Masque World

Anthony Villiers #3

by Alexei Panshin

This is book three of Panshin's science fiction gentleman adventurer Anthony Villiers. character driven, not hard science fiction

Genres: Science Fiction, Fiction, Humor, Science Fiction Fantasy, Fantasy

167 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1969

About the author

Alexis Adams Panshin is an American author and science fiction critic.

Reviews

[Alex Sarll]

Not that they have much else in common with Terra Ignota, but Alexei Panshin's Anthony Villiers books make me suspect that I'm a sucker for any science fiction steeped in the mood of the 18th century. An aristocrat, unwelcome at home for reasons never exactly specified, travels the galaxy, getting into scrapes and cheating slightly by revealing his credentials whenever things threaten to get too serious: "it hardly seems proper behaviour. It is certainly fair for a noble to go incognito, just as it is for a common man to occasionally assume a weekend title. But if nobles are going to go incognito, they should have the grace to stay incognito come the last muffin on the plate. But they never do. No, they stand, announce themselves, and in the stunned silence they gobble the muffin. Clearly they are taught the wrong things in childhood." Sometimes this involves a little genteel crime or violence, but more often it's a matter of raised eyebrows, elegantly orchestrated social cutting, and devastating retorts: "Sir, you have only one story. You tell it twice an evening, and I've heard it now for roundabout thirty years. It was minor when you told it first. Minor!" And yes, it gains from context, but if these quotes aren't raising at least the beginning of a smile then Villiers may not be for you, though other attractions range from genuinely lovely writing on stars and parties to the daft chuckles of a planet where the loveliest moment, for which one tries to be perfectly situated, is neither sunrise nor sunset, but peelgrunt. There's a touch of Wodehouse, though maybe more filtered through Sir Henry At Rawlinson's End, and at least a dash of Ogden Nash. The plot this time may be more minor than ever, centred as the title suggests on a big fancy party, but the plot was never really the appeal. Still, there is a cliffhanger of sorts, and the last page assures us the fourth volume, The Universal Pantograph, is "To follow soon." That was in 1969 and, although Panshin is still with us, 'soon' remains ongoing. People who think the wait for The Winds Of Winter and/or The Doors Of Stone has been excessive: you don't know you're born.

[Nicole · Rating 5 out of 5]

Authors can be very cruel. We still await the forth book The Universal Pantograph.

[Chrome · Rating 5 out of 5]

wonderful - always a refuge and a comfort to read - funny and endearing - well written and
intelligent - Are you a wonder or a marvel?

[Tentatively, Convenience · Rating 4 out of 5]

review of
Alexei Panshin's Masque World
by tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE - March 25, 2024

This is the 4th bk of Panshin's I've read & reviewed & the 3rd in the Anthony Villers series, of wch I've read & reviewed the 1st 2 already. A 4th bk in the series, The Universal Pantograph never apeared in print. Someone shd get a copy of it & publish it. Panshin continues his Comedy of Customs:

"He reached within his coat and produced a large flat wallet which he opened.

"McBe said, "Bribery?" He didn't say it too loudly. He got halfway into the word, and then finished it as a question.

"Villiers said, "Sir, while it might be possible to bribe you, nothing in our short acquaintance leads me to the belief that there could be any conceivable benefit in doing so. Accordingly, I shall forgo the opportunity you have just proferred. I trust you will not take ot amiss, and will forgive me if I have misjudged you."

"To Slyne, he said, "I thought to supplement my papers with various items of identification. If you find them satisfactory, perhaps you will allow me to travel on the planet and will monish my papers as you please in the meantime. Here, to begin, is my Patent."

""You have a title?" Slyne asked, to and by appearances impressed.

""Viscount Charteris," said Villiers. He said it with the straightest of faces." - p 17

I'm a nudist. Therefore, a scene, even one as modest as this one, is pleasing to me.

"In these days when any man can comfortably dance naked in a snowstorm (Imagine careening down a long and leaning hillside, knee-high in snow, free flakes swirling about you shank to thatch. You kick and scatter the snow, start slides, throw it over your shoulders in scattering double handfuls, hop and caper in the gray and white twilight.) It remains true that the general run of mankind is sufficiently attached to their clothing to forego the opportunity. Theirs be the loss; I am assured by those who know that it is an uncommonly rewarding experience." - p 20

In Star Well a girl named Louisa falls for Villiers & hopes to marry him. This subject is revived 2 novels later in Masque World:

""When you marry my sister, can I carry flowers?"

""Of course," said Villiers, ever the gentleman.

"She said, "Can I come live with you?"

"It is perfectly reasonable that with a father who dressed like a rug salesman, and moreover yelled, she might wish to leave home, but Villiers was finding his sudden promotion to brother-in-law premature at the least." - p 27

Panshin's humanizing of robots w/ temperaments & quirks is reminiscent of the great comedic sci-fi writer Ron Goulart.

"Siry Henry temporarily balanced on one foot while a measurement was taken. "What is that you object to in your uniform?"

""Orange? Me in orange? Milord Semichastny chose orange deliberately because he knew I shouldn't like it."

"This seemed loose talk to Sir Henry, extremely loose. It is all very well to give robots Limited Volition, but not if it going to be abused." - p 56

"Before he could fairly respond, something whizzed by their heads down the central stairwell, just missing the balustrade, and smashing rottenly on the next floor below. Villiers was startled.

""What was that?" he said.

""That was a melon," she whispered, and slipped off down the hall.

"Sir Henry, using the full power of his suit's resources, which were considerable, called up from below. "And what is this, now?"

"Lord Semichastny's voice yelled angrily from the floor above: "Damned prank-playing robot!"" - p 69

"Timur i Leng, vizier of Chagatay under Suyurghatmish, discovered one day that the world looks different from forty feet in the air and was overwhelmed. He gathered his army and overran Khorasan, Jurjan, Manzandaran, Sijistan, Azerbaijan, and Fars. In each place he raised a pyramind of skulls forty feet high and limped to the top in the hopes of recapturing that first thrilling rush—and missed the point completely." - p 87

Well, waddya know, there was a Timur:

"Timur then went north to begin his Georgian and Golden Horde campaigns, pausing his full-scale invasion of Persia. When he returned, he found his generals had done well in protecting the cities and lands he had conquered in Persia. Though many rebelled, and his son Miran Shah, who may have been regent, was forced to annex rebellious vassal dynasties, his holdings remained. So he proceeded to capture the rest of Persia, specifically the two major southern cities of Isfahan and Shiraz. When he arrived with his army at Isfahan in 1387, the city immediately surrendered; he treated it with relative mercy as he normally did with cities that surrendered (unlike Herat).  However, after Isfahan revolted against Timur's taxes by killing the tax collectors and some of Timur's soldiers, he ordered the massacre of the city's citizens; the death toll is reckoned at between 100,000 and 200,000. An eye-witness counted more than 28 towers constructed of about 1,500 heads each." - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timur

In psychology, I reckon Timur's 1st experience of seeing the world from 40 ft above-ground was instantiated in him & he tried to reinstantiate it from then on. Even making the towers out of skulls just wasn't enuf. I won't even suggest how he cd've upped his ante b/c then some nutjob will try out my suggestion.

One of my favorite parts of Masque World is the bit about Lord Semichastny throwing a big expensive party that no-one wants to attend.

"But Lord Semichastny was not mollified, He paced through the empty house mumbling to himself. He took hasty notice of food, drink, music and decoration, but he did not pause for long. He waited for someone to come. He waited for someone to call. No one called. No one came. And so he paced.

"At last he said, "I'm going to town. Run out a flitter, Charles."" - p 92

Panshin's well doesn't run dry. Neither does his poggar (if you know what I mean - & even if you don't).

"["]Where is Annie?"

"Her place at the table was empty, the result of an altercation terminated by authority.

"Mrs. Parini said, "I sent her to her room. She said poggar and hobyah and beng. I wish you would speak to her about it."

""I will," said her husband." - p 120

"While Harbourne Firnhaber was down in Lord Semichastny's cold cellar picking out a variety of his best melons, Charles gave instructions to the serving table that was to left in charge when all the other mobile mechanicals had gone.

""But I'd like to go too," the serving table said.

""Someone has to stay. Someone has to be in charge."

""I was counting on serving tonight. This is my most attractive set of attachments."

""I know," said Charles." - p 139

What can I say? This was a gas, a real moon gas, if you know yr records.

[Jonathan Palfrey · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a relatively uneventful episode in the life of Anthony Villiers (Lord Charteris) and his travelling companion Torve the Trog. Things happen, to be sure, and they’re quite diverting, but they’re not particularly important; and most of the characters we’ve already met are offstage throughout. It would make an acceptable filler between the second and fourth books in this series; unfortunately, Panshin planned a fourth book but never managed to write it.

If you enjoyed the first two books, you’ll probably enjoy this one too. I think it’s not quite as good as the others; but my reaction to each book depends somewhat on the mood I’m in when reading.

[Pete · Rating 3 out of 5]

Masque World is a typical entry in this series. Not much particularly important happens, but what does happen happens in an amusing way. As SF, these works are very slight. There is very little actual speculation about a future system wide civilization. There are musings about the absurdity of the fashions and beliefs of society. Apparently, there was another volume planned in the series that never materialized. Fun light reading, but I can't imagine reading the series again.

[Bradley · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm surprised that this little comedy of SF errors, with boorish family members and boorish ideas of parties ACTUALLY turned out to be an SF XMAS tale.

*takes note*

An XMAS SF, mildly humorous, customs-humor on a backwater world.

It very much has the feel of better-times and celebrations for no particular reason. Sometimes this is exactly what we might need in these dark days. :)

[Nightwitch · Rating 4 out of 5]

Weird and absurdist, but ultimately delightful.

[Karen-Leigh · Rating 3 out of 5]

I do like this series. It is truly unique writing and a pleasure.

Not that they have much else in common with Terra Ignota, but Alexei Panshin's Anthony Villiers books make me suspect that I'm a sucker for any science fiction steeped in the mood of the 18th century. An aristocrat, unwelcome at home for reasons never exactly specified, travels the galaxy, getting into scrapes and cheating slightly by revealing his credentials whenever things threaten to get too serious: "it hardly seems proper behaviour. It is certainly fair for a noble to go incognito, just as it is for a common man to occasionally assume a weekend title. But if nobles are going to go incognito, they should have the grace to stay incognito come the last muffin on the plate. But they never do. No, they stand, announce themselves, and in the stunned silence they gobble the muffin. Clearly they are taught the wrong things in childhood." Sometimes this involves a little genteel crime or violence, but more often it's a matter of raised eyebrows, elegantly orchestrated social cutting, and devastating retorts: "Sir, you have only one story. You tell it twice an evening, and I've heard it now for roundabout thirty years. It was minor when you told it first. Minor!" And yes, it gains from context, but if these quotes aren't raising at least the beginning of a smile then Villiers may not be for you, though other attractions range from genuinely lovely writing on stars and parties to the daft chuckles of a planet where the loveliest moment, for which one tries to be perfectly situated, is neither sunrise nor sunset, but peelgrunt. There's a touch of Wodehouse, though maybe more filtered through Sir Henry At Rawlinson's End, and at least a dash of Ogden Nash. The plot this time may be more minor than ever, centred as the title suggests on a big fancy party, but the plot was never really the appeal. Still, there is a cliffhanger of sorts, and the last page assures us the fourth volume, The Universal Pantograph, is "To follow soon." That was in 1969 and, although Panshin is still with us, 'soon' remains ongoing. People who think the wait for The Winds Of Winter and/or The Doors Of Stone has been excessive: you don't know you're born.

[Alan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Again the best sound bite description I can think of for Panshin's Anthony Villiers is a comedy of manners. Villiers is paid by his family to travel, in part because they are embarrassed by him (even though we are never told why they feel that). Somehow he fell into the company of Torve, a Trog, whose people are confined to their star system after losing a war to the Empire about 200 years previously.

So Tony, as is usually the case charms Torve through customs and they go their separate ways. Torve to find his pen pal, and Tony to see a relative who is supposed to have his next payment from his family. On the side Tony has made inquiries about who has tried to have him killed (twice) and to get some false papers for Tove to amke their traveling easier.

In between all of this their is his relative's masquerade ball, a contest of Wondrs and Marvels (Torve is considered a Wonder by one house which finds him and Tony a Marvel by a another).

While the fourth book is promised at the book's end it was never published as just about every series launched by Ace during this expansion of their science fiction line (re-issues of the Professor Jameson tales, Edmond Hamilton;s Starwolf, Hanibal Fortune, Agent of T.E.R.R.A, Perry Rhodan translations, and Jack Vance's Planet of Adventure) all ended after 3-5 books (except for Rhodan).

If you find any of the Villiers books I think you'll have a delightful couple of hours reading them, you might not laugh out loud, but you'll definitely grin.

[Jan Priddy · Rating 3 out of 5]

How to rate such a story? Perhaps 4 stars or five would be more fair. This, like others in the series is rollicking fun—silliness and absurdity of Wonders and Marvels and meeting on the Green at the hour of peelgrunt (which involves the forecasting tones of grunting peels)—and Panshin sprinkles all the Villier's tales with rich bites of wisdom: "The most presumptuous thing you can ask of any mortal being is to wait. There are none so visibly involved with death as those condemned to wit" (146).

I was crushed after looking up the listed sequel to find it has never been published. I went to Panshin's website and read around, but nothing there. Waiting, Mr. Panshin, still waiting.

[Rowdy · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book has an average score of 4+ stars , Really?

I read all three books. Yes, It was good enough to keep me reading, but I rate it 2 stars. There is no discernible plat. The books left me with this thought. What!!?