Reviewed by Ted Gioia
Imagine a world without murder. Then use it as
the setting for a murder mystery.
That's the challenge Alfred
Bester sets himself in his
unconventional cult classic
The Demolished Man, the
1953 novel that was the
first winner of Hugo Award.
The book is an oddity—half
science fiction and half
detective story, mixing in
generous doses of the police
procedural genre while antici-
pating elements that would
come to the fore in later
cyberpunk lit. With its
fast pace and campy atmospherics, the book also
reminds us that Bester made his living writing for
comic books, radio and television.
The Demolished Man is set in the world of the year
2301, when police have an easy time of it. No
successful premeditated murder has been com-
mitted in 79 years. The existence of a cadre of
mind-readers—known as "Espers"—make it
impossible to hide criminal intent from the
authorities. A murderer will either be stopped
before the crime is even committed, or apprehend-
ed immediately afterwards. In such a world, the
clichéd phrase about "getting away with murder"
has become a pure metaphor, describing a state
of affairs that could never occur in the real world.
In this environment, Ben Reich is caught up in a
heated conflict with his business rival Craye
D'Courtney, owner of D’Courtney Cartel. Reich's
firm, Monarch Industries, is on the verge of
bankruptcy, and he feels rebuffed in his attempts
to propose a merger. In anger and desperation, he
decides to kill D’Courtney.
Okay, Bester doesn’t go in for subtlety—already
we have a Reich and Monarch going up against a
Cartel. You’ll hardly be surprised to learn that
the hero detective in this book is named Lincoln
—Lincoln Powell, a Class 1 Esper and Prefect of
the Psychotic Division of the police. In case some
readers miss the presidential allusion, Lincoln
sometimes falls into a habit of telling outlandish
tall tales—taking on an alternate persona, one that
the policeman himself calls "Dishonest Abe."
Mr. Reich needs some expert help if he is to plan
and execute a murder without coming to Powell's
attention. He enlists the support of Gus Tate,
another Class 1 Esper and psychiatrist who is a
renegade among the mind-readers. When he is
around Reich, Tate can block the efforts of other
Espers, and can also snoop around in surrounding
minds in order to assist in the plotting and
execution of the crime. But Reich also needs some
way of stopping the brain peepers when Tate is not
on hand—and here he relies on an inane musical
jingle, one of those maddening tunes you can’t get
out of your head.
Tenser, said the Tensor.
Tenser, said the Tensor.
Tension, apprehension,
And dissension have begun….
Bester no doubt wanted lyrics whose sheer inanity
would keep mind-readers at bay. Too bad he
didn't know about Rebecca Black’s "Friday"…
With these peculiar supports, Reich is prepared to
kill his adversary. He makes his move at a
fashionable party, but the assault is observed by a
young woman, D'Courtney’s daughter, who runs
away from the scene of the crime. Now Lincoln
Powell and Ben Reich are caught up in a race to
find the missing eyewitness. The action is en-
livened by the some jive James Bond-ish gadgetry
—flash grenades that destroy the retinas of
unfortunate on-lookers, harmonic guns that kill
with soundwaves, etc.
The book is zany, and moves ahead with the brash
momentum of a superhero comic book. But
Bester tries to impart some psychological gravitas
through generous doses of Freudian concepts and
plenty of psychiatric jargon. Even the punishment
for serious crimes draws on a therapeutic
worldview—instead of the electric chair, the legal
authorities of the year 2301 rely on 'demolition,'
in which the offender’s personality and memories
are extracted, leaving behind a new substratum for
healthy re-education. Indeed, Bester’s original title
for the story was Demolition!, and he only switched
to The Demolished Man at the urging of editor
H.L. Gold.
Many readers will find this story maddening and
unsatisfying. Josh Wimmer has cited The
Demolished Man as an evidence for why highbrow
literary types look down on sci-fi—not without
some justification. "Science fiction was ghettoized
for a long time because at first, it deserved to be,"
he argues, and compares the implausibility of
Bester's story with Ernest Hemingway’s The Old
Man and the Sea, which won the Pulitzer the same
year The Demolished Man took the Hugo. The
comparison may be a bit unfair—Hemingway
never set a novel in the 24th century—but even
fans of Bester's work can hardly avoid recognizing
the slapdash quality that permeates the novel. Nor
does the use of reheated psychobabble serve as an
adequate substitute for real psychological depth in
Bester’s characters.
No, this is not great literature. That said, the
madcap energy of this book can’t be denied. And
the concept itself of a man plotting the perfect
murder in an age when premeditated crimes have
been eradicated is a thought-provoking one. I’m
not surprised that, a few years later, Philip K. Dick
—and later Steven Spielberg—drew on a similar
concept for Minority Report. Bester never quite
freed himself from the pulp fiction and TV script
formulas that cast a long shadow over most genre
works of the era, but he was a master of these very
same recipes. As a result, anyone wanting to
understand why action-packed genre tales had
such a large following during the middle decades
of the 20th century could hardly do better than to
make the acquaintance of this author and his most
famous novel.
Ted Gioia's latest book is The Birth (and Death) of
the Cool.
Imagine a world without murder. Then use it as
the setting for a murder mystery.
That's the challenge Alfred
Bester sets himself in his
unconventional cult classic
The Demolished Man, the
1953 novel that was the
first winner of Hugo Award.
The book is an oddity—half
science fiction and half
detective story, mixing in
generous doses of the police
procedural genre while antici-
pating elements that would
come to the fore in later
cyberpunk lit. With its
fast pace and campy atmospherics, the book also
reminds us that Bester made his living writing for
comic books, radio and television.
The Demolished Man is set in the world of the year
2301, when police have an easy time of it. No
successful premeditated murder has been com-
mitted in 79 years. The existence of a cadre of
mind-readers—known as "Espers"—make it
impossible to hide criminal intent from the
authorities. A murderer will either be stopped
before the crime is even committed, or apprehend-
ed immediately afterwards. In such a world, the
clichéd phrase about "getting away with murder"
has become a pure metaphor, describing a state
of affairs that could never occur in the real world.
In this environment, Ben Reich is caught up in a
heated conflict with his business rival Craye
D'Courtney, owner of D’Courtney Cartel. Reich's
firm, Monarch Industries, is on the verge of
bankruptcy, and he feels rebuffed in his attempts
to propose a merger. In anger and desperation, he
decides to kill D’Courtney.
Okay, Bester doesn’t go in for subtlety—already
we have a Reich and Monarch going up against a
Cartel. You’ll hardly be surprised to learn that
the hero detective in this book is named Lincoln
—Lincoln Powell, a Class 1 Esper and Prefect of
the Psychotic Division of the police. In case some
readers miss the presidential allusion, Lincoln
sometimes falls into a habit of telling outlandish
tall tales—taking on an alternate persona, one that
the policeman himself calls "Dishonest Abe."
Mr. Reich needs some expert help if he is to plan
and execute a murder without coming to Powell's
attention. He enlists the support of Gus Tate,
another Class 1 Esper and psychiatrist who is a
renegade among the mind-readers. When he is
around Reich, Tate can block the efforts of other
Espers, and can also snoop around in surrounding
minds in order to assist in the plotting and
execution of the crime. But Reich also needs some
way of stopping the brain peepers when Tate is not
on hand—and here he relies on an inane musical
jingle, one of those maddening tunes you can’t get
out of your head.
Tenser, said the Tensor.
Tenser, said the Tensor.
Tension, apprehension,
And dissension have begun….
Bester no doubt wanted lyrics whose sheer inanity
would keep mind-readers at bay. Too bad he
didn't know about Rebecca Black’s "Friday"…
With these peculiar supports, Reich is prepared to
kill his adversary. He makes his move at a
fashionable party, but the assault is observed by a
young woman, D'Courtney’s daughter, who runs
away from the scene of the crime. Now Lincoln
Powell and Ben Reich are caught up in a race to
find the missing eyewitness. The action is en-
livened by the some jive James Bond-ish gadgetry
—flash grenades that destroy the retinas of
unfortunate on-lookers, harmonic guns that kill
with soundwaves, etc.
The book is zany, and moves ahead with the brash
momentum of a superhero comic book. But
Bester tries to impart some psychological gravitas
through generous doses of Freudian concepts and
plenty of psychiatric jargon. Even the punishment
for serious crimes draws on a therapeutic
worldview—instead of the electric chair, the legal
authorities of the year 2301 rely on 'demolition,'
in which the offender’s personality and memories
are extracted, leaving behind a new substratum for
healthy re-education. Indeed, Bester’s original title
for the story was Demolition!, and he only switched
to The Demolished Man at the urging of editor
H.L. Gold.
Many readers will find this story maddening and
unsatisfying. Josh Wimmer has cited The
Demolished Man as an evidence for why highbrow
literary types look down on sci-fi—not without
some justification. "Science fiction was ghettoized
for a long time because at first, it deserved to be,"
he argues, and compares the implausibility of
Bester's story with Ernest Hemingway’s The Old
Man and the Sea, which won the Pulitzer the same
year The Demolished Man took the Hugo. The
comparison may be a bit unfair—Hemingway
never set a novel in the 24th century—but even
fans of Bester's work can hardly avoid recognizing
the slapdash quality that permeates the novel. Nor
does the use of reheated psychobabble serve as an
adequate substitute for real psychological depth in
Bester’s characters.
No, this is not great literature. That said, the
madcap energy of this book can’t be denied. And
the concept itself of a man plotting the perfect
murder in an age when premeditated crimes have
been eradicated is a thought-provoking one. I’m
not surprised that, a few years later, Philip K. Dick
—and later Steven Spielberg—drew on a similar
concept for Minority Report. Bester never quite
freed himself from the pulp fiction and TV script
formulas that cast a long shadow over most genre
works of the era, but he was a master of these very
same recipes. As a result, anyone wanting to
understand why action-packed genre tales had
such a large following during the middle decades
of the 20th century could hardly do better than to
make the acquaintance of this author and his most
famous novel.
Ted Gioia's latest book is The Birth (and Death) of
the Cool.
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| The Demolished Man By Alfred Bester |
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Conceptual Fiction:
A Reading List
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Home Page
Abbott, Edwin A.
Flatland
Adams, Douglas
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
Allende, Isabel
The House of the Spirits
Amis, Martin
Time's Arrow
Asimov, Isaac
The Foundation Trilogy
Asimov, Isaac
I, Robot
Atwood, Margaret
The Handmaid's Tale
Banks, Iain M.
The State of the Art
Ballard, J.G.
Crash
Ballard, J.G.
The Crystal World
Bester, Alfred
The Demolished Man
Bradbury, Ray
Dandelion Wine
Bradbury, Ray
Fahrenheit 451
Bradbury, Ray
The Illustrated Man
Bradbury, Ray
The Martian Chronicles
Bradbury, Ray
Something Wicked This Way Comes
Burgess, Anthony
A Clockwork Orange
Card, Orson Scott
Ender's Game
Chabon, Michael
The Yiddish Policemen's Union
Chiang, Ted
Stories of Your Life and Others
Clarke, Arthur C.
Childhood's End
Clarke, Arthur C.
A Fall of Moondust
Clarke, Arthur C.
2001: A Space Odyssey
Clarke, Susanna
Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell
Danielewski, Mark Z.
House of Leaves
Dick, Philip K.
Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said
Dick, Philip K.
The Man in the High Castle
Dick, Philip K.
Ubik
Doctorow, Cory
Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom
Gaiman, Neil
American Gods
Gibson, William
Burning Chrome
Gibson, William
Neuromancer
Grass, Günter
The Tin Drum
Haldeman, Joe
The Forever War
Hall, Steven
The Raw Shark Texts
Harrison, M. John
Light
Heinlein, Robert
The Moon is a Harsh Mistress
Heinlein, Robert:
Stranger in a Strange Land
Heinlein, Robert
Time Enough for Love
Herbert, Frank
Dune
Huxley, Aldous
Brave New World
Le Guin, Ursula K.
The Lathe of Heaven
Le Guin, Ursula K.
The Left Hand of Darkness
Leiber, Fritz
The Big Time
Leiber, Fritz
Conjure Wife
Leiber, Fritz
Swords & Deviltry
Leiber, Fritz
The Wanderer
Lem, Stanislaw
His Master's Voice
Lem, Stanislaw
Solaris
Lethem, Jonathan
The Fortress of Solitude
Lewis, C. S.
The Chronicles of Narnia
Link, Kelly
Magic for Beginners
Márquez, Gabriel García
100 Years of Solitude
McCarthy, Cormac
The Road
Miéville, China
Perdido Street Station
Miller, Jr., Walter M.
A Canticle for Leibowitz
Mitchell, David
Cloud Atlas
Niffenegger, Audrey
The Time Traveler's Wife
Niven, Larry
Ringworld
Noon, Jeff
Vurt
Okri, Ben
The Famished Road
Pohl, Frederik
Gateway
Pynchon, Thomas
Gravity's Rainbow
Robinson, Kim Stanley
Red Mars
Rowling, J.K.
Harry Potter & the Sorcerer's Stone
Rushdie, Salman
Midnight's Children
Saramago, José
Blindness
Shelley, Mary
Frankenstein
Silverberg, Robert
Dying Inside
Silverberg, Robert
Nightwings
Simak, Clifford
City
Simak, Clifford
The Trouble with Tycho
Smith, Cordwainer
Norstrilia
Smith, Cordwainer
The Rediscovery of Man
Stephenson, Neal
Snow Crash
Stross, Charles
Glasshouse
Sturgeon, Theodore
More Than Human
Sturgeon, Theodore
Some of Your Blood
Updike, John
The Witches of Eastwick
Van Vogt, A.E.
The World of Null A
Verne, Jules:
Around the Moon
Verne, Jules:
From the Earth to the Moon
Verne, Jules:
Journey to the Center of the Earth
Wallace, David Foster
Infinite Jest
Wells, H.G.
The First Men in the Moon
Wells, H.G.
The Island of Dr. Moreau
Wells, H.G.
The Time Machine
Zelazny, Roger
Lord of Light
Special Features
Notes on Conceptual Fiction
Ray Bradbury: A Tribute
Remembering Fritz Leiber
Curse You, Neil Armstrong!
Robert Heinlein at 100
Links to related sites
The New Canon
Great Books Guide
Postmodern Mystery
Ted Gioia's web site
SF Site
io9
Graeme's Fantasy Book Review
Los Angeles Review of Books
Jospeh Peschel
The Misread City
Reviews and Responses
SF Signal
True Science Fiction
Disclosure: Conceptual Fiction and its
sister sites may receive review copies
and promotional materials from
publishers, authors, publicists or other
parties.
www.twitter.com/tedgioia
Conceptual Fiction:
A Reading List
(with links to reviews)
Home Page
Abbott, Edwin A.
Flatland
Adams, Douglas
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
Allende, Isabel
The House of the Spirits
Amis, Martin
Time's Arrow
Asimov, Isaac
The Foundation Trilogy
Asimov, Isaac
I, Robot
Atwood, Margaret
The Handmaid's Tale
Banks, Iain M.
The State of the Art
Ballard, J.G.
Crash
Ballard, J.G.
The Crystal World
Bester, Alfred
The Demolished Man
Bradbury, Ray
Dandelion Wine
Bradbury, Ray
Fahrenheit 451
Bradbury, Ray
The Illustrated Man
Bradbury, Ray
The Martian Chronicles
Bradbury, Ray
Something Wicked This Way Comes
Burgess, Anthony
A Clockwork Orange
Card, Orson Scott
Ender's Game
Chabon, Michael
The Yiddish Policemen's Union
Chiang, Ted
Stories of Your Life and Others
Clarke, Arthur C.
Childhood's End
Clarke, Arthur C.
A Fall of Moondust
Clarke, Arthur C.
2001: A Space Odyssey
Clarke, Susanna
Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell
Danielewski, Mark Z.
House of Leaves
Dick, Philip K.
Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said
Dick, Philip K.
The Man in the High Castle
Dick, Philip K.
Ubik
Doctorow, Cory
Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom
Gaiman, Neil
American Gods
Gibson, William
Burning Chrome
Gibson, William
Neuromancer
Grass, Günter
The Tin Drum
Haldeman, Joe
The Forever War
Hall, Steven
The Raw Shark Texts
Harrison, M. John
Light
Heinlein, Robert
The Moon is a Harsh Mistress
Heinlein, Robert:
Stranger in a Strange Land
Heinlein, Robert
Time Enough for Love
Herbert, Frank
Dune
Huxley, Aldous
Brave New World
Le Guin, Ursula K.
The Lathe of Heaven
Le Guin, Ursula K.
The Left Hand of Darkness
Leiber, Fritz
The Big Time
Leiber, Fritz
Conjure Wife
Leiber, Fritz
Swords & Deviltry
Leiber, Fritz
The Wanderer
Lem, Stanislaw
His Master's Voice
Lem, Stanislaw
Solaris
Lethem, Jonathan
The Fortress of Solitude
Lewis, C. S.
The Chronicles of Narnia
Link, Kelly
Magic for Beginners
Márquez, Gabriel García
100 Years of Solitude
McCarthy, Cormac
The Road
Miéville, China
Perdido Street Station
Miller, Jr., Walter M.
A Canticle for Leibowitz
Mitchell, David
Cloud Atlas
Niffenegger, Audrey
The Time Traveler's Wife
Niven, Larry
Ringworld
Noon, Jeff
Vurt
Okri, Ben
The Famished Road
Pohl, Frederik
Gateway
Pynchon, Thomas
Gravity's Rainbow
Robinson, Kim Stanley
Red Mars
Rowling, J.K.
Harry Potter & the Sorcerer's Stone
Rushdie, Salman
Midnight's Children
Saramago, José
Blindness
Shelley, Mary
Frankenstein
Silverberg, Robert
Dying Inside
Silverberg, Robert
Nightwings
Simak, Clifford
City
Simak, Clifford
The Trouble with Tycho
Smith, Cordwainer
Norstrilia
Smith, Cordwainer
The Rediscovery of Man
Stephenson, Neal
Snow Crash
Stross, Charles
Glasshouse
Sturgeon, Theodore
More Than Human
Sturgeon, Theodore
Some of Your Blood
Updike, John
The Witches of Eastwick
Van Vogt, A.E.
The World of Null A
Verne, Jules:
Around the Moon
Verne, Jules:
From the Earth to the Moon
Verne, Jules:
Journey to the Center of the Earth
Wallace, David Foster
Infinite Jest
Wells, H.G.
The First Men in the Moon
Wells, H.G.
The Island of Dr. Moreau
Wells, H.G.
The Time Machine
Zelazny, Roger
Lord of Light
Special Features
Notes on Conceptual Fiction
Ray Bradbury: A Tribute
Remembering Fritz Leiber
Curse You, Neil Armstrong!
Robert Heinlein at 100
Links to related sites
The New Canon
Great Books Guide
Postmodern Mystery
Ted Gioia's web site
SF Site
io9
Graeme's Fantasy Book Review
Los Angeles Review of Books
Jospeh Peschel
The Misread City
Reviews and Responses
SF Signal
True Science Fiction
Disclosure: Conceptual Fiction and its
sister sites may receive review copies
and promotional materials from
publishers, authors, publicists or other
parties.