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 uni ...
novel by American writer
Theodore Sturgeon
Theodore Sturgeon (; born Edward Hamilton Waldo, February 26, 1918 – May 8, 1985) was an American fiction author of primarily fantasy, science fiction and horror, as well as a critic. He wrote approximately 400 reviews and more than 120 sh ...
. It is a revision and expansion of his previously published
novella
A novella is a narrative prose fiction whose length is shorter than most novels, but longer than most short stories. The English word ''novella'' derives from the Italian ''novella'' meaning a short story related to true (or apparently so) fact ...
''Baby is Three'', which is bracketed by two additional parts written for the novel ("The Fabulous Idiot" and "Morality").
It won the 1954
International Fantasy Award
The International Fantasy Award was an annual literary award for the best science fiction or fantasy book and, in 1951-1953, the best non-fiction book of interest to science fiction and fantasy readers. The IFA was given by an international panel ...
, which was also given to works in science fiction. It was additionally nominated in 2004 for a "
Retro Hugo
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 ...
" award for the year 1954. Science fiction critic and editor
David Pringle
David Pringle (born 1 March 1950) is a Scottish science fiction editor and critic.
Pringle served as the editor of '' Foundation'', an academic journal, from 1980 to 1986, during which time he became one of the prime movers of the collective whi ...
Simon & Schuster
Simon & Schuster () is an American publishing company and a subsidiary of Paramount Global. It was founded in New York City on January 2, 1924 by Richard L. Simon and M. Lincoln Schuster. As of 2016, Simon & Schuster was the third largest publi ...
published a
graphic novel
A graphic novel is a long-form, fictional work of sequential art. The term ''graphic novel'' is often applied broadly, including fiction, non-fiction, and anthologized work, though this practice is highly contested by comic scholars and industry ...
version of ''More Than Human'' in 1978, titled '' Heavy Metal Presents Theodore Sturgeon's More Than Human''. It was illustrated by
Alex Niño
Alex Niño (born May 1, 1940) is a Filipino comics artist best known for his work for the American publishers DC Comics, Marvel Comics, and Warren Publishing, and in '' Heavy Metal'' magazine.
Biography
Early life and career
Alex Niño was bo ...
and scripted by
Doug Moench
Douglas Moench (; born February 23, 1948) is an American comic book writer notable for his ''Batman'' work and as the creator of Moon Knight, Deathlok, Black Mask, '' Electric Warrior'' and '' Six from Sirius''. He is also known for his critica ...
.
Plot introduction
The novel concerns the coming together of six extraordinary people with strange powers who are able to "blesh" (a
portmanteau
A portmanteau word, or portmanteau (, ) is a blend of wordsgestalt consciousness, called the ''homo gestalt'', the next step in the human evolution.
Plot summary
The first part of the novel, ''The Fabulous Idiot'', narrates the birth of the gestalt. In the beginning, we are introduced to the world of Lone, referred to as the "Idiot", a 25-year-old male with a telepathic ability who lives on the street. He knows he can make people do what he wants them to, but has never experienced real human connection. One day he encounters Evelyn Kew, an innocent woman who has been completely sheltered in an isolated house by her domineering father. She is the first person he has mentally and physically connected with. Evelyn's father finds out about the relationship and kills Evelyn and himself. During this incident Lone barely escapes a beating from the father; bleeding and nearly dead, he is found and then adopted by the Prodds, a poor farming couple, and lives with them for about seven years. When Mrs. Prodd becomes pregnant, the couple are about to ask Lone to leave, but he makes his departure appear to be his own idea. Lone builds a shelter in the forest and is soon joined by three runaway children: Janie, an eight-year-old with a telekinetic gift, and the twins Bonnie and Beanie, who cannot speak but possess the ability to teleport. Lone returns to the farm to find Mrs. Prodd has died after giving birth to a "
Mongoloid
Mongoloid () is an obsolete racial grouping of various peoples indigenous to large parts of Asia, the Americas, and some regions in Europe and Oceania. The term is derived from a now-disproven theory of biological race. In the past, other terms ...
" baby. Altering Prodd's memories so that he thinks his wife is on a trip and they never had a child, Lone adopts the baby, who has a phenomenal mental capacity and thinks almost like a computer. Together, Lone, Janie, the twins and Baby form what will be later called the ''homo gestalt''. Prodd's old truck is always getting stuck in the mud, and when Lone asks Baby for a solution, Baby helps Lone build an anti-gravity generator. He installs it in Prodd's truck, only to find that Prodd has left for Pennsylvania.
The second part of the novel is ''Baby is Three'', which occurs several years after ''The Fabulous Idiot''. Gerry Thompson, a street urchin who has grown up in abusive institutions, is possibly sociopathic. He consults a psychiatrist, trying to piece his memory back together. Gerry ran away from the institution and was taken in by Lone. They lived in a refurbished cave until they found the abandoned Kew house. Lone was killed in an accident and Gerry subsequently became the leader of the gestalt. Lone had instructed the children to seek out Evelyn's sister, Alicia, after his death. In her urban house they were educated and fed under her care. Soon, however, Gerry learned that domestication and normalization had weakened their gestalt. He killed Alicia, and the group returned to living alone in the woods. If anything, Gerry's telepathic abilities are stronger than Lone's. His amnesia was caused by Alicia's having accidentally transmitted her memories to his mind when they first met, triggered by her strong emotional reaction to hearing the words "Baby is three". He learned about her entire life, including her past relationship with Lone, in a split second. After being helped by the psychiatrist, Gerry erases the man's memory of him.
The third and concluding part of the novel is ''Morality''. Again, it occurs several years after the previous part. Lt. Hip (Hippocrates) Barrows is a gifted engineer who worked for the US Air Force until the incident which led to his incarceration, first in an insane asylum, then in jail. Janie, now an adult, befriends him and helps him regain his health. He slowly remembers what had happened. He discovered some odd effects on an anti-aircraft range. Practice shells fired in a certain area were all duds. Barrows does magnetic tests and finally discovers the anti-gravity machine, still on the rusted-out old truck on the nearby farm. Gerry knows of Hip's investigation and poses as a common soldier assisting Hip. When they find the truck, Gerry launches the anti-grav into space to stop Hip from retrieving it. He then mentally attacks Hip to make him look insane, driving him to a mental breakdown and amnesia. Gerry does this because Baby has told him that if the anti-grav was discovered, it would lead either to a terrible war or to the complete collapse of the world economy. Aided by Janie, Hip regains his memory, and they go to the isolated Kew house where the gestalt is now living again. Gerry attempts to attempt to attack Hip again. Instead, he finds Hip prepared for this moment, imagining in his mind a code of morality. This prompts Hip to merge as the last part of the gestalt, its conscience. As a result of this completion, the gestalt is telepathically greeted by, and welcomed into, the pre-existing community of other gestalts around the world. At the conclusion Gerry:
He saw himself as an atom and his gestalt as a molecule. He saw these others as a cell among cells, and he saw in the whole the design of what, with joy, humanity would become.
He felt a rising, choking sense of worship, and recognized it for what it has always been for mankind ― self-respect.
Reception
''
New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'' reviewer Villiers Gerson placed the novel among its year's best, praising it for "a poetic, moving prose and a deeply examined ''raison d'etre''."
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 ...
described ''More Than Human'' as "a masterpiece of invention... written in an unmannered prose that still has a poetic, panchromatic individuality." Boucher and McComas praised it for "its crystal-clear prose, its intense human warmth and its depth of psychological probing" as well as its "adroit plotting and ceaseless surge of action," finding it "one of the most impressive proofs yet of the possibility of science fiction as a part of mainstream literature." P. Schuyler Miller praised the novel as among the year's best, saying that Sturgeon "has Bradbury's poetry and style without ever running thin." Writing in 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 ...
'', reviewer R. W. Wallace praised ''More Than Human'', saying "In its psychological wisdom and its deep humanity this novel is one of the finest achievements of science fiction." In his "Books" column for ''
F&SF
''The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction'' (usually referred to as ''F&SF'') is a U.S. fantasy fiction magazine, fantasy and science fiction magazine first published in 1949 by Mystery House, a subsidiary of Lawrence E. Spivak, Lawrence Spiva ...
'',
Damon Knight
Damon Francis Knight (September 19, 1922 – April 15, 2002) was an American science fiction author, editor, and critic. He is the author of " To Serve Man", a 1950 short story adapted for ''The Twilight Zone''.Stanyard, ''Dimensions Behind t ...
selected Sturgeon's novel as one of the 10 best sf books of the 1950s.
Writing in 1975, R. D. Mullen declared that in ''More Than Human'', " turgeonhad a theme well suited to his talents and inclinations, ndthe result is a book that pretty well avoids the mawkishness that mars most of his work. This book is not a masterpiece, but it comes pretty close." Aldiss and Wingrove found that the novel "transcends its own terms and becomes Sturgeon's greatest statement of one of his obsessive themes, loneliness and how to cure it." In 2012, the novel was included in the
Library of America
The Library of America (LOA) is a nonprofit publisher of classic American literature. Founded in 1979 with seed money from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Ford Foundation, the LOA has published over 300 volumes by authors ran ...
two-volume boxed set ''American Science Fiction: Nine Classic Novels of the 1950s'', edited by
Gary K. Wolfe
Gary K. Wolfe (born Gary Kent Wolfe in 1946) is an American science fiction editor, critic and biographer. He is an emeritus Professor of Humanities in Roosevelt University's Evelyn T. Stone College of Professional Studies.
Life
Wolfe was bo ...
Internet Archive
The Internet Archive is an American digital library with the stated mission of "universal access to all knowledge". It provides free public access to collections of digitized materials, including websites, software applications/games, music, ...
SF Site
SF may refer to:
Locations
* San Francisco, California, United States
* Sidi Fredj, Algeria
* South Florida, an urban region in the United States
* Suomi Finland, former vehicular country code for Finland
In arts and entertainment Genre ...