However, nothing in Zebrowski’s works is ever quite what it seems, because the very act of moving back and forth through the portals alters either the viewer or the viewed in ways which are sometimes subtly, sometimes grossly skewed from the original. Eye color may be changed, or the outcome of a football game—or the fundamental history of the world as Obrion has known it. Why did the alien race develop this alternate mode of transportation? Why have all their facilities been abandoned? Where have they gone? Can mankind use these structures to ensure its survival? The answers to these questions lead Obrion and company on a strange odyssey beyond the universe to an existence outside time and space as we know it.
The author’s third major work, The Killing Star (with Charles Pellegrino, 1995), poses another curious question: if the universe is filled with intelligent life, as Carl Sagan and many other scientists have proposed, must they necessarily be as friendly as has been postulated? And if they’re not friendly, or even if they’re just a little bit afraid of what we might do to them in the future, won’t they do it to us first? Within the first few pages of this gripping adventure set a hundred years hence, most of humanity is wiped out by an unseen alien race which has decided to dispose of a potential problem with humanity before it arises. By accelerating rocks and other debris to near-light speeds, the unseen enemies create devastating bombs that home in on all radio emissions in the solar system, eliminating 99% of the human species within a few minutes. All that survive are isolated outposts and ships, and these are quickly targeted for “mop-up” operations by the alien intruders. The bulk of this gripping saga deals with the efforts of the remnants of humanity to survive and fight back, countering the overwhelming alien presence with new and innovative scientific discoveries.
Zebrowski has penned more than just these three novels, of course. His young adult series, The Sunspacers Trilogy (comprising Sunspacer [1984], The Stars Will Speak [1985], and Behind the Stars [1996]), has been well-received in the juvenile market. His numerous short stories include significant works of science fiction, horror, fantasy, and mainstream fiction. His editorial credits include numerous original and reprint anthologies, and long service as co-editor of the Bulletin of the Science Fiction Writers of America. He also has gathered together several collections of his essays, including the groundbreaking pieces on Eastern European SF featured in Beneath the Red Star: Studies on International Science Fiction (edited by Pamela Sargent, published in 1996), and the forthcoming selection of autobiographical essays, Perfecting Visions.
Most of Zebrowski’s fiction focuses on man’s attempts to rise from the mud of his mundane existence and lift his face to the stars. If our race is to survive the wars and chances of planet-bound existence, he seems to be saying, we must leave this place for the limitless reaches of outer space, we must find new challenges for the species as a whole. Life on Earth is inherently flawed, for by creating a world on the edge of collapse we have imperiled our own future existence. In Zebrowski’s cosmos, limited or unlimited, Earth (the soil) is Hell, the stars (the universe) are Heaven, and humanity can become either god or devil, savior or destroyer, as he or she so chooses.
28. DERYNIAN DREAMS
THE FANTASY WORLDS OF KATHERINE KURTZ (1991)
The beginning of the tale, as related by the author in The Deryni Archives, derived from an especially vivid dream which came to her on the night of October 11, 1964. Kurtz summarized what she remembered of this vision on a 3 x 5” card, and shortly thereafter expanded the scenario into the novelette, “Lords of Sorandor.” “Sorandor” was in turn reworked into the climactic section of Kurtz’s first novel, Deryni Rising.
These journeyman efforts contain all of the seeds of the author’s later work. Katherine Kurtz has spent much of her creative life developing an alternate fantasy world centered around the medieval state of Gwynedd, the central kingdom of an area patterned roughly after tenth-to-twelfth-century England, Scotland, and Wales (in our own world, Gwynedd was an ancient name for Northern Wales). Although we can see rough similarities to medieval Britain—in language, culture, religion, and politics—there are equally striking differences.
Gwynedd and its neighbors are peopled by both humans and Deryni; the latter are outwardly similar to man, but have the innate ability to perform acts which their fellow humans regard as magical. These psychic talents vary considerably from individual to individual, and may be developed further with appropriate training. The history of Gwynedd has been marred by a series of conflicts between the two races, the Deryni having controlled Gwynedd for less than a century of its history. (They still control Torenth, a large neighboring kingdom, which they have ruled from its inception.) Such clashes have been exacerbated by lack of empathy between the two groups, by arrogance on the part of the Deryni, and by outright racial hatred and envy on the human side, with concomitant persecutions and pogroms of the Deryni minority.
Kurtz’s geography also varies significantly from the Europe we know, and these differences have themselves altered the political dynamic of the region. Unlike Britain, for example, Gwynedd is joined directly to the mainland; without the benefit of a channel buffer, it is immediately subject to invasion from hostile neighbors. The Mediterranean Sea does not seem to exist in this world, although references are made at several points to a “Holy Land” where Christ was born, preached, and martyred, much as in our own world. We can also see rough equivalents to the Moors, Gauls, and other ethnic groups from Earth, but no other obvious political, historical, or geographical correspondences with real-life medieval Europe.
The religious hierarchy of Kurtz’s world is also subtly different from that of medieval Europe, generally following the tenets of the Roman Catholic Church, but being organized administratively along the lines of our own world’s Eastern Orthodoxy or the Anglican Church. Thus, each major state contains its own autocephalous religious body, governed by an archbishop or patriarch chosen and supported by an independent ruling Synod. There is no “Pope” or central Church authority (indeed, no “Rome”) in Kurtz’s “Europe,” although Latin remains the official Church language, and the celebration of the mass its key ritual.
Kurtz has developed her world in four sets of trilogies and nine short stories, eight of the latter being collected in The Deryni Archives. “The Chronicles of the Deryni,” comprising Deryni Rising (1970), Deryni Checkmate (1972), and High Deryni (1973), relate the rise to power of King Kelson Haldane, who succeeds to the throne of Gwynedd at the age of thirteen when his father is assassinated. The Haldanes, although not traditionally Deryni, have the ability to exercise similar powers when these have been activated through a magical ritual. Kelson represents the new man, merging the best of both blood lines into one person, unfettered by the past and able to forge the nation into a unified whole. In these three novels Kelson defeats the two representatives of the Festil dynasty, consolidates his position as King, and begins exploring his arcane heritage.
“The Legends of Camber of Culdi,” comprising Camber of Culdi (1976), Saint Camber (1978), and Camber the Heretic (1981), take place two hundred years earlier, at a time when Deryni monarchs ruled Gwynedd. Camber, the Deryni Earl of Culdi, proves instrumental in locating the last Haldane heir, Prince Cinhil, whom he restores to the throne after the latter kills the Deryni King Imre. By the end of Cinhil’s reign the restoration has created a backlash against the Deryni minority, resulting in increasingly harsh measures and massacres, as the newly-appointed human bishops and peers assume the reins of power.
“The Histories of King Kelson,” including The Bishop’s Heir (1984), The King’s Justice (1985), and The Quest for Saint Camber (1986), return to the time of Kelson, picking up where High Deryni left off. Now eighteen, Kelson must face a revolt in the provinces, endure a marriage of convenience and the murder of his wife, and counter further unrest at home, as the surviving conservative bishops attempt to oust him and his government. He also faces treachery from within his own family, and ultimately learns that the art of states
manship must be tempered with the king’s justice.
“The Heirs of Saint Camber,” comprising The Harrowing of Gwynedd (1989), King Javan’s Year (1992), and The Bastard Prince (1994), are set in the years following the death of King Cinhil Haldane. The king’s passing brings the forces of repression to the fore, and the few remaining Deryni must go underground to protect the remnants of their persecuted race. One by one the King’s three young sons succeed to the throne and are killed by the human monsters actually governing the realm. But King Rhys Michael’s death is not without meaning, for he leaves a will that provides his supporters with a way of overthrowing the conservative rulers. The succession of his infant son, King Owain, promises new hope for the future.
Two additional novels return to the later era in Kurtz’s fictional universe. King Kelson’s Bride (2000) is by far the worst contribution to the entire series, reflecting an unfortunate amalgamation of incompatible stories of political intrigue in Torenth and an attempted romance in Gwynedd between the young king and his younger cousin. Alas, this book illuminates quite clearly the author’s total inability to present either believable women characters or believable romantic situations, and the attempt to shoehorn this “love story” into the usual political machinations fails miserably.
In the Service of the King (2003) returns to the era of two generations earlier, at the end of the reign of Kelson’s grandfather and the succession of his father, King Brion, but the tale seems in the end almost as tired and shopworn as Bride, reflecting a turning-in of the author’s fictional world upon itself, and a cannibalization of old scenarios and milieux. We have seen this all before—and better done at that!
Politics and religion are inextricably intertwined in Kurtz’s creation, as they were in our own history, with state and church constantly vying with each other and the Deryni minority for power and authority. The key players of these historical fantasies recognize that the price of failure is either disgrace or death. What sustains them is faith, an abiding and sincere belief in God, his Church, his anointed King, and their close friends and family as the key structures of society.
Even those depicted on Kurtz’s tableaux as cruel or manipulative largely perceive themselves as acting in the best interests of Church or state or family, often justifying their despicable acts through religious dictates that condemn the Deryni as evil personified. We may not applaud such individuals, but we can readily understand their motivations. The author’s villains are carefully drawn in shades of gray, not splotches of black and white; some even seem marginally sympathetic, being true in their own fashion to the world as they see it. In her fiction Kurtz consistently champions intelligence, duty, sensitivity, love, faith, truth, and all of the other finer virtues. Such attributes do not always save her characters from the acts of evil-minded men, but they save their souls for eternity, and that is a far, far better thing to do.
In recent years Kurtz has begun a new series of fantasies co-authored with Deborah Turner Harris. The Adept sequence, beginning with The Adept (1991), and continuing with The Lodge of the Lynx (1992), The Templar Treasure (1993), Dagger Magic (1995), and Death of an Adept (1996), feature a group of Scottish and British occult detectives seeking to right wrongs and counter the influence of evil in the modern world. Kurtz’s solo novel, Lammas Night (1983), which is set during World War II, can be considered a prequel to these books. These novels, while entertaining in their own right, seem less effective than the Deryni books, perhaps because the contemporary setting decreases the verisimilitude of vast conspiracies and evil magicians working their wills over time on generations of insipid followers.
The characters in the Adept books are less ambiguous, more rigid in their beliefs, and ultimately less real. Ironically, the authors’ message shines through in these books even clearer than before. Man makes of this world what he will, Kurtz seems to be saying, either a heaven or a hell, and this condition clearly presages what he (or she) will ultimately become in the afterlife.
29. THE FAT MAN, THE CONSULTING DETECTIVE, AND THE SELLER OF SPECULATIONS
THE CURIOUS WORLD OF ARTHUR BYRON COVER (1991)
The world of Arthur Byron Cover reads like a Classic Comics version of Hieronymus Bosch: grotesqueries there are aplenty, unexplained and inexplicable, wandering the bizarre landscape of a caricature Earth, interacting with each other in curious and unique ways, seeking neither resolution nor evolution nor solution, but just existing as they are. Forget about plots, forget about the conventionalities of science fiction or fantasy, or of fiction in general: you won’t find them here. What you will find are orts from Cover’s intellectual table, pieces and snatches of characters, conversations, situations, perambulations, rearranged in new and interesting ways.
Take, for example, the author’s first novel, Autumn Angels (1975). We see a strange, far-future or other-dimensional Earth dominated by godlike beings scrapping over philosophical nullities while trying to establish his or her own position. Each has assumed the guise of a well-known fictional character of the past—from comic books, pulp fiction, motion pictures, or television—and is known to the reader only by the label of his or her choice (“the demon,” “the lawyer,” “the fat man,” “the other fat man,” etc.). The only named characters are two “bems” (“bug-eyed monsters” in SF parlance), Dwit and Xit, the aliens who had originally metamorphosed the race of man into “godlike man” as a joke. The plot, if such exists, meanders back and forth across a landscape of broken conversations and philosophical musings. Each of these beings is searching for a unique identity in a world where individualities have failed; each seeks something to give him or her purpose: a name, a self, a reason for living. But the best that the demon, the lawyer, and the fat man can do at story’s end, with all of their immense powers, is to cause the two alien bems to instill a sense of depression into their world, a form of negative identity that may help alter the stasis into which the godlike men have fallen.
The results of the trio’s action can be seen in two later works by Cover, “The Clam of Catastrophe” (in the collection The Platypus of Doom and Other Nihilists [1976]) and the long novel, An East Wind Coming (1979). “Clam” introduces the character of the Consulting Detective, a pastiche of Sherlock Holmes, who is hired by the three beings to discover why sexism, which they have introduced into the world of the future to offset the effects of depression, has divided the godlike beings into two warring camps. To achieve the greatness of mere man, the detective ultimately concludes, godlike man must explore the ramifications of love, not sex.
An East Wind Coming, the author’s major work of fiction, further explores the theme of identity, as the consulting detective and the good doctor must face the threat of a new Jack the Ripper, who is using an anti-matter knife to disembowel female godlike beings. After murdering his final victim, the Seller of Speculations (i.e., a bookseller: Cover himself is co-owner of a science-fiction shop, Dangerous Visions), the ripper is forced by the detective to destroy himself, thus ending the threat to the godlike beings. The right of the individual to be individual has thus been reaffirmed.
Three other Cover novels deserve some mention. The author’s second book, The Sound of Winter (1976), relates the story of Michael St. Claire, a would-be revolutionary, and his mute sister, Elizabeth, who travel from the City to the Wasteland, seeking a new way of life. Ultimately, Elizabeth regains her tongue, but is killed by her husband, and Michael comes to the realization that he never really understood anything about his sister’s character—or about life in general. The book reads like a nineteenth-century Russian travelogue, and remains one of the most accessible of his works.
Two later books, Planetfall (1988) and Stationfall (1989), plus Futurefall, an uncompleted third book in the projected trilogy, reflect a change in direction for Cover, utilizing synthesized pulp and animation influences to produce more directly a deliberately farcical and very broadly-based SF satire. Although billed as game tie-ins, these two fictions have very little to do with the a
ctual games from which they were theoretically derived, but take various elements from hackneyed science-fiction plots, reworking them à la Monty Python into a crazy patchwork of slapstick humor. Both are hilarious satires well-worth a second read.
The author’s other works include a readable novelization of the screenplay for Flash Gordon (1980), three time-travel gamebooks for young adults, two tie-ins to multi-author series (Isaac Asimov’s Robot City: Prodigy [1988]) and Robert Silverberg’s Time Tours: The Dinosaur Trackers, written with Tim Sullivan and John Gregory Betancourt under the joint pseudonym, Thomas Shadwell [1991]), and a handful of short stories, the latest of which appeared in Down & Dirty (1988), the fifth of George R. R. Martin’s Wild Cards mosaic novels. His most recent contributions have been to graphic stories in the comic book, Disney Adventures.
Cover’s novels share a certain common framework, jumbling together elements from science fiction, the pulps, magic realism, detective fiction, music, comic books, movies, comedy, and the theatre into semi-coherent polemics about the manner in which people live their lives. The author’s chief characters are quintessential outsiders trying to make sense of an essentially meaningless existence. Cover was particularly influenced by the Fireside Theatre, having noted how the actors utilized odd remarks, lines, and themes from extremely diverse sources to create something unique and darkly satirical. He has tried to regenerate this feeling in his fiction, which is filled with non-sequiturs, scrambled plots, and snatches of philosophy.
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