"Like a Keepsake"

The genre of epistolary fiction -- stories told through letters, journal entries and news reports -- dates back to the beginnings of fiction itself, but most scholars date its English language debut to Samuel Richardson’s 1740 novel Pamela, a hugely successful effort that not only spawned scores of imitators of the specific form, but also marked the maturation of the novel itself as an art form. By the end of the 18th century the form had pretty much run its course, but many novels written in the following century used the form, most notably Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, Wilkie Collins’ The Moonstone and that greatest of all epistolary novels (in my opinion), Bram Stoker’s Dracula. (Not that I’ve read even a fraction of the works done in the 18th century.)

It’s usage in the 20th century continued sporadically, with notable titles such as The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis, Alice Walker’s The Color Purple and Stephen King’s still amazing first novel, Carrie. More contemporary efforts now include communications of the digital age such as emails, text messages and Twitter tweets.

The closest John D MacDonald came to writing an epistolary novel was his 1960 masterpiece The End of the Night, which begins with a long letter and goes on to include a “Death Row Diary” and several official memoranda. But these entries are far too lengthy and detailed to convey the illusion of a real epistle, and one gets the feeling that the author began with the idea of writing the novel in this specific form but his words simply got away from him. A year later he wrote One Monday We Killed Them All, which begins with an excerpt from an official statement, but that is as far as he takes it.

His short fiction contains at least three examples of this form, and there certainly may be more among the stories I haven’t read. His November 1950 science fiction story “Final Mission” employed memos, the minutes of a country club meeting and even excerpts from a play before ending the story with straight prose. “Dear Old Friend,” written in 1970 and one of the last short stories MacDonald would write, used several rough drafts of a letter recorded on a dictaphone before ending with the finished product, an amazing example of concise and perfect short story writing if there ever was one. But his first effort at epistolary storytelling was -- I believe -- back in 1949 with another science fiction tale he titled “Like a Keepsake.”

Made up of six letters, presented in chronological order, “Like a Keepsake” appeared in  the June 1949 issue of Thrilling Wonder Stories, MacDonald’s third of seven stories he would have published in that science fiction pulp. Each letter is written by Bill Wheeland, a welder in his late teens, to a girl named Zell. Bill has just returned from a trip to Venus, where he met and dated Zell, and things ended badly. Believing “that stuff the fellows told me,” he made a pass at Zell on their last date before Bill left for Earth and got his face slapped. Zill left in a huff and Bill wandered around for hours before hitting the sack. He’s writing to a.) apologize for his bad behavior and for thinking that Zell’s name was funny, b.) to confess that he isn’t really a space ship co-pilot, c.) to let her know that he is scheduled to return to her planet in three months, and d.) to tell her she is “the most gorgeous thing” he’s ever seen. At the end of his letter, almost as an afterthought, he mentions something that’s happening on Earth:

The papers are full of some sort of trouble in London. Tonight on the telescreen they gave us a quick look at it. I couldn't make head or tail of it -- a black line that goes right up from a rooftop straight up into the air. The big scientists have given out with a lot of fancy language but nobody seems to know anything about it except that it's growing.

The letter, postmarked “New Mexiport,” is dated 10 September 1998.

Bill’s next letter is written ten days later and he’s now writing from Bristolport in England. Gone, for the most part, are the pleasantries and romance and they are replaced with an explanation as to why he is in England and the “trouble” that is happening there. The black line has grown and it is now two miles thick and its properties baffling. When it was pencil sized, a man walked through it and was cut in half. As it grew scientists tried experimenting on it. Steel bars shoved into it came out with the inserted portions gone. Bathtubs full of water had their ends cut off without any of the water flowing out. They’ve tried flame throwers, electricity, fire hoses, even bombs, and nothing makes a dent in it. And it has begun to attract the crazies.

Lots of crazy people have sneaked by the police lines and jumped into it. They don't even yelp, I hear. Crazy religions have popped up all over and people are yammering about the end of the world... the newspapers are full of fancy talk. One old bug called it a "crack in infinity." Imagine that?

The third letter comes from Parisport, nine days after the second one, and London is gone…

“Like a Keepsake” contains a kind of poignancy that may not be apparent after a single reading, and the events and the ending of the tale may evoke little more than a “so what?” in the reader, but looking more closely one sees how MacDonald slowly unravels background and character through (and despite) this most limiting of fictional forms. Little bits of information thrown out here and there do much to create this future world (well, the future as written in 1949). Like comparing the early size of the “line” to Zill’s “pretty arm,” discussing Earth’s political balance of power by relating it to two military bases -- one British, one Russian -- on Venus, and postulating that Earth’s historic Black Death of the fourteenth century was probably known to Zill by way of Earth’s missionary schools on Venus, all convey a richer fictional world simply by the manner of their indirect inclusion into the storyline. “Like a Keepsake” may not be the best or the most memorable bit of science fiction writing John D MacDonald ever composed (it wasn’t included in his sf anthology Other Times, Other Worlds), but it is a great example of his storytelling skills, his use of economy in writing, and the way he could encourage the imagination of the reader in only five pages of a pulp magazine.

Although the story was never anthologized, it has reappeared an an eBook -- well, really an eStory, via Peril Press, who was also responsible for several other reissued tales, including “What Makes Sammy Laugh?” which I wrote about a few weeks ago. “Like a Keepsake” can be purchased from either of the two big online booksellers for a mere 99 cents, well worth the price to own and read a bit of JDM sf that hasn’t see the light of day, or Venus, in over sixty years.

"Spectator Sport"

John D MacDonald's "Spectator Sport" originally appeared in the February 1950 issue of Thrilling Wonder Stories. Often cited by critics as one of MacDonald's very best science fiction efforts, its subjects include time travel, virtual reality, an impersonal bureaucracy, human ambition, and a decaying society, all done nicely in the relatively short space of 2,200 words. It was included in the author's 1978 SF anthology Other Times, Other Worlds, where editor Martin H. Greenberg referred to the story as "a minor classic," and it has been included in at least three other SF anthologies, beginning in 1952, only two years after it was originally published. What's more, in the sixty-one years since the story was written it has proven to be incredibly prescient, anticipating the invention, popularity and enervating effects of video games, although we are (thankfully) no where near the stage they exist in "Spectator Sport." Best of all, this is a great yarn, as enjoyable and as readable as anything MacDonald ever wrote, with an ending that -- for the lovers of the written word -- takes one's breath away.

"Spectator Sport" begins in much the same vein as another, earlier JDM SF tale, "The Miniature," although in this story the protagonist has arrived in the future by his own design and knows exactly why he is there. Dr. Rufus Maddon is a scientist who has studied and written on the physics of time, and who -- along with a group of other like-minded experts -- has finally perfected a means to travel into the future. Maddon is chosen as the first to try this new device, and he transports himself 400 years into future America, into the same city from whence he came. Expecting to appear to the inhabitants of 2350 as a barbarian, he is astounded to find things relatively the same. Relatively.

"There was a general air of disrepair. Shops were boarded up. The pavement was broken and potholed. A few automobiles traveled on the broken streets. They, at least, appeared to be of a slightly advanced design, but they were dented, dirty and noisy... as he reached the familiar park... his consternation arose from the fact that [it] was all too familiar. Though it was a tangle of weeds the equestrian statue of General Murdy was still there in deathless bronze, liberally decorated by pigeons... Clothes had not changed nor had common speech. He wondered if the transfer had gone awry, if this world were something he was dreaming... He limped out of the park, muttering, wondering why the park wasn't used, why everyone seemed to be in a hurry... It appeared that in four hundred years nothing at all had been accomplished. Many familiar buildings had collapsed. Others still stood. He looked in vain for a newspaper or a magazine."

Dr. Maddon makes several attempts to stop pedestrians as they hurry past him. He wants to announce his presence as the first man to travel through time, but no one is interested in even stopping. When he grabs one man and turns him around, he is rebuffed and told to "go get a lobe job."

But there is one change that has occurred in this seemingly decaying future, and it is the prevalence of a number of "low-slung white panel delivery trucks," all in good repair and all bearing the legend WORLD SENSEWAYS. Upon closer inspection he notices a smaller inscription on the vehicles. Some read Feeder Division, others Hookup Division, and one that reads Lobotomy Division. Unfortunately for Dr. Maddon, one such truck featuring the latter inscription pulls up beside him and two husky men get out and force him inside.

 The scene shifts and we are inside the office of Roger K. Handriss, the Regional Director of World Senseways. He has been informed of the detention and subsequent lobotomization of one Dr. Rufus Maddon, and has been made aware of his claims that he had come from the past. Handriss has been brought the contents of Maddon's pockets, which include some twentieth century change, several membership cards of the era and a letter that references a book on time travel that the good doctor had written. When Handriss confirms that just such a book had been published in 1950, he realizes that they have done Maddon "a great wrong." And it also serves as a literary device to allow Handriss to recall the history of the era, and of how things changed only four years after Maddon's time of departure.

"Imagine what it must have been like in those days, Al. They had the secrets but they didn't begin to use them until -- let me see -- four years later. Aldous Huxley had already  given them their clue with his literary invention of the Feelies. But they ignored him... All their energies went into wars and rumors of wars and random scientific advancement and sociological disruptions. Of course, with Video on the march at that time, they were beginning to get a little preview. Millions of people were beginning to sit in front of the Video screens, content even with that crude excuse for entertainment... Now all the efforts of a world society are channeled into World Senseways. There is no waste of effort changing a perfectly acceptable status quo. Every man can have Temp and if you save your money you can have Permanent, which they say is as close to heaven as man can get."

When the lobotomized Dr. Maddon is brought into Handriss' office, walking "with the clumsiness of an overgrown child," Handriss struggles for a way to try and rectify his terrible error. Reeducating him would take to long, and sending him back might bring a flood of others into the future. No, there is only one thing a compassionate corporate regional director can do in this situation: allow Maddon a privilege it takes most men all of their lives to save up for...

Despite MacDonald's reference to Huxley's 1931 novel Brave New World, the fictional future of the two worlds could not be more different. In Huxley's World State, a paternalistic and all-controlling government has made all resources readily available to everyone. It controls population and has eliminated the family unit. It encourages free sex and conspicuous consumption as a means to provide a stable economy and society. Yet both works feature society's rulers keeping its subjects under control with an external device: Huxley's "Feelies" and the drug Soma, World Senseways' Temps and Perms. In this respect the theme is the same: a future society built on the control of its subjects through the supply of endless distractions to those same subjects. Pleasure, rather than pain, is used as the ultimate controlling device.

Yet the difference in the choice of controlling entity -- government or private industry -- has led some critics to use "Spectator Sport" as an example of the evils of capitalism. Greenberg, in his very brief introduction to the story in Other Voices, Other Worlds, makes reference to the tale's "nature of reality, capitalism and American culture," and makes direct reference to cultural critic H. Bruce Franklin, who reportedly "praised" the story for it's "social content." Franklin is a noted cultural historian who has taught at several big universities, including Stanford, Johns Hopkins, Yale and Rutgers. He has written extensively on the Viet Nam war, on prison literature, and on science fiction. He is also a self-proclaimed Marxist. I suppose one's worldview colors one's observations on just about everything, and so it is with his opinions about "Spectator Sport." To me it is more than clear that MacDonald was writing from the Huxleyan point of view, that mankind's "distractions" are a better way to enslave society than using one's fears, but Franklin sees more than that. Despite the fact that JDM was a Keynesian at best and -- later in life -- fled from that point of view, Franklin sees in "Spectator Sport" a grand dissertation of the evils of capitalism:

"In fact the interlocking Anglo-American empires have decayed so far that they have produced some SF that does indeed border on a Marxist analysis. Advanced state capitalism has now given birth to a whole body of SF works that project the next stages of its monstrous cancer. Kurt Vonnegut's Player Piano, Frederik Pohl and C. M. Kornbluth's The Space Merchants, Pohl's "The Midas Plague," Robert Silverberg's "The Pain Peddlers" and "Company Store," Robert Sheckley's "Something for Nothing," J. G. Ballard's "Subliminal Man," John D. MacDonald's "Trojan Horse Laugh" and "Spectator Sport"--all these are good projections of what capitalism might become if it were not destroyed. But capitalism is in the process of extinction, and those who are wiping it out and replacing it with a decent human society are guided by the science of Marxism."

No matter one's political point of view, I find this an utterly wrongheaded analysis of the story. MacDonald was writing about mankind's need to be distracted, and whether that need was met by a benevolent central government or by a global corporate entity was immaterial to the author. The point was that man will do what man will do, and the easiest way out was the way that would be most readily supplied, be it by government or by private enterprise.

 The real genius of "Spectator Sport" is it's precognitive recognition of television as the ultimate drug.  What in 1950 was a kind of a novelty, a "radio with pictures," became -- as MacDonald correctly guessed -- the great opiate of the masses. And its interactive stepchild, the video game, -- something MacDonald could have only dreamed up in his wildest fiction -- is the real prescience of this short story. Anyone who has ever played a well-crafted, involving game, or who has had a child born in the gaming age can well attest to JDM's surmise of an outcome. And do we really have to wait 400 years for the future of "Spectator Sport" to arrive?

Used copies of Other Times, Other Worlds are easy to find at relatively low prices. The other anthologies that include "Spectator Sport" are Omnibus of Science Fiction: 43 Foremost Stories (1952) edited by Groff Conklin (reprinted in 1956 and 1963 as Science Fiction Omnibus), Fifty Short Science Fiction Tales (1963) edited by Isaac Asimov and Groff Conklin, and Science Fiction of the Fifties (1979) edited by Martin H. Greenberg and Joseph Olander.

"Shadow On the Sand"

On the planet Strada there exists a technologically advanced civilization, one that has conquered space travel and which has colonized scores of other planets. Society is orderly, efficient and maintains a single ideology. The government has evolved into two separate camps of governance: The League, which supervises the administrative affairs of the society, and The Center, which concerns itself with science. They are the two equally-powerful branches of Stradian society, and they have no love for each other. In fact, something akin to an unspoken Mutually Assured Destruction agreement exists between the two bodies. Agents from either branch routinely go undercover and assassinate members of the other branch, in furtherance of their own agenda. It is an underground, piecemeal conflict that goes on with the unspoken knowledge of each other's actions. Any attack overtly carried out would result in open warfare and, in all probability, the end of their civilization. It is this assurance that keeps each side honest and allows for the orderly running of society.

Amro, an agent for The Center, has been assigned a new mission, one to take place on another world. He studies and learns the language, then the history of this strange place he has never heard of. Outside of his unfamiliarity with this planet, it seems like just another mission. He's been doing this for five years and this will be his fifteenth undercover assignment.

There is a reason Amro has never heard of this new place: it is farther away than any spaceship could travel. It has been discovered by the scientists of The Center, a twin world in a kind of different dimension, reached not by spacecraft but by passing through a portal that The Center has learned how to create. The Center is going to use this newly discovered world, unknown to the members of The League, as a staging area to launch a final attack for complete dominance of their empire. The new world is Earth.

In "Shadow On the Sand" John D MacDonald wrote a 30,000 word novella, published in the October 1950 issue of Thrilling Wonder Stories. Full of long, descriptive detail of Stradian government and society, it is a wordy piece that would been a much more endurable read with 10,000 less words. JDM's great burst of science fiction writing was drawing to a close and he would only write eleven more s-f stories in the 1950's (out of a total of 55). What does make "Shadow On the Sand" an interesting story (at least for me) are the characters and scenes that take place on Earth. Here MacDonald was in more familiar territory and his confidence shows.

In order for Amro and his fellow Stradian agents to infiltrate Earth, they need to find and replace individuals. Three Earthlings are kidnapped and brought to Strada, their memories harvested and their outer skin removed. That skin and memory is then grafted onto the agents, who "become" that person. The people they find are a married couple and a male houseguest, enjoying an extended stay in a remote beach house near Harlingen, Texas. Jerry, the husband, is a chemical engineer who has been injured on the job and has been given a six month leave of absence to recover. He's also a cuckold. The male houseguest, strong, attractive Quinn French is having an affair with Jerry's wife, Fran. Jerry suspects something but is too much of a wimp to do anything about it. In an effort to cover their tracks, they've decided to have Quinn invite a female friend to stay for awhile, someone who he hasn't seen in years, but who can throw Jerry off the scent of their adulterous relationship. By the time Martha Kaynan arrives, however, Jerry, Fran and Quinn have all been replaced by Amro and two other Stradian agents. Martha's gradual unease and eventual discovery of the charade is the real meat of the story.

At times it becomes obvious to the reader that MacDonald was being paid by the word. The explanation of the portal is especially mind-numbing:

"We have made the basic and very important discovery of a twin planetary system corresponding to our own, separated from us only by a symbolic logician's definition of reality. This is not a completely physical and technical phenomenon. It is a philosophical phenomenon. 

"In simplest terms the formula can be expressed this way: The twin world exists because any definitive explanation of reality presupposes alternate realities. Thus the doorway was achieved by the creation of unreality. Call it negative matter if you will. A sphere where there is no reality must, through the application of the basic formula, be a bridge between realities. The bridge had been achieved but there is much that we don't know."
 

Martha Kaynan is the real hero of the story, and is the typical plucky MacDonald female: "She was a small girl with brown hair that sometimes glinted red in the sunlight. Her eyes were a soft and smoky aqua and her mouth had a childish look. A careless observer might think her a quite low-pressure little girl, possibly a bit dull. But the careless observer missed the lift of her chin, the directness of the eyes, the squared shoulders, the determined walk." And although Martha views Quinn as "a definitely unwholesome type," the invitation comes at a time when things in her life hadn't been going too well. Of course, she never does get reacquainted with Quinn, she encounters a disguised Amro instead. Their eventual relationship is the engine that drives the story along.

I'll confess to being someone who doesn't really read much science fiction. The only books in my library that could be called s-f are the works of Ray Bradbury and several old, collectable volumes of Charles Beaumont stories, and these can't really be classified exclusively as science fiction. A well told, well-written story is a joy in any genre, however, and "Shadow On the Sand," if you have the patience, contains a good story buried underneath an awful lot of words.

I found a reference to the story online, indicating that "Shadow On the Sand" may be the first-ever story containing the idea of alternate reality, or an alternate world. If this is so, hooray for MacDonald, but reading the citations makes my head hurt. If you like you can try for yourself here.

The story is not an easy one to locate any more. It was anthologized twice, once in 1957's Wonder Stories Annual (reprinted in 1963) and again in Strange Tomorrows, published in 1972.

 

"A Child is Crying"

I'm currently in the process of submitting a few changes to John D MacDonald's page on the IMDb. They're missing a few shows from the early days of television, they had a couple of sources wrong, and they're listing the wrong episode of Run For Your Life that was based on a JDM story. Still awaiting their response. Previously I sent in a correction on their entry for "Hangover" and they accepted it and made the changes with no questions asked and without requesting my sources. Kind of makes me wonder about the reliability of the IMDb...

It's focused my attention on the television adaptations and made me want to see more of the shows I've never seen, which should be an easier task now in this age of Hulu and Netflix. MacDonald had no love for what Hollywood did to his work and felt ill-used by them, to the point that he refused to allow the filming of any Travis McGee novel after seeing Darker Than Amber. More on Travis McGee, based on The Empty Copper Sea, in a later post... He was right for the most part, but it doesn't mean that everything ever filmed based on a MacDonald source is without merit. Even he acknowledged the excellence of the film based on A Flash of Green. I've tried to see as many JDM adaptations as I could and recently found what I believe to be one of the earliest MacDonald television adaptation, now available on the Internet to watch in streaming video for free.

It's a half-hour kinescope of his 1948 short story "A Child is Crying," originally published in Thrilling Wonder Stories. "Child" was adapted and broadcast by two separate programs in the early days of television: Lights Out and Tales of Tomorrow. The Lights Out version aired in 1950, the Tales version in 1951. It is the Tales of Tomorrow adaptation that can be seen at The Archive.

Martin Greenberg, who edited MacDonald's only science fiction anthology, called "A Child is Crying", "a minor classic". He pointed out that the child of the story is "both the villain and the hero, functioning as an example of what was to become known as the 'Atomic Warning Story.' It is one of the best of a large number of stories on this theme published in the late 1940s." It is a brief tale of 3,800 words that takes place in the near future and revolves around a child of unique brilliance who is used by the government to further its military goals. Billy Massner "could read and write and carry on a conversation when he was thirteen months old, and at two and a half was doing quadratic equations. at four, completely on his own, he worked out theories regarding non-Euclidian geometry and theories of relativity that paralleled the work of Einstein." Now he's seven and the government wants him.

Billy's mental abilities are increasing at an amazing rate and, while never developing the gift of real prophesy, he acquires the ability to predict the future based on variables in the "cyclic rhythm." The military naturally wants to know that future and, in the end, they're sorry they asked.

The Tales of Tomorrow adaptation is surprisingly faithful to its source. The gender of the child is changed to a female, but the actress who plays the child is professional and very convincing in her role. A few bits were condensed here and there, and the live broadcast was performed on only two or three small sets, but it's still MacDonald's story from beginning to end. The actress playing Lily ("the child") is Robin Morgan, a child star of the time and a regular on the early show Mama. She quit acting in her teens and became a radical feminist, authoring such works as Sisterhood is Powerful, Sisterhood is Global and Sisterhood is Forever (I wonder what her next title will be...)

This show was unknown to The Shines and appears nowhere in their Bibliography, nor did the Lights Out adaptation. The free viewing can be enjoyed on the Internet Archive here.