Sea Wolves by Michael Moorcock

 


Sea Wolves - adventure number six of Michael Moorcock's The Lives and Times of Jerry Cornelius. Sea Wolves first appeared in Science Against Man, edited by Anthony Cheetham, Avon, 1970.

Sea Wolves features twenty-four microchapters contained within fifteen pages, beginning with Your computer needs you and ending with a reminder the 1970s are just around the corner and a note that all ad quotes in Sea Wolves are from the December 6 issue of Business Week.

And what awaits a reader between beginning and end? As per Jerry Cornelius usual, a multiverse of imagination. Below are assorted sparks -

"It occurs to us that while we've been saying "you need your computer" we'd also like to emphasise something equally important.
"Your computer needs you."
You see, without you your computer is nothing.
In fact it's people like yourself that have made the computer what it is today.
It's people like you that have made their computer do some pretty exciting things."

Amazing. It's as if visionary Michael Moorcock could see fifty years into the future, could see our present day world culture of ubiquitous laptops and cell phones, where the entire population is connected via the internet, a world where we no longer project ourselves onto our personal internet profile since we ARE our internet profile. With a touch of black humor, way back in 1969 Michael Moorcock could hear the current 2021 generation proclaim: Who cares when my physical body gives out and I die? I will live on as my internet profile!

"Running, grinning, aping the movements of the mammals milling about him, Jerry Cornelius made tracks from the menagerie that was My Lai, the monster tourist attraction of the season."

This quote is from the the first chapter, a vision of hell on earth, the My Lai massacre, a horror reaching households around the globe in full living technicolor by way of TV, newspapers and magazines. The hell of the Vietnam War casts its bloody, deadly stain as Eternal Champion Jerry Cornelius journeys forth as the alpha Sea Wolf.



"A fine balance had to be maintained between man and machine, just as between man and man, man and woman, man and environment."

Clues to maintaining a fine balance might be found it what it means to be a sea wolf, as per - 

First meaning: Sea wolves are a unique breed of wolf in the Great Bear Rainforest along the Pacific Coast of Canada. Genetically distinct from wolves in any other part of the world, sea wolves swim between islands like fish. Recall from The English Assassin, Jerry has had his own spot of time in the salty sea.

Second meaning: The Sea Wolves is a 1980 film starring Gregory Peck, Roger Moore and David Niven based on the 1978 thriller by James Leasor, which, in turn, is based on a covert March, 1943 attack against a German merchant ship that had been transmitting information to German U-boats.

Of course, Michael Moorcock writing his Sea Wolves back in 1970 had no knowledge of the future film nor did the British author necessarily know about those fish-like wolves in the Pacific Northwest. But, and here's where the multiverse magic kicks in, it is as if Jerry Cornelius embodies the energy of those unique swimming wolves along with what it takes to pull off that dangerous maneuver conducted by Special Operations Executive in World War II.



Jer will need all the energy he can muster. He'll be traveling to Phnom Penh, encountering Cossacks along the Dnieper River and wandering along grassy paths between ancient ruins in Villahermosa, Mexico.

At one point a young gent by the name of Cyril Tome enters Jerry's hut. Cyril can see JC has his needler, heater and vibragun. Jerry brushes back his fine blonde shoulder length hair. After some prattle, Jerry detects Cyril is filled with fear. "Fear, Mr. Tome. I think we might have to book you."
Cyril responds, "But I thought you were on my side."  To which Jerry replies, "Christ! Of course I am. All their sides. And all the other sides. Of course I am!"

You tell him, Jerry! A Sea Wolf Eternal Champion transcends categories and political affiliations. Forever his own man, Jerry will also encounter the likes of Bishop Beesley and Miss Brunner and he isn't about to be bound by preconceived notions of identity.

But, you might ask, the chapter title is Sea Wolves as in more than one wolf. Ah, yes, wolves travel in packs - and Jerry needs other wolves to help him hunt. And, who are these other wolves? Why, of course - you the readers! That's right, in keeping with Michael Moorcock's vision of the Jerry Cornelius series, readers are cocreators and participate in the adventures via their own imagination. You are among the chosen pack. The hunt is on.


British author Michael Moorcock, born 1939