King Solomon's Mines by H. R. Haggard

Nothing works perfectly the first time you try it out, right? Doesn’t matter if you’re fumbling with a girl in the backseat of a Fiesta or shooting at a lion in the African svelt, the first time you do it, you probably won’t get it quite right. Such is the case with King Solomon’s Mines, the famous first ‘lost race’ novel. Written by H. R. Haggard in 1889, it features his hero Allen Quatermain, who would go on to star in a number of other tales of high adventure set in Africa. While an entertaining novel, Mines features many devices and tropes that have had their effectiveness blunted by years or re-use.

Things get started when Quatermain meets Sir Henry Curtis and Captain John Good on board a steamer leaving Cape Town. He learns that they intend to locate Good’s brother, who went searching for the legendary mines of the biblical King Solomon. The mines are supposedly located in an interior kingdom never before seen by white men. Trouble is, it’s surrounded by treacherous mountains and an impassable desert, and anyway, nobody really knows exactly where it is located. Except that Quatermain then reveals that he knows where it is, because some time ago he came into possession of a map made by a Spaniard called Jose da Silvestre two hundred years earlier. Silvestre died upon finding the exact spot, and in a nice dramatic touch by Haggard, the map is written in his own blood. Being a sensible man, and by nature no seeker of dangerous adventure, Quatermain has thus far had no reason to test the map’s accuracy for himself. But being a poor man, he agrees to accompany the two on their trek upon securing a handsome payment, with which he intends to pay for his son’s education. Decent chap, Quatermain.

The three Englishmen pick up a Zulu named Umbopa to accompany them, and all four brave the terrors of the desert and the mountains and eventually discover a new country, Kukuanaland. There, they become embroiled in intrigue that climaxes in a civil war.

It’s hard to imagine the reaction this book must have provoked in its day, as so many of the tropes it uses have since become standards. The mere idea of white men going off into uncharted Africa and having adventures was a groundbreaker for the literature of the time (though not, I note, for real life). Haggard lived in South Africa for six years, and was present during the British takeover of Bechuanaland. He even read out the declaration of the takeover, as the officer who ought to have done so was sick on the day. His love for Africa, its landscape and cultures, shines on every page, but his writing style is so plain that it often does not overcome the familiarity modern readers will have with almost every situation in the book. In terms of style, he’s certainly a full step down from the likes of Wells and Conan Doyle. There are some great touches, such as the map written in blood, and the dying man who presents it to Quatermain, pointing to the far-off mountain top as the sun goes down. The perilous trek through the desert is also suitably hair-raising. But there are also some childish ‘humorous’ parts that have aged badly, such as the Kukuanas’ awed reaction to John Good’s lack of trousers.

Quatermain himself is quite a likeable character. While no coward, he’s genuinely humble (instead of just continually saying that he’s humble, like some fictional characters I could mention). He’s certainly not afraid to admit when he’s quaking in his khakis, and though he usually swallows his fear and does the right thing (he is a Victorian gentleman, after all), he indulges in heroics and violence with a certain reluctance that makes him far more realistic than the likes of, say, John Carter. He’s pretty much the first and archetypal ‘great white hunter’ character in fiction. As for the rest, they’re a distinctly more forgettable bunch than their counterparts in the later Lost World. Apart from Umbopa, who’s got his own plot-o-matic storyline going on, they simply exist to provide a bit of banter for Quatermain to indulge in.

The Kukuanas in particular are a perfect example of the totally generic ‘African tribe’ in literature. They live in huts, they have a corrupt king who needs to be deposed, and they worship the white men as gods because of their superior weaponry. Yawn. Haggard heavily based them on his own experiences with the Zulus, but their culture is never really explored in any more depth than the plot calls for. Umbopa, to the surprise of no reader over the age of ten, turns out to be the true king of Kukuanaland, precipitating the inevitable climax. Surely, this kind of thing was already old hat in 1889. Also, the lack of any truly fantastic elements make the novel less dramatic than those that followed it (including even Haggard’s own novels). The Kukuanas are, really, just another tribe.

Haggard has often been complimented for his comparatively progressive attitude towards race. For the most part, Quatermain recognizes a ‘gentleman’ whatever his colour, and he respects the pride and bravery of many of the natives he meets. He knows the different tribes of South Africa well, and differentiated between them in terms of character based on experience, not prejudice. As I said above, he’s a pretty likeable guy. But, like most ‘lost race’ novels before and since, the Kukuanas live in the shadow of a distinctly white civilization that scored pretty much all the major achievements in the kingdom. In particular, there is a long, wide Roman road running through their valley, lined with impressive statues. Now, one of the real-world inspirations for Mines was the discovery of the ancient city of Zimbabwe in what was then Rhodesia. At the time, it was unthinkable to European archaeologists that a black civilization could have built such a grand structure. Right up until the independence of Zimbabwe, great leaps in logic were employed to convince the populace that a white or even Arab civilization was responsible. It seems that even Haggard was not immune from this kind of thinking. But compared to other literature of the period, his books still provide a refreshing and humane depiction of black Africa.

King Solomon’s Mines is a largely enjoyable read, but its now-common tropes and somewhat childish tone marr it somewhat. It provides an interesting base from which to compare his later, better novels.

(check out this here comic while you're at it...)

Big Game

Here's a silly little cartoon I did this morning. Been reading King Solomon's Mine's recently, and there's an awful lot of gratuitous hunting in it, so I had this little idea for a comic about conservation-minded 19th century hunters. I had to use a really bad pen for most of the inking though, and it shows. You'll have to click on it to view- I'm working on making it full-size on this page.

The Great Work Of Time by John Crowley

At the end of this novella is a brief editor’s note in which John Crowley lists the history book Pax Brittanica as a reference, and thanks its author, Jan Morris, for ‘many hours spent dawdling in a world more fantastical than any he could himself invent.’ It’s a quote that reminds how much the British Empire is a perfect setting for sci-fi. With that in mind, I’ll delve into The Great Work of Time.

The narrator is unsure exactly when to begin his tale, being that in this convoluted universe, everything he describes has both already happened and is yet to happen. He finally settles on one Caspar Last, a quirky American genius who discovers time travel in 1983. Little interested in the practical applications of what is, to him, an idea only interesting for its theory, Last concocts a scheme to make himself rich after only a single use of the machine. He travels to British Guyana in 1851, and returns to the present carrying a stamp that is now worth millions. He then destroys the machine, hoping that his trip will have had no other consequences.

But Last’s venture into the Empire’s past has unwittingly caught the attention of the Otherhood, a secret organization created by Cecil Rhodes. Their goal is to ensure the stability of the Empire by whatever means possible, and in Last’s Apparatus, they have found their most powerful tool yet…

The Great Work of Time is a deeply strange piece. It’s a time travel story that really rises to the challenge of presenting a complex but consistent set of rules for its chronological meddling. It’s a warning about the nature of chaos and stability. But for me, its most powerful attribute is its affecting description of longing for a world now lost. This is most clearly expressed through the character of Denys Winterset. Winterset has lived in a peaceful world shaped by the Otherhood- a world in which the Empire never fell and the world wars never occurred- but he has also lived in a world much closer to our own.

The contrasts between the two are constant yet subtle. When Caspar Last travels to Guyana in 1983, he does so by a suffocating and cheap package-tour flight full of noisy tourists. Arriving at his destination, he finds it a rotting tropical backwater kept afloat only by the shoddily-built American facilities that cater to tourists.

When Denys Winterset travels to Khartoum in the alternate 1954, he does so on the luxurious Cape-to-Cairo railway. Designed by Rhodes to pass right through the spray of Victoria Falls, it is magnificent, efficient and proud. It turns out that in a 20th Century without world wars or a powerful America, the development of technology has been somewhat slowed by the dominant British Empire-

-a great beast without predators, and naturally conservative; it clung to proven techniques and could impose them on the rest of the world by its weight.

This is a little whimsical fantasy on Crowley’s part- in real life, the British Empire greatly hastened the modernization of the world throughout its time by spreading steam power, electricity and the telegraph everywhere it went. The fact that the Empire happened to be on the way out just as the motor cars and telephones became ubiquitous is, I believe, slightly off the point. I guess Crowley is thinking of a world without a dominant USA and its drive towards a world of Model T’s and assembly lines. It’s a fantasy that allows Crowley to make his alternate Empire one in which airships and trains still dominate transport by the 20th Century- a common enough trope in Empire-themed science-fiction.

It’s also part of what makes the alternate 1954 so pleasant. Everything is more laid back than in our own world. People who work for the Empire have pride and purpose. It’s all fantasy of course- little is said of how native peoples feel about this Empire, for example- but some throw-away lines indicate that the English have become more enlightened about their inherent ‘superiority’ than they were in the 19th Century.

Ultimately, it is slightly frustrating that, having created this fascinating world, it is not explored in much detail. The novella is short, and much time is spent on other worlds. Some of them are interesting, such as a well-researched section on Cecil Rhodes. Others are so distracting that it feels as if they belong in a different book, such as a future London that is inhabited by several non-human species. The ultimate result of all the Otherhood’s meddling is a far future that is puzzling but visually memorable.

The writing throughout is great, and there are plenty of treats for fans of sci-fi and Empire alike. The tortured logistics of Caspar Last's attempt to enrich himself using his machine are hilarious and thought-provoking- in Crowley's time-traveling universe, it's much harder than it sounds. Recommended.

(photo by Isabelle Grosjean)

Vathek by William Beckford

I’m going to have to plumb a bit deeper than usual into the depths of weird fiction in order to review an early example of Orientalist literature- the cod-Arabian Nights fantasy Vathek, written by the demented William Beckford in 1786.

Beckford seems to have been something of a card. At one time the richest man in England, he inherited the blood money squeezed from a slave plantation in the West Indies. This allowed him to live out his insane fantasies, most of which were influenced by the then-nascent neo-Gothic movement and the recently popular Arabian Nights. According to the introduction to the Wordsworth edition-

“…he used his immense wealth to creatc what was in essence a small kingdom in Wiltshire where he indulged himself in all the human excesses. …he exercised his love of Gothic architecture by creating a monastery-like building on his estate… One entered the building through doors forty feet high, so carefully counter-weighted that they could be opened by two fantastically garbed dwarves in Beckford’s employ.”

Sounds like my kind of guy, apart from the fact that he was eventually outed as a paedophile (it does say all the human excesses). The bastard probably even specified that he was looking for dwarves when he put up his ‘help wanted’ signs, or whatever they did back then.

Anyway, to further indulge in his passion for this kind of thing, Beckford wrote Vathek, a novella in the style of the Arabian Nights. The only version he would have had access to at that time would have been Galland’s 1776 French translation- the original document that sparked an enthusiasm for all things mysterious and Eastern across Europe. Suddenly, no dignified upper-crust European was without a hookah and a funny little round cap. For some reason, another development of this was that all Oriental tales henceforth composed by Europeans were written in French! By the time Vathek was translated into English, it was being falsely claimed as being a genuine Eastern legend, because its author was now shamed and living in exile.

The titular Vathek is the Caliph of the Muslim world and the grandson of Haroun Al Raschid. Raschid was a real-life super-Caliph who reigned during Baghdad’s glorious hey-day, but he was also famously fictionalized in the Arabian Nights. By making Vathek his grandson, Beckford shows us immediately that 1) he knows his Orientalism, and 2) Vathek is a badass. It’s a bit like writing an American novel and having your protagonist be Abraham Lincoln’s grandson, or something.

Like his creator, Vathek is a hedonist. Probably unlike his creator, he can kill men stone dead with a look from his eye when angered. He builds a tower from which he can overlook all of his kingdom, and he adds five wings onto his palace, each of which caters to the pleasuring of one of the five senses. At the beginning, he’s not such a bad guy. He’s happy to share his good living and his pleasure palace with all and sundry. But when a mysterious Indian appears at the palace selling weapons that fight by themselves and other powerful items, Vathek becomes obsessed with acquiring such power. Like Faust, he makes a deal with a demon in order to gain it. And whenever he lags in his commitment to this cause (such as when he falls in love with the daughter of an Emir), his witch of a mother ensures that he continues on his path to damnation. Soon the two of them are merrily sacrificing first-borns and stripping naked in front of pyres full of mummy bones and eyes of newt. Will it all end happily?

Despite being one of the oldest texts I’ve read for the site, Vathek is a relatively smooth read. The characters do talk in a kind of mock-Shakespeare vernacular, with plenty of ‘thees’ and ‘thous’, but by and large the prose rattles along at a pleasant rate. And like the Arabian Nights themselves, the novella is light on character and long on incident. The frequent detours the plot winds into are sometimes tiresome, though it’s hard to remain critical when each is so chock-full of dangerous journeys, wise Viziers, loyal eunachs and graveyards full of helpful ghouls. Even old Mohammad himself makes a brief late appearance- not sure if that’s the kind of twist that goes down well east of Suez.

Vathek himself is clearly a stand-in for Beckford, and an early Gothic anti-hero. Byron himself claimed to have modeled himself somewhat after him. His only weakness (and it’s a whopper) is his desire to experience all things and learn all knowledge. While I don’t advise you to emulate him completely, tracking down a copy of Vathek is recommended for those interested in experiencing what’s largely regarded as being the finest European imitation of the Arabian Nights.

Fantasy, Generation X and Backpackers: The Beach

Ever spent a little time away from real life? Ever lived far from home, immersed in an alien culture in which you can be a new person? In such circumstances, do you reckon you’d be attracted or repulsed by thoughts of home? In Alex Garland’s The Beach, young travelers escape from the troubles of The World by retiring to a place that, oddly, is not made to seem much more pleasurable than the world they left behind.

The novel takes the form of a classic adventure story. In a Bancock hostel, Richard, a young English Generation X-er, is entrusted with a map by a suicidal Scot who calls himself Daffy Duck. The map supposedly leads to an Eden-like island off the coast of Thailand where a group of backpackers, or ‘travelers’, as they like to be called, have set up an idyllic community. Richard hooks up with two French youths, Etienne and Francoise, and all three head off to find the Beach.

The book feels like a slight read- slighter by far than the classics to which it’s often compared, Heart of Darkness and Lord of the Flies. If there’s a deep lesson here about man’s endless quest for unspoiled paradise, it’s hard to spot it amid the breezy writing and endless joint-rolling. Garland’s prose fairly flies off the page, making The Beach a literal page-turner. On a sentence level, he’s an extremely skilled writer.

As narrator, Richard’s thought processes are extremely natural, and it’s easy to identify with the little mental games he plays constantly. Trailing through the jungle at night, he pretends that every snapped twig costs him a video game-inspired ‘life’. Avoiding dope-guards, he pretends that they are Vietcong soldiers. As a Generation X kid, he’s been brought up on a diet of videogames, movies and pop-culture that colours how he interprets the world. He frequently likens his Thailand adventure to the Vietnam war- not the real Vietnam of course, but the glorified cinematic version pedaled by Oliver Stone and Stanley Kubrick. If he can liken his own situation to a situation from movies or TV, he is likely to lose his already-fragile handle on reality. This tendency goes so far as to cause him to take serious risks and make questionable decisions. Hey, if the A-team could swim through shark-infested waters, so can Richard, right? He’s such a relatable character that it takes the reader some time to realize that he’s actually a bit of a dick.

There’s a lack of irony throughout that is refreshing. Garland has little criticism for backpacker culture, probably because he’s a fan of it in real life. I wonder how Richard and his gang would fare if they met up with the small-minded backpacker twerps from Are You Experienced (another classic 90's travel story, written by the deeply cynical William Sutclife). Much potential ridiculousness is avoided due to the lack of any of the New Age nonsense that often comes with this territory. In fact, Garland is very clear that the Beach community have no philosophy whatsoever. They just work, eat and have a good time.

A serious flaw with the novel is how the Beach itself is viewed by Richard and the others that live there. For starters, they are already all feckless travelers, having traipsed across Asia, Africa and Europe to a man. They’re not exactly buttoned-down cubicle-jockies, and even before they reach the Beach they weren’t exactly living in what might be called the ‘real world’. Little detail is given about Richard’s life in England, but we are given no reason to suppose that he is unhappy there or in need of escape from anything. Beautiful and isolated as the Beach is, there seems little contrast between the characters lives there and their lives before, making the plot escalation about the impending destruction of life on the Beach a little underwhelming. They enjoy living there, but it doesn’t seem to have changed them in any way. Swim, catch fish, eat. Meh.

They scorn what they call The World, but they have failed in any meaningful way to live apart from it. Beach life is notably non self-sustaining, as they are reliant on occasional trips to the mainland to purchase rice, as well as the batteries they need for their Gameboys and other ‘essentials’. Seriously- much of the text is given over to who has the Gameboy, what their high score is, and when they're getting their next shipment of batteries. We are meant to accept that the Beach, at least at first, is the ultimate getaway from the world, but at the same time the characters there seem not to have lost their interest in it. Richard frequently doesn’t seem too pushed about whether he continues living there or goes home, and when he finally makes the decision to leave, he convinces several others to accompany him with almost pathetic ease. So when the shit does hit the fan and the community collapses, it’s sometimes hard to feel that much has been lost.

Of course, it’s possible that this is deliberate, and that the point of the book is actually how jaded Generation X are, and how they have it so easy that they don’t really appreciate anything, and how pop culture means more to them than real life. In this interpretation, by portraying the Beach as not being completely awesome, Garland sacrifices making the book work as an adventure story in favour of providing some deep social commentary. But somehow I doubt that that’s what he meant.

The Beach is definitely worth a read. Find a battered old copy in a second-hand shop and stick it in your bag alongside Lonely Planet and some pre-rolled joints, and you probably won’t be disappointed. Millions weren't. All the same, I have some deep reservations about anyone whose ultimate fantasy island getaway-situation involves a Nintendo Gameboy.

A Princess of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs

Carl Sagan has a lot to answer for. In 1980, the famous astronomer and rationalist (Dawkins would have loved him) wrote the book and TV series Cosmos. The book kicked around my house until I was of an age to read it, and I found it a real treasure- a sprawling account of the universe and our relationship with it, told through science, myth, history and literature. No stone remained unturned- in a chapter on Mars, Sagan rightly devotes as much time on the impact writers such as H. G. Wells and Burroughs had on the public’s perception of the red planet as the 1970’s Viking missions.

Sagan grows particularly misty-eyed as he recalls the exploits of Burroughs’ hero John Carter of Mars. He recalls daring adventure, exotic locales and beautiful heroines. He recalls the best damn two-fisted adventures in the history of literature. All in all, he recalls too much.

It was many years later that I finally got my hands on a Burroughs book. It was A Princess of Mars, the first book Burroughs ever wrote (in 1912), and the first one that featured John Carter.

Carter is a good ‘ol boy from Virginia who, at the end of the Civil War, finds himself destitute, and with ‘his only means of livelihood, fighting, gone’ (Not to worry, John. There’ll be plenty of fighting where you’re going). While prospecting in Arizona, Carter gets trapped in a cave by some marauding Indians. Apropos of nothing, he suddenly looks up to the sky to the planet Mars, and announces that, actually, as a fighting man, he’s always had a fascination with the planet of the god of war, don’t you know. He finds his spirit somehow transported to Mars, while his body lies in the the cave on Earth.

On Mars, Carter encounters a version of the red planet that was very much in the public mind of the time- a dying world of dried-up seas, cris-crossed with canals as ancient civilizations carry out last-ditch efforts to make the planet habitable. He encounters the Tharks, eight-foot tall green men with four arms who live to fight. He fights alongside them and earns their trust and respect, and eventually goes on an expedition to rescue the beautiful (and notably more human) princess Dejah Thoris from the clutches of an enemy people.

As Sagan notes in Cosmos, the popular idea of an old, dying Mars was largely due to an American named Percival Lowell, who also influenced Wells. Lowell was an astronomer who believed he could see canals on Mars using his telescope, and produced remarkably consistent maps and globes of their positions over a period of many years in the late 19th century, even going so far as to name many of them. He was a respected astronomer and no crank, and whatever it was that he was chronicling is still something of a mystery today.

So that was the state of Mars in the public perception, circa 1912. What Burroughs brings to the table is that his Mars is a place of ADVENTURE! Unfortunately, what 'adventure' means to Burroughs is endless captures, escapes and fights. Carter faces pulpish creatures on almost every page- in cities, in deserts, in arenas- but he’s such a designated hero that none of it seems to matter. He’s such a hardass that we never believe he’s in the slightest danger. Couple this with a ‘heroic, manly’ attitude reminiscent of Sir Galahad, and Carter quickly becomes a bore.

I am not prone to sensitiveness, and the following of a sense of duty, wherever it may lead, has always been a sort of fetich (sic) throughout my life; which may account for the honours bestowed upon me by three republics and the decorations and friendships of several lesser kings, in whose service my sword has been red many a time.

Not a humble chap, our John. He’s almost like Flashman played straight, and while this uncynical view of manliness and heroism is often part of the charm of early 20th-century fiction, here it grates immensely. Carter never admits a weakness. He’s nothing but a tremendous Mary Sue- a stand-in for the author, only faster and stronger and more popular. His black-and-white world view is vindicated by all the characters he meets- Thoris is good because she is a beautiful woman who knows her place and falls in love with him immediately. Tars Tarkas the Thark is good because, though a barbarian, he has a sense of honour and duty similar to Carter’s own. And bad characters are similarly flat- jealous and conniving from the moment they are introduced. Character development is not one of Burroughs’ strong points.

So is the novel saved by the exotic locales and fantastic events? For the most part, Burroughs neglects to describe the scenery and architecture of this I’m-sure-it-would-be-fascinating-if-I-could-see-it world. In fact, his most poetic prose appears instead on those rare occasions where he lets us know what the narrator is feeling- when he is scared, or anxious, or lonely. Of course, Carter is such a manly man that he doesn’t allow this to happen too often.

There are few ideas here beyond a straightforward adventure story. Attempts to flesh out the details of the Tharks alien society do add some depth and interest, but once we discover that these underachieving ‘barbarians’ are in fact merely squatting in the ruins of great cities built by a lost utopian race, who were of course wise, noble and very white, the charm does fizzle somewhat. As Carter is looking at the frescoes of one of the most beautiful buildings-

They were of people like myself, and of a much lighter colour than Dejah Thoris. They were clad in graceful, flowing robes, highly ornamented with metal and jewels, and their luxuriant hair was that of a beautiful golden and reddish bronze. The men were beardless and only a few wore arms. The scenes depicted for the most part, a fair-skinned, fair-haired people at play.

This is such a common trope amongst fiction of the period that it quickly becomes tiresome. Did anybody of the time, even just once, posit a utopian society that did not have elitist, racist undertones? Finding it in this novel, mentioned briefly and with no relevance to the plot, is quite disheartening. It’s like Burroughs interrupts the narrative to shout ‘hey kids, I know it’s not really relevant, but I thought I’d remind you that only white people can be civilized- even in fantasy!’

Perhaps it's unfair to ask such things of a rock-em sock-em pulp adventure. But the truth of the matter is that other authors have done this kind of thing, before and after Burroughs, far better. According to Sagan, there’s a lot more books where this one came from, but don’t be expecting a review of them to pop up here anytime soon.

The Devil Rides Out (1968)

It strikes me that there are certain kinds of ‘supernatural’ occurrences or superstitions that most people take more seriously than others. Obviously, few adults are deeply troubled nowadays by movies that feature stock horror elements such as vampires, werewolves and the like. But mention demonic possession, or ouja boards, or satanic worship, and these same people will begin to harden their eyes and quiver their lips.

“Well, I’m not superstitious,” they’ll say, “but there are some things out there that are just not worth messing with, right? I mean, just in case.”

For some reason, these elements are in a vague way treated seriously, and even with some element of real fear, by otherwise skeptical persons. Moreso than other fantastic evils, they seem to belong in some arcane corner of our real world. We all know a spooky story about someone who messed with ouja, and we’ve all noticed those ‘satanic abuse’ scandals which occasionally pop up.

It seems almost like shooting credulous fish in a skeptical barrel to make a scary movie using these elements- The Exorcist, The Wicker Man, and today’s feature, The Devil Rides Out, are all excellent films that gain at least some of their power from the fascination the public has with their esoteric subject matter.

Many moons ago, as a child, I was prevented from watching a movie by my mother. No matter that I gorged myself on daily repeats of taped-off-the-telly VHS versions of Jurassic Park and Terminator 2: Judgment Day. As scary and brutal as those movies are, they seemed to her to be definitely ‘fantasy’, and thus not deeply unsettling. But this old-fashioned, plodding supernatural chiller about uptight Englishmen messing about with pentagrams and goats’ blood, though containing little overt horror, was, for some reason, a no-no. Her reaction left a deep impression on me- that this kind of horror was somehow more serious, perhaps because it was something that actually happened in the real world.

Years later, I was able to track it down using the wonderful ‘I Need to Know’ board on IMDB. Turns out it was The Devil Rides Out, starring Christopher Lee, with a screenplay by Richard Matheson. Now that’s pedigree!

Christopher Lee plays the Duc de Richleau, an upper-class English gent who discovers that his close friend Simon has become involved with the Occult. Eventually, it becomes clear that the somewhat naive Simon, along with the beautiful Tanith, has come under the power of the black magic adept Mocata (played by one-time Blofeld Charles Gray). The Duke and his stalwart companion Rex Van Ryn track down Mocata’s satanic cult, crashing their midnight sabbat and having lots of car chases through the British countryside.

Richleau lives in a 1930’s Britain where the attitudes and class system of Victorian days has not yet entirely faded. He is an aristocratic gentleman of leisure, of the kind that would not survive the next War- his friends are all upper-class, and have servants and nannies for their children. Despite the budgetary constraints of the Hammer studio, the period feel is wonderfully evoked through the use of old country houses, fantastic sets and beautiful 1930’s cars. It’s a fun look at a dying world.

One of the strengths of the film is its restraint- the horror builds through a growing sense of unease rather than through frequent horrific imagery. Of course, in a movie about the occult, the film-makers are going to have to show something supernatural sooner or later. Aside from one early apparition, the film delays doing this for as long as possible- and with good reason, for the special effects are mostly disappointing. It’s really the only element at which the low budget really slaps the viewer in the face. It is strange to hear Lee constantly enthuse on the commentary that the film would have been much improved by the use of elaborate CGI boogies- seemingly missing much of what makes the film so effective.

Lee seems to have been a bit of a Dan Ackroyd for the 60’s, given his intense interest in the occult. He did much of his own research for the movie, making sure that all the Duke’s esoteric ramblings have a ‘genuine’ background in lore. Its something the movie shares with the source material- the 1931 novel by Denis Wheatley- and adds to making the subject seem credible.

All in all, The Devil Rides Out is an entertaining watch for those with in interest in Hammer films, British society in the early 20th century, and of course, those who enjoy performing the age old rite of the sacrifice of the white hen and the black cockrel when the planets are in alignment.

And for real Grand Masters of the Left Hand Path, here’s a link to a documentary about Hammer films.

Young Indiana Jones Chronicles- Ireland, Easter 1916

One of the great common archetypes of Empire-themed fiction (and reality) is the civilized white man who immerses himself in some alien culture, becoming involved in local affairs and generally having colourful adventures. The country he visits will, of course, be a Hollywoodized version of its real-life counterpart. Naturally, the exoticism of the country will be ramped up the max, and at every turn the hero will encounter interesting historical characters and events, despite the fact that they may not have been around at the same time. It's kind of like history as a theme-park, if you will. How exciting it is, so, to see Ireland finally portrayed in such a manner.

So Indiana Jones spent a little time on the old sod? According to the dubiously-canonical 1990’s TV show Young Indiana Jones Chronicles, he did. With unfortunate timing that Harry Flashman would be proud of, he arrives during Easter in 1916. Pulling into the port of Queenstown (now Cobh) bound for Europe and the Great War, he quickly leaves this writer's home county behind and heads for the capitol, where adventures await. Sean O’Casey, W. B. Yeats, the Abbey Theatre and the Easter Rising are all ahead of him. Ah well, at least there’s no snakes. Young Indy even finds time to romance the sister of future Taoiseach Sean Lemass (!).

As crazy as it sounds, this episode is actually one of the less cringe-inducing Hollywood versions of Ireland (or Diddely-Ireland, as Colin Murphy once called it). Because Young Indiana Jones Chronicles appeared to have been rather a big-budget show, they immediately trump 99% of movies set in Ireland by 1) actually filming on location, 2) actually getting Irish actors to play Irish characters, and 3) actually doing their homework regarding the history. Diddley-Ireland does occasionally raise its freckled face (there is a bar fight while stereotypical music plays), but its most conspicuous occurrence is rightly lambasted minutes afterwards.

When Indy first meets Lemass and his friends, the sister, who has no interest in nationalism, takes him to the music hall, where the audience sings along with a maudlin performance of ‘When Irish Eyes Are Smiling’. It’s played dead straight. Indy thinks that this is grand, until he meets the frustrated socialist playright Sean O’Casey.

“Have ye been to the theatre?” asks O’Casey. Indy says yes, but O’Casey bitterly corrects him on the difference between the stage-Irish of the music hall and the reality portrayed in the plays that run in the Abbey Theatre. O’Casey is wonderfully played by John Lynch. Throughout, the show does bravely attempt to hint at the complexity of the situation, but it’s through the character of O’Casey that this really comes out. Having said this, my favourite line in the whole thing is still when he calls Yeats a bollox. Neil Jordan was never so brave.

When the rebellion does get underway, the show does not simplify the nationalists by making them unquestionably heroic. They are rightly portrayed as brave men who knowingly sacrificed their lives for what they believed in, though through the character of O’Casey the show also questions the necessity of their violent methods. Nor does it whitewash the anti-nationalist sentiment that was common amongst the populace of Dublin. When the proclamation is read from the front of the GPO by Padraig Pearse- a moment of Irish history made sacred by decades of Fianna Fail education, and one that still causes a twinge in this writer’s innards-randomers in the street express skepticism and grumble about not being able to collect their pension.

All exteriors appear to have been shot in Dublin, with the city’s many beautiful Georgian streets providing an easy period feel. The GPO, acting as itself, provides a dramatic focus for the action scenes during the Rising. It’s really stirring to see such a seminal event in Irish history portrayed with a decent budget in the actual locations. It’s great to place the Rising alongside other epic set pieces of the British Empire- Rorke’s Drift, Balaclava, the Indian Mutiny, etc. Each of them was tragic, epic, dramatic, sad, and not at all simple. But sometimes it helps to have a fictional portrayal to bring it all home.

While Young Indiana Jones Chronicles is naturally primarily concerned with the tribulations of its foppish title character (young Indy is quite likeable, actually), the research and care given to this episode make sure that the Ireland he encounters is more than just a colourful background.

Most of the episode is viewable on Youtube- check it out here.

Traumatising Paranormal Literature

A strange and unsettling thing began to occur during the early 1970’s- the term ‘paranormal’ began to replace the older word ‘supernatural’. This may seem a trifling point, but it actually has a subtle importance. This new term was deliberately intended to indicate that the study of the weird had evolved into an actual science, with established rules and methods.

As a child, I was led by the literature I consumed to believe that the ‘paranormal’ was taken seriously by all. I presumed that most universities probably had departments dedicated to researching this most important of topics, with methods standardized by decades of practice. If the evidence was as overwhelming as was claimed in the books I was reading, surely only a fool would remain skeptical. After all, they laughed at Copernicus too, right? Obviously, movies such as Ghostbusters and Poltergeist didn’t exactly help to straighten me out on this issue either.

But at least I knew they were fiction. It’s those who promoted this stuff as fact, often to impressionable children, that I will concern myself with in this article.

A certain brand of scientific-seeming paranormal literature continued until the 1990’s, but it was certainly at its apex during the 70’s, when it seemed you couldn’t even pick up an astronomy book without reading at least a short chapter about those puzzling (but factual) flying saucers. But there was one man who did more than his fair share to convince me that we lived in a strange world. He was an Englishman named Colin Wilson.

Wilson is an infamous figure in British literature- a self described ‘genius’ whose philosophy work was first hailed and then reviled in the 1950s. During his extended exile from literary respectability, he produced books about the paranormal. Most appeared to be harmless potboiler-type collections of odd tales, with generic titles such as World Famous Strange But True. A closer look, however, reveals a more calculating, scientific approach that made the super-normal seem far actually believable (and hence utterly terrifying).

In the period after spiritualism had failed to change the world and the first wave of New-Age mysticism had broken, Wilson saw the ‘paranormal’ as exactly that- simply an extension of the natural world that we couldn’t yet explain. An umbrella term that could encompass apparitions (the term ‘spirit’ had too many religious, non-scientific connotations), UFO’s, extra-sensory perception as well as all manner of other weirdness, the ‘paranormal’ was different to what had gone before. For one thing, there was no spiritual aspect whatsoever. Any unusual phenomena-that most delightfully non-commital of words- was expected eventually be explained as a natural law. Kitchen implements are floating around your house? Spoons are bending? It’s just some aspect of physics we haven’t figured out yet. We’re not there yet, but we’re working on it. This week Uri Gellar, next week cold fusion. That’s science. This was the attitude that prevailed during this time.

By this logic, ghostly encounters that early 20th-century investigators would interpret using outmoded ideas like ‘souls’ and ‘demonic possession’ would instead be seen in the light of proper ‘scientific’ ideas such as ‘psychokinesis’ and ‘telekinetic energy’. Yep, I can sure see the boffins down at the lab congratulating themselves on that breakthrough in weasel-words.

Even old Freud was dragged into this reassessment of values, as the unconscious mind was called upon to carry out what was once the Devil’s work. Wilson in particular liked the idea that poltergeist cases were not what they seemed. Even if a poltergeist openly declared itself to be a demon or a witch or the spirit of a dead person, this was nothing but a cover story. The real poltergeist, according to Wilson, was the suppressed sexual energy of some troubled adolescent in the house. It’s true enough that most reported poltergeist cases have revolved around a child close to the age of puberty. It’s also true that during puberty, frustrations and tensions often cause intense feelings and emotions. And lastly, it’s true that there is much we have still to learn about how the mind works. Perhaps the unconscious mind sometimes taps into some store of energy during this turbulent time? Given an already-existing belief in psychic energy, the whole thing almost sounds reasonable! It’s a stirring concept- a poltergeist as a powerful manifestation of teenage angst; a pimply Creature from the Id.

When presented in the guise of a ‘factual’ book, these ideas were very impressionable to the young mind. Wilson believed he was helping to figure out and demystify the workings of the universe, but in fact he was making traumatizing phenomena seem horribly plausible. Imagine being a child in a world where at any time, for no reason at all, your house might be invaded by forces that could explode windows, cause chairs to march about the house, and create a cacophony of inexplicable sounds at all hours of the night. And knowing that ghosts might be explained by ‘tape recordings’, or energy from a violent, emotional event that is somehow trapped by the surroundings, makes them no less disturbing. If anything, it makes them moreso, simply by providing a convincing explanation.

Wilson was not, in fairness, writing for children. An outfit that does write for children, and that made some extremely strange decisions round about this time, is Usborne Publishing.

It was the 70’s. Everyone was getting into the whole ‘paranormal’ thing. But Usborne was, and is, a tried-and-trusted brand known for producing quality children’s books. When they publish a book about rockets, or pets, or the countries of the world, you know it’ll be a solid, educational read. So when they produced the Supernatural Guides in 1979, it was akin to announcing to the children of the world that this stuff was real.

The Haunted Houses, Ghosts & Spectres Guide is chock-full of traumatising nightmare fuel- floating heads covered with blood, poltergeists throwing children out of bed and pulling their hair, the spectre of a tongueless woman, spirits setting houses on fire- and all illustrated with horrifying pulp-esque oil paintings. Not only were the pictures seriously scary for a book with writing apparently pitched at the level of a ten year old, but nowhere did it indicate that this stuff might not be real. To the literal mind of a child there is no difference between a Supernatural Guide and a newspaper, so the presentation of the material in this way raises some serious questions.

A sample ‘ghost report form’ is even provided, with tips on how to investigate hauntings in a systematic way. Information was also provided on the history of the Society for Psychical Research, without mentioning that they were, at best, a group of dedicated, largely-amateur enthusiasts rather than a pillar of the scientific establishment. Prior to the age of instant information, how was a child to have the slightest shred of doubt that ghost-hunting was an accepted, matter-of-fact science?

Similarly, the Mysterious Powers Guide includes rundowns on ESP and other oddities of the mind, all of which are, again, treated as though they are completely real, accepted phenomena. The use of Zener cards (recognizable from the opening of Ghostbusters) to scientifically quantify the existence of mental powers is mentioned. So is the work of Cleve Backster, who famously believed that he had proven, using polygraph testing, that plants respond emotionally to the world around them. Such examples seem to provide the trappings of real scientific research, when in fact they were already discredited, fringe works. It is not the place to begin explaining how these researchers acquired false positive results -the explanations are far more complicated and less interesting than the initial results. The use of such material, out of context, provides a false image of the place of paranormal research within the scientific thinking of the day.


























These publications could only have happened in the 1970’s, a time when the paranormal was briefly regarded as a legitimate field of study by some. Today’s reader has to wonder whether the writers believed that this was really an important topic for children to read about, given the climate of the time, or whether they were simply careless in how they presented the material.

Flashman and the Mountain of Light

The British Empire- as some wit once said (probably a Belgian, too)- was acquired in a sort of ‘fit of absence of mind’. In this volume of old Flash’s adventures, G. M. Fraser shows his distain for this particular myth, and attempts to educate the reader (by way of Edgar Rice Burroughs) as to the real state of affairs in many of the Indian native states before they were ‘invited’ into the civilizing embrace of the British. Dipping once again into his well-thumbed volume of ‘Queen Victoria’s Little Wars’, Fraser comes out with an almost forgotten campaign to chronicle- the Anglo-Sikh War of 1845.

As the novel begins, the Punjab is in a state of unrest. Incompetent leaders shamble drunkenly on and off the throne as their own relations scheme against them. The Khalsa- the living embodiment of the Sikh nation and the most powerful, well-trained native army East of Suez, is spoiling for a fight, with its beady eye on the power-hungry East India Company to the south. And into this hellish situation is thrust one Harry Flashman. The table is set for a rare feast of literary delights.

As usual for late-period (though chronologically early: why doesn’t Flashman remember meeting John Nickelson again in 1857?) Flashman, there’s a political point to be made. See, in this case the British don’t want to own the Punjab. In fact, it’s useful to them as a buffer state against the hostile Mohammadan hordes of Afghanistan. It’s just that the damn Sikhs, being Oriental and all, can’t keep their affairs in order. Their rulers are so corrupt and debauched, with endless drinking and rutting going on at the Lahore durbar (court) that the country is about to tear itself apart. It all sounds rather jolly to Flashman of course, until he hears about the wanton cruelty of the ravishing Maharani. Yep, the Orientalism factor here is high enough to make Edward Said snap his hookah in half with anger. Oriental rulers are, by and large, barbarous, decadent and sensous; with Fraser’s famous historical accuracy, it's difficult to know how much of this is true and how much is Imperialist bilge. Many of the excesses of the native Indian state rulers were absolutely mind-boggling-witness the recent Victoria & Albert exhibition of Nabob finery. Regular parades, with elephants bedecked with jewels as big as your head, were the order of the day- and this at a time when most Indians were lucky if they could afford a nice patch of dirt to burn their wives on, as Flashman might have put it.

So eventually the British have to step in and sort all this out. How will it end?

Now while almost every Flashman book serves up a delightful curry of exotic thrills, Mountain of Light does a particularly sterling job of keeping historical accuracy and Fraser’s political commentary firmly within the boundaries of telling a rip-roaring good story. ‘Like a page out of Burton’s Arabian Nights’, says Flash frequently as he languishes next to dusky maidens in moonlit pleasure gardens, or clashes steel with blackguards and badmashes in a Lahore dungeon. Of course, he’s referring to the lavasciously-illustrated versions you could only get on the continent (that Burton, eh? Chap had a touch of the Flashman himself, I’d say). And the rub is that it was all- more or less- real. Palaces, beauties, dungeons, back-stabbing Viziers- it’s all in the history books. As if to make this point clear, Fraser includes Dr Josiah Harlan and Alexander Gardner (and comes close, by association, to including the incredible Joseph Wolff), both adventurers whose real-life careers were, if anything, more incredible that Flashman’s own. Sometimes the reader’s just gotta be reminded how strange truth is before (s)he’ll accept the fiction.

Though all the usual treats are present and correct, including Frasier’s ability to make the events of the past seem alive and real (they were, you know), Mountain of Light reads like the most fantastic adventure story ever concocted. In fact, when he hits this kind of magic equilibrium, his writing provides the kind of thrills that Edgar Rice Burroughs fails to provide for anyone above the age of 14 (I was intensely let down by Burroughs when I finally read him. Can you tell?).

No, it isn’t just the sex, juvenile and Flemming-ish as it is. There’s more to being ‘adult’ than that, I hope. Mountain of Light is simply an adventure story that functions on a higher level- it takes the basic framework of a Burroughs novel, but adds great writing, emotion, historical interest, politics and fully-rounded characters. There’s no reason why anyone who was intensely affected by John Carter of Mars or The Lost World as a teenager shouldn’t be able to get the same thrill as an adult, but the writing must rise to the occasion. Flashman and the Mountain of Light is the answer to this conundrum, and is simply one of the most enjoyable entries in the series.

Empire by Niall Ferguson

If it goes without saying that the British Empire is a great setting for tales of adventure and derring-do (and it should), then it must also be stated that, properly considered, the British Empire itself was really the greatest adventure of all. Of course, it may not have appeared that way to those executed in Delhi in 1857 or in Dublin in 1916. But to those who were in a position to appreciate it, the Empire certainly provided ample scope for thrills aplenty as fortunes were sought and squandered across the breath of the red-tinted globe. Not a view many would have qualms with, however they may now scoff at the seemingly simple-minded Victorian interpretation of events. But in Empire: How Britain Made the Modern World, Scottish historian Niall Ferguson seeks to convince the reader of an idea which may today seem far less palatable to many- that, by and large, the British Empire was a good thing. How well does he succeed?

The book functions by taking the reader on a whistle-stop tour of the Empire from its nebulous beginnings to its still-ongoing dissolution. Ferguson feels that the Empire (and thus the book) can be divided into certain periods- the scattered early Empire founded by pirates and privateers for strictly profit-based reasons, the continent-run-by-corporation that was early British India, the consolidation of government control in the mid 19th century and the more familiar (and frequently ridiculed) 'missionary' period during which Britain felt it was its moral and spiritual duty to 'better' the worlds lot. And all in under 400 pages.

Quite literally, it's a terrific story; as much a page-turner as any novel. Ferguson shows his skill at being able to juggle events occurring thousands of miles apart over a period of several hundred years and manage to keep them in some kind of context. Of course, many, many important events have been minimised or even left out. Pretty much anyone from a nation once affected by the Empire will have their own particular bugbear about this (my own is his one-line dismissal of Ireland's wartime policy of neutrality as 'shameful'), but considering what Ferguson is trying to achieve- an overview of the entire Empire in under 400 pages- there is surprisingly little to quibble about. He gives a fair indication of what attitudes and actions were prevalent in the Empire during the various time periods by focusing on certain key events. It seems beyond the wildest notions of even the most fantastic tales of Burroughs or Conan Doyle that events as varied and fascinating as the American Revolution, the Indian Mutiny and the Opium Wars could have their roots in the same political juggernaut.

As may be evident by now, Ferguson is not shy at exposing the brutality, hypocrisy and greed of those who ran the Empire. His is no one-sided polemic, and he refuses to whitewash the Empire's many sins. But his overall thesis is that, on the overall 'balance sheet', the good outweighs the bad. Yep- railroads, democracy, free trade and the end of slavery- all the usual suspects are present and correct. But Ferguson, known for his 'counterfactual' history, goes one step further and challenges us to answer some tough questions- what if the British Empire had never happened? How much better off would the poor, downtrodden colonies be?

Ferguson's rather convincing answer to this is- they'd be under the heel of some other Empire, and quite likely one that was a lot rougher than the British one. He chills the reader with visions of elseworld scenarios where Russia's brutal 19th-century land gobbling continued worldwide; where the Japanese empire followed the horrific rape of Nanking with the rape of all south-eastern Asia. Weather these visions strike you as realistic or ridiculous, they certainly provide some food for thought. These (and others) were 'political organisations' that did not construct Civil Services to look after the rights of conquered citizens. They did not punish members of their own race who wronged said citizens. And they certainly did not have cabinets at home full of liberal politicians always ready to sympathize with the colonised, criticize the colonisers and (however ineffectually) rally constantly for the independence of dominion states.

Certainly, Britain did not command the most evil empire in the gang, and things could certainly have been worse. Much worse. But does that excuse the evils that Britain did perpetrate? That's a debate for another day. Meantime, Empire does a terrific job of presenting a readable guide to the Greatest Adventure of All. Huzzah!

And for good boys who eat all their vegetables, here's a bonus link: Ferguson's recent and difficult-to-upload comments on Irish attitudes to Empire.

20,000 Leagues Under The Sea

There's one very good reason why I have not yet tackled reviewing the Wells/Verne oeuvre of 19th century early science fiction, and it's name is Jess Nevins. Were I to post a link to his site, you would simply never return, for you may rest assured that he is simply the best and most complete chronicler of Victorian-age fantastic fiction ever to suck ether. After he has completed one of his famously thorough reviews, anything left yet to be said on the subject is but the feeble-minded gibberish of an opium-sodden Pathan. Nevertheless, I will venture to provide a few words on the subject of Mr. Verne's book, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea.

Though one of the two best-remembered pioneers of what we now know as science fiction, Verne has always been regarded as the poorer writer. While many of his characters and ideas, in particular Phillias Fogg, Captain Nemo, the Nautilus and the moon-shot, are still well known today, his books are simply not often read. It is War of the Worlds, not 20,000 Leagues which is today on school curriculums worldwide. Why is this the case? For one thing, Wells used his science fiction to explore social issues, making them ripe for boring English-class over-analysis. Yep, you though you were reading about time travel, alien invasions and future worlds? Sorry mate, but you were actually being secretly lectured about the British class system, colonialism and socialism (probably at length too, knowing Wells).

Verne of course, being a Frenchman, and writing several decades beforehand, had no time for such nonsense. He wrote science fiction with an emphasis on the science. Leagues, for example, is really nothing more than an excuse for Verne to plan exactly how his most recent Big Idea (in this case, the Nautilus) would actually work.

Proceedings get off to a jolly good start when the French Professor Arronax, his odious assistant Conseil and designated asshole Ned Land set off to discover (and destroy) a mysterious 'creature' which has been attacking ships all around the world. Arronax, being a naturalist, believes it to be some sort of gigantic narwhale. Of course, to the surprise of nobody except cultural philistines and those who haven't read the back of the book, the 'creature' turns out to be none other than the Nautilus, a submarine-like craft that is well ahead of its time. It is piloted by the enigmatic Captain Nemo. Nemo rescues the other characters from a watery grave, and so begins their travels throughout his watery domain. Though they will see many marvels and wonders unseen by terrestrial man, Nemo makes it clear that they have sacrificed their freedom- he will never let them leave the Nautilus.

It has to be stated that Verne is a stiffer read than other writers of his type, and most readers will make their way through Leagues a good bit slower than they will through anything by Wells. The characters for the most part are so flat that they'd become invisible if they turned to the side, and really only exist to drop massive infodumps on the unsuspecting reader.

Oh God, the infodumps...

Verne has always been infamous for this kind of thing, and Leagues is no exception. It occasionally feels as if he's decided to write the book simply to show off all the research he's done. One character will say: "Why look at that curious island there on the horizon. I wasn't aware there was an archipelago in this area. What is it?" And another character will say: "Well, I'm glad you asked. You see, those are the Sandwich Islands, which were first scouted by the Portuguese in 1656, and later colonised by..." History, biology, geology- no subject is safe.

This can be pretty interesting when it's Captain Nemo talking about the Nautilus, for Verne has, as usual, worked out the exact dimensions and workings of his creation, and it is fun to see how such an incredible craft could have been constructed using only 1860's technology. Verne does cheat somewhat by having Nemo use an unknown 'type' of electricity, thus allowing him to perform feats that electricity was not known to be capable of at the time (and how come there's no mention of decompression?). But when Arronax and Conseil drone on and on about the kinds of sea life they encounter, the readers' eyes start to glaze over. These infodumps tend to consist of enormous lists of species names (often in latin) which will mean absolutely nothing to 90% of readers (now or then!). And if you're really unlucky, that little twerp Conseil will even start reeling off the taxonomy of each species. Why would Verne include this kind of thing? There's often no explanation at all for what he's talking about. Not everybody out there has a zoology degree, Verne (though ironically enough, Wells did, and he never felt the need to go on about it).























Lest we get carried too far out into the sea of negativity, I will mention that the Nautilus is an extremely cool idea, and one which has rightly continued to fascinate writers and filmakers. But it is Nemo himself who is probably the best thing about the book- a misanthrope who has cut off all ties with the land due to some undisclosed past horror (Indian Mutiny, anyone?). He's suitably moody and mysterious, and he plays a mean organ to express his inner anguish. He always knows how to get out of a jam, and this makes him quite smug. His genius may have made the world a better place but instead the world rejected him, and he has taken all he loves (great works of art and nature) on board the Nautilus and quit the land for good. This is definitely an attractive idea.

Verne works best as a kind of wish fulfillment, and when Leagues sobers up from its educational sermonizing and remembers that its supposed to be an adventure story, it does this quite well. Personally, I've always though that when it came to being stuck indefinitely in a sweaty tin can with several other men, Verne's other famous misanthrope Captain Robur (who flew an airship) had one over on Nemo. The freedom of the sky beats the freedom of the sea for me. I mean, even if you were obsessed with sea life like Arronax and C*****L are, wouldn't it get a bit boring on board the Nautilus? Verne tries hard to hide the fact (Arronax constantantly says that he's so 'busy' reading and looking at fish that he doesn't have time to be bored), but being unable to even go for a walk for months on end doesn't sound like wish fulfillment.

Leagues is worth a look, but had Verne spent more time on characterization and less on the infodumps he might still be read today instead of just fondly remembered.

Incidentally, do check out Jess Nevins' page here. And also this detailed, well-researched page on designs for the Nautilus.

Tales of Unease- Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

As a child, I knew that when a bunch of well-educated men in old-fashioned dress got together in their 'club' (whatever that was) and started to tell tall tales around a great warm hearth, there were only two ways in which things could pan out- they would inevitable end up (a) somewhere exotic, such as jungle or a desert, or (b) in a haunted house. In either case, an adventure would ensue. Of course, no women would be present during it, for they are troublesome, meddling creatures. Such is what comes of consuming the Right Sort of Literature.

Eventually, I discovered that the particular time and place during which these adventures usually seemed to occur was Britain, about one hundred years ago, and that the reason these educated, civilized men so often wound up in wild countries was that they, in fact, owned them. Ah. And so, as night follows day, as the training-montage-scene must follow the inspirational-speech-scene, my interest in tales of adventure and the supernatural led to an interest in the age of imperialism. But what has all this got to do with the creator of Sherlock Holmes?

Tales of Unease is a collection of Doyle's non-Baker St related stories, and wouldn't you know it, it turns out to be a veritable taproot of the archetypes I mentioned above. These stories are set in a world where upper-class twits (sorry, Brits) discover ghostly goings-on in every drawing-room and college dormitory (Oxford, naturally). I've aired my grievances over Doyle's use of spiritualism in fiction before, but in this collection he gets the balance just right. His characters, though mostly Mary-Sue type author inserts, are not fools and require about as much convincing as you or I would that something supernatural is truly afoot. This adds to the mood Doyle is attempting to create with these stories- the feeling that the world is a much stranger place that we had ever dreamed, and that we are on the brink of some great, if uncomfortable, realization. Of course, most of this will take the form of tables banging in dark rooms during seances, but you can't have everything, right?





















One thing you can have though, is mummies. Plenty of 'em. In classic tales such as The Ring of Thoth and Lot 249, Doyle appears to have contributed to the then-growing idea of Egyptian curses and mysticism. These stories in particular appear to have been among the first to introduce the elements of immortality, reincarnation and lost love to the mummy cycle. Lot 249 in particular is one of the most enjoyably creepy shorts in this collection. There's little doubt that these stories influenced most of the ideas regarding Egyptian mysticism that followed, climaxing with the 'real-life' curse of Tutankhamun in 1922, as well as the 1932 Karloff movie.

Special mention must go to The Captain of the Polestar, in which the crew of a whaling ship in the frozen north begin to see strange things out on the ice. Here, Doyle is drawing on his own experiences of being ships' doctor on a whaler, and the resulting images of the endless white desert are indeed haunting. It's a great example of 'less is more'- knowing that whatever is in the readers' imagination is surely more wondrous than whatever he can provide in the narrative, the author plays it subtle with this one.

Special mentions also to The Horror of the Heights, for being the best (and only) damn story ever written about the possibility of giant sky-jellyfish living in our upper atmosphere. 'Aeroplaning' had only been around for less than twenty years when the story was written (1913). Doyle makes it seem almost reasonable-

'A visitor might descend upon this planet a thousand times and never see a tiger. Yet tigers exist, and if he chanced to come down into a jungle, he might be devoured. There are jungles of the upper air, and there are worse things than tigers that inhabit them..."

It's the kind of open-ended 'anything's possible' logic that Charles Fort would be proud of, but it does allow for a thrilling adventure. (This story in particular has always stuck with me, and I used the idea in my comic Laissez-Faire. Click here to read it!)

As for the rest, well they're a mixed bag, including some downright failures (there's something about a prehistoric cave-dwelling bear-creature wandering around South Kensington that just isn't scary). But there are plenty of Victorian-age novelties scattered throughout to tide the jaded reader over. Egyptians are mysterious, Turks are inscrutable and at every turn doughty and fearless (but modest)Englishmen swallow their fear in order to confront the strange mysteries that lie just beyond the veil. Even in the most horrific of circumstances-

'-there lies deep in every man a rooted self-respect which makes it hard for him to turn back from what he has once undertaken.'

In every man? I sure hope so!

Actually, though this kind of bluff claptrap is common among Victorian fictional heroes, Doyle might just actually have meant it. The man did attempt to enlist as a private in the British army during the Boer War (when he was 40) and again during the Great War (when he was 54!). He does seem like a chap who practiced what he preached.

As is well known by fans of genre fiction, Doyle rather hoped that he'd be remembered for stories that did not involve cocaine and violin-playing. Though not famous for it today, he was as good at constructing a genuinely creepy 19th-century ghost story as any more famous names you may care to mention. And of course, there's nary the rustle of a petticoat in the whole thing, as H. R. Haggard might say. At least, not the petticoat of a living woman. Muster up some of that late-Victorian can-do attitude and track down Tales of Unease.

Flashman and the Redskins

(Note: For my overview of the Flashman series, click here)

The wild west has always been of the classic stock settings for tales of high adventure. Incidentally, I've been there to see what's left of the place myself, and it's still an awe-inspiring part of the world. Truly an extreme environment in every sense of the word. Areas of vast emptiness incomparable to any part of western Europe are punctuated only by the occasional ghost town or abandoned mine to remind travelers of the tough hombres who once eked out a life in this parched country. And, as with most hellish parts of the Earth, it was probably inevitable that Harry Paget Flashman would wind up spending a little time there.

While most of Harry Flashman's transatlantic exploits have resulted in some of the more disappointing books, it seems that his creator, the late G. M. Fraser, had a bit of a soft spot for the bastard child of the British Empire. He really went to town on this one. For this book truly is the epic of the series- over 400 pages and 81 friggin' notes. Being a direct sequel to the much-inferior Flash for Freedom, this tome finds our 'hero' in need of a quick exit from New Orleans, circa 1849. After accepting passage with a traveling brothel (what else?), the old lecher effectively becomes one of the 'forty-niners'- those first colonists who headed west in that year following the discovery of gold in the Sunshine State. Thus, in his own words, he has seen the West 'almost from the very beginning'. To Fraser's credit, many hoary tropes now associated with Westerns are avoided- there are no sheriffs, saloon brawls or shoot-outs at noon. Instead, the first half of the book takes Flashy through largely wild, Indian-controlled country. The second part picks up over twenty years later, as he returns just in time to visit his old comrade-in-arms General Custer in the fateful year of 1875...

As usual with Flashman, anyone with leanings further left than the port side of a Nazi U-boat on its way to a BNP meeting will probably find something to be offended by in this chronicle of the old cad Flash Harry's adventures way out west. But in Flashman and the Redskins, the old apologist has his boistrous Briton produce possibly more racism than even I thought he had in him. Yep, as usual old Flashy is not shy about expressing his disdain for the natives of a foreign land, but this time I finally couldn't chuckle along with him. Perhaps it's because in this book above all the other, Fraser really sets down his agenda regarding the treatment of natives by the western nations, and the reader can no longer entertain the fantasy that the opinions expressed are there for 'period accuracy' alone.





























But behind all this, there are places in the book where Flashy really engages the reader in some honest debate, and leaves one feeling that there is at least another side to the story. An opening debate between an aging, experienced Flashman and a clueless strawman liberal about the treatment of the native Americans in particular is fantastically written. The conservative old goat is truly allowed to vent his bile in this set-piece scene, and with all the authority of someone who was actually there, he mercilessly destroys the dewy-eyed romanticism his nemesis holds for the Indians. A quote might be in order-

'"-try to enlighten a Cumanche war party, why don't you? Suggest humanity and restraint to the Jicarillas who carved up Mrs. White and her baby on Rock Creek? Have you ever seen a Del Norte Rancho after the Mimbrenos have left their calling cards?"'

Despite such sentiments, it seems Flashy does possess a little respect for the red man. His overall attitude regarding the winning of the West for the white man seems to be-

'"I don't condone it", says I, holding my temper. "And I don't condemn it either. It happened, just as the tide comes in, and since I saw it happen, I know better than to jump to the damnfool sentimental conclusions that are fashionable in college cloisters, let me tell you-"'

And as usual, it's Fraser's remarkable storytelling ability which carries the reader safely through the sea of racism, misogyny and ambiguous morality. And in this book, I think Fraser may have shown once and for all that he is one of the greats. As comedy, as historical fiction, as an adventure story, and as a piece to prompt some serious discussion about our changing attitudes towards race, Empire, and history, Flashman and the Redskins is distinctly top-class. The reader may not agree with his ideas, but rarely will he or she have encountered 400 pages that fly by so easily. Admittedly, the first part of the book is far superior- after Flashy's early Western adventures end, the novel seems to come to a natural, satisfying conclusion. The second part of the book occasionally feels like an overly-long tacked-on afterthought. But containing as it does a fascinating portrait of General George Custer, it is certainly not lacking in merit.

Now, to finish- a little story. I once read a Ray Bradbury tale about a man from the future who brought novelist Thomas Wolf back from the past, because he believed there was no man alive in his own time with the ability to convey, in words, the incredible future world he lived in. Rockets leaping from star to star, with tongues of fire in their belly (you know what Bradbury's like, right?)- what man had imagination enough to capture this time? No man since Tom Wolf, apparently.

Conversely, I reckon that almost no writer before Fraser could convey the old West in quite the same way. This book is not simply the obligatory 'Wild West' entry in a series of 19th century-set adventures. Instead, it should be an important entry in anyone's collection of Western-themed literature. So why not mosey on down the trail, hang em high, and break out the Back to the Future Part 3 soundtrack as Flashy heads West?

The Rise of the Indian Rope Trick by Peter Lamont

I owe a little something to Peter Lamont. For years I have been fascinated by the Victorians' tendency to portray Eastern cultures as being alien and mysterious, but I never thought to question why they did so. In this book, Lamont finally nails the reason. He has also necessitated this review, which incredibly is the first mention of British India in this blog! Salaam, sahib!

Lamont is a Scottish magician, and like the many magicians throughout history that he describes in The Rise of the Indian Rope Trick, he has a particular penchant for spoiling other people's tricks, and for pointing out that if something seems too wonderful and fantastic to be true, then it probably is. In this fascinating volume, he deflates the famous myth which perhaps most typifies the mystic image of the East.

Everyone thinks they know the Indian Rope Trick. A fakir (or faker, if you prefer) causes a rope to rise into the air. A small boy climbs the rope, and disappears at the top. The fakir will often ascend the rope after him, and in more extravagant versions of the trick, will chop the boy into pieces that will be re-united at the end of the trick. It's generally accepted that, even if it's nothing but a legend, it's an age-old Indian legend. Explorers from antiquity such as Marco Polo and Ibn Battuta are often claimed to have reported seeing the trick during their travels, thus apparently cementing its timeworn status.

With admirable scholarship, Lamont proves that this is not the case. The trick, in fact, was mostly invented by a now-forgotten American journalist called Wilkie in a 1890 article for a Chicago newspaper. Because Wilkie included elements from the real life tricks of Indian fakirs and jugglers (such as those seen by Polo and Battuta), his Indian Rope Trick became quickly accepted as part of the canon. Thus Lamont skilfully shows how easily fiction and fact can become intertwined. Within decades, witnesses were claiming to have seen the trick during the mid 19th century, and academics produced 'evidence' showing that the trick had been around for centuries.

Lamont's most interesting point concerns the reason why the idea of the trick caught on, and why it proved so difficult to discredit. Essentially, his thesis is that the West created a 'mystic East' just at the point when it needed it most- the 19th century, when its own sense of mystery and superstition was being killed off by that new candle in the dark- science. It seems that mankind, on some unconscious level, needs the world to be a bizarre and inexplicable place, and if that isn't the case at home, than it must be so someplace Other. India in particular was portrayed as a land of murderous thuggee cults, rampaging juggernauts and gravity-defying yoga mystics. In short- a world where the ordinary rules don't apply. A natural home for a wonder such as the rope trick, eh memsahib?

For imperialists, this view also served as a handy justification for colonization- a useful reminder that natives of foreign lands were naive and superstitious, and therefore in need of direction from worldly Europeans who were of course above such things- or so they thought. For the Indian Rope Trick was conceived and perpetuated entirely in the West. In fact, no-one had even heard of it in India itself until the 1930's, after which it somehow became accepted as a part of Indian 'culture'.

The book is written in a very peculiar semi-humorous style. Several aspects of its construction seem to mess with the medium; such as when Lamont quotes a historian who wrote about the need to check primary sources- and then admits that the quotation, and the historian, are both fictional. With stunts such as these he reminds the reader of the strange relationship between print and belief.

Like David Standish, Lamont frequently appears to look down on his subjects, and humiliates them simply by quoting them at length and allowing them to 'hang' themselves. The book also concludes rather unexpectedly with a searing attack on tourism and wonder-seeking in modern India that is as witty as it is cringe-inducing. But despite such quirks, The Rise of The Indian Rope Trick comes highly recommended for anyone fascinated by 19th century magic, spiritualism, or the nature of belief.

By focusing on the Indian Rope Trick alone, Lamont describes our need for this 'mystic' India. Given the still-current fascination with Indian yoga and spiritualism, it seems this need is still very much with us.

(If you're interested, check out some videos of the rope trick here- which comes with the standard bogus history, and here for a more modern version.)