Literary critic Ted Gioia on Harlan Ellison's seven rule-shattering stories collected here:
"But I am willing to declare, under oath if need be, that this book is a classic, one of the defining works in the New Wave movement that rewrote the sci-fi rulebook back in the 1960s. And while many of the other New Wave books have aged poorly, their once daring gambits now looking like failed sucker bets, this one still ups the ante. And probably because Harlan Ellison, even at his most experimental, always wrote as if his life depended on it."
As Harlan Ellison wrote in his Forward to this collection (an essay entitled How Science Fiction Saved Me From a Life of Crime), when writer Joanna Russ told him that she wished he'd write with more precision so she could admire the details of his stories as if they were statues:
"My stories were by no means "statue" stories, immobile, fixed, permanent. They were assaults, and if they ruined her equilibrium only once, I'd settle for that. I wanted explosions, not cool meditative thinkpieces. There are other writers who do those in abundance; what I do is something else."
The Ellison seven do indeed serve as assaults, as explosions. Here's my write-up of the famous title story from the twitching, banging skull of this fresh-mouthed Maladjusted Guttersnipe (Harlan's own words in caps when describing himself):
I HAVE NO MOUTH, AND I MUST SCREAM
I concur with Ted Gioia: Harlan Ellison helped rewrite the science fiction rulebook back in 1967, specifically with I Have No Mouth, as per:
Nuclear Apocalypse
Unlike all those Golden Age heroes forever seeking adventure in their gleaming rocket ships, the future in this scalding tale is bleak– the creation of mastercomputers to fight the Cold War turned WWIII backfired. Following nuclear obliteration, the separate mastercomputers created by the US, Russia and China could detect they would only destroy one another if they continued fighting, so all three joined forces as one super mastercomputer – AM. And that’s AM as in Allied Mastercomputer, Adaptive Manipulator, Aggressive Menace and eventually: I think, therefore I AM.
Technology Doesn’t Help But Hinders
AM doesn’t submit (understatement) to Isaac Asimov's "Three Laws of Robotics" formulated in 1942, laws that made sure robots would always obey humans and never bring harm to humans. Obey humans? Ha! - never happen. Powerful AM assumes complete control and takes a special pleasure inflicting pain on humans.
Matter of fact, for the past 109 years, AM has devised various tortures for the five remaining humans (four men, one woman) it has been keeping alive after nuclear war destroyed the entire human population. For example: AM never shares the reason why it acts the way it does; AM can alter human personality, reduce humans to the level of demented, amoral animals; AM continually rejuvenates the five, thus keeping them in prime health for even more torture; AM adds more kicks and jollies by producing a heaving, bulky creature to frighten the humans. Net effect: all are reduced to AM’s belly slaves.
Actually, the tale’s human narrator knows AM hates humans for giving it sentience; for giving it the capacity to develop consciousness; for keeping it trapped in its own electronic circuitry, forever forced to maintain relations with humans.
Psychology Not Physics
Rather than emphasis on hard science as was common in old style sci-fi, Harlan's tale shifts to psychology: AM alters human biology so it can change character and personality. And, wouldn’t you know it, AM has also deprived the quintet of our distinctively human capacity for laughter.
Attack on Traditional Religion
Science fiction prior to the 60s would never take swipes at traditional Judaeo-Christian religion. Harlan Ellison’s tale does just that: the narrator states if AM is God then it’s “Daddy the Deranged.” Additionally, at one point AM appears as a burning bush and, at yet another, the humans have a vision of a host of archangels.
Mind Screw
AM can screw the human mind to the point of madness: “Perhaps Benny was the luckiest of the five of us: he had gone stark staring mad many years before." Deep into the tale, the narrator watches as AM enters his own mind (ahhh!) in order to manipulate it. Now, that’s a major mind screw!
Sex and Sexuality
In the years preceding 1960s New Wave, sex was mostly a taboo subject in science fiction. Harlan hits sex hard: "the machine masturbated and we had to take it or die," "the machine giggled every time we did it,” “He was big in his private parts, she loved that! She served us as a matter of course, but she loved it from him."
Pessimism To The Bitter End
The narrator reverts to caveman with spear as murder weapon. Then, another twist of torment: "AM has altered me for his own peace of mind, I suppose. He doesn't want me to run at full speed into a computer bank and smash my skull. Or hold my breath till I faint. Or cut my throat on a rusted sheet of metal."
Bitter and bitter and bitter. The ending? For Harlan Ellison to scream.
American author Harlan Ellison, 1934-2018
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