Алхимичният брак на Алистър Кромптън

by Robert Sheckley, Светлана Комогорова-Комата (Translator)

Алистър Кромптън е суховат и скучен, защото преди двайсет години две трети от неговата самоличност са били отцепени и прехвърлени в изкуствени тела с единствената цел запазване на живота му.
Е, дошло е времето за цялостна Реинтеграция и Кромптън е готов на всичко, за да се превърне в една комплексна и пълноценна личност.

Само че има един малък проблем - другите части от личността му никак, ама никак не са съгласни да бъдат заличени…

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

208 pages, Paperback

First published March 1, 1978

About the author

One of science fiction's great humorists, Sheckley was a prolific short story writer beginning in 1952 with titles including "Specialist", "Pilgrimage to Earth", "Warm", "The Prize of Peril", and "Seventh Victim", collected in volumes from Untouched by Human Hands (1954) to Is That What People Do? (1984) and a five-volume set of Collected Stories (1991). His first novel, Immortality, Inc. (1958), was followed by The Status Civilization (1960), Journey Beyond Tomorrow (1962), Mindswap (1966), and several others. Sheckley served as fiction editor for Omni magazine from January 1980 through September 1981, and was named Author Emeritus by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America in 2001.

Reviews

[Glenn Russell]

Let me begin with a confession. I debated with myself as to whether or not I should post a review of this Sheckley novel. At first I decided no review since I just did post a review on the author's Immortality Inc. and alluded to all the Loney Tunes craziness. With Crompton Divided, I'd have to do repeat myself.

But on further reflection, I decided I'd review Crompton Divided, a novel where Sheckley focuses on facets of human personality and the practice of psychotherapy that provide the author a canvas to share his wild, unbounded imagination and counts as one of the most outrageous sidesplitters ever written.

Most certainly Crompton Divided is a howler, a combination commentary on psychoanalysis, Alice in her Wonderland and MAD Magazine featuring Alfred E. Neuman gone bonkers.

The story's setup stated succinctly: Alistair Crompton (surely a takeoff on occultist Aleister Crowley) goes haywire as a teenager where there's only one cure in this far future world: perform brain surgery to split off the sensual part of his personality and also the violent part of his personality and send these two parts to live their own lives on planets within distant galaxies. Sound ridiculous? Sheckley uses the softest of the soft SF as his framework to launch a madcap tale where Crompton journeys forth as a less than complete adult on his cosmic odyssey to seek reintegration of his parts and thereby become whole once again (a risky procedure but Alistair feels he has no other choice).

Since much of the humor derives from Sheckley's jocular but sophisticated use of language and terminology, I'll link my comments to a few juicy quotes from the book.

“Aaians have no fixed “self” to refer to. Aaians are only who they happen to have chosen to be for a period of time. When the moment comes to be someone or something else, they shed their former bodies, feelings, values, etc., and existences....Before doing any business with an Aaisan, ask him for the date of expiration on his current psychosomatic setup. He is bound to honor his commitments during this term by the oldest ethical rule of the race: Say what you do and do what you say in the words of Amirra Tauba, founder of the Aaian Uniform Code of Ethics for Consciously Sentient Beings."

The above is an excerpt from the brochure Crompton reads on the spaceship headed for planet Aaia, his first destination, home of Edgar Loomis, the sensual pleasure component of his scattered personality. Sheckley doesn't miss a chance to hit on one of his abiding SF themes: given the proper set of circumstances, individuals (of any species) can change bodies as easily as they change clothes. Also, note a spinoff of Say what you mean and mean what you say. Sheckley brings playing with words to the pitch of comic virtuoso art – you'll continually encounter, to list several: spoonerisms, phonic reversals, neologisms, onomatopoeia, paraprosdokians and malapropisms.

First step for Crompton: seeing Edgar Loomis in person so he knows what he's dealing with. After all, asking Loomis to give up his separate body in order to reintegrate with him could prove a bit tricky. Crompton goes to a theater to watch Loomis perform on stage. What a show! Here's the grand finale:

"A large stage had appeared. Crowded on it were all of the humanoforms who had performed in that night's episodes. Behind them were two symphony orchestras. As Crompton watched, all of these beings threw off their clothing and crowded together, closer, closer, writhing and slipping and sliding over, around, under and into each other in an unlikely potpourri of arms, thoraxes, feelers, wings, cunts, chitins, claws, tentacles, cocks, shoulders, heads, ovipositors, exoskeletons, pistils, kneecaps, mandibles, fins, stamens, suckers, and the like. Somehow, despite their contorted and unnatural positions, the humanoforms were able to sing, squeak, whistle and vibrate."

We can imagine Alistair Crompton's reaction to this sensual feast. After all, he's a man whose most exciting activity in his adult life has been playing solitaire. Alistair must ask himself: Does he really want Loomis the unabashed sensualist taking up residence in his very own mind? Sidebar: I include the quote to underscore Sheckley is all about the extreme limits of exaggeration.

Alistair pushes on. He travels to yet again another planet to find Dan Stack, the violent part of his personality. What a hoot! Perhaps no surprise, Alistair discovers Dan Stack qualifies as a homicidal maniac, a ruthless killer who would feel at home in Cormac McCarthy's Blood Meridian. At one point a foreman at Blood Delta relates to Alistair how Dan Stack started killing his own men. “Stack just like using that whip too much.” Once again, Alistair Crompton the sedate player of solitaire has to make a choice: Is reintegration worth a trek across swamps and through hostile lands to seek out a cold blooded killer?

The Intersentient Therapeutics Center on the planet of Aion could prove the final destination. Alistair wonders if he should undergo treatment. One psychiatrist tells him, "We here at Aion believe that all sentient creatures are endowed with Original Sanity, and that we are the unremitting instrumentalities in the bringing forth of that Sanity. We have never failed, except of course at those times when our anticipations have been frustrated by premature terminations of the patient's life processes. Can't win them all, I guess."

Will Alistair Crompton accomplish what he set out to achieve? Recall he was told directly dangers are involved in reintegration. If you want to find out just how bugged out Loony Tunes loony Robert Sheckley can be, you've found your novel.


American SF author Robert Sheckley, 1928-2005

[Maureen · Rating 5 out of 5]

** disclaimer: this book was originally published in 1978. we have different terms and interpretations for mental illness now than we did then. i reminded myself of that when i read this book and i'd advise anybody who might read it to remind themselves of same and that it is a work of speculative fiction.

when alistair crompton was just a kid, he did some pretty horrifying things. when his parents finally undertook to get him treatment, they were told that he had "viral schizophrenia" and it had been caught too late. the only hope for alistair (so They said) was a procedure where his brain would be analyzed, and his new array of personalities physically split, the wilder ones ousted and thrust into human simulacra while what was perceived as the most stable persona was allowed to remain in his body, still to be called alistair, alone. he was told that future integration with these personalities was possible but highly discouraged and to ensure that he didn't raise his hopes or make an attempt, the other parts of him were sent to distant corners of the galaxy.

despite the disapproval and the distance, one fine day he decides he can't take it anymore, decides to find himself, and bring himself all back together.

here again, robert sheckley woos me with his endless invention and creativity. but this time he marches me down the aisle with a rock-solid anchor of a premise, and that ballast makes the whirling dervish writing here something really significant -- he amuses you, bemuses, and underneath it all reminds you of the loneliness of the human experience, of the self, and the desire for marriage: to be completed, to be more than just that small stolid little self in our heads. the reader might lose sight of this at times, in the bacchanalia and riot of ideas and scenes and smirking innuendo but it is always there, and when i read the final page i thought i saw what he thinks of it all.

i nodded in assent. of course, i thought. that makes sense.

4.78 stars, i think. i'd split the different three ways, but these things have a way of multiplying.

[Chiaralletti · Rating 3 out of 5]

Più che fantascientifico, surreale con supercazzole ante litteram.
Figo, fighissimo... ma a un certo punto boh. Troppo?
Sembra più un "esercizio di stile" che un romanzo/racconto.

[Trace Reddell · Rating 3 out of 5]

Weird little book from Robert Sheckley. At times, the droll humor (especially around alien names, planets, entities) reminds me of Douglas Adams. 1978 feels a little late for this book, by which I mean the writing, narrative, themes, feel a little behind-the-times (rather than of, or, as we might expect from an SF novel, ahead of them), though it's closing take on something like Esalen seems pretty spot on though still a bit like a third-rate PKD plot element. I love this time-period, in which science fiction broke out into more psychological themes, often informed, as in this work, by psychedelics and the emerging New Age culture as much as by an actual understanding of the psychiatric sciences. I do appreciate speculative psychology as a mode of science fiction narrative, and this at times comes across as a fictionalized take on Félix Guattari's concept of "schizoanalysis" but by way of Jungian re-integration ideas. I don't feel like the book valorizes or condemns the notion of reintegration into a unified self, and so I appreciate the science fictional uncanny the work develops without a strong need for conclusion or synthesis. In this way, the form of the book plays out the plight of dissociative or multiple personality disorder of the main character -- who may or may not actually be Alistair Crompton!

[Ishmael Soledad · Rating 3 out of 5]

I picked this up at a $5 second hand bin and I'm glad I did. Never heard of Sheckley before this one.

A very strange story - well written for the most - of a man searching to reunite his split personalities. It is quirky and disjointed enough to be entertaining and engaging, at least over 190 pages.

Only issue, and the thing that made me reduce the stars from 4 to 3, was the ending. It felt rushed and ill-thought out, as if Sheckley has allowed his main character to run the plot and then finds himself with no conclusion. A shame.

[Mary Ann · Rating 3 out of 5]

I remember Sheckley being funnier than this...

[Oreon · Rating 3 out of 5]

http://whatsread.pp.ua/work/10049
Після повісті («The Humours») "це" виглядає блідою поробкою. Воно об'єктивно довше, нудніше, зі зміщеними моральними та етичними акцентами, більше грубощів, маразму, додалися псевдопсихіатричні викладки та ульоти в сюрреалізм і шизу. Кромптон із тихого закомплексованого клерка перетворився на унікального фахівця і у підсумку злодія. Луміс - із простого ласолюбця, альфонса і дамського угодника - на повного збоченця. Додалися сцени, діалоги і персонажі, які не мають жодного значення для подальшої розповіді. Наприклад, офіціантка, яка радісно і задарма вкладає першого-ліпшого психа в активній фазі до себе в ліжко, розходиться в діалогах, що припускають продовження, і... благополучно кане в Лету. Туди ж іде і колишній начальник Кромтона, тільки-тільки з неї виринувши ближче до кінця оповіді.

Загалом, це якась погана пародія на оригінал. Але не читаючи оригіналу, сама ідея, притаманна обом творам, витягує до певного рівня і цей "шедевр", тож, не читаючи повість, роману можна поставити, напевно, "7", але після оригінальної повісті, при чому того ж автора, - ще один бал злітає сам собою. Я просто не розумію, навіщо так було робити?

Отож, хто тільки збирається приступити до читання цього роману - моя порада: не псуйте собі інтригу і прочитайте спочатку повість, а тоді спробуйте порівняти з романом. Сподіваюся багато в чому ви будете змушені зі мною погодитися 🙂.

[Hex75 · Rating 5 out of 5]

avete presente "guida galattica per gli autostoppisti"? ecco, immaginate un esperimento simile ma totalmente privo di freni, capace di sguazzare nel pacchiano più atroce e con momenti quasi degni dei film del trio z.a.z. (quelli de "l'aereo più pazzo del mondo", per intenderci) e totalmente schizofrenico come il suo protagonista. fantascienza che in patria e in quegli anni sarà piaciuta assai a chi bazzicava riviste come "mad magazine" e sconsigliata a chi prende tutto troppo sul serio

[Aniello · Rating 5 out of 5]

Un'ironia così sottile, divertita e profonda che per qualcuno potrebbe diventare un'ostacolo alla lettura. Per il resto è un romanzo di formazione sul disvelamento della propria natura di uomo, mentre la fantascienza degli anni 70 è utilizzata come strumento per parlare liberamente di qualsiasi cosa: puro ossigeno per l'anima - assolutamente da leggere.

[Richard · Rating 4 out of 5]

The story is yet another “protagonist jumps from here to here to there.” Maybe I could compare the story to Dorothy Gale tripping through the Land of Oz with all her travel companions sharing her body. But the ending is sort of whatthefokk. None the less, it’s above average.

[Alan · Rating 4 out of 5]

An absurd tale about the world’s greatest olfactorist who embarks on a galactic quest with the intention of making his life complete. Its surrealist psychobabble may contain a plausible reflection regarding the human psyche. I just enjoyed the playfulness of it all. Even the puns.

[Rob Christopher · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not as good as his best short stories, but it sure packs in a lot of wild and amusing ideas.

[Hellread · Rating 2 out of 5]

Could not finish. Got to half.

[Catalina Louise · Rating 5 out of 5]

Surprisingly good and funny! 🤩

[Federico · Rating 2 out of 5]

Che dire. Non male, con momenti veramente divertenti, ma troppo confuso. Tipo esagerare con gli stupefacenti

[Marcin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Have you ever felt as if you were not yourself? As if there are two or three yous inside? As if every day you were fighting with your other you to stay in control? In the future they found a solution - they "surgically" extract those other sides, those Hydes your Jekyl fears might make him Hulk down everyone in the near vicinity and hurt your beloved ones. Then, they send them far, far away, far enough to never cross your paths... Is it a good solution to the problem? The hero of the story, or rather the heroes, tried it and while at the beginning everything seemed alright soon it became obvious one can't exist without his shadow, Jekyl can't cope without Hyde, Banner needs his Hulk... So our character goes after his alter egos to unite oneself once more and like Banner he soon finds he might not be ready for what his other selves have done. Can he become the one? Or maybe it's not a good idea? After all, you can't undone what's happened without repercussions. Will the space and time help him unite? Usually heroes survive, break a few bones, get the girls, run from the bad guys, but here are 3 drastically different heroes whose unification means death to a pair of them. Would you say yes and join with a stranger self when you have your own life to live through? Yeah, that's the problem of our hero going after his each other self. If you're interested how to deal with the monster inside you and how removing it might disrupt the delicate balance and only wreak more havoc, how to try to recover lost parts and how you might end with this gruesome task jedi masters would be afraid to take on, than get this book.

[Simon · Rating 2 out of 5]

Crompton was a troubled youth - multiple personality disorder - so they separated his selves and embedded his louche over-sexualized persona in one artificial body, and his hyper-agressive self in another, and then dispatched the two to different and distant locations across the galaxy. This leaves Crompton highly functional but emotionless, and many years later, after a successful career, he commits a crime to fund his goal of finding his seperated selves and re-uniting with them: literally. Well, this is sci-fi.

It's fun, but strangely alike so many other Sheckley novels. Pyschedelic, random until the last page then tied neatly into a little bundle. Cruel to call this light-weight but I have no idea what it's really all about.

[Timothy · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a fun read in places but ultimately a letdown. I've read a couple short pieces by Sheckley and had high hopes, but the ending turned a credible speculative study of personality into a cartoon image of insanity. Can't help but love the concept of Psychosmell Inc., but I was left wishing for a more satisfying conclusion.

[Alex G · Rating 5 out of 5]

I found this book strange and weird as Crompton would try to complete his incompleteness. But I love this book. I find it as a nice and fun adventure, I definently recommend this for any sci fi reader of sheckley fan.

[Leif · Rating 3 out of 5]

The always amusing Mr. Sheckley. Never "laugh out loud funny" to me, but will always keep you grinning, 'Crompton Divided' is one of his middling books...not bad at all...better than a lot of schlock, but marginal considering some of Sheckley's other works.

[Nona Drobot · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm familiar with Shackley's other short stories, he is fun to read, but this story he left unfinished in my view. I was hoping to see what will happen to Crompton after all. But the book ended in that exact place ...

[Lysergius · Rating 3 out of 5]

Hard to keep track of all the metamorphoses.

[Leah · Rating 2 out of 5]

Kind of odd. It's funny at times, but I found the style really awkward to read. Great (if somewhat predictable) ending.

[Vladimir Stolyarov · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting

[RC · Rating 2 out of 5]

A Sheckley story less than the sum of its parts.

[Yemic · Rating 2 out of 5]

A very peculiar read, funny at times.

[Newly Wardell · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love this book. Robert Sheckley's Aion is what I feel like most people's ideal world. The car accident scene was so great for me. So funny and bitingly satirical. Science fiction delight.

[Valentina Arena]

WTF???