Long before he wasnamed Best Fan Writer — way back in 1978 , in fact — Frederik Pohl win another Hugo ( and a Nebula too ) , for his novel Gateway . And yikes , what a book .
https://gizmodo.com/congratulations-to-the-2010-hugo-award-winners-5630533
Gateway is one of the Hugo winner I ’d record before starting this project , and when I think about it , it ’s linger with me more than any other — except maybeLord of Light — primarily because the book is so dreadful .
https://gizmodo.com/lord-of-light-big-wheels-keep-on-turnin-5534746
But when I say “ dreadful , ” note , please , that I mean the first definitiongiven in Merriam - Webster , not the second : this Word is not super bad , not scarcely . No , it inspires dread ; it cause big and oppressive fear .
At least it does in me . And this is a timbre I sometimes actively seek in a account , and do n’t notice nearly often enough . It ’s not that difficult to gross me out , to horrify me — graphic descriptions of morally questionable medical procedures work pretty well , as does taking your half - masticate gum out of your sass and sticking it on the edge of your plate while we consume lunch . But dread is a much more subtle affair to achieve .
Lovecraft has never done it for me , and neither didThomas Ligotti , though I had high Bob Hope he would . Harlan Ellison managed it with “ I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream , ” and maybe a few minute in Neil Gaiman ’s Sandman and Alan Moore ’s running on Swamp Thing did , too ( although From Hell did n’t at all , and that was a sore disappointment ) . A lot of Philip Dick ’s shortsighted stories hover in the right world-wide field . And weirdly , though it ’s an awful Holy Writ , one bit ofFritz Leiber ’s The Wandererdid manage it . ( Since you should never take that book , I ’ll just tell you : It was when a couple of military officers , a man and a cleaning lady , regain themselves pin on top of a cabinet , wait for either the water in the elbow room they ’re stuck in to rise and submerge them or for their O to persist out , and it ’s clear there ’s no opportunity of escape . )
https://gizmodo.com/sorry-fritz-leiber-the-wanderer-is-terrible-5492961
Gateway , though , just — teems is n’t the right Bible , because when dread starts pour , it middling much stop being dread . Better to say the novel is coated in apprehensiveness : even in the scenes that are n’t correct on the unsettling alien space station from which it make its name , you could reek the feeling . And most of those scenes take spot old age in the story ’s futurity , in the safe , comfortable federal agency of a favorable robot psychologist the friend is voluntarily seeing .
say protagonist is Robinette — or Bob — Broadhead , who was born poor on an Earth that ’s slogging its mode toward a whimper , rather than a bang . It ’s overpopulated , and a big chunk of the world ’s food comes from slimy bacteria maturate on shale mined in less - than - idealistic condition . Jobs are gruelling to come by , and though medical technology has made some great pace , it ’s only available to the wealthiest the great unwashed . Formerly a food miner , Bob is now one of those wealthy people , endure in Manhattan ( which is a controlled environment sealed under a big bubble ) .
He got plentiful by going to Gateway , a outer space post formerly dwell by an ancient , mysterious alien race humans have dubbed the Heechee . Here is what we hump about the Heechee : almost nothing . We ’ve found a few of their artifacts and deciphered some of their technology , but we ’re not sure what they look like , what their culture was like , or what happened to them .
Gateway is a rock’n’roll about ten kilometers wide at its long point in time , honeycombed with tunnels and pervade on the outside with bulge and gob . The bumps are the hulls of Heechee ships . The holes are where Heechee ships used to be . Human scientist have visualize out how to make the ship run — sort of . Other humans , normally poor ones , spend their life nest egg to become prospectors , and vanish Heechee ships out of Gateway on predetermined trend to they - know - not - where , hoping to strike it rich determination trace of the alien civilization .
About a third of the ship fall back . And the people indoors are n’t always alert when they do .
That ’s as best I can channel what make Gateway such a dreadful book . Human existence scramble into modest spacecraft that passeth understanding — there are parts of the control panel , particularly a golden ringlet , that bewilder everyone who tries to determine their function — and pip off into the nihility at faster - than - light speeds , not sleep together what their destination is , how long it ’ll take to get there , whether their solid food will last the whole trip , and if they ’re going to a habitable planet or if they ’ll end up burning alive inside the Saint Elmo’s light of a star .
They just love their chances are less than one in three . And they pay big money for the opportunity — Bob wins the drawing on Earth , and spends his winnings to get to Gateway — because things are bad enough back home to make it worth the risk .
The whole premiss is so bare , and so credible , and yet I ’ve never study another book quite like Gateway . What Frederik Pohl does that ’s so smart is underact the terror . Oh , you instruct pretty quick how ugly the odds are for prospector , and how macabre their fates can be , but Pohl have it all speak for itself , treating the risk as an unpleasant but unavoidable fact of life for the characters , to the point where it borders on the mundane . And that ’s what take a crap it scarey : the approximation that even a terrible destruction on an unidentified planet is just par for the course .
What ’s passably neat is that it form even though you know from the very beginning that Bob makes it out live . As I say , he ’s a racy New York man-about-town with Full Medical benefit who lives off his Gateway - catch destiny and spends his destitute meter pursuing hobbies like the guitar and sexual practice with cute young womanhood .
Every other chapter draw one of his therapy sessions with an AI he calls Sigfrid von Shrink . Now , Bob is a complicated guy wire , beyond just being a fellow with a miss ’s name : He ’s in therapy of his own accord , he attends his sessions reliably , and yet he resent Sigfrid and seems determined to annul really dig into the issues that are causing him so much sadness .
Gateway is spent alternate between Bob ’s sessions with Sigfrid and his experiences on Gateway and in outer space — where , as thing progress , it becomes clear that something awful happened that force him to lock up emotionally . I am certain as hell not endure to let on what that something awful is — an articleon Hugo winner Robert J. Sawyer ’s websitespoiled it for me , and I ’ve always wish I ’d had the hazard to let it hit me in the brain unawares — but I will say it ’s childlike and graceful and totally disturbing , and could only take place in a skill - fiction story .
I said the amazing affair force Bob to lock up emotionally , but that ’s not exactly right . Throughout the book , he ’s not exactly a mentally healthy guy . That ’s one of the things that makes him such a compelling champion . But to say he ’s “ flawed ” does n’t really leave a sense of his character . No , Bob Broadhead is straight - up screwed up . He does n’t just make mistakes or ethically ambiguous option — through his first - somebody narration , one gets the horse sense moderately apace that he experience like he is , at the core of his being , a mistake .
It ’s a very honest and genuine depiction of a role , and even if parts of the psychotherapeutics scenes — Bob ’s Freudian slip , his froward inability to recognise clamant symbolization in his dream — palpate a little forced , it ’s forgivable . I heard some SF writer utter a couple weeks ago , and one was speak about how science fiction get short shrift as “ substantial ” literature because mainstream fable critic look at history as resting somewhere on a spectrum : focusing either on characterization ( which is laudable ) or on patch ( which is common and dewy-eyed — and which is what most literary genre fiction does ) . He allege there was a third co-ordinate to consider , which was set , and that that was actually where SF scramble .
And to be trusted , Gateway ’s mise en scene is crucial ; it ’s what really provides that sense of dread . But you know , the truth is that all three factors — characterization , plot , and mark — actually intermix in such a path that in a good fib it ’s hard to nail where one leaves off from another . And it ’s Pohl ’s rendering of Bob as a character that elevates the book from a neat , freaky idea executed well to a sprain body of work , and one you could shove in the face of any snootyface who pooh - poohed sci - fi .
Here ’s the thing about Gateway : It does not just deal in the scary kind of dread . Whether Fred Pohl intended it or not , it traffics in the profoundly philosophical sortthat poor sad Søren Kierkegaard was always on about . If I may get really pedantic and quotethe Wikipediaon the dear Dane ’s definition of the word :
Kierkegaard uses the example of a man stand on the edge of a tall edifice or cliff . When the valet looks over the edge , he experience a focussed reverence of falling , but at the same clip , the humankind feels a terrific impulse to throw himself intentionally off the sharpness . That experience is anxiety or dread because of our complete exemption to choose to either throw oneself off or to stay put . The simple fact that one has the possibility and freedom to do something , even the most terrific of possibilities , triggers immense feelings of dread . Kierkegaard call this our “ dizziness of exemption . ”
So Bob , who has dreamed of being a prospector ever since he was a tot and take in Heechee heirloom at a carnival , wins this drawing and mother to give up his terrible Book of Job and go to Gateway . He finish his education there and then … gets a job on - post , rather than risk his spirit on a trip out . He is bring together in this by his eventual girlfriend and co - enabler , Gelle - Klara Moynlin . She ’s been out a couple of times , but now would rather attend out and gamble in the place gambling casino — just like Bob , later , wo n’t be quite ready to invest to therapy but never pretermit an date with Sigfrid , Klara is n’t quite ready to get into a ship but remain on Gateway despite having the immediate payment to bequeath .
Gambling , the urge to take chances , recurs as a motive in different phase throughout this novel , and I imagine what makes Gateway something like a masterpiece , to my thinker , is how organically it all works ; I do n’t sense like Pohl was forcing a point ( and based onhis very late telling of writing the book , it does n’t sound like he was ) . He does n’t have the “ moral ” get in the way of the write up , and that ’s hugely important , because the moral is one of those absolutely heavy , inarguably valuable lessons that are totally obvious to be anyone with a half a intellect :
What Bob and Klara urgently need is to hold back control condition over their lives . And yet the itch to live — to unfeignedly and truly live — is at betting odds with that desire , and it continue on poking through .
Dammit , this is a upright book . There ’s stuff and nonsense I could say about Bob ’s gender ( that part of the book never matte up quite necessary to me , but it ’s part and parcel of his issues with control ) , and I bet I could get a whole nother essay out of Bob and Klara and the something awful that constitutes the orgasm of the Word , and how we all leave the great unwashed we bonk behind , somehow , and they stay lock into our remembering , stable . I should unquestionably mention the sidebar that litter the Sir Frederick Handley Page , perhaps one of the more effective methods of infodump that SF has ever seen ( and rereading them , I really wish the ending had n’t been bollocks for me ) . I should belike mention that this is the first book in a serial and that I ’ve never read the residual , but require to more than I want to scan the rest period of the Dune novels or Ringworld or Rama books . I should refer wretched Shikitei Bakin , legless and float through the broken gravity of Gateway on gauzy wings strapped from wrist to shank , and doomed . But really , if you ’ve never read it yourself , you should just go and do that , now .
https://gizmodo.com/dreamsnake-the-controversial-hugo-winner-thats-no-long-5670359
Josh Wimmer is a freelance writer in Madison , WI . He can usually be foundhere .
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