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''Cities in Flight'' is a four-volume series of
science fiction
Science fiction (sometimes shortened to Sci-Fi or SF) is a genre of speculative fiction which typically deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology, space exploration, time travel, parallel unive ...
novels and short stories by American writer
James Blish
James Benjamin Blish () was an American science fiction and fantasy writer. He is best known for his ''Cities in Flight'' novels and his series of ''Star Trek'' novelizations written with his wife, J. A. Lawrence. His novel ''A Case of Conscienc ...
, originally published between 1950 and 1962, which were first known collectively as the "
Okie
An Okie is a person identified with the state of Oklahoma. This connection may be residential, ethnic, historical or cultural. For most Okies, several (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of their being Oklahoman. ...
" novels. The series features entire cities that are able to fly through space using an anti-gravity device, the
spindizzy
''Cities in Flight'' is a four-volume series of science fiction novels and short stories by American writer James Blish, originally published between 1950 and 1962, which were first known collectively as the "Okie" novels. The series features ent ...
. The stories cover roughly two thousand years, from the very near future to the end of the universe. One story, "Earthman, Come Home", won a Retro
Hugo Award
The Hugo Award is an annual literary award for the best science fiction or fantasy works and achievements of the previous year, given at the World Science Fiction Convention and chosen by its members. The Hugo is widely considered the premier a ...
in 2004 for Best Novelette. Since 1970, the primary edition has been the omnibus volume first published in paperback by
Avon Books
Avon Publications is one of the leading publishers of romance fiction. At Avon's initial stages, it was an American paperback book and comic book publisher. The shift in content occurred in the early 1970s with multiple Avon romance titles reach ...
. Over the years James Blish made many changes to these stories in response to points raised in letters from readers.
The books
''They Shall Have Stars''
''They Shall Have Stars'' (1956) (also published under the title ''Year 2018!''), incorporating the stories "Bridge" and "At Death's End", is set in the then near future (the book begins in 2013). In this future, the Soviet Union still exists and the
Cold War
The Cold War is a term commonly used to refer to a period of geopolitical tension between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies, the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc. The term '' cold war'' is used because the ...
is still ongoing. As a result,
Western civil liberties have been eroded more and more, until society eventually resembles the
Soviet model
Soviet-type economic planning (STP) is the specific model of centralized planning employed by Marxist–Leninist socialist states modeled on the economy of the Soviet Union (USSR).
The post-''perestroika'' analysis of the system of the Soviet e ...
. Alaska's Senator Bliss Wagoner, head of the Joint Congressional Committee on Space Flight, is determined to do something about it.
Scientific research has stagnated, mainly because knowledge has become restricted. On the advice of scientist Dr. Corsi, Wagoner concentrates his attention on
fringe science
Fringe science refers to ideas whose attributes include being highly speculative or relying on premises already refuted. Fringe science theories are often advanced by persons who have no traditional academic science background, or by researchers ...
theories. One project he has funded is the building of a "bridge" made of
Ice IV
Ice IV is a metastable high-pressure phase of ice.
It is formed when liquid water is compressed with an immense force.
Preparation
Several organic nucleating reagents had been proposed to selectively crystallize ice IV from liquid water, but e ...
on the surface of
Jupiter
Jupiter is the fifth planet from the Sun and the List of Solar System objects by size, largest in the Solar System. It is a gas giant with a mass more than two and a half times that of all the other planets in the Solar System combined, but ...
. This leads to one of two major discoveries which make interstellar space travel feasible: gravity manipulation (nicknamed the "
spindizzy
''Cities in Flight'' is a four-volume series of science fiction novels and short stories by American writer James Blish, originally published between 1950 and 1962, which were first known collectively as the "Okie" novels. The series features ent ...
"), which leads to both a faster-than-light travel and effective shielding. Another project yields an "anti-agathic" drug, which stops aging. Wagoner is eventually convicted of treason by an oppressive regime, but not before he has sent out expeditions (in a later book, it is revealed that they succeed in establishing thriving colonies). Politically, the book clearly expresses a strong opposition to
McCarthyism
McCarthyism is the practice of making false or unfounded accusations of subversion and treason, especially when related to anarchism, communism and socialism, and especially when done in a public and attention-grabbing manner.
The term origin ...
, at its peak during the time of writing. The main antagonist is Francis X. MacHinery, hereditary Director of the
FBI
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic Intelligence agency, intelligence and Security agency, security service of the United States and its principal Federal law enforcement in the United States, federal law enforcement age ...
, which has become a ''de facto'' secret police agency. In the final chapter he is heard to say "Bliss Wagoner is dead", with the narrative noting that "as usual, he was wrong", as Wagoner's legacy will endure.
Reviewing a later edition, the ''
Hartford Courant
The ''Hartford Courant'' is the largest daily newspaper in the U.S. state of Connecticut, and is considered to be the oldest continuously published newspaper in the United States. A morning newspaper serving most of the state north of New Haven ...
'' described the novel as "a skillful mixture of human reality and technological fantasy".
''A Life for the Stars''
In the period in between the first and second parts, the Cold War ended with the peaceful merging of the Eastern and Western blocs into a single, planet-wide Soviet-ruled dictatorship, which hardly made any perceptible change, as the West's political system had already become virtually identical with the Soviet one. However, this dictatorial power was broken by the spindizzy drive which becomes more efficient as more mass is affected, so that dissidents and malcontents have an easy way of escaping and going off into space. First factories, then eventually whole cities migrate from the economically depressed Earth in search of work; these space-wandering cities are called
Okie
An Okie is a person identified with the state of Oklahoma. This connection may be residential, ethnic, historical or cultural. For most Okies, several (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of their being Oklahoman. ...
s.
''A Life for the Stars'' (1962) is a ''
bildungsroman
In literary criticism, a ''Bildungsroman'' (, plural ''Bildungsromane'', ) is a literary genre that focuses on the psychological and moral growth of the protagonist from childhood to adulthood ( coming of age), in which character change is impo ...
'' describing the adventures of sixteen-year-old Chris deFord, born when the above process of migration had already been going on for a considerable time. When Chris goes to watch the imminent departure of
Scranton, Pennsylvania
Scranton is a city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Lackawanna County, Pennsylvania, Lackawanna County. With a population of 76,328 as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 U ...
, he is kidnapped and brought with it.
After several adventures, Chris is fortunate to be transferred to the much more prosperous New York (or at least the
Manhattan
Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...
portion of it), a major "
Okie
An Okie is a person identified with the state of Oklahoma. This connection may be residential, ethnic, historical or cultural. For most Okies, several (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of their being Oklahoman. ...
" city under
Mayor
In many countries, a mayor is the highest-ranking official in a municipal government such as that of a city or a town. Worldwide, there is a wide variance in local laws and customs regarding the powers and responsibilities of a mayor as well a ...
John Amalfi. Scranton is run by the
city manager
A city manager is an official appointed as the administrative manager of a city, in a "Mayor–council government" council–manager form of city government. Local officials serving in this position are sometimes referred to as the chief execu ...
rather than its figurehead mayor. When the two cities meet again and come into conflict over Scranton's bungling of a job, Chris is able to convince an influential friend in his old city to depose the city manager and end the conflict. Impressed, Amalfi elevates him to the newly created position of city manager of New York and gives him the status of resident rather than passenger (and thus entitled to anti-agathic drugs).
''Earthman, Come Home''
''Earthman, Come Home'' (1955, G. P. Putnam's Sons, New York), combining the stories "Okie", "Bindlestiff", "Sargasso of Lost Cities" and "Earthman, Come Home", is the longest book in the series. It describes the many adventures of New York under Amalfi, amongst a galaxy which has planets settled at different periods of history under the loose control by Earth. After an economic collapse causes a galactic depression, New York ends up in a "Jungle", where Okie cities orbit a dying red giant star while waiting for work. Amalfi realises that the "Vegan Orbital Fort", a semi-mythical remnant of the previously dominant alien civilisation, is hiding among the Okies. His plan to stop the Vegans involves forcing the Okies to "march" on Earth, attracting the Vegan fort to join in the "march", and culminates in installing a
spindizzy
''Cities in Flight'' is a four-volume series of science fiction novels and short stories by American writer James Blish, originally published between 1950 and 1962, which were first known collectively as the "Okie" novels. The series features ent ...
drive system on a small planet and using it to lead the march. When the march reaches Earth, a big fleet of armed Earth police ships appears from invisibility and summarily vaporises all the marchers, with at least one loss in the police fleet, because it is recorded that the flying city
Buda-Pesht destroyed a police
monitor
Monitor or monitor may refer to:
Places
* Monitor, Alberta
* Monitor, Indiana, town in the United States
* Monitor, Kentucky
* Monitor, Oregon, unincorporated community in the United States
* Monitor, Washington
* Monitor, Logan County, West Vir ...
.
A mention of the "Battle of the Jungle" may mean that the Earth Police cleanup fleet then goes to the "Jungle" and destroys all that it finds there.
Amalfi takes advantage of the vastly higher speed and size of the flying planet to destroy the fort, then flies New York away before the Earth Police can catch them.
Eventually, the city is projected out of the Milky Way galaxy, towards the
Greater Magellanic Cloud
The Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC), or Nubecula Major, is a satellite galaxy of the Milky Way. At a distance of around 50 kiloparsecs (≈160,000 light-years), the LMC is the second- or third-closest galaxy to the Milky Way, after the ...
. With some of New York's spindizzies irreparably damaged, Amalfi convinces the New Yorkers that they must find a planet to call home. On their chosen planet, New York encounters the Interstellar Master Traders (IMT), a rogue city whose sacking of the planet Thor 5 damaged the reputation of Okies in general, and who have enslaved the local human population. In typical fashion, Amalfi swindles the IMT residents and sets their spindizzy engineers to fly the city off the planet, where they are destroyed by an Earth Police ship. Although Blish rarely defines how much time passes during each adventure, a late chapter implies that over three hundred years pass in the course of the novel. Reviewer
Groff Conklin
Edward Groff Conklin (September 6, 1904 – July 19, 1968) was an American science fiction anthologist. He edited 40 anthologies of science fiction, one of mystery stories (co-edited with physician Noah Fabricant), wrote books on home improvemen ...
praised it as "a real, honest, pure, gee-whiz space opera."
''A Clash of Cymbals/The Triumph of Time''
''A Clash of Cymbals'' (published in the U.S. as ''The Triumph of Time'') (1959) follows the passage of Amalfi and the planet "He" undertaking the first intergalactic transit. In the less relativistically-distorted space between the two galaxies, evidence of a collision between two universes is detected by the "Hevians" — a matter-
antimatter
In modern physics, antimatter is defined as matter composed of the antiparticles (or "partners") of the corresponding particles in "ordinary" matter. Antimatter occurs in natural processes like cosmic ray collisions and some types of radioac ...
collision that reveals the cyclic nature of reality. An alien culture is also investigating this phenomenon, which will shortly accelerate to engulf all galactic space; in other words, the colliding universes will end in a transition in between the
Big Bang
The Big Bang event is a physical theory that describes how the universe expanded from an initial state of high density and temperature. Various cosmological models of the Big Bang explain the evolution of the observable universe from the ...
and
Big Crunch
The Big Crunch is a hypothetical scenario for the ultimate fate of the universe, in which the expansion of the universe eventually reverses and the universe recollapses, ultimately causing the cosmic scale factor to reach zero, an event potential ...
. It will be possible to modify the future development of the fresh universes which will emerge from this singularity, and Amalfi directs the "New Earth" residents to compete with the alien culture (the Web of Hercules) in order to prevent their manipulation of the future of the universe.
As with the other books, a detailed description of the technologies used is provided, including cosmological calculus. While there are some continuity slips, the series presents a unified story of humanity's expansion across the galaxy, and the birth of a new universe.
Frederik Pohl
Frederik George Pohl Jr. (; November 26, 1919 – September 2, 2013) was an American science-fiction writer, editor, and fan, with a career spanning nearly 75 years—from his first published work, the 1937 poem "Elegy to a Dead Satelli ...
praised the novel as "science fiction which deals with tomorrow on its own terms", citing Blish's "triumph of inventions, great and small", but concluded that despite the "brilliance" of the author's conceptions, ''Triumph'' suffered from its inadequate story.
Fictional technology
* The powerful
space weapon
Space weapons are weapons used in space warfare. They include weapons that can attack space systems in orbit (i.e. anti-satellite weapons), attack targets on the earth from space or disable missiles travelling through space. In the course of the ...
called the Bethé blaster operates by causing a fast
nuclear fusion
Nuclear fusion is a reaction in which two or more atomic nuclei are combined to form one or more different atomic nuclei and subatomic particles ( neutrons or protons). The difference in mass between the reactants and products is manifest ...
explosion in all low-
atomic-weight elements in its target, thus completely vaporizing its target. It efficiently and quickly destroys any Okie city which it is fired at. It was named after
Hans Bethe
Hans Albrecht Bethe (; July 2, 1906 – March 6, 2005) was a German-American theoretical physicist who made major contributions to nuclear physics, astrophysics, quantum electrodynamics, and solid-state physics, and who won the 1967 Nobel Prize ...
.
* The mesotron rifle is a hand-held
energy weapon.
* The
spindizzy
''Cities in Flight'' is a four-volume series of science fiction novels and short stories by American writer James Blish, originally published between 1950 and 1962, which were first known collectively as the "Okie" novels. The series features ent ...
is an
anti-gravity
Anti-gravity (also known as non-gravitational field) is a hypothetical phenomenon of creating a place or object that is free from the force of gravity. It does not refer to the lack of weight under gravity experienced in free fall or orbit, or to ...
and
faster-than-light
Faster-than-light (also FTL, superluminal or supercausal) travel and communication are the conjectural propagation of matter or information faster than the speed of light (). The special theory of relativity implies that only particles with zero ...
flight device. The drive also produces a "force field" barrier around the city that keeps in its atmosphere and heat. One unusual aspect of the drive is that the larger the mass inside the spindizzy field, the higher velocity it can achieve. In several stories in which planets were equipped with spindizzy drives, the speed of travel is so high only computers can react quickly enough to avoid collisions with stars.
* The Dirac communicator allows instantaneous communication across the width of a galaxy. It was named after
Paul Dirac
Paul Adrien Maurice Dirac (; 8 August 1902 – 20 October 1984) was an English theoretical physicist who is regarded as one of the most significant physicists of the 20th century. He was the Lucasian Professor of Mathematics at the Univer ...
. It occurs often in Blish's fiction and its creation is described in the novel ''
The Quincunx of Time
''The Quincunx of Time'' is a short science fiction novel by American writer James Blish. It is an extended version of a short story entitled "Beep", published by ''Galaxy Science Fiction'' magazine in 1954. The novel form was first published ...
''.
* Bethé barrier: a sort of defensive barrier sometimes set up at an Okie city's limits.
*
Transistor metals: the story mentions
germanium
Germanium is a chemical element with the symbol Ge and atomic number 32. It is lustrous, hard-brittle, grayish-white and similar in appearance to silicon. It is a metalloid in the carbon group that is chemically similar to its group neighbors s ...
often, including as a money metal, but it never mentions
silicon
Silicon is a chemical element with the symbol Si and atomic number 14. It is a hard, brittle crystalline solid with a blue-grey metallic luster, and is a tetravalent metalloid and semiconductor. It is a member of group 14 in the periodic tab ...
. In the real world, silicon
became reliable as a transistor metal in 1957-1958, after most of these books were published.
* In the start of ''A Life for the Stars'' a man booking a ride in a computer-controlled taxicab spoke his
social security number
In the United States, a Social Security number (SSN) is a nine-digit number issued to U.S. citizens, permanent residents, and temporary (working) residents under section 205(c)(2) of the Social Security Act, codified as . The number is issued to ...
to it, demonstrating computer voice recognition.
Spindizzy
The Dillon-Wagoner Graviton Polarity Generator, known colloquially as the spindizzy, is a fictitious
anti-gravity
Anti-gravity (also known as non-gravitational field) is a hypothetical phenomenon of creating a place or object that is free from the force of gravity. It does not refer to the lack of weight under gravity experienced in free fall or orbit, or to ...
device imagined by Blish in Cities in Flight. This device grows more efficient with the amount of mass being lifted, which was used as the hook for the stories—it was more effective to lift an entire city than it was to lift something smaller, such as a classic
spaceship. This is taken to extremes in the final stories, where an entire planet is used to cross the galaxy in a matter of hours using the spindizzy drive.
According to the stories, the spindizzy is based on the
Blackett effect
The Blackett effect, also called gravitational magnetism, is the hypothetical generation of a magnetic field by an uncharged, rotating body. This effect has never been observed.
History
Gravitational magnetism was proposed by the German-British ...
—principles contained in an equation coined by British physicist
P.M.S. Blackett
Patrick Maynard Stuart Blackett, Baron Blackett (18 November 1897 – 13 July 1974) was a British experimental physics, experimental physicist known for his work on cloud chambers, cosmic rays, and paleomagnetism, winning the Nobel Priz ...
. Several other Blish stories involving novel
space drives contain the same assertion. Blackett's original formula was an attempt to correlate the known
magnetic fields
A magnetic field is a vector field that describes the magnetic influence on moving electric charges, electric currents, and magnetic materials. A moving charge in a magnetic field experiences a force perpendicular to its own velocity and to ...
of large rotating bodies, such as the Sun, Earth, and a star in
Cygnus whose field had been measured indirectly.
It was unusual in that it brought
Isaac Newton
Sir Isaac Newton (25 December 1642 – 20 March 1726/27) was an English mathematician, physicist, astronomer, alchemist, theologian, and author (described in his time as a "natural philosopher"), widely recognised as one of the grea ...
's
gravitational constant
The gravitational constant (also known as the universal gravitational constant, the Newtonian constant of gravitation, or the Cavendish gravitational constant), denoted by the capital letter , is an empirical physical constant involved in ...
and the
Coulomb constant
The Coulomb constant, the electric force constant, or the electrostatic constant (denoted , or ) is a proportionality constant in electrostatics equations. In SI base units it is equal to .Derived from ''k''e = 1/(4''πε''0) – It was named ...
together, the one governing forces between masses, the other governing forces between
electric charges
Electric charge is the physical property of matter that causes charged matter to experience a force when placed in an electromagnetic field. Electric charge can be ''positive'' or ''negative'' (commonly carried by protons and electrons respe ...
. However, it was later disproved by more accurate measurements, and by new discoveries such as
magnetic field reversals on
Earth
Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the only astronomical object known to harbor life. While large volumes of water can be found throughout the Solar System, only Earth sustains liquid surface water. About 71% of Earth's surfa ...
and the
Sun
The Sun is the star at the center of the Solar System. It is a nearly perfect ball of hot plasma, heated to incandescence by nuclear fusion reactions in its core. The Sun radiates this energy mainly as light, ultraviolet, and infrared radi ...
, and the lack of a magnetic field on bodies such as
Mars
Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun and the second-smallest planet in the Solar System, only being larger than Mercury (planet), Mercury. In the English language, Mars is named for the Mars (mythology), Roman god of war. Mars is a terr ...
, despite its rotation being similar to Earth's.
Blish's extrapolation was that if rotation combined with mass produces magnetism via gravity, then rotation and magnetism could produce anti-gravity. The field created by a spindizzy is described as altering the magnetic moment of any atom within its influence.
The spindizzy was also used in at least two novels by Jesse Franklin Bone, ''The Lani People'' and ''Confederation Matador'', and appears as the nickname for fictional
Heim theory
Heim theory, first proposed by German physicist Burkhard Heim publicly in 1957, is an attempt to develop a theory of everything in theoretical physics. The theory claims to bridge some of the disagreements between quantum mechanics and general rel ...
devices in
Ken MacLeod
Kenneth Macrae MacLeod (born 2 August 1954) is a Scottish science fiction writer. His novels ''The Sky Road'' and ''The Night Sessions'' won the BSFA Award. MacLeod's novels have been nominated for the Arthur C. Clarke, Hugo, Nebula, Locus, an ...
's ''
The Execution Channel
''The Execution Channel'' is an alternate history science fiction novel by British writer Ken MacLeod, which focuses on the early decades of the 21st century. The military of the United States of America and some of its allies have conducted a ...
''.
Cities
In the year 2010
omnibus edition
An omnibus edition or omnibus is a creative work containing one or more works by the same or, more rarely, different authors. Commonly two or more components have been previously published as books but a collection of shorter works, or shorter wor ...
, these flying Okie cities are named (but many more are mentioned):
*
Buda-Pesht (Hungary)
*
Coquilhatville
Mbandaka (, formerly known as Coquilhatville in French, or Coquilhatstad in Dutch) is a city on the Congo River in the Democratic Republic of Congo located near the confluence of the Congo and Ruki rivers. It is the capital of Équateur Provinc ...
- Congo
*
Dresden - Saxony (Germany)
*
Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh ( ) is a city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, Allegheny County. It is the most populous city in both Allegheny County and Wester ...
*
New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...
- The main protagonist City about which the stories revolve.
* Thorium Trust's Plant Number 8
* Gravitogorsk-Mars (''later renamed'') IMT = Interstellar Master Traders
*
Los Angeles
Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...
(only in a legend that was current among the Okie cities)
*
Liverpool
Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. With a population of in 2019, it is the 10th largest English district by population and its metropolitan area is the fifth largest in the United Kingdom, with a popul ...
(England)
* Bradley - Vermont
*
Lincoln, Nevada (a false name used for itself by the Vegan orbital fort).
*
Scranton
Scranton is a city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Lackawanna County, Pennsylvania, Lackawanna County. With a population of 76,328 as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 U ...
(Pennsylvania, USA)
And one city which is not described as flying:
*
Washington, D.C.
)
, image_skyline =
, image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...
- Described as 'The sole City on the sleepy planetary capital of the system', and 'The place where old bureaucrats went to retire', Earth. All other Cities had by this time left the earth. Seat of operations of the Earth Police, and the Earth Government which regulates and polices the far-flung Okie cities.
References in other works
The
spindizzy
''Cities in Flight'' is a four-volume series of science fiction novels and short stories by American writer James Blish, originally published between 1950 and 1962, which were first known collectively as the "Okie" novels. The series features ent ...
was used in at least two novels by Jesse Franklin Bone, ''The Lani People'' and ''Confederation Matador'', and appears as the nickname for fictional
Heim Theory
Heim theory, first proposed by German physicist Burkhard Heim publicly in 1957, is an attempt to develop a theory of everything in theoretical physics. The theory claims to bridge some of the disagreements between quantum mechanics and general rel ...
devices in
Ken MacLeod
Kenneth Macrae MacLeod (born 2 August 1954) is a Scottish science fiction writer. His novels ''The Sky Road'' and ''The Night Sessions'' won the BSFA Award. MacLeod's novels have been nominated for the Arthur C. Clarke, Hugo, Nebula, Locus, an ...
's ''
The Execution Channel
''The Execution Channel'' is an alternate history science fiction novel by British writer Ken MacLeod, which focuses on the early decades of the 21st century. The military of the United States of America and some of its allies have conducted a ...
''.
''Cities in Flight'' is also a song by
Test Shot Starfish.
References
{{Reflist, 2
External links
Technovelgy article
Science fiction book series
American bildungsromans
Large Magellanic Cloud in fiction
1950 science fiction novels
American novel series
Fiction set in 2013
Fiction set in 2018
Future history
Avon (publisher) books