(In a neat chain effect, Stapledon’s next novel, Star Maker, which he began working on before Odd John was finished, can be linked to this one, as one thing the titular John leaves behind at the end is “an amazing document… purporting to give an account of the whole story of the Cosmos” - a pretty accurate description of Star Maker.) If anything, we have moved closer to the stage when conflict between superior and sapient man is imminent.Stapledon’s third novel, Odd John, began life as an appendix to his second, Last Men in London (1932), a short piece that was called “John’s Story”, which was never published. For those in literature, in psychology, in philosophy, or even in the world as it now exists, the detailed histories of these two strange beings will be ones to ponder. If his writing, as he says in the subtitle to Odd John, is between jest and earnest, his sympathies are divided between the conflicting forces of man and superman. Stapledon is capable of a great deal of humor and tongue-in-cheek description. Odd John and Sirius are something else besides explorations of superbeings.
Stapledon uses his powers - intellectual, imaginative, and observant - to detail the conflict in its very human form.
Sirius, although the logical successor to Odd John, deals with quite another being - an alien intelligence, artificially produced, a dog with superhuman mentality, who is not only superior to his own kind, but rejected by those with whom he has most in common. What is more, he has to decide what to do with his gifts.
After a strange birth and childhood, John is suddenly compelled to accept the fact that he is different. Odd John is the definitive fictionalization of the mutated superman. The central question is: if and when a superior being is introduced into a culture, how will either survive? Stapledon's answers are by no means romantic fantasies they are the pathetic, realistic conclusions which we, one day, may be forced to accept. Odd John and Sirius are no less accurate in dealing with the problem in another guise. Last and First Men and Starmaker are generally considered to be the finest future histories ever written, the gage by which all earlier and later works are measured. In the list of modern science fiction personalities, the late British philosopher and novelist W. Prison Life: Help for Inmates and Families Used : Fiction, Romance and Urban Fiction Used: Science Fiction & Fantasy and Horror Novels Used: Western and Historical Novels & Historical Romance Used: Mysteries, Thrillers, Suspense and Action Novels Science Fiction & Fantasy and Horror Novels Mysteries, Thrillers, Suspense and Action Novels
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