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Scientifictionist, v. 1, issue 4, April 1946
Page 13
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AMONG THE CLASSICS -- III by Norman Staneley BEYOND PLUTO: Novel by John Scott Campbell. Wonder Stories Quarterly. Vol. 3, No. 4 (Summer 1932) John Scott Campbell is one of three individuals whose writing makes one wish to see more -- much more -- from his pen, but who, alas, appears only at geological intervals. BEYOND PLUTO is, to the best of your reviewer's knowledge, Campbell's only scientifiction novel. Indeed, in addition to the above I have encountered only one novelette (1) and two short stories (2, 3) by this author. All are to be recommended. The idea of an obscure, highly advanced civilization concealed in the African interior and carefully avoiding any contact with the barbaric rest of us is hardly unique in scientifiction. Yet it presents possibilities which Campbell has seized upon and developed into a most surprising and entertaining yarn. Some thousands of years ago the Metyrs, an advanced human species, had been forced to migrate to earth from their original home, the moon. On landing in Africa they founded their nation of Zongainia, which subsequently absorbed Egyptian and Phoenician tribes that fled to the interior in retreat before the Roman Legions. The Zonganians, from their encounters with the warlike Romans, concluded that the people of the earth were too uncivilized to make further intercourse desirable, and hence they isolated their land by erecting natural barriers about it. In their interior fastness they had since grown to a nation of many millions, yet one in which the Metyr blood predominates, due to the lengthy life-span of that species. But even though the Zongainians still prefer to remain unknown to the other nations of the earth they are in no sense of an insular temperament, but instead have active contact and trade, via interstellar travel, with many other advanced civilizations in distant worlds. Zongainia maintains its integrity by deporting all hapless explorers, who brave the barriers to enter the forbidden domain, to a planet of Alpha Centauri -- about the most secure place imaginable! And that is what happens to the protagonists of the tale, a a party of five explorers. They find the Zongainians to be highly cultured and likeable people, who are regretful, but nonetheless firm in the action to install the five as permanent residents in the "Discontented Club", as the little colony of exiles on the Centaurian planet, Dunsaan, is termed. The seeming hopelessness of their situation is relieved, however, when after arriving on Dunsaan they are let in on an escape plot devised by the previous exiles. They find that the club has been working sub rosa for many years on the abandoned hull of a prolo, or space car, which they found in a nearby swamp. Tho they had succeeded in rebuilding the ship with parts filched from the neighborhood prolo dockyard, the death of one of their number had left them with no one able to install and use the navigational instruments. This the new arrivals accomplish partially when the discovery of the plot by their Zongainian jailers forces them to take to space in the rebuilt airship. But it is speedily found that even the finest of space craft (and the Zongainian prolo is a fine space craft!) won't take them home when no one knows the way across the vast interstellar distance. When our friends sight another prolo in space and decide to follow it, on the gamble that it will lead them back to earth, they find instead that it has precipated them neatly into the thick of an interstellar war and the obscurities of a hostile and definitely alien civilization. When they are shot down in a battle of prolo fleets over the enemy planet of Kanan they are picked up by the crew of a Zongainian battle prolo, which has also been forced ---------------- (1) THE INFINITE BRAIN, Science Wonder Stories, Vol. 1 No. 12 (May 1930). (2) THE INVULNERABLE SCOURGE, Wonder Stories, Vol. 2 No. 6 (Nov. 1930) (3) THE SEEING EAR, Thrilling Wonder Stories, Vol. 9 No. 1 (Feb. 1937) page 13
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AMONG THE CLASSICS -- III by Norman Staneley BEYOND PLUTO: Novel by John Scott Campbell. Wonder Stories Quarterly. Vol. 3, No. 4 (Summer 1932) John Scott Campbell is one of three individuals whose writing makes one wish to see more -- much more -- from his pen, but who, alas, appears only at geological intervals. BEYOND PLUTO is, to the best of your reviewer's knowledge, Campbell's only scientifiction novel. Indeed, in addition to the above I have encountered only one novelette (1) and two short stories (2, 3) by this author. All are to be recommended. The idea of an obscure, highly advanced civilization concealed in the African interior and carefully avoiding any contact with the barbaric rest of us is hardly unique in scientifiction. Yet it presents possibilities which Campbell has seized upon and developed into a most surprising and entertaining yarn. Some thousands of years ago the Metyrs, an advanced human species, had been forced to migrate to earth from their original home, the moon. On landing in Africa they founded their nation of Zongainia, which subsequently absorbed Egyptian and Phoenician tribes that fled to the interior in retreat before the Roman Legions. The Zonganians, from their encounters with the warlike Romans, concluded that the people of the earth were too uncivilized to make further intercourse desirable, and hence they isolated their land by erecting natural barriers about it. In their interior fastness they had since grown to a nation of many millions, yet one in which the Metyr blood predominates, due to the lengthy life-span of that species. But even though the Zongainians still prefer to remain unknown to the other nations of the earth they are in no sense of an insular temperament, but instead have active contact and trade, via interstellar travel, with many other advanced civilizations in distant worlds. Zongainia maintains its integrity by deporting all hapless explorers, who brave the barriers to enter the forbidden domain, to a planet of Alpha Centauri -- about the most secure place imaginable! And that is what happens to the protagonists of the tale, a a party of five explorers. They find the Zongainians to be highly cultured and likeable people, who are regretful, but nonetheless firm in the action to install the five as permanent residents in the "Discontented Club", as the little colony of exiles on the Centaurian planet, Dunsaan, is termed. The seeming hopelessness of their situation is relieved, however, when after arriving on Dunsaan they are let in on an escape plot devised by the previous exiles. They find that the club has been working sub rosa for many years on the abandoned hull of a prolo, or space car, which they found in a nearby swamp. Tho they had succeeded in rebuilding the ship with parts filched from the neighborhood prolo dockyard, the death of one of their number had left them with no one able to install and use the navigational instruments. This the new arrivals accomplish partially when the discovery of the plot by their Zongainian jailers forces them to take to space in the rebuilt airship. But it is speedily found that even the finest of space craft (and the Zongainian prolo is a fine space craft!) won't take them home when no one knows the way across the vast interstellar distance. When our friends sight another prolo in space and decide to follow it, on the gamble that it will lead them back to earth, they find instead that it has precipated them neatly into the thick of an interstellar war and the obscurities of a hostile and definitely alien civilization. When they are shot down in a battle of prolo fleets over the enemy planet of Kanan they are picked up by the crew of a Zongainian battle prolo, which has also been forced ---------------- (1) THE INFINITE BRAIN, Science Wonder Stories, Vol. 1 No. 12 (May 1930). (2) THE INVULNERABLE SCOURGE, Wonder Stories, Vol. 2 No. 6 (Nov. 1930) (3) THE SEEING EAR, Thrilling Wonder Stories, Vol. 9 No. 1 (Feb. 1937) page 13
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