ELECTION YEAR, U.S.A.

The world holds its breath: lives, livelihoods, the welfare and integrity of people and peoples all over the globe hang in the balance with every shift of power in the U.S. or U.S.S.R. The world watches, waits, listens. We talk.

Speeches, debates, discussions, panels, symposia, lectures, letters-to-the-editor, political advertisements, pamphlets, articles, poems, songs, records, cartoons, books.

And more books. Not just the predictable biographical, autobiographical, analytical, eulogistic, polemical, and predictive volumes by and about the candidates and would-be candidates, but a veritable river, spate, flood of argument, narrative, pejorative, paean, satire, sloganeering, data-processing, policy-interpreting, philosophical, scientistic, spiritual, idealistic, pragmatic, prejudiced, protesting, and patriotic literature in every possible guise and disguise.

Not just another Presidential election, but a time of grave decision on issues we will probably never have a chance to reconsider: a time of crises as immediate and important for this country as those of the 1860's, as vital to the rest of the planet as those of the 1930's. A time of national dissatisfaction without historical precedent: I doubt that anyone from the President down is satisfied or optimistic; never has U.S. prestige been so low with its own citizens —never before has the phrase "my country, right or wrong," been so charged with ambivalence.

Twenty years ago, when the seeds of the monstrous issues of today were sprouting in the ideological fallout of atomic victory, science fiction proved to be by far the most effective medium for prophets and propagandists. Nuclear and biological warfare, the population explosion, automation, possible planetary pollution, technological proliferation, were all topics indigenous to the genre, and (then) so little understood by most of the reading public that they could neither be treated as given in "realistic" novels, nor taken straight in non-fiction (on any level below the rarified, militant one of the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists).

Then, in the fifties—Eisenhower, and Sen. Joseph McCarthy—the science fiction magazines were, for a while, the only pop arena in America for the dissemination and examination of nonconformist and dissident ("subversive") ideas. The use of the genre for this purpose became so familiar to a growing body of "mainstream" writers, that at least one new-won enthusiast swung considerable critical weight behind his conviction that political and social criticism was the only valid use of science fiction.

S-f writers generally refused to be limited to this aspect of the field; but the science fiction idiom was adopted by other mainstream writers, and even more by journalists (columnists like Buchwald and Baker, Mad-type satirists, documentarians like Hersey) as a standard vehicle for political comment.

Today, the science fiction infield is actually far behind the "underground" and even much of the mainstream, in the extent and intensity of its criticism of the status quo. Nor is the medium intrinsically particularly well suited to the examination of intergroup confrontations and institutional moralities. Nevertheless, it seems that every philosopher, politician, moralist or people-watcher currently without platform has, this year, bethought himself of Swift, Wells, Bellamy, Huxley, and Orwell, and sat himself down to construct a novel around his own analysis of the ills of society or his individual recipe for salvation.

Since many regular writers of s-f can also be described as unemployed philosophers, a number of "message" novels and a general trend toward political themes are evident on the regular lists of publishers specializing in the genre. Others—depending on the author's reputation and political position—come from mainstream publishers, and some are even privately printed.

As most readers of this magazine already know, I too have certain strong political biases. I also like to believe that I am capable of recognizing literary merit even in a book entirely opposed to my own way of thinking. But art and propaganda are poor bedfellows at best, and even in the books closest to my own convictions, I have found none so far that merit high praise for their purely literary virtues: the best one can say of some is that they contrive to be entertaining while instructive, and of others that they are provocative enough in content to compensate for novelistic ineptitude. In any case, I make no claim, in this period of political passions, to a detachment amounting to perversity, which would permit me to admire the logic of a book whose premises I consider seriously in error—or recommend for pre-election reading a convincing argument for the Bad Guys.

What I can do, in an (only slightly reluctant) effort to be "fair," is open this column to opposing views; I therefore invite anyone who feels that books representing his views are being slighted or ignored here, to submit reviews to this space.* (The most interesting reviews will be used in the letters column which began in the May issue. Please limit comments to 250 words.—Ed.)

THE REPORT FROM IRON MOUNTAIN ON THE POSSIBILITY AND DESIRABILITY OF PEACE first appeared in shorter form in Esquire, and was then published by Dial at $5.00; both versions were introduced by one Leonard C. Lewin, presumably an editor at Dial, who presents the document as the final report of a "Special Study Group" convened (by "unnamed government administrators of high rank") in utmost secrecy in the summer of 1963, and as quietly disbanded in the fall of 1966, after its own decision to suppress its findings. The publication of the Report is purportedly due to determined opposition to the idea of suppression by one member ("John Doe") of the 15-man commission.

“. . . the unwillingness of Doe's associates to publicize their findings," says Lewin, is "readily understandable," since their recommendations were based on the conclusion that "lasting peace, while not theoretically impossible, is probably unattainable; even if it could be achieved it would almost certainly not be in the best interests of a stable society to achieve it."

The deadpan approach slips only occasionally, and then only by the tiniest margin, into obvious farce—and I kept trying to explain away these small clear signs of send-up, wanting the "Study Group" to be real, wishing I could believe that there were high government officials prepared to sponsor, read, and act on a report so cynically realistic:

"We find that at the heart of every peace study we have examined . . . lies one common fundamental misconception . . . the incorrect assumption that war, as an institution, is subordinate to the social system it is believed to serve.

". . . Although war is 'used' as an instrument of national and social policy, the fact that a society is organized for any degree of readiness for war supersedes its political and economic structure. War itself is the basic social system . . . which has governed most human societies of record . . .

"Wars are not 'caused' by international conflicts of interest. Proper logical sequence would make it more often accurate to say that war-making societies require—and thus bring about—such conflicts.

“. . . 'war' is virtually synonymous with nationhood. The elimination of war implies the inevitable elimination of national sovereignty and the traditional nation-state.

"The war system not only has been essential to the existence of nations as independent political entities, but has been equally indispensable to their stable internal political structure. Without it, no government has ever been able to obtain acquiescence in its 'legitimacy,' or right to rule its society. The possibility of war provides the sense of external necessity without which no government can long remain in power. . . ."

In this vein, the book describes the functions of war from economic, political, sociological, ecological, cultural and scientific viewpoints; then considers possible substitutions for the various functions, and concludes that none of the 'war surrogates' considered are sufficiently "technically feasible, politically acceptable, and potentially credible to the members of the societies that adopt them," although the closest single substitute—"development of an acceptable threat from 'outer space,' presumably in conjunction with a space-research surrogate for economic control"—is considered "unpromising" only in terms of credibility. ("New, less regressive, approaches to the creation of fictitious global 'enemies' invite further investigation.")

I have traced here, very sketchily, the line of reasoning presented under the subhead, 'Political' in the successive sections of the book, not because it is either the most incisive or the most likely to shock, but because it provided the final evidence of the fictional character of the book. Quite clearly, no administration capable of recognizing the callous truisms expressed here could possibly mismanage the conquest of Vietnam as badly as it is now being done; nor could a government of—after all—decent, civilized, twentieth-century Americans conceivably participate in the inhumanity of the present conduct of the war unless it had first come to believe its own mythology about the nature and purposes of the conflict.

IRON MOUNTAIN is neither fiction nor science, let alone science fiction—but it is the essence of politico-socio-economic science-fiction compacted into the fictionally scientific "Report" form, which has provided one of the great vehicles for contemporary s-f. The lack of plot is insignificant; the book is guaranteed to stir your adrenalin, no matter what your views: there is something in it to infuriate everyone.

There is more science and better fiction in THE CASSIOPEIA AFFAIR (Doubleday, $4.95), a novel by Chloe Zerwick and Harrison Brown (one of the early post-WW II anti-Bomb atomic scientists), which takes as its theme the impact of the discovery of an intelligent extraterrestrial planet on terrestrial international affairs—and more specifically, on the political and personal conflicts of two distinguished American scientists, one an Einstein/Oppenheimer figure, the other a Teller-type. Although the personal dramas are sometimes compelling, and the narrative is well paced and well told, the book lacks either the extrapolative logic or the excitement of IRON MOUNTAIN.

Hayden Howard's THE ESKIMO INVASION (Ballantine, 75¢), on the other hand, is one of the worst-constructed novels I have ever read—and one of the most brilliantly radical examinations of the philosophic and spiritual/moral premises on which, essentially, all aspects (however opposed) of contemporary American thinking are based. The book was first published as an extended series of short stories in Galaxy—of which the first was excellent, and the others increasingly tedious. It is a method occasionally utilized successfully by an accomplished and experienced novelist. This is Howard's first novel, and the stories, strung together, are almost as dreary as they were separately—until the explosive final sequence fits them together. The warm, affective opening should carry you a good way into the body of the book, and you can then look forward to four or five more exceptionally moving and convincing scenes en route. But even if it goes very slowly much of the way, it is a book to be read, and not skimmed too much.

I look forward to Howard's next novel; I hope it is being written with book, rather than magazine, publication in the forefront of the author's mind.

In much the same category is LET US REASON TOGETHER, "A Novel of Election Year, 1968," written and published (paperbound, varityped-offset) by Thomas Morrill (Dupont Press, 1403 Stone Road, Tallahassee, Florida 32303. $2), whose name will be familiar to readers of that unique journal, The Worm Runners' Digest, as the author of the memorable "Alice's Adventures in Evolutionland."

I wish I could say that Morrill has the same flair for Swiftian savagery that he had for Carollian pastiche. This is a heavy-handed leaden-footed novel about President Lyman P. Pinson (and his wife, Bug), his boyhood companions, Joseph (now General) Arim and Junior Sexton, now known as Ex. Other characters include Marylin and Robby Colleny, Nick Dixon, and a cross-section of dissenters and conspirators in "'The Underground." MacBird did it better—or anyhow funnier—except for one thing: this book has something more to say, and the reader with the capacity for endless conversations, expositions, and set-scenes characteristic of Moskowitzian ("classic" 1930's) science fiction will find it worth the effort before he is done. I say this in full expectation, and with the warning, that not one in a thousand readers is likely to find himself in full, or large, agreement with Morrill's thesis, which builds from the premise that American entry into World War II was the initial error from which the Vietnamese involvement grew, and from which a true Police State is in process of growing. But you may be surprised—and upset—at the way the lesser premises cling together, given this foundation.

Also, I think, privately printed (Arcturus Pub., 1044 Lake St., Oak Park, Ill.) is Lowell B. Mason's THE BULL ON THE BENCH, the life story of Justice Thomas Bullock of the Supreme Court of Moovalia—the sovereignty which replaced the United States of America after an atomic Doomsday effected some swift gene-switching in humans and cattle both:

"With humanity spiritually impotent, and cattle freed of their muteness, the latter forged ahead . . . adopted the Constitution . . . drew up a Five Year Plan . . . issued Position Papers, Proclamations, Directives, and Orders in Council. With that splendid generosity common to all who find it easy to take other people's property, cattle proceeded to care for their ill-fed, ill-clothed, and ill-housed relations still wandering about in open pastures."

The author was a Federal Trade Commissioner under President Truman, to whom the book is dedicated, with a nostalgic reference to the Truman Credo, "If you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen!" Those whose political memories, like mine, go back to pre- (Joseph) McCarthy times, will understand me when I say this is a truly Trumanesque book: knowledgeable rather than intellectual, more humorous than witty, not dirty but earthy, riddled with inconsistencies yet punctuated with sudden satisfying insights of a sort that seem to have vanished entirely from my world. This is a morality tale of the nobility of the Individual in the sinful morass of Welfarism. It would be nice to believe; it was refreshing to read; it is sad to have to remember, at the end, that the last claim of technologized man to that kind of simplistic Honor went up in mushrooming smoke over Hiroshima, on Mr. Truman's orders.

Patterned like THE BULL, Olof Johannesson's THE TALE OF THE BIG COMPUTER (Coward-McCann, $4.00), translated by Naomi Walford from a Swedish novel by the pseudonymous scientist/author, is a "future history" of the evolution of life on earth through the age of humans and the "Symbiotic Age" to the beginning of the true Computer Age. It may be full of telling points; I wouldn't know: it was too dull to read.

—JUDITH MERRIL