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Fantascience Digest, v. 2, issue 2, January-February 1939

Page 12

Page 12     FANTASCIENCE DIGEST

the plots are worked out in both stories. The earth is not the first place attacked, but some other place is, and the inhabitants come running to earht for help. The heroes sally forth,meet a solitary ship of the enemy, and by the use of a recently acquired weapon, vanquish this enemy ship. They go on and explore various planets looking for people are sufficiently advanced to give them aid.

Now here differences occur in the treatment of the stories. Campbell has his heroes merely take hints for weapons from various sources and develop them themselves by the use of much calculations. He also has the heroes devise their own power source, giving them enough time to do so by the trick of shooting them back in time and having them age up to the present. Smith goes about it the easier way. He finds a race that is so advanced all that is necessary is for them to educate Richard Seaton to know all the science there is to know, whereupon he is ready to build himself a super-colossal space ship and go out and lick the pants off the enemy.

And that is what happens in both stories. After they are good and ready, the super-ships are built, the minor bases of the enemy destroyed, and finally, the entire planet of the enemy finished up. In Campbell's story that is the final play, but Smith makes that merely incidental; in fact, done merely by pushing a button. The big fight comes when Seaton has to go out and chase the ship that is fleeing to the distant universe. Notice, though, despite the fact that the heroes have almost everything there is to have, at the end the enemy almost gets them with an ace up the sleeve. That, of course, merely follows logically from plot construction.

Another source of similarities is the activities of the enemy In both stories the enemy is intent upon conquering the universe, for the usual reasons. In both stories the enemy comes from a huge planet, are strong and stocky like regular heavy planet men, and have ultra-vicious psychologies.In both cases, when a message comes home telling about the resistance of the earth people, intrigue rears its ugly had; the ruler of the planet is murdered, and someone else takes his place.

Following all of this up is an interesting lesson in the logic of plot construction, but more interesting is the opportunity to compare the individual styles of two authors who are both considered the top of the [[underline]]same[[end underline]] field, and yet who can, with the same plot, evolved individually, use such different treatment, and create such different atmosphere. For the treatment of these two stories is different.

Smith, although writing in a more rounded style, is lazier than Campbell. Smith does not take the trouble to explain away the Einstein theory, but merely disregards it. Campbell, through and through, is seen to have more mechanical ingenuity, for he does get away with going faster than light, even taking Einstein into consideration, and in his many different kinds of rays he shows more versatility than Smith, who merely uses one system of vibrations and gives them all sorts of properties. Campbell, at the end of his story, finishes up with two devices which Smith did not get up to in "Skylark Three," but saw fit to use in the next story, "Skylark of Valeron". These are: cosmic energy, and mental control. Campbell, in being the first to use mental control, shows, at the same time more laziness and more ingenuity. You see, it takes quite a bit of imagination to figure out a decent control for such a lot of

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Page 12 FANTASCIENCE DIGEST the plots are worked out in both stories. The earth is not the first place attacked, but some other place is, and the inhabitants come running to earht for help. The heroes sally forth,meet a solitary ship of the enemy, and by the use of a recently acquired weapon, vanquish this enemy ship. They go on and explore various planets looking for people are sufficiently advanced to give them aid. Now here differences occur in the treatment of the stories. Campbell has his heroes merely take hints for weapons from various sources and develop them themselves by the use of much calculations. He also has the heroes devise their own power source, giving them enough time to do so by the trick of shooting them back in time and having them age up to the present. Smith goes about it the easier way. He finds a race that is so advanced all that is necessary is for them to educate Richard Seaton to know all the science there is to know, whereupon he is ready to build himself a super-colossal space ship and go out and lick the pants off the enemy. And that is what happens in both stories. After they are good and ready, the super-ships are built, the minor bases of the enemy destroyed, and finally, the entire planet of the enemy finished up. In Campbell's story that is the final play, but Smith makes that merely incidental; in fact, done merely by pushing a button. The big fight comes when Seaton has to go out and chase the ship that is fleeing to the distant universe. Notice, though, despite the fact that the heroes have almost everything there is to have, at the end the enemy almost gets them with an ace up the sleeve. That, of course, merely follows logically from plot construction. Another source of similarities is the activities of the enemy In both stories the enemy is intent upon conquering the universe, for the usual reasons. In both stories the enemy comes from a huge planet, are strong and stocky like regular heavy planet men, and have ultra-vicious psychologies.In both cases, when a message comes home telling about the resistance of the earth people, intrigue rears its ugly had; the ruler of the planet is murdered, and someone else takes his place. Following all of this up is an interesting lesson in the logic of plot construction, but more interesting is the opportunity to compare the individual styles of two authors who are both considered the top of the [[underline]]same[[end underline]] field, and yet who can, with the same plot, evolved individually, use such different treatment, and create such different atmosphere. For the treatment of these two stories is different. Smith, although writing in a more rounded style, is lazier than Campbell. Smith does not take the trouble to explain away the Einstein theory, but merely disregards it. Campbell, through and through, is seen to have more mechanical ingenuity, for he does get away with going faster than light, even taking Einstein into consideration, and in his many different kinds of rays he shows more versatility than Smith, who merely uses one system of vibrations and gives them all sorts of properties. Campbell, at the end of his story, finishes up with two devices which Smith did not get up to in "Skylark Three," but saw fit to use in the next story, "Skylark of Valeron". These are: cosmic energy, and mental control. Campbell, in being the first to use mental control, shows, at the same time more laziness and more ingenuity. You see, it takes quite a bit of imagination to figure out a decent control for such a lot of