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There's a whole subgenre of science fiction (SF) that consider `what if' scenarios in history, alternate histories such as if Hitler won World War II, etc, that has been very popular for at least the past 15 years and have around for much longer than that. The What If? in the title does NOT represent that. Instead it means what if some circumstances in real history were different, politics in SF etc, thus the stories enclosed could have won the Hugo award. There are seven stories, one published in each year from 1952 to 1958.
The most interesting part of the collection is the introduction by Richard Lupoff that gives a brief history of science fiction from the first SF pulp magazine in 1923 (and some references earlier), to 1958. Since there's now so much that has been written in SF, growing up I was one of probably many other readers that tried to get a sense of earlier SF by looking up the Hugo and Nebula award winners and reading only those stories, which is still quite of wealth of material. That meant nothing was read that was written before the presentation of the first Hugo award for the year 1952. Quite a bit of very good SF was written before then. However, Lupoff considers only stories from the start of the award period for the Hugos. Within this he describes the state of SF as having started mainly as a pulp magazine genre and the ups and downs and the start and failure of multitudes of SF magazines on through to 1952. He also gives some background on the magazine Astounding Tales and particularly of its editor John Campbell. I have heard from other sources that Campbell was strict in his requirements (some more colorful language had been used), but that he required quality. Thus he was one facet, amongst other political factors, that influenced what got published where and thus indirectly what got awarded the Hugo. Thus Lupoff selects stories that may have won the Hugo if circumstances were somehow different.
A breakdown on the stories are:
* * Earned Glory * Richard A. Lupoff * in
* * Firewater * William Tenn * na Astounding Feb '52
* * Four in One * Damon Knight * nv Galaxy Feb '53
* * The Golden Helix * Theodore Sturgeon * na Thrilling Wonder Stories Sum '54
* * One Ordinary Day, with Peanuts * Shirley Jackson * ss F&SF Jan '55
* * The Man Who Came Early * Poul Anderson * nv F&SF Jun '56
* * The Mile-Long Spaceship * Kate Wilhelm * ss Astounding Apr '57
* * Two Dooms * Cyril M. Kornbluth * na Venture Jul '58
Firewater has a visiting alien species that of all things mostly ignores the human race. There is a surrogate group that acts as a medium for any contact between the aliens and humans. Analogies are made between contact with these surrogates and firewater in the contact between early European settlers and American Indians.
Four in One is a somewhat creepy science fiction tale by famed horror writer Damon Knight. It's somewhat of a cross between Theodore Sturgeon's More Than Human and the 1950's movie The Blob.
The Golden Helix has a ship of space faring Earthlings on an alien planet. Back in the 50's was the idea that fetuses developing in the womb go through the entire evolution of humankind from single celled creatures to an eventual human. Watson and Crick had also not too long before discovered that human DNA exists as a helix. The story works with those concepts.
One Ordinary Day, with Peanuts is somewhat like a classic Twilight Zone episode if anyone still knows what that is. Ordinary people going about almost geeky lifestyles have extraordinary powers.
I was never crazy about Poul Anderson. He includes a lot of Scandinavian mythology in his stories, which I know a little about, but is often written very dryly. However, even though his story stars out slow, it is an interesting look on if one went back in time 1000 years. However, ironically I think the story has more to say about Scandinavia, not just 1000 years but today as well. Culture can sometimes be so regimented that, to use an actual term that Anderson uses, occasionally a person goes `berserk'... crazy from the restrictions of life and culture, and it's tolerated by the society, the person eventually recovers, and then society expects that person to act normally again. This is not a very flattering outlook on life there, and may be a bit overly harsh. However, grant it to say, I don't think anyone should think it would be easy if they were sent individually, with few relevant items back hundred of years into the past. It was an interesting story.
The Mile-Long Spaceship is perhaps the most exciting story of the collection and unfortunately the shortest. Just as you're just starting to get into the protagonists situation on this humongous ship, you see that it's the last page. Still, 5 stars for the story.
I had written the first part of this review while midway through the book and just when you think the title of this book means What If circumstances or politics with the Hugo voting committees were different, maybe these stories would have won, the last story, Two Dooms, is what's considered a classic What If story (what if history was different) in science fiction. I realized that even though I've heard about What If stories for years, especially the classic What If story of what if the United States lost World War II, that of all the hundreds of books and stories I've read, I haven't actually read any that fit into that category. Sure I've seen a few shows on TV, such as the episode on the original Star Trek with the famous "Edith Keeler must die" spoken by Spock, but not read a book or story. Well this story is that, and as you can imagine, it's a chilling tale. It goes into much more depth than any show or movie I've seen and portrays events on the ground level. Should be essential reading alone for anyone in science fiction or any reader for that matter.
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- AntinomianReviewed in the United States on 8 June 2006
What If? Volume 1, Stories That Should Have Won The Hugo, Richard Lupoff (ed), 266 Pages, Publ 1980
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