Tags
1950s, 1958, After Such Knowledge series, Ballantine Books, first contact, Gollancz SF Masterworks, Hugo Award winner, If: Worlds of Science Fiction, James Blish, Open Road Media, Recapitulation theory, religion, Retro Hugo Award winner, Richard Powers
Ballantine – 1958 – illo by Richard Powers.
A Case of Conscience focuses on a UN expedition to the planet Lithia, where the opinions of the expedition’s four scientists will determine the fate of the planet and its inhabitants. For the physicist, chemist, and geologist, the questions posed by the planet are purely rational: should it be exploited for its natural resources (namely its lithium, key component to nuclear weapons) or should its peaceful natives be quarantined? For Father Ruiz, biologist and Jesuit priest, the question of Lithia is of a theological nature. Lithians are a peaceful race, with an innate sense of morality based on emotionless, rational logic. But they do not have the knowledge or concept of God or an afterlife, and seem to live without any idea of faith or spirituality. Are the Lithians somehow living in Eden, having yet to fall into sin? Or were they a sinister trap laid by Satan to trick mankind?
Of course, Ruiz ends up determining that the latter idea is correct, and that they are a cunning ploy by Satan to cause humans to doubt God; maybe it’s because I’m not Catholic, but I must say part of his rationalization perplexes me—it feels like Blish set up a loaded theological argument and picked one he’d rather examine, rather than one of the others, as several of the theological decisions that are made don’t make a ton of sense to me (such as the Pope later admonishing Ruiz for heresy by telling him that he should have committed another heresy, exorcism). Blish himself was not religious, and I’m not sure if he considered this a legitimate debate or reasonable conclusion. Personally, I like to analyze it it as an example of humans projecting their socio-religious values onto an alien culture, bringing our baggage and limited understanding with us to the stars, whether it was something Blish considered when he wrote the novel.
If – Sept 1953 – Ken Fagg.
The second half of the book switches gears, becoming disjointed in the process. Ruiz was gifted a young Lithian embryo as he left the planet, and it develops in a cold, sterile lab environment without Lithia’s natural challenges or hazards. The result is Egtverchi, a cunning and charismatic if oddly sadistic Lithian; upon reaching adulthood he begins to attract followers from a civilian society that’s been going mad as a result of living in subterranean defense bunkers long after the fear of nuclear attack has gone. While Egtverchi stirs up the stir-crazy populace, inciting them to riot from inflammatory television broadcasts, Ruiz makes his pilgrimage to Rome and must face charges of heresy, while the UN decides that the idea using Lithia to make bombs might not have been such a terrible idea after all. This half lacks the first half’s focus, jumping across interesting but incomplete ideas, with some unbelievable developments in the process.
A Case of Conscience is a fascinating but uneven work, a bit dated and clunky, and while its philosophical-theological debates are complex, they don’t make for a stimulating read. The first half—originally a 1953 short story—is a pretty good combination of first contact and theological conundrum, while a bit clunky, and it’s not a bad choice to win a Retro Hugo. The second half—new content written for the book version of the tale—is kind of a jumbled tangled web that starts to fall apart all too soon. If you are fascinated with science-fictional examinations of religion and aren’t bothered by wooden characterization and stiff, expository dialogue, this should go on your to-read list. Fans of ’50s SF and those trying to read every Hugo winner should also be interested, but be warned: books that resonated in the genre back in the day don’t always remain as impactful or insightful 60 years later.
A Case of Conscience is important for being the first “serious” SF novel to try and examine philosophical/religious issues, though I think it left me with more questions than answers.
Book Details
Title: A Case of Conscience
Author: James Blish
First Published: 1958
What I Read: Open Road Media ebook, 2017
Price I Paid: $0 (e-ARC via Netgalley and Open Road
MSRP: $19.00 tpb / $7.99 ebook
ISBN: 0345438353 / B01N63YQEX
Battered, Tattered, Yellowed, & Creased 
It might be interesting to read just for the sake of examining its assumptions: Mainly the one that all colonization themed stories deal with: our (humans, whites, name-your-nation) right to walk in and take over planets or countries.
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A very good point; I found it notable that the original goal of the expedition was to determine how Earth would use (or isolate) Lithia, and everything from there was applying human values and understanding to the situation without consideration for the natives. And it felt like an assumption Blish just made, like it wasn’t even an element he considered.
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A good account of the book. I remember enjoying its first half a lot and then being disappointed by the second. Should I ever return to it, I imagine I’d read just the original novella and not bother with the rest.
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I wholeheartedly agree, the disjointed second half does not add much to the novel.
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Religion as a theme in science fiction,is usually more interesting when considered from the viewpoint of metaphyscal speculation,usually involving religious experience,rather than just by it’s social and polictical aspects,as seems be the case here.The only novel I’ve read by him,the later,two volume work comprising “Black Easter” and “The Day After Judgement”,does treat the subject of satanic evil in orthodox religion in a literal and daring fashion,although it seemed too long to satisfy,and wasn’t all that keen on it.I think I can stay away from this one then.
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Not looking closely because I haven’t read it yet
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Somehow I don’t expect it will top your list of the Hugo ‘9s.
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Sorry, I gotta be that guy… 🙂
“A Case of Conscience is important for being the first “serious” SF novel to try and examine philosophical/religious issues…”
I take it you haven’t read Olaf Stapledon’s Star Maker? It allows you to leave the quote marks at home. 🙂
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Oh, golly, yes. I’ve just been checking at the SFE, and there are others.
At a quick glance, though, Conscience might well be the first “serious” genre sf novel to tackle the subject?
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Yes, my subconscious lumps Stapledon, Lewis, and others as pre-scientifiction/proto-SF, while Conscience is very much a genre novel. I probably should have clarified that was what I was thinking when I wrote it.
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I’m not sure what you mean by “…and others as pre-scientifiction/proto-SF, while Conscience is very much a genre novel.” Could you explain?
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SFE has pretty good descriptions of what I was thinking for both “Proto SF” and “genre SF.” But in short, it’s that Conscience was very much embedded in the tropes, conventions, and mindset of “SF” as genre fiction; the others may have used the same tropes but existed at least somewhat outside of the genre. Stapledon in particular called his writing “fantastic fiction of a semi-philosophical kind,” and his reaction upon first learning of genre SF and its fandom in the early ’40s was… less than positive, though I can’t really fault him for that.
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There was a vast gulf between what was pulp science fiction and what Olaf Stapleton wrote,during the time the two existed side by side.As I’ve said before,the fact that Stapleton’s stuff superfically resembled what was then being done in the magazines,was a case of parallel development I think.With the emergence of the paperbacks,there was a merging of the formerly two quite different currents that had comprised science fiction.
Yes,Stapleton found himself feted in America,by the same crowd who read the pulp magazines,much to his surprise!
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I was thinking of Stapleton’s novel.It does deal with an actual encounter with God,so this one isn’t anywhere even near it,over twenty years later.
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Hi
I remember disliking the book a great deal. Possibly partly because of my dislike of colonialism religious or secular. Also at the time the finer nuances of religious dogma applied to aliens left me cold (okay it still does). As a teen I confess I often sided with the aliens in stories which did not help in this case. Probably I should take a more mature look at the novella. I find expanding novella’s for novels, Hawksbill Station and Rogue Moon spring to mind, rarely does them justice.
Happy Reading
Guy
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I agree on both counts. I also empathized more with aliens as a child, and stories like this feel very much like colonialism taken to the stars which is not an element I enjoy. And I prefer the novella version of many stories (Hawksbill Station is another) to their expanded novel versions.
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So you’re telling me I need to read the novella version of Hawksbill Station…. I loved the novel! 🙂
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Well, I liked it better than the novel… Seemed like the pacing was tighter and it didn’t have that vague sexism.
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So I’m assuming all of the flashbacks were inserted into the novel?
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Yep, no flashbacks though the protag does think back to his past/the present once or twice.
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Thanks for that Chris – I think I do have the short story somewhere in fact …
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This is one of those novels that I read in my youth and said, “wow, SF can be about religion and social speculation and not only spaceship battles.” I remember it as transformative, and I suspect having read widely since then I won’t enjoy it as much as I did.
As always, a wonderful review — especially your comments about imposing ideas onto another species. Forcing them to fit into existing categories….
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I can see it being a transformative idea, and I kind of wish I had that experience with this book… Instead, I’ve already posted reviews for so many books that deal with religious, philosophical, or social speculation just in the last five years alone.
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I think at the time the ONLY other SF one I had read on similar themes at that point was A Canticle for Leibowitz. Which I did reread and enjoy. I’ve read quite a few recent reviews of A Case of Conscience and they have all been semi-negative.
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Oddly, I haven’t read Canticle on forever, but I have the feeling I’d appreciate it more now than I did back then — but yes, Case of Conscience gets semi-negative reviews because of its extreme unevenness. The novella half wasn’t bad, but returning to it five years later might not have been the best strategy.
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I’m with you on this. I was bowled over by the novella (which I first read as the first half of the novel) simply because I hadn’t read much else like it before. Canticle I read a little later and was likewise impressed by. (Not so much by the eventual sequel.) At about the same time I read, in its New Worlds incarnation, Mike Moorcock’s Behold the Man, a much later sf work tackling religion, which I didn’t much like in my teens but was stunned by when I finally reread it a few years ago.
I think with novels/novellas like Conscience one really has to take into account the era in which they were written. Blish wasn’t the greatest of prose stylists, but at the time very few sf writers were.
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