All reviews copyright 1984-2020 Evelyn C. Leeper.
Asylum by A. E. van Vogt
[From "This Week's Reading", MT VOID, 05/11/2018]
"Asylum", by A. E. van Vogt (Astounding Science Fiction, May 1942): I'm sorry, but I just cannot get into Van Vogt. It is probably his writing method; as expressed in an interview with Jeffrey Elliot, Van Vogt explained, "I write my science fiction in eight-hundred-word scenes. Each scene has five steps." [Science Fiction Review #23] The underlying idea of this story might have been interesting, but so much stuff was piled on that it became tedious.
"Far Centaurus" by x:
[From "This Week's Reading", MT VOID, 05/22/2020]
"Far Centaurus", A. E. van Vogt: The basic idea behind this story is good (I won't spoil it here even though the story is seventy- five years old), but the execution leaves a lot to be desired. I know it was a different time and all that, but the only female character (other than someone's three ex-wives) is there only so that the main character can keep remembering her red lips and goodbye kiss. Add to this bizarre (and frankly unbelievable) science, with bizarre "scientific" terms (Adeledicnander? Really?!), and an excess of exclamation points, and you get a real mess.
SLAN by A. E. Van Vogt:
[From "This Week's Reading", MT VOID, 07/08/2016]
SLAN by A. E. Van Vogt (Astounding Science-Fiction, Dec 1940): When I was about thirteen years old, I discovered in our library John W. Campbell's "Black Star" series (THE BLACK STAR PASSES, ISLANDS OF SPACE, and INVADERS FROM THE INFINITE). I really enjoyed them at that age, and when I saw them a couple of years later or so for 45 cents each (new--it was a long time ago), I bought them, as some of the first books I ever bought. I suspect I might still enjoy them today ... but primarily for their sentimental value. The writing was very "whiz-bang", but fantastic invention piled on fantastic discovery. SLAN is like that (though with more attempt at social commentary), but without the sentimental value (for me, anyway). Yes, it's a classic, but there is a question whether that should get it a Retro Hugo. Are we voting for what was popular then, what was influential in the interim, or what reads like a Hugo nominee today? In some sense, only the latter makes sense--the non-Retro Hugos do not have the benefit of seventy-five years of hindsight, and it is impossible to judge the works of 1940 with 1940 eyes. If the Hugos (both current and Retro) are to be a recommendation list of sorts, then one must apply at least some level of current judgment, and in this it seems to be that SLAN does not measure up as well as some of the other works.
"Vault of the Beast" by A. E. Van Vogt:
[From "This Week's Reading", MT VOID, 07/15/2016]
"Vault of the Beast" by A. E. Van Vogt (Astounding, Aug 1940): This was added well into the voting, replacing Jack Williamson's "Darker Than You Think", which was discovered (somewhat belatedly) to be a novella rather than a novelette. Aspects of it bear a strong resemblance to TERMINATOR 2, even to the shape-shifting alien imitating the floor. But the mathematics are fingernails-on-a-blackboard to anyone with basic math knowledge. I will say that the numbers Van Vogt gives as examples of prime numbers do appear to be prime numbers, but that is small comfort when he claims there is an "ultimate" (i.e., largest) prime number. Quick proof: Assume N is the largest prime. Take the product of all numbers up to and including N (expressed as N!). Now consider N!+1. If is not divisible by any prime up to and including N--there is always a remainder of 1. So either it is itself prime, or it is divisible by a prime larger than N. Q.E.D.
THE WEAPON MAKERS by A. E. van Vogt:
[From "This Week's Reading", MT VOID, 05/03/2019]
THE WEAPON MAKERS by A. E. van Vogt (no ISBN) is a short book (186 pages), but I still couldn't force myself to finish it. I gave up after van Vogt had postulated a weapon that could be used only defensively, a gun that could be materialized from an invisible plane and fire a death ray and then vanish, an immortal, a process that could instantly enlarge an ordinary rat to one twenty feet tall, and a monarchy that has lasted (apparently without any breaks) several thousand years. And I had gotten to only page 45.
And then I discovered that I wasn't even reading the nominated work! According to the "Prospero's Isle" website, the book version was a "heavily rewritten and reorganized version in which the two leading protagonists are essentially merged into the one person of the super-hero Robert Hedrock, a rewrite that necessitated some far-out twists as body transfers and mind-reading that make it a very different and, we feel, considerably less satisfactory tale indeed."
Well!
As with DAS GLASPERLENSPIEL, I suspect that most (if not all) voters will be reading a work that differs from the actual finalist. In one case, it will be a translation, which presumably is accurate as to plot, characters, etc., but in this case it seems to be a very different work--sort of like voting on the 1943 film version of PHANTOM OF THE OPERA on the basis of having seen the 1962 version.
Anyway, luckily I discovered my error and switched to reading the actual finalist instead. It still has a weapon that could be used only defensively, a gun that could be materialized from an invisible plane and fire a death ray and then vanish, an immortal, a process that could instantly enlarge an ordinary rat to one twenty feet tall, and a monarchy that has lasted (apparently without any breaks) several thousand years. I got further this time--halfway through--before deciding that life was too short to read bad books.
"The Weapon Shop" by A. E. van Vogt:
[From "This Week's Reading", MT VOID, 05/18/2018]
"The Weapon Shop", by A. E. van Vogt (Astounding Science Fiction, December 1942): This is yet another story about how arming civilians is important (I guess this may have been in response to the war in Europe). But Van Vogt was never an author to have just one idea, so he has portals to other planets and a scheme to defraud the main character as well. It later became part of the fix-up novel THE WEAPON SHOPS OF ISHER.