Solar Enemy Number One: The Stars My Destination (1956) by Alfred Bester

A frenzied tale of revenge in a baroque 25th century

Alfred Bester (1913 - 1987) was arguably one of the most important science fiction writers of the 1950s. Strikingly, he reached this status on the strength of only two novels and just over a dozen short stories published during the decade. As the Science Fiction Encyclopedia puts it, “Bester was never prolific in SF, which was more of a hobby than a career for him" [...] but his talents "were evident from the beginning".

His debut SF novel The Demolished Man (1953) is a tale of corporate power, murder, and psychic abilities which was immortalised by becoming the first ever winner of the Hugo Award for Best Novel. Bester followed this with The Stars My Destination (1956), an even more spectacular saga. Again, the central novum is the existence of psionic powers, something of a trend in the 1950s. This time, Bester focuses on teleportation - an almost universal ability which transforms human society.

With its breakneck pace, improbable plotting, and larger-than-life characters, The Stars My Destination is best thought of as an SF ripping yarn. While Bester explores no themes in any depth, there is much to admire in his ability to craft a stirring adventure - and it is understandable that so many later authors have credited this novel as an influence.

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And when thy heart began to beat

For an American SF novel, The Stars My Destination has distinctly British connections. Its first publication was in the UK, at which point it was known as Tiger! Tiger! This reflects the inclusion of a portion of William Blake’s 1794 poem “The Tyger” on its opening page. The novel was outlined by Bester during a period when he was living in the UK; for this reason, many of the characters are named for British towns and villages.

Two months after the UK book publication, the novel began to be published as a four-part serial in the US SF magazine Galaxy. It was at this point that it acquired its now more familiar title.

“Liar… Lecher… Tiger… Ghoul.”

In Bester’s imagined version of the 25th century, personal teleportation using the power of the mind - called “jaunting” - is an almost universal ability. Its principal limitation is that it is not possible to jaunt through space, for example from Earth to the moon. The economic shockwaves caused by the unlocking of the ability to jaunt have triggered a war between the Inner and Outer Planets of the solar system. 

The novel focuses on, and is dominated by, the antiheroic figure of Gulliver “Gully” Foyle. When the novel opens, this unqualified, lazy space crewman is trapped in the wreck of the merchant space vessel Nomad, the sole survivor of its destruction. After eking out a life for 170 days in a supply closet, venturing out periodically for fresh oxygen cylinders, Foyle sees a chance for rescue. The crew of an approaching ship, the Vorga, instead leave him to die.

This cruel abandonment lights a fire inside Foyle. He is transformed from a diffident everyman into a superman in the making, fueled by a fanatical desire for vengeance. He devises an escape, returns to civilisation, and begins a savage campaign of retribution. Exploring this strange future world, he leaves a trail of mayhem behind him, using and abusing anyone he needs to in order to close in on his goal. His mission not only changes him in many ways, but also threatens to upend the solar system all over again.

Non-stop

The Stars My Destination is an uncommonly propulsive novel which proceeds at a hectic pace. As Graham Sleight notes in an introduction to the SF Masterworks edition, almost every chapter begins in a new location. Foyle's frantic journeying takes him to New York, Rome, Australia, France, the Moon, Mars, a habitable asteroid, and multiple spacecraft. This frequent shifting of locale reinforces the novel's huge forward momentum.

It is not only events which fly by, but also ideas. Bester comes up with wild notions at a frenzied clip, many of which are raised, exploited, and dropped in short order. Foyle tangles with a cargo cult living in the wrecks of spacecraft, becomes a super-powered cyborg, meets a woman who sees only in the infrared spectrum, visits a sect dedicated to total sensory deprivation, and encounters a drug which enables its users to live as if they are animals. It is this energetic style which led Brian Aldiss to coin the term “widescreen baroque”, which he also applied to Charles L. Harness’ The Paradox Men (1953).

While it is packed with ideas, The Stars My Destination never feels as if it is about anything. Bester's achievement is in his dynamo plot and madcap energy, rather than much in the way of deeper meaning.

Legacy of rage

One of the most notable aspects of the novel is the long shadow of its influence. It is often said to have influenced both the New Wave in the 1960s and the cyberpunk movement in the 1980s. Certainly it has had its advocates in those camps, including Michael Moorcock and William Gibson respectively. Taking cyberpunk as an example, the novel has the corporate conspiracies, global settings, and cynical tone associated with that movement. But Bester is minimally interested in the effects of technology on people or societies, and his frenetic pacing precludes the development of real atmosphere or multi-dimensional characters.

Certain elements of Bester’s narrative may sour it for contemporary readers. Racism and sexism are evident. The supporting character Robin Wednesbury is referred to as a "Congo Venus", and often portrayed as hysterical. The spymaster Y'ang Yeovil boasts of his covert methods of communication, a product of an absurdly bogus idea of a talent for subterfuge inherent in Chinese people. No-one is overly bothered by Foyle's commission of rape, seemingly including the victim.

While - like Hell Tanner in Roger Zelazny's later Damnation Alley (1969) - Foyle is a largely reprehensible figure with an arc leading towards a semblance of concern for other people, he is a truly brutal antihero.

The Stars My Destination is a cornerstone of Bester's career, and had a clear impact on numerous prominent SF authors. Its dubious attitudes may be off-putting for contemporary readers, though, and while its abundant energy is admirable, its shallowness of ideas may no longer place it in the top rank of 1950s SF.

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• The idea of a war between colonised planets within the solar system was explored around the same time by Arthur C. Clarke, in his novel Earthlight (1955).
• The novel reveals an affinity with 19th century literature - its opening is a bold tranche of exposition which parodies the beginning of Dickens' A Tale of Two Cities (1859). The SFE describes this as "one of SF's most memorable infodumps". Much of Bester's plot is a lift from Dumas' The Count of Monte Cristo (1846), especially Foyle's imprisonment, escape, and adoption of an aristocratic guise to further his vengeful objectives.