rich in Close to Critical being the "Easy" Hoffman of Star Light, 25 years older. MISSION OF GRAVITY, one of the best loved novels in sf, is set on the intriguingly plausible high-gravity planet of Mesklin, inhabited by HC's most interesting ALIENS. The plot concerns the efforts of the Mesklinite Captain Barlennan and his crew to assist a human team in extracting a vital component from a crashed space probe; the humans cannot perform the feat, because Mesklin's GRAVITY varies from an equatorial 3g to a polar 700g. Barlennan's arduous trek is inherently fascinating, but perhaps even more engaging is HC's presentation of the captain as a kind of Competent Man in extremis, a born engineer, a lover of knowledge. These characteristics permeate the texts of everything that HC writes, even those stories whose protagonists are no more than pretexts for the unfolding of the genuine text - which is the physical Universe itself.HC's most successful novels apply the basic plot of MISSION OF GRAVITY to fundamentally similar basic storylines - a character, usually human, must cope with an alien environment, with or without the help of natives, as in Iceworld (1953), Cycle of Fire (1957) and the stories assembled in Natives of Space (coll 1965) and Small Changes (coll 1969; vt Space Lash 1969). HC's only collaboration, "Planet for Plunder" (1957) with Sam MERWIN Jr, demonstrates his fascination with alien environments and viewpoints, as he initially wrote the story entirely from a nonhuman standpoint; Merwin, acting for Satellite Magazine, where it appeared, wrote an additional 10,000 words from a human standpoint.HC brought a new seriousness to the extrapolative HARD-SF physical-sciences story, and his vividness of imagination - his sense that the Universe is wonderful - has generally overcome the awkwardness of his narrative technique. He is a figure of importance to the genre. [JC]Other works: Ranger Boys in Space (1956), a juvenile; Some Notes on XI Bootis (1960 chap), a lecture; First Flights to the Moon (anth 1970), nonfiction; Ocean on Top (1967 If; 1973); The Best of Hal Clement (coll 1979); The Nitrogen Fix (1980); Intuit (coll of linked stories 1987), four Laird Cunningham tales; Still River (1987); Isaac's Universe: Fossil* (1993), tied to the works of Isaac ASIMOV.About the author: Hal Clement (1982) by Donald M. HASSLER; Hal Clement, Scientist with a Mission: A Working Bibliography (1989 chap) by Gordon BENSON Jr.See also: CONCEPTUAL BREAKTHROUGH; CRIME AND PUNISHMENT; ECOLOGY; FANTASTIC VOYAGES; PARASITISM AND SYMBIOSIS; ROBERT HALE LIMITED; SCIENTIFIC ERRORS; STARS; SUN; UNDER THE SEA. CLEMENTS, DAVID [r] ROBERT HALE LIMITED. CLEVE, JOHN Pseudonym used mainly by Andrew J. OFFUTT for several erotic sf novels and for the first 6 vols of the 19-vol Spaceways sequence; most of the rest were jointly authored. Offutt's collaborators included G.C. EDMONDSON, Roland GREEN, Jack C. HALDEMAN, Robin Kincaid, Victor KOMAN, Geo W. PROCTOR and Dwight V. SWAIN. CLICHES Sf cliches have developed, perhaps, partly out of a need for identification of stories as genuine sf - readers know where they are with a time-space warp - but mainly out of the lazy and parsimonious recycling of ideas at every level. The most obvious are cliche gadgets ( BLASTER, ANDROID, HYPERSPACE drive, CYBORG, TIME MACHINE, brain suspended in aquarium, FORCE FIELD, food pill, ANTIGRAVITY shield, translating machine, judiciary COMPUTER), but major sf cliche themes are also old friends (daring conquest of the Galaxy; scientist goes too far; witch-hunt for telepaths; post- HOLOCAUST barbarism; triumph of Yankee knowhow). A list of sf cliche characters might begin with mad SCIENTISTS (Frankenstein to Dr Strangelove), though scientists may also be either young, muscular and idealistic or else elderly, absentminded and eccentric. Cliche WOMEN AS PORTRAYED IN SF normally have no character above the neck ( SEX). Some are sexy and helpless (often lab assistants or daughters of elderly scientists, rescued from danger by young scientists), break into hysterical laughter and need a slap, faint during critical fight scenes, and twist their fragile ankles during the flight through the jungle. Others are sexy and threatening (Amazon Queens from She to Wonder Woman) or sexy but ignorant tomboys (as in FORBIDDEN PLANET). Since the advent of FEMINISM, however, women are less commonly weak ("She flexed her mighty thews"). Cliche CHILDREN IN SF are hardly more variable: some are MUTANT geniuses, possess magical or PSI POWERS, or prove mankind's only link with alien invaders by virtue of their innocence. With "The Small Assassin" (1946), Ray BRADBURY began a new line of sf cliche kids who, after menacing mankind in many of his stories, turned up to menace again in John WYNDHAM's The Midwich Cuckoos (1957; vt Village of the Damned) and in the film IT'S ALIVE! Sf cliche MACHINE characters must be comic (in many Isaac ASIMOV stories), horrifying (from the GOLEM to the DALEKS) or sometimes both (from Nathaniel HAWTHORNE's dancing partner in "The Artist of the Beautiful" [1844] to HAL in 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY [1968]); they are seldom allowed as much thought or emotion as even BEMS or other minatory extraterrestrials. Among MONSTERS, giantism, dwarfism, scales, hair, slime, claws and tentacles prevail. H.G. WELLS first used octopuses in "The Sea Raiders" (1897); other writers kept the loathsome tentacles waving for half a century, up to and beyond IT CAME FROM BENEATH THE SEA [1955].Sf cliche plots and plot devices are so numerous that any list must be incomplete. We have the feeble old nightwatchman left to guard the smouldering meteorite crater overnight ("I'll be all right, yessirree"); the doomed society of lotus-eaters; civilization's future depending upon the outcome of a chess game, the answer to a riddle, or the discovery of a simple formula ("a one-in-a-million chance, but so crazy it just might work!"); shapeshifting aliens ("one of us aboard this ship is not human"); invincible aliens ("the billion-megaton blast had no more effect than the bite of a Sirian flea"); alien invaders finally stopped by ordinary water (as in films of both The DAY OF THE TRIFFIDS [1963] and The Wizard of Oz [1939]); the ANDROID spouse who cuts a finger and bleeds machine-oil; the spouse possessed or hypnotized by aliens ("darling, you've been acting so strangely since your trip to Ganymede"); the disguised alien sniffed out by "his" pet dog, who never acted this way before; destruction of giant computer brain by a simple paradox ("when is a door not a door?"); robot rebellion ("yes, 'Master'"); a Doppelganger in the corridors of time ("it was - himself!"); Montagues and Capulets living in PARALLEL WORLDS; evil Master of the World stopping to smirk before killing hero; everyone controlled by alien mind-rays except one man; Oedipus kills great-great-grandad; world is saved by instant technology ("it may have looked like just a hunk of breadboard, a few widgets and wires - but wow!"); a youth elixir - but at what terrible price?; thick-headed scientist tampers unwittingly with elemental forces better left in the hands of the Deity; IMMORTALITY tempts Nature to a terrible revenge; monster destroys its creator; dying alien race must breed with earthling models and actresses; superior aliens step in to save mankind from self-destruction (through H-bombs, POLLUTION, fluoridation, decadence); Dr X's laboratory ( ISLAND, planet) goes up in flames ...Pulp can always be recycled.But, then again, it is always possible to add new pulp to old, as happened in the 1980s, when new cliches appeared while most of the old ones continued. They were mostly found in films, but some were in books, too: kids playing with computers start or wage actual wars without knowing it; Japanese advertising appears everywhere from posters to retinas; GENETIC ENGINEERING produces warring subcultures; expanding BLACK HOLES at the galactic centre are the legacy of wars between superbeings; kids TIME-TRAVEL into the past and invent rock'n'roll; alien cops buddy up with Earth cops to nab alien criminals; unemotional teachers and scientists turn out to be killer android/robots; vast alien artefacts prove to have extensions infinite in time and/or space or to lead somewhere else ( BIG DUMB OBJECTS); future people obsessed with 1950s rock'n'roll (Stephen KING, Allen STEELE); God is an AI; an alien virus turns us all into cannibalistic zombies; transplant technology leads to sex orgies (severed heads have cunnilingus, penis grafts increase libido). An old cliche that returns more regularly than Halley's Comet, but especially at around the same time, has gigantic objects in space impacting with Earth. Two promising new cliches that could not have been predicted are spacefaring trees (Stephen BAXTER, Larry NIVEN, Dan SIMMONS) and romantic poets such as Keats, Byron and Shelley meeting either separately or together with monsters, AIs and so on (Brian W. ALDISS, William GIBSON, Tim POWERS, Dan Simmons and others). [JS/PN] CLIFTON, MARK (1906-1963) US writer and businessman, for many years occupied in personnel work, putting together many thousands of case histories from which he extrapolated conclusions after the fashion of Kinsey and Sheldon; these conclusions MC reportedly used to shape the arguments of his sf, most of which was published in ASF, beginning with "What Have I Done?" (1952).Much of his fiction is comprised of two series. The Bossy sequence - "Crazy Joey" (1953) with Alex Apostolides (1924- ), "Hide! Hide! Witch!" (1953) with Apostolides, and They'd Rather be Right (1954 ASF; edited version 1957; vt The Forever Machine 1958; text restored under original title 1982) with Frank RILEY - concerns an advanced COMPUTER named Bossy who is almost made ineffective by the fears of mankind about her, even though she is capable of conferring IMMORTALITY. They'd Rather be Right won the 1955 HUGO award for Best Novel. MC's second series, the Ralph Kennedy sequence - "What Thin Partitions" (1953) with Alex Apostolides, "Sense from Thought Divide" (1955), "How Allied" (1957), "Remembrance and Reflection" (1958) and When They Come from Space (1962) - is rather lighter in tone, focusing initially on Kennedy's dealings with psi phenomena ( PSI POWERS) in his role as the investigative personnel director for a cybernetics firm, and moving on in the novel which concludes the series to deal with a typical ASF target, inflated Federal bureaucracy. The long-suffering Kennedy is appointed "extraterrestrial psychologist" and is forced to cope with a team of aliens which is mounting hoax INVASIONS.MC's only out-of-series novel is Eight Keys to Eden (1960), in which an E-man, or Extrapolator, is sent to the colony planet of Eden to extricate it from an apparently insuperable problem: the problem turns out to be normal human civilization, not the paradise. Despite a slightly awkward prose style and an occasionally heavy wit, MC's novels and stories - a convenient selection is The Science Fiction of Mark Clifton (coll 1980) under the editorship and advocacy of Barry N. MALZBERG - convey a comfortable lucidity and optimism about the relation between technology and progress; his attempts to apply the tone of HARD SF to subjects derived from the SOFT SCIENCES reflect ASF's philosophical bent in the 1950s under John W. CAMPBELL Jr's editorial guidance. [JC]See also: AUTOMATION; COLONIZATION OF OTHER WORLDS; DIMENSIONS; ECOLOGY; INTELLIGENCE; PASTORAL. CLINE, C(HARLES) TERRY, Jr (1935- ) US writer of, among others, three borderline-sf novels - Damon (1975), about MUTANT superchildren, Death Knell (1977), which deals interestingly with REINCARNATION, and Cross Current (1979), and one sf tale, Mindreader (1981), whose protagonist, while in hiding, unremarkably uses ESP to save the rest of us. [JC]See also: REINCARNATION. CLINGERMAN, MILDRED (McELROY) (1918- ) US writer and book-collector who never worked as a full-time author. Since beginning to publish her shapely stories in 1952 with "Minister without Portfolio" for FSF she was as strongly associated with that magazine as was Zenna HENDERSON. A Cupful of Space (coll 1961) reflects this association in the frequency of stories included which wed a literate tone to a sometimes sentimental cuteness. [JC]See also: WOMEN SF WRITERS. CLINTON, DIRK [s] Robert SILVERBERG. CLINTON, JEFF Jack M. BICKHAM. CLIVE, DENNIS John Russell FEARN. CLOCK, HERBERT (1890-1979) US writer, apparently the senior collaborator with Eric Boetzel on The Light in the Sky (1929), an sf tale set in a LOST WORLD under Mexico, where Aztecs retreated after the genocidal onslaught of the Spanish and have constructed, over the centuries, a culture dominated by high science, telepathy, and - apparently - human sacrifice. The immortal Aztec genius behind the throne is in fact benevolent, and plans to benefit humankind; but the usual terminal DISASTER puts an end to this. [JC] CLOCKWORK ORANGE, A Film (1971). Polaris/Warner Bros. Dir Stanley KUBRICK, starring Malcolm McDowell, Patrick Magee, Warren Clarke, Michael Bates, Aubrey Morris. Screenplay Kubrick, based on A CLOCKWORK ORANGE (1962) by Anthony BURGESS. 137 mins. Colour.This controversial adaptation of Burgess's novel about mind control tells of Alex (McDowell), a teenage thug in a tawdry NEAR FUTURE - dehumanizing and luridly presented - who is cured of his violent ways by a sadistic form of aversion therapy. It was the (arguable) glamorizing of Alex's anarchic sex and violence (in contrast to the book) that provoked so much angry reaction in the media, though otherwise Kubrick's adaptation is moderately faithful. The film is not in fact amoral, though its moral is controversial: ACO is a religious allegory with a FRANKENSTEIN theme - it warns humankind not to try to compete with God - but Burgess reverses the theme, showing it to be as evil to unmake a monster, by removing his free will, as to make one. ACO is an intensely visual tour de force, deploying clinically a spectrum of powerful cinematic effects. As in Kubrick's 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY, some sequences were rendered even more disturbing by the use of MUSIC contrasting wildly with the visual content, most famously in Alex's rendition of "Singing in the Rain" while kicking in the ribs of the husband of a woman he is about to rape.ACO received the 1972 HUGO for Best Dramatic Presentation. [JB/PN] CLONES A clone is a group of individuals comprising the asexually produced offspring of a single individual. A pair of identical twins is a clone because the twin cells are produced by the asexual fission of the fertilized ovum. Asexual reproduction is very common among protozoa and some groups of invertebrates, but is much rarer in vertebrates. The possibility of cloning humans by transplanting the nucleus of a somatic cell from a donor into an ovum which can then be replaced in a host womb has attracted much attention, although no such operation has yet been performed in the real world.Clones of various kinds have long been common in sf, though not always recognized or labelled as such. The replication of individuals by matter-duplicator ( MATTER TRANSMISSION), as in William F. TEMPLE's Four-Sided Triangle (1949), Fletcher PRATT's Double Jeopardy (1952) and Primo LEVI's "Some Applications of the Mimer" (1966; trans 1990), is a kind of cloning, as is replication via TIME PARADOX, as in Robert A. HEINLEIN's "By His Bootstraps" (1941) and David GERROLD's The Man who Folded Himself (1973). The mechanism by which Gilbert Gosseyn was given so many genetically identical bodies in A.E. VAN VOGT's The World of A (1945; 1948; vt The World of Null-A) is unclear, but a series of clone members is the result. All-female societies whose members reproduce by parthenogenesis, as in Poul ANDERSON's Virgin Planet (1959) and Charles Eric MAINE's World without Men (1958; rev vt Alph 1972), also consist of clones. Ironically, the first sf story prominently to display the term - The Clone (1965) by Theodore L. THOMAS and Kate WILHELM - is irrelevant to the theme, the eponymous monster being an all-consuming cell-mass produced by pollution-induced mutation.Long before the word "clone" became popular, sf writers had considered the possibility of duplicating people for eugenic purposes. Poul Anderson's "UN-Man" (1953) refers to its cloning process as "exogenesis". Here and in John Russell FEARN's The Multi-Man (1954 as by Vargo Statten) the idea is used as a gimmick, and the possible consequences of such technological development are left unexplored. A more ambitious application of the notion is found in "When You Care, When You Love" (1962) by Theodore STURGEON, in which a rich woman attempts to reproduce her dead lover by growing him anew from one of the cancer cells which have destroyed him. Among the nonfiction books that popularized the term was Gordon Rattray Taylor's The Biological Time-Bomb (1968), which commented on the implications of experiments carried out by F.C. Steward in the early 1960s on the cloning of plants: "It is not mere sensationalism to ask whether the members of human clones may feel particularly united, and be able to cooperate better, even if they are not in actual supersensory communication with one another." This possibility has been widely explored in such stories as Ursula K. LE GUIN's "Nine Lives" (1969), Pamela SARGENT's Cloned Lives (1976), Kate Wilhelm's WHERE LATE THE SWEET BIRDS SANG (1976) and Fay WELDON's The Cloning of Joanna May (1989), in which intimate human relations are explored in depth and with some sensitivity. Stories of this kind often exaggerate the probable psychological effects of growing up as one of a clone (after all, identical twins have been doing it for centuries!). Even though clones are genetically identical, each member inhabits from the moment of implantation an environment subtly different from its fellows; it is a very naive kind of genetic determinism that leads writers occasionally to argue that an adult donor and his or her environmentally differentiated clone-offspring may be reckoned "identical". One of the few sf novels fully to recognize this is Ira LEVIN's The Boys from Brazil (1976), in which neo-Nazis raise a batch of clones derived from Hitler but can make only absurdly inadequate attempts to reproduce the kind of environment that made Hitler what he was.The concept of clone-identity in the stories cited above is best considered as a metaphor, enabling the authors to pose questions about the nature of individuality and the narcissistic aspects of intimate relationships. Other works which employ the notion in such a fashion include Gene WOLFE's THE FIFTH HEAD OF CERBERUS (1972), Jeremy LEVEN's Creator (1980) and C.J. CHERRYH's extraordinarily elaborate CYTEEN (1988). This kind of theme seems to be particularly attractive to female writers; others to have written significant clone stories include Naomi MITCHISON, author of the DYSTOPIAN Solution Three (1975), Nancy FREEDMAN, whose Joshua, Son of None (1973) is about the cloning of John F. Kennedy, and Anna Wilson, whose Hatching Stones (1991) suggests that human males might lose all interest in ordinary sexual reproduction if they were able to raise clone-duplicates of themselves instead.Male authors have tended to use cloning in more conventional action-adventure stories, exploiting its potential for establishing dramatic confrontations. Richard COWPER's Clone (1972) is a satirical account of events following a child's recovery of his memory of being one of a batch of superpowered clones. In Norman SPINRAD's The Iron Dream (1972) the narcissistic aspect of clonal reproduction is recruited by Hitler in his sf power-fantasy "Lord of the Swastika"; as the Earth dies, ships blast off for the stars to populate the Galaxy with duplicates of the pure-bred Aryan members of the SS. Cloning is used in Arthur C. CLARKE's Imperial Earth (1975) to perpetuate a dynasty of space pioneers. Ben BOVA's The Multiple Man (1976) is a thriller in which the clonal duplicates of the US President keep turning up dead - a murder mystery recalling Maurice RENARD's and Albert Jean's Le singe (1925; trans as Blind Circle 1928). John VARLEY's "The Phantom of Kansas" (1976) is another clone-based murder mystery; his THE OPHIUCHI HOTLINE (1977) deploys the idea more ingeniously. Michael WEAVER's Mercedes Nights (1987) features a conspiracy devoted to the cloning of a famous sex-object; the conspirators in Wolfgang JESCHKE's Midas (trans 1990) stick mostly to cloning famous scientists.The idea of another self - an alter ego or Doppelganger - has always been a profoundly fascinating one, and recurs insistently in occult FANTASY and PSYCHOLOGY. Recent speculation about the cloning of humans has made the notion available to sf writers for detailed and intensive examination, and the stories thus inspired are of considerable psychological interest. [BS]See also: BIOLOGY; CHILDREN IN SF; GENETIC ENGINEERING; MEDICINE. CLONING OF JOANNA MAY, THE UK tv miniseries (1991). Granada/ITV. Prod Gub Neal, dir Philip Saville, screenplay Ted Whitehead, from The Cloning of Joanna May (1989) by Fay WELDON. Starring Patricia Hodge as Joanna May, Brian Cox as Carl May, Billie Whitelaw as Mavis, Siri Neal as Bethany, and Emma Hardy, Helen Adie and Laura Eddy as the three clones.Weldon's comic-romantic melodrama about an obsessive business tycoon who effectively clones his wife, then repudiates her when she is unfaithful - with the aim of taking one of the three clones as his new wife when they have grown up - is already painted in broad strokes. The three-hour tv dramatization is even broader, though not unwitty, with finely over-the-top performances all round. [PN] CLOSED UNIVERSE This term is in no sense a synonym for POCKET UNIVERSE, a literary term which describes a particular kind of story; nor is it here used in its cosmological sense. A closed universe is a work or series whose characters and venues remain strictly under its author's control, and which is not open to fans or others to make uncopyrighted use of in FANZINES. In this sense, a SHARED-WORLD enterprise may still be a closed universe, if its owners restrict its use to other professionals on a contractual basis-indeed, most are. It should perhaps be assumed by sf readers that any work of art is a closed universe unless otherwise signposted. [JC]See also: OPEN UNIVERSE. CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD KIND Film (1977). Columbia. Dir Steven SPIELBERG, starring Richard Dreyfuss, Francois Truffaut, Teri Garr, Melinda Dillon, Cary Guffey, Bob Balaban. Screenplay Spielberg. 135 mins. Colour.After STAR WARS came the second major sf film production of 1977, at over twice the cost but with a story which, while lacking the comic-book appeal of Star Wars, perhaps cuts deeper in its evocation, rare in sf CINEMA, of a SENSE OF WONDER. A power company technician (Dreyfuss) witnesses a series of UFO appearances and develops an obsession with them which is almost religious in its nature and intensity. He becomes convinced that aliens plan to land one of their craft on an oddly shaped mountain in Wyoming. A parallel plot concerns a secret group of scientific and military experts also engaged in uncovering the secret of the UFOs. The film ends in a barrage of special effects when the spacecraft arrives; communication between the two species is achieved by means of bursts of light and music. The hero enters the mother ship, much as Tam Lin once entered the Fairy Mound, and is taken to the Heavens in a glowing apotheosis; the elfishness of the slim aliens supports a reading in which UFO occupants are mythically equivalent to fairies. CEOTTK has flaws, but remains an intensely evocative work, certainly one of the half dozen best sf films to date. Despite the pressure from Columbia to produce a financial blockbuster, Spielberg did not take the easy way out but made an intelligent and relatively complex film, maintaining the high standards he had set himself in Duel (1971) and Jaws (1978). The special effects are excellent. A different version, CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD KIND - THE SPECIAL EDITION, was released in 1980.The novelization, Close Encounters of the Third Kind * (1977), is as by Spielberg. [JB]See also: HISTORY OF SF; LINGUISTICS; MUSIC. CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD KIND - THE SPECIAL EDITION Film (1980). Credits as for CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD KIND. 132 mins. This slightly shorter, re-edited version of SPIELBERG's huge 1977 success, which contains some new footage, represents a curious piece of cinematic history. Many critics saw it as inferior to the original, though the idea was that Spielberg now had so much commercial clout that he could, at last, release the film exactly as he had always wanted it. New material includes a scene where Neary, the UFO-obsessed power worker, makes his family hysterical; a surrealistic shot of an ocean liner left stranded by puckish aliens in the Gobi Desert; and a sequence inside the mother ship (so-so special effects) with an ill-judged soundtrack of "When You Wish Upon a Star" from Walt Disney's Pinocchio (1940). The new Neary sequences darken the film; the new ending, in contrast, lightens it by emphasizing its fairy-tale aspect. Whatever, the new version, which is the one now normally shown, made a lot of money. [PN] CLOUD OF ANDROMEDA, THE TUMANNOST ANDROMEDY. CLOUSTON, J(OSEPH) STORER (1870-1944) Scottish magistrate and usually humorous author. JSC began writing works of genre interest with Tales of King Fido (coll 1909), a Graustarkian fantasy ( RURITANIA). His books of genre interest include Two's Two (1916), an F. ANSTEY-like fantasy about an embodied alter ego; Button Brains (1933), about a ROBOT that is taken for the human upon which it was modelled, with comic consequences; The Chemical Baby (1934), marginal as the baby turns out to be natural; Not Since Genesis (1938), a satirical look at the European nations faced by a meteoritic DISASTER; and The Man in Steel (1939), a TIME-TRAVEL tale. [JE/JC]See also: ANDROIDS; HUMOUR. CLUB STORY It is almost certainly no coincidence that volumes of club stories should have become popular in the UK towards the end of the 19th century. The classic club story may be described as a tall tale told by one man to other men in a sanctum restricted to those of similar outlook, who agree to believe in the story for their mutual comfort; and it was precisely during the fin de siecle, and the years leading up to WWI, that the great march of history began to seem problematical to socially dominant white UK males, whose sense of reality now began to fray under the assault of women, and Darwin, and dark rumours of Freud, and Marx, and Zola, and Flaubert . . . and Henry James. Though it is no more a true club story than Joseph CONRAD's "Heart of Darkness" (1902) or Chance (1914), James's "The Turn of the Screw" (1898) is indeed a tale told at a club, and it is indeed a tall tale. But James uses the convention of the story told within a frame to underline the unreliability of his narrator, and to make forever problematical the "true" reading of his tale; "The Turn of the Screw" is a preview of the epistemological insecurities of the dawning new world. The conventional club story, on the other hand, by foregrounding the security of the sanctum itself, sidesteps the question of the believability of the tall tale (and sidesteps most of the 20th century as well). In the conventional club story, that tale is accepted by the males to whom it is addressed not for its intrinsic plausibility but as part of a shared conspiracy to maintain an inward-looking, mutually supportive consensus.The great counterexample to this model is - perhaps inevitably - the work of H.G. WELLS, who often imitated popular modes of storytelling in his early writings, but almost always to subversive effect. THE TIME MACHINE (1895 USA; exp 1895 UK) does certainly exhibit some club-story features - a group of men gather together to hear the Time Traveller tell his tall tale - but in this case the ambience is far from consolatory, and the Traveller's dark report from the future seems all the darker when it is evident that his hearers may be forced to believe it. Some of Wells's early short stories, too, are club tales - notably "The Truth about Pyecraft" (1903) - though in name only. It should come as no surprise that the most typical club stories were composed by men of a very different cast of mind than Wells's, and that most club stories are conservative in both style and content. Though precursors to the convention can be adduced almost indefinitely - from Chaucer's Canterbury Tales and Boccaccio's Decameron to Charles Dickens's Master Humphrey's Clock (1840-41) - the first collection to express the ambience of the genuine club story is perhaps Robert Louis STEVENSON's New Arabian Nights (coll 1882 in 2 vols; 1st vol only vt The Suicide Club, and The Rajah's Diamond 1894) and its successor, More New Arabian Nights: The Dynamiter (coll 1885) with Fanny Van de Grift Stevenson. As early a work as Jerome K. Jerome's After Supper Ghost Stories (coll 1891), although set not in a club but around the table after Christmas Eve dinner, parodies the club-story format and the tales told therein. Some of the exploits recounted in Andrew LANG's The Disentanglers (coll of linked stories 1902) are of sf interest, though more frequently - as in G.K. CHESTERTON's The Club of Queer Trades (coll 1905) - early examples of the form read more like lubricated SATIRE than fantasy. Alfred NOYES's Tales of the Mermaid Tavern (coll 1914) is a set of narrative poems told in Shakespeare's pub; while sequences like P.G. WODEHOUSE's Mulliner books (from 1927) heavily emphasize the tall-tale element, and The Salzburg Tales (coll 1934) by Christina Stead (1902-1983) evoke Boccaccio. Of greater genre interest are SAKI's The Chronicles of Clovis (coll 1907), John Buchan's The Runagates' Club (coll 1928), the five Jorkens books by Lord DUNSANY, beginning with The Travel Tales of Mr Joseph Jorkens (coll 1931) and continuing for two decades, and T.H. WHITE's Gone to Ground (coll of linked stories 1935), which - as these tales are told by survivors of a final HOLOCAUST - stretches to its limit the capacity of the form to comfort.In "Sites for Sore Souls: Some Science-Fictional Saloons" (1991 Extrapolation), Fred Erisman suggests that sf club stories - or in his terms saloon stories - respond to a human need for venues in which an "informal public life" can be led. Although Erisman assumes that the paucity of such venues in the USA is reflected in the UK, and therefore significantly undervalues the unspoken but clearly felt ambience of the pub in Arthur C. CLARKE's cosily RECURSIVE Tales from the White Hart (coll 1957 US), his comments are clearly helpful in understanding the persistence of the club story in US sf. Beginning with L. Sprague DE CAMP's and Fletcher PRATT's Tales from Gavagan's Bar (coll 1953; exp 1978), it has been a feature of magazine sf for nearly half a century - perhaps partly because imaginary US saloons and the genuine affinity groups that generate and consume US sf are similar kinds of informal public space. Further examples of the club story in the USA are assembled in Isaac ASIMOV's several volumes of Black Widowers tales, starting with Tales of the Black Widowers (coll 1974), Sterling LANIER's The Peculiar Exploits of Brigadier Ffellowes (coll 1972) and The Curious Quests of Brigadier Ffellowes (coll 1986), Larry NIVEN's Draco Tavern tales, which appear mostly in Convergent Series (coll 1979) and Limits (coll 1985), and Spider ROBINSON's Callahan books, starting with Callahan's Crosstime Saloon (coll 1977). There are many others; some individual stories are assembled in Darrell SCHWEITZER's and George SCITHERS's Tales from the Spaceport Bar (anth 1987) and Another Round at the Spaceport Bar (anth 1989). [JC] CLUTE, JOHN (FREDERICK) (1940- ) Canadian novelist and sf critic; in the UK from 1969. His first professional publication, a long sf-tinged poem called "Carcajou Lament", appeared in Triquarterly in 1959. He began publishing sf proper with "A Man Must Die" for NW (1966), where much of his earlier criticism also appeared; further criticism and reviews have appeared in FSF, Washington Post, Omni, Times Literary Supplement, New York Times, NEW YORK REVIEW OF SCIENCE FICTION, INTERZONE, Los Angeles Times, Observer and elsewhere. Selections from this work appear in Strokes: Essays and Reviews 1966-1986 (coll 1988 US) and Look at the Evidence: Essays and Reviews (coll 1995). In 1960 he was Associate Editor of Collage, an ill fated Chicago-based "slick" magazine which in its 2 issues did manage to publish early work by Harlan ELLISON and R.A. LAFFERTY. He served as Reviews Editor of FOUNDATION 1980-90, and was a founder of Interzone in 1982; he remains Advisory Editor of that magazine and since 1986 has contributed a review column. JC's criticism, despite some studiously flamboyant obscurities, remains essentially practical; it has appeared mostly in the form of reviews, some of considerable length. He was the Associate Editor of the first edition of this encyclopedia (1979) and is Co-Editor of the current version, for which he shared a 1994 HUGO with Peter NICHOLLS. In 1994 he also received a PILGRIM AWARD. SF: The Illustrated Encyclopedia (1995) is a narrative survey unconnected to this encyclopedia. His novel, The Disinheriting Party (1973 NW; exp 1977), is not sf. [JC]Other works as editor: The Aspen Poetry Handbill (portfolio 1965 chap US), associational; Interzone: The 1st Anthology (anth 1985) with Colin GREENLAND and David PRINGLE; Interzone: The 2nd Anthology (anth 1987) with Greenland and Pringle; Interzone: The 3rd Anthology (anth 1988) with Pringle and Simon Ounsley; Interzone: The 4th Anthology (anth 1989) with Pringle and Simon Ounsley; Interzone V (anth 1991) with Lee Montgomerie and Pringle.See also: CANADA; COLLECTIONS; CRITICAL AND HISTORICAL WORKS ABOUT SF; DEFINITIONS OF SF; HISTORY OF SF; MUSIC; NEW WORLDS; SENSE OF WONDER. COATES, ROBERT M(YRON) (1897-1973) US writer, primarily associated throughout his career with the New Yorker, on which he worked, and to which he contributed many stories. He is primarily of interest to the sf field for his first novel, The Eater of Darkness (1926 France), which, written before he had fully assimilated the sometimes restrictive urbanity of New Yorker style, quite brilliantly applies a wide arsenal of literary devices, some of them surrealistic, to the exaggeratedly spoof-like tale of a master criminal and his absurd super- WEAPON, which sees through solids and applies remote-control heat to kill people invisibly; beneath the spoofing and the cosmopolitan style lies a sense of horror. The Hour after Westerly and Other Stories (coll 1957) contains some fantasy of interest, though in general his later work lacks some of the fire of his first book. [JC]Other works: The Farther Shore (1955).See also: MATHEMATICS. COBB, WELDON J. (? -? ) US businessman and writer who specialized in dime novels ( DIME-NOVEL SF), working mainly c1866-c1902. Tales of sf interest include A Wonder Worker, or The Search for the Splendid City (1894 Golden Hours; 1907), which combines travel and invention after a fashion typical of the genre, and two EDISONADES, At War With Mars, or The Boys who Won (1897), and To Mars With Tesla, or The Mystery of Hidden Worlds (1901), the latter featuring, in place of Thomas Alva Edison, his great rival Nikola Tesla (1856-1943). Amusingly, the lad who carries most of the action goes by the name of Young Edison. [EFB/JC] COBBAN, J(AMES) MacLAREN (1849-1903) UK writer, of some interest for Master of his Fate (1890), whose protagonist, tortured by the need to drain the life energy of others to maintain his own IMMORTALITY, confesses all to an expert in the field of animal magnetism; and then kills himself. The Tyrants of Kool-Sim (1896) is a LOST-WORLD tale featuring dwarfs with poisonous blood and brave British lads who prevail. [JC] COBLENTZ, STANTON A(RTHUR) (1896-1982) US novelist and polemically traditionalist poet. He began his career in the early 1920s, after gaining an MA in English literature, with book reviews for New York papers and a volume of poems, The Thinker and Other Poems (coll 1923); he also wrote considerable nonfiction. He began publishing sf with The Sunken World (1928 AMZ Quarterly; 1948), a UTOPIA set in a glass-domed ATLANTIS, in which satirical points are made against both the egalitarian Atlanteans and the contemporary USA, though the obtuse narrator (of the sort found in most utopias) tends to blur some of these issues. SAC was never a smooth stylist, nor an imaginative plotter, as all his five novels for AMZ Quarterly tend to show, though at the same time he had a strong gift for the description of ingeniously conceived ALIEN environments, so that he was often regarded as one of the writers best capable of conveying the SENSE OF WONDER so rightly valued by the readers of US PULP-MAGAZINE sf between the two world wars. The Sunken World was followed by After 12,000 Years (1929 AMZ Quarterly; 1950), "Reclaimers of the Ice" (1930 AMZ Quarterly), The Blue Barbarians (1931 AMZ Quarterly; 1958) and "The Man from Tomorrow" (1933 AMZ Quarterly). Other novels from the same general period, like The Wonder Stick (1929), a prehistoric tale, and Hidden World (1935 Wonder Stories as "In Caverns Below"; 1957; vt "In Caverns Below" 1975), share similar virtues and faults. Hidden World, for instance, is another SATIRE, set in an underground venue, with fascinating descriptions but cardboard characters. Later novels, like Under the Triple Suns (1955), failed to show much stylistic development, and were not successful. [JC]Other works: The Pageant of Man (1936); Youth Madness (c1944 chap); When the Birds Fly South (1945); Into Plutonian Depths (1931 Wonder Stories Quarterly; 1950); The Planet of Youth (1932 Wonder Stories; 1952 chap); Next Door to the Sun (1960); The Runaway World (1961); The Moon People (1964) and its sequel, The Crimson Capsule (1967; rev vt The Animal People 1970); The Last of the Great Race (1964) and The Lost Comet (1930 AMZ as "Reclaimers of the Ice"; cut 1964), both apparently severely edited; The Lizard Lords (1964); Lord of Tranerica (1939 Dynamic Science Stories; 1966); The Day the World Stopped (1968); The Island People (1971).About the author:Adventures of a Freelancer: the Literary Exploits and Autobiography of Stanton A. Coblentz (1993) by SAC with Dr. Jeffrey M. ELLIOT.See also: ASTEROIDS; FANTASTIC VOYAGES; LOST WORLDS; OUTER PLANETS; POLITICS; SOCIOLOGY; UNDER THE SEA; VENUS. COCHRAN, MOLLY [r] Warren B. MURPHY. COCHRANE, WILLIAM E(UGENE) (1926- ) US writer who began publishing sf with "How High on the Ladder" for Fantasy Book in 1950, writing as Leo Paige. As S. Kye Boult from 1971, and also under his own name from 1973, he began to publish in Analog the hard-edged sf adventures, like "Whalekiller Grey" (1973) as WEC, for which he became known. After Solo Kill (1972 Analog; exp 1977) as by Boult, he used his own name exclusively. Class Six Climb (1980), told from the viewpoint of a giant god-tree, is perhaps his most sustained effort. He was inactive during the 1980s, but new work is (1992) projected. [JC] COCOON Film (1985). Fox-Zanuck-Brown. Dir Ron Howard, starring Don Ameche, Wilford Brimley, Hume Cronyn, Jack Gilford, Steve Guttenberg, Maureen Stapleton, Jessica Tandy, Gwen Verdon, Tahnee Welch. Screenplay Tom Benedek from a story by David Saperstein. 117 mins. Colour. ALIENS disguised as humans come to Earth to revive their kinfolk who were abandoned millennia ago in cocoons on the ocean floor; the swimming pool prepared for their revival is discovered and used by occupants of a neighbouring old people's home, who are (to a degree) rejuvenated by it. Some leave Earth for a new life with the aliens. C was aptly described by critic Tom Milne as "Peter Pan for the senior citizen". Directed with intermittent panache, it oscillates between the whimsical, the genuinely touching and the merely vulgar. A saccharine sequel with a soap-opera plot, Cocoon: The Return (1988), dir Daniel Petrie, is dispiriting. [PN] COCOON: THE RETURN COCOON. CODE NAME TRIXIE The CRAZIES. COEURL AWARD CANADA. COFFEY, BRIAN Dean R. KOONTZ. COGSWELL, THEODORE R(OSE) (1918-1987) US writer and academic, an ambulance driver on the Republican side in the Spanish Civil War. He began publishing sf in 1952 with what proved to be one of his most successful stories, "The Specter General" for ASF. In this long, amusing tale - much in the vein Keith LAUMER was later to make his own - a long-forgotten maintenance division of the Galactic Protectorate reinvigorates a decadent Space Navy. In 1959, he founded and edited a FANZINE for professional writers called Publications of the Institute of Twenty-First Century Studies but universally pronounced PITFCS; it ran through 1962, with a final number in 1979; became quickly famed for the informative frankness of its contents; and was assembled as PITFCS: Proceedings of the Institute for Twenty-First Century Studies (anth 1992). TRC's two volumes of stories, The Wall around the World (coll 1962) and The Third Eye (coll 1968), contain most of his fiction; his work is polished, enjoyable and, though it sticks closely to fantasy and sf genre formats, gives off a sense that it was written for pleasure. "The Wall around the World" (1953) was one of TRC's most popular stories; the tale of a boy who lives in a place where MAGIC seems to work, and discovers the true, POCKET-UNIVERSE nature of his world, is an archetypal rendering of the experience of CONCEPTUAL BREAKTHROUGH. [JC/PN]Other works:Spock, Messiah! * (1976) with Charles A. Spano, a STAR TREK novel.See also: SHARED WORLDS. COHEN, BARNEY (? - ) US writer whose first novel of genre interest was The Night of the Toy Dragons (1977). His The Taking of Satcon Station (1982) with Jim BAEN is an engagingly over-the-top application of private-eye idioms and plots (Dashiell Hammett's The Maltese Falcon [1930] being much in evidence) to the NEAR FUTURE and near space, the eponymous satellite being the focus for the climax. Blood on the Moon (1984) is similar but grimmer. [JC] COHEN, LARRY (1938- ) US film-maker. A cult figure as much for the wildness of his ideas as for the sporadic brilliance of his direction, LC has never tried to graduate to the mainstream in the way contemporaries like David CRONENBERG or Brian De Palma have, and turns out as many curate's eggs as low-budget masterpieces. Originally a tv writer, he early discovered PARANOIA in his creation of the Western show Branded (1965-6) and the sf show The INVADERS (1967-8), both featuring on-the-run protagonists, perhaps modelled on The Fugitive (1963-7). He continued to write for tv, including prestigious series like The Defenders and Columbo, turning also to film writing with Westerns and suspense dramas. He made his directorial debut with the ABSURDIST thriller Bone (1972; vt Dial Rat for Terror; vt Beverly Hills Nightmare). Nearly all his films are written, prod and dir by LC and made by his own production company, Larco, which he founded in 1965.He made the superior Black action movies Black Caesar (1973; vt The Godfather of Harlem) and Hell up in Harlem (1973) before discovering the sf MONSTER MOVIE with IT'S ALIVE (1974), a compound of ecological, familial and 1950s sf ideas about a mutant killer baby on the loose in Los Angeles. LC has subsequently developed the theme in two sequels, IT LIVES AGAIN (1978; vt It's Alive II) and It's Alive III: Island of the Alive (1986), and alternated between sf, HORROR and suspense in a series of gritty, oddball pictures: GOD TOLD ME TO (1976; vt Demon), in which a modern "Jesus" is shown to have been a hermaphrodite homicidal maniac from outer space; The Private Files of J. Edgar Hoover (1976), a fascinating political-psychological autopsy of Hoover's USA; Full Moon High (1982), a werewolf comedy; Q (1983; vt The Winged Serpent; vt Q: The Winged Serpent), an ingenious different take on the giant-monster theme; Blind Alley (1984), a Hitchcockian thriller; Special Effects (1984), a psycho-horror drama in a film milieu; The STUFF (1985), a sloppy but amiable parody of The BLOB (1958) in which the formless monster disguises itself as an addictive fast food; Return to Salem's Lot (1987), a clever variant on the village-of-vampires concept; Wicked Stepmother (1989), a farcical witch story; and The Ambulance (1990), a striking slice of medical paranoia and urban nightmare.Energetic and often lopsided, LC's films benefit from unusual characterizations, wayward plotting, cleverly cast familiar faces and a determination not to do things the accepted way. [KN]See also: CINEMA; HUMOUR. COHEN, MATT Working name of Canadian novelist Matthew Cohen (1942- ), best known for short stories and novels set among disturbed urbandwellers in contemporary Ontario. Too Bad Galahad (1972 chap), however, is an Arthurian FABULATION, and several of the stories assembled in Columbus and the Fat Lady (coll 1972) and Night Flights (coll 1978) are fantasy. The Colours of War (1977) is a NEAR-FUTURE tale of civil strife for which the Ontario countryside serves as a not ungrim backdrop. [JC] COLD NIGHT'S DEATH, A Made-for-tv film (1973). Spelling Goldberg/ABC. Dir Jerrold Freedman, starring Eli Wallach, Robert Culp. Teleplay Christopher Knopf. 73 mins. Colour.Interesting, atmospheric but ponderous yarn with a bizarre premise about two quarrelsome scientists, one emotional (Wallach) and one dispassionately rational (Culp), in a remote Arctic station. Their experimental chimpanzees ( APES AND CAVEMEN) turn the tables and start conducting stress tests on the scientists themselves. [PN] COLE, ADRIAN (CHRISTOPHER SYNNOT) (1949- ) UK writer, most of whose books lace fantasy and horror venues with sf devices, but which in the final analysis read essentially as fantasies. He began publishing work of genre interest with "Wired Tales" for Dark Horizons in 1973, and several stories soon followed about a not entirely unusual Cursed Warrior named The Voidal, culminating perhaps in The Coming of the Voidal (1977 chap). The quasi-sf Dream Lords FANTASY sequence - A Plague of Nightmares (1975 US), Lord of the Nightmares (1975 US) and Bane of Nightmares (1976 US) - was followed by the fantasy Omaran Saga - A Place among the Fallen (1986), Throne of Fools (1987), The King of Light and Shadows (1988) and The Gods in Anger (1988). The Star Requiem sequence, which is sf - Mother of Storms (1989), Thief of Dreams (1989), Warlord of Heaven (1990) and Labyrinth of Worlds (1990) - demonstrates in a PLANETARY-ROMANCE setting AC's moderate familiarity with sf tropes (like the flight of a remnant of humanity from genocide, and the relentless search for that remnant by genocidal aliens) and a smooth style broken by intermittent moments of inattention. For collaborative stories he has also signed himself Adrian Bryant. [JC]Other works: Madness Emerging (1976), which combines sf and horror, as does Paths in Darkness (1977); Longborn the Inexhaustible (1978 chap); The LUCIFER Experiment (1981); Wargods of Ludorbis (1981); Moorstones (1982) and The Sleep of Giants (1983), both juveniles; Blood Red Angel (1993).See also: ROBERT HALE LIMITED. COLE, ALLAN (1943- ) US tv scriptwriter and journalist. His sf sequence featuring Sten, a rebel who becomes a military hero in the defence of a GALACTIC EMPIRE under threat, comprises Sten (1982), The Wolf Worlds (1984), Court of a Thousand Suns (1985), Fleet of the Damned (1988), Revenge of the Damned (1989), The Return of the Emperor (1990),Vortex (1993) and Empire's End (1993), all written with Chris Bunch. The Far Kingdoms (1993), and its sequel, The Warrior's Tale(1994), both also with Bunch, are fantasy. [JC] COLE, BURT Pseudonym of US writer Thomas Dixon (1930- ), author of The Funco File (1969), in which a world-dominating COMPUTER is pitted against anarchic opposing forces. His other titles of genre interest are Subi: The Volcano (1957), a savage tale set in an Asia dominated by a WAR much like that in Vietnam a decade later, and Blood Knot (1980). The Quick (1989) is an extremely expert and iconoclastic exercise in military sf. [JC] COLE, CYRUS (? -? ) US author. In his eccentrically interesting The Auroraphone: A Romance (1890), messages from Saturn are received on the eponymous instrument; life there is UTOPIAN in many ways, although a ROBOT revolt is under way. A later message includes recordings, for the benefit of the enthralled terrestrial listeners, of famous events on Earth, including the Battle of Gettysburg. [PN] COLE, EVERETT B. (1910-1977) US writer, formerly a professional soldier. He began publishing sf in 1951 with the first of a series, "Philosophical Corps", in ASF, which ceased there in 1956 before reappearing much later with "Here, There Be Witches" (1970 ASF) and "Philosophical Corps!" (1970 ASF). The Philosophical Corps (1951-5 ASF: fixup 1961) is based on the first story and two others; the remaining stories are "These Shall Not Be Lost" (1953), "Exile" (1954), "Millennium" (1955), "Final Weapon" (1955) and "The Missionaries" (1956). The philosopher protagonist of the series, Commander A-Riman, brooks no nonsense from aliens and the like, whom he re-educates in course of his SPACE-OPERA adventures. A second novel, "The Best Made Plans" (ASF 1959), has not reached book form. [JC] COLE, ROBERT W(ILLIAM) (? -? ) UK author. His first novel, The Struggle for Empire: A Story of the Year 2236 (1900), took the future- WAR novel to its logical conclusion. In a UTOPIAN future the Anglo-Saxon Federation has expanded into other solar systems when interstellar warfare breaks out between Earth and a superior race from the Sirius system. The descriptions of space battles, and of an Earth surrounded by a barrage of space torpedoes and mines while scientists struggle to perfect the ultimate weapon, make it the equal of many of the SPACE-OPERA stories of the 1930s. RWC's later novels are anticlimactic. His Other Self (1906) is a mildly humorous tale of a physical alter ego; The Death Trap (1907) is a mundane though harsh account of an invasion of the UK; The Artificial Girl (1908) is not of genre interest. [JC]See also: COLONIZATION OF OTHER WORLDS; FANTASTIC VOYAGES; GALACTIC EMPIRES; STARS. COLE, WALTER R(ANDALL) (1933- ) US sf fan and bibliographer, compiler of A Checklist of Science-Fiction Anthologies (1964), reissued in facsimile - it was originally stencilled - by ARNO PRESS in 1975. It has now been superseded and updated by William CONTENTO's indexes of ANTHOLOGIES. [PN] COLEMAN, CLARE Clare BELL. COLEMAN, JAMES NELSON (? -? ) US writer of two sf novels, Seeker from the Stars (1967) and The Null-Frequency Impulser (1969), both routine adventure stories with ALIENS and superscience providing much of the action. [JC] COLERIDGE, JOHN Eando BINDER. COLEY, ROBERT [s] Donald WANDREI. COLLABORATIONS Science fiction writers love to collaborate. Some have collaborated for fun, some as a creative experiment, and there is a strong possibility that some writers did it to sell books or to reduce their workload.The teenaged Futurians wrote stories together in the late 1930s, a practice that came naturally because they lived together. Other kinds of collaborations included transatlantic ones - like the anthology written by Ian Watson in southern England and Michael Bishop in Georgia...or a transmedia collaboration, as when Piers Anthony wrote the novelization for the film Total Recall, which was based on a Phillip K. Dick story.Most collaborations are between colleagues who are essentially peers, like Stephen King and Peter Straub's work on The Talisman. So the 1995 collaboration by Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich and SF writer William Forstchen on the novel 1945 is just a continuation of a well-established practice. COLLAPSARS BLACK HOLES; NEUTRON STARS. COLLAZO, MIGUEL [r] LATIN AMERICA COLLECTIONS With sf/fantasy now a subject for academic study, especially in the USA, many major institutional collections have been built up, a process which has supplemented but in no sense supplanted the large number of private collections amassed by fans and scholars. From the first, GENRE SF has tended to be published in formats significantly (and foolishly) slighted in the accession policies of every category of institutional library - from university libraries to libraries of record like the Library of Congress and the British Library; and without private collections much of the research undertaken in recent years would have been impossible to conduct successfully. Some private collections - notably those of Forrest J. ACKERMAN in Los Angeles and Sam MOSKOWITZ in Newark - are extremely well known, extremely large, and accessible to visitors, but they tend not to be thoroughly catalogued. Individual researchers in sf and fantasy almost invariably maintain their own store of material, on a scale rather larger than probably necessary in cognate fields. Entirely typical of such research collections are those held, for instance, by the editors of this volume: John CLUTE with 12,000 items, Peter NICHOLLS with 7000 items, and Associate Editor Brian STABLEFORD with 15,000 items.The strongest library collection in the USA is the J. LLOYD EATON COLLECTION. For important library holdings in other countries, MAISON D'AILLEURS (Switzerland, extremely strong on French sf), MERRIL COLLECTION OF SCIENCE FICTION, SPECULATION AND FANTASY, formerly the Spaced Out Library (Canada), SCIENCE FICTION FOUNDATION (UK) and UNIVERSITY OF SYDNEY LIBRARY (Australia). A number of other large institutional collections exist. In the USA these include: the University of Arizona Library; California State University Library at Fullerton (which holds important research material on Philip K. DICK); Dallas Public Library; Louisiana State University Library; University of Louisville Library (very large Edgar Rice BURROUGHS collection); MIT Science Fiction Society Library at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology; San Francisco Academy of Comic Art Library; Texas A & M University Library.Also important to sf researchers are the great libraries of record, such as the US Library of Congress (which, shortsightedly, does not normally catalogue its separately warehoused, inaccessible mass-market paperback fiction) and, in the UK, the British Library and the Bodleian Library. These, however, tend to be weak on ephemera (fanzines, comics, pulp magazines); in some cases their book and magazine collections have suffered depredation through theft.Further data on large sf collections can be found in Anatomy of Wonder: A Critical Guide to Science Fiction: Third Edition (1987) ed Neil BARRON and in Science/Fiction Collections: Fantasy, Supernatural and Weird Tales (1983) ed Hal W. HALL. [PN/JC] COLLIER, JOHN (HENRY NOYES) (1901-1980) UK novelist, poet and short-story writer who also spent time in the USA writing filmscripts. He was known mainly for his sophisticated though sometimes rather precious short stories, generally featuring acerbic snap endings; many of these stories have strong elements of fantasy or sf, in particular No Traveller Returns (1931 chap), whose protagonist visits a DYSTOPIAN future, and The Devil and All (coll 1934), whose contents are exclusively FANTASY. His best-known title, Fancies and Goodnights (coll 1951 US; cut vt Of Demons and Darkness 1965 UK), assembles new material plus a selection of tales from Presenting Moonshine (coll 1941) and The Touch of Nutmeg (coll 1943 US)-itself a compendium drawn from the previous volume and from The Devil and All; until the release of The John Collier Reader (coll 1972 US; cut vt The Best of John Collier 1975 US), Fancies and Goodnights remained the handiest presentation of the kind of short fiction with which JC has been identified: highly polished magazine stories, adroit, world-weary, waspish, often insubstantial. It won the first INTERNATIONAL FANTASY AWARD.Radically dissimilar to his most familiar work is Tom's A-Cold (1933; vt Full Circle 1933 US), a remarkably effective post- HOLOCAUST novel set in the 1990s, long after an unexplained disaster has decimated England's (and presumably the world's) population and thrust mankind back into rural barbarism, a condition out of which the eldest survivors, who remember civilization, are trying to educate the young third generation. The simple plot plays no tricks on the reader: the young protagonist, a born leader, rises through raids and conflict to the chieftainship, undergoes a tragedy, and reconciles himself at the novel's close to the burdens of a government which will improve the lot of his people. Throughout the novel, very movingly, JC renders the reborn, circumambient natural world with a hallucinatory visual intensity found nowhere else in his work. Along with Alun LLEWELLYN's The Strange Invaders (1934), Tom's A-Cold can be seen, in its atmosphere of almost loving conviction, as a genuine successor to Richard JEFFERIES's After London (1885); and it contrasts markedly with JC's earlier No Traveller Returns (1931 chap), a harsh dystopian novella set in a deadened world. [JC]Other works: His Monkey Wife, or Married to a Chimp (1930), a fantasy; Green Thoughts (1932 chap) and Variation on a Theme (1935 chap), both assembled with other stories in Green Thoughts and Other Strange Tales (coll 1943 US); Witch's Money (1940 chap US); Pictures in the Fire (coll 1958); Milton's "Paradise Lost": Screenplay for Cinema of the Mind * (1973).See also: APES AND CAVEMEN (IN THE HUMAN WORLD); DISASTER; EC COMICS; HISTORY OF SF; HUMOUR; SATIRE. COLLIER'S WEEKLY US "slick" magazine published by Crowell-Collier Publishing Co, ed William L. Chenery, Walter Davenport and others. Weekly from 28 Apr 1888 as Collier's Once A Week, became CW in Dec 1904, continuing weekly to 25 Jul 1953, then biweekly to 4 Jan 1957.CW published sf - e.g., H.G. WELLS's "A Moonlight Fable" (1909) and George Allan ENGLAND's "June 6, 2016" (1916) - only intermittently until the 1920s and 1930s, when numerous serializations of works by Sax ROHMER appeared. Later well remembered sf publications were: "There Will Come Soft Rains" (1950), "A Sound of Thunder" (1952) and other stories by Ray BRADBURY; The Day of the Triffids (1951) by John WYNDHAM; and many early stories by Jack FINNEY from 1951, including his most famous novel The Body Snatchers (1954 Collier's; 1955; vt Invasion of the Body Snatchers). [JE/PN] COLLINGS, MICHAEL R(OBERT) (1947- ) US poet, story writer and author of a number of nonfiction studies of sf and fantasy writers, including several on various aspects of the work of Stephen KING. In Naked to the Sun: Dark Visions of Apocalypse (coll 1986 chap) and Dark Transformations: Deadly Visions of Change (coll 1990 chap), he published POETRY which tended to use sf and fantasy motifs as premises for metamorphic brooding. His nonfiction includes Piers Anthony (1984 chap), Brian W. Aldiss (1986) and In the Image of God: Theme, Characterization, and Landscape in the Fiction of Orson Scott Card (1990), plus the various books on King: Stephen King as Richard Bachman (1985), The Shorter Works of Stephen King (1985) with David Engebretson, The Many Facets of Stephen King (1986), The Films of Stephen King (1986), The Stephen King Phenomenon (1987) and The Work of Stephen King: An Annotated Bibliography and Guide (1992). His criticism tends to be theme-oriented. He edited Reflections on the Fantastic: Selected Essays from the Fourth International Conference on the Fantastic in the Arts (anth 1987). [JC] COLLINGWOOD, HARRY Pseudonym of UK writer William Joseph Cosens Lancaster (1851-1922), most of whose fiction was for boys and featured nautical settings. He remains best known for his "Flying Fish" sequence of sf tales: The Log of the "Flying Fish": A Story of Aerial and Submarine Peril and Adventure (1887), With Airship and Submarine (1907) and The Cruise of the "Flying Fish": The Air-Ship-Submarine (1924). The eponymous vehicle is a ship which operates in the air, on the surface and UNDER THE SEA, and which takes the tales' protagonists back and forth across the Earth, leading them to a LOST WORLD, to inner Africa and elsewhere. The third volume, in which a dreadnought successor to the ship fails to be built in time to affect WWI, is anticlimactic. Other HC tales include Geoffrey Harrington's Adventures (1907), Harry Escombe: A Tale of Adventure in Peru (1910) and A Pair of Adventurers in Search of El Dorado (1915; vt In Search of El Dorado 1925). [JC] COLLINS, CLARK [s] Mack REYNOLDS. COLLINS, GILBERT (1900-? ) UK writer in various genres, whose two LOST-WORLD novels are of sf interest. The Valley of Eyes Unseen (1923) finds a Tibetan hidden valley inhabited by scientifically advanced descendants of Alexander the Great's Greeks, from whom the protagonist eventually escapes using purloined mechanical wings. In The Starkenden Quest (1925) the valley is located in Indochina, the primordial dwarf inhabitants are enthralled by an immortal blonde priestess (who nevertheless dies), and a great flood ends the tale. [JC]Other works: Flower of Asia: A Novel of Nihon (1922), a fantasy of Japan. COLLINS, HELEN (1935 - ) US biologist and writer whose first novel, Mutagenesis (1993), packs a wide range of material into its moderate compass. The frame premise-an expedition from ecologically-devastated Earth rediscovers an old colony planet, where some original plant species still survive-soon expands into a quest-saga in PLANETARY ROMANCE style as the female protagonist, accompanied by some escaped unusually independent native women (see FEMINISM), has various adventures in search of the mysterious "doctors" who have manipulated the genetic stock of the colonists, apparently for eugenic reasons. The cast is full, and includes an interesting presentation of the "geneslave" concept (the term comes from Elizabeth HAND's Winterlong sequence); and the plot embodies a number of Twice-Told fairy tales. HC's future work is eagerly awaited. [JC] COLLINS, HUNT Evan HUNTER. COLLINS, MICHAEL Dennis LYNDS. COLLINS, PAUL (1954- ) Australian editor, publisher, writer and bookseller. At an early age he began publishing and editing a SEMIPROZINE, VOID SCIENCE FICTION AND FANTASY (1975-81), which in due course transmuted into a series of original ANTHOLOGIES, including Envisaged Worlds (anth 1978), Ron Graham Presents Other Worlds (anth 1978), Alien Worlds (anth 1979), Distant Worlds (anth 1981) and Frontier Worlds (anth 1983); a later anthology is Metaworlds: Best Australian Science Fiction (anth 1994). His debut novel, Hot Lead - Cold Sweat (1975), not sf, was published by his own SMALL PRESS, Void Publications. With Peter Wilfert he edited Sf aus Australien ["Australian SF"] (anth 1982 Germany). In 1980 he set up a second small press, Cory & Collins, in partnership with Rowena Cory. Despite execrable production standards, this was of some importance in providing a platform for Australian sf and fantasy novelists - authors included Russell BLACKFORD, A. Bertram CHANDLER, David LAKE, Wynne N. WHITEFORD and Jack WODHAMS - but the venture ceased in 1985 after 14 books. PC's sf-writing career began with "The Test" for Weirdbook 12 in 1977, and he has since been remarkably prolific, with over 50 sf stories published, mostly in Australia but some overseas, though even in Australia he has not made the impression on sf readers that his craftsmanlike work may at its best deserve. [PN]See also: AUSTRALIA. COLOMBIA LATIN AMERICA. COLOMBO, JOHN ROBERT (1936- ) Canadian author and editor of over 80 books, notably anthologies of Canadiana and works of popular reference. Books with sf relevance include: CDN SF&F: A Bibliography of Canadian Science Fiction and Fantasy (1979 chap) with Michael Richardson, Alexandre L. Amprimoz and John Bell; Blackwood's Books: A Bibliography (1981); Years of Light: a Celebration of Leslie A. Croutch (1982); and Mostly Monsters (coll 1977), fantastic POETRY. Other Canadas (anth 1979) was the first anthology of Canadian sf, and Not to be Taken at Night (anth 1981) likewise for Canadian HORROR fiction. [PN]Other works as editor: Friendly Aliens (anth 1981); Windigo (anth 1982).Nonfiction: Colombo's Book of Marvels (1979; exp vt Mysterious Canada 1988); Extraordinary Experiences (1989); Mysterious Encounters (1990); Mackenzie King's Ghost (1991); UFOs over Canada (1991).See also: CANADA. COLONIZATION OF OTHER WORLDS The idea of colonizing the other worlds of the Solar System has had an uncertain history because the optimism of sf writers has constantly been subverted and contradicted by the discoveries of ASTRONOMY. The attractions of the idea have, however, always overridden cautionary pessimism, and the reluctant acceptance of the inhospitability of local planets has served only to increase interest in colonizing the worlds of other stars ( GALACTIC EMPIRES).The example of the British Empire was insufficient to inspire many early UK sf writers to speculate about its extension into space. The most important of those who did was Andrew BLAIR, whose Annals of the Twenty-Ninth Century (1874) was the most extravagant of early future HISTORIES. H.G. WELLS used the example of the UK's colonial history as an analogy for the Martians' conduct in THE WAR OF THE WORLDS (1898) but never considered the idea of mankind's colonizing MARS, although Robert W. COLE did in The Struggle for Empire (1900). Later writers of SCIENTIFIC ROMANCE were almost completely uninterested in the conquest of space; both J.B.S. HALDANE in "The Last Judgement" (1927) and Olaf STAPLEDON in LAST AND FIRST MEN (1930) imagined mankind migrating to other worlds but only under extreme duress, as Earth became uninhabitable. The avoidance of the notion may be connected with a sense of shame about the methods employed in colonizing terrestrial lands; the parallel which Wells drew between the European invasion of Tasmania and the Martian invasion of Earth is a harsh one, and the brutality of the POLITICS of colonization has always been a key issue in sf stories, even in the US PULP-MAGAZINE sf that made the conquest of space its central myth. Early cautionary allegories include Edmond HAMILTON's "Conquest of Two Worlds" (1932) and Robert A. HEINLEIN's grim "Logic of Empire" (1941), although it was not until the 1950s that such lurid polemics as Avram DAVIDSON's "Now Let Us Sleep" (1957) and Robert SILVERBERG's Invaders from Earth (1958 dos) could be published, and not until the 1970s that mature and effective moral tales like Silverberg's Downward to the Earth (1970) and Ursula K. LE GUIN's THE WORD FOR WORLD IS FOREST (1972; 1976) became commonplace. These stories of genocide, slavery and exploitation are the harshest critiques of human behaviour found in US sf; they often embody a strong sense of guilt regarding the fate of the inhabitants of pre-Columbian North America. Mike RESNICK's bitter study of spoliation in Paradise (1989) is an effective transfiguration of the history of Kenya.Political issues are at the heart of another recurrent colonization theme, which deals with the relationship between colonies and the mother world. Here history provides - at least for US writers - much more attractive parallels, and the War of Independence has frequently been refought, from the early "Birth of a New Republic" (1930) by Miles J. BREUER and Jack WILLIAMSON to Isaac ASIMOV's "The Martian Way" (1952), Robert A. Heinlein's THE MOON IS A HARSH MISTRESS (1966) and Poul ANDERSON's Tales of the Flying Mountains (coll 1970). UK writers have been less enthusiastic about the notion of colonial defection, and sometimes develop images of a very uneasy relationship between Earth and its colonies; examples include Arthur C. CLARKE's The Songs of Distant Earth (1986) and Paul J. MCAULEY's Of the Fall (1989; vt Secret Harmonies).The pioneer spirit is something much celebrated in sf at all levels. The mythology of the conquest of the Old West is often transcribed into sf so literally that even the covered wagon is retained. AMAZING STORIES once published a novel - "Outlaw in the Sky" (1953) by Guy Archette (Chester S. GEIER) - in which only half a dozen words had been modified in making the transposition from Western to sf; a more recent example is the "pioneer" sequence of Heinlein's Time Enough for Love (1973). Celebrations of the heroism of colonists fighting tremendous odds to tame hostile environments include Henry KUTTNER's Fury (1950; vt Destination: Infinity), Walter M. MILLER's "Crucifixus Etiam" (1953), E.C. TUBB's Alien Dust (1955) and Harry HARRISON's Deathworld (1960). It is often difficult to offer a convincing motivation for the colonists, and so various reasons are commonly devised to compel colonization, as in The Survivors (1958; vt Space Prison) by Tom GODWIN, Orbit Unlimited (coll 1961) by Poul Anderson, Mutiny in Space (1964) by Avram Davidson, Castaways' World (1963 dos; rev as Polymath 1974) by John BRUNNER and Farewell, Earth's Bliss (1966) by D. G. COMPTON. A frequent subtheme deals with native populations that resist colonization, sometimes consciously and sometimes by virtue of the fact that the ECOLOGY of the planet has no suitable niche for the colonists. Many stories by Poul Anderson fall into this category, as do "You'll Never Go Home Again" (1951; vt "Beachhead") and "Drop Dead" (1956) by Clifford D. SIMAK and "Colony" (1953) by Philip K. DICK.One of the most significant uses which sf writers have found for human colonies on alien worlds is in building distorted societies, sometimes for SATIRE and sometimes for thought experiments in SOCIOLOGY. Notable satirical exercises include Search the Sky (1954) by Frederik POHL and C.M. KORNBLUTH, The Perfect Planet (1962) by Evelyn E. SMITH, A Planet for Texans (1958) by H. Beam PIPER and John J. MCGUIRE, and many short stories by Eric Frank RUSSELL, including the justly celebrated ". . . And Then There Were None" (1951). More straightforward sociological treatments include Poul Anderson's Virgin Planet (1959), John JAKES's Mask of Chaos (1970), Harry Harrison's Planet of the Damned (1962; vt Sense of Obligation) and such remarkable novels as THE LEFT HAND OF DARKNESS (1969) by Ursula K. Le Guin, THE FIFTH HEAD OF CERBERUS (1972) by Gene WOLFE and AND CHAOS DIED (1970) by Joanna RUSS. In many of these stories the colonies are isolated worlds within a GALACTIC EMPIRE. The notion of an extended chain of remote colony worlds is used in A. Bertram CHANDLER's Rim Worlds novels and Murray LEINSTER's Med Ship stories.Two fundamental classes of colonization story can be easily distinguished: the "romantic" and the "realistic". The first derives from a tradition which makes much of the exotic qualities of alien environments. Here the alien worlds are exotic Earths, little different from the distant lands of travellers' tales. Human and humanoid alien co-exist. The politics of exploitation is not the focal point of the story but may serve to turn the wheels of the plot as the hero, alienated from his or her own kind, champions the downtrodden natives against the horrors of vulgar commercialism. Women writers have been particularly prolific in this vein: Leigh BRACKETT often used it, as has Marion Zimmer BRADLEY in her Darkover novels. Anne MCCAFFREY's Pern novels likewise belong to the romantic school, and Jack VANCE has written many novels featuring a less stylized romanticism. Some of the most impressive works in the romantic vein are Cordwainer SMITH's stories of Old North Australia and his Quest of the Three Worlds (fixup 1966). Recent examples often emphasize quasimystical processes of adaptation to the alien environment: a reharmonization of mankind and nature that often covertly echoes the Eden myth ( ECOLOGY; LIFE ON OTHER WORLDS; PASTORAL). A simple example is Outpost Mars (1952; vt Sin in Space) by Cyril Judd (C.M. Kornbluth and Judith MERRIL); a more complex one is Eight Keys to Eden (1960) by Mark CLIFTON. The archetype of the species is Ray BRADBURY's "The Million-Year Picnic" (1946). The image of a lost Eden plays an important part in many of the otherwise realistic colonization novels of Michael G. CONEY, tingeing them with a peculiar nostalgia; examples include Mirror Image (1972), Syzygy (1973) and Brontomek! (1976).The "realistic" school, whose authors concentrate on blood, sweat and tears rather than glamorous exotica, developed in the post-WWII era, although Edmond Hamilton's archetypal "What's it Like out There?" (1952) was written in the 1930s. This school won its early successes outside the sf magazines, being extensively developed by Heinlein and Arthur C. Clarke in stories published in general-fiction magazines and in (often juvenile) novels. Heinlein's contributions include Red Planet (1949), Farmer in the Sky (1950) and many of the stories in The Green Hills of Earth (coll 1951). Clarke's include the Venture to the Moon series of vignettes in the London Evening Standard and the novels The Sands of Mars (1951) and Earthlight (1955). Patrick MOORE's series of juveniles, including Domes of Mars (1956) and Voices of Mars (1957), also belongs to this tradition. These juvenile novels take great pains to achieve some kind of authenticity, but "realism" in the magazines was much more a matter of literary posturing, consisting mainly of ultra-tough novels with a strong seasoning of cynicism: Police Your Planet (1956 as by Erik van Lhin; rev 1975) by Lester DEL REY is a cardinal example. Realistic treatment of colonization methods remains a common theme in sf; it plays a subsidiary but important role in, for example, Mindbridge (1976) by Joe HALDEMAN and GATEWAY (1977) by Frederik Pohl. The realistic school has suffered somewhat where it has conscientiously remained within the boundaries of a Solar System whose hostility has become increasingly apparent, but it has been saved from extinction not only by the idea of domed colonies with self-enclosed ecologies but also by the notion of TERRAFORMING, significantly treated in such works as Kim Stanley ROBINSON's RED MARS (1992 UK), Pamela SARGENT's VENUS OF DREAMS (1986) and Venus of Shadows (1988), and Ian MCDONALD's Desolation Road (1988), which features a remarkable juxtaposition of the ultra-romantic and cynically realistic modes. Other writers have favoured the idea that colonists need not bother with worlds at all; Konstantin TSIOLKOVSKY, the pioneer of ROCKET research, proposed that we might build artificial satellites to contain orbital colonies, and this notion of SPACE HABITATS has been sophisticated in recent times by such nonfiction writers as Gerard K. O'Neill. Sf stories displaying such ideas include a series of novels by Mack Reynolds begun with Lagrange Five (1979; later novels in the series are ed Dean ING), Lois McMaster BUJOLD's FALLING FREE (1988), and the satellite-tv soap opera Jupiter Moon (1990).Terraforming adapts worlds to colonists, but one might logically expect it to be much easier to adapt colonists to worlds. Relatively little attention has been given to this approach. Biological-engineering methods were applied to the business of colonization by James BLISH in the stories making up THE SEEDLING STARS (fixup 1957) ( PANTROPY) and by Poul Anderson in "Call Me Joe" (1957), and were investigated in more detail by Frederik Pohl in MAN PLUS (1976), but increasing interest in GENETIC ENGINEERING has yet to bring forth prolific speculation in this vein.Theme anthologies concerning colonization include The Petrified Planet (anth 1952) ed anon Fletcher PRATT and Medea: Harlan's World (anth 1985) ed Harlan ELLISON. [BS]See also: GENERATION STARSHIPS; LIVING WORLDS. COLOSSUS OF NEW YORK, THE Film (1958). William Alland Productions/Paramount. Dir Eugene Lourie, starring John Baragrey, Mala Powers, Otto Kruger, Charles Herbert, Ed Wolff. Screenplay Thelma Schnee, based on a story by Willis Goldbeck. 70 mins. B/w.A curious little film about a man killed in an accident whose brain is transferred by his scientist father into an 8ft (2.4m) ROBOT body. Without a human body his mind both loses all compassion and resents it in others; hence he decides to destroy good guys at the UN. But his lingering humanity asserts itself and he asks his son (who doesn't know who he is) to turn him off. TCONY has been praised, but most see it as a routine potboiler. Shooting took eight days, and its director claims he can barely remember making it. [PN] COLOSSUS, THE FORBIN PROJECT (vt The Forbin Project) Film (1969). Universal. Dir Joseph Sargent, starring Eric Braeden, Susan Clark, Gordon Pinsent, William Schallert. Screenplay James Bridges, based on Colossus (1966) by D.F. JONES. 100 mins. Colour.A supercomputer, Colossus, is designed by Dr Forbin to take control of the US defence network but, once activated, develops ambitions of its own and ignores all commands. Unlike the neurotic HAL in 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY (1968), Colossus is a COMPUTER of the old school - emotionless, arrogant and practically omnipotent. It forms an alliance with its Russian equivalent and the film ends with the two computers in charge and likely to stay that way. The subtext is the usual one: better to be human and idiotic, even at the risk of nuclear WAR, than to surrender our autonomy to machines. The scenes showing Colossus in vast caverns beneath the Rocky Mountains have a powerful admonitory charge. This is a neat, well made film. [JB/PN] COLUMBIA PUBLICATIONS DYNAMIC SCIENCE FICTION; FUTURE FICTION; ORIGINAL SCIENCE FICTION STORIES; SCIENCE FICTION; SCIENCE FICTION QUARTERLY. COLVIN, IAN (GOODHOPE) (1912-1975) UK writer and journalist whose sf novel is Domesday Village (1948), set in a NEAR-FUTURE UK with a socialist regime. [JC] COLVIN, JAMES House name used primarily by Michael MOORCOCK for book reviews and stories in NW (and for one independent collection of stories), and occasionally by others for book reviews. Moorcock has also written at least one story as Warwick Colvin Jr, who is identified as JC's nephew. [JC] COLVIN, WARWICK Jr [s] James COLVIN. COMA Film (1978). MGM. Dir Michael CRICHTON, starring Genevieve Bujold, Michael Douglas, Rip Torn, Richard Widmark. Screenplay Crichton, based on Coma (1977) by Robin COOK. 113 mins. Colour.Crichton's most commercially successful film, C is a present-day thriller with one sf element: the use of hospital patients, deliberately put into irreversible coma by using poisoned anaesthetic, as living repositories of body parts which are profitably sold for use in transplant surgery - a scheme, it has been alleged, that by the 1980s had real-life counterparts. Bujold is good as the resourceful young woman doctor - the film was praised at the time by the Women's Movement - who uncovers the plot in this stylish but wholly implausible paranoid melodrama. Crude but effective visual symbolism equates medicine with the meat trade, which cannot have pleased those of Dr Crichton's old colleagues still in practice. [PN]See also: CINEMA. COMET US PULP MAGAZINE; 5 issues, Dec 1940-July 1941, bimonthly after Jan 1941. Published by H-K Publications; ed F. Orlin TREMAINE. Tremaine, former editor of ASF, made a brief and undistinguished return to sf-magazine editing with this title. Contributors included Eando BINDER, Frank Belknap LONG and Harl VINCENT. The last issue contained "The Vortex Blaster", the first story of E.E. SMITH's series of that name. A continuing feature was "The Spacean", an imaginary future newspaper which betrayed the magazine's juvenile slant. C had little visual appeal; its cover layout was particularly ungainly. [MJE] COMFORT, ALEX(ANDER) (1920- ) UK writer and medical doctor who has published significant popular work in the fields of sexology and gerontology, being perhaps best known for The Joy of Sex (1972). Before WWII he established an extremely precocious reputation for poetry, fiction and a pacifism he espoused rigorously during the years of conflict. One early novel, No Such Liberty (1941), edges into parable in its description of the wartime internment of Germans; Cities of the Plain (1943) is an anti-capitalist DYSTOPIAN play; Tetrarch (1980 US), a fantasy, takes its protagonists magically into a political and sexual UTOPIA named Los, where they must find their true shapes; and Imperial Patient (1987) infuses a tale of the emperor Nero with mythical elements. His first genuine sf novel, Come Out to Play (1961), is a near-future SATIRE on scientism narrated by a smug sexologist. The Philosophers (1989), set in a NEAR-FUTURE UK, savages a decrepit Tory hegemony. [JC] COMICS This rubric covers the comic strip in daily and Sunday newspapers, European comic papers and the US-style comic book; it does not cover the GRAPHIC NOVEL per se, although clearly there is overlap between the two categories. Strip-cartoon stories use some interaction of text and picture, as opposed to the established "storybook" use of words plus illustrations of the words. Design, drawing style, caption and word-balloon continuity all serve to make the strip cartoon a medium with its own syntax and frame of reference, one which may have been best defined by Scott McCloud (1960- ) - in his seminal Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art (graph 1993) - as "Juxtaposed pictorial and other images in deliberate sequence, intended to convey information and/or to produce an aesthetic response in the viewer."Like the history of sf, the history of the comic strip is far more complex, and extends much further into the past, than had been assumed until recent decades, when researchers (see Further Reading list below) began properly to examine the record, and to establish a continuity between the graphic work of the 18th century and the comic papers and Sunday newspaper supplements which flourished so conspicuously in the USA a century later. Sf comic strips as such, however, were slow to develop. By the end of the 19th century, though the comic strip had achieved very considerable sophistication and was capable of treating very widely varied subject matter, there was virtually no sf presented in a credible manner, nor would there be for another 30 years. Prior to this, the emphasis on humour in the comic strips had relegated sf to the realms of fantasy, as in Our Office Boy's Fairy Tales (1895 The Funny Wonder), an anonymous UK series depicting a family on Mars facing totally impossible hardships and jubilations. More mature in its approach was Winsor MCCAY's fantasy Little Nemo in Slumberland (1st series 1905-11 New York Herald), which depicted the dream adventures of a young boy and an ever-increasing array of characters from the court of King Morpheus. McCay's manipulation of the size, shape and position of each panel, together with his use of perspective, gave added emphasis to the narrative and indicated how artistic technique could augment the text. (This attribute of the comic strip was sometimes itself used to create the fantasy element, as in Krazy Kat [1911-44] by George Herriman [1880-1944], where the scenic background, changing from panel to panel, created a surrealistically alien environment, or in Felix The Cat [1923 onwards] by Otto Messmer [1892-1983], where the eponymous feline gave substance to his imagination by treating the contents of his thought balloons as physical realities.) McCay's fantasies were perhaps topped only by the expressionist whimsy of his contemporary, Lyonel Feininger (1871-1956), in Wee Willy Winky's World and The Kin-Der Kids.In the 1920s, when economic depression brought about a change in public outlook, a demand was created for action-adventure strips, making publication of outright sf comic strips feasible. The transition came with BUCK ROGERS IN THE 25TH CENTURY (1929-67), an adult comic strip inspired by a novel in AMAZING STORIES; it spawned several rivals, among them BRICK BRADFORD (1933 onwards), FLASH GORDON (1934 onwards), Speed Spaulding (1939), adapted from Edwin BALMER's and Philip WYLIE's When Worlds Collide (1933) and illustrated by Marvin Bradley, and not forgetting Frank Godwin's CONNIE (1927-44), which in the mid-1930s abandoned its everyday terrestrial setting for outer-space intrigue. These all drew their plots extensively from the epics of classical literature, modernized by the inclusion of SPACESHIPS and ray-guns, and distanced from reality by being located in the far future or remote past.Similar innovations occurred in Europe following the reprintings there of the major US comic strips. High points were the appearances of: in France, Futuropolis (1937-8 Junior) and Electropolis (1939 Jean-Pierre), both written and illustrated by Rene Pellos; in Italy, Saturno Contro la Terra (1937-43), written by F. Pedrocchi and illustrated by G. Scolari; and, in the UK, GARTH (1943 onwards).The growth in the number of sf comic strips was, however, largely a reflection of the increased number of comic strips in general; they were now so popular in the USA that new methods of packaging them were being explored. Out of this experimentation developed the comic book. Initially comic books contained merely reprints of the newspaper strips-e.g., Buck Rogers in Famous Funnies (1934-55) and Flash Gordon and Brick Bradford in King Comics (1936-51)-but soon the available existing strips were used up, and comic books featuring original strips were the inevitable second stage. In the first issue of one of these new titles, Action Comics (1938 onwards; DC COMICS), SUPERMAN appeared. Featuring a larger-than-life figure, omnipotent (mostly) in the face of all adversity, Superman (1939 onwards) proved so popular that numerous imitation SUPERHEROES appeared, from Batman through CAPTAIN MARVEL to the many heroes featured by the modern MARVEL COMICS group, all being variations on the same basic theme.In many of these comic books a central sf story was backed up by strips from outside the genre, but some comics were entirely devoted to sf. The first sf comic book was Amazing Mystery Funnies (1938-40), which contained a pot-pourri of superhero and SPACE-OPERA strips, its artists including Bill Everett (1917-1973), Will Eisner (1917-) and Basil Wolverton (1909-1979). Hugo GERNSBACK briefly entered the field with Superworld Comics (1939). Buck Rogers (1940-43) and Flash Gordon (intermittently 1943-53) also appeared as titles. Most successful was Planet Comics (1940-54), a companion to PLANET STORIES, which featured Star Pirate by Murphy Anderson (1926- ), Lost World by George Evans (1920- ), Auro, Lord of Jupiter by Graham Ingels (1915-1991) and other memorable strips.In such a competitive market it was inevitable that publishers would turn to the sf PULP MAGAZINES for help. National Periodicals (DC Comics) offered Mort WEISINGER, then editor of THRILLING WONDER STORIES, an editorial post. Accepting it, he worked initially on Superman, using authors of the calibre of Alfred BESTER, Edmond HAMILTON, Henry KUTTNER and Manly Wade WELLMAN to help compete with the rival publication, Captain Marvel, scripted by Otto Binder ( Eando BINDER). Well known artists from the sf magazines were also used. Alex SCHOMBURG appeared in Startling Comics (1940-51), Edd CARTIER in Shadow Comics (1940-50) and Red Dragon, 2nd series (1947-8), and Virgil FINLAY in Real Fact Comics (1946-9). Similarly, in the UK Serge Drigin, artist on SCOOPS and FANTASY, illustrated Space Police (1940 Everyday Novels and Comics).By the early 1950s numerous sf comic books were appearing, among them: Lars of Mars (1951) and Space Patrol (1952), both issued by ZIFF-DAVIS, publishers of AMAZING STORIES and FANTASTIC ADVENTURES; and Rocket to the Moon (1951) and An Earthman on Venus (1952), both published by Avon and featuring adaptations of, respectively, Otis Adelbert KLINE's Maza of the Moon (1930) and Ralph Milne FARLEY's The Radio Man (1924 Argosy All-Story Weekly; 1948; vt An Earthman on Venus 1950); and an anti-communist propaganda sf comic book, Is This Tomorrow? (1947). More durable were Mystery in Space (1951-66) and Strange Adventures (1950-73), both from DC, Harvey's Race for the Moon (1956) and Richard E. Hughes's Forbidden Worlds (1951-67), all of which managed some consistency, albeit of a distinctly juvenile nature. Distinguished artwork came from the likes of Sid Greene, Carmine Infantino, (1925- ), Gil Kane (1926- ), Jack KIRBY, Mike Sekowsky, Al Williamson (1931- ) and sometime Buck Rogers illustrator Murphy Anderson (1926- ). All the while, new sf comic strips were appearing in newspapers, two of the better titles being Beyond Mars (1951-3 New York Sunday News), scripted by Jack WILLIAMSON from his two novels Seetee Shock (1950) and Seetee Ship (1951), with illustrations by Lee Elias (1920- ), and Twin Earths (1951-4), a counter-Earth story created and written by Oskar Lebeck illustrated by Alden McWilliams (1916- ) - not to forget Sky Masters (1959-61), drawn by Kirby and written by Bob and Dick Wood, doing their best to second-guess a space programme that still lay 10 years in the future.The most important of this period, however, were the sf comic books published by EC COMICS. Appearing initially at the suggestion of Harry HARRISON, who had been working in comics as artist and scriptwriter since 1946, Weird Science (1950-53) and Weird Fantasy (1950-53) - which later merged to form Weird Science Fantasy (1953-5) before being finally renamed Incredible Science Fiction (1955-6) - published the most sophisticated sf stories yet to appear in the comic books, often featuring wry endings in the manner of Philip K. DICK. Illustrated by such well known sf artists as George Evans, Frank FRAZETTA, Roy G. KRENKEL, Bernard Krigstein (1919-1990), Al Williamson and Wallace WOOD, they often included adaptations of stories by popular sf authors, in particular Ray BRADBURY. With the imposition of the Comics Code in 1955, these and many other titles ceased, and comics then went through a period of restraint and unoriginality.A similar boom in sf comic books was taking place in Europe. Included in these titles were Super Science Thrills (1945), Tit-Bits Science Fiction Comics (1953) and The Jet Comic (1953), a companion to AUTHENTIC SCIENCE FICTION, which appeared in the UK, and Espace (1953-54) and L'An 2,000 (1953-4), in France. Also of interest was Tarzan Adventures (1953-9) which, under Michael MOORCOCK's editorship from 1957, published several sf comic strips, including James CAWTHORN's Peril Planet. It was in the weekly comic papers, however, that the best-drawn and -plotted sf comic strips were to appear. Foremost was DAN DARE (1950-67 Eagle). With its clean linework by Frank HAMPSON, this became the UK's most influential sf comic strip, inspiring several rivals - including JEFF HAWKE, Captain Condor (1952-5 Lion), at one time illustrated by Brian LEWIS (who also did many NEW WORLDS covers), and Jet-Ace Logan (1956-9 Comet; 1959-60 Tiger), written by Frank S. Pepper (1910-1988) and, later, by Moorcock (who also scripted Rick Random, Space Ace, drawn by Rowland [Ron] Turner (1922- ) for Thriller Picture Library). Equally notable was Rocket (1956), an sf comic paper which featured US reprints and others, including Escape from Earth, Seabed Citadel and Captain Falcon; it ran to 32 issues. More successful was Boy's World (1963-4) which, prior to its merger with Eagle, published Wrath of the Gods, initially written by Moorcock and illustrated by Ron Embleton (1930-1988), then by John M. Burns (1938- ), Ghost World, illustrated by Frank Bellamy (1917-1976), and The Angry Planet, an adaptation of Harry Harrison's Deathworld (1960) plotted by Harrison and scripted by Kenneth BULMER. Mention should also be made of TV Century 21 (1965-9), which published material based on Gerry ANDERSON's tv puppet shows STINGRAY, FIREBALL XL5, THUNDERBIRDS and CAPTAIN SCARLET AND THE MYSTERONS and on Terry NATION's horrors, the DALEKS. In 1977 the first truly UK sf comic arrived in the shape of 2,000 AD, starring the quasi-fascist supercop JUDGE DREDD.A turning point was the publication by MARVEL COMICS - which had published innumerable horror, fantasy and sf anthology titles throughout the 1950s and early 1960s - of The Fantastic Four (1961 onwards), whose success heralded a new wave of superhero comics, starring new characters and heroes (like Captain America and Sub-Mariner) resuscitated from Marvel productions of the period during and immediately after WWII. National Periodicals (DC Comics), publishers of Superman, was already in the process of expanding its superhero list, so DC and Marvel very soon became established as the "Big Two" in the field. Another trend was the growing number of adaptations of sf TELEVISION series, notably STAR TREK and DR WHO, which both appeared in a variety of publications. Innovations appeared in the "underground" comics, where sf supplied an ideal framework for scatological examinations of society's neuroses and phobias; original artistic styles were developed by Richard CORBEN, Vaughn BODE and others. Roger ELWOOD edited Starstream Comics (1976) in an attempt to introduce adaptations of work by Poul ANDERSON, Larry NIVEN, Robert SILVERBERG and others, but this venture apparently failed to attract any substantial readership. A similar fate befell a slightly earlier series, Unknown Worlds of Science Fiction (1975) ed Roy Thomas, which adapted stories by Moorcock, Bob SHAW, Stanley G. WEINBAUM and others. Published by the Marvel Comics group and with the byline "Stan Lee Presents" ( Stan LEE), it ran for 6 issues in 1975. Several other sf comics appeared in the mid-1970s, notably Charlton Comics's Space 1999 Magazine (a companion to the Gerry Anderson tv series SPACE 1999), the apocalyptic colour comic Doomsday Plus 1 (recently reprinted, due to the popularity of artist John Byrne [1950- ], by Fantagraphics) and Marvel's Planet of the Apes magazine (based on the 1968 movie PLANET OF THE APES and its sequels), which was immensely popular in the UK in 1975. Mike Friedrich's titles Star Reach (1975-8) and Imagine (1976-8), which graduated in 1977 from underground comics to small-magazine format, had a heavy sf and fantasy bias. Friedrich's list of contributors reads like a who's who of comics experimenters and stars: Howard V. CHAYKIN, Michael T. Gilbert, Lee Marrs, P. Craig Russell (1950- ) (well remembered for his work on Marvel's Killraven space opera - see below - which ran in Amazing Adventures 1975-6 and was republished as a graphic novella, 1983), Jim Starlin (1949- ). . . the list is a long one. Mention should also be made of Marvel's 1977 adaptation of the 1968 film 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY, done by Jack Kirby, who also had a 100pp novella, The Silver Surfer (graph 1977), co-authored with Stan LEE, published in that year.In the UK interest in Jeff Hawke had waned sufficiently for the London Daily Express, the national newspaper in which it had appeared, to discontinue the strip - although the Express's sister newspaper, the Scottish Daily Record, missed Jeff Hawke enough that it commissioned a new and exceptionally similar strip from Sidney Jordan: this was Lance McLane, which ran from 1976 until the mid-1980s. Earlier, in 1973, writer Richard O'Neill and artist John M. Burns had created a Philip Jose FARMER-style fantasy, Danielle (1973-4; brief revival in 1978; graph coll as Danielle 1984), for the London Evening News. In the USA Gil Kane and Ron GOULART embarked on a daily space-adventure strip, Star Hawks (1977-81), cleverly jumping in before the release, later that year, of the movie space opera STAR WARS.With the success of that film came a renewed interest in sf proper, rather than the fringe-sf of the superhero adventure. The 1970s had seen their fair share of interesting though often short-lived features, such as: Mike Kaluta's elegant adaptation of Edgar Rice BURROUGHS's Carson of Venus adventures in Korak (1972-4); Killraven (Amazing Adventures 1973-6) by Don MacGregor, initially drawn by Howard V. Chaykin and after 1975 by Russell, which was an attempt at a sequel to H.G. WELLS's THE WAR OF THE WORLDS (1898); Monark Starstalker by Chaykin; Deathlok; Star Hunters; Warlock and CAPTAIN MARVEL, both these latter by Jim Starlin; Guardians of the Galaxy (written by Steve Gerber); Starfire and The Eternals (inspired by the notions of Erich von DANIKEN) - as well as the many excellent stories published by James Warren in his black-and-white magazines Eerie (1965-83), Creepy (1965-83), 1984 (1978-80) and Comix International (1974-7). Baronet Books issued The Illustrated Roger Zelazny (graph 1978) by Gray MORROW and followed up with The Illustrated Harlan Ellison. HEAVY METAL - a US avatar of France's METAL HURLANT - opened many eyes to European comics stars such as Moebius (Jean GIRAUD), later creator of The Airtight Garage (graph coll trans 1987), and Philippe DRUILLET, with Lone Sloane (graph 1967) and Delirius (graph 1973). Star Wars and, to a lesser extent, LOGAN'S RUN (1976) began the deluge of late 1970s/early 1980s sf on film and tv. ALIEN, BATTLESTAR GALACTICA, BLADE RUNNER, BUCK ROGERS IN THE 25TH CENTURY, OUTLAND, 2010 and UFO all had comics adaptations. Star Wars's own comic series ran for 10 years (1977-86); and, despite its having to change publishers several times, there has been a Star Trek comic book running continuously right through the 1970s and 1980s to today's Star Trek: The Next Generation. In the UK at this time it was the tv-related magazines that produced the best comic-strip sf. Countdown (later renamed TV Action 1970-74) ran a Dr Who strip and another based loosely on 2001: A Space Odyssey, and Look In had some excellent stories ranging from The TOMORROW PEOPLE through Buck Rogers in the 25th Century to The SIX MILLION DOLLAR MAN .Smaller independent companies like First Comics brought us items such as: Mars (1984) by Marc Hempel (1957- ) and Mark Wheatley (1954- ), a tale of Earth science and colonists versus Martian Mother Nature; NEXUS (1981-91) by Mike Baron (1949- ) and Steve Rude (1956- ), possibly the ultimate mixture of HARD SF and superhero genres; AMERICAN FLAGG! (1983-8; 2nd series 1988-9), Chaykin's DYSTOPIAN masterpiece (there were 3 collections: Hard Times [graph 1984], Southern Comfort [graph 1986] and State of the Union [graph 1987]), followed by his two stylish Time (2) novellas, The Epiphany (graph 1986) and The Satisfaction of Black Mariah (graph 1987). First Comics also continued the comics adaptations of Michael Moorcock's Elric books after Pacific Comics had expired - Elric of Melnibone (1984), Sailor on the Seas of Fate (1985-6), Weird of the White Wolf (1986-7), The Vanishing Tower (1987-8) and Bane of the Black Sword (1988-9) - as well as initiating further Moorcock series: Hawkmoon (5 series, 1986-9) and Corum (1987-9). Marvel Comics brought out a glossy magazine in the Heavy Metal mould called Epic Illustrated (1980-86; rev 1992), and this led Marvel to set up in 1984 a separate imprint, Epic Comics, which has put out some excellent material: Starstruck (1985-6; graph exp vt Starstruck: The Expanding Universe 1990-91); also adapted as a stage play) by Elaine Lee and Mike Kaluta; Void Indigo (1984-5) by Steve Gerber, which dealt with a few too many TABOOS and was left unfinished; Alien Legion (1984-current); and Plastic Forks (1990), a Philip K. Dick-style adventure by Ted McKeever. Epic Comics is currently publishing McKeever's apocalyptic story Metropol (1991-current). Other items of interest include: Frank MILLER Inc.'s story Ronin (1983-4; graph coll 1987), a fascinating mixture in which post- HOLOCAUST techno-principality (New York) meets Samurai drama; and comics's answer to Fritz LANG's METROPOLIS (1926), MR X (1984-91) by Dean Motter and Paul Rivoche, issued by Canadian publisher Vortex and produced briefly by the LOVE AND ROCKETS creators Gilbert (1957- ), Jaime (1959- ) and Mario Hernandez, with a collection published as The Return of Mr X (graph coll 1985). The comic-book company Innovation has recently published several sf and fantasy adaptations based on work by (among others) Piers ANTHONY, Terry PRATCHETT, Anne Rice (1941- ) and Gene WOLFE. JAPAN - home of martial-arts epics, GOJIRA and gargantuan ROBOTS - deserves special discussion. The robots usually have an initial manga (comic-strip) incarnation. The ancestor of them all is Osamu TEZUKA's Tetsuwan Atom (vt Astroboy). This diminutive hero's comic-strip adventures date back to 1952, and his tv cartoon show, first aired in 1963, marked the birth of tv animation in Japan. As well as robo-colossi such as Mazinger X and The Shogun Warriors, space operas like Space Cruiser Yamato and Galaxy Express 999 and the space piracy of by Masamune Shirow, the closely-guarded pseudonym of a Japanese writer/artist (1962- ) Captain Harlock (all created by Reiji Matsumoto) were very popular in 1970s manga and on tv. More recently speculative manga have been given a chance to diversify a little as evidenced by Mai the Psychic Girl (trans graph coll 1990 UK); Rumiko Takahashi's Lum (1989-90), a sort of sf farce; the serene HARD SF of Yukinobu Hoshino's 2001 Nights (trans graph 1990);Appleseed (trans graph coll, vol 1 1990, vol 2 1991, vol 3 1992)by Masamune Shirow, the closely-guarded pseudonym of a Japanese writer/artist (1962- ); and Katsuhiro OTOMO's phenomenally successful Akira (1982 onwards), filmed as AKIRA (1987), whose nearly 2000 pages are being published in colour in English by Epic Comics (1989 onwards).In the 1990s the "adult" cartoon strip has finally begun to find its way into bookshops and away from the "funnies" sections of the newspapers. Reading V for Vendetta (graph 1990) by Alan MOORE and artist David Lloyd (1950- ) is not the simple, lowest-common-denominator entertainment that was once the norm for comic books; reading the Luther Arkwright trilogy (graph coll 1989) by Bryan Talbot (1952- ) involves an understanding of the language of comics, especially in layout; reading Matthias Schultheiss's Bell's Theorem (graph in 3 vols 1989) really does hinge on an understanding of the eponym. Of course, there is no shortage of trashy adventure comics and fatuous newspaper strips, just like 50 years ago. The difference is that now there are intelligent comic strips, comic books and graphic novels as well.For a list of all comics and comics-related entries Introduction. [JE/SW/SH/JC]Further reading: The best studies of the comic strip before the end of the 19th century are, both by David Kunzle, The Early Comic Strip (1974) and The History of the Comic Strips: The 19th Century (1992), the first 2 vols of an extended and intensive overview; and The American Comic Book Catalogue: The Evolutionary Era, 1884-1939 (1990) by Denis Gifford (1927- ), which lists nearly 500 separate titles and series, is an important aid. For later periods, see The Comics (1947; reissued 1990) by Coulton Waugh; The Penguin Book of Comics (1967; rev 1971; rev 1990) by George Perry and Alan Aldridge; A History of the Comic Strip (1968) by P. Couperie and Maurice Horn; The World Encyclopedia of Comics (1967) by Maurice Horn; The Adventurous Decade: Comic Strips in the Thirties (1976) by Ron GOULART; The World Encyclopedia of Comics (1976) ed M. Horn; Smithsonian Collection of Newspaper Comics (1977) ed Bill Blackbeard and Martin Williams; Smithsonian Book of Comic Book Comics (1979) ed Blackbeard; The International Book of Comics (1984) by Denis Gifford; Encyclopedia of Comic Characters (1987) by Denis Gifford;Comics: Ideology, Power and the Critics (1989) by Martin Barker; The Encyclopedia of Comic Books (1991) by Ron Goulart; Adult Comics: An Introduction (1993) by Roger Sabin; The Comic Book: The One Essential Guide for Comic Book Fans Everywhere (1994) by Paul Sassienie; the important annual bibliography The Overstreet Comic Book Price Guide by Robert M. Overstreet. COMMANDO CODY - SKY MARSHAL OF THE UNIVERSE US tv series (1955). Republic Studios/Hollywood Television Service for NBC TV. Prod Mel Tucker, Franklyn Adreon, dir Fred Bannon, Harry Keller. Written by Ronald Davidson, Barry Shipman. Weekly. 25 mins per episode. B/w.Despite the title, the hero of this short-lived children's tv series was more likely to be found riding in a four-door sedan than travelling around the Universe. A cross between the Lone Ranger and Captain Midnight (his rival crime-fighter on CBS), Cody wore a costume that looked as if its previous owner had been in the German High Command and a mask whose function was unclear. Cody (here played by Judd Holdren) and his sidekick Joan (Aline Towne) had previously appeared in two Republic Studios film serials, Radar Men from the Moon (1952; 12 episodes), in which Cody was played by George Wallace, and Commando Cody (1953; 12 episodes), starring Holdren. Equipped with several secret laboratories, a spaceship and an ordinary revolver, Cody fought conventional gangsters and, occasionally, the Ruler, an evil genius from outer space. Unsurprisingly reminiscent of the absurdities of the movie serials, CC was more entertaining than the slicker CAPTAIN MIDNIGHT. [JB/PN] COMMUNICATIONS Many aspects of communication in sf are dealt with under separate entries in this volume. The most familiar form of communication is through language, for a discussion of which LINGUISTICS. Direct mental communication, or telepathy, is discussed under ESP. For communication in the sense of travel MATTER TRANSMISSION and TRANSPORTATION. For communications networks COMPUTERS, CYBERPUNK and MEDIA LANDSCAPE.Once the implications of Relativity were absorbed by GENRE SF it was realized that most SPACE OPERAS and any story involving a GALACTIC EMPIRE faced the problem that messages from one star system to another might take many lifetimes to deliver. The issues raised here are discussed under FASTER THAN LIGHT (see also HYPERSPACE), and two of the best known sf devices invented by writers to cope with it are discussed under ANSIBLE and DIRAC COMMUNICATOR. Communication within our Solar System has been dealt with in many stories, mostly earlier, notably those collected in Venus Equilateral (coll of linked stories 1947) by George O. SMITH.Messages can be sent forwards in time using time capsules. Sending them backwards in time is trickier, but the apparent prohibition against sending such messages implied by Relativity may be sidestepped by using the (theoretical) elementary particle called the TACHYON, which can travel only faster than light. Sending messages to the past in this way (see also TIME TRAVEL) is central to TIMESCAPE (1980) by Gregory BENFORD. Indeed, messages from the future to the past are not uncommon in sf, a recent example, with bewilderingly rococo detail, being provided by Dan SIMMONS's Hyperion books, HYPERION (1989) and The Fall of Hyperion (1990), in which a titanic struggle across the ages by different but ultimate AIs involves such sometimes contradictory time messages as the lethal Shrike (a God of Pain), mysterious Time Tombs, and Moneta, the goddess of backwards memory who lives backwards in time, along with what appears to be reversed predestination where the future determines the past. All such stories worryingly violate the Principle of Causality which states, to put it simply, that causes precede effects.The most common communications scenario in sf-often but not always linguistic - involves the meeting of humans with ALIENS. These are often called first-contact stories, and perhaps the best known of them is "First Contact" (1945) by Murray LEINSTER; an anthology of such stories is First Contact (anth 1971) ed Damon KNIGHT. Among some of the alien-contact stories most relevant to communication are "A Martian Odyssey" (1934) by Stanley G. WEINBAUM, "The Big Front Yard" (1958) by Clifford D. SIMAK and THE MOTE IN GOD'S EYE (1974) by Larry NIVEN and Jerry POURNELLE.Aside from the areas of communications which are dealt with in greater detail elsewhere in this volume, there remains that of nonlinguistic communication, though the distinction is merely semantic, in that many writers would take linguistics to include, for example, mathematical symbology and sign language ( MATHEMATICS). In many nonfiction works - an early example, for the lay reader, being We Are Not Alone (1964) by Walter Sullivan - there is discussion of the possibility of using universal mathematical symbols to communicate with aliens, and this idea is by no means restricted to sf: it was used, for example, as the basis for the symbols inscribed on the first space capsule whose course would take it outside the Solar System. The best of all stories about talking to aliens via mathematics may be Neverness (1988) by David ZINDELL, in which the Solid State Entity, a godlike consciousness formed by an ordering of space and matter comprehending thousands of star systems, is talked to - at length and very convincingly, even movingly - in this manner.There was not much emphasis on communication problems in early sf. Most nonlinguistic communication stories are post-WWII, by which time there had already been much discussion of information theory, especially in the context of CYBERNETICS. Any message consists of coded information: whether in the form of words, mathematical symbols, signs, modulated electromagnetic waves, intermittent laser beams or even the chemical pheromones used for communication by animals. A number of sf communication stories, then, have been in effect code-cracking stories. In James BLISH's VOR (1958) an alien communicates by changing the colours of a patch on his head (VOR stands for violet, orange, red). Jack VANCE's "The Gift of Gab" (1955) turns on whether a squid-like alien creature is intelligent; his intelligence is proven when he learns to use a semaphore language - invented for the purpose - by waving his tentacles. Vance's stories persistently invent new communication systems, usually linked with the nature of alien cultures. Messages in various of his stories are passed by masks, music, smells, colours or signs. (A number of stories of this general type are discussed under ANTHROPOLOGY.) Suzette Haden ELGIN is another writer whose stories blend cultural anthropology with communication problems; she has a PhD in linguistics. Naomi MITCHISON has written a notable book in this area, MEMOIRS OF A SPACEWOMAN (1962), centred on a research worker whose job it is to understand and if possible communicate with alien species; Mitchison's aliens are more vivid and convincing than usual, perhaps because of her background in BIOLOGY. Communication with aliens is, of course, a popular theme in sf, and many books, such as Conscience Interplanetary (1972) by Joseph GREEN, have dealt with it at a less demanding level.Fred HOYLE has several times tackled the problem of decoding alien messages, most interestingly in The Black Cloud (1957) but also in A for Andromeda (1962), written with John ELLIOT. The latter story tells of the cracking of a binary code picked up on a radio telescope and its interpretation as instructions for building an artificial person. One of the purest stories of this kind is James E. GUNN's The Listeners (1972), which concentrates on the motivation behind attempts to pick up messages from the stars, and brings in many questions of human communication as well. Decoding alien communication also occurs in Michael P. KUBE-MCDOWELL's debut novel Emprise (1985), a first-contact story, in Carl SAGAN's bestselling Contact (1985) and in Jack MCDEVITT's The Hercules Text (1986). Sagan's book has some good detail on the physics of communication and contains the entertaining notion that hidden within the number pi, with its endless succession of apparently random numbers after the decimal point, is a message from the original geometers of the Universe. This outdoes Kurt VONNEGUT Jr who, in THE SIRENS OF TITAN (1959), reports the discovery that many great human events and artefacts are in fact coded messages from the alien Tralfamadorians. Stonehenge, when viewed from above and decoded, means "Replacement part being rushed with all possible speed".Much closer to home, a popular theme has been attempts to communicate with species on our own planet, notably in The Day of the Dolphin (1967; trans 1969) by Robert MERLE and Clickwhistle (1973) by William Jon WATKINS. Both of these owe much to the well known work carried out by the scientist John Cunningham Lilly, author of The Mind of the Dolphin: A Nonhuman Intelligence (1968). Ian WATSON adopts a rather different method of cetacean communication in The Jonah Kit (1975) - indeed, most of Watson's books dramatize methods of transcending the limitations of spoken human communication.There are plenty of communication problems in our own society, even without aliens. D.G. COMPTON makes one of the best uses of a familiar idea in SYNTHAJOY (1968), a well written and serious story about what happens when a machine is built which records emotional experiences and can be plugged into other minds. And, of course, there are many stories, both in the mainstream and in sf - too many to list here - about the effect of DRUGS in assisting (or militating against) genuine human communication.Some of the most interesting sf communication stories are those which stress the ambiguity that may be involved in interspecies communication. Three particularly enigmatic novels on this theme are ROGUE MOON (1960) by Algis BUDRYS, SOLARIS (1961 Poland; trans 1970) by Stanislaw LEM and Whipping Star (1970) by Frank HERBERT. The Stanley KUBRICK film 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY (1968) also comes into this group. In ROGUE MOON a labyrinthine artefact, apparently meaningful, is found on the Moon's surface. However, those who walk through it, some penetrating further than others, have all died. These slaughters may in one sense be acts of communication also; they are given a number of human analogies by Budrys, who seems to see all communication as fraught with difficulty. (Alien-artefact stories are further discussed under BIG DUMB OBJECTS and DISCOVERY AND INVENTION.) Lem's SOLARIS tells of the living planet of Solaris; humans in an orbital laboratory hope to communicate with the (hypothetical) planetary intelligence; when communication arrives it takes the form of replicating figures from the scientists' subconscious minds. All efforts at communication are thwarted by the anthropomorphism of the observers, and the novel asks the pessimistic question: will it ever be possible to transcend our human-centred view of the Universe, or is communication with the alien a contradiction in terms? Herbert's Whipping Star is frivolous by comparison, but its ingenious array of semantic confusions - as humans attempt to communicate with entities whose corporeal form, it turns out, is as stars - poses some sharp questions. Kubrick ducked the question altogether in what has become the most famous sequence in sf CINEMA; when the mysterious alien intelligence of 2001 does communicate, the audience is given only an enigmatic and incomprehensible collage of lights, fragmentary landscapes, an unexpected 18th-century room and a foetus. We are given to understand that communication is achieved, but we receive only the static that surrounds it. CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD KIND (1977) is another film which ends on a comparable note, the communication here being between humans and the occupants of a UFO by means of lights and musical notes; the climax is a kaleidoscope of colour and sound. COMMUNION Film (1989). Pheasantry Films in association with Allied Vision, The Picture Property Company. Coprod Philippe Mora, Whitley STRIEBER and Dan Allingham; dir Mora; screenplay Strieber based on his own book Communion: A True Story(1987); starring Christopher Walken, Lindsay Crouse, Joel Carlson, Frances Sternhagen, Andreas Katsulas and Terri Hanauer. 101 mins. Colour.This interesting film which tells of the abduction by ALIENS of fantasy writer Whitley Strieber has little of the documentary about it, and while based on a book that purported to be factual, is only distinguishable from science fiction in one obvious respect. Although we actually witness the alien abduction, at first in jerky neurotic flashbacks, later as a more continuous narrative, the film always allows, even encourages, an alternative reading. This is that fantasist Strieber, suffering from writers' block, and shown in the film to behave in an increasingly unstable manner, has experienced a mental breakdown with a component of paranoid hallucination. (Another theoretical alternative scenario, that Strieber invented the whole story in a cynical and successful attempt to break into the best-seller market, is not considered.) Nonetheless, the dual reading offered gives the film an edgy, captivating quality, much assisted by the brio of Mora's direction and a ruthlessly committed performance from Walken, who in some films appears to drift through his roles. Mora (from an Australian family much involved with art) sets almost every scene with ambiguous paintings and sculptures in the background, and this too adds to the teasing (documentary fact or postmodernist fiction?) quality of the film. The film's most celebratedly surreal scene is that in which Strieber during an examination by aliens is sodomised by something resembling a petrol pump. But the aliens themselves are disappointing, some resembling blue orcs, some resembling the big-eyed, etiolated, elf-like figures we originally saw in CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD KIND (1977), and in both incarnations filmic stereotypes. (Though if the paranoid reading is correct, then the aliens indeed "should" be stereotypes.) [PN]See also: UFOS, for a discussion of various abducted-by-flying-saucer books and films. COMPTON, D(AVID) G(UY) (1930- ) UK writer, born of parents who were both in the theatre; he has lived in the USA since 1981. DGC's novels are almost always set in the NEAR FUTURE, and each presents a moral dilemma. The future is used as a device for bringing contemporary trends into a clearer focus. Most of the interest lies in personal relationships and the behaviour of people under stress; minor characters are observed with humour which frequently arises from class differences. Endings are ambiguous or deliberately inconclusive. Later novels have varying modes of narrative technique. DGC's rare public utterances confirm the impression that he is not interested in the staple concerns of GENRE SF.DGC's first sf novel was The Quality of Mercy (1965; rev 1970 US), concerning a genocidal plot, using a biological weapon, to combat OVERPOPULATION. In The Silent Multitude (1967) the crumbling of a cathedral city reflects a disintegration in the human spirit. Farewell, Earth's Bliss (1966; rev 1971 US) shows the plight of social misfits transported to MARS. SYNTHAJOY (1968), a more complex novel, brought DGC wider notice, particularly in the USA. A surgeon and an electronics engineer develop tapes which enable unremarkable people to enjoy the experiences of those who are more gifted or fortunate. This basic idea is a premise for the exploration of a moral problem and the observation of human beings in extreme situations. The Steel Crocodile (1970 US; vt The Electric Crocodile 1970 UK) presents the danger of new knowledge and its application. Chronocules (1970; vt Hot Wireless Sets, Aspirin Tablets, the Sandpaper Sides of Used Matchboxes, and Something that Might have been Castor Oil 1971 UK; a further apparent vt, as Chronicules 1976 UK, is almost certainly a publisher's misspelling) is a TIME-TRAVEL story. The Missionaries (1972 US) describes the efforts of some evangelizing aliens with a good deal of social comedy.DGC's strengths as a writer are all displayed in the much admired The Continuous Katherine Mortenhoe (1974; edited version vt The Unsleeping Eye 1974 US; vt Death Watch 1981 UK). A woman in her 40s is given four weeks to live. A reporter with eyes replaced by tv cameras has the job of watching her decline for the entertainment of a pain-starved public in a world where illness is almost unknown. The reporter sees one of the transmissions and realizes that the camera cannot tell the truth; the recorded film is without mind and therefore without compassion. The sequel, Windows (1979 US), depicts the consequences of the reporter's decision to opt for the oxymoron of literal blindness; neither character in the end is allowed to escape into solitude. The former novel was filmed as La MORT EN DIRECT (1979). In DGC's most recent solo novel of real interest, Ascendencies (1980 US), manna-like free energy begins to fall from space, but the side-effects include profound displacements, both physical and in the domestic psyches whose traumas have always inspired his best work. Ragnarok (1991) with John GRIBBIN shows DGC's grasp of character depiction, but its near-future plot - a scientist brings on a nuclear winter in an attempt to enforce disarmament - owes much to his collaborator's grasp of scientific process. But Nomansland (1993) and Justice City (1994) each increasingly demonstrates his recapture of the humane smoothness with which, in earlier books, he so eloquently anatomized the near future. [MA/JC]Other works: The Palace (1969); A Dangerous Malice (1978) as by Frances Lynch; A Usual Lunacy (1978 US); Scudder's Game (1985 Germany, in German; English text 1988); Radio Plays (coll 1988 chap).See also: COLONIZATION OF OTHER WORLDS; COMMUNICATIONS; COMPUTERS; CYBERNETICS; CYBORGS; DISASTER; MEDIA LANDSCAPE; OVERPOPULATION; POWER SOURCES; PSYCHOLOGY; RELIGION; SCIENTISTS. COMPTON CROOK/STEPHEN TALL MEMORIAL AWARD AWARDS. COMPTON-RICKETT, Sir JOSEPH Joseph Compton RICKETT. COMPUTERS The computer revolution in the real world has been so recent and so rapid that sf has had to struggle hard to keep up with actual developments. Although Charles BABBAGE's attempts to develop a mechanical computer have lately attracted attention in such STEAMPUNK novels as THE DIFFERENCE ENGINE (1990 UK) by William GIBSON and Bruce STERLING, they failed to inspire the 19th-century literary imagination. In fiction the notion of "mechanical brains" first evolved as a corollary to that of mechanical men ( ROBOTS) - an early one is featured in Edward Page MITCHELL's "The Ablest Man in the World" (1879) - but this tacit acceptance of the notion of powerful skull-sized computers contrasts oddly with the tendency to imagine advanced computers as huge machines the size of buildings, cities or even planets. Sf writers who had been awakened to the advent of computers by the building of ENIAC in the late 1940s failed utterly to foresee the eventual development of the microprocessor. A partial exception is Howard FAST's "The Martian Shop" (1959), which features a computer that fits into a 6in (15cm) cube; however, the point made is that such tininess (which anyway does not seem so tiny today) could not be achieved using foreseeable human technology.In the early sf PULP MAGAZINES, artificial brains, like robots, showed a distinct tendency to go mad and turn against their creators; examples include "The Metal Giants" (1926) by Edmond HAMILTON and "Paradise and Iron" (1930) by Miles J. BREUER. But clever machines featured in more sympathetic roles in several stories by John W. CAMPBELL Jr, who went on from "The Metal Horde" (1930) to write such stories as the series begun with "The Machine" (1935 as by Don A. Stuart), in which a benevolently inclined machine intelligence finally bids farewell to the human race in order to prevent mankind from stagnating through dependence upon its generosity. Revolutions against a mechanical mind which rules society more-or-less benignly have long been commonplace in sf; examples include Francis G. RAYER's Tomorrow Sometimes Comes (1951), Philip K. DICK's Vulcan's Hammer (1960 dos) and Ira LEVIN's This Perfect Day (1970). The New York Times commissioned Isaac ASIMOV's satirical explication of the theme, "The Life and Times of MULTIVAC" (1975), which questions whether such a rebellion would be desirable or necessary; Asimov had been consistently favourable towards the idea of a machine-run society ever since his early advocacy in "The Evitable Conflict" (1950). Another strongly pro-computer story from the 1950s, redolent of the conflict and confrontation typical of the period, is They'd Rather Be Right (1957; vt The Forever Machine) by Mark CLIFTON and Frank RILEY. Hysterical fear of computers is satirized in "The Man who Hated Machines" (1957) by Pierre BOULLE.The idea that machine intelligence might be reckoned the logical end product of EVOLUTION on Earth has a long history in sf, extending from Campbell's "The Last Evolution" (1930) to Sagan om den stora datamaskinin (1966; trans as The Tale of the Big Computer 1968; vt The Great Computer; vt The End of Man?) by Olof JOHANNESSON. The notion of computers evolving to become literally Godlike is featured in Fredric BROWN's "Answer" (1954), Isaac Asimov's "The Last Question" (1956), Dino BUZZATI's Il Grande Ritratto (1960; trans as Larger than Life 1962) and Frank HERBERT's Destination: Void (1966). Other accounts of huge computers with delusions of grandeur and the power to back them up include The God Machine (1968) by Martin CAIDIN, Colossus (1966) and its sequels by D.F. JONES, Mayflies (1979) by Kevin O'DONNELL Jr, The Judas Mandala (1982) by Damien BRODERICK and The Venetian Court (1984) by Charles L. HARNESS. The computer incarnation of the Father of Lies in Jeremy LEVEN's Satan (1982) is, by contrast, humble and unassuming. The notion that the computer might be the answer to all our problems is ironically encapsulated in Arthur C. CLARKE's fantasy "The Nine Billion Names of God" (1953), in which a computer rapidly and easily completes the task for which God created mankind.The idea that computers might one day be endowed with - or spontaneously evolve - self-awareness has generated a whole series of speculative exercises in machine existentialism, which inevitably tend to the anthropocentric. Notable examples include "Mike" in THE MOON IS A HARSH MISTRESS (1966) by Robert A. HEINLEIN and the central characters of When Harlie was One (1972) by David GERROLD, The Adolescence of P-1 by Thomas J. RYAN (1977), and Valentina: Soul in Sapphire (1984) by Joseph H. DELANEY and Marc STIEGLER. In recent years the notion has become so commonplace as to be intensively recomplicated in such novels as Rudy RUCKER's Software (1982) and Wetware (1988), although Rucker earlier treated the notion sceptically in Spacetime Donuts (1981). William Gibson's eponymous Neuromancer (1984) kicked off a new trend in sentient software, carried forward by other CYBERPUNK writers and fellow-travellers, including Kim NEWMAN in The Night Mayor (1989). Autobiographical statements are offered by nascently sentient machines in "Going Down Smooth" (1968) by Robert SILVERBERG, Arrive at Easterwine (1971) by R.A. LAFFERTY and - most impressively - Queen of Angels (1990) by Greg BEAR.The fear of computers "taking over" our lives remains a powerful influence, manifest across a broad spectrum of story types. These range from straightforward foul-up stories - e.g., "Computers Don't Argue" (1965) by Gordon R. DICKSON - to surreal extravaganzas like "I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream" (1967) by Harlan ELLISON. D.G. COMPTON's The Steel Crocodile (1970; vt The Electric Crocodile) and John BRUNNER's The Shockwave Rider (1975) offer striking examples of computers being used, with good intentions but repressively, by NEAR-FUTURE politico-technocratic elites. On the other hand, Man Plus (1976) by Frederik POHL presents a secret computer take-over as not necessarily a bad thing, and Michaelmas (1977) by Algis BUDRYS proposes that the dictatorship of the machine-based system might in the end be benevolent. A metaphysical ( METAPHYSICS) species of take-over is displayed in stories in which computers literally absorb human personalities. Interesting examples are The Ring of Ritornel (1968) by Charles L. HARNESS, Midsummer Century (1972) by James BLISH and Catchworld (1975) by Chris BOYCE. In recent years the idea of "downloading" human personalities into machinery has been used very promiscuously indeed, being one of the key corollaries of the notion of "cyberspace"; it is featured in Vernor VINGE's proto-cyberpunk story True Names (1981; 1981 dos), and had become a virtual cliche by the time Frederik Pohl's Heechee Rendezvous (1984) and Greg BEAR's Eon (1985) proposed that software afterlives might one day be universally on offer. The attractions of this possibility are obvious, if slightly dubious.Real-world developments in computer games have had a considerable influence on sf ( GAMES AND SPORTS; GAMES AND TOYS); Rob SWIGART's novel Portal: A Dataspace Retrieval (1988) is eccentrically modelled on such a game. Computer SCIENTISTS are nowadays common characters in sf stories and, despite the late start made by sf writers in getting in on the computer boom, it now seems that ideas developed by William Gibson and those who have followed his example are proving a significant inspiration to real computer scientists.Relevant theme anthologies include Science Fiction Thinking Machines (anth 1954) ed Groff CONKLIN; Computers, Computers, Computers: In Fiction and in Verse (anth 1977) ed D. Van Tassel; Machines that Think (anth 1984) ed Isaac Asimov, Patricia S. WARRICK and Martin H. GREENBERG; Computer Crimes and Capers (anth 1985) ed Asimov, Greenberg and Charles G. WAUGH; Microworlds: SF Stories of the Computer Age (anth 1984) ed Thomas F. MONTELEONE; and Digital Dreams (anth 1990) ed David V. Barrett. [BS]See also: AUTOMATION; CYBERNETICS; CYBORGS; INTELLIGENCE. COMSTOCK, JARROD Sharon JARVIS. COMYNS, BARBARA Working name of UK writer Barbara Comyns-Carr (1909-1992), whose style's transfixed faux-naive simplicity urged much of her work into a tone of pregnant magic realism ( FABULATION). The Vet's Daughter (1959) describes the emotional distress of its doomed narrator, Alice Rowlands, in such a deadpan fashion that the violent scene of fatal levitation which culminates the tale seems totally unfantasticated. The Juniper Tree (1985) is a retelling, in hallucinated modern garb, of a fable from the Brothers Grimm. [JC] CONCEPTUAL BREAKTHROUGH The legends of Prometheus and of Dr Faustus contain a central image which is still vigorous in sf: the hero in his lust for knowledge goes against the will of God and, though he succeeds in his quest, he is finally punished for his overweening pride and disobedience. Adam eating the forbidden apple is another version of the legend. Its reverberations resonate throughout the whole of literature.Of all the forms which the quest for knowledge takes in modern sf, by far the most important, in terms of both the quality and the quantity of the work that dramatizes it, is conceptual breakthrough. It is amazing that the importance and centrality of this idea in sf has had so little in the way of critical recognition, though an essay by Gary K. WOLFE, "The Known and the Unknown: Structure and Image in Science Fiction" (in Many Futures, Many Worlds [anth 1977] ed Thomas D. CLARESON), points towards it.Conceptual breakthrough can best be explained in terms of "paradigms", as that term is used by philosophers of science. A paradigm is a generally held way of looking at and interpreting the world; it consists of a set of often unspoken and unargued assumptions - for example, before Nicolas Copernicus (1473-1543) the paradigm saw Earth as the centre of the Universe. All the most exciting scientific revolutions have taken the form of breaking down a paradigm and substituting another. Often the old paradigm is eroded slowly at first, through discovery of lots of little puzzling anomalies, before the new paradigm can take over. Such an altered perception of the world, sometimes in terms of science and sometimes in terms of society, is what sf is most commonly about, and few sf stories do not have at least some element of conceptual breakthrough.An important subset of conceptual-breakthrough stories consists of those in which the world is not what it seems. The structure of such stories is often that of a quest in which an intellectual nonconformist questions apparent certainties. Quite a number have been stories in which the world turns out to be a GENERATION STARSHIP, as in "Universe" (1941) by Robert A. HEINLEIN, Non-Stop (1958; vt Starship US-the US title giving the game away) by Brian W. ALDISS, and Captive Universe (1969) by Harry HARRISON. In "The Pit" (1975) by D. West the world turns out to be inside an artificial asteroid. In "Outside" (1955), by Aldiss, a suburban house turns out to be an experimental laboratory in which shape-changing aliens are incarcerated. In several stories the world is artificial, either literally or because its inhabitants have been brainwashed into seeing it wrongly, as in Time out of Joint (1959) by Philip K. DICK. Philip Jose FARMER's Riverworld books deal throughout with conceptual breakthrough; the first breakthrough is the realization that, despite all the resurrected dead who populate it, Riverworld is not Heaven; the second is the recognition that the inhabitants are being manipulated. There is a touch of PARANOIA here ("we are property"), quite common in conceptual-breakthrough stories, as in those where the world turns out to be a construct to aid market research; e.g., "The Tunnel Under the World" (1955) by Frederik POHL and Counterfeit World (1964; vt Simulacron-3 US) by Daniel F. GALOUYE.Closely allied to the above are stories where information about the world turns out to be not so much wrong as incomplete. The classic example here is "Nightfall" (1941) by Isaac ASIMOV, in which the constant presence of suns in the sky of another planet has prevented knowledge of the stars, and everyone panics every 21,049 years when five suns set and the sixth is eclipsed. Arthur C. CLARKE's The City and the Stars (1956) has two breakthroughs, the first out of a beautiful but static utopian city into the greater world, and the second into a knowledge of civilizations in the stars. Another post-WWII classic is "Surface Tension" (1952) by Blish, in which the hero breaks out of his underwater microcosm to discover a great world arching over his puddle. (Blish always recognized the shift from one paradigm to another as the essence of sf, and said as much in "The Science in Science Fiction" [1971; reprinted in The Tale that Wags the God coll 1987 ed Cy Chauvin]. His novel about Roger Bacon, Doctor Mirabilis [1964], which takes conceptual breakthrough as its theme, has, therefore, the flavour of sf even though based on historical fact.) Daniel F. Galouye's Dark Universe (1961) is perhaps the best of many stories in which an underground community has lost its memory of the surface. In LORD OF LIGHT (1967) by Roger ZELAZNY the breakthrough is into an understanding of the true nature of an artificial heaven.All stories where the apparently complete world of the story's beginning, whether a generation starship or an underground community, turns out to be only part of a greater whole can be termed pocket-universe stories. ( POCKET UNIVERSE, where the case is made that many conceptual-breakthrough stories of this sort can be linked with the passage from the constrictions of childhood to the freedoms of adulthood.) The archetype of all such stories is The History of Rasselas (1759) by Samuel JOHNSON, in which the hero, walled into a tranquil Abyssinian valley by mountains, finds his yearning for knowledge of the outside world obsessing him, not letting him enjoy the happiness he sees all around him. He escapes; the world outside is less happy than his own, but it is interesting. Rasselas provides the template for the whole subgenre; moreover, the intellectual discontent and formless yearnings of its hero are among the commonest qualities of sf HEROES, and Johnson's mild pessimism - which recognizes that, even though the new world-picture may be uglier than the old, we need to know about it - captures exactly the accepting tone which was to permeate so much sf. It is a romantic, if often melancholy, form of striving, and sf never reveals its romantic origins more clearly than when it uses the tropes of conceptual breakthrough.Sometimes the breakthrough is transcendent, and can be given to the reader only by analogy, inasmuch as the new state cannot be described in a terminology which itself belongs to the old paradigm. Such a state is commonly attained by the heroes of A.E. VAN VOGT and Alfred BESTER, and more recently those of Ian WATSON, all of whose works centre on a conceptual breakthrough of some kind. Such, too, are the end of the film 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY (1968), where kaleidoscopic imagery of hypnagogic intensity is an emblem of the incomprehensible, and the vastly superior INTELLIGENCE attained by the hero of CAMP CONCENTRATION (1968) by Thomas M. DISCH, a book which alludes with some subtlety to every celebrated literary variant of the Faust myth. In Algis BUDRYS's extraordinary novel ROGUE MOON (1960) conceptual breakthrough (in the attempt to understand a labyrinthine artefact on the Moon) seems invariably accompanied by death, and this too recalls the Faustian theme, transcendence being linked to mortality. A similar consequence occurs in The Black Cloud (1957) by Fred HOYLE.Sometimes conceptual breakthrough is ambiguous: the objective nature of the new paradigm cannot be understood because of the subjective nature of PERCEPTION. A joke version of this occurs in "The Yellow Pill" (1958) by Rog PHILLIPS, where one character believes himself to be in a room, the other in a spaceship, and both are tempted to break down the other's version of reality; one walks, fatally, through what he believes to be a door. Paradoxes of this kind were enjoyed by Philip K. Dick, as in "Impostor" (1953) - where a man who believes himself unjustly persecuted as a machine breaks through to the realization that he is indeed a robot with a bomb in his belly - and also in, among others, Eye in the Sky (1957), Martian Time-Slip (1964), Ubik (1969) and A Maze of Death (1970). A subjective, disturbing form of conceptual breakthrough is the basis for many of J.G. BALLARD's stories, such as "Build-Up" (1957; vt "The Concentration City"), "Manhole 69" (1959), "Thirteen to Centaurus" (1962) and even "The Drowned Giant" (1964; vt "Souvenir"). One of the most remarkable conceptual-breakthrough stories of recent years - whose author, Christopher PRIEST, saw the work as in part a homage to Aldiss's Non-Stop - is INVERTED WORLD (1974). In this book a city is constantly and painfully pushed forward on rails because the world-picture of its inhabitants is of a hyperboloid where time and space are progressively distorted both north and south of an always moving optimum line. The probable truth turns out to be very different. As in many such stories, the breakthrough is inner as well as outer; the book adopts the Berkeleyan view that the world is what we see it as being; changes in objective truth are changes in perception; there is no such thing as pure scientific truth.The forms taken by conceptual breakthrough in sf are almost impossible to enumerate. David LINDSAY's A VOYAGE TO ARCTURUS (1920) is structurally an ironic series of such breakthroughs, with each new truth seen in turn to be as inadequate as the previous one, until the grim, rather nihilistic and ultimate reality is revealed at the end. John FOWLES's The Magus (1965; rev 1977) achieves a similar effect in a non-sf context. C.S. LEWIS's Perelandra (1944; vt Voyage to Venus) has some moments of startling beauty when the hero tries to accommodate his perceptions to the alien configurations of Venus. William GOLDING's The Inheritors (1955) has the breakthrough symbolized in the confrontation between Neanderthal and Cro-Magnon. Many of Ray CUMMINGS's PULP-MAGAZINE stories deal with the realization (based, ironically, on a now discredited paradigm) that an infinite series of worlds can exist, each within the atoms of the next higher in the series. Various conceptual leaps take place in most of Samuel R. DELANY's stories, notably "The Star Pit" (1967) and BABEL-17 (1966). In the latter story the breakthrough, ultimately conceptual, is initially LINGUISTIC. Delany sees paradigms as actually existing within, and created by, language itself, a common view in linguistic sf and one found also in Ian Watson's THE EMBEDDING (1973). In Theodore STURGEON's "Who?" (1955; vt "Bulkhead") a spaceship pilot, frightened of the unknown outside his ship, is cheered by the voice of his unreachable companion beyond the bulkhead; only at the end does he find that the other crewman is a mental projection of his own younger self, and that the bulkhead is, metaphorically, in his own mind. Hal CLEMENT's Mission of Gravity (1954) takes place on a high-gravity planet whose natives are forced to understand their world through human eyes, and vice versa. The SWORD-AND-SORCERY milieu of John CROWLEY's The Deep (1975), accepted by the reader as a literary convention, turns out to have a quite different explanation, necessitating a wrench to the reader's view of the novel as well as the hero's view of his world. Ursula K. LE GUIN's The Dispossessed (1974) is structured around parallel breakthroughs in political understanding and fundamental physics; the crossing of walls is the book's central image. The hero of Daniel KEYES's Flowers for Algernon (1959 FSF; exp 1966) begins as a moron, comes to understand the nature of the world as no other human can, then tragically has the gift of intelligence taken away. The breakthrough in "Strangers" (1974) by Gardner DOZOIS is in cultural understanding, and is accomplished only after the death of the protagonist's alien lover. The breakthrough at the end of Orbitsville (1975) by Bob SHAW takes place in an almost unimaginably huge DYSON SPHERE, whose nature puts human evolutionary struggle into a new perspective.Examples could be multiplied endlessly, and have been given extensively to demonstrate how all-pervasive the theme is in sf; no adequate DEFINITION OF SF can be formulated that does not somehow take it into account. It is present, regardless of the usual boundaries, in old wave and NEW WAVE, HEROIC FANTASY and HARD SF, GENRE SF and sf by MAINSTREAM writers. It recurs so compulsively, and so much of the feeling and passion of sf is generated by it, that it must be seen as springing from a deep-rooted human need: to reach out, escape mental traps, prefer movement to stasis; to understand. Sf is pre-eminently the literature of the intellectually discontented, those who need to feel there must be more to life than this; and therein lies its maturity, which by a paradox can be seen as a perpetual adolescent yearning.The breakthrough is often merely implicit in the text, and sometimes easy enough to miss. In these cases it is the readers themselves whose perceptions are shifted through their reading of clues. An extreme case is that of Gene WOLFE, whose Book of the New Sun series is set in a quasimedieval-seeming heroic-fantasy milieu, but the readers' genre expectations are rudely broken as they realize that the book is pure sf, not fantasy; that the time is the far future, not the distant past; that the tower in which apprentice torturers are educated is in fact a derelict spaceship. Wolfe enjoys such coded jolts, as in The Fifth Head of Cerberus (1972), in which the narrator who at the outset was a human anthropologist has towards the end been supplanted by a shape-shifting native of the planet. The exact textual point of the breakthrough can be identified, but only by a careful reader. Thus conceptual breakthrough is not just the subject of much sf: it is also, quite often, its designed effect.Conceptual breakthrough remained as popular a theme as ever in the 1980s and 1990s, though seldom provoking quite the same shock of surprise. The breakthrough in recent sf is often catalysed by confrontation with alien artefacts ( BIG DUMB OBJECTS; DISCOVERY AND INVENTION). The pre-eminent conceptual-breakthrough writer of the 1980s is Greg BEAR, notably in BLOOD MUSIC (1985), a story of evolutionary transcendence mediated by a new form of microorganism. Nancy KRESS's AN ALIEN LIGHT (1988) contains a whole string of conceptual breakthroughs as two rival human cultures and one alien culture make a series of discoveries about each other's initially incomprehensible modes of thinking and patterns of behaviour.Robert SILVERBERG is an interesting case of a writer who - often - no sooner evokes a conceptual breakthrough than he morosely contemplates its drawbacks for people who just want to be ordinary human beings. Such is his The Face of the Waters (1991), in which the revelation that all native life on a planet is linked in a single, godlike, transcendent organism is followed by angst on the part of the humans who may be allowed to join it. One feels that had Silverberg overheard Galileo muttering "Eppur si muove" ["And yet it moves"] he would have responded: "Yes, I agree, but I wish it didn't." [PN] CONDE NAST ASTOUNDING SCIENCE-FICTION. CONDON, RICHARD (THOMAS) (1915- ) US writer, formerly in advertising, best-known for works outside the sf field such as Money is Love (1975), a rococo fantasy, though many, including most notably The Manchurian Candidate (1959), employ some sf elements in the complex generic mix characteristic of his fiction. Later made into a well known film, The MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE (1962), this novel combines a superior kind of brainwashing and elements of the political thriller ( POLITICS) in a story of the attempted assassination of the US President. So extreme is RC's rendering (and rending) of the US political scene that it is fair to think of much of his work as occupying a series of ALTERNATE WORLDS, as in the savage Winter Kills (1974), which features the assassination of a JFK-like US President at the behest of his own father; in Mile High (1969), which argues the premise that Prohibition was created as the Mafia's answer to market insecurity; in The Star Spangled Crunch (1974), in which a 142-year-old tycoon manipulates the world through oil crises; in The Whisper of the Axe (1976), which augurs a successful overturning of the US Government, as does The Emperor of America (1990); in Death of a Politician (1978), which castigates unto death with Swiftian ( Jonathan SWIFT) vigour a Nixon-like figure; and in The Final Addiction (1991), which is set in a grotesquely corrupt NEAR FUTURE. All presume a USA subtly but distinctly other than our own. In all of RC's work, an almost magic-realist intensity of attention to the turns of plot combines with an unerring eye for the hypnotic surface of things to gloss over his profound cynicism about the human animal. But the abyss beneath never shelves. [JC]About the author: "Fantastic Non-Fantastic: Richard Condon's Waking Nightmares" by Joe Sanders, Extrapolation 25.2 (1984).See also: FANTASY; PARANOIA. CONDRAY, BRUNO G. Pseudonym of UK writer Leslie George Humphrys (1921- ), known only as the possible author of Odyssey in Space (1953), as by Vektis BRACK, and of The Dissentizens (1954 chap) and Exile from Jupiter (1955 chap). [JC] CONEHEADS Film (1993). Paramount. Dir Steve Barron, prod Lorne Michaels, starring Dan Aykroyd, Jane Curtin, Laraine Newman and Michael McKean. Screenplay Tom Davis & Aykroyd and Bonnie Turner & Terry Turner. 82 mins. Colour.This gentle and very lightweight SATIRE, an intermittently amusing comedy, is based on sketches first performed on the US tv show Saturday Night Live. Two aliens (Aykroyd and Curtin), humanoids with conical heads who are married to one another, crashland in New York when plans to spearhead an alien invasion of Earth go wrong. Since a rescue expedition will not pick them up for many years, they are compelled to live as humans. Upwardly socially mobile, the male begins working in a repair shop, then (dressed in a turban) drives a taxi, and eventually becomes a middle-class suburbanite, father of a typical American cone-headed teenage daughter (Newman), who excels at golf. Apart from an over-the-top performance by McKean, who plays the obsessive immigration officer determined to track them down for working as illegal immigrants, there is little pungency in either script or performances, and the film lacks the bite of the somewhat similar MEET THE APPLEGATES. The best running gag is the fact that almost nobody picks them as aliens, despite the giveaway huge heads. [PN] CONEY, MICHAEL G(REATREX) (1932- ) UK-born writer, resident in Canada since 1973, working for the British Columbia Forest Service until his retirement in 1989. He was the manager of the Jabberwock Hotel in Antigua when he published his first story, "Sixth Sense" for Visions of Tomorrow in 1969; several more followed rapidly. His first novel, Mirror Image (1972 US) features ALIEN "amorphs" who can so perfectly mimic humans that, when they have done so, they believe themselves to be in fact human; the amorphs reappear in Brontomek! (1976 UK), which won the BRITISH SCIENCE FICTION AWARD. The ecological ( ECOLOGY) puzzle story Syzygy (1973 US) is set on the same world. Another novel loosely connected to these is Charisma (1975 UK), a PARALLEL-WORLDS story whose chief locale is a Cornish fishing village; similar seaside towns, often transplanted to other planets, commonly feature in his work. The Hero of Downways (1973 US) is a more stereotyped action-adventure story, but Friends Come in Boxes (fixup 1973 US; rev 1974 UK) is a fascinatingly grim account of an unorthodox solution to the problem of OVERPOPULATION. Perhaps the best of his early books are Winter's Children (1974 UK), a post- HOLOCAUST novel, and Hello Summer, Goodbye (1975 UK; vt Rax 1975 US; vt Pallahaxi Tide 1990 Canada), a wistful story of adolescent love in an alien environment. A series of stories somewhat reminiscent in their setting of J.G. BALLARD's Vermilion Sands includes several which were amalgamated into The Girl with a Symphony in her Fingers (fixup 1975 UK; vt The Jaws that Bite, the Claws that Catch 1975 US).After Brontomek! there was a considerable gap in MGC's writing career, the two books published during the hiatus, the DYSTOPIAN The Ultimate Jungle (1979 UK) and the UNDER-THE-SEA adventure Neptune's Children (1981 US), being books written earlier that had not sold on first submission. His more recent work is bound together by a FAR-FUTURE background developed in the two-decker novel The Song of Earth: The Celestial Steam Locomotive (1983 US) and Gods of the Greataway (1984 US). Here humans co-exist with other humanoid species, living out a kind of languid dream thanks to the manipulation by a COMPUTER, Rainbow, of the Ifalong (a multiverse of ALTERNATE WORLDS) despite the interference of the godlike alien Starquin. Publication of this was preceded by the spinoff novel Cat Karina (1982 US). MGC then employed the highly flexible metaphysical context to frame two eccentric Arthurian fantasies, Fang the Gnome (1988 US) and its sequel King of the Scepter'd Isle (1989 US). [MJE/BS]Other works: Monitor Found in Orbit (coll 1974 US); the British Columbiasequence comprising A Tomcat Called Sabrina (1992) and No Place for a Sealion (1992), each containing fantasy elements.See also: ARTS; COLONIZATION OF OTHER WORLDS; GAMES AND SPORTS; PLANETARY ROMANCE; REINCARNATION; UNDER THE SEA. CONKLIN, (EDWARD) GROFF (1904-1968) US editor who began his career as manager of Doubleday Book Stores 1930-34, and who intermittently held various editing positions, in and out of commercial publishing, for the rest of his life; he was, however, primarily a freelance. The first of his many sf ANTHOLOGIES was The Best of Science Fiction (anth 1946), a huge compendium which vied in size and potential influence with Raymond J. HEALY's and J. Francis MCCOMAS's Adventures in Time and Space (1946), although the latter book was contracted earlier and had first pick of the material. Nevertheless, The Best of Science Fiction and its successors from the same publisher - A Treasury of Science Fiction (anth 1948; much cut 1957), The Big Book of Science Fiction (anth 1950; much cut 1957) and The Omnibus of Science Fiction (anth 1952; much cut vt Science Fiction Omnibus 1952; much cut vt Strange Travels in Science Fiction 1953; much cut vt Strange Adventures in Science Fiction 1954 UK; cut 1986 - all cut versions differing in their excisions) - are rewarding compilations. GC wrote a book-review column for GALAXY SCIENCE FICTION from #1 (Oct 1950) until Oct 1955. He also edited for Grosset & Dunlap a series of $1 hardcover sf novels, starting in 1950 with novels by A.E. VAN VOGT, Jack WILLIAMSON and others. The series included the first book publication of Henry KUTTNER's Fury (1947 ASF as Lawrence O'Donnell; 1950) with an introduction by GC which has been reprinted in subsequent editions. GC produced anthologies on various themes, including INVASION in Invaders of Earth (anth 1952; much cut 1953 UK; much cut 1955 US; much cut 1962 US; much cut in 2 vols vt Invaders of Earth 1962 UK and Enemies in Space 1962 UK - all cut versions differing in their excisions), TIME TRAVEL and PARALLEL WORLDS in Science Fiction Adventures in Dimension (anth 1953; cut vt Adventures in Dimension 1955 UK; cut under original title 1965 US), ROBOTS, ANDROIDS and COMPUTERS in Science Fiction Thinking Machines (anth 1954; cut vt Selections from Science Fiction Thinking Machines 1955) and MUTANTS in Science Fiction Adventures in Mutation (anth 1955; cut 1955). Later GC became consultant sf editor to Collier Books, for whom he produced the notable anthologies Great Science Fiction by Scientists (anth 1962) and Fifty Short Science Fiction Tales (anth 1963), the latter with Isaac ASIMOV. GC's anthologies were never definitive but were always considered and capable. [MJE/JC]Other works as editor: The Science Fiction Galaxy (anth 1950); Possible Worlds of Science Fiction (anth 1951); In the Grip of Terror (anth 1951); Crossroads in Time (anth 1953); The Supernatural Reader (anth 1953) with Lucy Conklin; 6 Great Short Novels of Science Fiction (anth 1954), not the same collection as Six Great Short Science Fiction Novels (anth 1960), though both are from the same publisher; Science Fiction Terror Tales (anth 1955); Operation Future (anth 1955); The Graveyard Reader (anth 1958); 4 for the Future (anth 1959); Br-r-r-! (anth 1959); 13 Great Stories of Science Fiction (anth 1960); Twisted (anth 1962); Worlds of When (anth 1962); 12 Great Classics of Science Fiction (anth 1963); 17 x Infinity (anth 1963); Dimenson 4 (anth 1964); Five-Odd (anth 1964; vt Possible Tomorrows 1972 UK); 5 Unearthly Visions (anth 1965); Giants Unleashed (anth 1965; vt Minds Unleashed 1970); 13 Above the Night (anth 1965); Another Part of the Galaxy (anth 1966); Seven Come Infinity (anth 1966); Science Fiction Oddities (anth 1966; cut vt Science Fiction Oddities, Second Series 1969 UK); Elsewhere and Elsewhen (anth 1968; vt in 2 vols Science Fiction Elsewhen 1970 UK and Science Fiction Elsewhere 1970 UK); Seven Trips through Time and Space (anth 1968).See also: ALIENS; CYBERNETICS; PUBLISHING. CONLY, JANE LESLIE [r] Robert C. O'BRIEN. CONNER, MIKE Working name of US writer Michael Conner (1951- ), who used his full name for the first half decade or so of his career, beginning to publish work of genre interest with "Extinction of Confidence, the Exercise of Honesty" in New Constellations (anth 1976) ed Thomas M. DISCH and Charles Naylor. His first novel, I am Not the Other Houdini (1978; vt The Houdini Directive 1989), is a burlesque flirtation with apocalypse set in California in the 21st century. Groupmind (1984) is less eccentric; but Eye of the Sun (1988), told with the genre-mixing abundance of many PLANETARY ROMANCES, follows the careening adolescence of three royal children as their FAR-FUTURE world totters into a religious crisis which threatens a long-sustained matriarchy. He won a 1992 NEBULA for "Guide Dog" (1991). [JC] CONNIE US sf COMIC strip, written and drawn by Frank Godwin (1889-1959) from its beginnings in 1927 until 1944, when it was terminated after several years of dwindling success. The early years of the strip, which featured throughout the madcap adventures of its eponymous flapper heroine, were relatively mundane, but by the mid-1930s Connie had become involved in LOST-WORLDS tales, encounters with mad SCIENTISTS, interplanetary missions and TIME TRAVEL. Godwin was not much admired for his writing, but his complex illustrations, both painterly and draughtsmanlike, made the strip memorable. [JC] CONNINGTON, J.J. Pseudonym for all his fiction of UK writer and chemistry professor Alfred Walter Stewart (1880-1947), best known for his detective novels. His one sf novel was Nordenholt's Million (1923). A prototype story of world- DISASTER being surmounted, it is realistic, reasoned, sociologically observed and credible. Fireball-mutated denitrifying bacteria destroy the world's vegetation, then die out. A multimillionaire secures the dictatorship of the UK, selects five million people, segregates them in the Clyde valley with supplies, and engineers the collapse of the rest of the country. On the Clyde, nitrogen is synthesized, moral crises take place, there is an atomic-energy breakthrough at the cost of lives, and the exhausted dictator dies. New cities are built. JJC's intellect tackles the scenario seriously and with feeling; though he is occasionally over-"literary", his imagination is firmly anchored in reality. Under his own name he wrote publications on chemistry and, about himself, Alias J.J. Connington (1947). [DIM]See also: END OF THE WORLD; HISTORY OF SF; HOLOCAUST AND AFTER. CONNOLLY, ROY (? - ) UK writer of whom nothing is known beyond his collaboration with the equally diffident Frank McIlraith on one sf novel, Invasion from the Air: A Prophetic Novel (1934), which depicts with some vividness the effects on London of raids using poison gas and incendiaries. The consequences, it is suggested, will include revolution ( WAR). [JC] CONQUEST, JOAN (?1883-1941) UK writer of floridly euphemistic novels of high romance, typical of which are Leonie of the Jungle (1921), whose eponymous heroine escapes the hypnotic thrall of the goddess Kali in the nick of time, and Love's Curse (1936), in which the spirit of an Egyptian pharaoh curses two 20th-century lovers. Her two sf novels are The Reckoning (1931), in which it is presumed that artificial insemination will result in females lacking both morality and reproductive organs, and With the Lid Off (1936), a future- UTOPIA in which a benevolent Christian dictatorship holds sway. [JC] CONQUEST, (GEORGE) ROBERT (ACWORTH) (1917- ) UK writer, poet, critic and editor, most active as an sf figure in the latter capacity, editing with Kingsley AMIS (whom see for details) the Spectrum ANTHOLOGIES , though some sf essays and reviews of interest appear in The Abomination of Moab (coll 1979), a non- fiction collection. RC was educated at Oxford (DLitt), was a member of the Diplomatic Corps 1946-56, and was later literary editor of the Spectator. He has an OBE. In addition to much poetry, political history and a non-sf novel, The Egyptologists (1965) with Amis, he published A World of Difference (1955), an sf tale whose complicated and discursive plot combines poltical ( POLITICS) speculation with a remotely told scientific adventure centred on a new space drive destined to give humanity a chance to reach beyond the Solar System. [JC]Other work as editor: The Robert Sheckley Omnibus (coll 1973). CONQUEST OF SPACE, THE Film (1955). Paramount. Prod George PAL, dir Byron HASKIN, starring Walter Brooke, Eric Fleming, Ross Martin, Mickey Shaughnessy. Screenplay James O'Hanlon, based remotely on Weltraumfahrt (1952; trans H.J. White as The Mars Project 1953 US), by Wernher von Braun (1912-1977). 80 mins. Colour.The title of this film is taken from the popular-science book The Conquest of Space (1949) by Chesley BONESTELL and Willy LEY. Though supposedly based on a work of science fact by von Braun, the story, set in the 1980s, of a military research expedition to Mars and back is riddled with implausibilities, both scientific (an asteroid burning in the vacuum of space) and human (the commander, regarded as the only person capable of sustaining the mission, becomes a twitching religious fanatic - at one point uttering the celebrated line: "There are some things that Man is not meant to do"). There is a strange but irrelevant Oedipal conflict, ending with the son killing his father, the commander, when the latter tries to sabotage the ship. The special effects are quite ambitious but clumsily executed, in particular the matte work. A truly awful film, TCOS is probably Pal's worst production; it was his last for Paramount. [JB/PN]See also: SPACE HABITATS. CONQUEST OF THE EARTH GALACTICA: 1980. CONQUEST OF THE PLANET OF THE APES Film (1972). Apjac/20th Century-Fox. Dir J. Lee Thompson, starring Roddy McDowall, Don Murray, Natalie Trundy, Hari Rhodes. Screenplay Paul Dehn, based on characters created by Pierre BOULLE. 86 mins. Colour.This was the fourth in the ever-weakening series of films beginning in 1968 with PLANET OF THE APES. Caesar (McDowall), the ape born in ESCAPE FROM THE PLANET OF THE APES (1971), is being kept in a circus but comes to resent the human exploitation of apes so much that, with the help of a sympathetic and all too symbolic Black man (Rhodes), he incites his fellow primates to revolt. The film ends with apes victorious over humans after a bloody battle, thus laying the ground for the future situation (there has been a time-warp) of Planet of the Apes. All this is crudely simplistic. The novelization is Conquest of the Planet of the Apes * (1974) by John JAKES. [JB] CONRAD, EARL (1912-1986) US writer, fairly prolific and sometimes controversial. His sf comprises a NEAR-FUTURE novel, The Premier (1963), and a collection of short stories, The Da Vinci Machine: Tales of the Population Explosion (coll 1969). [JC] CONRAD, GREGG [s] Rog PHILLIPS. CONRAD, JOSEPH (1857-1924) Naturalized UK writer, born in Poland. His full name was Josef Teodor Konrad Nalecz Korzeniowski. For most of his life he laboured under the misprision of his early reputation as a teller of"mere" sea tales; but posthumously he has received due attention for more complex later works like Nostromo (1904) and The Secret Agent (1907). Though it is not sf, "Heart of Darkness" (1902), a dense and potently shaped allegory of guilt, colonialism, alienation and false epiphany in the abyss of Africa, has more than once served as a model for modern sf writers, like Michael BISHOP and Lucius SHEPARD, obsessed by similar concerns: whenever an sf explorer comes across a ravaged cod-godling "white man" in the tropical heart of an alien planet, JC's memory has shaped the tale. Another story, "The Secret Sharer" (1912), has similarly been embraced by Robert SILVERBERG in The Secret Sharer (1988). With Ford Madox FORD JC wrote The Inheritors: An Extravagant Story (1901); the people of the title represent a future race, the "Dimensionists", who will come to supersede ordinary mankind. Though the novel is primarily political SATIRE in its projection of the cold, practical, manipulative future humans, it is genuine sf in its use of themes of other DIMENSIONS and EVOLUTION. [JC/PN]About the author: "Joseph Conrad's Forgotten Role in the Emergence of Science Fiction" by Elaine L. Kleiner, in EXTRAPOLATION, Dec 1973.See also: CLUB STORY. CONRAD, M.G. [r] GERMANY. CONRAD, PAUL Preferred pseudonym of UK writer and journalist Albert King (1924- ), an extremely prolific writer in various genres under a series of names: for his ROBERT HALE LIMITED sf he has used PC, his own name, Mark Bannon, Floyd Gibson, Scott Howell, Christopher King and Paul Muller. Born in Northern Ireland, he left school at the age of 14. He is the author of about 120 Westerns, 44 thrillers and 29 romances in addition to his production of 16 sf titles (over 2 years), of which the most notable are perhaps Ex Minus (1974), as by PC, and The World of Jonah Klee (1976), as by Christopher King. Most of his work is routine adventure. [JC]Other works as PC: Last Man on Kluth V (1975); The Slave Bug (1975).As Albert King: Stage Two (1974).As Mark Bannon: The Wayward Robot (1974); The Assimilator (1974); The Tomorrow Station (1975).As Floyd Gibson: A Slip of Time (1974); A Shadow of Gastor (1975); The Manufactured People (1975).As Scott Howell: Menace from Magor (1974); Passage to Oblivion (1975).As Christopher King: Operation Mora (1974).As Paul Muller: The Man from Ger (1974); Brother Gib (1975). CONROY, RICK Working name of UK writer Richard Conroy (? - ), best known for his Westerns as by Duke Montana, and for historical Westerns as Scott Jefferson. He was also active around 1950 as an author of routine sf novels, almost certainly being responsible for 3 titles as by Lee Stanton: Mushroom Men of Mars (1951), Seven to the Moon (1951) and Report from Mandazo (1951). Under his own name he wrote Mission to Mars (1952) and Martians in a Frozen World (1952); they are unconnected. [JC] CONSTANTINE, MURRAY Katherine BURDEKIN. CONSTANTINE, STORM (1956- ) UK writer whose name, initially a pseudonym, is now her name for all purposes. Her most successful work to date is probably the Wraeththu trilogy which began her career: The Enchantments of Flesh and Spirit (1987), The Bewitchments of Love and Hate (1988) and The Fulfilments of Fate and Desire (1989), all three assembled as Wraeththu (omni 1993). The sequence follows the rise of a hermaphroditic race from men (not, at least initially, from women), who take possession of a post- HOLOCAUST Earth devastated by war and pollution. The books focus on the question of whether the Wraeththu, mystically aware and symbolically balanced between male and female yet frequently fascinated by violence and destruction, will prove to be any better than the humans they replace. The Monstrous Regiment (dated 1989 but 1990) is set on a colony world where FEMINISM has gone disastrously wrong and the psychotic ruler - the Dominatrix - plans to confine all men to compounds and milk them for semen to produce children. The sequel, Aleph (1991), is less inflamed. In Hermetech (1991) a woman saves an ecologically damaged Earth by means of a sexual coupling, the energies from which are technologically redirected into the planet's "consciousness". SC's novels, which are not really set within an sf framework, give equal weight to the underlying assumptions of science and modern pagan magick. They are all fundamentally concerned with sex and gender (especially androgyny), approached through the realities and potentials of both the male and female experience, a technique very considerably sophisticated in Calenture (1994), whose immortal protagonist ( IMMORTALITY) traces - in his imagination, and ultimately in truth - two characters he has in a sense created as they trek through a world of CITIES whose wild divergences offer considerable scope for loose but invigorating SATIRE. Her writing continues to be vigorous, erotic, highly visual, aesthetically informed by a late punk/Goth sensibility, occasionally somewhat crudely executed, and linguistically shaped by an unusual fusion of intensely contemporary slang and ritualistic "High Style". [NT]Other works: Burying the Shadow (1992); When the Angels Came (1992 chap); Sign for the Sacred (1993).See also: CYBERPUNK; ESP; GAMES WORKSHOP; INTERZONE; NEW WORLDS. CONTAMINATION CONTAMINATION: ALIEN ARRIVA SULLA TERRA. CONTAMINATION: ALIEN ARRIVA SULLA TERRA (vt Contamination; vt Alien Contamination) Film (1981). Cannon. Dir Luigi Cozzi, starring Ian McCulloch, Louise Marleau, Siegfried Rauch, Martin Mase, Lisa Hahn. Screenplay Cozzi. 85 mins. Colour."In Italy," says Cozzi, "when you bring your script to a producer, the first question he asks is . . . What film is your film like?" This is one of several competing Italian attempts to exploit the success of ALIEN (1979). Its opening imitates Lucio Fulci's Zombi 2 (1979) (mysteriously deserted ship with monstrous cargo docked in New York, and the use of actor McCulloch); and a lot is borrowed from QUATERMASS II (1957). A tolerably lively effort, which repeats too often its image of an alien parasite making characters' stomachs explode in a flurry of guts and blood, this has a Martian MONSTER and a hypnotized astronaut disseminating alien seed-pods around the globe. There's a loud score by Goblin, and some well staged action as resourceful heroes take on zombified alien slaves and an especially ridiculous last-reel monster. [KN] CONTENTO, WILLIAM G(UY) (1947- ) US hardware technical support engineer for Cray Research at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, and bibliographer. His books, beginning with Index to Science Fiction Anthologies and Collections (1978) and Index to Science Fiction Anthologies and Collections: 1977-1983 (1984), are essential tools of reference. Researchers wishing to know where to locate short stories in collections and ANTHOLOGIES (and also what books of or about sf were published in a given year) after this period would normally then turn to the annual series compiled by Charles N. BROWN and WGC, and published by LOCUS Press, beginning, in terms of coverage year, with Science Fiction, Fantasy, & Horror: 1984 (1990), and going on through Science Fiction in Print: 1985 (1986), Science Fiction, Fantasy, & Horror: 1986 (1987), Science Fiction, Fantasy, & Horror: 1987 (1988), Science Fiction, Fantasy, & Horror: 1988 (1989), Science Fiction, Fantasy, & Horror: 1989 (1990) and Science Fiction, Fantasy, & Horror: 1990 (1991) and Science Fiction, Fantasy, & Horror: 1991 (1992), the last of the series. Despite very occasional omissions, these are still by far the most comprehensive annual BIBLIOGRAPHIES available, containing useful comment about the nature of each title. They are even more useful from 1988 (1989) onwards, as the later volumes contain a Research Index by Hal W. HALL. WGC has also compiled, with Martin H. GREENBERG, Index to Crime and Mystery Anthologies (1990). [PN] CONTINENTAL PUBLICATIONS WONDER STORIES. CONVENTIONS One of the principal features of sf FANDOM, conventions are usually weekend gatherings of fans and authors, frequently with a programme of sf discussion and events. In FAN LANGUAGE conventions are usually referred to as cons. They are informal, not professionally organized, and with no delegated attendants or, usually, paid speakers. Typical activities include talks, auctions, films, panel discussions, masquerades and banquets.Although some US sf fans date the first convention to 1936, when a group of fans from New York spent a day with a group from Philadelphia (including Oswald TRAIN), the first formally planned sf convention took place in Leeds, UK, in 1937. Since then regular conventions have been established around the world. In the UK the major annual convention is known as Eastercon (inaugurated 1948), though it was held at Whitsun until 1955 (except 1950, when there was no convention), and has had up to 900 attending; recent venues have included Liverpool, Leeds, Glasgow, Jersey and Blackpool. A second convention, Novacon, was added to the calendar in 1971; it takes place every November in Birmingham and attracts some 300 people. Since the late 1970s there has been an explosion in the number of small conventions held in the UK.The first US convention was held in New York in 1938 and the first Worldcon, now the premier sf convention, took place there in 1939 (though it was originally so-named because of the World's Fair in New York that year). Worldcon, at which the HUGO Awards are presented, is held annually, usually in the USA, where it has attracted as many as 8000 attending. It has also gone once each to Germany (1970) and Holland (1990), twice each to Canada (1948 and 1973) and Australia (1975 and 1985), and four times to the UK (1957, 1965, 1979 and 1987). Annual regional conventions have also been long established in North America: major events include Westercon (inaugurated 1948), Midwestcon (inaugurated 1950), Deepsouthcon (inaugurated 1963), Disclave (Washington; inaugurated 1950), Lunacon (New York; inaugurated 1957), Boskone (Boston; inaugurated 1964) and Windycon (Chicago; inaugurated 1974). There are also national conventions in AUSTRALIA, JAPAN and several European countries, including FINLAND, FRANCE, GERMANY, ITALY, the NETHERLANDS and NORWAY. In 1976 one of the international Eurocons (inaugurated 1971) was held in POLAND, the first sf convention in what was then the communist bloc.Sf conventions are now very numerous, especially in the USA: taking the whole world into account, there are about 150 a year. There are similarities and a degree of overlap between sf cons and those held by fans of COMICS, FANTASY and horror, and also the specialist conventions held by fans of, for example, STAR TREK and DR WHO. [PR/RH] CONWAY, GERARD F. (1952- ) US writer who began publishing sf with "Through the Dark Glass" for AMZ in 1970. His first sf novel was The Midnight Dancers (1971). Mindship (1971 Universe; exp 1974) is a SPACE OPERA: the mindships of the title are spaceships coordinated by the PSI POWERS of specially trained "corks". Not untypically of sf novels of the time, by the end of the book a gestalt state has been achieved between one cork and his captain. As Wallace Moore, GFC wrote the Balzan of the Cat People series: The Bloodstone (1974), The Caves of Madness (1975) and The Lights of Zetar (1975). [JC]See also: FASTER THAN LIGHT. CONWAY, TROY Michael AVALLONE. COOK, GLEN (CHARLES) (1944- ) US writer who began his sf career with orthodox stories like his first, "Song from a Forgotten Hill", in Clarion (anth 1971), and with the sf novel The Heirs of Babylon (1972), in which an authoritarian religious government takes over after the HOLOCAUST. However, he soon became best known for his high FANTASY, especially the Dread Empire series, which was notable for its concerted military set-pieces, moderately complex plotting, violence, and a sense of undue haste - he has been exceedingly prolific. The series includes: A Shadow of All Night Falling (1979); October's Baby (1980); All Darkness Met (1980); "Soldier of an Empire Unacquainted with Defeat" (1980); a 2-vol subsequence made up of The Fire in his Hands (1984) and With Mercy Toward None (1985); Reap the East Wind (1987); An Ill Fate Marshalling; (1988). A further, similar series, the Chronicles of the Black Company, perhaps stands out; the first 3 vols - The Black Company (1984), Shadows Linger (1984) and The White Rose (1985) - were assembled as Annals of the Black Company (omni 1986), and were followed by a second sequence, the Book of the South, comprising Shadow Games (1989) and Dreams of Steel (1990); The Silver Spike (1989) is set in the same world. A series of humorous fantasies, starring a Chandleresque private eye named Garrett, provides a somewhat relentless light relief, with titles derivative of John D. MACDONALD: Sweet Silver Blues (1987), Bitter Gold Hearts (1988), Cold Copper Tears (1988) - all three assembled as The Garrett Files (omni 1988) - Old Tin Sorrows (1989), Dread Brass Shadows (1990), Red Iron Nights (1991) and Deadly Quicksilver Lies (1994). Of his singletons, A Matter of Time (1985), a TIME-TRAVEL tale starring detective figures, and The Tower of Fear (1989), a strongly plotted fantasy, are the most notable. GC is a writer of considerable energy but little patience. [JC]Other works: The Swap Academy (1970) as by Greg Stevens, GC's first novel, a non-genre erotica title; The Swordbearer (1982); the Starfishers sequence, comprising Shadowline (1982), Starfishers (1982) and Stars' End (1982), which is related to Passage at Arms (1985); the Darkwar trilogy: Doomstalker (1985), Warlock (1985) and Ceremony (1986); The Dragon Never Sleeps (1988), a SPACE OPERA; Sung in Blood (1990), a fantasy.About the author: A Glen Cook Bibliography (1983 chap) by Cook and Roger C. SCHLOBIN. COOK, HUGH (MURRAY WILLIAM) (1957- ) NEW ZEALAND author, known primarily for his mildly competent and sometimes inventive fantasy series, Chronicles of an Age of Darkness, which seems intended for a young-adult readership. His only sf novel, The Shift (1986 UK), a finalist in the 1985 Young Writers' Competition run by The Times (London) with publishers Jonathan Cape, is a confused tale of deeply undergraduate humour about an alien INVASION and a machine that selectively alters human history. [PN]Other works: Plague Summer (1980), not sf; the Chronicles of an Age of Darkness fantasy series, comprising #1: The Wizards and the Warriors (1986 UK; vt Wizard War 1987 US), #2: The Wordsmiths and the Warguild, or The Questing Hero (1987 UK; in 2 vols vt The Questing Hero 1987 US and The Hero's Return 1988 US), #3: The Women and the Warlords (1987 UK; vt The Oracle 1987 US), #4: The Walrus and the Warwolf (1988 UK; cut vt Lords of the Sword 1991 US), #5: The Wicked and the Witless (1989 UK), #6: The Wishstone and the Wonderworkers (1990 UK), #7: The Wazir and the Witch (1990 UK), #8: The Werewolf and the Wormlord (1991), #9: The Worshippers and the Way (1992)and #10: The Witchlord and the Weaponmaster(1992). COOK, PAUL H(ARLIN) (1950- ) US poet and novelist whose infrequent sf stories began with "The Character Assassin" in Other Worlds #1 (anth 1979) ed Roy TORGESON. In his first novel, Tintagel (1981), a virus transports its victims, by actualizing their response to MUSIC, into fantasy worlds from which the immune protagonist must rescue them. Duende Meadow (1985) depicts the post- HOLOCAUST return of North Americans to the surface of the world, where they find Russian farmers. The lure of transcendence marks PHC's books; if their focus sharpens, they may become substantial. [JC]Other works: The Alejandra Variations (1984); HALO (1986); On the Rim of the Mandala (1987), a congested SPACE OPERA.See also: EVOLUTION; MUSIC. COOK, ROBIN 1.Working name of UK writer Robert William Arthur Cook (1931-1994), resident for some years in France (in order, he intimated, to put distance between himself and gangland acquaintances) before returning to the UK a year or so before his death . He wrote thrillers as Derek Raymond, a name he began to use when his career was flagging and his own name was eclipsed by 2. His last novel as RC, A State of Denmark, or A Warning to the Incurious (1970), is a savage and scatological depiction of a NEAR-FUTURE welfare DYSTOPIA in the UK.2. (1940- ) US writer of medical horror thrillers whose premises are often extracted from sf. His best-known novel is his first, Coma (1977), filmed as COMA (1978) by his medical- HORROR confrere Michael CRICHTON. Others include Brain (1981), Fever (1982), Godplayer (1983), Mindbend (1985), Outbreak (1987), Mortal Fear (1988), Mutation (1989), Harmful Intent(1990) and Terminal (1993). [JC]See also: BIOLOGY; GENETIC ENGINEERING; MEDICINE; TECHNOTHRILLER. COOK, WILLIAM WALLACE (1867-1933) US writer, reportedly pseudonymous, much of whose production appeared after the turn of the century in such magazines as The ARGOSY, and only later in book form, in a stapled format reminiscent of DIME-NOVEL SF. Noteworthy among these books are A Round Trip to the Year 2000, or A Flight Through Time (1903 The Argosy; 1925), in which various contemporary writers travel by SUSPENDED ANIMATION to AD2000, where they observe social conditions, and find themselves popular, and Adrift in the Unknown, or Adventures in a Queer Realm (1904-5 The Argosy; 1925), a satire on US capitalism in which a burglar goes along for the ride with a reformist scientist in his spaceship to MERCURY, where he teaches the kidnapped capitalists he has brought with him some lessons in social justice. WWC was a crude writer, but is of interest in his attempts to combine adventure plots and SATIRE. [JC]Other works: Castaway at the Pole (1904 The Argosy; 1926); Marooned in 1492, or Under Fortune's Flag (1905 The Argosy; 1925); The Eighth Wonder, or Working for Miracles (1906-7 The Argosy; 1925); Around the World in Eighty Hours (1925).See also: DISCOVERY AND INVENTION; HISTORY OF SF; ROBOTS; TIME TRAVEL. COOKE, ARTHUR Collaborative pseudonym used on "The Psychological Regulator" (1941) by C.M. KORNBLUTH, Robert LOWNDES, John Michell (1917-1969), Elsie Balter and Donald A. WOLLHEIM. [JC] COOKE, JOHN ESTES L. Frank BAUM. COON, HORACE (1897-1961) US writer in whose 43,000 Years Later (1958) ALIENS come to a post- HOLOCAUST Earth, become intrigued by the civilization that had gone before, and, through records, explore the 20th-century world to satirical effect. [JC] COON, SUSAN Pseudonym of US writer Susan Plunkett (1945- ), whose Living Planet sequence - Rahne (1980), Cassilee (1980), The Virgin (1981) and Chiy-Une (1982) - skids rather loosely about a GALACTIC-EMPIRE setting, only to terminate in an abrupt and complicated coming-together of humans and ALIENS on the sentient world which gave its name to the final volume. [JC] COOPER, C. EVERETT R. REGINALD. COOPER, COLIN (SYMONS) (1926- ) UK writer, active as a scriptwriter for TELEVISION and RADIO. His first sf was a 6-part BBC serial, "Host Planet Earth" (1967). His somewhat downbeat sf novels, The Thunder and Lightning Man (1968) and Outcrop (1970), have not had a strong impact on the field. Dargason (1977) is a story of the NEAR FUTURE in which, for mysterious reasons, listeners to MUSIC become severely affected by a variety of psychologically extreme states; it was perhaps the only sf thriller before Paul H. COOK's Tintagel (1981) to posit music as a WEAPON. [JC/PN]Other works: The Epping Pyramid (1978). COOPER, EDMUND (1926-1982) UK writer who served in the British Merchant Navy 1939-45 and who began to publish stories of genre interest with "The Unicorn" (1951), producing a considerable amount of short fiction in the 1950s, much of it assembled (with considerable overlap) in Tomorrow's Gift (coll 1958 US), Voices in the Dark (coll 1960) and Tomorrow Came (coll 1963). His early pseudonyms included Martin Lester; George Kinley, under which name he published his first sf novel, Ferry Rocket (1954); and Broderick Quain. For a later sf adventure series (see listing below) he used the name Richard Avery.It was as a novelist that EC became most highly regarded, and it was for his earlier novels that he was most appreciated, though later works like The Overman Culture (1971) showed a continuing (if reluctant) facility in newer modes; in his persistent use of post-nuclear- HOLOCAUST settings he was probably expressing his own conviction about the future course of events. His first novel under his own name, The Uncertain Midnight (1958; vt Deadly Image 1958 US), describes a post-holocaust world in which ANDROIDS are gradually threatening to supplant humankind. Seed of Light (1959) is a GENERATION-STARSHIP novel in which a small group manages to escape from a devastated Earth. Other novels to incorporate the basic premise that the planet has been rendered to a greater or lesser degree uninhabitable include The Last Continent (1969 US), The Tenth Planet (1973 US) and The Cloud Walker (1973), which was his best received novel (certainly in the USA) and the last to be much praised. Its message was perhaps conventional, but was competently delivered: even though two nuclear holocausts have afflicted England, the Luddite response of a new church is inappropriate, and the young protagonist properly wins the day with an invention which he uses to defend his village from assailants. As the novel closes, the march of progress is seen to resume.In general, however, EC's later work lacked much joie de vivre, while an anti- FEMINIST point of view - he was quoted as saying of women: "Let them compete against men, they'll see that they can't make it"-became explicit in his novels Five to Twelve (1968) and Who Needs Men? (1972; vt Gender Genocide 1973 US), and implicit elsewhere. These attitudes were neither politic, in the heightened atmosphere of the 1970s, nor in fact intrinsically becoming. The stories assembled in Merry Christmas, Ms Minerva! (coll 1978) failed to help. EC died with his reputation at a low ebb; but he was a competent and prolific writer, and a better balance may some day be reached. [MJE/JC]Other works: Wish Goes to Slumberland (1960 chap), a fantasy for children; Transit (1964); All Fools' Day (1966); A Far Sunset (1967); News from Elsewhere (coll 1968); Sea-Horse in the Sky (1969); Son of Kronk (1970; vt Kronk 1971 US); The Square Root of Tomorrow (coll 1970); Unborn Tomorrow (coll 1971); The Slaves of Heaven (1974 US); Prisoner of Fire (1974); Jupiter Laughs (coll 1980); A World of Difference (coll 1980).As Richard Avery: The Expendables sequence of SPACE OPERAS, comprising The Deathworms of Kratos (1975), The Rings of Tantalus (1975), The War Games of Zelos (1975) and The Venom of Argus (1976).About the author: "Hope for the Future: The Science Fiction Novels of Edmund Cooper" and "An Interview with Edmund Cooper" both by James Goddard, in Science Fiction Monthly vol 2 #4.See also: ANTHROPOLOGY; DISASTER; OUTER PLANETS; SCIENCE FICTION BOOK CLUB; SEX; SOCIOLOGY. COOPER, JAMES FENIMORE (1789-1851) US writer, best known for the Leather-Stocking Tales sequence in a gentlemanly frontier-adventure tale style, which includes The Last of the Mohicans (1826) and many other widely read novels featuring the woodsman Natty Bumppo. In JFC's sf novel, The Monikins (1835), an English gentleman purchases several captured specimens from an articulate monkey civilization located in a LOST WORLD in the Antarctic, which they describe to him so vividly that he returns there with them, only to find that the monkey civilization parodies 19th-century human politics. As in many PROTO-SCIENCE-FICTION tales of this sort, the protagonist then awakens. The Crater, or Vulcan's Peak (1847; vt Man's Reef, or The Crater 1868 UK) is a UTOPIA set on an ISLAND, which sinks. [JC]See also: APES AND CAVEMEN (IN THE HUMAN WORLD). COOPER, SUSAN (MARY) (1935- ) UK writer, a graduate in English studies from Oxford, for some time a journalist; now resident in the USA. In her sf novel Mandrake (1964) the eponymous politician takes over a distressed NEAR-FUTURE England and, in mystical league with the forces of Nature, begins the process of cleansing the Earth of Man, but is stopped just in time. Her juvenile FANTASY series, The Dark is Rising, is made up of Over Sea, Under Stone (1965), The Dark is Rising (1973 US), Greenwitch (1974 US), The Grey King (1975 US) and Silver on the Tree (1977 US). It is thought by many critics to be one of the most distinguished of the mythological fantasy series which, following the success of J.R.R. TOLKIEN's work, were published in a spate during the 1960s and 1970s. The hero of the series, Will Stanton, is at once a small boy and a vessel of ancient powers, and SC shows great skill in blending in him a perfectly natural, unsentimentalized, childish innocence and the sophistication of a mage. The series owed much to Anglo-Saxon and Celtic MYTHOLOGY, but also uses such sf tropes as ALTERNATE WORLDS, TIME PARADOXES and time stasis. The Grey King won the 1976 Newbery Award. Seaward (1983 US) once again utilizes Celtic material, this time in a dark hegira into the world of death. [JC/PN]Other works: J.B. Priestley: Portrait of an Author (1970) and Stars in our Hands (1977 chap Canada), both nonfiction; Jethro and the Jumbie (1979 chap) and The Silver Cow (1983), both fantasies for young children; The Boggart(1993 US).See also: CHILDREN'S SF. COOVER, ROBERT (LOWELL) (1932- ) US writer who has established a considerable reputation with his novels, in which FABULATION and political scatology mix fruitfully. His work might be seen to represent a POSTMODERNIST intensification of the same milieu excoriated by Richard CONDON. The Origin of the Brunists (1965) subverts the millennial fantasy tropes at its heart. The Universal Baseball Association Inc., J. Henry Waugh, Prop. (1968) also denatures its FANTASY premise, the eponymous dreamer's creation of a baseball world to be safe in. The Public Burning (1977) can be read as an alternate history ( ALTERNATE WORLDS) of the early 1950s, taking in the death of the Rosenbergs and examining Richard Nixon - a figure RC also anatomized in Whatever Happened to Gloomy Gus of the Chicago Bears? (1987). A Night at the Movies, or You Must Remember This (1987) is a Hollywood fantasia. In Pinocchio in Venice (1991) the Pinocchio of human flesh, slowly reverting to wood in his old age, returns to his origins. Pricksongs and Descants (coll 1969) contains some stories of sf interest. [JC]Other works: Aesop's Forest (1986 chap dos); A Political Fable (1968 New American Review as "The Cat in the Hat for President"; rev 1980 chap). COPLEY, FRANK BARKLEY (? -? ) US writer in whose The Impeachment of President Israels (1912) a future Jewish US president is impeached for refusing on ethical grounds to make war on Germany, but is vindicated. [JC] COPPEL, ALFRED (JOSE Jr) (1921- ) Prolific US author (and wartime fighter pilot) who has written also as Robert Cham Gilman and Sol Galaxan (for 1 story only, 1953). He began publishing sf with "Age of Unreason" for ASF in 1947, and published a good deal of magazine fiction in the next decade, though he was in fact producing considerably more in other genres with such action novels as Hero Driver (1954). His first sf novel was Dark December(1960), an extremely effective post- HOLOCAUST quest story set in a nuclear-war-devastated USA and featuring the protagonist's search for his lost family. As Gilman, AC published the Rhada SPACE-OPERA sequence for tough, older children: The Rebel of Rhada (1968), The Navigator of Rhada (1969) and The Starkahn of Rhada (1970) are not easy reading, and neither is the prequel The Warlock of Rhada (1985). The Burning Mountain: A Novel of the Invasion of Japan (1983) embodies an orthodox alternate-history ( ALTERNATE WORLDS) premise in thriller dress, told grippingly: the A-bomb fizzles, necessitating a land invasion of Japan to end WWII; after some delay, a rejuvenated bomb stops the mayhem in 1946. Although AC's energies have been, for most of his career, focused on non-sf projects, the recent and ongoing Goldenwing Cycle- comprising Glory (1993) and Glory's War (1995), with further volumes projected - is a series of glowingly mature space opera tales structured around the travels of the eponymous FTL ship, itself intricately realized. AC's return to sf has been revelatory. [JC]Other works: Four marginal political thrillers set in the immediate future: Thirty-Four East (1974) The Dragon (1977); The Hastings Conspiracy (1980); The Apocalypse Brigade (1981).See also: GALACTIC EMPIRES. CORBEN, RICHARD (1940- ) US illustrator and film animator. He attended the Kansas City Art Institute, and worked for almost a decade with a Kansas City animation company, doing sf illustration (a cover for FSF in 1967 was his first sale) and underground COMICS on the side. He became a full-time freelance illustrator in 1972. Better known as a comic-book artist than as an sf illustrator, RC in fact combines the fields in his work: his sf art can look cartoonish, while his comics art has the solid feel of sf illustration. While his men tend to look like "sacks filled with potatoes" and his women are ridiculously huge-breasted, he has a genius for surface texture and for three-dimensional solidity achieved with shading. Much of his best work in sf has been for the SCIENCE FICTION BOOK CLUB and DOUBLEDAY, and, in comics, for METAL HURLANT, especially his two series Den and Rowlff. He contributed a sequence to the animated film Heavy Metal (1981), published the GRAPHIC NOVEL Bloodstar (1976) and, with Jan Strnad, produced New Tales of the Arabian Nights (1979). A somewhat fannish study, with 80 pages of colour illustration and many more in b/w, is Richard Corben: Flights into Fantasy (1982) by Fershid Bharuch. Richard Corben's Art Book (graph coll 1990) is useful. Richard Corben's Art Book (graph coll 1990) is useful. [PN/JG]Other works: Vic and Blood (graph coll 1989) with Harlan ELLISON. CORBETT, CHAN [s] Nat SCHACHNER. CORBETT, JAMES (? -? ) UK author of popular thrillers specifically written for the lending-library market. His The Devil Man from Mars (1935) is an interplanetary novel with a poor scientific background (or perhaps it was intended as a parody) in which a Martian, equipped with death rays and hypnotic powers, travels to Earth with, literally, the wind at his back all the way. More sophisticated in content is The Man who Saw the Devil (1934), a rewrite of Robert Louis STEVENSON's Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1886), in which neither personality is aware of the other's existence. Many of his other works contain some elements of sf and the weird-Vampire of the Skies (1932), The Monster of Dagenham Hall (1935), The Death Pool (1936), The Man They Could not Kill (1936), The Man with Nine Lives (1938) The Moon Killer (1938) and The Ghost Plane (1939) - but none has any real importance. [JE] CORELLI, MARIE (1855-1924) UK writer, almost certainly born Mary (nicknamed "Minnie") Mackay, though she was secretive about her birth, which may have been illegitimate. She wrote extremely popular bestsellers (selling, in her prime, 100,000-copy editions), although her first novel, A Romance of Two Worlds (1886; rev 1887) - in which interstellar travel is accomplished at about the turn of the century, through "personal electricity" - and its sequel, Ardath: The Story of a Dead Self (1889), were only moderately successful. The Sorrows of Satan (1895), in which a Corelli-like protagonist charismatically cures the Devil of evil, reaches perhaps her peculiar peak. By 1900 her odd brand of sublimated sex, heated religiosity, self-absorbed "female frailty" and unctuous fantasy had begun to lose its appeal; by her death she had been virtually forgotten. Most of her early work can be read as fantasy, though careful explication of the texts may derive a form of religious ( RELIGION) explanation for the most extraordinary events. Also of sf interest are The Young Diana: An Experiment of the Future (1918), about a scientific experiment to make a woman (and hence Woman in general) beautiful, and The Secret Power: A Romance of the Present (1921), featuring a huge airship and a secret power that triggers a great earthquake in California. [JC]Other works: The Soul of Lilith (1892); Barabbas: A Dream of the World's Tragedy (1893); Ziska (1897); Song of Miriam and Other Stories (coll 1898); The Master-Christian (1900); The Strange Visitation of Josiah McNason: A Christmas Ghost Story (1904 chap; vt The Strange Visitation 1912 chap); The Devil's Motor (in A Christmas Greeting, coll 1901;1910 chap); The Life Everlasting (1911).About the author: Now Barabbas was a Rotter (1978) by Brian Masters; "Yesterday's Bestsellers, 1: Marie Corelli" by Brian STABLEFORD in Million, #1 (1991).See also: GODS AND DEMONS. COREY, PAUL (FREDERICK) (1903-1992) US writer in various genres, active from as early as 1934, though his first sf story, "Operation Survival" for NW, did not appear until 1962. Most of his early novels are set on farms in the US Middle West; the title of one of them, Acres of Antaeus (1946), deceptively suggests sf content. His sf novel, The Planet of the Blind (1968), written for ROBERT HALE LIMITED, is a variation on the theme of the one-eyed man in the country of the blind inaugurated (for sf) by H.G. WELLS in "The Country of the Blind" (1904). [JC] CORLETT, WILLIAM (1938- ) UK actor, playwright and novelist, in the latter capacity mostly for older children. He is of sf interest mainly for the Gate trilogy - The Gate of Eden (1974), The Land Beyond (1975) and Return to the Gate (1975) - set in a bleak DYSTOPIAN UK of the NEAR FUTURE: social disintegration prefigures the moments of hope and rebuilding in the final volume. The Dark Side of the Moon (1976) ingeniously parallels the experiences of a kidnapped child with those of an astronaut spiritually adrift in deep space. The Magician's House sequence-comprising The Steps up the Chimney (1990),The Door in the Tree(1991), The Tunnel behind the Waterfall (1991) and The Bridge in the Clouds (1993) - is fantasy. [JC]Other works: The Summer of the Haunting (1993). CORLEY, EDWIN (1931-1981) US writer whose Siege (1969) resembles several other US novels of the period in its depiction of a Black revolution centred-as in John WILLIAMS's Sons of Darkness, Sons of Light (1969) - on Manhattan. His other novels of sf interest include The Jesus Factor (1970) - which factor prevents the detonation of nuclear weapons, Hiroshima being a hoax intended to prevent future wars - Acapulco Gold (1972), Sargasso (1977), and The Genesis Rock (1980, which foresees a NEAR-FUTURE volcanic eruption under New York. [JC] CORLEY, JAMES (1947- ) UK writer and computer programmer whose first novel, Benedict's Planet (1976), combines SPACE OPERA and some rather technical speculations about the possibility of FASTER-THAN-LIGHT travel in a somewhat overcrowded tale in which the discoverer of a new source of fuel runs into complex trouble. Neither Orsini Godbase (1978) nor Sundrinker (1980), written for ROBERT HALE LIMITED, proved significantly more ambitious as novels. [JC] CORMAN, ROGER (1926- ) US film-maker, a number of whose films are sf. Born in Los Angeles, he graduated in engineering from Stanford University in 1947, and spent a period in the US Navy and a term at Oxford University before going to Hollywood, where he began to write screenplays; his first sale was Highway Dragnet (1954), a picture he coproduced. He soon formed his own company and launched his spectacularly low-budget career. From 1956 he was regularly associated with American International Pictures, a distribution company specializing in cheap exploitation films, often made to fit an already-planned advertising campaign. In 1959 he founded Filmgroup, which distributed its own product, but he returned to AIP in the 1960s for his Edgar Allan POE movies (discussed below). In 1970, with brother Gene and Larry Woolner, Corman founded New World Pictures, which soon overtook AIP as the leading producer and distributor of exploitation films; he sold his share of the company in 1983.RC's B-movies - mainly Westerns and sf/horror stories at first, later also thrillers, road movies and drugs and rock'n'roll movies, most aimed specifically at teenagers - did much to redefine the various exploitation-movie genres, but only by the 1970s did they begin to attract attention from radical film critics. At first he served only as a producer, but in 1955 he began directing. Sf films he has directed - the dates are those of first release - include The DAY THE WORLD ENDED (1956), IT CONQUERED THE WORLD (1956), NOT OF THIS EARTH (1957), ATTACK OF THE CRAB MONSTERS (1957), War of the Satellites (1958), Teenage Caveman (1958; vt Prehistoric World; vt Out of the Darkness), The WASP WOMAN (1959), LAST WOMAN ON EARTH (1960), The Little Shop of Horrors (1960), Creature From the Haunted Sea (1961), X - THE MAN WITH THE X-RAY EYES (1963), GAS-S-S-S, OR IT BECAME NECESSARY TO DESTROY THE WORLD IN ORDER TO SAVE IT (1970) and FRANKENSTEIN UNBOUND (1990). The boom for sf films which had begun in the 1950s was dying out by 1963, after which year RC and other quickie-producers made far fewer of them. RC-directed films are rare after 1970; throughout the 1970s and 1980s he concentrated on producing because directing had stopped being fun.Sf-oriented films he has produced, sometimes only as executive producer, include Monster from the Ocean Floor (1954; vt Monster Maker), Beast with a Million Eyes (1955), NIGHT OF THE BLOOD BEAST (1958), Beast from Haunted Cave (1959; uncredited), Attack of the Giant Leeches (1960; vt Demons of the Swamp), DEATH RACE 2000 (1975), PIRANHA (1978), Deathsport (1978), Humanoids from the Deep (1980; vt Monster), BATTLE BEYOND THE STARS (1980), Galaxy of Terror (1981; vt Mindwarp: An Infinity of Terror ; vt Planet of Horrors), FORBIDDEN WORLD (1982; vt MUTANT), Space Raiders (1983), NOT OF THIS EARTH (1988 remake), Crime Zone (1988), Lords of the Deep (1989), Time Trackers (1989), BRAIN DEAD (1989) and Welcome to Oblivion (1990).In the 1960s, RC furthered the practice (pioneered by the 1956 US release of GOJIRA) of buying up foreign-language films with spectacular effects and reshooting inserts with well-known US performers to create wholly new films, often farming out the revision jobs to up-and-coming young talent. This explains the presence in the filmographies of Francis Ford Coppola, Peter Bogdanovich and Curtis Harrington of, respectively, Battle Beyond the Sun (1963), Voyage to the Planet of Prehistoric Women (1966; vt Gill Woman) and Voyage to the Prehistoric Planet (1965); Harrington also made Queen of Blood (1966; vt Planet of Blood) in this way. These four films drew on footage from the Soviet films Niebo Zowiet (1959; vt The Sky Calls; vt The Heavens Call) and PLANETA BUR (1962; vt Planet of Storms; vt Storm Planet; vt Cosmonauts on Venus). Throughout his career, indeed, RC has been known for his fostering of young film-makers: as well as Coppola, Bogdanovich and Harrington there have been Martin Scorsese, Monte Hellman, Jonathan Demme, Paul Bartel and Jonathan Kaplan; in the sf-film world specifically he was mentor to James CAMERON, Joe DANTE, Irvin Kershner and John SAYLES. During his proprietorship of New World, RC became known also as the US distributor of prestigious films by Kurosawa, Bergman, Fellini and Truffaut, but he was up to his old tricks with the US release of NIPPON CHINBOTSU (1973; vt The Submersion of Japan) as a truncated travesty, Tidal Wave (1974). However, he presided over an inspired re-use of miles of New World footage in Hollywood Boulevard (1976), dir Joe Dante and Allan Arkush; this is a skit on low-budget film-making revolving round the production of an sf exploitationer called Atomic War Brides.As a director, RC also worked in the field of supernatural HORROR. The Undead (1957) has a TIME-TRAVEL theme in its tale of a prostitute, the REINCARNATION of an executed medieval witch, travelling back into the past but refusing to intervene in her own earlier death because by so doing she would destroy many futures. Later, RC attracted much critical praise with his series of films based (often insecurely) on the works of Edgar Allan Poe, beginning with House of Usher (1960) and mostly starring Vincent Price, of which one of the finest is The Tomb of Ligeia (1964), written by Robert Towne, later one of Hollywood's major screenwriters. Only The Haunted Palace (1963)-actually based on a story by H.P. LOVECRAFT despite the Poe title - has sf elements: deformed MUTANTS. RC also produced a second Lovecraft adaptation, The Dunwich Horror (1969), which was mediocre.The argument over RC's true worth as a film-maker continues. It is clear that by the 1970s he was mostly pursuing rather than setting trends. His work has attracted a cult following and considerable attention from that school of film critics which holds that there is often a freshness and inventiveness in B-grade films lacking from more "respectable" Hollywood productions. In an interview he said of his sf films: "I was never really satisfied with my work in this field." His autobiography is How I Made a Hundred Movies in Hollywood and Never Lost a Dime (1990). He played a bit part (as FBI Director Hayden Burke) in the 1991 hit film The Silence of the Lambs. [PN/KN]Further reading: The Films of Roger Corman: Brilliance on a Budget (1982) by Ed NAHA; Roger Corman (1985) by Gary Morris; Roger Corman: The Best of the Cheap Acts (1988) by Mark McGee.See also: CINEMA; MONSTER MOVIES. CORNETT, ROBERT [r] Kevin D. RANDLE. CORNWALLIS-WEST, G(EORGE FREDERICK MYDDLETON) (1874-1951) UK writer in whose sf novel, The Woman who Stopped War (1935), the eponymous heroine sacrifices her virtue in order to gain money to fund the Women's Save the Race League as another WAR approaches. War is halted. But was it worth the cost? [JC] CORPSICLE One of the wittiest items of sf TERMINOLOGY. The coinage, credited to Frederik POHL by Larry NIVEN in his essay "The Words in Science Fiction" (in The Craft of Science Fiction [anth 1976] ed Reginald BRETNOR), was first used by Niven in "Rammer" (1971). Formed on the analogy of "popsicle", a US ice-lolly, the word refers to a frozen dead person, preserved in the hope of resuscitation in a medically advanced future ( CRYONICS). [PN] CORREA, HUGO [r] LATIN AMERICA. CORREN, GRACE Robert HOSKINS. CORREY, LEE G. Harry STINE. CORSTON, (MICHAEL) GEORGE [r] ROBERT HALE LIMITED. CORWIN, CECIL [s] C.M. KORNBLUTH. CORY, HOWARD L. Collaborative writing name of Jack Owen Jardine (1931- ) and Julie Ann Jardine (1926- ), then married; the name was taken from her stage name, Corrie Howard. The Sword of Lankor (1966), in which natives of a high- GRAVITY planet unknowingly extract valuable crystals for genially manipulative spacefarers, is swashbuckling. In The Mind Monsters (1966 dos) a crash-landed Terran takes over a peculiar alien planet. Jack Owen Jardine's solo sf was written as by Larry MADDOCK. [JC] CORY & COLLINS Paul COLLINS. CORYELL, JOHN RUSSELL [r] Nick CARTER; Bernarr MACFADDEN. COSGROVE, RACHEL [r] E.L. ARCH. COSMIC MONSTER, THE The STRANGE WORLD OF PLANET X . COSMIC SCIENCE FICTION COSMIC STORIES. COSMIC SCIENCE STORIES UK PULP MAGAZINE. 1 undated issue, cJune 1950, published by Popular Press, London; an abridged reprint of the Sep 1949 issue of SUPER SCIENCE STORIES. The lead novelette was "Minions of Chaos" by John D. MACDONALD. [FHP] COSMIC STORIES US PULP MAGAZINE. 3 bimonthly issues, Mar-July 1941. Published by Albing Publications; ed Donald A. WOLLHEIM. CS was one of 2 companion magazines (the other being STIRRING SCIENCE STORIES) started by Wollheim in 1941. It was cheaply produced (lacking full-colour covers) and had a microscopic editorial budget - most of the stories were not paid for at all, being solicited by Wollheim from his fellow FUTURIANS. The first issue contained a story by Isaac ASIMOV, "The Secret Sense"; C.M. KORNBLUTH contributed a number of stories under various pseudonyms. The title changed with the second issue to Cosmic Science Fiction, but the whole venture proved abortive and the magazine was dead within 6 months. [MJE] COSMIC STRINGS BLACK HOLES. COSMOLOGY Cosmology is the study of the Universe as a whole, its nature and its origins. It is a speculative science (there being little opportunity for experiment) and in discussing past writings on the subject it is occasionally difficult to distinguish essays and fictions. Johannes KEPLER's Somnium (1634) is basically an essay inspired by the heliocentric theory of the Universe, opposing the Aristotelian system then favoured by the Church ( PROTO SCIENCE FICTION). Works of a similar nature include Gabriel DANIEL's Voyage du monde de Descartes (1690; trans as A Voyage to the World of Cartesius 1692), which popularized the cosmological (and other) theories of Rene Descartes (1596-1650), and Bernard le Bovyer de FONTENELLE's Entretiens sur la pluralite des mondes habites (1686; trans as The Plurality of Worlds 1929). An early attempt to describe an infinite Universe with habitable worlds surrounding all the stars was presented as a revelation by Emanuel SWEDENBORG in De Telluribus (1758; trans as (short title) The Earths in Our Solar System and the Earths in the Starry Heavens 1787). There are several important 19th-century works belonging to this tradition of "semi-fiction". Edgar Allan POE's Eureka (1848), elaborating ideas first laid out in "A Mesmeric Revelation" (1844), is a poetic vision embodying intuitive hypotheses about the nature and origins of the Universe; Camille FLAMMARION's Lumen (1887; trans 1897) combines religious notions with a powerful scientifically inspired imagination, and J.H. ROSNY aine's La legende sceptique ["The Sceptical Legend"] (1889) belongs to the same class of works. Edgar FAWCETT's The Ghost of Guy Thyrle (1895) includes a cosmic vision, and H.G. WELLS offered a brief - and somewhat ironic - account of a cosmic vision in "Under the Knife" (1896).In the 20th century this tradition petered out. William Hope HODGSON's The House on the Borderland (1908) is better regarded as a late addition to the 19th-century corpus, combining a curious moral allegory with a spectacular vision of the END OF THE WORLD. R.A. KENNEDY's curious philosophical fantasia, The Triuneverse (1912), introduced the microcosm and the macrocosm to speculative fiction ( GREAT AND SMALL) but is far too absurd to be taken seriously. There is only one cosmic-vision story comparable in scope and ambition to Eureka and La legende sceptique: Olaf STAPLEDON's classic STAR MAKER (1937; part of discarded first draft published as Nebula Maker, 1976).The early GENRE-SF sf writers were highly ambitious in the scope and scale of their fantasies, but their attitude was conspicuously different from that of the cosmic visionaries. They were interested in adventure, and the viewpoints of their stories remained tied to the experience of their characters. Protagonists sometimes caught brief visionary glimpses of the cosmos, but these were rarely extrapolated at any length. There is a curious narrowness about the tales of the infinite Universe pioneered by E.E. "Doc" SMITH's Skylark of Space (1928; 1946), and even such macrocosmic romances as Donald WANDREI's "Colossus" (1934). The bathetic quality of attempts by pulp writers to tune in to the infinite is amply illustrated by the first pulp sf story to develop the idea of the expanding Universe: Edmond HAMILTON's "The Accursed Galaxy" (1935). Hamilton "explained" the expansion by proposing that all the other galaxies might be fleeing in horror from our own, because ours is afflicted with a terrible disease (life). A.E. VAN VOGT's "The Seesaw" (1941; incorporated into THE WEAPON SHOPS OF ISHER fixup 1951), in which the formation of the Solar System results from an unfortunate accident whereby a man is caught in a temporal "seesaw", is another example of the tendency of sf writers to minimize the issues of cosmology; ironically, a parodic version of this in Earthdoom! (1987) by David LANGFORD and John Grant ( Paul BARNETT), in which the Big Bang is "triggered" by an unwitting time traveller, has a far more plausible scientific grounding. The kind of joke embodied in L. Ron HUBBARD's "Beyond the Black Nebula" (1949 as by Rene Lafayette), in which it is discovered that our Universe is somewhere in the alimentary tract of a macrocosmic worm, is echoed in several other works, including Damon KNIGHT's "God's Nose" (1964) and Robert RANKIN's Armageddon - The Musical (1990).More earnest cosmological visions have been inserted into a number of sf novels, sometimes by means of unusual literary devices. Examples include James BLISH's The Triumph of Time (1958; vt A Clash of Cymbals), Poul ANDERSON's Tau Zero (1970) and an episode in Bob SHAW's Ship of Strangers (fixup 1978). Ian WATSON's The Jonah Kit (1975) casually suggests that the actual cosmos might be a mere shadowy echo of the original creation, while dramatic and symbolic use of the steady-state theory is made in THE RING OF RITORNEL (1968) by Charles L. HARNESS. Eccentric cosmological speculations are used to good effect in Philip Jose FARMER's The Unreasoning Mask (1981) and in several novels by Barrington J. BAYLEY, including The Pillars of Eternity (1982) and The Zen Gun (1983).Among cosmologists who have dabbled in sf are George GAMOW, who included some cosmological fantasies in his book of didactic fictions Mr Tomkins in Wonderland (1939), and Fred HOYLE, who incorporated visionary moments into The Black Cloud (1957) and The Inferno (1973, with Geoffrey HOYLE).An avant-garde story featuring a juxtaposition between the minutiae of everyday existence and cosmological notions is Pamela ZOLINE's "The Heat-Death of the Universe" (1967). Italo CALVINO produced several eccentric cosmological fantasies, some of which are in Le Cosmicomiche (coll of linked stories 1965; trans as COSMICOMICS 1968). Surreal exercises in "alternative cosmology" include Lester DEL REY's The Sky is Falling (1963), which deals with a pseudo-Aristotelian closed Universe, and two stories in which the Universe is mostly solid, with habitable lacunae: Barrington J. Bayley's "Me and My Antronoscope" (1973) and David LAKE's The Ring of Truth (1982).20th-century ASTRONOMY has, of course, gradually revealed the true strangeness of the cosmos; it has popularized such notions as ENTROPY and the Big Bang, and has produced such curious images as that of a hyperspherical Universe which is finite in dimension but infinite in extent. The idea that the Universe may contain vast numbers of BLACK HOLES which themselves may contain universes-in-miniature has lent a new respectability to microcosmic romance, while the notion of PARALLEL WORLDS is thought by some modern physicists to be a likely consequence of quantum theory. The kind of visionary extravagance found in Poe's and Flammarion's cosmological essays pales into insignificance beside such modern popular essays on cosmology as Steven Weinberg's The First Three Minutes (1977), Paul DAVIES's Other Worlds (1980) and Stephen Hawking's A Brief History of Time (1988). The discoveries and speculations reported in such books as these have posed a challenge to contemporary sf writers, several of whom have made interesting attempts to devise fantasies which can contain and do justice to a distinctively modern cosmic perspective. Worthy attempts include George ZEBROWSKI's Macrolife (1979), Charles SHEFFIELD's Between the Strokes of Night (1985) and Greg BEAR's Eternity (1988). The inspiration provided by modern cosmology has been adequate to bring about something of a renaissance in the cosmic-vision story; further examples include Michael BISHOP's "Close Encounter with the Deity" (1986), the visionary sequences in Brian M. STABLEFORD's The Centre Cannot Hold (1990) and The Angel of Pain (1991) and David Langford's "Waiting for the Iron Age" (1991). [BS]See also: ASTRONOMY; BLACK HOLES; ESCHATOLOGY; FASTER THAN LIGHT; METAPHYSICS; PHYSICS. COSMONAUTS ON VENUS PLANETA BUR. COSMOS Fanzine. FANTASY REVIEW. COSMOS SCIENCE FICTION AND FANTASY MAGAZINE 1. US DIGEST-size magazine. 4 issues, irregular, Sep 1953-July 1954, published by Star Publications; ed L.B. Cole. This was an unremarkable magazine of moderate standard which published no memorable fiction; the actual editing was done by Laurence M. JANIFER. There was a scoop in #2, "Visitor from Nowhere", an sf story by the mysterious writer of Westerns, B. Traven (?1882-1969).2. US BEDSHEET-size magazine. 4 issues, bimonthly, May-Nov 1977. Published by Baronet Publishing Co.; ed David G. HARTWELL. CSFFM contained a sophisticated mixture of sf and fantasy in an elegant format which included full-colour interior illustration. It serialized a short novel in Fritz LEIBER's Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser series, "Rime Isle"; ran Michael BISHOP's "The House of Compassionate Sharers"; and featured a number of other major authors; there was a book-review column by Robert SILVERBERG. CSFAFM had one of the most promising launches of the decade but, undercapitalized and suffering distribution problems, it folded. [FHP/MJE/PN] COSTA RICA LATIN AMERICA. COSTELLO, P.F. One of the many ZIFF-DAVIS house names, this appeared on over 40 magazine stories 1941-58, but until the late 1940s exclusively for stories by William P. McGivern (1921-1982). It was then sometimes used by Chester S. GEIER, later by Roger P. Graham (Rog PHILLIPS) and probably others still unidentified. "Secret of the Flaming Ring" (1951) and "Space is for Suckers" (1958) have both been attributed to Graham. [PN] COSY CATASTROPHE A term coined by Brian W. ALDISS in Billion Year Spree (1973) to describe the comforting ambience shed by the sort of DISASTER tale told by UK writers like John WYNDHAM (see also HOLOCAUST AND AFTER). [JC] COTE, DENIS (1954- ) Canadian author whose first two novels, marketed like their successors as juveniles, were Les Hockeyeurs cybernetiques (1983; trans Jane Brierley as Shooting for the Stars 1990), a tale marked by a high degree of invention, and Les Paralleles celestes ["The Celestial Parallels"] (1983), which demonstrates considerable literary ambition and talent. The former book begins the Inactifs sequence, further volumes including L'idole des inactifs ["A Star for the Idle Masses"] (1989), La Revolte des inactifs ["The Rebellion of the Idle Masses"] (1990) and Le Retour des inactifs ["The Return of the Idle Masses"] (1991). DC won the 1984 Canada Council Award and the Grand prix de la science-fiction et du Fantastique Quebecois. Some of DC's short stories are non-juvenile. [LP]Other works: Les Geants de blizzard ["The Giants in the Blizzard"] (1985); La Penombre jaune ["Yellow Shadow"] (1986); Nocturnes pour Jessie ["Nocturnes for Jessie"] (1987); Les Prisonniers du zoo ["Prisoners of the Zoo"] (1988); Terminus cauchemar ["Terminus Nightmare"] (1991); Les Yeux d'emeraude ["Eyes of Emerald"] (1991). COTES, MAY Grant ALLEN. COTTON, JOHN [s] John Russell FEARN. COULSON, JUANITA (RUTH WELLONS) (1933- ) US writer, briefly a schoolteacher, who began publishing sf with "Another Rib" in FSF in 1963 with Marion Zimmer BRADLEY under the shared pseudonym John Jay Wells. With her husband, Robert COULSON, she won the 1965 Best Amateur Publication HUGO for their long-running fanzine YANDRO. JC's first novel, Crisis on Cheiron (1967 dos), like her second, The Singing Stones (1968 dos), is set on a primitive planet in a human-dominated Galaxy; the oppressed species of each planet needs help to survive the inimical influence of large corporations and the like. Unto the Last Generation 1975 Canada) deals negatively with population control; Space Trap (1976 Canada) is a First-Contact tale. The romantic coloration of her work is more evident in the Children of the Stars family saga of exploration and survival: Tomorrow's Heritage (1981), Outward Bound (1982), Legacy of Earth (1989) and The Past of Forever (1989). Star Sister (1990) continues in the same mode. She has also written FANTASY and Gothic novels. [JC]Other works: The Secret of Seven Oaks (1972), Door into Terror (1972), Stone of Blood (1975) and Fear Stalks the Bayou (1976), Gothics; the Krantin fantasy series, comprising The Web of Wizardry (1978) and The Death-God's Citadel (1980); Dark Priestess (1977), historical and marginal. COULSON, ROBERT (STRATTON) (1928- ) US writer, a long-time fan who edited, with his wife Juanita COULSON, the fanzine YANDRO, winner of a 1965 HUGO. With the exception of To Renew the Ages (1976 Canada), a mildly anti- FEMINISM post- HOLOCAUST adventure, and the less interesting High Spy (1987), his sf novels have been written with Gene DEWEESE. They include Gates of the Universe (1975 Canada; rev vt Nightmare Universe 1985 US), a mildly amusing SPACE OPERA, but more notably the Joe Karns sequence of RECURSIVE tales spoofing sf and sf CONVENTIONS, Now You See It/Him/Them (1975) and Charles Fort Never Mentioned Wombats (1977). His revision of But What of Earth? (1976 Canada) from the Piers ANTHONY manuscript, published as a collaboration, proved controversial. Anthony (see his entry) has argued his sense of the matter at great length; neither author, in fact, approved of the final editing by LASER BOOKS. [JC]Other works: Two Man from U.N.C.L.E. novelizations with DeWeese, writing together as Thomas Stratton: The Invisibility Affair * (1967) and The Mind-Twisters Affair * (1967). COUNTDOWN Film (1968). William Conrad Productions. Dir Robert Altman, starring Robert Duvall, James Caan. Screenplay Loren Mandel, based on The Pilgrim Project (1964) by Hank SEARLS. 101 mins cut to 73 mins for UK. Colour.A year later, C would have looked like documentary, for it concerns the first landing on the Moon, which actually took place in 1969. The film's struggle between the USSR and USA to be first to reach the Moon strays from the real-life facts (Searls's original novel was published in 1964), but the behind-the-scenes planning on which the film focuses is gripping. The idiosyncratic, vivid view of personal relationships - here among astronauts and technicians - that typifies Altman's work brings life to the soap-opera elements (astronaut's wife takes to drink, etc.). C's climax is authentically exciting. This is early Altman, and he had no way of preventing a clumsy re-edit or the butchery of the UK print. A number of the later films of Robert Altman (1925- ) were fantasy or sf: Brewster McCloud (1970), 3 Women (1977), QUINTET (1979) and Popeye (1980) most obviously. [PN] COUPER, STEPHEN Stephen GALLAGHER. COUPLING, J.J. [s] John R. PIERCE. COURTENEY, LUKE Alfred Taylor SCHOFIELD. COURTIER, S(IDNEY) H(OBSON) [r] ROBERT HALE LIMITED. COUTINHO, ALBINO [r] LATIN AMERICA. COVER, ARTHUR BYRON (1950- ) US writer. He was involved in the CLARION SCIENCE FICTION WRITERS' WORKSHOP in 1971-2, and began publishing sf with "Gee, Isn't He the Cutest Little Thing?" in Stephen GOLDIN's Alien Condition (anth 1973). His first novel, Autumn Angels (1975), with intro by Harlan ELLISON, depicts in hallucinated language a FAR-FUTURE Earth, with LINGUISTIC and cultural jokes proliferating rather exhaustingly. The sequel, An East Wind Coming (1979), continues to introduce to the end of time cultural icons in pastiche. The stories in Platypus of Doom and Other Nihilists (coll of linked stories 1976) similarly - though with a modest induction of calm - features a sequence of somewhat unhinged parodies of popular figures. Of these early books, only The Sound of Winter (1976), a love story set in a mutation-riddled post- DISASTER wonderland, attempts to create a more humanly moving outcome. Parody is technically not far removed from novelization, and ABC's next novel, Flash Gordon * (1980), novelizing the film of that name, was thus perhaps a logical move. Subsequently ABC has written for Byron PREISS some Time Machine sharecrops - The Rings of Saturn * (1985), American Revolutionary * (1985) and Blade of the Guillotine * (1986) - as well as two sharecrops -Planetfall * (1988) and Stationfall * (1989) - derived from computer games. Other sharecrops include Isaac Asimov's Robot City, Book 4: Prodigy * (1987) and Robert Silverberg's Time Tours #5: The Dinosaur Trackers * (1992). [JC] COVILLE, BRUCE (1950- ) US writer of sf and fantasy, almost exclusively juveniles. Of some interest are: Murder in Orbit (1987 UK; vt Space Station ICE-3 1987); My Teacher is an Alien (1989) and its sequels, My Teacher Fried my Brains (1991), My Teacher Glows in the Dark(1991) and My Teacher Flunked the Planet (1992); Philip Jose Farmer's The Dungeon #2: The Dark Abyss * (1989), a tie; and the A.I. Gang sequence for children - Operation Sherlock (1986), Robot Trouble (1986) and Forever Begins Tomorrow (1986). [JC]Other works: Eyes of the Tarot (1983); Spirits and Spells (1983); Waiting Spirits (1984); Amulet of Doom (1985); The Monster's Ring (1987); The Ghost in the Third Row (1987); The Ghost Wore Gray (1988); The Unicorn Treasury (anth 1988); How I Survived my Summer Vacation (1988); Some of my Best Friends are Monsters (1988); Monster of the Year (1989); Jeremy Thatcher, Dragon Hatcher (1991); The Ghost in the Big Brass Bed (1991); Jennifer Murdley's Toad (1992); Space Brat (1992); Aliens Ate my Homework (1993); The Dragonslayers (1994); I Left my Sneakers in Dimension X (1994); Oddly Enough (coll 1994); Bruce Coville's Book of Monsters: Tales to Give you the Creeps (anth 1994); Bruce Coville's Book of Aliens: Tales to Warp your Mind (anth 1994); the Unicorn Chronicles sequence beginning with Into the Land of Unicorns (1994). COWAN, FRANK (1844-1905) US writer whose Revi-Lona: A Romance of Love in a Marvelous Land (1879), is a parody of the lost-race ( LOST WORLDS) novels so popular in the late 19th century. It is set, like many of them, in Antarctica, where a council of matriarchs falls under the narrator's sexual sway. The results are syphilis and suicide, death and disaster, and the escape of the hero. Some sharp points are made about UTOPIAS. [JC] COWAN, JAMES (1870-1943) US writer whose sf novel, Daybreak: A Romance of an Old World (1896), features an ambulatory MOON which deposits upon MARS a balloon whose passengers discover there a new defence of Christianity in the form of parallel EVOLUTION and the multiple incarnation of Christ. [JC] COWIE, DONALD (JOHN) (1911- ) UK writer (blind since 1984), long resident in Switzerland, author of several crabbed visions of a century in decay. Prose & Verse (coll 1945) with Julian Mountain contains some fantasy stories; of sf interest are The Indiscretions of an Infant, or The Baby's Revenge (1945) and The Rape of Man, or The Zoo Let Loose (1947), in which the other mammals of the world shake off the human yoke. [JC] COWPER, RICHARD Pseudonym of UK writer John Middleton Murry Jr (1926- ), son of the famous critic; RC also published four non-sf novels under the name Colin Murry, beginning with The Golden Valley (1958); and, as Colin Middleton Murry - Colin being a nickname - two autobiographical volumes, One Hand Clapping (1975; vt I at the Keyhole 1975 US), which deals mainly with his relationship with his father, and Shadows on the Grass (1977).After working for some years as a teacher, and finding his non-sf novels to be only moderately successful, he adopted the Cowper pseudonym for Breakthrough (1967). Not conventional GENRE SF, being more richly characterized and romantic than is usual, its story of ESP and a kind of reverse REINCARNATION is sensitively told and given unusual reverberations by its use of a leitmotif from Keats. It remains one of RC's finest works, and its romantic theme - of the power of the mind to sense ALTERNATE WORLDS, and of the flimsiness and limitations of this one's reality, crops up often in his work, sometimes in images of deja vu; as does its venue, a NEAR-FUTURE Southern England on the cusp of transformation. These characteristics feature in many of the short stories assembled in The Custodians (coll 1976), The Web of the Magi (coll 1980) and The Tithonian Factor (coll 1984), the title story of the first of these collections being much praised in the USA and nominated for several awards. They also inform what is generally considered his best singleton, The Twilight of Briareus (1974); in this tale England has been transformed, through a disruption in world weather caused by a supernova explosion, into a snowbound Arcadia; from the same apparent source later come psychic influences which lead to complex interaction between humans and ALIENS. The story - like all of RC's best work - is charged with a strange, expectant vibrancy. Its explorations of human PERCEPTION demonstrate an openness not unlike that described in John Keats's remarks about "negative capability" - remarks that RC has quoted in print. Keats's plea was for a kind of waiting expectancy of the mind, which should be kept free of preconceptions. RC does not usually link telepathy with the idea of the SUPERMAN, as is more normally found in US sf uses of the convention; instead, it can be seen in his work as an analogue of "negative capability".Although the air and style of RC's sf is a long way from traditional HARD SF, its content uses traditional themes. Kuldesak (1972) deals with an underground society on a post- HOLOCAUST Earth ( POCKET UNIVERSE), and one man who finds the surface against the will of an all-powerful COMPUTER. Clone (1972), which saw RC's first real breakthrough into the US market, is an amusing near-future SATIRE. Time out of Mind (1973), like the earlier Domino (1971), rather mechanically applies psi tropes ( PSI POWERS) to thriller-like plots involving TIME TRAVEL and the rescue of a future UK from the totalitarian implications of the 20th century. Worlds Apart (1974) is a not wholly successful comedy, burlesquing several sf CLICHES in a story of an alien world on which an sf novel is being written about Urth, while back on Earth an sf writer writes about the alien world. Profundis (1979) places RC's now-expected mild-mannered telepathic Christ-figure in a huge submarine which has survived nuclear holocaust and is being led around the world by dolphins anxious to keep human violence at bay.RC remains best known for his Corlay trilogy - THE ROAD TO CORLAY (1978; with "Piper at the Gates of Dawn"1976 added, as coll 1979 US), A Dream of Kinship (1981) and A Tapestry of Time (1982) - in which what might be called the pathos of expectancy typical of his best work is finally resolved, for the essential parts of the sequence take place in an England 1000 years after changing sea-levels have inundated much low-lying country, creating an archipelago-like venue which hearkens - perhaps consciously - back to Richard JEFFERIES's After London, or Wild England (1885), and which also clearly resembles the West Country featured in Christopher PRIEST's coeval A Dream of Wessex (1977). In this land, an oppressive theocracy is threatened by the solace offered through a young lad's redemptive visions of a new faith, whose emblem is the White Bird of Kinship. The sequence proceeds through the establishment of a new church, its stiffening into its own repressive rituals, and its rebirth. Throughout, a sweet serenity of image and storytelling instinct - RC has always been a gripping teller of tales - transfigure conventional plot-patterns into testament. The Corlay books so clearly sum up RC's imaginative sense of a redeemed England that it is perhaps unsurprising that he has written relatively little since. [PN/JC]Other works: Phoenix (1968); Domino (1971); Out There Where the Big Ships Go (coll 1980 US); The Story of Pepita and Corindo (1982 chap US); The Young Student (1982 chap US); The Unhappy Princess (1982 chap US); The Missing Heart (1982 chap US); Shades of Darkness (1986); The Magic Spectacles, and Other Tales (coll 1986 chap).As Colin Murry: Recollections of a Ghost (1960); A Path to the Sea (1961); Private View (1972), written at the same time as the other non-sf novels.About the author:"Backwards Across the Frontier" by RC in FOUNDATION 9, 1975.See also: CHILDREN IN SF; CLONES; DISASTER; ESCHATOLOGY; GOTHIC SF; IMMORTALITY; METAPHYSICS; MILFORD SCIENCE FICTION WRITERS' CONFERENCE; MUSIC; PARALLEL WORLDS; PARANOIA; RELIGION; UNDER THE SEA. COX, ADRIAN [r] M.H. ZOOL. COX, ERLE (1873-1950) Australian novelist and journalist who reviewed for The Argus and the Australasian 1918-46. His best-known sf novel is Out of the Silence (1919 The Argus; 1925; cut 1947), about the attempt by a representative of an otherwise extinct super-race to rule first Australia and then the world. The novel exhibits some racist overtones. Fool's Harvest (1939) warned against a future INVASION of AUSTRALIA. The Missing Angel (1947) is a fantasy about foxing the Devil. [JC]See also: SUSPENDED ANIMATION. COX, JOAN (IRENE) (1942- ) US rancher and author whose first sf novel, Mindsong (1979), features a planet terraformed into a Hellenic Eden. Her second, Star Web (1980), is somewhat less engaging. [JC]See also: FASTER THAN LIGHT. CRACKEN, JAEL [s] Brian W. ALDISS. CRACK IN THE WORLD Film (1965). Security Pictures/Paramount. Dir Andrew Marton, starring Dana Andrews, Janette Scott, Kieron Moore, Alexander Knox. Screenplay J.M. White, Julian Halevy. 96 mins. Colour.An attempt to tap the energy at the Earth's core causes a large and ever increasing crack in the crust. A bid to halt the process with a nuclear explosion sends into space a large chunk of the Earth, which forms a new moon. This ambitious DISASTER movie, filmed in Spain, is undermined by too small a budget, but is suspensefully directed. [JB/PN] CRAIG, A.A. [s] Poul ANDERSON. CRAIG, ALEXANDER (? -? ) Author of the lost-race ( LOST WORLDS) novel Ionia: Land of Wise Men and Fair Women (1898). Ionia is a singularly pious and anti-Semitic Greek colony in the Himalayas boasting prohibition, eugenics and communism. He is not to be confused with Alexander George Craig (1897- ), author of The Voice of Merlin (1946) as Alec Craig, a book-length poem on Arthurian themes. [JC] CRAIG, BRIAN Brian M. STABLEFORD. CRAIG, DAVID Pseudonym of UK writer and journalist Allan James Tucker (1929- ), whose Roy Rickman series - The Alias Man (1968), Message Ends (1969) and Contact Lost (1970) - a mundane jeremiad about the coming 1970s world crisis, with the UK becoming a Soviet satellite, is sufficiently displaced into sf to be of some interest. [JC] CRAIG, RANDOLPH [s] Norvell W. PAGE. CRAIG, WEBSTER [s] Eric Frank RUSSELL. CRAIG, WILLIAM Working name of UK writer Charles William Thurlow-Craig (1901- ), whose two NEAR-FUTURE sf novels, Plague Over London (1939) and The Tashkent Crisis (1971), demonstrate a fine consistency of mind through three decades, for in each the Russians are the villains who, with secret weapons and unflagging spite, threaten the world. [JC] CRAIGIE, DAVID Pseudonym used by illustrator and writer Dorothy M. Craigie (1908- ) on her books for young adults. As Dorothy Craigie, she wrote numerous stories for younger children, from Summersalts Circus (1947) to Nicky and Nigger Join the Circus (1960); also as Dorothy Craigie she illustrated children's books, including Graham Greene's four in the genre.As DC, she wrote two sf novels with young protagonists. In The Voyage of the Luna 1 (1948), which she illustrated under her real name, the two children of famous explorers more or less hijack a Moon-bound rocket and encounter various strange species there. Dark Atlantis (1951) takes its protagonist three miles down to an ATLANTIS inhabited by intelligent reptiles. [JC] CRAMER, JOHN G(LEASON) (1934- ) US experimental physicist (Professor of Physics at the University of Washington) and writer; father of Kathryn CRAMER; author of the Alternate View series of science articles in ASF from the 1980s onwards. His HARD-SF novel, Twistor(1989), engagingly describes the eponymous invention, which sends folk into other DIMENSIONS, where they find copious supplies of food, while a villainous corporation attempts - in the end unsuccessfully - to corner the device for its own ends. As the novel closes, several new and virgin worlds stand at the brink of being used by humans. [JC] CRAMER, KATHRYN (ELIZABETH) (1962- ) US critic and editor; daughter of John CRAMER. She has been involved in various capacities with the NEW YORK REVIEW OF SCIENCE FICTION since it began in 1988, where she has published some spiky, erudite criticism. She has become deeply involved in arguing the aesthetic case for - and writing - fiction designed for hypertext, including "In Small & Large Pieces" (1994 The Eastgate Quarterly Review of Hypertext). Her anthologies include two volumes in the Christmas series, both with David HARTWELL: Christmas Ghosts (anth 1987) and Spirits of Christmas (anth 1989); The Architecture of Fear (anth 1987) with Peter D. Pautz (1952- ); Masterpieces of Fantasy and Enchantment (anth 1988) with Hartwell; Masterpieces of Fantasy and Wonder (anth 1989) with Hartwell; Walls of Fear (anth 1990); The Ascent of Wonder: The Evolution of Hard Science Fiction (anth 1994) with Hartwell, a huge and ambitious attempt to delineate, and to represent by examples, the scope of HARD SF. [JC] CRAMER, MILES [s] Thomas Calvert MCCLARY. CRANE, ROBERT Pseudonym of Bernard Glemser (1908-1990), UK novelist who worked for his government in the USA after WWII, remaining there after his resignation. Under his own name he wrote several non-genre novels, at least two of which feature a protagonist named Robert Crane. As RC he began to write sf with "The Purple Fields" in 1953, but is best remembered for Hero's Walk (1954) - the basis for a tv play, "The Voices" (1954) - an intelligent and realistically conceived tale in which superior ALIENS quarantine a militaristic Earth and eventually bomb it to rubble. There is some hope at the novel's close that humanity will be permitted to survive and mature. [JC] CRANK! US SEMIPROZINE, from 1993, current, quarterly, four issues to Fall 1994, trade paperback format, ed and pub Bryan Cholfin from Cambridge, Massachusetts.The uncompromising style of Cholfin's Broken Mirrors Press (which has published worthy though uncommercial projects by writers such as David R. BUNCH and R.A. L LAFFERTY) informs this attractive SMALL PRESS fiction quarterly, which enjoys a remarkably high level of editorial quality. Its first issues have included new fiction by Ursula K. LE GUIN, Gwyneth JONES, Brian W. ALDISS, and R.A. LAFFERTY, as well as publishing Gene WOLFE's novella "Empire of Foliage and Flower", previously available only in a de luxe edition. Le Guin's novelette "The Matter of Seggri" was nominated for the 1994 Nebula Award C's high standards, however, may militate against its success; its recent publication schedule has become uncertain. [GF] CRAWFORD, NED (? - ) UK writer whose Naming the Animals: A Haunting (1980) congestedly depicts a DYSTOPIAN future, out of which, freighted in symbol, a new Eden implausibly emerges. [JC] CRAWFORD, WILLIAM L(EVI) (1911-1984) US publisher and editor, one of the first sf fans to become a publisher, editing and producing two SEMIPROZINES: UNUSUAL STORIES - ambitiously announced in 1933 but more or less still-born - and MARVEL TALES, which came out in 1934. At about the same time, after a chapbook anthology assembling "Men of Avalon" by David H. KELLER and "The White Sybil" by Clark Ashton SMITH, he published, in Mars Mountain (coll 1935) by Eugene George KEY, one of the first US GENRE-SF books to be produced by a US SMALL PRESS founded for that purpose, and the first to be released with any expectation that copies would be sold to buyers who did not know the author personally. A second novel, which would have been Andre NORTON's first published sf, was accepted for publication in 1934 but stayed in manuscript - except for a few excerpts - until WLC finally released it 38 years later as Garan the Eternal (1972). This first press, Fantasy Publications, was followed by Visionary Press, which published The Shadow over Innsmouth (1936) by H.P. LOVECRAFT; but various projects then foundered, and WLC became successfully active again only in 1945, when as Crawford Publications he released some booklets, including Clifford D. SIMAK's The Creator 1946 chap) and an anthology, The Garden of Fear (anth 1945 chap); 2 further anthologies, Griffin Booklet One (anth 1949) and The Machine-God Laughs (anth 1949), both ed WLC, were under the Griffin Publishing Co. imprint. These enterprises all proved less significant than FANTASY PUBLISHING COMPANY, INC. (or FPCI), which WLC was instrumental in founding in 1947, along with the magazine FANTASY BOOK (editing the latter under the pseudonym Garrett Ford). FPCI was one of the central fan presses of the era, publishing L. Sprague DE CAMP's The Undesired Princess (1951), L. Ron HUBBARD's Death's Deputy (1948), A.E. VAN VOGT's and E. Mayne HULL's Out of the Unknown (coll 1948) and other titles of importance; it failed in the end only through incompetent management.WLC soldiered on through the 1950s and afterwards, hand to mouth, always hopeful and full of projects, some of which were at least partially realized. He edited Science and Sorcery (anth 1953) as Garrett Ford; launched the magazine SPACEWAY in 1953; became publisher of the magazine Witchcraft & Sorcery (formerly Coven 13) in the 1970s; and became in the mid-1970s a CONVENTIONS entrepreneur. Also, various stray pamphlets appeared. WLC's diverse projects included the publishing of some scarce and interesting material, and it may well have been the unattractive, amateurish production values which characterized all his work that caused his general lack of commercial success; certainly he knew sf, and loved it. [JC/MJE] CRAWLING EYE, THE The TROLLENBERG TERROR . CRAZIES, THE (vt Code Name Trixie) Film (1973). Cambist Films. Dir George ROMERO, starring Lane Carroll, W.G. McMillan, Harold Wayne Jones. Screenplay Romero, based on a story by Paul McCollough. 104 mins. Colour.A plane carrying germ-warfare material crashes near a small US town and pollutes the drinking-water, causing an epidemic of homicidal and psychopathic behaviour in the inhabitants. The army moves in and the crazed brutality of the soldiers as they shoot victims of the virus (or trapped innocents) is as bad as the lunacy of their targets. There are strong similarities between this and Romero's best-known film, NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD (1968), in that both involve a small group of trapped "normal" people surrounded by nightmare. Romero's exploitation movies are more ambitious than most - wittier, too - and this, as usual, has, half-visible through the blood, a political/cultural subtext about an uncaring society. [JB/PN] CRAZY RAY, THE PARIS QUI DORT. CREASEY, JOHN (1908-1973) UK author, publisher and literary agent who began writing for the BOYS' PAPERS in 1926, turning to adult thrillers in 1932. He wrote 564 books under (it is widely reported) 28 pseudonyms, but it is doubtful if all were exclusively by him (Michael MOORCOCK was at one time approached to do writing for JC). Like George GRIFFITH with his future- WAR novels, JC exploited contemporary fears of organized crime and of terrorist and revolutionary activities, often including sf elements as an additional horror-for example, his first novel, Seven Times Seven (1932; rev 1970), depicts a criminal gang equipped with "freezing gas". In later works, beginning with Dangerous Quest (1943; rev 1965), a futuristic novel about an underground Gestapo group in liberated Yugoslavia, and continuing in his Dr Palfrey series (see listing below), sf themes came to the fore. Midget aircraft piloted by zombie-like children attack the world's cities in The Children of Hate (1952; rev vt The Children of Despair 1958 UK; vt The Killers of Innocence 1971 US). Human-induced world DISASTER was imminent in The Flood (1955) and others, while an alien INVASION was defeated in The Unbegotten (1971). All were sensational in nature, contributing nothing to the genre, and were influential only on the cheap-thriller market. [JE]Other works include: The Death Miser (1932; rev 1965); Men, Maids and Murder (1933; rev 1972); The Mark of the Crescent (1935; rev 1967); Death Round the Corner (1935); The Mystery Plane (1936); Thunder in Europe (1936; rev 1968); The Air Marauders (1937); Carriers of Death (1937; rev 1968); Days of Danger (1937; rev 1968); The S.O.S. Flight (1937); Death Stands By (1938; rev 1966); The Fighting Fliers (1938); Menace! (1938; rev 1971); Panic! (1939; rev 1969); Death by Night (1940); The Island of Peril (1940; rev 1968); The Peril Ahead (1940; rev 1964); Death in Flames (1943; rev 1973 as by Gordon Ashe); Dark Peril (1944; rev 1958); The League of Dark Men (1947; rev 1965); Department of Death (1951); Four of the Best (coll 1955); The Black Spiders (1957); A Shadow of Death (1968); A Blast of Trumpets (1975). Dr Palfrey stories: Traitors' Doom (1942), The Valley of Fear (1943; vt The Perilous Country 1949), The Legion of the Lost (1943), The Hounds of Vengeance (1945; rev 1967), Death in the Rising Sun (1945), Shadow of Doom (1946), The House of the Bears (1946; rev 1962), Dark Harvest (1947; rev 1962), Sons of Satan (1948; rev 1970), The Wings of Peace (1948; rev 1964), The Dawn of Darkness (1949), The League of Light (1949; rev 1963), The Man who Shook the World (1950; rev 1958), The Prophet of Fire (1951), The Touch of Death (1954), The Mists of Fear (1955), The Plague of Silence (1958), The Drought (1959; vt Dry Spell 1967 UK), The Terror (1962; rev 1970), The Depths (1963), The Sleep (1964), The Inferno (1965), The Famine (1967), The Blight (1968), The Oasis (1969), The Smog (1970), The Insulators (1972), The Voiceless Ones (1973), The Thunder-Maker (1976) and The Whirlwind (1979). [JE]See also: CRIME AND PUNISHMENT. CREATURE FROM ANOTHER WORLD, THE The TROLLENBERG TERROR . CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON, THE Film (1954). Universal. Dir Jack ARNOLD, starring Richard Carlson, Julia Adams, Richard Denning. Screenplay Harry Essex, Arthur Ross, from a story by Maurice Zimm. 3-D. 79 mins. B/w.A humanoid creature with gills successfully resists attempts by three scientists - attracted to the area by the discovery of a fossilized hand with fins - to take him from his native lagoon in the upper Amazon. One (Denning) is ready to kill it; another (Carlson) hopes to keep it alive. The Gill-Man - lumbering on land but remarkably graceful in the underwater sequences - became one of the icons of Universal's MONSTER MOVIES. Shot in 3-D, the film is richly atmospheric despite its routine script. It became an archetype of the genre through the bizarre eroticism of the Creature's fascination with the third scientist (Adams), especially in the balletic sequence where he swims unseen beneath her in a sensuous mime of intercourse. In some respects Steven SPIELBERG's successful Jaws (1975) was a remake of TCFTBL. The film had two sequels: REVENGE OF THE CREATURE (1954) and The CREATURE WALKS AMONG US (1956).The novelization is Creature from the Black Lagoon * (1954) by Vargo Statten ( John Russell FEARN). [PN/JB] CREATURE FROM THE HAUNTED SEA Roger CORMAN. CREATURE WALKS AMONG US, THE Film (1956). Universal. Dir John Sherwood, starring Jeff Morrow, Rex Reason, Leigh Snowden. Screenplay Arthur Ross. 78 mins. B/w.This is the second, inferior sequel to The CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON (1954) - the first being REVENGE OF THE CREATURE (1954); it was not shot in 3-D, and had a new director. Here the Creature is transformed by fire into a land monster, complete with lungs (and, later, clothes), thereby depriving him of precisely the qualities that made him popular. There is a ludicrous plot about an exploitative scientist (Morrow) making money out of the space programme by building up the Creature's red corpuscles and thus (!) altering his gene structure. [PN/JB] CREDITS In sf TERMINOLOGY, a credit is a unit of MONEY. Credits are used widely in tales of the future. [PN] CREEPING UNKNOWN, THE The QUATERMASS XPERIMENT . CRICHTON, MICHAEL (1942- ) US writer and film director; he graduated with an MD from Harvard Medical School. He began publishing sf under the pseudonym John Lange with Drug of Choice (1968). Most of the Lange books are thrillers; A Case of Need (1968), published as by Jeffery Hudson, won an Edgar Award for Best Mystery Novel of the year. Some of MC's Lange books, like Zero Cool (1969) and Binary (1972), make perfunctory use of sf devices in a way typical of the modern post-James-Bond thriller. Binary was filmed for tv in MC's directorial debut as PURSUIT (1972). Of greater interest are the novels he has written under his own name, many of which are sf or fantasy, beginning with The Andromeda Strain (1969), an immediate bestseller soon filmed as The ANDROMEDA STRAIN (1971), in which microscopic spores from space attack the US West ( DISASTER). MC's medical background is evident in much of his work ( MEDICINE). The Terminal Man (1972) speculates fascinatingly on the morality and effects of electronic brain implants as a control device, and was the basis of the film The TERMINAL MAN (1974), dir Mike Hodges. Eaters of the Dead (1976) recounts a savage conflict between Vikings and strange Neolithic people; it is in fact a retelling of the Beowulf legend. Congo (1980) is a LOST-WORLD story set in Africa, and reads like updated H. Rider HAGGARD. Sphere (1987) is an UNDER-THE-SEA thriller about the discovery of a long-sunken spacecraft, anticipating The ABYSS (1989). JURASSIC PARK (1990) is a return to the theme of WESTWORLD (discussed below): it effectively argues the risks inherent in uncontrolled GENETIC ENGINEERING, "done in secret, and in haste, and for profit", though the plot itself - dinosaurs reconstituted from genetic scraps cause havoc in the theme park they have been created to stock - is little more than a MCGUFFIN; it was filmed as JURASSIC PARK (1993) by Steven SPIELBERG. All of these novels read a little like film treatments.After Pursuit, MC determined to exercise artistic control over screen adaptations of his work and though he did not do so in the case of The Terminal Man, he both scripted and directed WESTWORLD (1973), an intelligent and cleverly commercial film about a ROBOT-manned reconstruction of the Old West (see also LEISURE) that falls apart at the seams when a robot gunslinger runs amuck; the screenplay was published as Westworld (1974). He scored his biggest commercial hit as a director with COMA (1978), based on Robin COOK's marginally sf novel, a further exploration of MC's technophobic, PARANOID vision, drawing on his medical background for a conspiracy thriller about a high-tech organ-transplant business that draws its raw material from hospital beds. After a meticulous and underrated period re-creation, The Great Train Robbery (1979; vt The First Great Train Robbery), adapted from his own novel - not sf - of the same title, MC has rather lost ground as a director, with LOOKER (1981) and RUNAWAY (1984) both failing at the box-office. However, these films, for all their plot failings, are interesting explorations of his fascination with and distrust of an increasingly mechanized society. Looker deals with image-generation technology, while Runaway casts Tom Selleck as a future policeman whose speciality is tackling dangerously malfunctional household robots. Physical Evidence (1989), a non-sf thriller, is his least interesting or personal film to date.An efficient and intelligent writer and director, MC is capable of producing remarkable work. [JC/PN/KN]See also: APES AND CAVEMEN (IN THE HUMAN WORLD); CINEMA; HORROR IN SF; MYTHOLOGY; VILLAINS. CRICHTON, NEIL (1932- ) Canadian photographer and writer in whose sf novel, Rerun (1976), a man from 1990 goes back 15 years into his own life of the mid-1970s but does not ultimately profit from his foreknowledge. [JC] CRIME AND PUNISHMENT Genre fiction concerned with crime may be roughly divided into detections and thrillers. The former are problem stories; the latter exploit the melodramatic potential of the conflicts inherent in criminal deviation.Detective stories depend very heavily on ingenuity and generally require very fine distinctions between what is possible and what is not. It is not easy to combine sf and the detective story because in sf the boundary between the possible and the impossible is so flexible, but futuristic detective stories can work, given a sufficiently rigid set of ground rules; thus Isaac ASIMOV was able to create intriguing detections based on the restrictions of his three laws of robotics, most notably The Naked Sun (1957), and Randall GARRETT was able to write his ingenious Lord D'Arcy stories about an ALTERNATE-WORLD detective who must use his powers of ratiocination to solve crimes in which rigorously defined magical laws feature, often being used forensically. There was also a subgenre of early detective stories featuring "scientific detectives" armed not only with the scientific methods of thought made famous by Sherlock Holmes but also with the equipment and arcane knowledge of advanced science; notable works in this vein include The Achievements of Luther Trant (coll 1910) by Edwin BALMER and William MacHarg and the many Craig Kennedy adventures chronicled by Arthur B. REEVE, including The Poisoned Pen (coll 1911) and The Dream Doctor (fixup 1914). Hugo GERNSBACK's short-lived SCIENTIFIC DETECTIVE MONTHLY published fiction of this sort, but the speculative aspects of the stories are understandably tentative.Crime is much more commonly and effectively exploited in sf for its melodramatic potential; the imaginative freedom of sf allows both criminals and crime-fighters to become exotic, and their schemes grandiose, a pattern which underlies Jules VERNE's great creations: Captain Nemo, who features in Vingt mille lieues sous les mers (1870; trans as Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Seas 1872 UK) and its sequel L'ile mysterieuse (1874-5; trans as The Mysterious Island 1875 UK); and Robur the Conqueror, who features in Robur le conquerant (1886; trans as The Clipper of the Clouds 1887 UK; vt Robur the Conqueror 1887 US) and its sequel Maitre du monde (1904; trans anon as Master of the World 1914 UK). PULP-MAGAZINE sf grew up alongside increasingly exotic detective pulps which featured the prototypes of the SUPERHEROES who would ultimately come into their own in COMIC books, most notably DOC SAVAGE. In the early days of scientific romance the scientific supercriminal (often embittered by the world's failure to recognize and reward his genius) was a common character, frequently holding the world (or large parts of it) to ransom. Robert CROMIE's The Crack of Doom (1895) and Fred T. JANE's The Violet Flame (1899) feature early examples of world-threatening superscientists. There was a glut of such stories in the 1930s, including Power (1931) by S. Fowler WRIGHT, The One Sane Man (1934) by Francis BEEDING and I'll Blackmail the World (1935) by S. Andrew WOOD. Few apocalyptic threats were fully carried out in such novels, although Neil BELL's The Lord of Life (1933) is a flamboyant exception. (The tradition is kept alive today by, among others, the plots of the many James Bond movies.) Disenchantment with the state of the world allowed many writers of the 1930s to sympathize with world-blackmailers whose demands were humanitarian; C.S. FORESTER's The Peacemaker (1934) is a notable example, and C.J. Cutcliffe HYNE's Man's Understanding (coll 1933) includes two black comedies suggesting that even the most destructive and unreasonable mad SCIENTIST would be no worse than the actual rulers of the world. Later examples include the atom-bomb story The Maniac's Dream (1946) by F. Horace ROSE and the Dr Palfrey novels by John CREASEY.Among the early GENRE-SF writers to make use of the stereotyped supercriminal was Murray LEINSTER, whose many versions of it include "A Thousand Degrees Below Zero" (1919), "Darkness on Fifth Avenue" (1929), "The Racketeer Ray" (1932) and "The Earth-Shaker" (1933). John W. CAMPBELL Jr used the formula in "Piracy Preferred" (1930), but he armed his heroes as well as his villain (who reformed and joined the heroes for several sequels). The game of interplanetary super-cops vs super-robbers was pioneered by Edmond HAMILTON in the Interstellar Patrol stories, some of which were reprinted in Outside the Universe (1929; 1964) and Crashing Suns (1928-30; coll 1965), and extravagantly carried forward by E.E. "Doc" SMITH in the Skylark series and Spacehounds of IPC (1934; 1947). The conflict in the Skylark of Space books, between Richard Seaton and the impressively villainous Blackie DuQuesne, was vigorously sustained; and the later Lensmen series (in book form 1948-54), featured perhaps the most famous genre-sf criminal organization of all: the Eddorian-run interstellar cartel known as Boskone.Pulp sf writers imagined that future crime would follow much the same pattern as crime today, although they were happy to imagine that romantic crimes like piracy might come back into fashion in outer space - or even in time, as in Ross ROCKLYNNE's "Pirates of the Time Trail" (1943). Retribution, too, tended to follow well established tracks, although one or two writers used sealed time-loops and other gimmicks to design punishments to fit particular crimes; Lester DEL REY's "My Name is Legion" (1942) suggests an appropriate fate for Hitler. One magazine story of the 1940s which attempts to make a significant statement about deviancy and penology is Robert A. HEINLEIN's "Coventry" (1940), which imagines a curious kind of exile, then proceeds to develop one of the most annoying of sf CLICHES: the idea that selfish deviants might be harassed as a kind of test to prove their suitability for recruitment into the social elite of a stable society.When sf writers took to building all kinds of eccentric totalitarian societies for their future scenarios in the 1940s and 1950s, the rectitude of deviancy became a much more open question. As forms of conformity became stranger, so did forms of nonconformity. In Fritz LEIBER's GATHER, DARKNESS! (1943; 1950) the establishment's superscience masquerades as RELIGION, leading the rebels to disguise their own superscience as witchcraft. More sophisticated studies of odd forms of deviancy in warped societies include Wyman GUIN's "Beyond Bedlam" (1951), whose heroine rebels against the obligation to share tenancy of her body with her split personality's alter ego, Ray BRADBURY's FAHRENHEIT 451 (1953), whose meek rebels learn books by heart to save them from would-be burners, and Philip Jose FARMER's Dayworld (1985) and its sequels, in which "daybreakers" exceed their allotted active time in an overcrowded world.In the 1950s, new ideas regarding the treatment of deviants began to appear in some profusion. In "Two-Handed Engine" (1955), by Henry KUTTNER and C.L. MOORE, criminals are attended by robot "furies" to monitor their actions and symbolize their guilt. In Damon KNIGHT's "The Country of the Kind" (1956) criminals are outcast, free to do as they will but utterly lonely - an idea explored with greater intensity in Robert SILVERBERG's "To See the Invisible Man" (1963). Robert SHECKLEY's The Status Civilization (1960) is a satirical extrapolation of the penal-colony theme, imagining the kind of society which criminals might establish in reaction against the one which exiles them. The notion of the prison colony is taken to a terrible extreme in Cordwainer SMITH's "A Planet Named Shayol" (1961), in which criminals are made to grow extra limbs and organs for harvesting and use in transplants. A much more humane view of the issues involved in crime and punishment is featured in Alfred BESTER's classic sf novel based on Fyodor Dostoyevsky's Crime and Punishment (1866), THE DEMOLISHED MAN (1953), in which the obsessed villain ultimately fails to avoid detection by a telepathic policeman, but finds the prospect of punitive "demolition" less terrible than its name implies. Bester's "Fondly Fahrenheit" (1954) is another forceful study in homicidal psychology. New fashions in the real-world treatment of prisoners - especially the notion of "brainwashing" - were extensively featured in borderline-sf thrillers, and taken to surreal lengths in the tv series The PRISONER , whose theme was sensitively novelized by Thomas M. DISCH in The Prisoner * (1969).Exotic police forces were featured in heroic roles in many sf stories and series in the 1950s. An alien policeman pursues a criminal to Earth in Needle (1950) by Hal CLEMENT, requiring to inhabit the body of an earthly host in order to do so. Time police - patrolling and protecting history - became commonplace, as in The End of Eternity (1955) by Isaac Asimov, Guardians of Time (1955-60; fixup 1960) by Poul ANDERSON, and H. Beam PIPER's Paratime Police series. Asimov's first sf detective story, The Caves of Steel (1954), was followed a few years later by the first murder mystery in which Earth is the corpse: Poul Anderson's After Doomsday (1962). Realistic futuristic police-procedural stories were pioneered by Rick RAPHAEL in an effective series of stories dealing with road-traffic law enforcement in the near future, Code Three (fixup 1966), and were carried forward by such novels as Lee KILLOUGH's The Doppelganger Gambit (1979), but law enforcers of a rather less conventional kind have understandably remained dominant. Joe Clifford FAUST's A Death of Honour (1987) imagines that the 21st-century police might be simply too busy to investigate a murder. The vast majority of the novels of Ron GOULART feature crime and detectives in some quirky fashion or other; most notable among them are the Chameleon Corps books. (John E. STITH is another writer who mixes HUMOUR, crime and sf, but with less accent on the humour than Goulart.) Although the world of sf crime has remained male-dominated, female detectives have made significant appearances in Rosel George BROWN's Sibyl Sue Blue (1966; vt Galactic Sibyl Sue Blue) and the St Cyr Interplanetary Detective series begun by Ian WALLACE in Deathstar Voyage (1969). SUPERHERO crime-fighters made relatively little impact in written sf until the advent of George R.R. MARTIN's SHARED-WORLD anthology series begun with Wild Cards (anth 1986), but an interesting precursor was featured in Doris PISERCHIA's Mister Justice 1973); Temps (anth 1991), "created by" Neil GAIMAN and Alex Stewart, was the first of a series of shared-world anthologies featuring the crime-fighting escapades of part-time and/or limited-ability superheroes.A more romantic view of crime is preserved by picaresque sf stories. Although muted for a long time by editorial TABOOS, a considerable body of sf makes heroes of social outsiders and deviants. An early example is Charles L. HARNESS's Flight into Yesterday (1949; 1953; vt The Paradox Men), and much of Harness's work features similar heroic outsiders, who tend to be artists when they are not rogues, and are often both. Much of the work of Jack VANCE falls into a similar category. Far less romantic is the eponymous antihero of Harry HARRISON's The Stainless Steel Rat (1957-60; fixup 1961) and its sequels. Philip Jose Farmer wrote a series featuring John Carmody, a criminal who reformed to become a priest, the most notable being Night of Light (1966). As the taboos eased there appeared criminal heroes who remained both unrepentant and charismatic, including the protagonist of Roger ZELAZNY's Jack of Shadows (1971) and the narrator of Samuel R. DELANY's "Time Considered as a Helix of Semi-Precious Stones" (1968); Delany is another writer who almost invariably uses miscreant artists as heroes. The most extravagant example of a charismatic criminal in sf is probably the protagonist of Mike RESNICK's Santiago (1986), who is pursued across the Galaxy by assorted exotic bounty-hunters, most of whom are certainly no better than he turns out to be.The relativity of crime and the idea of evil in societies which have very different values is widely featured. Earnest variants can be found in such stories as "The Sharing of Flesh" (1968) by Poul Anderson and Speaker for the Dead (1986) by Orson Scott CARD, in which alien societies license or compel acts which seem to us utterly horrific. Robert Sheckley often addresses the question ironically, as in "Watchbird" (1953), a moral fable about a mechanical law-enforcer's tendency to exceed its brief, and "The Monsters" (1953), which features an alien society in which wife-murder is a moral act. The blackest sf comedy in this vein is probably Piers ANTHONY's "On the Uses of Torture" (1981).Despite the welter of criminal activity in sf there are very few new crimes, although such DYSTOPIAS as Yegevny ZAMIATIN's My (written 1920; trans as We 1924) and George ORWELL's NINETEEN EIGHTY-FOUR (1949) have taken the rooting-out of political deviance to new extremes in making "thoughtcrimes" detectable and remediable. Crimes of nonconformity often take bizarre forms, as in such J.G. BALLARD stories as "Billenium" (1961), in which the existence of an empty room is wickedly but futilely concealed, and "Chronopolis" (1960), in which the hero illegally winds clocks. Tampering with history is a crime which features only in sf - matched by the singularly appropriate punishment of historical erasure in Robert Silverberg's Up the Line (1969) - but even this is no more than an extreme of subversive activity. A more original crime is committed by the protagonist of Piers Anthony's Chthon (1967), although the extremely nasty prison colony to which he is condemned for it is ordinary in kind. The same situation pertains in the design of punishments, and has done ever since Arthur Conan DOYLE's "The Los Amigos Fiasco" (1892), which anticipated the use of the world's first electric chair but made the consequences of its use exaggeratedly melodramatic. Numerous sf stories have anticipated the use of "electronic tagging", although usually the tags are capable of administering on-the-spot punishment. An early example (although here the "tags" are created by mental conditioning) is featured in "The Analogues" (1952) by Damon Knight; others are in The Reefs of Space (1964) by Frederik POHL and Jack WILLIAMSON and The Ring (1968) by Piers Anthony and Robert E. MARGROFF. When the merits of punitive, retributive and rehabilitative theories of penology are compared in sf, the extremism of plausible examples often makes the argument starkly dramatic; examples of Swiftian "modest proposals" abound. An interesting polemical work on penological theory is John J. MCGUIRE's "Take the Reason Prisoner" (1963), and a macabre combination of the punitive and retributive theories is featured in those of Larry NIVEN's stories in which the crime of "organlegging" co-exists with a new penal code whereby criminals are broken up for bodily spare parts. Several of Niven's stories on these lines are among the best examples of the sf detective story; some are collected in The Long ARM of Gil Hamilton (coll 1976).Since Sherlock Holmes fell into the public domain he has been a popular character in sf stories, appearing in key roles in Morlock Night (1979) by K.W. JETER, Sherlock Holmes' War of the Worlds (1975) by Manly Wade and Wade WELLMAN, Dr Jekyll and Mr Holmes (1979) by Loren D. Estleman and Time for Sherlock Holmes (1983) by David DVORKIN. Another Victorian figure, from the opposite end of the moral spectrum, who has exerted a similar fascination upon modern writers is the prototypical serial killer Jack the Ripper; several of the stories in the centenary anthology Ripper! (anth 1988; vt Jack the Ripper UK) ed Susan CASPER and Gardner DOZOIS are sf.Theme anthologies concerned with sf crime stories include Space Police (anth 1956) ed Andre NORTON; Space, Time and Crime (anth 1964) ed Miriam Allen DEFORD; and Computer Crimes and Capers (anth 1985) ed Isaac Asimov, Martin H. GREENBERG and Charles G. WAUGH. [BS]See also: SOCIOLOGY; UTOPIAS. CRIMES OF THE FUTURE Film (1970). Emergent Films. Prod, dir, written and photographed David CRONENBERG, starring Ronald Mlodzik, Tania Zolty, Jon Lidolt, Jack Messinger. 70 mins. Colour.This cheaply made, inventive Canadian film, something between an underground and a commercial movie, is chiefly of interest as ushering in - along with Stereo (1969) - Cronenberg's distinguished, eccentric and (according to some) disgusting career in sf cinema. With hindsight, we can see many Cronenberg strategies and themes here in embryo: deliberately tasteless SATIRE, the moral corruption of society, human metamorphosis created by irresponsible TECHNOLOGY, sexual metaphor at the heart of the argument, and the contrast of sterile settings with ravages and mutations of the flesh. The film is set in a NEAR FUTURE where humans are devolving ( DEVOLUTION) and all women of child-bearing age have been killed by an epidemic spread through a cosmetics additive created by a mad dermatologist (in the House of Skin), thus making procreative pedophilia a likely "crime of the future" and putting a 5-year-old girl (Zolty) at the centre of the barely comprehensible plot. [PN] CRIME ZONE Roger CORMAN. CRISP, FRANK R(OBSON) (1915- ) UK writer, at one time in the Merchant Navy. His sf novels, The Ape of London (1959) and The Night Callers (1960), are routine adventures deploying thriller and horror elements; their sf displacement is inconsiderable. The latter, involving an alien INVASION, was filmed as The NIGHT CALLER (1965). [JC]See also: ASTRONOMY; PARASITISM AND SYMBIOSIS. CRISPIN, A(NN) C(AROL) (1950- ) US writer who was first known as a competent author of ties, including three for the Star Trek enterprise - Yesterday's Son * (1983) and its direct sequel Time for Yesterday * (1988), along with Star Trek, The Next Generation #13: The Eyes of the Beholder * (1990) - and three for the "V" sequence - "V" * (1984), East Coast Crisis * (1984) with Howard WEINSTEIN and Death Tide * (1985) with Deborah A. Marshall ( "V"). She also collaborated with Andre NORTON on a Witch World novel, Gryphon's Eyrie (1984), before embarking on her first independent work of significance, the StarBridge sequence for older children: StarBridge (1989), Silent Dances (1990) with Kathleen O'MALLEY and Shadow World (1991) with Jannean (L.) Elliott. The first volume of the series (projected to contain at least5 vols) follows the exploits of an extremely bright teenaged girl who becomes involved in problems of galactic scope, and participates in the founding of an Academy for youngsters like herself. The second, rather more interestingly, puts a deaf Academy member of Native American background on an ominous planet where only she can read the signs of ALIEN intelligence. In the third, an alienated male Academy member finds, in a short-lived alien race, challenges that are precisely adapted to his needs. Through these well planned if not strikingly original tales ACC has demonstrated a consistent professionalism about her trade, and considerable generosity about giving good value. [JC] CRISPIN, EDMUND Pseudonym for his literary work of UK composer, writer and editor Robert Bruce Montgomery (1921-1978), who remains best known for his nine Gervase Fen detective novels. He also reviewed crime fiction for the Sunday Times and, as a composer, under his real name wrote the music for many UK films of the 1950s and 1960s, including several of the Carry On series. EC did not write sf, but his work as an sf anthologist was of great influence. When Best SF (anth 1955) appeared it was unique in several ways: its editor was a respected literary figure; its publisher (Faber & Faber) was a prestigious one; and it made no apologies or excuses for presenting sf as a legitimate form of writing. Moreover, EC's selection of stories showed him to be thoroughly familiar with sf in both magazine and book form, and his introductions to this and succeeding volumes were informed and illuminating. Best SF was followed by Best SF Two (anth 1956), Three (anth 1958), Four (anth 1961), Five (anth 1963), Six (anth 1966) and Seven (anth 1970). It would be difficult to exaggerate the importance of the early volumes in this series in establishing sf in the UK as a respectable branch of literature. EC also edited two sf ANTHOLOGIES for schools, The Stars and Under (anth 1968) and Outwards from Earth (anth 1974), as well as Best Tales of Terror (anth 1962) and Best Tales of Terror Two (anth 1965). [MJE]See also: BRITISH SCIENCE FICTION ASSOCIATION; LONGEVITY (IN WRITERS AND PUBLICATIONS); MUSIC. CRISTABEL Pseudonym of US nurse, professor of nursing, and author Christine Elizabeth Abrahamsen (1916- ), who wrote at least one Gothic as Kathleen Westcott. She began publishing sf with the florid Veltakin sequence of sf adventures: Manalacor of Veltakin (1970) and The Cruachan and the Killane (1970). Her singletons were The Mortal Immortals (1971) and The Golden Olive (1972). All are written in a style that crosses the romance genre with boys' fiction. [PN/JC] CRITICAL AND HISTORICAL WORKS ABOUT SF This entry restricts itself to works which generalize about sf, and only in passing mentions books or articles about specific authors or themes (for which see relevant entries).The range and sophistication of sf studies have expanded greatly. Before 1970 very little useful material was available, but since then, and especially during the 1980s, the publication of secondary materials on sf has become an industry. The first work of criticism devoted to US sf is Hammer and Tongs (coll 1937 chap) by Clyde F. Beck (? -1985), which collects still-readable essays from a fanzine, The Science Fiction Critic; the first important study, Pilgrims through Space and Time: Trends and Patterns in Scientific and Utopian Fiction (1947), by J.O. BAILEY, is historical and thematic, dealing mostly with work published decades previously; value judgments are almost absent, and trivia are discussed alongside works of lasting interest. Despite its limitations, this was a valuable pioneering work. The PILGRIM AWARD for excellence in sf studies was named after it.Bailey was an academic, but for the next several decades most books about sf were written by fans rather than academic critics. While this meant that their scholarly and critical procedures were often eccentric, and sometimes of indifferent quality, it also introduced considerable vigour into the early days of debate about sf, along with a willingness to plunge into areas of research (ephemeral publications-magazines and FANZINES - as well as books, along with the recording of reminiscences by authors, editors and publishers) avoided by academia; such knowledge of the HISTORY OF SF as is now available to us is very much a product of their initial work. Research is still shallow in many areas of sf's past, and no consensus history yet exists.The next serious study after Bailey's was New Maps of Hell (1960 US) by Kingsley AMIS, a celebrated novelist with an academic background but, so far as sf was concerned, a fan. Brief and unscholarly, it is nevertheless witty, critical and suggestive; Amis regarded the essential aspects of modern sf as satirical and dystopian ( DYSTOPIAS; SATIRE). Unlike Bailey, he took most of his examples from contemporary GENRE SF. Less literary in their approach, and more sober though passionate in their way, were the historical studies of sf by Sam MOSKOWITZ, which, while adopting simplistic critical criteria and not always accurate in detail, were nevertheless important in the huge amount of research they codified for the first time, especially regarding sf in early magazines, but going well beyond that. Three collections of his essays which are often taken to be models of fan scholarship are Explorers of the Infinite (coll 1963), Seekers of Tomorrow (coll 1966) and Strange Horizons (coll 1976); also of note are his Science Fiction by Gaslight: A History and Anthology of Science Fiction in the Popular Magazines 1891-1911 (anth 1968) and Under the Moons of Mars: A History and Anthology of "The Scientific Romance" in the Munsey Magazines, 1912-1920 (anth 1970), with their long, informative introductions.Two well known writers of sf, Damon KNIGHT and James BLISH, often took time out to write shrewd, well informed criticism, the latter under the pseudonym William Atheling Jr. Much of Knight's critical work was collected in In Search of Wonder (coll 1956; exp 1967) and of Atheling's in The Issue at Hand (coll 1964) and More Issues at Hand (coll 1970). These books were published by ADVENT: PUBLISHERS, a SMALL PRESS specifically set up to publish books about sf by fan scholars. It was with Knight and Blish that some sort of critical consensus began to emerge about what constituted sf and who were its most influential writers. The first of three critical symposia ed Reginald BRETNOR, also featuring the critical views of sf writers themselves, appeared very early: Modern Science Fiction: Its Meaning and its Future (anth 1953; rev 1979). It was followed by his Science Fiction, Today and Tomorrow (anth 1974) and The Craft of Science Fiction (anth 1976).The cautious interest being shown in sf by the US academic world bore its first fruits in 1959, in the shape of the critical journal EXTRAPOLATION. For many years this was stencilled, not printed, which suggested that the financial support it was receiving from academia at large was small; nevertheless it lived on. Two further academic magazines about sf followed, both (in different ways) a little livelier: FOUNDATION: THE REVIEW OF SCIENCE FICTION in the UK (1972) and SCIENCE-FICTION STUDIES in the USA (1973). The former - as much fannish as academic - emphasized reviews and critical and sociological studies of contemporary and post-WWII sf; the latter - more strictly academic - concentrated on writers of sf's past plus only the more academically acceptable of the present, with good coverage of European sf and some interesting and, to many, unexpected Marxist criticism. A newcomer has been JOURNAL OF THE FANTASTIC IN THE ARTS (1988).Some of the best critical writing about sf has appeared in these journals, and also in a great many FANZINES. Unfortunately, fanzines tend to be produced cheaply (and as a result often disintegrate rapidly) and have low circulations; back copies are usually therefore extremely difficult to obtain. Some of the more interesting critical fanzines and SEMIPROZINES from the 1940s through the 1980s were (and in many cases still are) ALGOL, AUSTRALIAN SCIENCE FICTION REVIEW, FANTASY COMMENTATOR, FANTASY NEWSLETTER, FANTASY REVIEW, JANUS/AURORA, LOCUS, LUNA MONTHLY, NEW YORK REVIEW OF SCIENCE FICTION, QUARBER MERKUR, RIVERSIDE QUARTERLY, SCIENCE FICTION & FANTASY BOOK REVIEW, SF COMMENTARY, SCIENCE FICTION EYE, SCIENCE FICTION REVIEW, SCIENCE FICTION TIMES, SFRA NEWSLETTER, SPECULATION, THRUST, VECTOR and WARHOON. The professional sf magazines, too, have regularly published sf criticism, that of FSF in particular often being of a high quality, as has been (beginning much later) that of INTERZONE.By the 1970s a large body of sf criticism had been built up, though much of it was and is difficult to get hold of. The earlier notion that sf should be judged by criteria different from those normally applied to conventional literature began steadily to lose ground in the 1970s to the view that sf is strong enough to be gauged by the same standards that prevail elsewhere in literary criticism. Very naturally, however, the literary analysis of sf tends to this day to be argued thematically and structurally, and to eschew a criticism grounded in concepts of psychological realism on the one hand or metaphorical power on the other. Although this is inevitable, mimetic realism and good characterization being qualities somewhat marginalized by the very nature of sf, it does help explain why even now sf criticism has not generally developed a vocabulary enabling judgmental distinctions to be well made; that is, when explaining why some books and stories are worse than others (an explanation that sf criticism feels called upon to make more seldom than is healthy), it does not usually do the job with much conviction.The trickle of sf criticism in book form became a small spate around the mid-1970s and something of a torrent later on, but already by 1974 a number of new books had appeared, including studies by Sam J. LUNDWALL and Donald A. WOLLHEIM in the USA. A major tributary joined the river with Billion Year Spree (1973) by Brian W. ALDISS; Aldiss later revised and updated this work with David WINGROVE as Trillion Year Spree (1986), a version that won them both a HUGO. The book is idiosyncratic in some respects, with genuine scholarship of an autodidact kind, although not remotely academic. Many reviewers observed that, in the earlier version of the book, Aldiss's account of the post-WWII period was hurried and not very informative, but this remains an important book, especially in the literary and cultural context it gives for sf ever since the days of Mary SHELLEY, who is Aldiss's candidate for the position of the first bona fide sf writer. His cheerful, informal raconteur's tone enlivens without cheapening his many serious points, and comes as a relief after the ponderousness of some previous studies of sf and the defensive fannish enthusiasm of others.The next important book on sf for the general reader was also by a professional writer from the genre: James E. GUNN's Alternate Worlds: The Illustrated History of Science Fiction (1975), a balanced and intelligent survey (although coverage of later writers tends to be confined to long lists) which strongly emphasizes the Campbellian tradition of magazine sf in the USA. This book was part of a sudden rush of handsome, illustrated books about sf, some of which are listed under ILLUSTRATION.A collection of essays by Alexei and Cory PANSHIN, SF in Dimension (coll 1976), argued a coherent if controversial viewpoint. Alexei Panshin had earlier published an interesting study of Robert A. HEINLEIN, and he and his wife would later publish The World Beyond the Hill: Science Fiction and the Quest for Transcendence (1989), a long book full of incidental insights but whose overall thesis is open to argument. It elicited a devastating review from John CLUTE, always a pungent critic of sf, in New York Review of Science Fiction (July 1991), which in turn prompted a correspondence whose overall implication may be that the US-centred, magazine-centred, somewhat inbred and sentimental view of the development of the genre which had dominated sf historians for decades was now being rejected by a new generation of sf critics and scholars. Clute's own book of sf criticism, Strokes: Essays and Reviews 1966-1986 (coll 1988 US), was an example of the development of a wider perspective on sf, dealing as it does with sf's concerns in terms of their metaphoric resonance - their subtexts - as well as their literal meaning. A sometimes thuddingly literal-minded reading of sf themes, from robots to the colonization of other worlds, had characterized many of the books and articles published on sf prior to the 1980s.Numerous sf writers apart from those already mentioned have also written well informed and lively sf criticism and essays in sf scholarship; many of these, like Thomas M. DISCH, Gardner DOZOIS, Joanna RUSS, Robert SILVERBERG and Ian WATSON, have not yet had their critical pieces collected in book form. Among those who have are: Algis BUDRYS, with Benchmarks: Galaxy Bookshelf (coll 1985); Samuel R. DELANY, with The Jewel-Hinged Jaw: Notes on the Language of Science Fiction (1977) and Starboard Wine: More Notes on the Language of Science Fiction (coll 1984), whose structuralist and sometimes POSTMODERNIST criticism is dense and difficult, irritating and interesting; Ursula K. LE GUIN, with The Language of the Night: Essays on Fantasy and Science Fiction (coll 1979; rev 1989 UK); Barry N. MALZBERG, whose The Engines of the Night: Science Fiction in the Eighties (1982) may not have had the attention it deserves; Norman SPINRAD, with Science Fiction in the Real World (coll 1990), which collects many of his critical columns from ISAAC ASIMOV'S SCIENCE FICTION MAGAZINE; and Brian M. STABLEFORD, whose several well researched books on the subject, including Scientific Romance in Britain 1890-1950 (1985), have done much to dispel the view that sf was primarily a product of PULP MAGAZINES and specialist SF MAGAZINES.A phenomenon largely of the 1980s was the production of large, multi-author reference works containing critical assessments of sf, of which one of the earliest was the first edition of this encyclopedia (1979). The first edition of Neil BARRON's Anatomy of Wonder: A Critical Guide to Science Fiction (1976; rev 1981; rev 1987) was earlier still, and the book remains one of the best and most accessible critical guides. Others include: the desperately uneven 5-vol Survey of Science Fiction Literature (anth 1979) ed Frank N. Magill, though the actual editing and organization was largely the work of associate editor Keith NEILSON; the largely excellent Science Fiction Writers: Critical Studies of the Major Authors from the Early Nineteenth Century to the Present Day (anth 1982) ed E.F. BLEILER; the 2-vol Twentieth-Century American Science-Fiction Writers (anth 1981) ed David Cowart and Thomas L. Wymer; and Twentieth-Century Science-Fiction Writers (anth 1981; rev 1986; rev 1991) first two edns ed Curtis C. SMITH, with its useful essays badly compromised by poor presentation of bibliographical data. Most of these books are reference works from specialist publishers at prices that may deter lay sf readers, but they are readily located in academic libraries.None of these books is purely academic in its authorship, but in most of them many of the essays are by academic specialists - for honourable reasons but also, naturally enough, because the publish-or-perish syndrome will always ensure academic contributors willing to work for little or nothing - and it is in the field of academic books on sf that the largest expansion of book publishing on sf has taken place, especially in the 1980s. Long before that there were, aside from Bailey's, two other important early works of academic sf scholarship: The Imaginary Voyage in Prose Fiction: A History of its Criticism and a Guide for its Study, with an Annotated Check List of 215 Imaginary Voyages from 1700 to 1800 (1941) by Philip Babcock GOVE, and Voyages to the Moon (1948) by Marjorie Hope NICOLSON. After a long gap, the next academic works of importance (apart from studies of single authors such as of H.G. WELLS and Aldous HUXLEY) were Voices Prophesying War 1763-1984 (1966) by I.F. CLARKE, who followed this work with other studies of sf, and Yesterday's Tomorrows (1968) by W.H.G. ARMYTAGE. Running concurrently with all these publications, and beginning much earlier, have been the many books on literary UTOPIAS.Next in the academic line came Into the Unknown: The Evolution of Science Fiction from Francis Godwin to H.G. Wells (1970) by Robert M. PHILMUS. In the 1970s Darko SUVIN came to the fore as an influential academic critic of sf, his earliest full-scale book being first published in French: Pour une poetique de la science-fiction (1977 Canada; exp in English as Metamorphoses of Science Fiction: On the Poetics and History of a Literary Genre 1979 US). Two important later books by Suvin are Victorian Science Fiction in the U.K.: The Discourses of Knowledge and of Power (1983 US) and Positions and Presuppositions in Science Fiction (coll 1988 US).After 1974 the pace of academic publishing increased. The most important studies of the mid-1970s were New Worlds for Old (1974) by David KETTERER, Visions of Tomorrow (coll 1975) by David SAMUELSON and Structural Fabulation (1975) by Robert SCHOLES. Scholes went on to collaborate with Eric S. RABKIN on Science Fiction: History, Science, Vision (1977), one of the best semi-popular accounts of the genre. Rabkin has since published widely in the field.Scholes's work was much influenced by Introduction a la litterature fantastique (1970 France; trans as The Fantastic: A Structural Approach to a Literary Genre 1973) by Tzvetan TODOROV, a work which has aroused controversy and much interest. Sf criticism, primarily Marxist, structuralist or both, is flourishing in Europe. Other notable European critics are Michel BUTOR, Boris Eizykman (1949- ), Vladimir GAKOV, Jorg Hienger (1927- ), Jean-Henri Holmberg ( SCANDINAVIA), Julius KAGARLITSKI, Gerard KLEIN, Stanislaw LEM, Carlo PAGETTI, Franz ROTTENSTEINER, Martin Schwonke (1923- ), Jacques van Herp (1923- ) and Pierre VERSINS. Rottensteiner, who also publishes in English, is one of the most renowned European critics; unfortunately, his best-known book in English, The Science Fiction Book: An Illustrated History (1975), is not quite up to his own usually high standard. Some exceptionally controversial criticism by Stanislaw LEM has been published in English, although his much-discussed Fantastyka i futurologia (1970 Poland), a full-length study of sf, has yet to be translated in full; a small part appeared, with other work, in Microworlds (coll trans 1985 US). Back in the USA, the appearance in the 1970s of many academic courses about sf ( SF IN THE CLASSROOM) had repercussions in the publication of anthologies of critical essays. A pioneer editor in this field was Thomas D. CLARESON with SF: The Other Side of Realism (anth 1971), Voices for the Future: Essays on Major Science Fiction Writers Vol. 1 (anth 1976) and its two sequels, and Many Futures, Many Worlds: Theme and Form in Science Fiction (anth 1977). Clareson has also published books of his own, his most important work being on the early HISTORY OF SF, as in Some Kind of Paradise: The Emergence of American Science Fiction (1985), which is more a historical and thematic survey than a critical study. Two critical anthologies about sf aimed at the general reader rather than at the student or teacher are Science Fiction at Large (anth 1976; vt Explorations of the Marvellous) ed Peter NICHOLLS and Turning Points: Essays on the Art of Science Fiction (anth 1977) ed Damon Knight. The former book contains several essays which, in their readiness to see shortcomings in sf, may be a particular example of a general lessening of the rather tedious boosterism in many earlier books about the field. Another good, academic critical anthology of the 1970s was Science Fiction: A Critical Guide (anth 1979) ed Patrick PARRINDER.In the 1980s a great many critical anthologies about sf were published, often choosing their contents from the proceedings of academic conferences or from academic-track programming at sf CONVENTIONS. A number of these are listed in the entries of such individual editors as Martin H. GREENBERG, Donald HASSLER, Eric S. RABKIN and George E. SLUSSER. Many of the academics who have edited such books have also written studies of their own. Among them are perhaps the two most stimulating US academic theoreticians about sf to have risen to prominence in the 1980s: Mark ROSE and Gary K. WOLFE. Rose is the author of Alien Encounters: Anatomy of Science Fiction (1981), which in its discussion of what he sees as the central paradigms in sf breaks new ground, if controversially. Wolfe is the author of many articles and several books, including The Known and the Unknown: The Iconography of Science Fiction (1979), perhaps the major study of sf in the recent period, and comes as close as any critic ever has to defining, in useful and quite rigorous theoretical terms, the SENSE OF WONDER that fans so often use to describe what they seek for and find in sf. Unlike many of his academic colleagues, Wolfe writes with clarity, grace and wit, and avoids the jargon that makes so much recent academic analysis of sf so inaccessible to the ordinary reader - and so boring, sometimes, to even the academically trained reader.The books of two other academic critics of considerable interest have been more narrowly focused than most of the above: H. Bruce FRANKLIN and W. Warren WAGAR. Both write well. Franklin has written, from a Marxist perspective unusual in US criticism, Robert A. Heinlein: America as Science Fiction (1980) and War Stars: The Superweapon and the American Imagination (1988). Wagar is the author of a book which is as much a contribution to the history of ideas as it is an analysis of sf specifically: Terminal Visions: The Literature of Last Things (1982).In the early 1970s anybody interested in the history and criticism of sf could have found very little to read on the subject. Now there is too much to cope with, and the difficulty is in locating what might be available and interesting. The "interesting" criterion remains a lottery, but the "availability" criterion can be helped considerably. Here the Science Fiction and Fantasy Reference Indexes of Hal W. HALL are very useful, as is The Year's Scholarship in Science Fiction and Fantasy series compiled by Marshall B. TYMN and Roger C. SCHLOBIN (see their entries for details). An earlier reference is Science Fiction Criticism: An Annotated Checklist (1972) compiled by Clareson.Further discussion of secondary materials for the sf researcher will be found in BIBLIOGRAPHIES, CINEMA, DEFINITIONS OF SF and POSTMODERNISM AND SF, and in selected author and theme entries throughout. [PN] CRITICAL WAVE UK SEMIPROZINE (1987-current) ed Martin Tudor and Steve Green. CW is a bimonthly sf and fantasy newsletter - the schedule often slips by a month - with reviews plus news items covering fantasy, horror and comics as well as sf; it also features interviews and articles. Originally a mimeographed FANZINE, CW became professionally printed with #9 and is said to have a circulation above 1000. The editors clearly want it to become the UK equivalent of LOCUS; as of 1992, it still had some way to go. [RH] CRITTERS Film (1986). New Line/Smart Egg/Sho films. Dir Stephen Herek, starring Dee Wallace Stone, M. Emmet Walsh, Billy Green Bush, Scott Grimes, Don Opper. Screenplay Herek, Dominic Muir, with additions by Opper. 86 mins, cut to 85 mins. Colour.Small furry carnivorous aliens with voracious appetites and large teeth (very clearly modelled on the creatures in Joe DANTE's Gremlins [1984]) besiege a farmhouse in Kansas and are driven off with the help of alien bounty-hunters. This wholly derivative film has some charm and competence, however, and was a not disastrous debut for director Herek, who went on to make BILL & TED'S EXCELLENT ADVENTURE (1989). The sequel, Critters 2: The Main Course (1988; vt Critters 2), dir Mick Garris, has all the sparkle of a second-generation photocopy, and demonstrates nicely how the 1980s video market had such an insatiable appetite for teenage horror movies that even imitations bred imitations. It was Garris's first film as director, though he was already known as a writer on the tv series AMAZING STORIES. Two further straight-to-video sequels followed. Critters 3 (1991), dir Kristine Peterson, 81 mins, reprises the beasties in an apartment block setting. Critters 4: Critters in Space (1992), dir Rupert Harvey, screenplay Joseph Lyle and David Schow, 90 mins, continues to star Opper as chief critter-hunter, and also stars Brad Dourif. This last instalment, still low-budget, takes place on a spaceship, and can claim to be the most genuine sf episode of the series, but is in other respects only slightly superior to the second and third. The usual homages to ALIEN occur. [PN]See also: MONSTER MOVIES. CRITTERS 2: THE MAIN COURSE CRITTERS. CRITTERS 3 CRITTERS. CRITTERS 4: CRITTERS IN SPACE CRITTERS. CROHMALNICEANU, OVID S. [r] ROMANIA. CROLY, [Reverend] GEORGE (1780-1860) UK clergyman whose novel of IMMORTALITY Salathiel: A Story of the Past, the Present and the Future (1826; vt Salathiel the Wandering Jew 1843 US; vt Salathiel the Immortal 1855 UK; vt Tarry Thou Till I Come 1901 US) was published anon but soon acknowledged. [JC] CROMIE, ROBERT (1856-1907) Irish author of the well known interplanetary sf novel A Plunge Into Space (1890) in which visitors travel by ANTIGRAVITY to MARS, where they discover humans living under UTOPIAN conditions and a fatal romance ensues; the 1891 edition includes a preface by Jules VERNE. In The Crack of Doom (1895) something very like atomic energy rather intriguingly threatens the world (the first test of the substance, thousands of years earlier, destroyed the fifth planet to create the ASTEROIDS); though hazily described, RC's use in this novel of a nuclear device to shake civilization marks the first occurrence of a theme which would dominate the next century. Two volumes of a cluttered future HISTORY - For England's Sake (1889) and The Next Crusade (1897) - fail, like his remaining works, to retain much interest. [JC]Other works: The King's Oak and Other Stories (coll 1897); A New Messiah (1902); El Dorado (1904; vt From the Cliffs of Croaghaun 1904 US).See also: CRIME AND PUNISHMENT; END OF THE WORLD; HISTORY OF SF; POWER SOURCES; SPACESHIPS. CRONENBERG, DAVID (1943- ) Canadian film-maker. Crucially a writer as well as a director, DC can be claimed as one of the most important practitioners of sf, in any medium, of the last quarter of the 20th century. From his early student and underground films - Transfer (1966), From the Drain (1967), Stereo (1969) and CRIMES OF THE FUTURE (1970), the tv short Secret Weapons (1972) - through his gutsy, increasingly surreal exploitation movies - The PARASITE MURDERS (1974; vt They Came From Within; vt Shivers), RABID (1976), The BROOD (1979), SCANNERS (1980) and VIDEODROME (1982) - to his more mainstream ventures - The DEAD ZONE (1983; from Stephen KING's novel), The FLY (1986; a remake of the 1958 MONSTER MOVIE), Dead Ringers (1989), The Naked Lunch368992; based on William S. BURROUGHS's 1959 novel), and his projected film of J.G. BALLARD's Crash (1973) - DC has shown a remarkably consistent visual and intellectual style, dealing with the mind-body divide, near-future social, religious and chemical taboos, the MEDIA LANDSCAPE, and the extremes of experience. DC has also worked as an actor, in John Landis's Into the Night (1985) and, more notably, Clive Barker's Nightbreed (1990). The odd man out in his own filmography is Fast Company (1977), an efficient but nondescript movie about drag racing. The highly bizarre violence and mutation, often sexual in nature, of mid-period DC - especially the phallic parasites of The Parasite Murders and the sadomasochist visions of Videodrome - won him a reputation as the most uncompromising genre auteur of his generation, but The Brood, an interior-directed family-trauma drama, revealed a vein of icy sensitivity that later yielded The Fly, an extraordinarily moving rereading of its hackneyed premise which abjures monster-on-the-loose melodrama for a quietly affecting study of the process of physical change, and Dead Ringers, an entirely psychological and non-sf variation on DC's habitual themes that demonstrates how he has created his own category - the Cronenberg Movie - rather than inhabited the sf or HORROR genres in the way that contemporaries like George A. ROMERO and Wes Craven have done. On being hailed as "the King of Venereal Horror", DC commented: "It's a small field, Venereal Horror, but at least I'm king of it." Although DC is reported to have said around 1993 that he will no longer be working in horror or science fiction, his films are likely to retain the very distinctive DC tone, as could be said of his film - an adaptation of Henry David Hwang's successful play - M. Butterfly (1993), about a diplomat who falls in love with an apparently female Chinese opera singer, not realizing she is actually male. An interesting book of interviews is Cronenberg on Cronenberg (coll 1991) ed Chris Rodley. [KN]See also: CINEMA; CYBERPUNK; HUMOUR; MONSTERS; PARASITISM AND SYMBIOSIS; PSEUDO-SCIENCE; SEX. CRONIN, CHARLES BERNARD [r] Eric NORTH. CROOK, COMPTON N. [r] Stephen TALL. CROSBY, HARRY C. [r] Christopher ANVIL. CROSS, JOHN KEIR (1914-1967) UK writer of RADIO scripts before WWII, and later of novels and tv adaptations (one of them being of John WYNDHAM's The Kraken Wakes) for the BBC. Some of his books for younger children, written as Stephen MacFarlane, are fantasies; Lucy Maroon, the Car that Loved a Policeman (1944) and Mr Bosanko and Other Stories (coll 1944) are typical. All his sf novels are for older children; they include The Angry Planet (1945) and its sequel, SOS from Mars (1954; vt The Red Journey Back 1954 US), both of which represent JKC's transcription of manuscripts "by Stephen MacFarlane" encompassing the first three expeditions to Mars, which discover the vegetable life there to have suffered a Manichaean EVOLUTION into alternative races. The Owl and the Pussycat (1946; vt The Other Side of Green Hills 1947 US) is a fantasy, while The Flying Fortunes in an Encounter with Rubberface! (1952; vt The Stolen Sphere 1953 US) has an orbital satellite as a MCGUFFIN. Though he wrote several novels as JKC, including The White Magic (1947) - not a fantasy, although often recorded as such - his best-known work under his own name is The Other Passenger (coll 1944; cut vt Stories from The Other Passenger 1961 US), a collection of subtle fantasy tales for adults. He edited Best Horror Stories (anth 1956), Best Black Magic Stories (anth 1960) and Best Horror Stories 2 (anth 1965). [JC]See also: CHILDREN'S SF. CROSS, POLTON John Russell FEARN. CROSS, RONALD ANTHONY (1937- ) US writer who began publishing sf with "The Story of Three Cities" in New Worlds 6 (anth 1973) ed Michael MOORCOCK and Charles PLATT; the tale's steely moroseness characterizes much of his work in shorter forms. His first novel, Prisoners of Paradise (1988), bleakly generates a sense that the Fantasy-Island-type trap it depicts is not to be escaped from. The Eternal Guardians sequence - comprising The Fourth Guardian (1994) and The Lost Guardian (1995), with further volumes projected - is a fantasy of history. [JC] CROSS, VICTORIA Pseudonym under which UK novelist Annie Sophie ("Vivian") Cory (1868-?1952) published all her work, using the spelling "Crosse" until the death of Queen Victoria; she was briefly notorious for The Woman who Didn't (1895), written in response to Grant ALLEN's The Woman who Did (1895). Her only known sf is Marty Brown, M.P.: A Girl of Tomorrow (1935), which depicts relationships in a 30th-century UK ruled by women: unemployment, war and pollution do not exist, nor is meat eaten, and there is no prostitution because love is free. [RB] CROSSEN, KENDELL FOSTER (1910-1981) US writer and editor, active under various names in various PULP-MAGAZINE markets, perhaps most notably as an author of detective stories, his best work being published under his own name and as M.E. Chaber. Though the Green Lama series of early 1940s thrillers, published in Double Detective as by Richard Foster, and Murder Out of Mind (1945) as by Ken Crossen, slip close to the fantastic, he only began publishing sf proper with two stories in Feb 1951: "The Boy who Cried Wolf 359" in AMZ and "Restricted Clientele" in TWS. Towards the end of their existences he published a large amount of material with Startling Stories and TWS; much of this material is intendedly comic, in particular the Manning Draco series about an interstellar salesman and his amusing experiences with ALIENS: Once Upon a Star (1951-2 TWS, fixup 1953) plus 4 additional stories, "Assignment to Aldebaran" (1953), "Whistle Stop in Space" (1953), "Mission to Mizar" (1953) and "The Agile Algolian" (1954). Year of Consent (1952), about a COMPUTER that controls the West, expressively conveys the PARANOIA of much US fiction of the period. The Rest Must Die (1959), as by Foster, follows the story of those who have survived a nuclear attack on New York by happening to be underground in subways or cellars: conflicts ensue. KFC's ANTHOLOGIES - Adventures in Tomorrow (anth 1951; UK edn omits 2 stories) and Future Tense (anth 1952; UK edn omits 7 stories) - include some original stories, are competently selected, and were influential in their time. [JC] CROW, LEVI [s] Manly Wade WELLMAN. CROWCROFT, (WILLIAM) PETER (1925- ) UK writer whose The Fallen Sky (1954) describes a post- HOLOCAUST London reverted to barbarism and a sociologist's attempt to cure himself of violence while simultaneously founding a new civilization. Monster (1980 US) is a horror tale. [JC] CROWLEY, JOHN (1942- ) US writer who has also worked in documentary films and tv since 1966. His sf novels have had a considerable impact on the field, and his fantasies have established him as a figure whose work markedly stretches the boundaries of genre literature.His first sf novel, The Deep (1975), is set on a flat discworld resting on a pillar that extends beyond measurement into the circumambient Deep, in which very few stars are visible. On this disc complex feudal conflicts, which seem interminably to repeat a bad year from the Wars of the Roses, are regulated, maintained and when necessary fomented for its own pleasure by the mysterious Being who originally transported to this strange new domain its present inhabitants - humans whose own world was dying. Though the story is told from various points of view, the reader's main perspective is through the eyes of a damaged ANDROID with memory problems sent to record events by the disc's peculiar God. Using sources as widely divergent as James Branch CABELL's Biography of the Life of Manuel, Philip Jose FARMER's World of Tiers novels and E.R. EDDISON's The Worm Ouroboros (1922), JC constructed a story whose free and supple use of numerous generic conventions marks it as the sort of tale possible only late in the life of any genre.Beasts (1976) somewhat more conventionally depicts a balkanized USA, but with a complex deployment of sf themes, notable among which are the uses made of biologically transformed animals and of the potential for genuine interspecies empathy. The chilly belatedness of these two books - like all his work they depict worlds caught in the iron claws of a prior authority or Author - warms very considerably in the third, ENGINE SUMMER (1979), whose title neatly epitomizes JC's abiding central concerns and whose plot - its protagonist finds that his life in a dying post- HOLOCAUST pastoral USA is nothing but a memory interminably replayed, and that he himself is no more than a crystal device replaying those memories on command - exudes a cruel melancholy. But the story which Rush That Speaks represents in his being (and tells) is powerfully moving; and his sleep at the close (though he will soon be turned on again to play himself) is earned.A similar grave cruelty infuses the TIME TRAVEL cul-de-sacs uncovered in Great Work of Time (1991), a tale which depicts the desolate consequences of attempting to control history; it first appeared in NOVELTY (coll 1989), along with some shorter fantasies and "In Blue" a DYSTOPIAN parable. Further short work is assembled in Antiquities: Seven Stories (coll 1993).His major single novel, the grave and eloquent Little, Big (1981), is primarily a fantasy; partly set in a NEAR-FUTURE USA, this large work puts into definitive form JC's steely nostalgia for the long arm of immortal law. The title itself - which condenses a message repeated throughout the text: "The further in you go, the bigger it gets" - is a restatement in fantasy terms of the process of CONCEPTUAL BREAKTHROUGH central to much sf. The story embeds in the centrifugal world of US fantasy a UK tale of harrowing centripetal inwardness; Smoky Barnable's book-long attempt to enter the world of faerie ends, as it must, in something like death. In the meantime, as the century itself closes, a reborn Barbarossa ravages an unsavable USA. The Renaissance Art of Memory-later utilized by Gene WOLFE, Mary GENTLE and Michael SWANWICK, among others - significantly shapes the geography of the book, with the result that the metamorphoses suffered by its protagonists seem both mathematically foreordained (Lewis CARROLL is a constant presence in the text) and symbolically potent. Little, Big has permeated the field. As much cannot be said, perhaps, for AEGYPT (1987) and Love & Sleep (1994), the first two of the projected Aegypt sequence examining Renaissance neoplatonism with hallucinated concentration, and seemingly moving towards a millennial shift in the reality-determining Story of the world; but even the torso of this sequence confirms JC's very considerable shaping power, which is his most significant gift to genre literature. The novelty of his work is less important than the magnetism of the synthesis it represents. [JC]Other work: Beasts/Engine Summer/Little, Big (omni 1991).See also: ADAM AND EVE; ALTERNATE WORLDS; FANTASTIC VOYAGES; FANTASY; FAR FUTURE; GODS AND DEMONS; GREAT AND SMALL; MAGIC; METAPHYSICS; MYTHOLOGY; OMNI; OPTIMISM AND PESSIMISM; PASTORAL; PERCEPTION; POCKET UNIVERSE; SCIENCE FANTASY; SWORD AND SORCERY; TIME PARADOXES. CROWNPOINT PUBLICATIONS NEBULA SCIENCE FICTION. CRULS, GASTA~O [r] LATIN AMERICA. CRUMP, C(HARLES) G(EORGE) (1862-1935) UK writer whose sf novel, The Red King Dreams, 1946-1948 (1931), rather demurely satirizes the university life of the NEAR FUTURE. [JC] CRUMP, (JAMES) IRVING (1887-1979) US writer known almost exclusively for his sequence of prehistoric-sf novels for older children, set in Europe and featuring the resourceful Og, who introduces fire to his tribe, fights off giant reptiles and comports himself with commendable dignity throughout: Og - Son of Fire (1922), Og - Boy of Battle (1925), Og of the Cave People (1935) and Og, Son of Og (1965). The series was extended into graphic form, in Og, Son of Fire (graph 1937), a Big Little Book; and as in COMICS form from 1936 in The Funnies (1936-1942). Mog the Mound Builder (1931) is set in the Americas. [JC] CRYOGENICS From a Greek root meaning "cold-producing", this word is used in physics to mean the production of extremely low temperatures and the study of phenomena at those temperatures. The shorter word CRYONICS is more commonly used in sf TERMINOLOGY, especially when, as is usual, it is people or other organic materials that are frozen. [PN] CRYONICS A term coined in the 1960s by Karl Werner, referring to techniques for preserving the human body by supercooling. R.C.W. Ettinger's The Prospect of Immortality (1964) popularized the idea that the corpses of terminally ill people might be "frozen down" in order to preserve them until such a time as medical science would discover cures for all ills and a method of resurrecting the dead. Many sf stories have extrapolated the notion.The preservative effects of low temperatures have been known for a long time. The notion of reviving human beings accidentally entombed in ice was first developed as a fictional device by W. Clark RUSSELL in The Frozen Pirate (1887). In Louis BOUSSENARD's Dix mille ans dans un bloc de glace (1889; trans as 10,000 Years in a Block of Ice 1898) a contemporary man visits the future as a result of a similar accident. Edgar Rice BURROUGHS's "The Resurrection of Jimber Jaw" (1937) is a satirical account of the revival of a prehistoric man and his experiences in the civilized world; Richard Ben SAPIR's The Far Arena (1978) is a modern variant involving a Roman gladiator. Freezing is still sf's most popular means of achieving SUSPENDED ANIMATION (see also SLEEPER AWAKES), but recent debate about cryonics relates also to the themes of REINCARNATION and IMMORTALITY. The Cryonics Society of California began freezing newly dead people in 1967, and the movement seems to have survived the setback it suffered when a power failure caused a number of frozen bodies to thaw out in 1981, sparking off a chain of lawsuits. The rumour that Walt Disney's body is in a deep-freeze somewhere remains unconfirmed. Interest in the theme is by no means confined to the USA, and two of the major fictional examinations of the prospect are European: Nikolai AMOSOV's Zapiski iz budushchego (1967; trans as Notes from the Future 1970) and Anders BODELSEN's Frysepunktet (1969; trans as Freezing Point 1971; vt Freezing Down US). Cryonic preservation is still used in stories of TIME TRAVEL into the future, including Frederik POHL's The Age of the Pussyfoot (1969), Mack REYNOLDS's UTOPIAN Looking Backward, from the Year 2000 (1973) and the Woody Allen film SLEEPER (1973). It is also a common device in stories of slower-than-light SPACE TRAVEL: in E.C. TUBB's Dumarest series interstellar travel may by "high" or "low", depending upon whether time is absorbed by the use of drugs or more hazardous cryonic procedures, while James WHITE's The Dream Millennium (1974) explores hypothetical psychological effects of long-term freezing.The possible social problems associated with large-scale cryonic projects are explored in various sf stories. Clifford D. SIMAK's Why Call Them Back from Heaven? (1967) imagines a time when a person can be tried for delaying the freezing of a corpse, permitting "ultimate death", and the financial estates of the frozen have become a political power-bloc, inviting criminal manipulation. A cynical account of the politics of dealing with the dead is offered in Larry NIVEN's "The Defenseless Dead" (1973), which points out that the living have all the votes and that the dead might be an exploitable resource; it was Niven who first used in print Pohl's term CORPSICLES to denote the deep-frozen dead. Ernest TIDYMAN's satirical thriller Absolute Zero (1971), about a financier who builds up a vast cryonics industry, is similarly cynical. As might be expected, most stories depicting people who try to "cheat" death by having themselves frozen down find suitably ironic ways to thwart them. In "Ozymandias" (1972) by Terry CARR people who take to the cryonic vaults in order to avoid a war fall victim, like the mummified pharaohs of ancient Egypt before them, to professional "tomb-robbers". In Gregory BENFORD's now-anachronistic "Doing Lennon" (1975) an unfrozen John Lennon turns out not to be what he appears or aspires to be; much more ambitiously, Benford's Chiller (1993) as by Sterling Blake comprehensively (and very sympathetically) describes a near-future development of the cryonics movement under threat from a psychotic anti-freezer campaign conducted by a serial killer. And in ". . . And He not Busy Being Born" (1987) by Brian M. STABLEFORD a bold entrepreneur who succeeds against the odds in delivering himself into a world of immortals find that he still cannot evade his destiny. [BS] CSERNA, JOZSEF [r] HUNGARY. CSERNAI, ZOLTAN [r] HUNGARY. CUBA LATIN AMERICA. CUISCARD, HENRI [s] Charles DE LINT. CULBREATH, MYRNA (1938- ) US writer known almost exclusively for her collaborations with Sondra MARSHAK as a producer of ties for STAR TREK, including Star Trek: The New Voyages * (coll 1976) and its direct sequel Star Trek: The New Voyages 2 * (anth 1978), The Price of the Phoenix * (1977) and its direct sequel The Fate of the Phoenix * (1979), The Prometheus Design * (1982) and Triangle * (1983), as well as Shatner: Where No Man . . . : The Authorized Biography of William Shatner (1979) with William SHATNER. [JC] CULLINGWORTH, N(ICHOLAS) J(OHN) ROBERT HALE LIMITED. CULTURAL ENGINEERING A phrase not especially common in sf TERMINOLOGY, although what it refers to is fundamental to the genre. The idea of humans deliberately altering the nature of alien cultures (or of aliens doing it to us), or indeed of doing the same to isolated cultures on Earth, is often evoked in sf, sometimes approvingly, more often disapprovingly. This is especially so in stories in which ANTHROPOLOGY, COLONIZATION OF OTHER WORLDS and SOCIOLOGY are dominant themes. A common form of cultural engineering in sf is the TIME-TRAVEL or PARALLEL-WORLDS story (often both at once) in which some sort of time-police force attempts to engineer past, future or ALTERNATE WORLDS into the most stable and productive conformations. Sf itself can be seen as a form of sublimated cultural engineering in its persistent modelling of societies that differ from our own. [PN] CULVER, TIMOTHY J. Donald E. WESTLAKE. CUMMINGS, M(ONETTE) A. (1914- ) US writer of short stories in various genres who began publishing sf with "The Bridges of Ool" in Planet Stories in 1955. Her collection is Exile and Other Tales of Fantasy (coll 1968). [JC] CUMMINGS, RAY Working name of US writer Raymond King Cummings (1887-1957), author of over 750 stories under various names in various genres; he was one of the few writers active during the heyday of US PULP-MAGAZINE sf (1930-50) to have begun his career before Hugo GERNSBACK launched AMZ in 1926. His first sf of any note is also his best-known story, "The Girl in the Golden Atom" (1919), which appeared, as did much of his early work, in All-Story Weekly ( The ALL-STORY ); with its sequel, "People of the Golden Atom", serialized in the same magazine in 1920, this famous story - about a young man who takes a size-diminishing drug and has extraordinary adventures on a microscopic world-became The Girl in the Golden Atom (fixup 1922 UK; exp 1923 US) and proved the cornerstone both of RC's reputation and of much of his work from this time on, for he used the idea of the size-diminishing drug and the microscopic world, with many variations, for the rest of his long career ( GREAT AND SMALL). The Girl in the Golden Atom also constitutes the "Matter" segment of RC's Matter, Space and Time trilogy; the "Space" segment contains The Princess of the Atom (1929 The Argosy; 1950) and "The Fire People" (1922 The Argosy); the "Time" segment takes in The Man who Mastered Time (1924 The Argosy; 1929), The Shadow Girl (1929 The Argosy; 1946 UK) and The Exile of Time (1931 ASF; 1964).After the successes of his early years, RC remained prolific, but his mechanical style and the general rigidity of his stories gradually lost him popularity until, in the 1960s, some of his books were nostalgically revived. Typical of his journeyman prose and uneven quality are the Tama novels: Tama of the Light Country (1930 The Argosy; 1965) and Tama, Princess of Mercury (1931 The Argosy; 1966), the heroine of which does very well after being kidnapped from Earth to MERCURY. Brigands of the Moon (1931), later published in Canada with a mistaken attribution to John W. CAMPBELL Jr, and its sequel Wandl the Invader (1932 ASF; 1961 dos) are examples of his SPACE-OPERA output, in which space pirates tend to proliferate and humans to defeat terrifying alien monsters.RC was fundamentally a pulp writer; unlike some of those only a little younger - for example, Murray LEINSTER and Edmond HAMILTON - he was never capable of adapting himself to the changing times, either scientifically or stylistically. His later works could be interchanged with his earliest with very little adjustment. [JC]Other works: The Sea Girl (1930); Tarrano the Conqueror (1925 Science and Invention; 1930); Into the Fourth Dimension (1926 Science and Invention; anth 1943 UK), made up of the title novel plus stories by other hands, and not to be confused with Into the 4th Dimension (1981 chap), which reprints only the 1926 tale; The Man on the Meteor (1924 Science and Invention; 1944 UK); Beyond the Vanishing Point (1931 ASF; 1958 chap dos); Beyond the Stars (1928 The Argosy; 1963); A Brand New World (1928 The Argosy; 1964); Explorers into Infinity (1927-8 Weird Tales; fixup 1965); The Insect Invasion (1932 The Argosy; 1967); "The Snow Girl" (1929 The Argosy; in Famous Fantastic Classics No 1 [anth 1974]); Tales of the Scientific Crime Club (1925 The Sketch; coll 1979).See also: ASTOUNDING SCIENCE-FICTION; BLACK HOLES; CONCEPTUAL BREAKTHROUGH; FANTASTIC VOYAGES; HISTORY OF SF; PUBLISHING; ROBOTS; SCIENTIFIC ERRORS; TIME TRAVEL. CUMMINS, HARLE OWEN US writer who has not been traced with any security, but if precocious was almost certainly the HOC whose dates are (1884-1973). Of those stories collected in Welsh Rarebit Tales (coll 1902) at least 4, including "The Man who Made a Man" and "The Space Annihilator", have considerable sf interest. In the latter story a MATTER TRANSMITTER is introduced. Other tales are generally FANTASY, some showing the influence of Ambrose BIERCE. [JC] CUNHA, FAUSTO [r] LATIN AMERICA. CUNNINGHAM, E.V. Howard FAST. CURREY, L(LOYD) W(ESLEY) (1942- ) US specialist bookseller (since 1968) and bibliographer. With David G. HARTWELL he published SF-I: A Selective Bibliography (1971 chap), both writing as Kilgore TROUT; with Hartwell founded (1973) and operated Dragon Press, a SMALL PRESS publishing books about sf, fantasy and horror; the partnership was dissolved in 1979, leaving Hartwell sole owner. Also with Hartwell, he co-edited the GREGG PRESSScience Fiction Reprint series 1975-81; alone he edited the Gregg Press Masters of Science Fiction and Fantasy author BIBLIOGRAPHIES 1980-83. LWC's books are: A Research Guide to Science Fiction Studies: An Annotated Checklist of Primary and Secondary Sources for Fantasy and Science Fiction(1977) with Marshall B. TYMN and Roger SCHLOBIN; Index to Stories in Thematic Anthologies of Science Fiction (1978) with Tymn, Martin H. GREENBERG and Joseph D. OLANDER; and Science Fiction and Fantasy Authors: A Bibliography of their Fiction and Selected Nonfiction (1979). This last is his most important work, a standard text which brought new standards of accuracy and scholarship to sf bibliography. Listings for newly covered authors are often published in NEW YORK REVIEW OF SCIENCE FICTION. A second edition of the bibliography is in preparationScience Fiction, Utopian, Fantasy & Horror Literature (1705-1938) (1993), offered as his antiquarian bookseller's catalogue #94, is an extensively annotated checklist of almost 1000 texts from the library of Donald A. WOLLHEIM. [PN]See also: SF IN THE CLASSROOM. CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN FRANKENSTEIN. CURSE OF THE FLY Film (1965). Lippert. Dir Don Sharp, starring Brian Donlevy, George Baker, Carole Gray. Screenplay Harry Spalding, based on characters created by George LANGELAAN. 86 mins. Colour.This UK film is the sequel to the two US films The FLY (1958) and RETURN OF THE FLY (1959). The confused script is largely a rehash of them, but Sharp's direction, which concentrates on the mental disintegration of the mad SCIENTIST's wife (Gray), is - occasionally - visually powerful. The results of failed MATTER TRANSMISSION experiments, kept in outhouses in the garden, provide a nice touch. The critical consensus that this is the worst of the three films probably needs revision. [PN] CURTIES, [Captain] HENRY (1860-? ) UK writer whose first sf novel, Tears of Angels (1907), features its protagonist's conveyance to Alpha Centauri on an angel, who is perhaps weeping; from the star he gains a perspective on Earth, then returns home to find himself in an ALTERNATE-WORLD version of the future. Out of the Shadows (1908) is a detection with occult elements. When England Slept (1909) is a future- WAR tale. [JC] CURTIS, JEAN-LOUIS Pseudonym of French writer Louis Lafitte (1917- ). His collection of five satirical sf stories, Un saint au neon(coll 1956; trans Humphrey Hare as The Neon Halo: The Face of the Future 1958 UK), very sharply depicts a NEAR-FUTURE world whose centre cannot hold. The tone is vivacious, didactic, circumstantial; its wit is distanced in the recit fashion long favoured by French satirists. [JC] CURTIS, RICHARD A(LAN) (1937- ) US editor, literary agent and writer, known mainly in the first capacity for his anthology Future Tense (anth 1968), which is not to be confused with Kendell Foster CROSSEN's Future Tense (anth 1952). He has also published short work, beginning with "Introduction to 'The Saint'" for Cavalier in 1968, as well as Squirm (1976), an sf film novelization ( BLUE SUNSHINE). He wrote 1980-92 the Agent's Corner column in LOCUS, which has been adapted into book form as Beyond the Bestseller (coll 1989). [JC]Other works: How to Prosper in the Coming Apocalypse (1981); How to be Your Own Literary Agent (coll 1983; exp 1984); A Fool for an Agent: Publishing Satires and Verses (coll 1992 chap). CURTIS, WADE Jerry POURNELLE. CURTIS, WARDON ALLAN (1867-1940) US writer, a contributor to several pre-sf fiction magazines. His most important sf is a short story about a brain transplant, "The Monster of Lake LaMetrie" (1899 The Windsor Magazine), in which the brain is human and the recipient body that of a prehistoric survival from a bottomless lake that may lead into a HOLLOW EARTH. WAC also wrote an Arabian-Nights fantasy, "The Seal of Solomon the Great" (1901 Argosy) and The Strange Adventures of Mr Middleton (coll 1903), which contains a mixture of Oriental fantasy and bizarre mystery. [JE] CURTIS WARREN Founded in 1948, one of several UK publishing firms which flourished in the decade after WWII by releasing dozens of purpose-written paperback originals in various popular genres. Before it foundered in 1954, CW had published over 500 novels, 98 of them sf, all of them composed strictly according to length restrictions: in 1948-50, CW books were of 24 or 32pp; in 1950-53, they were of 112 or 128pp; from 1953, 160pp volumes were the rule. CW gained some posthumous fame for having published John BRUNNER's first novel, Galactic Storm (1951) under the house name Gill HUNT; but their most reliable and prolific author was Dennis HUGHES: as with some of his stablemates, little is known about this author beyond the titles he wrote, mostly under CW house names. Other authors associated with CW (see their entries for personal pseudonyms) included William Henry Fleming BIRD, Kenneth BULMER, John Russell FEARN, John S. GLASBY, David GRIFFITHS, Brian HOLLOWAY, John W. JENNISON and E.C. TUBB. As well as Gill Hunt, house names used for CW sf titles included Berl CAMERON, Neil CHARLES, Lee ELLIOT, Brad KENT, King LANG, Rand LE PAGE, Paul LORRAINE, Kris LUNA, Van REED and Brian SHAW.It cannot be assumed that all books published by CW were written on hire as SHARECROPS; but almost certainly almost all of them were. It remains a possibility that some of the 98 titles might have some intrinsic interest, the most likely candidates being those by Fearn, Glasby and Tubb. [JC]About the publisher: Curtis Warren and Grant Hughes (1985 chap) by Stephen HOLLAND. CURTONI, VITTORIO [r] ITALY. CURVAL, PHILIPPE Pseudonym used by journalist Philippe Tronche (1929- ), French writer. PC has since the 1950s been associated with the growth of sf in France as bookseller, magazine editor, photographer, chronicler and author. He is a fine stylist whose work is exemplified by a sensual, poetic mood and great affection for his characters. He has written over 20 stories, the first appearing in 1955. Cette Chere Humanite (1976; trans Steve Cox as Brave Old World 1981 UK), which won the 1977 Prix Apollo ( AWARDS), conflates the personal extension of lifespans with the artificial isolation of a future EEC. Le ressac de l'espace ["The Breakers of Space"] (1962) won the Prix Jules Verne in 1963 and L'homme a rebours ["Backwards Man"] (1974) was selected as Best French SF Novel of 1974. [MJ/JC]Other works:Les fleurs de Venus ["Flowers of Venus"] (1960); La fortresse de coton ["The Cotton Fortress"] (1967); Les sables de Falun ["The Sands of Falun"] (1970); Attention les yeux["Watch Out!"] (1972);Un souvenir de Pierre Loti"In Remembrance of Pierre Loti"(1975); Un soupcon de neant ["A Hint of Nothingness"] (1977)La Face cachee du desir ["The Dark Side of Desire"] (1978); Y a quelqu'un? ["Anybody Home?"] (1979); Le dormeur s'eveillera-t-il? ["Will the Sleeper Awake?"] (1979); Rut aux etoiles ["The Astral Mating Season"] (1979); Regarde, fiston, s'il y a un extra- terrestre derriere la bouteille de vin ["Take a Look, Boy, If There's an Alien Behind the Wine Bottle"] (coll 1980); Le Livre d'or de la science fiction: Philippe Curval ["The Golden Book of Science Fiction: Philippe Curval"] (coll 1980); L'Odeur de la bete ["The Scent of the Beast"] (1981); Tous vers l'exstase ["All Together to Ecstasy"] (1981); En souvenir du futur ["Remembrance of Time to Come"] (1982); Ah! Que c'est beau New York! ["Ah! New York is so Beautiful!"] (1982); Debout les morts, le train fantome entre la gare ["On your Feet, Dead Men, the Phantom Train is Pulling in"] (coll 1984); Comment jouer a L'Homme invisible en Trois Lecons ["How to Play The Invisible Man in Three Lessons"] (1986); Akiloe(1988); Habite-t-on reellement quelque part? ["Do we Really Live Somewhere?"] (coll 1990).See also: FRANCE. CUSH, GEOFFREY (1956- ) New Zealand-born writer and journalist, in the UK from the late 1970s. His first novel, God Help the Queen (1987), was an sf SATIRE about the UK of AD2003, which is in such lamentable condition that only Queen Britannia herself can save it from doublethink and Yankees. [JC] CUSSLER, CLIVE (ERIC) (1931- ) US writer, some titles in whose Dirk Pitt sequence of TECHNOTHRILLERS are of sf interest. Supremely competent, irresistible to women, slightly sadistic, Pitt is Special Projects Director for the (fictional) American National Underwater and Marine Agency, which engages in spectacular underwater salvage operations involving exotic technologies. Relevant titles include Raise the Titanic! (1976), filmed in 1980 as Raise the Titanic! dir Jerry Jameson, Vixen 03 (1978), which deals with the hunt for a "Doomsday virus", Night Probe! (1981), Pacific Vortex! (1983), which features human divers with artificial gills,Deep Six (1984), Cyclops (1986), in which a secret MOON colony figures, Treasure (1988), a tale of NEAR-FUTURE political manoeuvrings, Dragon(1990), Sahara(1992) and Inca Gold(1994).[NT] CYBERNETICS In sf TERMINOLOGY this is a word so often misused that its real meaning is in danger of being devalued or forgotten.The term "cybernetics", derived from a Greek word meaning helmsman or controller, was coined by the distinguished mathematician Norbert WIENER in 1947 to describe a new science on which he and others had been working since 1942. The word first passed into general usage with the publication of his Cybernetics (1948; rev 1961), subtitled "Control and Communication in the Animal and the Machine". Cybernetics was cross-disciplinary from the beginning; it developed when Wiener and others noticed that certain parallel problems persistently arose in scientific disciplines normally regarded as separate: statistical mechanics, information theory, electrical engineering and neurophysiology were four of the most important.Cybernetics has much in common with the parallel study of General Systems Theory, founded by Ludwig von Bertalanffy in 1940. It is concerned with the way systems work, the way they govern themselves, the way they process information (often through a process known as "feedback") in order to govern themselves, and the way they can best be designed. The system in question can be a machine or, equally, a human body. The trouble, Wiener found, was that the terminology with which engineers discussed machines led to a very mechanistic approach when applied to human systems, and, conversely, biological terminology led to an over-anthropomorphic approach in discussion of machines (or economic or ecological systems, two other areas where cybernetics is useful). The trick was to construct a new science which would not be biased towards either the mechanical or the biological. In his An Introduction to Cybernetics (1956), W. Ross Ashby remarked that "cybernetics stands to the real machine - electronic, mechanical, neural or economic - much as geometry stands to a real object in our terrestrial space"; that is, cybernetics is an abstracting, generalizing science. However, science being what it is, always tending towards specialization, the original idea of cybernetics as a cross-disciplinary study is in danger of being forgotten, and now we have specialists in, for example, engineering cybernetics and biological cybernetics. The latter is usually called "bionics", although this word, coined in 1960, is actually a contraction of "biological electronics".If we use the broad, scientifically accepted definition of "cybernetics", it cannot be delimited as a separate theme in this encyclopedia. Most of the stories discussed under the entries ANDROIDS, AUTOMATION, COMMUNICATION, COMPUTERS, CYBORGS, INTELLIGENCE and ROBOTS will, by definition, be cybernetics stories also. For example, Kurt VONNEGUT Jr's PLAYER PIANO (1952) has at its heart an image of humans incorporated in and subject to an impersonal, machine-like system ( AUTOMATION); they effectively become components or "bits" in a cybernetic system.However, in sf the term "cybernetics" is most often used to mean something narrower - generally the creation of artificial intelligence, or AI. This is indeed a central problem in real-world cybernetics, but by no means the only one. Some cyberneticians hope that analysis of neural systems (i.e., the brain) might lead to the synthesis of simulated intelligences which begin as machines but go on to become self-programming, or even, as in Greg BEAR's Queen of Angels (1990), self-aware. The first step towards AI in real life is the computer, which is why all computer stories are cybernetics stories also.Cybernetics also enters sf in the form of the word "cyborg", a contraction of "cybernetic organism". This usage is taken from an area of cybernetics not necessarily related to AI: a person with a wooden leg is a kind of very simple cyborg, because the melding of mechanical and human parts necessitates, whether consciously or not, the use of feedback devices (i.e., it is cybernetic). The study of cybernetics is, at bottom, the study of just such devices, whether they be servo-mechanisms or the messages that travel between eye and hand when we pick up a book from a table.Surprisingly few sf stories attack the problem of AI directly; far more commonly, the problem is sidetracked by conjuring up a magic word from the air. Isaac ASIMOV said his robots were POSITRONIC, and left it at that. One of the most comprehensive (if not always comprehensible) cybernetics works in sf is Destination: Void (1966) by Frank HERBERT, in which the problem is that of building not just a very complex computer but a machine that could be said to be conscious. Herbert actually spells out some of the steps through which this might conceivably be possible, and also goes on to ask those philosophical questions about autonomy and free will which must inevitably hover in the background of any cybernetics story of this kind. Much of the book's terminology is borrowed from Wiener's nonfiction God & Golem, Inc. (1964). Interestingly, the question "In what respect can a machine be said to have free will?" engenders a parallel question about humans themselves, at least for readers and writers who take the materialist view that the human mind is itself no more than a complex cybernetics system; this "anti-vitalist" view of humanity is common among cybernetics writers. The whole thrust of cybernetics as a study is to point up the resemblances between sciences superficially dissimilar, and the attempt by neurocyberneticians to analyse the mind as a system has led to impassioned attack from people who believe that humanness mystically transcends its own physical constituents.In real life, attempts to simulate INTELLIGENCE in machines have mainly taken the route of the heuristic programming of computers. This is a way of showing a computer how to solve a problem not by painstakingly going through every possible combination that might lead to a solution - this would take a computer billions of years in an ordinary chess game - but by programming short-cuts into the machine, so that it can gauge the most likely or fruitful directions for analysis. Humans do it automatically; machines have to be taught, but this teaching is the first step towards training a machine how to make choices, a vital step towards consciousness.The first important sf work to use the terminology of cybernetics was Bernard WOLFE's LIMBO (1952; vt Limbo '90 UK); he used its basic ideas (sometimes with hostility) in the wide sense, as they relate to computers, war-games, industrial management and the workings of the brain. Cybernetics terminology is used very loosely by Raymond F. JONES in The Cybernetic Brains (1950 Startling Stories; 1962), which tells of human brains integrated with computers. Although Jones probably used the term more because it was fine-sounding than for any other reason, this is nonetheless a legitimate cybernetics subject, and is also deployed notably in Wolfbane (1959) by Frederik POHL and C.M. KORNBLUTH, Catchworld (1975) by Chris BOYCE and many other stories.A number of stories about the development of consciousness in computers carry cybernetic implications, though few as far-ranging as those in Destination: Void. Some early examples can be found in Science Fiction Thinking Machines (anth 1954) ed Groff CONKLIN; also relevant are The God Machine (1968) by Martin CAIDIN, Vulcan's Hammer (1960) by Philip K. DICK, Sagan om den stora datamaskin (1966 Sweden; trans as The Tale of the Big Computer 1966; vt The Great Computer, A Vision 1968 UK; vt The End of Man? ) by Olof JOHANNESSON, THE MOON IS A HARSH MISTRESS (1966) by Robert A. HEINLEIN, When Harlie Was One (1972) by David GERROLD and "Synth" (1966) by Keith ROBERTS. The reverse progression, of human into machine, occurs in the vignettes of Moderan (coll of linked stories 1971) by David R. BUNCH.Already-developed machine consciousnesses appear in Roger ZELAZNY's story "For a Breath I Tarry" (1966), Cyberiada (coll of linked stories 1967 Poland; trans as The Cyberiad: Fables for the Cybernetic Age 1974 US) by Stanislaw LEM, all the Berserker stories by Fred SABERHAGEN, The Siren Stars (1971) by Richard and Nancy CARRIGAN and The Cybernetic Samurai (1985) by Victor MILAN. Of these - and they are only a tiny proportion of the total - Lem's fables are the ones that most directly confront the various philosophical paradoxes that machine intelligence involves. A particularly vast, Galaxy-spanning machine consciousness, literally a deus ex machina, features in Dan SIMMONS's HYPERION (1989) and its sequel.The Steel Crocodile (1970; vt The Electric Crocodile UK) by D.G. COMPTON is interesting from a cybernetics viewpoint; it is about computer systems, but also analyses the nature of human social systems and examines how the two kinds intermesh. Gray Matters (1971) by William HJORTSBERG examines disembodied human brain systems linked up in a network. Spacetime Donuts (1981) by Rudy RUCKER is one of many variants on the theme of a human society controlled repressively by a benevolent computer. The Black Cloud (1957) by Fred HOYLE dramatizes communication between a human mind and an inorganic intelligence in space; it also raises a number of cybernetic issues. The Jonah Kit (1975) by Ian WATSON asks cybernetic questions in that part of the story dealing with the imprinting of a human consciousness onto the mind of a whale.Various compound words have been formed, with dubious etymological exactness, from "cybernetics" - we have already met"cyborg" . There are the "Cybermen" and "Cybernauts" - two varieties of dangerous ROBOTS - in the tv series DR WHO and The AVENGERS , respectively; here the "cyber" component is merely a buzzword synonym for robot. Two terms where the "cyber" component has considerably more force, CYBERPUNK and CYBERSPACE, warrant their own entries.The only book that analyses cybernetics issues from an sf perspective is The Cybernetic Imagination in Science Fiction (1980) by Patricia S. WARRICK, interesting when talking about cybernetic ideas as they are used in sf - often inaccurately in her view - but on less sure ground when discussing the literary quality of the results. "Cyborgs and Cybernetic Intertexts: On Postmodern Phantasms of Body and Mind" by Gabriele Schwab in Intertextuality and Contemporary American Fiction (anth 1989), ed Patrick O'Donnell, is an academic essay on the subject. [PN] CYBERPUNK Term used to describe a school of sf writing that developed and became popular during the 1980s. The word was almost certainly coined by Bruce BETHKE in his story "Cyberpunk" (1983 AMZ), which had for some time before publication been circulating in manuscript. The term was picked up, either directly or indirectly, by writer and editor Gardner DOZOIS and used by him to characterize a literary movement whose main exponents, at first - in stories from about 1981-2 onwards - were seen as being Bruce STERLING and William GIBSON, along with Rudy RUCKER, Lewis SHINER and perhaps John SHIRLEY. It was not long after the publication of Gibson's first novel, NEUROMANCER (1984), that the term began to come into general use, and NEUROMANCER was the book that definitively shaped our sense of the subgenre to which "cyberpunk" refers.The "cyber" part of the word relates to CYBERNETICS: to a future where industrial and political blocs may be global (or centred in SPACE HABITATS) rather than national, and controlled through information networks; a future in which machine augmentations of the human body are commonplace, as are mind and body changes brought about by DRUGS and biological engineering. Central to cyberpunk fictions is the concept of VIRTUAL REALITY, as in Gibson's Neuromancer sequence, where the world's data networks form a kind of machine environment into which a human can enter by jacking into a cyberspace deck and projecting "his disembodied consciousness into the consensual hallucination that was the matrix" ( CYBERSPACE). The "punk" part of the word comes from the rock'n'roll terminology of the 1970s, "punk" meaning in this context young, streetwise, aggressive, alienated and offensive to the Establishment. A punk disillusion, often multiple - with progressive layers of illusion being peeled away - is a major component of these works.Data networks are more than just a part of cyberpunk's subject matter. Density of information, often slipped into stories by near-subliminal means, has from the outset strongly characterized cyberpunk's actual style. An important cyberpunk forebear was the film BLADE RUNNER (1982), whose NEAR-FUTURE milieu - mean, drizzling, populous streets lit up by enormous advertisements for Japanese products, alternating street junk with hi-tech - is, in the intensity of its visual infodumps, like a template for a cyberpunk scenario. Even more central to the cyberpunk ethos, however, are the films of David CRONENBERG, whose VIDEODROME (1982) in particular is a central cyberpunk document in its emphasis on bodily metamorphosis, media overload and destructive sex.Cyberpunk did not spring full-grown from Gibson's forehead, of course. Indeed, unfriendly critics have rejoiced in locating cyberpunk ancestors, as if this somehow devalued the entire movement; obviously cyberpunk can be read as the apotheosis of various idea-clusters that appeared earlier, but this seems neither surprising nor damaging. Ancestral texts include Bernard WOLFE's LIMBO (1952; vt Limbo 90 UK), with its prosthetic ironies, Alfred BESTER's Tiger! Tiger! (1956 UK; rev vt The Stars My Destination 1957 US), with its protopunk antihero, William S. BURROUGHS's The Soft Machine (1961 France; rev 1966 US) and its various quasi-sequels, with their drug and biological fantasias, Samuel R. DELANY's NOVA (1968), with its streetwise CYBORGS, James TIPTREE Jr's "The Girl who was Plugged In" (1973), with its painful ironies about altered body-image, and Ted MOONEY's Easy Travel to Other Planets (1981), with its interspecies sex and its information sickness. Other forebears would include J.G. BALLARD, John BRUNNER - notably with THE SHOCKWAVE RIDER (1975) - Norman SPINRAD, John VARLEY and perhaps even Thomas PYNCHON.Cyberpunk is often seen as a variety of Postmodernist fiction, a point made by the title of Storming the Reality Studio: A Casebook of Cyberpunk and Postmodern Science Fiction (anth 1992) ed Larry McCaffery. Many of POSTMODERNISM's allegedly principal qualities fit cyberpunk like a glove.The sense that cyberpunk was almost a political movement, not just a form of fiction, came in part from outside the fictions themselves. There had been nothing like it in the sf world since the NEW-WAVE arguments of the 1960s. In convention panels, in magazines (especially from 1987 in a critical semiprozine, SCIENCE FICTION EYE ed Stephen P. Brown) - in all sorts of media - passionate and sometimes heated arguments took place from about 1985 affirming the cyberpunks as shapers and movers in the sluggish, complacent world of sf publishing. Bruce Sterling's fervour in polemic of this sort was messianic, and it was he who edited the first influential anthology of the movement: MIRRORSHADES: THE CYBERPUNK ANTHOLOGY (anth 1986), whose preface resembles a manifesto. The arguments of Sterling and various of his colleagues have been not merely vigorous but also intelligent about the changing shape of our world (particularly as regards information technology and biological engineering), and many readers must have been attracted by the sense that here was a bunch of writers doing what sf authors are supposed to do best, surf-riding on the big breakers of change and the future. On the other hand, some of the cyberpunk propaganda was so aggressive that it irresistibly reminded older observers of the mid-century politics of the extreme international-socialist left: enjoyable, but tiring to watch.Some other sf writers, not part of the movement, were a bit taken aback by all the fuss - as well they might have been given the comparatively small amount of published fiction that was receiving such vast hype (the media picked up on cyberpunk in a big way around 1988). On the whole, cyberpunk received a friendly reception, although several of these outside writers seemed to see it as a matter more of tone than of content. Orson Scott CARD wrote a cyberpunk pastiche, "Dogwalker" (1989), that was apparently intended to make a point about this. In his comment on this story when it appeared in his Maps in a Mirror (coll 1990), Card wrote: "But the worst thing about cyberpunk was the shallowness of those who imitated it. Splash some drugs onto brain-and-microchip interface, mix it up with some vague sixties-style counterculture, and then use really self-conscious, affected language, and you've got cyberpunk." This was unfair to much of it, though certainly cyberpunk produced instant CLICHEES, as in books like Hardwired (1986) by Walter Jon WILLIAMS (although he rendered them rather well, and is by no means the most cynical-seeming of those who climbed or were hauled onto the bandwagon).In a magazine piece, "The Neuromantics" (1986; reprinted in Science Fiction in the Real World coll 1990), Norman Spinrad argued cogently that the "romance" component of Gibson's triple-punning title NEUROMANCER ("neuro" as in nervous system; "necromancer"; "new romancer") is basic to the cyberpunk form. Spinrad proposed ingeniously that the cyberpunk authors should in fact be called "neuromantics" (nobody seems to have taken him up on this), for their fiction is "a fusion of the romantic impulse with science and technology". (Spinrad sees romanticism and science as having been damagingly split during the New Wave vs HARD SF debates of the 1960s; only with cyberpunk, he argues, did they fuse together again.) He also argues, correctly, that Greg BEAR is - despite his denials - a cyberpunk writer, and an important one. Certainly the romance element is strong in Bear's work, as is the cyberpunk theme of literally remaking humanity. Gibson is not just mildly romantic: he is deeply so, as affirmed by the continuing homage his earlier work paid to the detective fiction of Raymond Chandler (1888-1959). On the other hand, Sterling's work - notably his Shaper/Mechanist stories - is not very romantic at all. Sterling's cool fictions are perhaps the strangest and most estranging of the cyberpunk stories in that their embracing of the future leaves remarkably few lifelines whereby readers might connect themselves back to the present; his prose, too, is more machine-like than Gibson's (which is notably stylish). All this, while making Sterling's work rather formidable for the reader, goes to show that Spinrad's definition, like most definitions of literary movements, has major exceptions to its rule ( DEFINITIONS OF SF).Cyberpunk has been accused of being a phallocratic movement, and certainly only one woman writer, Pat CADIGAN, is regularly associated with it in the public mind. But surely cyberpunk influence can be seen in the work of, for example, Candas Jane DORSEY, especially in her fine "(Learning About) Machine Sex" (1988), Elizabeth HAND, in WINTERLONG (1990), and even perhaps Kathy ACKER, although arguably she influenced cyberpunk more than it influenced her. Other candidates might be Storm CONSTANTINE and MISHA.Many further writers have been associated with cyberpunk, centrally so in the instances of Tom MADDOX and Richard KADREY, perhaps more marginally so with George Alec EFFINGER, K.W. JETER, Michael SWANWICK and Jack WOMACK; this is far from a fully comprehensive list. These authors, however, along with the others cited above, are by and large sufficiently distinguished to make it clear why cyberpunk made such a splash. To contemplate them all is certainly to evoke a sense of where some of the most exciting US sf action was during the 1980s.Towards the end of that decade, however, it became clear that the term "cyberpunk" no longer pleased all those whose work it had come to envelop. Perhaps it had begun to represent too many cliches, too many literary constraints, too big a readership wanting more and more of the same. If cyberpunk is dead in the 1990s - as several critics have claimed - it is as a result of euthanasia from within the family. Certainly the effects of cyberpunk, both within sf and in the world at large, have been invigorating; and, since most of its authors still continue to write - if not necessarily under that label - we can safely assume that the spirit of cyberpunk lives on. [PN] CYBERSPACE An item of sf TERMINOLOGY introduced by William GIBSON in his novel NEUROMANCER (1984). He takes quite an old sf idea, also much discussed by scientists, in imagining a NEAR-FUTURE era in which the human brain and nervous system (biological) can interface directly with the global information network (electrical) by jacking neurally implanted electrodes directly into a networked COMPUTER (or "cyberdeck"). The network then entered by the human mind is perceived by it, Gibson tells us, as if it were an actual territory, almost a landscape, the "consensual hallucination that was the matrix". This is cyberspace. Gibson goes on to imagine that cyberspace might contain not only human minds but also human or godlike simulacra, artefacts of the system created, perhaps accidentally, by AIs. The term "cyberspace" has since been used by other writers. It refers in fact to an imaginary but not wholly impossible special case of VIRTUAL REALITY, which is in our contemporary world a more commonly used term for machine-generated scenarios perceived, in varying degrees, as "real" by those who watch or "enter" them. [PN]See also: GODS AND DEMONS. CYBERSPACE The word "Cyberspace" has become ubiquitous. It was first coined by William Gibson in his 1984 novel, Neuromancer. But the concept of cyberspace - that an electronic interface exists between the human nervous system and a computer - has its roots in cybernetics, a term coined in the early 1940s by mathematician Norbert Wiener.In 1948, Wiener published a paper titled "Cybernetics: Control and Communication in the Animal and the Machine." In it he discusses the relationship between statistics, information theory, electronics, and the brain.Almost thirty-five years later, Wiener's ideas inspired the vision of cyberspace. From that vision came "cyberpunk:" - a literary style that has affected lifestyles...And what will happen in Cyberspace will most likely change the way we humans communicate in the future. CYBORGS The term "cyborg" is a contraction of "cybernetic organism" and refers to the product of human/machine hybridization. David Rorvik popularized the idea in As Man Becomes Machine (1971), writing of the "melding" of human and machine and of a "new era of participant evolution". Elementary medical cyborgs - people with prosthetic limbs or pacemakers - are already familiar, and have been extrapolated in fiction in such works as Bernard WOLFE's LIMBO (1952; vt Limbo '90 UK) and Martin CAIDIN's Cyborg (1972); the tv series The SIX-MILLION DOLLAR MAN - which popularized the term "bionic man" - was based on the latter. A more recent example of the cyborg SUPERMAN can be found in Richard LUPOFF's Sun's End (1984) and Galaxy's End (1988).There are two other common classes of cyborg in sf: functional cyborgs are people modified mechanically to perform specific tasks, usually a job of work; adaptive cyborgs are people redesigned to operate in an alien environment, sometimes so completely that their humanity becomes problematic. The subject of the earliest major cyborg novel, The Clockwork Man (1923) by E.V. ODLE, belongs to the latter category, featuring a man of the future who has a clockwork mechanism built into his head which is supposed to regulate his whole being, and which gives him access to a multidimensional world ( DIMENSIONS). The most common form of cyborg portrayed in the early sf PULP MAGAZINES was an extreme version of the medical cyborg ( MEDICINE), consisting of a human brain in a mechanical envelope. These are featured in Edmond HAMILTON's "The Comet Doom" (1928) and CAPTAIN FUTURE series, in Neil R. JONES's Professor Jameson series, and in Raymond F. JONES's The Cybernetic Brains (1950; 1962). Brains immortalized by mechanical preservation often became monstrous, like the ones in Lloyd Arthur ESHBACH's "The Time Conqueror" (1932; vt "Tyrant of Time") and Curt SIODMAK's much-filmed Donovan's Brain (1943). Some later writers approached the existential situation of humans in mechanized bodies in a much more careful and sophisticated manner; outstanding examples include C.L. MOORE's "No Woman Born" (1944) and Algis BUDRYS's WHO? (1958), both of which focus on the problems of re-establishing identity once the familiar emblems are gone. Existential problems are also to the fore in The Continuous Katherine Mortenhoe (1974; vt The Unsleeping Eye) by D.G. COMPTON, which features a man with tv cameras implanted in his eyes.An early example of the functional cyborg is strikingly displayed in "Scanners Live in Vain" (1950) by Cordwainer SMITH, which features cyborgs designed for SPACE FLIGHT; this particular theme dominates stories of both functional and adaptive cyborgs. Cyborg spaceships are central to Thomas N. SCORTIA's "Sea Change" (1956), Anne MCCAFFREY's The Ship who Sang (coll of linked stories 1969), Kevin O'DONNELL Jr's Mayflies (1979) and Gordon R. DICKSON's The Forever Man (1986), while Vonda MCINTYRE's Superluminal (1983) features space pilots who require mechanical replacement hearts. Stories dealing with the use of adaptive cyborgs to explore other worlds include Arthur C. CLARKE's "A Meeting with Medusa" (1971), Frederik POHL's MAN PLUS (1976) and Paul J. MCAULEY's "Transcendence" (1988). Barrington J. BAYLEY's The Garments of Caean (1976) has two races of cyborgs adapted to the environment of outer space. Another major theme in stories dealing with functional cyborgs concerns their adaptation to the needs of espionage and war; examples include "I-C-a-BEM" (1961) by Jack VANCE, "Kings who Die" (1962) by Poul ANDERSON and A Plague of Demons (1965) by Keith LAUMER. Relatively few stories treat more mundane manipulative functions, although Samuel R. DELANY's NOVA (1968) makes significant observations en passant. Many recent stories feature humans modified in such a way as to be able to plug in directly to COMPUTERS, sometimes working in harness with them to do many kinds of work. Particularly graphic images of this kind can be found in ORA:CLE (1984) by Kevin O'Donnell Jr, SCHISMATRIX (1985) by Bruce STERLING, Hardwired (1986) by Walter Jon WILLIAMS and Escape Plans (1986) by Gwyneth JONES; the notion is a staple background element of CYBERPUNK. Not all functional cyborgs involve human flesh: The Godwhale (1974) by T.J. BASS features a massive food-collecting cetacean cyborg.Sf in the cinema and on tv has often used the cyborg as a convenient figure of menace; examples include the DALEKS and Cybermen of DR WHO. Images of cyborg evil in written sf include the Cyclan in E.C. TUBB's Dumarest novels and Palmer Eldritch in Philip K. DICK's THE THREE STIGMATA OF PALMER ELDRITCH (1964). A more sympathetic cyborg is featured in Dick's Dr Bloodmoney (1965), and tv has presented at least one memorable sympathetic image in Harlan ELLISON's The OUTER LIMITS script "Demon with a Glass Hand" (1964).One work which transcends categorization to deal in semi-allegorical fashion with the relationship between human and machine via the symbol of the cyborg is David R. BUNCH's Moderan (1959-70; fixup 1971), an assemblage of vignettes about a world where machine-men gradually forsake their "fleshstrips" and retire into mechanized "strongholds" to plot the destruction of their fellows.A relevant theme anthology is Human Machines (anth 1976) ed Thomas N. Scortia and George ZEBROWSKI. [BS]See also: CYBERNETICS; ROBOTS. CYBORG 2087 Made-for-tv film (1966). Feature Film Corp. Dir Franklin Adreon, starring Michael Rennie, Karen Steele, Wendell Corey, Warren Stevens, Eduard Franz. Screenplay Arthur C. Pierce. 86 mins. Colour.This film, which though made for tv achieved theatrical release, has a renegade CYBORG (Rennie) from AD2087 going back to 1966 to prevent a scientist (Franz) from creating a device that will later be used by a totalitarian government for a mind-control programme to which the cyborgs themselves are central. He is followed back in time by two government agents, both cyborgs, but he overcomes them and persuades the scientist to destroy his invention, though he knows that by doing so he will eliminate the possibility of his own existence. When the device is indeed destroyed, he disappears along with everybody's memories of his visit. The narrative has a better grasp of TIME PARADOXES than usual for tv, but the performances are weak. The plot bears a similarity to that of the much later film TERMINATOR 2: JUDGMENT DAY (1991). [JB] CYRANO de BERGERAC The form of his name under which French soldier and writer Savinien Cyrano de Bergerac (1619-1655) is best known. He is famous as the hero of a play by Edmond Rostand (1868-1918), Cyrano de Bergerac (1898 UK), which made legends of his swordsmanship and the size of his nose. He fought with the Gascon Guard but retired after sustaining bad wounds. Only parts of his major work of PROTO SCIENCE FICTION, L'autre monde, were published in posthumous versions, censored (to tone down their heretical elements) by CdB's friend Henri le Bret. Histoire comique, par Monsieur de Cyrano Bergerac, contenant les etats et empires de la lune (1657 France; trans Tho. St Serf as Selenarchia: The Government of the World in the Moon 1659) is complete, but the text of Fragment d'Histoire comique par Monsieur de Cyrano Bergerac, contenant les etats et empires du soleil (1662 France; trans A. Lovell together with the former item as The Comical History of the States and Empires of the Moon and Sun, coll 1687) is partial. Some of the censored text is restored in a French edition of Cyrano's complete works (Oeuvres [coll 1957], and both books - Moon and Sun - are translated from that edition in Other Worlds: The Comical History of the States and Empires of the Moon and Sun (trans Geoffrey Strachan omni 1965). It is possible that the remainder of the second part and the third part (The History of the Stars) were written but subsequently lost or destroyed.The hero of the comic histories attempts SPACE FLIGHT by several absurd methods, including ROCKET power. His adventures are SATIRES interrupted by discourses and dialogues regarding contemporary issues in natural philosophy. A classic sequence in the second history has the hero tried for the crimes of humanity by a court of birds. The histories influenced several later satirists, including Jonathan SWIFT and VOLTAIRE. The first part borrows Domingo Gonsales from Francis GODWIN's The Man in the Moone (1638), and in the second part Tommaso CAMPANELLA appears as the hero's guide. [BS]See also: FANTASTIC VOYAGES; FRANCE; HISTORY OF SF; MOON; RELIGION. CZECH AND SLOVAK SF In Czechoslovakia there are two main groups, the Czechs and the Slovaks, speaking different languages. Sf is written in both.The history of Czech sf begins in the 19th century, with the first true sf work probably being Zivot na Mesici ["Life on the Moon"] (1881) by Karel Pleskac. Also of interest are some of the works of the famous mainstream author Svatopluk Cech; for example, Hanuman (1884; trans W.W. Strickland 1894 UK), depicting a civil war between two factions of apes ( APES AND CAVEMEN), and Pravy vylet pana Broucka do Mesice ["The True Trip of Mr Broucek to the Moon"] (1888). Another important ancestral figure was Jakub Arbes, who wrote a series of romanetos (short novels) on fantastic themes, including Newtonuv mozek (1877; trans Jiri Kral as "Newton's Brain" in Poet's Lore [anth 1982 US]), which prefigures the theme of TIME TRAVEL.The first author to write sf systematically was Karel Hloucha, author of seven novels and story collections, including Zakleta zeme ["Enchanted Country"] (1910) and Slunecni vuz ["The Solar Waggon"] (1921). Aliens that can take the shape of human beings play an important role in Metod Suchdolsky's novel Rusove na Martu ["Russians on Mars"] (1907).In 1920, the first sf book by Karel CAPEK was published: the play R.U.R. (1920; trans 1923) introduced the word ROBOT into the genre. The 1920s and 1930s were rich in sf novels; each year several titles appeared, with a variety of themes from technological inventions to the political and social aspects of future societies. Among the writers active in this period were Tomas Hruby, Jiri Haussmann, Marie Grubhofferova, J.M. Troska (the pseudonym of Jan Matzal) and others. Troska was the most influential, especially with his SPACE OPERA trilogy Zapas s nebem ["Struggle With the Skies"] (1940-41). At the opposite pole stood Jan Weiss (1890-1972) with his dreamlike mainstream sf novel Dum o 1000 patrech ["The Thousand-Storey House"] (1929).After WWII (and especially after the communist coup in 1948) the production of Czech sf decreased, and those few, mainly juvenile works which were published described a more "realistic" NEAR FUTURE. Frantisek Behounek, a well known scientist, wrote seven HARD-SF novels about the apotheosis of science in a communist future, examples being Akce L ["Operation L"] (1956) and Robinsoni vesmiru ["The Space Family Robinson"] (1958).The leading figure of the 1960s, and the symbol of the rebirth of sf, was Josef NESVADBA, whose work is well known also in the English-speaking world. Perhaps the most popular writer of this period, however, was Ludvik Soucek (1926-1978), author of nine witty sf-adventure novels and a few story collections, often with elements of the detective story. The first and most popular were the trilogy Cesta slepych ptaku ["Voyage of the Blind Birds"] (1964) and the collection Bratri cerne planety ["Brethren of the Black Planet"] (coll 1969); his last novel, Blazni z Hepteridy ["The Madmen from Hepteris"] (1980), was published posthumously. Two DYSTOPIAS by mainstream writers are of interest: Jiri Marek's Blazeny vek ["Cheerful Era"] (1967) and Cestmir Vejdelek's Navrat z Raje ["Return from Paradise"] (1961). The latter is a complex novel of high literary standard describing the inhabitants of a computer-ruled society who are unaware of their status as slaves. Other interesting writers of the period were Josef Koenigsmark, Vaclav Kajdos and Ivan Foustka.After the heightened activity of the 1960s, the so-called "normalization" of Czech culture following the invasion of Czechoslovakia by the Warsaw Pact countries in 1968 meant that there was another decrease in Czech sf in the first half of the 1970s. At the end of that decade, however, a new wave of writers appeared. The most significant authors of short fiction are Jaroslav Veis (1946), Zdenek Volny and Ondrej Neff (1945- ); each has published several books. Veis's Pandorina skrinka ["Pandora's Box"] (coll 1979) is very widely admired. Neff, after the success of his first collection, Vejce naruby ["An Inside-Out Egg"] (coll 1985), turned to novels: his Mesic meho zivota ["The Moon of My Life"] (1988), set in a colony of Moon-miners, is among the best Czech sf. Another fine book from the period, from the usually mainstream writer (although he has also produced four sf novels) Vladimir Paral, is the dystopian Zeme zen ["The Country of Women"] (1987). The most important publications for this generation of sf writers were the twin anthologies Lide ze souhvezdi Lva ["People from the Constellation of Leo"] (anth 1983) and Zelezo prichazi z hvezd ["Iron Comes from the Stars"] (anth 1983), both ed Vojtech Kantor.The establishment in 1982 of the Karel Capek AWARD for the best sf work by new authors encouraged the arrival of a still younger generation of writers - Josef Pecinovsky, Frantisek Novotny, Eduard Martin and Jan Hlavicka are the most significant. Although they have published collections, this group's work primarily attained popularity through anthologies: Navrat na planetu Zemi ["Return to Planet Earth"] (anth 1985) and Stalo se zitra ["It Happened Tomorrow"] (anth 1985), both ed Ivo Zelezny.A few sf works have been written by Czech authors in exile, an example being Maso ["Meat"] (coll 1981 Canada), a collection of two novellas by Martin Harnicek. Another author in exile, Ludek PESEK, is published in German and sometimes in English, although he writes in Czech. One novel by Ivo DUKA (pseudonym of Ivo Duchacek and Helena Koldova) was published in English: Martin and his Friend from Outer Space (1955). Pavel KOHOUT, who left Czechoslovakia in 1968, later published an sf novel (see his entry for its long title).Sf written in Slovak does not have as continuous a tradition, and there are noticeably fewer works. Sf featuring social comment and adventure was published in the 1930s and 1940s by Peter Suchansky, Dezo S. Turcan and Jan Kresanek-Ladcan. After WWII the production of Slovak sf was sporadic and its nature naive, as in Luna 2 neodpoveda ["Luna 2 Doesn't Answer"] (1958), one of the three sf novels written by Jan Bajla. Only one author from the 1960s stands out: Jozef Tallo, whose collection is Vlasy Bereniky ["The Hair of Berenice"] (coll 1962). Many more writers emerged in the 1980s: Alta Vasova, Jan Fekete, Jozef Repko and others; they write mainly juvenile fiction. The most successful may be the post- HOLOCAUST novel Po ["After"] (1979) by Vasova and three juvenile novels by Jozef Zarnay, including Kolumbovia zo zakladne Ganymedes ["Columbuses from Ganymede Space Station"] (1983).More than 50 sf films have been made in Czechoslovakia, the first of them in the early 1920s. The earliest of real interest are adaptations of stories by Karel Capek; they are Bila nemoc ["The White Plague"] (1937; vt Skeleton on Horseback), dir Hugo Haas, and Krakatit (1948), dir Otakar Vavra. From the mid-1950s to 1970, several sf films with animation and live action combined, based loosely on novels by Jules VERNE and using original drawings from French editions of his books, were made by director and animator Karel Zeman: Cesta do praveku (1955; vt Journey to the Beginning of Time), VYNALEZ ZKAZY (1958; vt Weapons of Destruction), Baron Prasil (1961; vt Baron Munchhausen), Ukradena vzducholod (1966; vt The Stolen Airship) and Na komete (1970; vt On the Comet). A completely animated Czech/French coproduction was La PLANETE SAUVAGE (1973; vt Fantastic Planet).The tradition of Czech sf comedies was launched by Oldrich Lipsky with a comedy set in "the 5th century after Sputnik": Muz z prvniho stoleti ["Man from the First Century"] (1961; vt Man in Outer Space). Lipsky's other sf films include: a TIME-TRAVEL comedy, Zabil jsem Einsteina, panove! (1969; vt I Killed Einstein, Gentlemen!); a parody of pre-WWII pulp detective fiction involving Nick CARTER and a carnivorous plant, perhaps his best film, Adela jeste nevecerela (1977; vt Adele Hasn't Eaten Yet); a Jules VERNE adaptation, Tajemstvi hradu v Karpatech ["Mystery of the Carpathian Castle"] (1981); and Srdecny pozdrav ze Zemekoule ["Cordial Greetings from Earth"] (1982). Milos Macourek has had a hand in several good sf comedies, notably KDO CHCE ZABIT JESSII? (1965; vt Who Would Kill Jessie?) and Coz takhle dat si spenat (1976; vt What Would You Say to Some Spinach?), and also cowrote the screenplay of ZITRA VSTANU A OPARIM SE CAJEM (1977; vt Tomorrow I'll Wake up and Scald Myself with Tea), one of a number of Czech sf films, several of them comedies, based on Josef Nesvadba's stories and novels.Not many Czech films are "serious" sf, or even straight sf, but those that are include: the space opera IKARIE XB-1 (1963; vt Voyage to the End of the Universe); the post- HOLOCAUST story KONEC SRPNA V HOTELU OZON (1966; vt The End of August at the Hotel Ozone); a film about a visit from deep space, Akce Bororo ["Operation Bororo"] (1972), dir Otakar Fuka; a children's film about First Contact with ALIENS, Odysseus a hvezdy ["Odysseus and the Stars"] (1974), dir Ludvik Raza; a free adaptation of Capek's Krakatit (1924), TEMNE SLUNCE (1980; vt The Black Sun); and, from Slovakia, ecological space sf in Treti Sarkan ["The Third Dragon"] (1985), dir Peter Hledik.Sf dramas are quite frequent on Czech tv, especially for children. One of the better serials has beenNavstevnici ["The Visitors"] (1984), in which an expedition from AD2484, when Earth is endangered by a comet, returns to 1984 to seek help; it was dir Jindrich Polak.Sf is very popular in Czechoslovakia. It has a wide readership, and print-runs of books by well known authors have been up to 100,000; however, the worsening economic situation in the early 1990s is likely to change that figure dramatically for the worse. On the positive side, a monthly sf magazine, Ikarie, was launched in June 1990 under the editorship of Ondrej Neff, who has also edited, with Jaroslav OLSA jr, Encyklopedie science fiction ["Encyclopedia of Science Fiction"] (1992). [IA/JO] CZECHOSLOVAKIA CZECH AND SLOVAK SF. Da CRUZ, DANIEL (1921-1991) US writer, formerly known for numerous men's action-adventure tales, who began publishing sf with The Grotto of the Formigans (1980), a novel about African grotto MONSTERS, and who came to more general notice with his Republic of Texas or Forte Family sequence: The Ayes of Texas (1982), Texas on the Rocks (1986) and Texas Triumphant (1987). The political premises underlying the series - in the late 1990s the USSR, having hoodwinked the supinely liberal US media, has come to dominate the world - have dated, but the exuberance of the tales themselves remains winning. The protagonist, a triple-amputee WWII veteran from the newly free Republic of Texas, arms an old battleship (itself called Texas), and sails off to fight the Russians. Much blood is spilt, and a good time is had by all. F-Cubed (1989) is a less entrancing TECHNOTHRILLER; but Mixed Doubles (1989) enjoyably depicts the attempts of a contemporary failed composer who travels back in time to steal MUSIC from those more talented than himself. [JC] |