Richard Rohmer Recycles (Again)

Starmageddon
Richard Rohmer
Toronto: Irwin, 1986

Starmageddon takes place in a future past. We know this because the Office of the Vice-President of the United States is held by a woman. The president calls her a bitch, primarily because she never supported Ronald Reagan's Strategic Defense Initiative. It's the year 2000, seventeen years have passed since The Gipper initiated the program and – glory be – the thing works! Doesn't the VP have mud on her face!

Time, 4 April 1983

When an American general insults the South Koreans, the lady vice-president is sent off to do damage control. Air Force One has been booked by the Secretary of State, meaning she and her staff have to travel on a commercial airliner. Seats are booked on a 747 that will follow the very same route taken in 1983 by doomed Korean Air Lines Flight 007.

What could go wrong?

Plenty.

The captain is distracted by the vice-president, another pilot is distracted by the hot purser, and the first officer is legally blind. As a result, the wrong coordinates are entered into the navigation system and the 747 flies over a site where the Soviet Union is at that very moment testing its own strategic defence system.

Well, you can imagine.

Starmageddon is the twelfth book tackled as part of the Reading Richard Rohmer project. By now, I've come to expect a fair amount of self-plagiarism in the author's books. For the most part, this takes the form of passages, speeches, chapters and fictitious documents lifted from previous novels. Separation Two, the most egregious act of self-plagiarism in Canadian literature, is the most extreme example.

Starmageddon is something else altogether. Here Rohmer lifts and tweaks page after page from Massacre 747, his 1984 book on the Korean Air Lines disaster. Behold, fiction born of non-fiction:

Like a lumbering elephant, Flight 315 began to move down runway fourteen, accelerating rapidly toward the computer-precalculated speed of 196 miles per hour. When the speed was reached, the co-pilot called out "rotation"and the captain, both hands now on the wheel of the control column, hauled back smoothly and strongly. Instantly, the nose rotated up into the climb position, and the enormous aircraft, 196 feet between its blinking wingtip lights and 232 feet between nose and tail, leapt gracefully up into the black night. It was 2:02 on the morning of August 29.

— Starmageddon 

Like a lumbering elephant, Flight 007 began to move down runway 31L, accelerating rapidly toward the computer-precalculated speed at which the co-pilot would call for rotation. When the rotation came, the captain, both hands now on the wheel on the control column, hauled back smoothly and strongly. Instantly, the nose came up into the climb position, and the enormous aircraft, 196 feet between its blinking wingtip lights and 232 feet between nose and tail, leapt gracefully up into the black night. It was 12:24 on the morning of September 1.

— Massacre 747

August 29, not September 1. The flight and runway numbers are different, too. Again, Starmageddon is set in the future; albeit a future in which the lessons of Flight 007 are forgotten. Oh, people still remember the disaster, its a real topic of conversation, but that doesn't prevent this from happening:

At 5:53 the Soviet pilot reported: "804. I have executed the launch."
       In one second the lights of the rockets, as burning propellants thrust the missiles ever faster toward the target, had become mere pinpoints in the distance. The rockets headed unerringly for the brilliant navigation lights and the red rotating beacons of the target.
       Pilot 804 knew this his heart-seeking missile, if functioning properly, would have locked onto one go the river of intense heat that the target's huge engines pouring out into the frigid high-altitude air.

— Starmageddon 

At 18:26:20 the Soviet pilot reported: "805. I have executed the launch."
     In one second the lights of the rockets, as burning propellants thrust the missiles ever supersonically faster toward the target, had become mere pinpoints in the distance. The rockets headed unerringly for the brilliant navigation lights and the red rotating beacons of the target.
       The fighter pilot knew this his heart-seeking missile, if functioning properly, would have "locked on" to one go the target's huge engines pouring out a river of intense heat into the frigid high-altitude air.

— Massacre 747

One can understand Rohmer's temptation; Massacre 747 is one hell of a book, and it contains some of his very best writing:

The mortally wounded 747 cut through the night sky, illuminating it for miles around. With only one wing it slowly began to roll. It was like a comet. Its long, distinctive humplike cockpit and nose thrust ahead and clear of the ball of flame as if trying to run away, to avoid being consumed. Inside the roiling fire all was being engulfed or spit out by the explosion into the icy air. Bodies were torn apart. Blankets, luggage, seats, toys – everything movable or ripped away from floors and ceilings at the rear of the massive aircraft – were spewed out the hole where the tail had been.

— Massacre 747 

The flaming and mortally wounded 747 cut through the night sky, illuminating it for miles around. With only one wing, it slowly began to roll. Its long, distinctive humplike cockpit and nose thrust ahead and clear of the ball of flame, as if trying to avoid being consumed. Inside, the roiling fire engulfed all that was not spit out into the icy air by the explosion. Bodies were torn apart. Blankets, luggage, seats, toys – everything that was movable or had been ripped away from floors and ceilings at the rear of the massive fuselage – were spewed out the hole where the tail had been.

— Starmageddon

Who wouldn't want to revisit those images. Besides, it gave opportunity to fix that awkward sentence about the roiling fire.

Did anyone notice?

Books in Canada, May 1986

John Gellner, who wrote glowing reviews of both books for the Globe & Mail, didn't mention the self-plagiarism; as editor of the Canadian Defence Quarterly, you'd think he'd have noticed. But what interests me more is Irwin, which was then in its death throes. Did anyone there know that large portions of their big fiction offering where copied from a book being sold by a rival publisher?

Best sentence:

Pieces of the shattered engine blade penetrated the thin fuselage skin like a knife through gossamer.

— Starmageddon 

Pieces of the shattered engine blade penetrated the thin fuselage skin like a knife through gossamer.

— Massacre 747

Object: A 241-page hardcover in blue binding. The cover art by Peter Mossman reminds me of the very worst albums sold during my time at Sam the Record Man (1983-85).

Access: At eight, I count more copies in public libraries than academic libraries.

The hardcover first edition – there was no second printing – is more common than the mass market paperback. The only cover image I can find (right) comes courtesy of Toronto bookseller David Harris, who offers his copy for all of two dollars.

Worth every penny.

Related posts:

Recycling Richard Rohmer

Freedom to Read Week: Condemned by Coren

How Do You Spell Abducted?
Cherylyn Stacey
Red Deer, AB: Red Deer College Press, 1996

Newspaper columnists don't always write their headlines, but I think Michael Coren had something to do with this one:

TAXES FUND OFFENSIVE CHILDREN'S BOOK ABOUT ABUSIVE FATHER:
Suddenly your dad is no longer a man to be loved or trusted

Published in the 31 July 1996 edition of the Financial Post, the column that followed lit amassing gas beneath the seat of Alberta backbencher Julius Yankowsky, who called for the book to be banned and its publisher's funding to be pulled. The MLA aped the columnist, repeating Coren's assertion that it was "hate literature", all the while acknowledging that he hadn't actually read the thing. After all, How Do You Spell Abducted? is 135 pages long, and some of the words have eight letters. Just look at that title!

A few months later in Books in Canada, Coren reported that the controversy he'd started over Do You Spell Abducted? had been "so much fun" – his words, not mine… as are these:

It begins with bad old Dad, divorced from good old Mum, forcing his way into his ex-wife's bedroom and screaming at her until she weeps. He then kidnaps the kids and they are so terrified they think he might kill them all and then commit suicide.

Well, no.

Dad never forces his way into any room, least of all his ex-wife's bedroom. Mum does indeed weep, which has been known to happen in divorces. Dad leaves with the kids on what is meant to be a vacation, but it soon becomes clear that he has no intention of returning. That stuff about the kids being "so terrified they think he might kill them all and then commit suicide" was fabricated by Coren; it isn't in the book.

Michael Coren is currently employed by the Sun News Network.

Not to be outdone or ignored, in the 19 August 1996 Western Report an anonymous reporter bravely worked to fan dying embers with the claim that "the fictional father threatened to kill or prostitute his progeny". It's a lie, plain and simple, but then the late magazine was never tied to the truth. More crap follows:

Her book features three other men: a crabby oldster, a fat and stupid state trooper and a good Samaritan who has been unjustly denied legal access to his own children.

There is no "crabby oldster" in the novel. The state trooper, girth never mentioned, is pretty sharp. The good Samaritan, named Dusty Andover, is a very fine and generous gentleman. He has never been denied access, legal or otherwise, to his children, though there is estrangement. Dusty's adult offspring – no sexes mentioned – begrudge his having spent their inheritances in fighting their mother's cancer.

How Do You Spell Abducted? is a rotten title, but the book isn't half bad. The characters, particularly the father, are well drawn. The plot is believable, disturbingly so, though the resolution is forced and fantastical.

I can say these things because, you see, I've read the book. I have Michael Coren to thank for bringing it to my attention.

Object: An unattractive trade-size paperback. The cover illustration by Jeff Hitch depicts a scene that does not feature in the novel.

Access:

It will be forgotten before we can say 'bleeding-heart neurotic'.

— Michael Coren, Books in Canada, Oct 1996

Found in most of our larger public libraries. Used copies are cheap, but I encourage anyone considering purchase to buy it new. Yep, How Do You Spell Abducted? is still available. Setting It Right, Michael Coren's book from the same year is long out of print.

Canada's Most Popular Writers (25 Years Ago)?

Unearthed this past weekend, this little list from the May 1987 issue of Books in Canada. It is as described, a "studiously unscientific survey", consisting only of those readers who cared to respond and sacrifice what was then a 34¢ stamp. Still, I think it interesting enough to comment, thereby risking ridicule and ruffled feathers.

I'll begin by stating the obvious (to me at any rate): The number of respondents was likely quite small, as indicated by the number of ties. And yet I think that the top five authors is an accurate reflection of the time.

Here they are again with what would have been their most recent books:

1. Alice Munro – The Progress of Love (1986)
2. Margaret Atwood – The Handmaid's Tale (1985)
3. Timothy Findley – The Telling of Lies (1986)
4. Robertson Davies – What's Bred in the Bone (1985)
     Margaret Laurence – A Christmas Birthday Story (1982)

The unexpected comes with the five names that follow. The presence of Mavis Gallant, whom I maintain has never been accorded proper respect and recognition, is a pleasant surprise, while Janette Turner Hospital, Marian Engel and Audrey Thomas are... well, simply surprises. I don't mean to belittle, but I dare say that they wouldn't figure in a top ten "People's Choice" today.

But then, who would? Carol Shields, whose The Stone Diaries was six years in the future, seems a sure bet. Timothy Findley would be down, if not out. Richler would be up, bucking a trendy decent of the deceased. And here I return to the late Mrs Shields in stating boldly that she would have ranked higher in 2003, when she was still amongst us, than she does today.

How forgetful we are. All but two of the writers on the 1987 Books in Canada list were living. The exceptions, Margaret Laurence and Marian Engel, would have been safely described as "recently deceased".

No authors of another century feature on this "People Choice" – the first half of the twentieth century is unrecognized. Are we Canadians not unique? Imagine an English list without Shakespeare, Austen, the Brontës and Dickens; a French list lacking Balzac, Flaubert and de Maupassant; or an American top ten without Whitman, Fitzgerald and Hemingway.

The most important and sad observation one might make about the Books in Canada list is this: francophones do not figure. Gabrielle Roy, perhaps the best hope, is absent, as are Michel Tremblay, Anne Hébert and Antonine Maillet.

Hector de Saint-Denys Garneau?

Don't give him a second thought.

Books in Canada, vol. 16, no. 4 (May 1987)
RIP

Atwood et al. Shill for Apple

An advert published twenty-five years ago this month in Books in Canada finds McClelland and Stewart under the sway of the "computer evangelicals of Apple Canada Inc." I had no idea such people existed. Could it be that I was out when they came to call? My first computer, bought the following year, was a PC. I've since seen the light.

Before Adobe Illustrator

Books in Canada, December 1983