Triplanetary

The pulp-era history of space opera is complicated, but E. E. “Doc” Smith is undoubtedly one of its icons. His Triplanetary is one of two prequels to the Lensman series. When its first version was published in 1934, the Buck Rogers radio series was in the middle of its run, and the comic strip had been out for five years. And, of course, the kid genius Tom Swift had been busy defeating bad guys with clever inventions since 1910. In 1948, a clunky, expanded fixup version of Triplanetary brought the beginning of the series into the Atomic Age. Reading the novel almost ninety years on, I was struck by the shifting style that veers from wartime slang to prose so purple it would make Bulwer-Lytton blush. At the heart of it all is the show more adoration of technology devoted to speed and power—especially force fields and beamed transmissions. Smith is especially fond of tractor beams, a term he may have coined as early as 1931.
Smith makes giant technological leaps seem easy. How about an inertialess tractor beam? “A tractor—inertialess?” Cleveland wondered. “Sure, why not?” Even fish, deep in the oceans of a distant planet, can do it because “those high-pressure boys were no fools.”
But my favorite bit of Smithian prose comes when the Nevians first appear in Tellurian space: “Space became suffused with a redly impenetrable opacity, and through that indescribable pall there came reaching huge arms of force incredible; writhing, coruscating beams of power which glowed a baleful, although almost imperceptible, red.”
Kids, they don’t write ‘em like that anymore. show less

This novel would confirm all the preconceptions of a reader who is not in tune with early popular science fiction. The characters are two dimensional and their interactions are almost laughable, the writing hardly rises above the adequate and at times is much worse than that, the plot if there is one is of the and then.. and then...variety, its realpolitik is crass in the extreme and the novel was cobbled together following publication of stories in science fiction pulp magazines like Amazing Stories and the joins are all too obvious. And yet...... it does have an undeniable sense of wonder, the action is fast moving and extremely imaginative, it broke new ground in a genre that has become known as "space opera" and the underlying theme show more of super intelligent aliens guiding or hampering emerging civilisations is a good one.

The adventure story in space, which takes up two thirds of this book appeared in 1934; serialised in Amazing Stories, but before we get to this we read Smith's additions that attempt to adapt the story into a sort of prequel to his famous Lensman series. Two old civilizations the Arisians and the Eddorians are fighting for control of the universe; both races have developed powers of the mind that enable them to influence all other races, their latest battleground is the planet earth and Doc Smith inventively sketches in a few key events in earth's history that have been the result of the ancient races machinations. At page 127 in my edition we reach the age of space travel and the adventures in space begin. The quality of some of the writing here is sacrificed for an all out action story that pits a few quintessential American heroes against alien invaders and a representative presence from one of the super powerful Eddorian race who is bent on shaping events for his own evil ends. Doc Smith's superbly orchestrated space battles involving "ultra wave" weapons, inertial-less space ships, tractor beams, shields and blasting weapons, read like an early evocation of something written by Alastair Reynolds. They are as thrilling as they are preposterous and our heroes emerge largely unscathed from overwhelming odds through their courage, resourcefulness and ability to invent whole new scientific technologies at the drop of a hat.

The pulpiness of the writing and the story telling must be swallowed whole to enjoy this novel, but if you can do this then there is a fast paced action adventure story that pushed the boundaries of science fiction writing in it's time; those space battles and the escape from the Navian fish men have that sense of wonder that makes this whole science fiction genre so rewarding to read. This together with a truly magnificent underlying theme of universal struggle encourages me to read some more books in the series. I am hoping that the quality of the writing improves a little, but I am not counting on it and so "on with the schlock". A Three star read. show less

Nostalgia. This was the first science fiction book I remember reading, and is the first book of the Lensman series, which quickly had me rapt. The library editions I devoured had little postage-stamp sized line drawings at the head of each chapter, one (not Triplanetary) involved the hero visiting a planet of Amazons (the women, not the bookstore), and the illustration showed a topless lady flying a biplane. What more could a twelve year old want?

Edward Elmer “Doc” Smith had a PhD in chemical engineering and worked mostly as a food scientist. There is an unverified claim that he invented a way to make powdered sugar stick to donuts. In his spare time, he verifiably invented the Space Opera; the six-volume Lensman series covers show more billions of years of galactic history and features noble heroes, their beautiful but spunky inamorata, space pirates galore, massive intragalactic battles, weird alien lifeforms and boldly going where no one had gone before. What more could a twelve year old want?

Triplanetary starts all this off; the original Triplanetary was a stand-alone magazine serial; Smith latter added additional material to fit it into the Lensman series. The galaxy is a war zone between the beatific Arisians and the brutal Eddorians; the Arisians attempt to peacefully guide various planets – including Earth, which for reasons presumably known only to Smith, is always called “Tellus” – to civilization, while the Eddorians intervene, disguised as Earthmen (including Nero, Hitler, etc.), and screw things up. The main story in Triplanetary involves a three-way space battle between Roger the Space Pirate (actually, of course, a disguised Eddorian); the triplanetary (Venus, Tellus, and Mars) battle fleet; and the amphibious Nevians, who show up in the middle of things with a FTL drive and a ray that converts iron to a liquid. The Stalwart Hero and the Beautiful and Spunky Heroine get captured successively by the space pirates and the amphibians but escape in time to lead the three planets to victory against all comers. What more could a twelve year old want?

Well, the science is dubious; there’s no mention of atomic energy (Triplanetary was published in 1933), the FTL drive works by removing inertia from matter, space is still “the ether”, “spy rays” see through walls; “tractor” and “pusher” beams shove stuff around. The heroes and heroines are all Red-Blooded American Boys and Girls (there’s a black man in First Lensman, but he’s a car hop; Smith is however, perfectly accepting of Martians, Venusians, four-dimensional aliens from Pluto, and miscellaneous other creatures). And everybody smokes. At twelve, I was OK with the racism – not even realizing it was racism. I was a little puzzled by the “ether”, as I was just well-read enough to realize there wasn’t any such thing. I was just beginning to be interested in the Red Blooded American Girls, as Smith always described them as wearing “wisps” of clothing; other than the aforementioned bare-breasted Amazon there were no pictures, but I could imagine a lot. And every adult I knew smoked.

On re-reading the Lensman series about 50 years later, I find them most interesting for sort of a future socioarcheology; what people of the past thought the future would be like. Which turns out, as I suspect it always will turn out, to be just like the present but with spaceships and ray guns. Well, so what? show less

Every time I see the Jack Gaughan covers (I'm sorry, all others simply don't cut it) I get nostalgic for when I first read this series. These books are corny as hell, they view the "gals" as needing big, strong men to protect them, the science will strike you as quite funny, and there's nary a doubt about who the bad guys are and who the good guys...or which will win in the end. But still, they're wildly exuberant and fun, and they invite you to just sit back and enjoy without judgment.

That said, Triplanetary is far and away the weakest book in the series. Part of that, I'm sure, is due to it having started out as an unrelated story that was reworked after the fact to fit into the Lensman chronicles. Another part is that it's all show more pre-history to the real story line and, therefore, you don't really bond to the characters as much, especially since it's a series of short episodes jumping through the generations.

It's a lightning quick read, so just zip through it and on to First Lensman to see if you like this series. show less

Don't trust my rating of this book; it's part of my childhood, when I read it over and over again, and I have no way of objectively rating it.

For reasons I no longer recall, I got rid of these books at some point, probably during a house move when I was trying to de-clutter. I found all seven in the series in a second hand book shop a few years ago and, struck by nostalgia, I bought them all. Reading them again, I found that the clunky writing, the cardboard characters, the outdated social mores, the bad science - everything that should make me drop this book like a venomous snake - was just charming. I was a kid again, thrilling to the adventures of Kim Kinninson and his spaceship crew.

The golden glow of summer afternoons in the garden show more and dimly-lit late nights in bed (I had a thing then for dozing off while reading by candlelight - luckily no fires!) so I could get to the end of a chapter (and just one more... maybe another one), illuminates this book with fond memories. It's just not possible for me, the adult, to betray me, the child, by giving this (and the rest of the Lensman series) anything less than 5 stars. Forgive me, you more discerning readers. show less

Well, that's done.

This has got to be the first novel I've read that opens with an introduction that prewarns that the author made a mistake with the first six chapters. And they weren't wrong. The first six chapters serve as an extended prologue. And it's boring and, for the most part, completely superfluous.

Most of the rest of the issues I have with the novel are simply because it's a product of its time. It contains that standard misogyny inherent to any action novel up to at least the 80s. Men are manly or cowardly, and women are there to look beautiful, be admired, and be saved so they can fawn over their manly men. The science part of the science fiction doesn't hold up whatsoever, with its outdated various rays and gases and show more ultrawave communication. And the dialogue, though quite typical of an action/adventure novel of the time, is shockingly bad. So bad that I actually laughed out loud at times. The aliens, in some cases supposedly emotionless, come across as bad gangsters. And all the aliens, no matter how removed from the human race they are, all talk like they're rough tough business men from the 1950s.

The final problem I have is with the actual narrator of this audiobook version. He's simply awful and, should he ever step near a microphone to record anything other than a spoof commercial for a K-Tel Goofy Greatest Hits of the 60s collection, then he should be bludgeoned into submission with a very large, very blunt instrument. Perhaps a Smart Car. Or a house.

Really. He's that bad.

So, unfortunately, I won't be diving into the other five adventures of the Lensmen. They'll just have to somehow muddle through without me. show less

Another "classic" sci-fi novel and another reminder of how much the genre --and really society, as if sci-fi existed separately from that-- has changed in the last 70 to 85 years (this was originally published serially starting in the early- to mid-1930's, I think, then collected and amended/rewritten for publication in 1948.)

More genre specific is the lower quality of the writing (reasonably decent here, considering, but still...) and the very time-specific plot/event style. E.g. "humans" discover some new technology based on some new physics and have a working, battleship-mounted weapon based on it in 3 days. E.g. the uber-competent agent/engineer/scientist builds a functioning first-of-its-kind "ultra wave" "camera" in-field in what show more sounds like hours, or at most days. I get it that (these days) that is a (sub-)genre specific trope and, moreover, that when e.g. someone on Star Trek picks a crystal up *off the ground* and "wires" it into their tricorder, or when someone in the Expanse decrypts and reprograms a Martian gunships' military-level encrypted computer with *hardware* tamper-triggers in what is apparently 9 to 90 minutes, that I am letting the exact same thing slide by... but it just seems so much worse and more obvious here.

I feel like I can also detect the fingerprints of the post-WWII, building Red Scare re-writes here. There are passages that either were super-awkwardly inserted and/or just leap out now. Some (one passage RE: an outside power riling up, essentially, "minorities") almost seem prescient a la "Russian election tampering" OR as simply being quite racist (e.g. the attraction of Communism for many black people in the period was because it spoke about and criticized American racism.) Others seem immensely callous OR as subtle criticisms (e.g. the worthy adversary that the "Earthlings" make peace with... nevermind that the Earthlings already realized that those same aliens have brutally subjugated and continue a total war against the other intelligent species on their planet... is this commentary on Communist Russia? Nazi Germany? "Worthy" adversaries in general?)

To be fair, I suppose that is another genre change. Early sci-fi was 100% action. The characters do not have, ah, "rich inner lives" nor do they live in societies.

Anyway, as a historical piece this was interesting; for my particular interest it was worth reading; as a story... eh, probably a waste of your time. show less