Van Gelder, Gordon. “One Lamp: Alternate History Stories
from The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction.” Four Walls, Eight
Windows, New York and London, 2003. Pbk. 433pp. rrp: $15.95 / £10.99. ISBN
1-56858-276-5
This is a collection of short stories exploring the themes
associated with alternate history: time travel (and its paradoxes), diverging
outcomes from imagined changes in the time line and the insertion of characters
into events they were not involved in. The writers are all from the North
American continent and so are probably more au fait with the history of
that continent than readers from elsewhere. This isn’t a criticism. Merely
saying that some of these stories, especially those that deal with American
history and culture, will mean far more to those on the western side of the
Atlantic than those on the eastern side. Here one should explain that these are
not stories set in parallel universes which resemble our Earth history in some
respects but which don’t share a known point of divergence. They all take as
their starting point generally agreed Earth history.
The writers range from the well-known: C.M. Kornbluth, Poul
Anderson, Alfred Bester, Ben Bova, Robert Silverberg and Harry Turtledove to
lesser known talents, with all of the tales being of some interest or amusement.
The time travel stories: Anderson’s “Delenda Est” and Bester’s
“The Men Who Murdered Mohammed” both date from the 1950’s (and so their
appearance now is a form of time travel in itself) and deal with the paradoxes
involved in trying to get the past to conform with the future so that the time
travellers can exist to go back and make the past conform … (and so on).
It seems that this type of story is no longer so fashionable (or maybe
the possibilities were exhausted a long time ago?), so most of the more recent
tales involve divergences from what we currently consider to be the agreed
historical time line.
Now this can be relatively straightforward extrapolation
– assume that the Nazis defeated the British and then conquered India – what
would have happened if Gandhi and Nehru had organised non-violent resistance to
the occupation. In Harry Turteldove’s view, in “The Last Article” they
would have simply have got slaughtered. End of story. Note that these are stories first and foremost and should not
be confused with academic musings on alternate histories where the emphasis is
on the bigger picture.
However to work properly, the diverging time line story has to make sure it is logical and consistent and that only those changes that occur, do so as a result (however distant) of the “foundation premise”. It also helps if you can get the line you’re diverging from correct. As an example of how easy it is to get things wrong read Jan Lars Jensen’s “The Secret History of the Ornithopter”. The premise – that an Englishman together with Japanese associates managed to get a working ornithopter to fly, is fair (if unlikely) enough. It sets up the story. However Jensen makes the error of not doing his research (or introducing historical changes not the result of the foundation premise) by having one of his characters flying the ornithopter in Northern France during the First World War on February Third (sic) 1916, where it is attacked by Sopwith Camels of the RAF. Aviation buffs will immediately spot the mistake – the Sopwith Camel did not enter service until the spring of 1917 and the RAF was not formed (by the amalgamation of the RFC and the RNAS) until April 1918. At which point the story is undone for such readers. Although I seem to remember that Japanese Naval Aviation was indeed spurred on by British involvement in the immediate post World War One environment.
The third form of story is exemplified by Bradley
Denton’s “The Territory” which introduces Mark Twain, as he was later
known, into an episode taken from the history of the American Civil War, where
some Rebel guerrillas attempt to attack the Unionists in Lawrence, Kansas.
Whether Twain’s involvement (as far as the story goes) materially affects the
outcome I can’t tell as I don’t know the history of this particular episode
and Twain survives to go to the rest of his career. (Here my ignorance of the
details of Twain’s biography and my sketchy history of the U.S. Civil War
means that for this reader the story probably doesn’t work the same as it
would if my historical knowledge was greater.
The nit-picking aside the stories are generally
entertaining, some quite amusing, and well written. If you’re interested in
stories set in or about alternate history then you’ll probably enjoy this
book. The more so if you are familiar with American history.
An enjoyable set of stories if nothing particularly
special.
6/10
Richard Alexander