Past Master
Page 23
A note in Lafferty’s papers at the University of Tulsa (Department of Special Collections and University Archives, McFarlin Library) suggests that he began the novel as a short story, taken from an earlier novel written around 1964; a complete typescript of the story is among Tulsa’s holdings. Lafferty later expanded this story to novel length and sent it to Terry Carr at Ace Books, who responded in detail on April 6, 1967: though Past Master had “all the makings of a very fine sf novel,” it suffered, among other things, from sometimes “stilted, mannered, lifeless” dialogue and “too much exposition,” and it needed reworking. Lafferty submitted a revised version on May 20 (“you’ve fingered quite a few of the things that are wrong with it, and I’ve figured out several”), and on June 9, Carr agreed to publish it. While praising the book as “one of the most fascinating sf novels I’ve read in several years,” Carr asked for further revisions to the opening chapter and warned Lafferty that he expected to edit it significantly himself, offering his author the opportunity to review the text prior to typesetting, or in page proofs. Lafferty quickly revised the first chapter and “half a dozen other pages” that had been “bothering” him, and he expressed “no objection to any editing” that Carr wanted to undertake: “You can tell better than I can when I’m being redundant, and redundancy annoys me in other writers, so slash it down when it seems to need it.” He also declined to review his typescript further, or to see proofs.
The Ace Books setting copy of Past Master, now in the Iowa Authors Manuscripts Collection at the University of Iowa, contains additions (all of them in the opening chapter), cancellations (most extensive in the second half of the novel), and corrections throughout, in Carr’s hand. Carr took the added material from Lafferty’s penultimate draft. The cancellations and corrections were his own, “aimed at smoothing out the rough spots” in Lafferty’s final typescript. Lafferty’s acceptance of Carr’s criticisms and revisions appears to have been sincere rather than expedient: interviewed in 1991, he cited Carr as one of his favorite editors, along with Horace Gold and Damon Knight. A selection of passages excised from Lafferty’s typescript appears in the Notes.
In the notes below, the reference numbers denote page and line of the print edition; the line count includes titles and headings but not blank lines.
8.7 lorica] Body armor.
26.22 Holbein’s portrait] Hans Holbein the Younger (c. 1497–1543) painted More in 1527.
30.25 miserere mihi Domine!] Latin: Lord have mercy!
33.17 I’ve seen him.”] In Lafferty’s original typescript of Past Master, in which Thomas More is called Thomas Major, a punning Latin name that More himself used occasionally in his lifetime, the dialogue continues:
“Paul, do you know why I fell out of King Henry’s favor?”
“It had to do with the authority that the papacy should or should not have over the realm, I believe.”
“Nowp, that was only a contrived excuse. I threw him at wrestling, and the puffy oaf fancies himself a scuffler.” Then Major added words to this statement, so that Paul had to remonstrate with him.
“The four-letter Anglo-Saxon words went out of polite conversation about a hundred years after your death, Thomas. Gentlemen no longer use them, either here or on Astrobe.”
“Why, what words are those, Paul?” Major asked in his innocence. So Paul named him six of them which Major had managed with facility to employ all in the same sentence.
“Are you daft, Paul? Those are not Anglo-Saxon words at all. Three of them we have from the early Danes, two of them we have from the Normans, and one of them is low Latin. Having corrected that, I suppose it is all right that I continue to use them?”
“Everything you do is all right with me,” Paul said. “But they would not be in accord with the image we are trying to present you under.”
49.22 fawney man] A confidence man selling supposedly “discovered” gilt rings as gold.
50.13 electrum] A term describing several metal alloys or, less frequently, amber.
51.19 draiocht] Magic, enchantment, Druidic art.
63.5 Mother Carey’s own chicken] In British nautical usage, storm petrels were known as “Mother Carey’s chickens,” and Mother Carey, a corruption of mater cara (precious mother), personified the sea. See, for instance, John Masefield’s poem “Mother Carey” (Salt Water Ballads, 1902), in which Mother Carey is “the mother o’ the wrecks, ’n’ the mother / Of all big winds as blow,” and a companion of Davy Jones.
66.26 the Camiroi and Puca] Alien cultures described in Lafferty’s stories “Primary Education of the Camiroi” (1966) and “Polity and Custom of the Camiroi” (1967), and his novel The Reefs of Earth (1968).
79.14 fan-tan] A Chinese game of chance.
80.15 chine] Spine.
85.9 concentus] A word ordinarily referring to a harmonious combination of sounds.
92.3 Babes in the Woods] A traditional British folktale.
104.27 Taibhse] Irish: ghost, apparition.
128.11 scurrae] Latin: dandies, jokers.
139.23 rale] An abnormal breath sound.
140.9–12 “Deus, qui . . . efficiamur et simus.”] From a Latin Mass for the traditional feast day of Saints John Fisher and Thomas More: “O God, who didst raise up Thy blessed martyrs, John and Thomas, from among the English to be the defenders of the true faith and of the primacy of the holy Roman Church, grant that through thy merits and prayers, we may all become and remain one by the profession of the same faith.”
144.10 doxie] Mistress, female prostitute.
156.30 things fought in his mind.] An excised paragraph follows in the typescript setting copy of Past Master:
“For my past attitudes and errors I should have been barred from the Great Thing,” he spoke again to himself, “but the merging all-everything is all merciful. But I’m puzzled. Who saw it and who did not? Did it haunt any of the others? Did they suspect that it could happen? Aristocles and Aristotle, did they take it for gold or for fools’ gold, for they both touched on it. Did Frankie-boy who followed me in England take it for burlesque or for true vision? The French Francis who was a boy when I was a man, I know it was a great joke to him; he’d never let it haunt him. He was not one to be intimidated by his own giants. But the French Peter of a later date, he at least took it deadly serious, with the seriousness that they have only in Hell—or in Golden Astrobe. What a shriveled thing it does become when it is taken seriously! I know that the Butler fellow took it for burlesque. Damn all Utopias to Hell anyhow! But they are hells, what is the proper name of them. I made up a hell for the sneering fun of it, and now I must fry in it?”
161.7 rechabitism] The practice of abstaining from alcohol.
168.22–23 a jealous maw.”] In the typescript setting copy of Past Master, two excised paragraphs follow:
“Yes, the men of Cathead did revolt, blindly and ineptly,” Northprophet said, “and they are about to be finished. Your real mission here is to persuade them to give up, to cease marring the wonderful ways of Astrobe. It was believed that they would tie onto you as a hero, the one honest man, and would give up when you told them that it was hopeless. That, however, was the plan of those certain human leaders who resemble us, but not closely enough. We have our own ways of handling it. You cannot realize it from your archaic viewpoint, Thomas, but nine out of ten Astrobe humans will see nothing wrong with our programs even if they understand it. ‘Why not?’ they will say. ‘Sure, phase us out. What’s the use of life? If we believed that we were more than machines we would not be what we are.’ They will really accept it in this manner, Major. Men created us in more ways than one, you see. For they also have altered themselves to be very like us. They have been shaping themselves in our image for centuries, before they even thought of making us concrete things. Why not? Given the main premise, why not
accept its conclusion. They shall have the great emptiness that they really desired for so long.”
“We tell you this, Major, because you cannot block us. And we will enjoy any futile attempts that you may make. You are one of the last of the transcendent men, a thing that we do not believe in. It is true that you say you are so only for a little while in the morning, but we have to regard you for it. Our automatic killers strike down all who have the transcendent smell on them. You block them because you are a freak of time. They have chopped down all except the besieged pockets in Cathead and the Barrio, and a very few slippery men.”
168.29–30 nothing at all,” Pottscamp said.] In the typescript setting copy of Past Master, two excised paragraphs follow:
“So, the pack of you were modeled on the libs,” Major said. “And they were Programmed Persons from the beginning. It is most odd that they should come to the fore beyond honest men, but false coin always drives out good. It’s true that they were always machine-things in their minds, and now they are the majority. Concatenated chowder-heads they are! They walk in lock-step and they bleat in unison! The sick twang of their falsetto chorus curdles the heavens. Fools’ fools they are.”
“Watch your talk,” said Holygee, “or I shall torture you in your brain with my extension. They are our fathers. They are our brothers, and we go into loving oblivion with them. And they are not all fools. Some of them have been very shrewd or they would not have come to the fore beyond divergent men. The bulk of folk, Major, has always been manipulated by a small number of astute men. And now the folk, in their terminal days, are manipulated by a small number of astute machines—ourselves and no more than a hundred others.”
172.6 two thousand year interval.] In the typescript setting copy of Past Master, two excised paragraphs follow:
It was for convenience that the First Year of Astrobe had been set at the two-thousand-and-first year of Earth era. This was supposed to mark the first viable Astrobe settlement—but it was not accurate. Actually, John Chancel was dead when the follow-up party returned to Astrobe right at the start of Earth year 2002. But a legend was created that he still lived at the time of that return, that with his dying words he passed on the torch of settlement to the return party. Those burning and dedicated, but never uttered words, are known to all. “I’ve had it, boys,” John Chancel was supposed to have said as he died, but in reality he had been dead about a month.
Nevertheless, they set the count that way. It was neater to have an even two thousand year interval than a two thousand and one year interval. It was neater to have it that way, but it took a trick to keep it that way.
177.26–27 why he passed it at all.] In the typescript setting copy of Past Master three excised paragraphs follow:
The Voracious Money Bill came through, amended, detailed, ridered, and supplemented. The original Voracious Money Bill, which the Lawmasters had sent back for improvement, had intended to stop money from eating up men and planets. The astute advisors, human, programmed, and outright-machine, pronounced the amended bill as the finest bill ever. Major understood correctly that the riders voided the bill itself, and turned it into a nothing bill. Money would remain as voracious as ever, and Major didn’t know how to curb it. Neither, he said, did Kingmaker.
“Economics had the opportunity of becoming the First Science, thousands of years ago,” Kingmaker said. “She muffed that opportunity, again and again. She missed being the first science. She remains the Last Sorcery. I don’t understand the stuff at all, myself.”
But he must have understood it a little, for he was the richest man in the Worlds. Thomas Major signed the Voracious Money Bill into law.
181.30 Will you sign it.”] In the typescript setting copy of Past Master, the following dialogue has been excised:
“Kingmaker, there has always existed the ‘Dialog of the Two Worlds.’ Why end it?”
“It’s ended itself. One of the worlds died, or was shown as never having existed at all. But the Two Worlds of the Dialog were never the Material World and the so-called Spiritual World. Those were only symbol words. It was the dialog between the more grossly material world, and the creative or artistic and inventive world, and spiritual was but a fanciful word for the latter group; it meant the material things that soar and climb, but the material nonetheless. Now the dialog has ended in any case. We are all of us material and creative and artistic and inventive at the same time, and much more, for we are perfected. There is nothing beyond us, nor could there be. Will you sign it tomorrow, a bill of its own, clear and uncompromised?”
183.9 nothing here which is living.”] The typescript setting copy of Past Master continues with the following cancelled text:
“No, not even twelve mustered for the end of the thing. In any case, the Metropolitan hadn’t been appointed at all. In five hundred years, not one Metropolitan has been correctly appointed. The first one died on his trip to Astrobe. Communication between the Metropolitans and the Papacy on Earth has always taken eleven years round trip; they are limited to light speed, they aren’t permitted Hopp Equation travel or communication. No communication has ever been completed. Either the Metropolitan or the Pope dies in the interim. A conversation cannot be carried out if one party drops dead every time before his hello is answered. Well, one provision of this proposal is that we take the space telephone away from them. We forbid an intercourse that has no meaning.”
“Why,” Major asked. “Isn’t it that you fear it still ties us to the only thing that has any meaning at all? Like the programmed, you’d exile all meaning. If the proposal is harmless, as you say it is, so are the practices against which it is directed. But there’s a curious fact which you forget. Every Metropolitan has taken office on the day of the death of his predecessor, and there has never been any doubt as to who the new Metropolitan should be. In every case, the Papal appointment was later found to have been made on that very day, five and a half years before the Pope could have known of the death of the old Metropolitan by natural means. And in every case, the new Metropolitan set down in his day book the exact words of his appointment, five and a half years before he receives them. It is clear that they do have dialog. For some reason, you wish that they hadn’t.”
“That’s the stuff legends are made of,” Kingmaker said sourly.
“So am I,” said Major. “And a new Metropolitan has been appointed while we talk here. And he was not one of the four last followers. He was a priest who apostacized thirty years ago, and is now called back to this thing.”
“Who has told you that nonsense, Major? A bird?” Proctor mocked.
“No. An ansel. Your pushing for this ban interests me.”
194.3 “Blessed be this rum,” said Evita.] A cancelled passage follows in the Past Master setting copy:
Then Evita told the story of the rather stiff men who died and came up to Heaven. Now it is a fact (you have heard it before, we’re sure, but you may have forgotten it) that no stiff person can enter Heaven. The unbending ones go to Hell, or they loosen up a little. It is harder for one of them to enter than for a man with the bongo to go through the camel’s eye.
So a bunch of the boys and girls up there thought they’d have some fun with him, get him to loosen up a little, and maybe even save his soul.
“Mount upon this blessed donkey,” Saint Jerome told him; and they brought a big razorback hog that would almost cut a man in two. “And on it you will ride into the Kingdom where you will find a Mansion prepared for you,” said Saint Bosco. “I appreciate the honor,” the stiff man said, “but I never saw a donkey with a snout on him like that.” “Naturally not,” said Saint Klingensmith, “that is his tail.”
So they set the man on the razorback hog backwards, tied him onto it with a tarred rope, and put a hood over his head—“lest the great light blind you,” Saint Polycarp said. Then Saint Isidore of Seville doused the hog in the
rump with kerosene, and Saint Aloysius touched a match to it; and the hog took off down a dry-weather creek, snorting angelic noises.
“Glory to Gabriel!” the stiff man shouted. “The donkey seems to be blowing fire out of his mouth and running backwards. Are you sure this is the way one rides into Heaven?” “Tell you what, man,” Saint Anastasia called after him, “there’s a low culvert ahead, and that’s a dry-weather creek your donkey’s charging down. You’d better loosen up, or there’ll be Hell to pay.”
The hog had almost gone into orbit, when man and razorback hit that low culvert over Lost Soul Creek. And they splattered. All that was left of the two of them Saint Zephyrinus gathered up in a cigar box. “Ah well, bring it in,” said the Lord. “I don’t know which is man and which is hog, but, whatever it is, it’s loose enough now.”
“Blessed be this rum,” said Foreman. “And who told you that story, Evita?”
“It was Mary told it to me. We archetypes get together sometimes and talk.”
204.18 Barnabas] An early disciple of Christ and later Catholic saint.
212.26–27 Pater, in manus tuas—] Father, into your hands— (echoing Christ’s last words on the cross; see Luke 23:46).