Spock Wrestles With His Emotions

Marvel Comics' Star Trek Vol. 1, Issue 1

At the beginning of “Star Trek: The Motion Picture,” we find Spock on Vulcan.  There, by spending years alone in the desert, he has striven to cast aside all emotion and achieve Kolinahr.  But then he senses a strange consciousness from space, and he cannot resist its call.  When he stands before the Vulcan elders, they judge him incapable of achieving pure logic, and tell him that his destiny lies elsewhere.  Thus he travels to rendezvous with the U.S.S. Enterprise, which is traveling to meet the entity known as V’ger.  There, his well-meaning human friends cannot resist telling him how happy they are to see him.  When she notices how much their enthusiasm shakes him, Uhura cannot help but explain, “It’s how we all feel, Mr. Spock.”

Summoned to the Officers’ Lounge, Kirk must plead with Spock to even sit down.  Spock clearly doesn’t want to be there; he is a man on a mission.  He must make contact with V’ger, and attempt to reason with the entity before it destroys Earth.  Dr. McCoy, whose role involves as much psychologist as physician, tells him, “Mr. Spock, you haven’t changed.  You’re just as warm and sociable as ever.”  Mr. Spock responds, “Nor have you, Doctor, as your predilection for irrelevancy demonstrates.”

Marvel Comics' Star Trek Vol. 1 Issue 2

In Marvel Comics’ “Star Trek” Issue 1, writer Marv Wolfman makes a slight change to the scene on Vulcan, with the elder telling Spock that they have also sensed V’ger’s messages.  But he makes wholesale changes to the exchange in the Enterprise Officers’ Lounge.  Particularly startling is Dr. McCoy’s statement that their dedication to logic has cost the Vulcan culture all art, music, and poetry.  This prompts me to ask two questions: 1) Did Wolfman miss all the times Mr. Spock played the Vulcan lute in the TV series? and 2) When did Dr. McCoy become a great lover of poetry?

“Oh nurse Christine,

you are my dream...”

or

"Scalpels are red, 

vials are blue..."

Um, right.  Back to the blog.  

Have you ever knelt in prayer, sat down to meditate, or attempted to concentrate on a problem or task, and found yourself unable to block out distractions?  Even if you were completely alone, with no sounds or sights intruding on your privacy, did you have trouble concentrating?  This is what I believe Spock sought in Kolinahr: not to divorce himself from everything that gives life meaning and reduce himself to the level of a machine, but the ability to focus on his priorities, to fix his mind on the task he decided was most important, and do so without being distracted by those around him, swayed by how he felt, or lured away by the other thoughts and tasks that compete for his attention.

To me, Kolinahr seems like something all of us should strive to achieve.  But before you head out into the desert, be sure to pack some sunscreen.  I’m told the light from Vulcan’s twin suns can be quite intense. 

Dragon Dave

Greg Bear: Star Trek Corona Part 2

Captain Kirk, T'Prylla, and Mr. Spock,
thankfully not a romantic triangle.

Yesterday, I discussed Greg Bear’s approach to writing for popular media franchises.  Then I launched into a discussion of Corona, his lone contribution to the Star Trek universe.  I also rued my ability to finish discussing this entertaining novel, and yearned for a Transporter Emergency Recovery (or TEREC) machine of my very own.  If I owned one, I could make several clones of myself, and get far more writing done each day.  But as I haven’t been able to acquire my own TEREC machine (mainly because they’re not yet publicly available), I’ll have to accept my limitations, and finish yesterday’s post today.

Come on, Apple Computer!  I don’t need a smarter phone; I need a TEREC.  Get your priorities straight!

All the issues listed yesterday are sufficient to make Corona an interesting and entertaining novel.  But Bear adds one more strand that sets his novel above the norm.  The lead scientist T’Prylla and her family heading the mission are outcasts.  They were exiled not because they were not sufficiently devoted to Logic, but because of their decision-making process.  Imagine the residents of an ancient Greek city gathered one day for a debate, and voted as to whether Plato or Aristotle’s philosophical approach to life was the most sound.  The winners--the majority--then drive the rest of their community, the followers of “an inadequate philosophy,” out of the city.  That is essentially what has happened to T’Prylla and her family. 

Meanwhile, human reporter Rowena Mason has accompanied the crew on this rescue mission.  She hails from the planet Yalbo, which has a small number of inhabitants.  She isn’t comfortable with the idea of leaving home.  Nor does she feel good about mixing with other species, such as Andorians or Vulcans, or even half-Vulcans like Mr. Spock.  But she works for the Federation News Service, and they needed her on this mission, so she couldn’t say "No."  The U.S.S. Enterprise’s rescue mission won’t change prejudices back on Yalbo, or for that matter on the planet Vulcan, but through Rowena's experience of working with Mr. Spock, and the exiled Vulcan scientists such as T’Prylla, her worldview starts to expand, and she begins to understand the benefits of accepting others for who they are, as equals, and the benefit of interacting directly with them.

Greg Bear’s scientific speculation sometimes overtakes my ability to follow, and readers with greater knowledge of such fields will thus find even more to enjoy in this classic Star Trek novel.  But there’s so much going on in this novel that any fan should find a sufficient number of interesting storylines, and the challenges the various characters face, to make reading this novel a pleasurable and rewarding experience.  Unfortunately, Pocket Books has published hundreds (if not thousands) of Star Trek novels, and Corona is one that is currently out of print, so you won’t find it in a new bookstore.  But there are older copies out there that you can find in a used bookstore, or at your local library.  If you read Corona, and enjoy it like I did, perhaps you might discuss it with your friends on the Internet?  Just like the radiation of those infant stars, the staff at Pocket Books could notice all the interest being generated, and decide to bring the novel back into print.  Perhaps, were they to do so, they might even send some unexpected royalties Greg Bear’s way.  That’d be an awfully nice thing to happen, to someone as open and giving to the Science Fiction community as he is.

So, you ask, does writing this book review mean that I'm a Greg Bear fan?  You bet!

Dragon Dave

Greg Bear: Star Trek Corona Part 1

Cover art courtesy of the great
Boris Vallejo

Greg Bear has written novels in other people’s universes, such as Star Trek, Star Wars, and Halo.  At first, this seemed rather strange to me.  As he has built a successful career with his imaginative Hard Science Fiction stories, he can no doubt commands large advances and royalties.  On the other hand, books written in media franchises typically pay an author a smaller advance, and little or no royalties.  When I met him at the World Fantasy Convention in San Diego in 2011, I asked him why he would solicit or accept such a work-for-hire project.  He responded that he does this because he’s a fan of these franchises, and writing a novel gave him the opportunity to explore them in greater detail.  

In the case of Star Trek, his love of the franchise is evident before one even starts his novel Corona.  In the Acknowledgements, Greg Bear mentions that he contributed illustrations for the original edition of Bjo Trimble and Dorothy Jones Hedyt’s Star Trek Concordance.  “Does this make me a trekkie?” he asks.  “You bet.”

In Corona, a team of Vulcan scientists becomes stranded on a distant outpost when the infant stars they are studying give off radiation that interferes with their ability to send and receive messages.  By the time the Federation receives their distress signal, ten years have passed, and they are presumed dead.  Nonetheless, the U.S.S. Enterprise is directed to investigate, and rescue any survivors they may find.  This turns out to be a fortunate coincidence.  The ship’s sickbay has just been upgraded with a Transporter Emergency Recovery (or TEREC) unit.  By comparing a person's originally transmitted body pattern with his or her present one, Doctor McCoy can repair injuries and cure a person's illness.  (Needless to say, Bear wrote this novel years before Star Trek: The Next Generation explored the concept further).  This TEREC unit could prove useful, as the infant stars’ radiation has damaged some of the Vulcan scientists who were in cryogenic suspension, and can no longer be revived successfully.  But Dr. McCoy’s ability to use the device may be limited, as it comes with protocols and safeguards that could limit the use of TEREC in this particular case. 

How much power and judgment should be allowed starship captains and their crews is one of the themes Bear concentrates on in Corona.  Unconstrained use of TEREC could allow Dr. McCoy to make unlimited copies of a given individual, as with cloning.  Alternatively, he could use TEREC to improve everyone aboard the Enterprise, cure all their bodily deficiencies, supercharge their muscles, brains, or immune systems, or even return their bodies to an earlier period of their lives (and by doing so repeatedly, grant them immortality).  Meanwhile, an observer aboard the Enterprise is comparing Kirk’s actions and decisions to computer recommendations.  Kirk’s judgment has often saved the ship, but no man is infallible.  Computers can sort through an infinite number of options quickly, and perhaps make a more informed choice.  So with this mission, the future of command is being determined, and Kirk, as the Defendant, represents all his fellow starship captains.

I’ve got more to say about Greg Bear’s novel, but time marches relentlessly on.  So with reluctance, I must sign off for today with the promise that this post will conclude tomorrow.  If only I had a TEREC machine, and could constantly rejuvenate myself, and enhance my brain’s functioning, so I could write more, better and faster! 

Maybe I'll telephone Dr. Rudy Wells, and order up a bionic brain.

Dragon Dave 

Boris Vallejo: a short biography

David Gerrold’s Protégé

What's bugging Mr. Spock?
(Not to mention Katalya!)

The “Star Trek” novel Vulcan!, written by Kathleen Sky, includes an introduction by David Gerrold.  He wrote this, he says, not at the invitation of the author or the publisher, but because he insisted on it.  In eight pages, he describes his friendship with Kathleen Sky, and how he has watched her grow and mature as a writer.  He describes the pride he felt when she wrote a story good enough for his anthology Generation, even though “she claims she was a student of the David Gerrold Bludgeon and Blast school of science fiction criticism,” in which he threw each manuscript into the air, and jumped up and down while yelling at her how terrible each story was. 

In my teen years, I found David Gerrold a consistent source of entertainment and inspiration.  Each month, I paged through “Starlog” magazine, seeking out his columns.  I remember how he compared Roy Neary’s experience with UFOs in Steven Spielberg’s “Close Encounters of the Third Kind,” to that of a believer who claims to have been visited by an angel.  Reading his columns every month made me want to read his books, and I still regard two of his novels, When HARLEY was One and The Man Who Folded Himself, as all-time favorites.  Then, of course, there was his book The Trouble With Tribbles, in which he offered a behind-the-scenes view of how the “Star Trek” TV show took his story from the initial pitch stage through to a filmed episode. 

In Kathleen Sky’s novel, the Enterprise is sent to investigate the planet Arachnae.  Mr. Spock believes the inhabitants to be sentient, but the scientist sent to study them, Dr. Katalya Tremain, contends they are no smarter than insects.  The creatures resemble the bugs in “Starship Troopers,” the movie version of Robert Heinlein’s novel portrayed so vividly (and viciously) by director Paul Verhoeven.  Could the Arachaens be capable of rational thought, and worthy of joining the Federation?  This is not the only source of contention between the two officers who will lead the expedition.  Dr. Katalya Tremain, a scientist Spock has previously respected for her logic, loathes not just him, but the entire Vulcan race.

Dr. Leonard McCoy finds himself defending Mr. Spock against her attacks, when he is usually the one who derides Spock for his cold, unemotional nature.  As deplorable as he sees her racism, Dr. McCoy cannot help his growing attraction for her.  Thus he studies her as he woos her, yearning to rid her, if he can, of what he sees as an inexplicable psychological disorder.  He ends up worrying over both of them when an Arachnaen attack kills all expedition members but Katalya and Spock, and circumstances prevent the Enterprise from beaming the two back to safety.  So it is Mr. Spock, the man she hates, who must unravel the twisted threads of Katalya’s past, while the two investigate (and are attacked by) these bugs that may or may not be sentient, but are definitely lethal.

I found reading the novel again every bit as satisfying as I remembered it.  Her engrossing story left me wondering if my own efforts might be improved by “the David Gerrold Bludgeon and Blast method.”  Sadly, I may never get to know him, or receive the benefit of his opinion concerning one of the novels I hope to publish.  Nevertheless, his books, stories, and columns fed my own dreams of becoming a storyteller.  Unlike Kathleen Sky, I may not have the honor of being called his protégé, let alone become his friend, but I can envy her for the relationship she shared with the great David Gerrold.

Remembering my early influences,

Dragon Dave

Related Dragon Cache entries

Star Trek: The Cage 

Robert E. Vardeman: Keeping Us on Course