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BAYLEY
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carroll
christopher
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"Bayley is
the zen master of modern space opera"
- Bruce Sterling
Author of 16 novels and
some 80 short stories, Barry Bayley
has been writing science fiction since 1954. His unique
vision
can be seen as a synthesis between A. E. van Vogt's
visionary
imagery with Borges' metaphysical notions.
"The most
original SF writer of his generation."
- Michael Moorcock
Cosmos Books is proud to
bring back into print all his classic
novels, from THE STAR VIRUS to THE
ROD OF LIGHT, his
two short story collections, KNIGHTS OF THE
LIMITS and
THE SEED OF EVIL as well as two previously
unpublished
science fiction novels, THE
SINNERS OF ERSPIA and
THE GREAT HYDRATION.
Interview
extracts with the author
You mentioned in an earlier interview that
you weren't
very interested in school, spending your time thinking
about spaceships. Did you know from early on that this
is what you wish to do?
I
discovered science fiction magazines at the age of
twelve and they very quickly became a dominating
influence. By the time I was fourteen I had it in mind
to become a science fiction writer.
I might have liked to become a scientist if I had the
ability (which I don't), but only if I could make an
original contribution!
How
do you go about creating a world, a new
universe, even a new set of physical laws? Is it a
detailed process with a great deal of notes and
references, or is it just something you mull over
in your head and transcribe to paper?
It's
the latter. I haven't any particular method.
It isn't hard to think up a future society; it sort
of springs into existence as a suitable background
for the story. Nor do you have to work very hard at
it: a few deft touches and the reader's imagination
fills the rest in.
I should add that I am slow at bringing things to
fruition. A story or novel might sketchily have been
conceived of, perhaps even some work done on it,
decades before I actually come to write it. So some
semi-conscious development could well have gone on
during that time.
You
seem like you have a great belief in technology,
yet your own books often have really quite nonexistent
(some would call them impossible) technologies in them.
Does this invention make the process of writing more
interesting to you, or are there perhaps other reasons
for this?
Why
limit yourself? There used to be (probably still is)
something of a divide among science fiction writers. I
remember meeting a young American writer who asked me,
'Do you write fantasy or clank-clank?' He proudly
announced that he wrote clank-clank. Clank-clank is
hard science fiction based on known science, with some
extrapolation, of course. All I can say is, today's
known science is tomorrow's phlogiston. Clank-clank
tends to look distinctly dated in only a few decades
time. How many science fiction writers predicted the
level of minituarisation of electronics we have today?
I know of only one example -- a short story in a
British magazine by someone I've never heard of
since as far as I know (having forgotten both the
name of the author and the title of the story).
Progress in electronics meant more and more gigantic
machines.
To answer the question more directly, yes, it makes it
more interesting. I always try to make future
technologies
self-consistent, even when, as in STAR WINDS, they are
based on wrong premises.
What
is THE SINNERS OF ERSPIA about? Also, you mention
in an earlier interview that you find your
"attention
dwelling more in the area of feeling and less on
conceptual
thought" these days. Is this true of the new novel,
and
how would you position it in your body of work?
Its
theme is the suggestibility of the human mind. An
alien being, whose own consciousness is totally solitary
and unassailable, is studying this phenomenon because he
thinks humankind is a freak of nature, only
semi-intelligent
and destined for early extinction. All other intelligent
species are like him.
The storyline is a series of adventures in experimental
societies the alien has set up. There is a bit of what
you
say; being solitary, the alien has no ethical sense,
whereas
the protagonist is highly ethical and believes in the
doctrine of karma. But the novel isn't really new; the
first part was written years ago, but I was never able
to come up with a satisfactory outline and so no one took
it up. Last year I finished it just for the hell of it,
and to see how it turned out in the end. I quite like it,
but I don't know if anyone else will or whether it will
see print. One publisher has returned it unread.
I have a number of planned novels from ten years ago or
more which failed to get placed; everything I came up
with
was being turned down. Some of them I quite like and if I
get the time may write them just for my own satisfaction.
Is
it a function of literature to critique, teach or preach,
or mainly just to entertain? And how do you feel about
your
writings in this context? Is there a goal you aspire to
achieve ?
My
goal is to write good science fiction, the sort that
blows
your mind! I regard science fiction as the literature of
the
twentieth century, and the only one which future
historians
will bother to study as they try to understand our age.
THE
STAR VIRUS
THE ANNIHILATION FACTOR
EMPIRE OF TWO WORLDS
COLLISION WITH CHRONOS
THE FALL OF CHRONOPOLIS
THE SOUL OF THE ROBOT
THE GARMENTS OF CAEAN
THE KNIGHTS OF THE LIMITS
THE SEED OF EVIL
THE GRAND WHEEL
STAR WINDS
THE PILLARS OF ETERNITY
THE ZEN GUN
THE FOREST OF PELDAIN
THE ROD OF LIGHT
THE SINNERS OF ERSPIA
THE GREAT HYDRATION
for
complete interviews, short stories and more,
visit Astounding
Worlds of Barrington Bayley!
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