The Stars My Destination

The Stars My Destination is a fast-paced novel about a taste for vengeance leading its protagonist on a path of emotional and spiritual growth. Gully Foyle, a 'common man' whose pursuit of revenge against the ship which abandoned him after being shipwrecked in space, becomes a "great man" figure in history who, by the novel's end, hopes for an awakening of the masses. In this sense, The Stars My Destination can be read as a reworking of The Demolished Man. Instead of the protagonist initially being a "great man" whose decisions rocks the world, only falling to the lowest point possible, Gully Foyle begins as a low, uneducated common man whose unhealthy obsessions drive him to abominable behavior and great stature. Perhaps Bester, after witnessing the impact of World War II and the inability of leaders to trust the masses, hoped that, in this distant future of war, jaunting, and neo-Victorian gender roles, taking a chance on giving the responsibility of the world to the people themselves would be the only solution to corporate monopoly capitalism and inter-planetary genocidal battles. Thus, in a strange way, one can see a common thread uniting both novels and their protagonists, for endeavoring to envision a way for those movers of society to recognize the same in others. 

Cœurs-Unis des Artisans

One of the most difficult aspects of tracing the early moments in Haitian labor history is reconstructing the origins of the Cœurs-Unis des Artisans. Mentioned by Michel Hector as an association founded in 1870, it grew and by the 1890s, expanded further to include artisans, intellectuals, and workers. Unfortunately, Hector's Syndicalisme et socialisme en Haïti: 1932-1970 does not examine the organization in detail. But, as an association of artisans founded in 1870, it would appear to resemble similar developments in Latin America and the Caribbean where artisans were also coming together in mutual aid societies or organizations. Other secondary sources that allude to Cœurs-Unis des Artisans include Laurent Dubois's Haiti: The Aftershocks of History,  Marc Péan's tomes on Cap-Haitien history, Luc-Joseph Pierre's Haïti: les origines du chaos and a chapter by Alex Bastien in Max Manigat's Cap-Haïtien : excursions dans le temps: au fil de nos souvenirs. Most of the secondary sources heavily rely on Marc Péan, who appears to be the sole historian to look in the archives and read some of the writings of Jules Auguste and other members of the association in Le Réveil, an important newspaper of the 1890s. 

Nonetheless, as the earliest known labor association (outside the rural world of Haiti and various forms of "peasant" associations), Cœurs-Unis merits further inquiry. Described by Luc-Joseph Pierre as a coterie of Freemasons who held meetings, processions, and banquets, which could not expand into a real movement during the zenith of firminisme, the association appears to be much more (Pierre 112). First of all, Cœurs-Unis was not a Masonic lodge, although several members were members of lodges, according to Alex Bastien (Bastien 27). Further, Bastien presents compelling evidence for Cœurs-Unis functioning as a mutual aid society and community institution. Its space served as a center for a chapel devoted to the Lady of Immaculate Conception, drawing worshipers and prayers from all social classes (Bastien 20). Moreover, Cœurs-Unis persisted well into the 20th century, and some of its later leadership (Jean Marquez Valbrun, an administrator of the association) lived long enough to impact Bastien and future generations. One of the usual functions of the group's local was a funeral salon, suggesting members saw it primarily as a mutual aid society for supporting similar artisans and laborers in the city (Bastien 27). 

Moreover, a plaque celebrating the centennial of the organization in 1970 describes its goal as "secours mutuels," indicating how the group's self-definition expressed mutualist aims (Bastien 26). However, Bastien's analysis of the group and its role in Cap-Haitien labor history is based on a much later incarnation of the organization. If one is searching for it's 19th century roots and ideology, only Péan becomes useful. Indeed, the three pivotal figures mentioned by Bastien were Etienne Leonce Bariento, Jean Marquez Valbrun, and Paul Emile Laguerre, none of whom appear in Péan's series on Cap-Haitien. However, their occupations give some sense of the reformist, progressive, and artisan base of the organization: Bariento was a lawyer, Laguerre a cabinetmaker (Bastien 18). Bastien also cites a book by Valbrun, which praised the labor solidarity of Cœurs-Unis des Artisans, presumably a value of the earlier moments in its foundation (Bastien 24). Sadly, Bastien does not cite any definitive proof of the organization involving itself in any labor conflicts, but he alludes to other possible mutualist acts of the organization.

In terms of the earlier development of Cœurs-Unis des Artisans, Péan's L'échec du firminisme comes closest to providing a full portrait. According to him, the organization was founded in 1870, after the civil wars of the Salnave years, to promote fraternity among Haitian artisans. This implies that Haitian shoemakers, tailors, etc. were already involved in the political affairs of the country, supporting one faction or another. However, Péan suggests that it was only in the 1880s when the organization became institutionalized through its monthly meetings, processions, banquets, and events (Péan 102). Péan additionally describes the conditions of industry and trades in the city of the late 19th century, but most learned a trade through an apprenticeship with a master artisan, including some who ran workshops of their own and were also members of Cœurs-Unis des Artisans, such as master-masons Godard Phaeton and Alcime Balthazar (Péan 103). Elsewhere, Péan names other members: William Dugue, Ocean Mompoint, Belotte, laywers like Jean Chrysostome Arteaud, the judge Cassius Daniel, intellectuals like Jules Auguste, and other artisans, such as Etienne Almajor. Péan claims most of the city's artisans were tied to Cœurs-Unis, but does not cite numbers or to what extent master artisans dominated the organization. 

Intriguingly, this mutualist organization survived for several decades, while the the Association Ouvriere in Port-au-Prince formed in July 1894 was short-lived. Even though Cœurs-Unis was suppressed during the failure of firminisme, since its members supported Firmin's message of reform, progress, and rational organization of finance and labor, somehow the organization continued to exist and exert a large influence on part of Cap-Haitien society. Perhaps the organization's longevity was due to the limited nature of industrialization in Cap-Haitien, where, despite the growth of a few small-scale industries employing between a dozen and 50 persons, the degree to which guild-like production faced challenges were limited (L'illusion héroïque: 25 ans de vie capoise, 1890-1915 describes in great detail changes in industry and the ideology of progress among would-be industrialists of the city) .

Thus, the organization did not seek to pursue unions or militant labor actions beyond mutualist concerns, since artisans and individual craft production faced fewer challenges there than in Port-au-Prince? Or perhaps the distance from the capital and the history of autonomy made it easier for artisans and workers to maintain a certain degree of independence in Cap-Haitien than in Port-au-Prince? Did the impact of Firminisme show an early example of labor and progressive politics coming together in Haiti for a social program? Why did the Coeurs-Unis not spread to the countryside? Were its members who received formal education or frequented the literary salons of the middle and upper classes sharing the same presumptions about the peasantry as the elite? To what extent did trade unions, class consciousness, or socialist ideology permeate the organization? The answer to these questions requires tackling the primary sources to move beyond conjecture.

The Demolished Man

Upon the recommendation of a relative, I read Alfred Bester's The Demolished Man. A complex novel with detective fiction and science fiction elements, two of my favorite genres, Bester's tale of a wealthy industrialist murdering a corporate rival while a telepathic police prefect tries to prove the former's guilt is a wild ride in a future New York centuries from now. Bester, whose influence on subsequent generations of science fiction writers is always mentioned, does not delve into great detail describing this future world, but it appears to be an early cyberpunk aesthetic with a criminal underworld, monopolistic corporations which resemble of the zaibatsus of Gibson, a Spaceland resort, and interplanetary colonization. The Espers, or peepers, those with telepathic powers, are organized into a Guild, but divided into two camps: right-wing extremists who want to ensure Esper supremacy, and the Guild leadership which is trying to spread the gift of telepathy to the entire human race. Ben Reich, who finds the Guild an obstacle to business, and fears the D'Courtney Cartel, conspires with the help of two telepaths to successfully murder D'Courtney. Of course, things are more complex, and Reich is not completely aware or sure of his motives for the crime, while Lincoln Powell, the Esper policeman, who knows Reich is guilty, struggles to prove it. 

Perhaps what is most interesting here, however, is how skillfully it foreshadows some of the major concerns in the novels of Philip K. Dick in the 1960s and 1970s. Large, monopolistic firms, unbridled capitalism, the threat of fascism and social divisions, and the unreliable basis of reality. Unlike Bester, Dick didn't resort to telepathy so much, but his precogs who could predict the future, were always major characters who represented future advances in human evolution and could predict, somewhat, the unstable world of post-apocalyptic societies. However, unlike Dick, who almost certainly had Marxist sympathies, Bester's novel is a bit more difficult to comprehend, politically. The greater than human personality of Ben Reich, an Übermensch overwhelmed by death obsession and criminality, appears to be on the verge of changing history as some kind of mythic, great man, is depicted as a sympathetic figure with regards to what his force could do for the Solar System. Without ruining the conclusion, it would appear that the Guild ultimately survives, and there is a hint of optimism, perhaps representing a kind of non-capitalist, mutualist order prevailing against fascist or zaibatsu-like domination through great men. With rehabilitation and emotional support, the great man can be utilized for the good of society, instead of being left only with the "sheep." Unfortunately, there isn't enough detail on this world to grasp a better idea of its society, but it would seem to have certainly influenced Dick and Gibson's imagined future of capital. 

I Called Him Morgan

I've finally watched I Called Him Morgan. It goes without saying that this is a superior documentary to the recent Coltrane documentary because it tells a lesser known story while actually disseminating new information to a general public that likely knows less about Morgan than Coltrane. Anyway, focusing on Lee Morgan through the perspective of Helen Morgan, his wife who fatally shot him at Slug's in 1972, was a brilliant move that humanizes Helen while providing a look at Lee Morgan through a completely different lens. We learn about Helen's roots in North Carolina, her struggle to make it on her own terms in an era when opportunities for black women in New York were extremely limited, and just how important her role was in resuscitating Lee, both musically and morally. Unfortunately, I would have liked to learn a bit more about Lee's music and his own Philadelphia roots, but interviews with Jymie Merritt, Wayne Shorter, Bennie Maupin, and others helped fill the gap. Extensive use of photographs of recording sessions for Blue Note were excellently matched with the oral testimonies of interviewees who either recorded with Morgan or knew both Helen and Lee intimately. Nonetheless, it was shocking that "The Sidewinder" was not referenced at all in this film, particularly since it shaped Lee's subsequent recordings with Blue Note and the "soul-jazz" phenomenon of the 1960s. Nor was there specific mention of Morgan's later work's new directions, including some in the vein of jazz fusion and funkier aesthetics, except for a song composed in honor of Angela Davis by Merritt. In spite of these shortcomings, and the rather somber tone of the film, there is a rich sense of humor throughout. Helen, from a recorded interview in the 1990s before her death, describes her first meeting with Miles Davis, who calls her a bitch with a quick mouth. Wayne Shorter's recollections about the food and drink at Blue Note recording sessions was amusing and light-hearted. Seeing Shorter remember is musical comrade from their days in the Jazz Messengers was quite endearing. Next on the list is Kasper Collin's Albert Ayler documentary!

Sun Ra Lives

After miraculously receiving a free ticket to see the Arkestra perform, my Thursday evening was enriched by 90 minutes of Sun Ra's Arkestra. Under the leadership of Marshall Allen, who might have been the only old-timer who was part of the early years of the Arkestra, they performed compositions encompassing the entire breadth of the Arkestra's years. A Fletcher Henderson tune here, some Latin jazz there, plus numerous chants, African grooves, and the musicians staging a procession through the audience's seating area comprised an evening of endless swing and rhythm. Like Duke Ellington, Ra's penchant for tonal sound poems brought to mind livid colors and otherworlds, matched by the outlandish garb of the band and the audience's appreciation. Marshall Allen was the main provider of "skronk," directing the rest of the Arkestra and occasionally joining the vocalist in scatting and chants. Unfortunately, the band didn't touch Sun Ra's less accessible free jazz material, nor did they explore one of my favorites from his New York years: "Moon Dance." Nonetheless, the band was successful in adapting old Arkestra standards for a fresh sound, as well as toying with some electronic instruments to explore different sounds and dissonances. Once I track down the name of that complex Latin jazz number the band performed, I will be ecstatic. 

Nick and the Glimmung

Philip K. Dick's Nick and the Glimmung is Dick's only children's novel and a sequel of sorts to Galactic Pot-Healer, one of his strangest 1960s novels. As a fellow cat lover, this children's novel is an enjoyable read of a family forced to either give up their cherished cat, Horace, or emigrate to a colony on a different planet. Needless to say, the family chooses to keep their cat and leave the overpopulated Earth. Unfortunately, for children's fiction, this novel is rather bare and doesn't capture as much of the sense of wonder one would expect from Dick (especially after reading Galactic Pot-Healer). However, if read as a continuation of Galactic Pot-Healer's planetary eternal struggle between Glimmung and anti-Glimmung, one can read the novel as a dualist tale calling for the harmony of light and darkness. Nick, as the child protagonist who ultimately restores the balance, is the child hero who, driven by his love for his pet cat and his determination to resist the totalitarian government on Earth for it, is the hero. Interpreted in this light, Dick's children's novel fits in quite well with his other work in its metaphysical and moral dilemmas, plus the role of children and animals in 'sniffing' out the simulacra from the real.

Gather Yourselves Together

Gather Yourselves Together is one of the earliest Philip K. Dick novels and, although full of occasional typos and some awkward passages, is actually an endearing tale of a love triangle in China after the Communist victory. Three Americans left behind as representatives of the Company learn about themselves, relationships between men and women, and adulthood. Two of them, an older man and a young woman, Verne and Barbara, were once lovers (Verne taking her virginity some years earlier), and Carl, a blonde "boy" (and virgin) who sounds a lot like Philip K. Dick himself, is left with the two. Like all of Dick's subsequent realist fiction, the fundamental problem of love and relationships between men and women are fleshed out in all their problematic ways, as the three characters struggle to make sense of themselves and their lot in a rapidly changing world. Communist China, the end of the American company, and their shifting realities and recollections of life in the US intersect almost seamlessly in this early work. Unfortunately, perhaps too much time is spent on some of the characters' recollections, but one cannot help but find Barbara Mahler to be one of the most interesting female characters of PKD. She's fundamental to the story, and her own sense of herself as a woman with sexual agency and development brings to mind Mary in Mary and the Giant. This is a frustrating and endearing novel worth a read for a hint at some of the common themes throughout PKD's later work.

Deus Irae

Deus Irae is one of the stranger Philip K. Dick novels. Coauthored with Roger Zelazny, it's quite brief, and although quite seamless, feels disjointed by the length of time the writers took to complete the novel. Nonetheless, it feels like something of Dick's. One of the main characters, Tibor, is a phocomelus, a human without limbs, which also appeared in another of Dick's works. Of course, in a post-apocalyptic setting, one needs new religious cults and moorings, so the Servants of Wrath compete with Christianity to make sense of the wasteland world. Although much could be said about this short novel and its ruminations on the meaning of life, religion, and Christianity, I am unsure how to begin tackling it...but perhaps its hilarious take on religion and the question of truth or validity for the dissemination of religious ideas is the best take-away. Phildickian sense of humor drives this absurd tale of a limbless man on a pilgrimage, and only Dick could make that work.

Voices From the Street

Dick's Voices From the Street is a hot mess. One of his posthumously published realist novels set in 1950s California, the novel begins with some of the exact same passages used in another of his realist novels. Furthermore, he recycles some of the same names, occupations, and character types here, with a TV salesman, the universe of small retail, and an unhappy marriage. However, where Voices From the Street departs from PKD's other realist novels is the omnipresence of fascism, in the shadows and bulging at the seams. In this novel, the unlikable "Nordic" protagonist, Stuart Hadley, meets a woman whose small literary magazine turns out to be a fascist rag. Despite her having an affair with an African-American millenarian movement leader, she also had met Oswald Mosley and echoes many of the common fascist interpretations of the ills of modern society.

Of course, anti-Semitism and race play a major role, despite her relationship with a black man. For a while, Hadley is attracted to her, and her fascistic worldview, even going as far as employing anti-Semitic slurs against his old high school friend, David Gold. Hadley, who has ambition, creativity, and is unhappy with the way of the world, oscillates between the fascist persuasion of modern life, and that of the religious cult (while also attempting bourgeois existence, for a stint). Ultimately, the fascist persuasion loses, but Dick's novel might provide some utility for understanding the fascist predicament and its threat to the future of humanity in his science fiction novels. Indeed, the appeal of fascism to middling sectors of society with declining status, the bankruptcy of American life during the Cold War (as well as the Korean War), plus Dick's perpetual questioning of the meaning of reality means Hadley questions the social fabric of his time, while fumbling repeatedly along the way. Examples abound, such as Hadley's rape of Marsha, his initial pull toward the fascist persuasion of modern life.