The spaceship is haunted not by ghosts but by teleporting aliens with telekinetic powers. There is a Star Trek episode where some extra-galactics pose as Hallowe'en items. In Poul Anderson's "Interloper," extra-solar aliens secretly controlling Earth (the ultimate conspiracy theory) and sporadically glimpsed by human beings, have generated myths about demons. However, these malevolent beings are opposed by a clandestine nocturnal Terrestrial species, also sporadically glimpsed, led by King Oberon. The magic in Poul Anderson's Operation Chaos is given a scientific explanation in his Operation Luna. Thus, the apparently supernatural can be rationalized scientifically. A less frequent narrative option is sf-fantasy overlap:
scientifically powered superheroes meet magically powered superheroes, but "superheroes" is a hybrid genre;
Poul Anderson's multiverse incorporates scientific and magical universes but there is no direct contact between them;
decades ago, in an American comic book, supernatural forces defended Earth against alien invaders and the British sf comic strip hero, Jet-Ace Logan, learned that superstitious practices like hanging up garlic against vampires worked.
3 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
And Stirling's three Shadowspawn books was how he used the paranoid idea of the world being ruled by a secret conspiratorial cabal!
And your comment about how garlic actually works at repelling vampire reminded again of Anderson's story "Superstition."
If vampires were real and repelled by garlic, the obvious thing would be to scientifically study them, complete with experiments. Except it would be very dangerous trying to use vampires for that!
Ad astra! Sean
I will have to reread "Superstition."
Kaor, Paul!
I also enjoyed "Pact" and "The Tale of Hauk," in the same collection.
Ad astra! Sean
Post a Comment