THE LOCAL AND THE UNIVERSAL IN ROBERT SHECKLEY’S MINDSWAP - Наукові конференції
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Рік заснування видання - 2014

THE LOCAL AND THE UNIVERSAL IN ROBERT SHECKLEY’S MINDSWAP

26.05.2023 22:31

[8. Філологічні науки]

Автор: Claudia A. Ustyuzhyna, MD, Independent scholar; Igor В. Ustyuzhyn, PhD, Kharkiv National University


I wonder what’ll become of my name when I go in?

I shouldn’t like to lose it at all – because they’d 

have to give me another, and it would be almost 

certain to be an ugly one.

Lewis Carroll [2, 84].

You may call it ‘nonsense’ if you like, but I‘ve 

heard nonsense, compared with which that would be

 as sensible as a dictionary.

Lewis Carroll [2, 60].

At the lecture given at Kharkov State University in 2005, Robert Sheckley (1928 – 2005) again “astonished, amused, horrified, and delighted” his audience [7, i]. Then he entertained questions. One of the ordinary ones was about Robert Sheckley’s books, he was especially fond of. Being extraordinary, the master did not respond ordinarily (sort of “I love them all”, the way a mediocre author would respond), but did give the Kharkovites a few titles, Mindswap included.

Mindswap (1966), a short novel consisting of 33 small chapters, is a hilarious blend of science fiction, dystopia, nonsense, detective- and love- story [*1]. As early as in the second paragraph of the book the reader is introduced to one of the most interesting characters there – a “studious and cultured gentleman from Mars, age 43, very highly recommended by the rectors of East  Skern University” [*2].

Very soon in the New-York body-brokerage house the protagonist ( Marvin Flynn from Stanhope, NY [*3] ) was shown his picture: a “nice looking chap” with a barrel chest, thin legs, slightly thicker arms and a small head with an extremely long nose was standing knee-deep in mud, waving to someone. It turned out that just like Marvin, the Martian was desirous of travelling and wished to exchange bodies with similarly inclined Earth gentleman for the month of August. Marvin decided to go for it and got into trouble. The Martian Sun-News  (tri-planet edition) summarised it this way: “SWAP SCANDAL! Police officials on Mars and Terra revealed today the existence of a Mindswap scandal. Wanted for questioning is Ze Kraggash, species unknown, who allegedly sold, swapped or otherwise disposed of his body to 12  Beings simultaneously” [5, 54]. 




The case was given to Urf  Urdorf, an ordinary middle-aged Martian detective, good at throwing darts at a target shaped like a woman’s bottom only. Soon he found out that having “swapped” into Marvin’s body, the criminal fled the Earth, taking with him Marvin’s body and Nemuchtian Adventist Aigeler  Thrus’ money. Then Urdorf traced the thief to Iorama  II, where he (the thief) smuggled himself into a cargoload of flash-frozen beef destined for Goera  Major. On Goera Kraggash represented himself as a fugitive from Hage XI, raised plenty of money there and left for Kvanthis, where he cashed his money. Staying no more than a day on Kvanthis, he boarded the local to the Fiftystar Autonomous Region (that contained no less than 432 planetary systems with combined population of 300 billion) and, finally, escaped to the Twisted World, so reminiscent of Lewis Carroll’s Wonderland and the Looking Glass Country that Alice travelled through. 

The detective knew that the Twisted World meant death or madness and that the chances of coming through it were extremely small [*4]. So, he preferred admitting failing his 159th case in a row to chasing the criminal in it. The only person bold / mad / desperate / furious enough to enter the flaming circle [*5] was Marvin Flynn who could have quoted Carroll’s Alice and cur had he had time:



all because “of all the unsatisfactory – ( <…> repeated this aloud as it was a great comfort to have such a long word to say) “of all the unsatisfactory people I ever met –“[2, 142]

**

Plato of the Twisted World wrote: “It ain’t whatcha do, it’s the way thatcha do it” [5, 236]. And Marvyn did it in style: Kraggash’s bastion fell in a night when Marvin kidnapped the Barbary apes, but Kraggash speeded across southern Thrace with his body in a suitcase. He was seized at the frontier of Phthistia, a country that Marvin improvised with considerable effect upon the history of Europe. 

In vain the knave invented devil-worship, “the followers of Marvinity bowed down not to the idol, but rather to the symbol” [5, 239]. Helpless at last Kraggash lay, the incarnation of evil, with the body of Marvin clutched in his talon. Rites of exorcism induced his final agony. A buzz saw disguised as a prayer wheel dis- membered him, a mace masquerading as a censer brained him. Kindly old Father  Flynn intoned over him the last words: “Thou gettest no bread with one meat-ball” [5, 239]. Then Martin opened the suitcase and took out his long-lost body. He wiped its nose and straightened its tie. Then, with seemly reverence, he put it on. 

 


The ending seems to be happy: Marvin accepted that (i. e.  Twisted) world at face value, married Stanhope’s leading real-estate dealer’s demure young daughter “and lived forever after” [*6].

Revenge was sweet. Justice was done. But at least one crucial question remained unanswered: was doing Justice really sweeter than doing Lady Catarina [*7]?

NOTES

[*1] The short version (consisting of 26 chapters) was previously published in Galaxy Magazine [6].

[*2] Plenty of intellectuals (Sheckley included) would, arguably, subscribe to many of his witty remarks and notes: “If a man cannot retain control of his body, then he deserves to lose it;” “Men will give their bodies to any rogue who asks, and will enslave their minds to the first voice that commands them to obey. This is why the vast majority of men cannot keep even their natural birthright of a mind and body, but choose instead to rid themselves of those embarrassing emblems of freedom;” “That which you call a crime when one man does it, you call government when many men do it” [5, 219]; “Something that is never has to prove anything;” “A proof is true only to itself, and it implies nothing except the existence of proofs, which prove nothing”[5, 224].

[*3] Marvin is described as “free, gay, and thirty-one. He was personable, a tall, broad-shouldered boy with a clipped black moustache and gentle brown eyes. He was healthy, intelligent, a good mixer, and not unacceptable to the other sex” [5, 8]. Sheckley’s “Stanhope, NY” is an “invincibly bucolic” town some 300 miles from New York City situated in the foothills of the Adirondacks [5, 6].

[*4] Cf. Carrol’s:   – How do you know, I’m mad? – said Alice.

– You must be, or you wouldn’t have come here [1, 91].

and Chagigah 14b.

[*5] The portal to the Twisted World.

[*6] Cf. “<…>he was already too old. <…>he never found the way” [3].

[*7] Cf. Rev. 2:2a, 4.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

1. Carrol, Lewis.  Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland in: Carrol, Lewis. Prikliuchenia Alisy v Strane Chudes [Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland]. Nabokov, Vladimir. Ania v Strane Chudes [Ania in Wonderland]. M.: Raduga Publishers, 1992.

2. Carrol, Lewis.  Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There. M.: Progress Publishers, 1966.

3. Kuttner, Henry. Mimsy Were the Borogoves in: The Best of Henry Kuttner. NY: Ballantine Books, 1975. 

4. Sheckley, Robert.  About Robert  Sheckley in: Sheckley, Robert. Untouched by Human Hands. 13 stories of the beings who dwell on the strange borders of reality. NY: Ballantine Books, 1954. P. 170.

5. Sheckley, Robert. Mindswap. SPB: KARO, 2013.

6. Shekley, Robert. Mindswap. Complete Short Novel in: Galaxy Magazine. Vol. 23, No. 5 (June, 1965). PP. 7-97.

7. A Word of Advice in: Sheckley, Robert. Untouched by Human Hands. 13 stories of the beings who dwell on the strange borders of reality. NY: Ballantine Books, 1954. P. i.




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