Back | Next
Contents

Part III:
Ruthven Agonistes

Ruthven Agonistes

Henry Martin Ruthven (b. 1926), the principal of the short story "Corridors" which concludes Engines of the Night is not an autobiographical figure. Of course he cannot fail to contain aspects of the author—the central point of "Corridors" is the commonality of science fiction writers—but he was consciously and deliberately modeled upon a real figure whose identity, you betcha, I will never divulge.

 

From the story's completion there was always the temptation to make of Ruthven what Doyle made of Holmes or Salinger of the Glass family. I resisted that temptation for many reasons—the Glasses plainly sunk Salinger for instance and Doyle was driven to kill Holmes (unsuccessfully) but when Scott Edelman, then editing Science Fiction Age asked in 1992 for a sequel, I did not resist. There seemed a little more to say about Ruthven after a decade and I said it.

 

I then guarded against the lure of further Ruthven stories by performing the necessary. Ruthven would understand. He always did. He understood more than I did. He has, in fact, and as in Engines of the Night the last word.

 

Back | Next
Framed