| conceptual fiction |
| Reviewed by Ted Gioia |
| The Wanderer by Fritz Leiber |
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Great literary works published
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Reviews of current books
Postmodern Mystery
Experimental works of
mystery & suspense
The sci-fi genre is not known for its experiments in narrative
structure. And in the 1950s and 1960s, when the genre
struggled to advance beyond its pulp fiction roots—under the
influence of Ray Bradbury, Kurt Vonnegut, J.G. Ballard, Robert
Heinlein and others with grander ambitions for speculative
fiction—few would have expected Fritz Leiber to play a role in
the revitalization of the idiom. True, Leiber demanded respect
for his skills as a storyteller, and the sheer excess of imagi-
nation that he brought to his tales, but for most fans he rep-
resented the old guard, not the new
wave.
Yet Leiber, one of the least predictable
literary figures of the century, shook
things up with The Wanderer, which
won the Hugo Award for best novel in
1965. In this expansive work, Leiber
simultaneously advances fifteen sepa-
rate plots—changing scenes every few
paragraphs. The closest counterpart in
the literary canon is Don DeLillo’s
Underworld, a similarly fragmented
novel published to much acclaim a
generation later. But Leiber adopts an
even more challenging blueprint than DeLillo, squeezing all
fifteen of his dramas into the same two-day period, and
maintaining a tight, sequential chronology even as he shifts
rapidly from scene to scene.
Despite winning the coveted Hugo, The Wanderer has often
been criticized in recent years—attacked by science fiction
fans who are put off by this same intricate narrative structure.
The complaints are the obvious ones: too many characters,
too many plots, too much jumping around from setting to set-
ting. To be sure, readers raised on Star Trek or Harry Potter
will only be frustrated by the complexity and constraints at
work here. But I look at Leiber’s ambitious novel as akin to
Slaughterhouse Five, another novel with an unconventional
structure—Vonnegut's narrative jumps around as his protago-
nist Billy Pilgrim becomes unstuck in time. The book bravely
flouts the usual rules of sequential storytelling, and might well
be judged a failure by the conventional standards of the genre.
Sci-fi writing, after all, eschews elaborate formalist conceits—
it is about content, not form, and any attempt to reverse that
priority is bound to face heated opposition. For a cinematic
example from this same period, consider Kubrick’s 2001: A
Space Odyssey, which also was roundly attacked because
its plot incorporated what appeared to be jarring discontinuities
(especially if the moviegoer hadn’t read Arthur C. Clarke’s
novel). Yet any study of sci-fi’s rise from its origins as pulp
fiction escapism needs to give due consideration to these very
same works, which aimed to remove the generic from genre
stories, and took chances with something other than
technological concepts.
Related Stories
Fritz Leiber at 100
Conjure Wife by Fritz Leiber
The Big Time by Fritz Leiber
Swords and Deviltry by Fritz Leiber
The Wanderer begins with the sudden appearance of a large
planet-sized object in the vicinity of the Earth. This unex-
pected intruder shows no obvious hostile intent, yet its mere
presence is enough to set off cataclysmic events. Its
gravitational pull is sufficient to draw the moon into its own
orbit, but the effects on Earth are even more deadly. The new
planet now begins to control the tides, with the potential for
them to grow exponentially—perhaps as much as 80-fold—
over their pre-vious levels. Earthquakes are set off, as our
planet’s crust adjusts to the new gravitational forces at work.
Fires, landslides and tsunamis add to the destruction. Radio
communication is shut down, overwhelmed by the new
planet’s magnetic fields, thus crippling efforts to respond to
the various emergencies. Amidst the confusion, gangs and
marauders begin taking matters into their own hands.
Leiber reveals considerable skills as a so-called “hard” sci-fi
writer throughout this work, where he revels in physics,
geology, astronomy, mathematics, oceanography and what-
ever other discipline he requires to depict his crisis scenario
in the most specific and convincing terms. It’s hard to believe,
on the basis of this easy erudition, that Leiber originally
gravitated to fantasy stories rather than science fiction be-
cause he had doubts about his ability to write convincing tales
in the latter genre. Not just the descriptive prose, but even
much of the dialogue of The Wanderer revolves around
scientific concepts—since many of the characters are
engineers, researchers or technology experts, amateur or
professional, and their conversations are often devoted to
speculation or analysis ofthe impact of the new planetary body
on Mother Earth.
Yet Leiber is, here as elsewhere in his oeuvre, a storyteller first
and foremost. This novel is character-driven, and the technol-
ogy rarely intrudes on the unfolding drama. Yes, aliens from
another galaxy do make an appearance in these pages, but
the most pressing threat to homo sapiens in this book come
from those old standbys: earth, water and fire. A short sum-
mary of the various ways characters interact with the elements
in these pages is impossible—suffice it to say that Leiber
covers the globe and beyond, above and below. His story-
lines include a sailor attempting a solo crossing of the Atlantic,
a couple on a date at Coney Island, a gun runner operating in
the waters off of Vietnam, a drunk poet in Wales, a group of
flying saucer fanatics in Southern California, a General and his
staff in a secret military bunker, an astronaut at a manned
station on the surface of the moon, Brazilian insurgents who
have seized a large luxury liner, and many, many others.
Once Leiber is off and running, you can never predict where
he will end. He is just as willing to kill off a major character, as
to press forward to a happy ending. And every once in while
he tries for something so outrageous, that the reader has to
stop and marvel at the sheer audacity. What other author
would try to solve the famous Black Dahlia murder case in the
midst of a sci-fi novel? Only Fritz Leiber, it seems, as
demonstrated in one of the stranger passages in The Wan-
derer. And when he concocts a romance, it may well bridge
an age gap of many decades or an evolutionary gap of many
millennia. As a staunch Shakespearian—Leiber acted
in Macbeth and King Lear—our author knows well that “the
course of true love never did run smooth.” But it is especially
challenging when your beloved looks like a cross between a
tiger and a monkey. All that, however, is par for the course, in
the odd, wide-ranging book.
No, not everything shines in this work. Leiber's wry humor and
his witty dialogue—so prominent in his masterpieces "Adept's
Gambit" and The Big Time—are delivered in the smallest
doses. I suspect that the author saw this as a darker story than
his other efforts, a massive novel of global disaster on the
grandest of scales. Even when he works for laughs, the humor
is overwhelmed by the destruction depicted. Yet without a
doubt, this is Leiber's most ambitious undertaking, and a must
read for those who hope to come to grips with this seminal
figure in 20th century genre lit.
structure. And in the 1950s and 1960s, when the genre
struggled to advance beyond its pulp fiction roots—under the
influence of Ray Bradbury, Kurt Vonnegut, J.G. Ballard, Robert
Heinlein and others with grander ambitions for speculative
fiction—few would have expected Fritz Leiber to play a role in
the revitalization of the idiom. True, Leiber demanded respect
for his skills as a storyteller, and the sheer excess of imagi-
nation that he brought to his tales, but for most fans he rep-
resented the old guard, not the new
wave.
Yet Leiber, one of the least predictable
literary figures of the century, shook
things up with The Wanderer, which
won the Hugo Award for best novel in
1965. In this expansive work, Leiber
simultaneously advances fifteen sepa-
rate plots—changing scenes every few
paragraphs. The closest counterpart in
the literary canon is Don DeLillo’s
Underworld, a similarly fragmented
novel published to much acclaim a
generation later. But Leiber adopts an
even more challenging blueprint than DeLillo, squeezing all
fifteen of his dramas into the same two-day period, and
maintaining a tight, sequential chronology even as he shifts
rapidly from scene to scene.
Despite winning the coveted Hugo, The Wanderer has often
been criticized in recent years—attacked by science fiction
fans who are put off by this same intricate narrative structure.
The complaints are the obvious ones: too many characters,
too many plots, too much jumping around from setting to set-
ting. To be sure, readers raised on Star Trek or Harry Potter
will only be frustrated by the complexity and constraints at
work here. But I look at Leiber’s ambitious novel as akin to
Slaughterhouse Five, another novel with an unconventional
structure—Vonnegut's narrative jumps around as his protago-
nist Billy Pilgrim becomes unstuck in time. The book bravely
flouts the usual rules of sequential storytelling, and might well
be judged a failure by the conventional standards of the genre.
Sci-fi writing, after all, eschews elaborate formalist conceits—
it is about content, not form, and any attempt to reverse that
priority is bound to face heated opposition. For a cinematic
example from this same period, consider Kubrick’s 2001: A
Space Odyssey, which also was roundly attacked because
its plot incorporated what appeared to be jarring discontinuities
(especially if the moviegoer hadn’t read Arthur C. Clarke’s
novel). Yet any study of sci-fi’s rise from its origins as pulp
fiction escapism needs to give due consideration to these very
same works, which aimed to remove the generic from genre
stories, and took chances with something other than
technological concepts.
Related Stories
Fritz Leiber at 100
Conjure Wife by Fritz Leiber
The Big Time by Fritz Leiber
Swords and Deviltry by Fritz Leiber
The Wanderer begins with the sudden appearance of a large
planet-sized object in the vicinity of the Earth. This unex-
pected intruder shows no obvious hostile intent, yet its mere
presence is enough to set off cataclysmic events. Its
gravitational pull is sufficient to draw the moon into its own
orbit, but the effects on Earth are even more deadly. The new
planet now begins to control the tides, with the potential for
them to grow exponentially—perhaps as much as 80-fold—
over their pre-vious levels. Earthquakes are set off, as our
planet’s crust adjusts to the new gravitational forces at work.
Fires, landslides and tsunamis add to the destruction. Radio
communication is shut down, overwhelmed by the new
planet’s magnetic fields, thus crippling efforts to respond to
the various emergencies. Amidst the confusion, gangs and
marauders begin taking matters into their own hands.
Leiber reveals considerable skills as a so-called “hard” sci-fi
writer throughout this work, where he revels in physics,
geology, astronomy, mathematics, oceanography and what-
ever other discipline he requires to depict his crisis scenario
in the most specific and convincing terms. It’s hard to believe,
on the basis of this easy erudition, that Leiber originally
gravitated to fantasy stories rather than science fiction be-
cause he had doubts about his ability to write convincing tales
in the latter genre. Not just the descriptive prose, but even
much of the dialogue of The Wanderer revolves around
scientific concepts—since many of the characters are
engineers, researchers or technology experts, amateur or
professional, and their conversations are often devoted to
speculation or analysis ofthe impact of the new planetary body
on Mother Earth.
Yet Leiber is, here as elsewhere in his oeuvre, a storyteller first
and foremost. This novel is character-driven, and the technol-
ogy rarely intrudes on the unfolding drama. Yes, aliens from
another galaxy do make an appearance in these pages, but
the most pressing threat to homo sapiens in this book come
from those old standbys: earth, water and fire. A short sum-
mary of the various ways characters interact with the elements
in these pages is impossible—suffice it to say that Leiber
covers the globe and beyond, above and below. His story-
lines include a sailor attempting a solo crossing of the Atlantic,
a couple on a date at Coney Island, a gun runner operating in
the waters off of Vietnam, a drunk poet in Wales, a group of
flying saucer fanatics in Southern California, a General and his
staff in a secret military bunker, an astronaut at a manned
station on the surface of the moon, Brazilian insurgents who
have seized a large luxury liner, and many, many others.
Once Leiber is off and running, you can never predict where
he will end. He is just as willing to kill off a major character, as
to press forward to a happy ending. And every once in while
he tries for something so outrageous, that the reader has to
stop and marvel at the sheer audacity. What other author
would try to solve the famous Black Dahlia murder case in the
midst of a sci-fi novel? Only Fritz Leiber, it seems, as
demonstrated in one of the stranger passages in The Wan-
derer. And when he concocts a romance, it may well bridge
an age gap of many decades or an evolutionary gap of many
millennia. As a staunch Shakespearian—Leiber acted
in Macbeth and King Lear—our author knows well that “the
course of true love never did run smooth.” But it is especially
challenging when your beloved looks like a cross between a
tiger and a monkey. All that, however, is par for the course, in
the odd, wide-ranging book.
No, not everything shines in this work. Leiber's wry humor and
his witty dialogue—so prominent in his masterpieces "Adept's
Gambit" and The Big Time—are delivered in the smallest
doses. I suspect that the author saw this as a darker story than
his other efforts, a massive novel of global disaster on the
grandest of scales. Even when he works for laughs, the humor
is overwhelmed by the destruction depicted. Yet without a
doubt, this is Leiber's most ambitious undertaking, and a must
read for those who hope to come to grips with this seminal
figure in 20th century genre lit.
Follow Ted Gioia on Twitter at
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
Apuleius
The Golden Ass
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
Bulgakov, Mikhail
The Master and Margarita
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
Delany, Samuel R.
Babel-17
Delany, Samuel R.
Dhalgren
Delany, Samuel R.
The Einstein Intersection
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
Esquivel, Laura
Like Water for Chocolate
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
Helprin, Mark
Winter's Tale
Herbert, Frank
Dune
Huxley, Aldous
Brave New World
Kundera, Milan
The Book of Laughter and Forgetting
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
Millhauser, Steven
Dangerous Laughter
Mitchell, David
Cloud Atlas
Niffenegger, Audrey
The Time Traveler's Wife
Niven, Larry
Ringworld
Noon, Jeff
Vurt
Obreht, Téa
The Tiger's Wife
Okri, Ben
The Famished Road
Pohl, Frederik
Gateway
Pynchon, Thomas
Gravity's Rainbow
Rabelais, François
Gargantua and Pantagruel
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
Vonnegut, Kurt
Cat's Cradle
Vonnegut, Kurt
The Sirens of Titan
Vonnegut, Kurt
Slaughterhouse-Five
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
The Year of Magical Reading
Remembering Fritz Leiber
Samuel Delany's 70th birthday
The Sci-Fi of Kurt Vonnegut
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.ç
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
Apuleius
The Golden Ass
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
Bulgakov, Mikhail
The Master and Margarita
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
Delany, Samuel R.
Babel-17
Delany, Samuel R.
Dhalgren
Delany, Samuel R.
The Einstein Intersection
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
Esquivel, Laura
Like Water for Chocolate
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
Helprin, Mark
Winter's Tale
Herbert, Frank
Dune
Huxley, Aldous
Brave New World
Kundera, Milan
The Book of Laughter and Forgetting
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
Millhauser, Steven
Dangerous Laughter
Mitchell, David
Cloud Atlas
Niffenegger, Audrey
The Time Traveler's Wife
Niven, Larry
Ringworld
Noon, Jeff
Vurt
Obreht, Téa
The Tiger's Wife
Okri, Ben
The Famished Road
Pohl, Frederik
Gateway
Pynchon, Thomas
Gravity's Rainbow
Rabelais, François
Gargantua and Pantagruel
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
Vonnegut, Kurt
Cat's Cradle
Vonnegut, Kurt
The Sirens of Titan
Vonnegut, Kurt
Slaughterhouse-Five
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
The Year of Magical Reading
Remembering Fritz Leiber
Samuel Delany's 70th birthday
The Sci-Fi of Kurt Vonnegut
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.ç