The Final Programme is the first volume in British author Michael Moorcock's The Cornelius Quartet. The other novels in the tetralogy are A Cure for Cancer, The English Assassin, The Condition of Muzak.
The Final Programme surely ranks among the top ten New Wave SF novels from the 60s. However, it must be noted, this Michael Moorcock genre-bender does not fit into any clearly defined category, science fiction or otherwise.
The Final Programme starts off as fast-paced action thriller and then shifts gears to set the world record for most philosophic reflections and cool images in a novel of 250-pages.
The novel's main dude is twenty-seven-year-old hip, wealthy Londoner Jerry Cornelius driving his Duesenberg luxury sedan, sporting the latest mod fashion and packing a deadly needle-gun (among the SF elements). Yes, yes, yet another of the author's Eternal Champions with the initials JC.
But what Jerry doesn't possess is his inheritance - precious microfilms to unlock the secrets of the universe. Jerry's drug-experimenting brother, diabolical Frank won that honor since Jerry's father discovered Jerry having sex with sister Catherine. That's right - incest. Any doubts we're reading a 60s novel pushing sexual boundaries?
Oh, how Jerry would love to get his hands on that precious microfilm. As does a Miss Brunner and a number of her metaphysically inclined, eccentric friends. And to add fuel to his brotherly revenge, Jerry plans to rescue dear sister Catherine currently held captive by dastardly Frank.
Ah, revenge! Jerry heads up an attack against Frank and Frank's small army of German mercenaries walled up in a Le Cobusier-style château along the coast of Normandy, a fortress their father constructed many years prior to the Second World War. Thus, the first portion of the novel is full throttle action thriller.
But fear not, the mighty Moorcock goes on to hurl so much at a reader beyond a mere James Bond adventure. As a way of sharing a tasty taste, here are some scrumptious Final Programme yummies:
Supreme Statement
Is the Final Programme of The Final Programme the ultimate equation for the ultimate computer program? I wouldn't want to spoil by even hinting at what this could mean. But I'll give you one hint: keep your eye on Miss Brunner.
Playful Parody
Michael Moorcock absolutely refused to be pigeonholed by any label or genre. Recall that stock Western phrase, "Throw down your gun and come out with your hands up." Well, the author plays off the cowboy command when he has Jerry tell Frank, "Throw in your needle and come in with your veins clear."
A careful reader will detect Michael Moorcock repeatedly poking fun at Golden Age pulp science fiction with its Buck Rogers rocket ships, good guys vs. bad guys and hideous Martians chasing scantly clad busty beauties.
Pop Culture
Jerry reads the comics, eats Mars bars, listens to The Who and The Beatles (natch,) plays pinball but still has the mental acumen to publish a paper on unified-field theory. Even during an exchange of ideas on cosmology there's the constant blare (real or imagined) of guitars and drums. Turning the pages of The Final Programme, you can almost hear the thumping beat of The Who's Tommy, Pinball Wizard switching back and forth with the Fab Four's Come Together, Let it Be and Strawberry Fields Forever.
Crash
"Instead there was a photo covering the whole side: a mass car smash with mangled corpses everywhere. Jerry supposed that the picture sold sheets." One of Michael Moorcock's preoccupations: the struggle of order vs. chaos. It's no coincidence The Cornelius Quartet published within the same time frame as J. G. Ballard's Crash. Slick modern automobiles as symbol for both life-giving freedom and death-dealing tragedy - order vs. chaos coming to a dealer near you.
Vampires
Jerry muses, "He found that he didn't need to eat much, because he could live off other people's energy just as well." An ongoing theme in the novel: the transfer of energy from one person to another, one object to another, in the context of Hindu cosmology, physics, astrology, vampires, you name it.
Seriousness Kills
The last thing our British author wants is for one to read his Cornelius Quartet without a sense of humor. Seasoned throughout Final Programme are quotable laugh lines, such as, "He would certainly kill Frank when they raided the house. Frank's final needle would come from Jerry's gun. It would give him his final kick - the one he kept looking for." James Bond meets another great JC - John Cleese.
Miss Brunner, Ally or Adversary?
Miss Brunner might be more than she appears to be. Jerry senses this when he says, "Miss Brunner, if I hadn't been through my theological phase, I'd be identifying you as first suspect for Mephistopheles" To which, Miss Brunner replies, "I haven't got my pointed beard. Not with me."
Ha! Beware, Jerry. As Arthur Schopenhauer was fond of repeating, "Whoever expects to see devils go through the world with horns and fools with jingling bells will always be their prey or plaything."
However, Jerry is wise enough to recognize that he can't fit Miss Brunner in with Homo Sapiens. When Miss Brunner, dear lady, hears Jerry voice these words, she acknowledges that she doesn't fit in easily anywhere.
Oh, my goodness. What is Miss Brunner admitting? Is this a foreshadowing of things to come? A question to keep in mind since Miss Brunner makes her appearance in each novel within the tetralogy.
Psychedlia
Prime 60s weapon employed by brother Frank in his role as prototypical Ian Fleming bad guy: LSD gas. Hang in, Jerry! You must steel yourself to overcome the mind-bending effects:
"His brain and body exploded in a torrent of mingled ecstasy and pain. Regret. Guilt. Relief. Waves of pale light flickered. He fell down a never-ending slope of obsidian rock surrounded by clouds of green, purple, yellow, black. . . . Another wave flowed up his spine. No-mind, no-body, no-where. Dying waves of light danced out of his eyes and away through the dark world. Everything was dying. Cells, sinews, nerves, synapses - all crumbling. Tears of light, fading, fading. Brilliant rockets streaking into the sky and exploding all together and sending their multicoloured globes of light - balls on an Xmas tree - x-mass - drifting slowly. Black mist swirled across a bleak, horizoness nightscape."
Hollow Earth Theory
Edgar Rice Burroughs wrote of a prehistoric world 500 miles below the earth's surface, a secret world lit by a constant noonday inner sun. Jerry toys with Hollow Earth Theory along with Hindu cosmic cycles (Kali Yuga most prominent), relativity, physics, neuroscience, mathematics, Nietzsche's eternal return, the list goes on.
I urge you to order a copy of The Final Programme. The recently published Titan Books edition is the one to go with, particularly since there's an insightful Introduction written by none other than lead authority on Science Fiction, critic and author John Clute.
I'll conclude with one of John Clute's keen observations re Jerry Cornelius. "The presentation of self in everyday life in the inner city is a form of theatre, where identity is rôle and where entropy is high, for time is passing. Jerry Cornelius is the paradigmatic native of the inner city."
Photo taken around 1968, the time when British author Michael Moorcock wrote The Final Programme
“A moment later, the world's first all-purpose human being strode eastward, whistling.
'A tasty world,' it reflected cheerfully. 'A very tasty world.'
'You said it, Cornelius!”
― Michael Moorcock, The Final Programme
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