Читать книгу The Streetcar to Andromeda - Celeste Hammond Streiff - Страница 4

A few years ago my older brother, Lee Streiff, a retired high school English teacher in Wichita, Kansas sent me a booklet he’d put together and published, in a small quantity on his own “Vortex Press.”

The booklet was entitled: CVC VERI, A Guide to the Epic of the Martian Empire. Eagerly I set out to read it, and to my delight, was greatly amused. When I finished reading, I sat in wonder, and as a tear streamed down my cheek I thought, “What a wonderful loving tribute Lee has written to his older brother James.” You see, our father was always away at work and so it was James that had really raised Lee and given him from his own vast knowledge and creativity, the priceless gift of “imagination.”

I immediately called Lee and told him that I thought his Guidebook could be developed into a unusual and magical short story that he should write. He laughed and said he thought it would make a wonderful children’s book and suggested that I should write it. Of course I was greatly flattered by his proposal and so in my spare time, set out to work on it.

It seems that back in 1937’ our brother James, an extremely imaginative thirteen year old had begun to fashion in his imagination, a cosmic Empire filled with strange and wonderful creatures and beings. The chief players and heroes in the Epic of the Martian Empire were a stalwart band of Martian Exiles, (James and his friends, of course) that were driven from their home planet of Mars during a great Revolt by the evil and vile Madman Roth. And now the goal of the Exiles was to reclaim their home planet of Mars. With this premise in mind, the group created many situations and characters to achieve their goal and have a lot of fun along the way. So over a period of the next eleven years the Epic of the Martian Empire grew and grew.

Basically the guys were way ahead of their time, because back in 1937’ they had actually created and were playing a game that was rather like a version of Dungeons & Dragons that erupted some 50 years later in the 1980’s. James and his friends became the lead characters in the game of the Martian Empire. They made up stories about each other and would then embellish on them. Now, not every member, friend, or fan involved, was an alternate character in the Empire fables, and a lot of the character were just “hearsay” that is, they were usually included and often talked about, but not “real” people like; the Mighty Moscovitch, The Ex-robot Dictator, the Dragons, and especially the most prominent Character, CVC VERI. Several members of the group played roles as themselves and so in a way, this is how “The Streetcar to Andromeda” is all loosely based on a true story.

The Stories of the Martian Empire eventually spread over most of the known universe before it finally faded around 1948’. During the 11 years it flourished however the Martian Epic became very elaborate, covering some 15 billion years of Martian History, Martian technology, manners morals, art, music, religion, language and literature. It generated a narrative Epic that encompassed many galaxies.

Although a number of people became involved in the game playing of this Epic, like Bob Parks, John Roth, Robert Frickel, Charles Goodrum, and Robert Arnold among others, It was first and foremost the vision of James, who worked out and brought together the maps, timelines, the celestial spaces, the songs, the customs and almost all of the characters that made up the Martian Empire in its diverse grandeur.

Central to the Epic were the cultural Hero; The Mighty Moscovitch (whose name must always be written in red ink or in someway be made distinctive); Madman Roth(John Roth)The demon Veri; The Evil Martian Aristocrats (who drove the Exiles who created the Empire, off Mars itself) and Shultz’s Beer Parlor;(the meeting place of the Exiles): Varnish (a virulent elixir); various gods and creatures, like Veri, Erf and Merf, the Dragons; Klono, god of Justice; Noshabkenning, god of space; the Little Men, messengers of Klono, ( Paul Carter), an Alien Statasonian from Blackfoot Idaho, who also created The Ex-Robot Dictator; and on and on; but at the center of it all was the Parks and Streiff Construction Co., whose partners were the prime movers of most of the action, James Streiff and Robert Parks.

In early 1937’ my brother Lee Streiff was only four years old, and so it was that most of his childhood and youth were some how surrounded or suffused with the images and tales of the Martian Epic. However, it was not until he reached the age of eleven that he became the brief inheritor of, and participant in the affairs of the Epic itself.

It was during World War 11, in 1943 that Lee first took over the job of running business of the Martian Empire while all of its members were away from Wichita in the Army, Navy and Air Force.

Knowing that he would soon be drafted, James began grooming Lee for the task earlier that year. James reported to active duty on June 3^rd 1943.

At first Lee’s duties of taking over the job of the Parks and Streiff Construction Co .Files were minimal; receiving correspondence from members of the group and sending it on to James, and keeping the files up to date.

Later in 1944’, Lee started a News letter, because it was easier to keep all the members of the group informed that way, and he called it, “The Martian News Letter.” He would run off copies of the News Letter on his hectograph machine and mail them off to fellow, Martians, aliens, Sci - Fi fans, and refugee’s, (real people) in the far-flung regions of the globe (overseas, and the Midwest) In 1943’ he decided he wanted to reorganize the files and bring the scattered parts of the legend together, but all he had were some letters, some essays, a lot of pictures, assorted documents and some obscure scribbled notes written in Martian script, and so on. He didn’t know how it had all come to be in the first place, or have a mental model of how all of these parts were to fit together, as they didn’t tell a connected tale or necessarily relate to each other even. So – he began to put the events of the Epic into a chronological narrative order and create a sort of an encyclopedia. Lee understood Encyclopedia’s. He had read most of the two sets our family owned and much of the World Book he’d borrowed from our neighbor Mrs. Peggy Easley by the time he was seven. With this wealth of knowledge he set to work extracting information from letters and asking James questions in their long extended correspondence while James was overseas.

When James returned from the War in February of 1946’ Lee’s task was done and in 1947’ as a sophomore in high school, his interest began to turn in other directions. He left Science Fiction behind for the most part and became more involved in art and literature — but then that’s another story.

After the War, most of the members, fans, and other Martians that had returned home began getting jobs and raising families of their own. — and so the Martian Empire winded down and came to a conclusion around 1948’.

Lee ended his Guidebook of “CVC Veri and the Epic of the Martian Empire,” with a poem James had written at that time.

“As we now go through so many rolling years, we gaze upon the greater glory of a mighty Empire. It stands in the memory of great men as the supreme effort of a mighty race.”

It was an epitaph of the Martian Empire and of the many, many, Martians who’d built it.

And so now my version of the Martian Empire comes together in the story of “The Streetcar to Andromeda,” in which I have given my view of the Epic, with considerable embellishing upon a few tales from the scribbling’s, notes and scattered letters and pictures of the Parks and Streiff Construction Company files, And from Lee’s wonderful guidebook of; CVC VERI and, The Epic of Martian Empire.

I have also woven in with my embellishments significant tales of my own, along with several stories and adventures of the exploits of the Martian Exiles and their many friends and creatures. In doing so, I have now added my own name to the long, long list of People and Martians that contributed their imaginations — a very long, long time ago, in another time and another place, way back in the 1940’s.

I have done all this with the wonderful gift of imagination by my side. Because you see, although it was James who had raised Lee, it was Lee in turn, that had raised me, and from his own vast knowledge and wisdom he gave to me the priceless gift of imagination, which I in turn —would enjoy passing on to you.