"Don't Call Us, We'll Call You": Donald E. Westlake's Farewell to Science Fiction (from The Best of Xero)

(NB: a version of this post also appears on The Violent World of Parker blog.)

Well, after all the excitement on Existential Ennui yesterday – not only a post on a scarce signed edition of an Adam Hall/Quiller spy novel, but also news of the return of Donald Hamilton's Matt Helm spy novels (broken first on this very blog, I might add – and do read the comments on that post if you haven't already) – it's back down to earth with a bump. Or rather, out into space with a jolt, as I return to the science fiction stories penned by crime novelist – and perennial Existential Ennui preoccupation – Donald E. Westlake.

I actually have Violent World of Parker reader Sandra Bond to thank for this latest post – or, more accurately, couple of posts: there's a lot to cover here, so it'll be better if I split it into two missives. Sandra emailed me after I'd finished my second run of reviews of Westlake's SF stories to draw my attention to the book you can see above. Published by Tachyon Publications in 2004, The Best of Xero is a collection of essays, reviews and letters collated from the long-defunct American science fiction fanzine Xero, which ran for ten issues from 1960–1962. It's a fascinating document of a pre-internet era, when fans – and professionals – communicated via fanzines rather than through blogs or message boards, and features pieces by the likes of James Blish, Roger Ebert, Frederick Pohl and Harlan Ellison.

But what, you may be wondering, has all this to do with Westlake? Well, midway through Xero's run, Westlake wrote an incendiary essay for the fanzine, entitled "Don't Call Us, We'll Call You". In the piece, Westlake burns his bridges with science fiction in spectacular fashion, laying into what he perceives as the dreadful editing endemic in the SF story magazines of the time, the terrible taste of those magazines' editors – Analog's John W. Campbell ("an egomaniac"), The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction's Robert P. Mills ("a journeyman incompetent"), etc. – and the pathetic state of the science fiction field in general.

But Westlake reserves his most scathing opprobrium for himself (kind of...). After noting that, "Today, I am a full-time mystery writer, working on my fifth mystery novel", and that the science fiction field "can't support" or even "interest" him, he writes: 

It's time for credentials, before going into this thing any deeper. If I'm going to talk as a professional writer who isn't doing anything in science fiction and who claims that he might have done something worthwhile if it were worth his while to do so, I ought to show my identity card. Therefore:

Science Fiction. I have sold thirteen stories, two of which have not yet been published and none of which are any damn good. I have sold to Universe, Original, Future, Super, Analog, Amazing, If, and Galaxy. A fourteenth story was sold to Fantastic Universe, which proceeded to drop dead before they could publish it. Both John Campbell and Cele Goldsmith have asked me to write sequels to novelettes of mine they had bought (I haven't written either, and won't). In a desk drawer I have twenty-odd thousand words of a science fiction novel, which is good, but which I'm not going to finish because it isn't worth my while.

I'm assuming the novel Westlake refers to is Anarchaos, which did eventually see print (albeit under a pseudonym), while some of the stories he talks about are ones I covered at length in my two runs of posts on Westlake's SF. I always had a question at the back of my mind whilst writing those posts: why did Westlake stop writing SF (or largely stop; years later he did pen some additional SF stories for Playboy)? Though none of Westlake's early SF stories – at least the ones I've read, which is roughly two-thirds of them – could be considered classics, either of the genre or compared to the best of his own work, it was always evident that the writer knew SF well and had, at some point, loved SF. Here, finally, in "Don't Call Us, We'll Call You", is the answer. After detailing his even-by-this-stage considerable achievements in the mystery field, Westlake continues:

I am not sitting around bragging. I'm simply trying to make something clear: I can write. I can write well. I am capable of first-class work. But the only thing I've ever written in science fiction that I am at all proud of is a novel I'll never finish because there is economically, stylistically, and philosophically no place for it.

Do you know what I'm talking about? I cannot sell good science fiction.

Westlake goes on to cite a specific example, whereby he and Randall Garrett – who was staying with Westlake for a while – were both writing stories aimed at John W. Campbell's Analog, and entertaining themselves by including private jokes for each other's benefit (something Westlake would continue to do with other writer friends). Westlake's wheeze in his story was to include an Air Force Colonel in the latter stages of the tale, "the spitting image of John Campbell, betting Randy that Campbell would never notice it". Having taken delivery of the story, Campbell requested a revision: "He wanted me to make the Colonel the lead character. I did it. Eighteen thousand words. Four hundred and fifty dollars."

Westlake doesn't name the story, but as Sandra Bond pointed out to me, it's clearly "Look Before You Leap", a tale I reviewed in September. I noted at the time that I found its militaristic leanings and upbeat ending curious, and here is the explanation for that: Westlake rewrote it, making Colonel Brice more prominent, at the request of John W. Campbell.

"Don't Call Us, We'll Call You" is remarkably strong stuff, written out of sheer frustration at the state of the American science fiction publishing landscape in the early 1960s. But as fascinating as it is, perhaps of even greater interest are the responses to Westlake's article, from regular Xero readers and from some of the targets of Westlake's scorn. And in my next Violent World of Parker cross-post, I'll be delving into those responses, as well as looking at Westlake's final say on the controversy he caused.

Back here on Existential Ennui, however, it's back to the spy fiction series we go. And for my final run of posts on spy series – for this year; there's more to follow in the new year – I'll be turning (or even, returning) to one of the most iconoclastic series of spy novels ever created, starring an anonymous secret agent narrator who subsequently gained a very familiar name via his cinematic outings...

BREAKING NEWS! Donald Hamilton's Matt Helm Spy Novels Series Returns to Print in 2013, from Titan Books!

So then, as teased at the end of the previous post (on Adam Hall/Quiller) – and indeed also hinted at last month – I have some very exciting news today. Beginning in 2013, Titan Books will be bringing back into print American author Donald Hamilton's series of espionage novels starring super spy Matt Helm!

For those unfamiliar with the Matt Helm novels, from 1960 to 1993 Donald Hamilton penned twenty-seven adventures – plus one further, unpublished work – starring Helm, a former World War II secret agent who's brought out of retirement in his debut outing, Death of a Citizen. Hailed by spy novelist Jeremy Duns (among many others) as one of the best espionage series ever published, the novels are renowned for their gritty, grounded take on the spy genre. The books were phenomenally successful in their day, shifting twenty million copies worldwide and begetting four movies (starring Dean Martin) and a TV show, but sadly slipped out of print for years. Not for much longer, however: because in 2013, my former employers, Titan Books, will begin reissuing the series, starting with the very first novel!

Commenting on the news, Titan Books' Publisher, Nick Landau, said: "These novels were among the best spy thrillers ever published. We're thrilled to partner with the estate of Donald Hamilton, enabling us to bring them back into print and show readers what they've been missing all these years."

Terrific stuff, and no mistake. Doubtless there'll be further details from Titan – home too, lest we forget, to the Hard Case Crime imprint – on their plans for the Matt Helm series down the line, so keep 'em peeled for updates – and in the meantime perhaps go have a read of my three previous Hamilton/Helm posts, which can be found here, here, and here. And I'll be back before too long with that promised Violent World of Parker cross-post...

The Striker Portfolio (Quiller #3) by Adam Hall: Signed Bookplate First Edition (Heinemann, 1969)

For this second of two posts on intriguingly collectible editions of Quiller spy novels by Adam Hall – a.k.a. Elleston Trevor – I have a first edition which has a direct connection to another Quiller first I blogged about in September...

This is the British hardback first edition of The Striker Portfolio, the third Quiller mission, published by Heinemann in 1969 (dustjacket design/cover photos uncredited, I'm afraid; again, perhaps the Quiller Yahoo Group can shed some light there). I blogged about this particular novel – which sees Quiller trying to find out why thirty-six Striker aircraft have crashed within a year – during my initial run of Adam Hall/Quiller posts back in July, in a 1970 Book Club edition. Which begs the obvious question, why on earth am I now blogging about the book again – albeit in a different edition – especially when I stated in that original post that the Heinemann first wasn't terribly scarce and that therefore I was perfectly happy with that Book Club copy? And it's true, the Heinemann first is readily available... but this particular copy is a bit more special than merely being a first edition. For if we take a look on the front endpaper...

We can see that it has an Adam Hall bookplate affixed, signed by Elleston Trevor as Hall. It's dated April 1969, and addressed from Domaine de Chateauneuf, near Nice, where Trevor was living at that juncture. But what's more, it's inscribed to a Kathleen Hutchings... who, in a strange quirk of fate, is precisely the same person the signed Adam Hall bookplate first edition of the second Quiller novel, The 9th Directive, I blogged about in September was dedicated to. What are the odds? The two books came from completely different dealers (although both from Amazon Marketplace), are in markedly different condition – fine in the case of The Striker Portfolio, only about good in the case of The 9th Directive – and are dated by Hall two years apart, and yet have both ended up in my greasy paws.

Mind you, considering the scarcity of signed copies of Adam Hall novels – as I mentioned in that 9th Directive Post, while there are a good forty-plus copies of various signed Elleston Trevor books on AbeBooks, signed Adam Hall/Quiller novels number in the low single figures – I guess it's not so surprising that I've ended up with two books dedicated to the same person. Whoever Kathleen Hutchings was, then, she belonged to a very select and lucky band, and, considering the two books I own are dated a couple of years apart, evidently she had a years-long association with Trevor. And as spy novelist and Hall/Quiller aficionado Jeremy Duns wondered when I tweeted about this copy of The Striker Portfolio – to my knowledge the only signed edition of the book in existence – does that mean there are other dedicated-to-Kathleen-Hutchings Quiller first editions out there somewhere...?

Anyway, that's all from Adam Hall for the moment (although as ever, I'll be returning to him down the line)... but that's not all from the spy fiction series. Because while I had planned to veer away from the espionage novels briefly for a Violent World of Parker cross-post, I've just received confirmation of a very exciting piece of news regarding another spy novelist – an author I blogged about just last month in a run of posts on his best known creation, Matt Helm. So check back in with Existential Ennui later today for an exclusive announcement about Donald Hamilton...

The Scorpion Signal (Quiller #9) by Adam Hall: Prebind or Uncorrected Proof? (Collins, 1979)

So then, did we all enjoy Paul Simpson's guest post on Big Finish's Sherlock Holmes audio plays? Jolly good. All being well, Paul will be back in the new year with another guest post, and I'll also hopefully have a further guest essay from another friend and former colleague of mine, on a "suppressed" work for adults by one of Britain's most beloved children's authors.

Back in the here and now, though, I'd just like to say a quick thank you to Ethan Iverson, whose brilliant Do the Math blog linked Existential Ennui at the end of last week, in the process sending a stampede of no-doubt bewildered traffic my way. I was already familiar with Do the Math, having used Ethan's terrific overview of Donald E. "Richard Stark" Westlake's canon – which includes quotes from Westlake himself – to navigate Westlake's work when I first got into that writer's novels a couple of years back, so it's a real pleasure to receive props from Mr. Iverson, and for my part I can heartily recommend spending a few hours exploring his extensive archives.

Anyway: to business. And I'm afraid the year is rather getting away from me: I'm not going to be able to complete my series of posts on spy fiction series before 2011 draws to a close, so that series will have to continue in the new year. But I should be able to squeeze in a couple more spy novelists – and a couple of Violent World of Parker cross-posts – before I inflict a barrage of end-of-year missives on you, both of them writers who've featured on Existential Ennui before. Beginning with the first of two novels by Adam Hall, an alias of Elleston Trevor:

This is The Scorpion Signal, Hall/Trevor's ninth novel to feature his secret agent protagonist Quiller. I blogged about the Quiller series in a run of posts in July; in this instalment, Quiller must retrieve an old ally from the clutches of the KGB. But what's interesting about this particular copy of the novel is that it's not, for a change, the British first edition – or at least not what we'd normally identify as a first edition. For one thing, although it has a dustjacket (unclipped, but also uncredited – I can't tell you who illustrated it; possibly Chris Foss, who illustrated the jacket of 1973's The Tango Briefing... perhaps the denizens of the Quiller Yahoo Group can lend some assistance here...?), once you remove the jacket, instead of being cased the book inside has been bound in a thin blue paper cover, with nothing at all printed on it:

However, the copyright line inside the book states that it is the 1979 Collins first edition:

So what is it? The eBay seller I bought it from called it a "prebind", a term which usually denotes a library edition of a novel. I'm not sure that's an accurate description, though. I think it's more likely it's an uncorrected proof, i.e. an advance readers' or reviewers' copy – see this post on a Patricia Highsmith proof and this one on a Dennis Lehane one – in which case it predates the British first edition. But while there are plenty of copies of the proper British first on AbeBooks at present, ranging in price from a fiver to over twenty quid, I can't see any other copies of this proof (or prebind, or whatever the hell it is), making it something of a collectible curio.

But not, perhaps, as collectible as the second Adam Hall novel I'll be showcasing – a very special first edition which has a connection to another Hall/Quiller first I blogged about in September...

Guest Post: Sherlock Holmes's Big Finish, by Paul Simpson

Something a little different today, in a couple of respects. In the first instance – much as I did with critic Michael Barber and his essay on Dennis Wheatley at the start of the year – I'm turning Existential Ennui over to a guest poster, in this case Paul Simpson, a longstanding friend and colleague of mine. Paul is just coming towards the end of a five year mission as editor of Titan's Star Trek Magazine – a position I also held for a time – and has been writing professionally about genre movies, TV shows and books for close to two decades; he's currently one of the editors of Sci-Fi Bulletin. It's a great pleasure to be able to host a piece of Paul's writing.

In the second instance, Paul's guest post deals with an area of publishing I've only touched on tangentially previously: audio plays and adaptations – more specifically, the Sherlock Holmes adaptations and new Holmes stories devised by British production company Big Finish. I'll leave it to Paul to elucidate further – and of course I'll be back before too long with the next instalment in my ongoing series of posts on spy fiction series – but before we sally forth, let me just note that, speaking as someone who still hasn't read any of Arthur Conan Doyle's Holmes stories (shameful, I know), the Big Finish audio plays strike me as an especially fine way to experience those tales. Oh, and there's a tenuous link here with my just-finished run of posts on spy fiction writer William Haggard, in that Conan Doyle was a contemporary of H. Rider Haggard, W. Haggard's fifth cousin.

Well, I did say it was tenuous...

Sherlock Holmes's Big Finish, by Paul Simpson

Although anyone who recognises the name above this post may associate me primarily with sci-fi (and particularly Doctor Who and Star Trek), I've had an abiding interest in crime and spy fiction ever since childhood. My mother was brought up reading these sorts of books, so there were plenty of 1930s and '40s editions of Leslie Charteris's Saint stories, G. K. Chesterton's Father Brown books, and of course, Sherlock Holmes on the bookshelves.

Like millions of others, I devoured the Conan Doyle canon (to the extent that when Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss were quoting wholesale from the original stories in last year's update – which is due to return to our screens on New Year's Day – I was mouthing along with the lines), and then discovered that the local library had new Holmes adventures available. Some of these were dire – I can still remember wondering what the hell the Michael Dibdin one was all about – while others grabbed me from the first page. I've always been a bit of a sucker for stories that expand an already-established universe (Star Trek books that are about crews or situations that we never saw on TV, for example), and I loved reading what other people did with Doyle's characters. At the late lamented Murder One bookshop in London, there used to be shelves of these stories that I would raid periodically...

And of course there have been new stories in other media. One of my favourite Holmes films, after the Rathbone and the Cushing Baskervilles adaptations, is Murder by Decree – not for its off-the-wall theories about the Ripper, necessarily, but for its expansion of Holmes into "real" life. The BBC have produced The Further Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, which have been of variable quality in terms of story, but never less than entertaining.

Now independent production company Big Finish have got in on the act. Big Finish has been around for some time, producing audio plays connected to various TV series – Doctor Who primarily, but also Sapphire and Steel, The Tomorrow People, Stargate and Robin Hood among many others – and have gained a deserved reputation for their output. The current executive producer is Nicholas Briggs (yes, the guy who does the Dalek voices on telly), who also continues a career as a stage actor. One of the roles he's played is Holmes – and it's hardly surprising, therefore, that he has overseen a range of audio plays featuring the character.

The first set of three were released last year, adapting three of the Holmes stage plays. Two starred Roger Llewellyn: David Stuart Davies's one-man plays The Last Act and The Death and Life; the other, Brian Clemens's Holmes and the Ripper, starred Briggs himself with Richard Earl as Watson. Although Clemens's play doesn't particularly work for me, the combination of Briggs and Earl is a winning one, and that has been retained for the new season, currently being released.

The second season is different in format, with one canonical release followed by a new story, or adaptation of a new tale. It kicks off with a 2-CD version of The Final Problem and The Empty House – otherwise known as the "Death and Resurrection of Sherlock Holmes". Hopefully there's no need to rehearse Conan Doyle's reasons for writing these stories, but particularly given that Briggs's adaptation is incredibly faithful to the source material, it's interesting to note the slight differences in style (and Doyle's ignoring of some of the events he chronicles in The Final Problem when writing The Empty House some years later – who cleared up Baker Street?).

Both Briggs and Earl excel in this release. The pent up emotions that Watson experiences in the tales is brought to the fore by Earl's performance, his voice threatening to break on more than one occasion as he recounts the dreadful events leading to Holmes's death, while Briggs delivers the long monologues as he describes his adventures in a way that grips the listener. This is a Holmes under more acute pressure than any he's experienced before, and you can hear that in Briggs's delivery.

The second story, The Reification of Hans Gerber, is a totally new tale by George Mann, and plays with a lot of the tropes of Victorian novels. There's a distressing death of a beloved relative, greedy grasping potential beneficiaries, lawyers who may or may not have hidden agendas, and among all this, the arrival of a mysterious figure from the continent – the eponymous Hans Gerber. To say more about the plot would spoil some of the surprises (although Mann plays fair, and everything that happens can be deduced from the evidence presented to the listener – from every source, it's fair to hint), and unlike many Holmes tales, this takes into account Watson's professional background. There's even a new foil for the great detective (nicely played by versatile voice actor Terry "Davros" Molloy). Both of these are highly recommended.

And next out of the gate for Big Finish? They're tackling the big one – The Hound of the Baskervilles...

A William Haggard / Colonel Charles Russell Spy Novel First Edition Gallery

For this third and final post on British author William Haggard's Colonel Charles Russell spy series – introduction and bibliography here, review of the debut Russell outing (also Haggard's debut novel, natch), Slow Burner, here – I've a selection of Haggard/Russell first editions from across the series, which I picked up in various places and by various methods over the past few months. Beginning with this:

Slow Burner was first published in hardback in the UK by Cassell in 1958, under a vibrant but sadly uncredited painted dustjacket. As already mentioned, I reviewed the novel itself yesterday, the story of which involves skullduggery surrounding a top secret nuclear fission process. Haggard's early novels can usually be found fairly easily in paperback, but hardback first editions are sometimes not so common; AbeBooks, for example, currently has just five copies of the Cassell first listed, but of those, three are sans jacket, another is ex-library and in New Zealand, and the last is also in New Zealand. You might have a bit more luck on Amazon Marketplace... but then again, you might not.

Next:

The UK hardback first edition of the second Colonel Russell thriller – and Haggard's third novel overall, following 1958's The Telemann Touch – Venetian Blind, published by Cassell in 1959. Once again the dustjacket illustration is uncredited, but at least copies of the first edition are a bit more readily available than Slow Burner: there are currently twelve of 'em on AbeBooks, in various states of disrepair. The story this time centres on Negative Gravity; check out the Charles Russell dedicated page on Spy Guys & Gals for more on Venetian Blind, and indeed on all of Haggard's Russell novels.

Moving swiftly on:

This is the UK hardback first edition of The Unquiet Sleep, the fourth Russell novel, published by Cassell in 1962; I'm currently missing the third Russell outing, The Arena (1961), but I expect I'll secure a first of that at some point. Just for a change, this one sports a photographic wrapper, but again, Cassell have let me down by neglecting to credit the photographer and the jacket designer. Unlike Slow Burner and Venetian Blind, both of which I purchased online, I found this copy of The Unquiet Sleep in the excellent Books by the Sea in Bude, Cornwall, during my summer holidays. Mind you, it's not exactly hard to find in first: presently AbeBooks has fourteen copies listed, many for less than a tenner. The story revolves around a relaxation pill called Mecron. I could do with a dose of that myself...

Next:

The UK hardback first edition of A Cool Day for Killing, published by Cassell in 1968. Quite a minimalistic dustjacket design on this one, and for a change it's credited, to one Brian Roll. The twelfth Charles Russell thriller, this one sees Colonel Russell protecting the daughter of a Malaysian Sultan, and is notable for being the final novel with Russell as head of the Security Executive; he was destined to retire in the next book, The Doubtful Disciple (1969), but would continue to assist the Executive in an unofficial capacity. Interestingly (er, possibly), by this point in the series (nearly midway), Cassell no longer felt the need to have the author's first name on the cover; he'd simply become Haggard (so to speak). Plenty of copies of the Cassell first of A Cool Day for Killing on AbeBooks: over twenty at present.

Forging ahead:

This is the UK hardback first edition of Bitter Harvest, published by Cassell in 1971. The fourteenth Charles Russell adventure, this one sees the good Colonel brought out of retirement to tackle rising political temperatures in the Middle East. The jacket design is by Brian Hampton, and once again there's a plentiful supply of first editions on AbeBooks. Bitter Harvest was retitled for its US publication – by Walker, in 1971 – and was known instead as Too Many Enemies; the subsequent Russell novel, The Old Masters (1973), was also retitled by Walker in the States, this time as The Notch on the Knife. Fascinating stuff, eh?

And finally:

The UK hardback first edition of Yesterday's Enemy, published by Cassell in 1976. I bought this for a few quid in the Albion Bookshop in Broadstairs, Kent, again during my summer holiday, but it's readily available on AbeBooks for around a fiver. In this one, Colonel Russell has to deal with a vanished nuclear physicist and the threat of a secret nuclear weapon. The front cover photo is by Mick Wells, and is a fine example of the kind of Raymond Hawkey-esque "artfully arranged weapons" photographs prevalent on British dustjackets in the 1970s. Great shot of Haggard on the back there, too.

And that, I think we'll all be elated to learn, is yer lot from William Haggard. I'll have further spy fiction posts for you shortly, more than likely on espionage series by Len Deighton – featuring the aforementioned Mr. Hawkey – and Adam Hall. Plus there'll be a Violent World of Parker cross-post or two before we head into Christmas/the New Year and my traditional end-of-year round-up posts. (Traditional as in, I did them once before, last Christmas.) But next on Existential Ennui, something rather exciting: a guest post by entertainment journalist Paul Simpson on a clutch of newly released Sherlock Holmes audio adventures. That's right: audio...