soul full ness
long ago I read The Lady Who Sailed the Soul
by Cordwainer Smith (secret identity Paul Myron
Anthony Linebarger), about a woman who had a
starship across a vast distance while her c o n
s c I o u s n e s s was slowed so that it seemed to
her her hair gushed out of her head.
later he began “Himself in Anachron”
but died before he finished. an artificial intelligence
just told me it is about a man who must save his wife
by divorcing himself from time and space,
in the sacrificial sense similar
to “The Lady Who Sailed the Soul.”
the author and editor Harlan Ellison went to some
length to acquire “Himself in Anachron” for the third
volume of his Dangerous Visions trilogy. his effort
was in vain.
today i walked two miles to see the west Toledo
library for the first time. I perused the science fiction
shelves and found Tommy dismay that they had NO
Poul Anderson books, NO Isaac Asimov. But they had
a single volume of Harlan Ellison, copyright 2014:
The Top of the Volcano, a compilation of Ellison
stories that had won awards.
i had read most of them but there was a long story
i had not. in it a man named bailey
had his soul yanked from him to be placed
into the soul of an alien military subaltern named
Pinke, there to cajole Pinke into ending a war that
had gone on for generations.
i have not finished the story. I will leave that
for another visit. rather, now, i reflect on the amazing
succession of life-events: i read Cordwainer Smith,
his story was covered by Harlan Ellison, i found the
Ellison book in the West Toledo Public Library, and
I began to read his story of the abduction and
exploitation of souls…
three weeks to the day
after having arrived in Toledo
from Phoenix, Arizona
in the company of my sweetheart
in an automobile of make Kia,
model
Soul.
