The Sykaos papers: Being an account of the Voyages of the Poet Oi Paz to the System of Strim in the Seventeenth Galaxy

by E.P. Thompson

First edition, first printing hardcover with unclipped dust jacket, in very good condition. Jacket is scuffed, and edges are creased and nicked. Page block is lightly blemished, otherwise as unread. LW

Genres: Science Fiction, Fiction, Satire

Hardcover

First published August 12, 1988

About the author

Edward Palmer Thompson was an English historian, writer, marxist and peace campaigner. He is probably best known today for his historical work on the radical movements in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, in particular The Making of the English Working Class (1963). He also published influential biographies of William Morris (1955) and (posthumously) William Blake (1993) and was a prolific journalist and essayist. He also published the novel The Sykaos Papers and a collection of poetry.

Thompson was one of the principal intellectuals of the Communist Party in Great Britain. Although he left the party in 1956 over the Soviet invasion of Hungary, he nevertheless remained a "historian in the Marxist tradition," calling for a rebellion against Stalinism as a prerequisite for the restoration of communists' "confidence in our own revolutionary perspectives". Thompson played a key role in the first New Left in Britain in the late 1950s. He was a vociferous left-wing socialist critic of the Labour governments of 1964–70 and 1974–79, and during the 1980s, he was the leading intellectual light of the movement against nuclear weapons in Europe.

Reviews

[Andrew Dombrowski · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a deeply compelling work, reminiscent at times of a darker version of Heinlein's Stranger in a Strange Land. The novel's tone varies considerably: the earlier parts of the novel are a fairly straightforward comic piece about the misunderstandings that result when a humanoid alien drops onto Earth, the middle pieces of the model flesh out the cultural background of the alien Oitarians and the political reaction to the Oitarians in the context of the late Cold War, and then the final parts of the novel build a deeply pessimistic picture of the future of human civilization and our prospects for successfully handling alien contact. The novel drags a little bit in the second half, but not in a particularly problematic way: the action slows down, but the author uses the space to more fully flesh out the personalities of the main characters, which is crucial for setting up the events at the end of the book. As other reviews have noted, the ending is hard to read, but the author deserves major credit for avoiding easy endings and simplistically likeable characters. One wishes that he had written more fiction.

[Steve Mayer · Rating 3 out of 5]

This last work by the great English historian E. P. Thompson is part War of the Worlds, part Brave New World and part Pygmalion. Parts of it are moving; parts are funny; and the end is unutterably sad. Not surprisingly, the description of human society and customs from an extra-terrestrial viewpoint is more interesting than the description of extra-terrestrial society.

The book gives a decidedly pessimistic view of the state of world affairs ca. 1987. It's too bad Thompson didn't live to see the end of the Cold War.

[Antoine · Rating 3 out of 5]

Thompson is not remembered chiefly as a novelist—this is his only work of fiction–but as a marxist social historian and activist. The Sykaos Papers is a biting satire in the tradition of Swift and (especially) Book 4 of Gulliver's Travels. But like that book, it offers no simple messages, and ends on a note every bit as heartbreaking, perhaps more so. Although the early chapters had me laughing so hard that my cheeks and sides actually hurt, the end was so dispiriting that I have never picked it up again.

[Dylan Vargas · Rating 3 out of 5]

Spoiler Warning: Rarely do I include overt spoilers in my reviews but for this book I kinda of have too.


I really went back and forth on this book many times throughout. I really disliked many parts but then enjoyed and was intrigued by other parts. But this book is by no means an easy read. The structure of the book was not a seamless narrative, building off of various "documents" to tell the story. At times this could be a bit jarring but ultimately was a very unique and engaging way to tell the story that I felt really stuck with the investigatory/scholarly themes of the plot. Another aspect I thought the novel did brilliantly was the clash of cultures was so stark and the slow understand humans and the alien made of each other was fascinating and well developed. I started to find myself analyzing my life and culture from the lens of an outsider which is a profound feat to accomplish and shows great skill from the author. I also was interested in the unique alien culture that they developed, one of almost a relgiusly structured techno society. I also really enjoyed the alternative political history and undertones of political and cultural commentary of the book. And the last interesting part of the book was the ending was very unexpected, as nothing resolved or was an unearned happy ending. The conclusion of the story felt real and grounded, nothing felt forced.

Now that's a lot of praise for a 3 start book. But it did have significant flaws. For one I absolutely hated the ancient alien aspect brought into the narrative about how aliens influenced early human cultures. It felt like a tripe that really took away from the novelty of the concepts. Second, I just hate books without really chapters or breaks. It was structured in four part with not real stopping points in the story. I had to find when to stop and start which was annoying. Third, it had more than a year time jump which ignored what could have been a fascinating addition. Fourth, while I liked the teasing out of the outside worlds politics it felt rigid and I wanted more. Many of these critisms are due to fragmented nature of the structure,which I had earlier praised but also detracted from the book. Additionally, I just didn't really feel all that invested in the characters or hoping for one outcome over the other which I felt was a failing of the story.

Ultimately, this was just a bizarre book that was both quite unique and interesting but also a difficult read that I just couldn't get into fully multiple times. Not a book I would recommend but one that was definitely unlike anything I've ever read both in structure and themes.

[Leslie Reiber · Rating 4 out of 5]

good science fiction by a brilliant historian

[Lysergius · Rating 3 out of 5]

A very strange novel.