A 1985 article about Robert Shea

Robert Shea

[This article is copied from a reprint in Robert Shea's zine, "No Governor." If you look under "Robert Shea Resources" at the right side of this page, you will see links to PDF files of all of the issues, which have material from Shea, Robert Anton Wilson and others. If you get interested in Shea, please take a look at my Robert Shea book, if you had not heard about it yet. -- The Management.]

Robert Shea has the write stuff

The Glencoe News, Jan. 3, 1985

Reprinted in No Governor No. 7, March 1985

By VIRGINIA GERST

If Robert Shea gets bored while reading a novel, he puts down the book, and tries to figure out what  has gone wrong.

"Usually, nothing is happening in the story, or I don't like the main character because he's not taking charge the way he should," the author said recently.

For the 51-year-old Glencoe resident, literary analysis is more than an intellectual exercise. It is a means of ensuring that his own plots remain lively, that his own heroes seize control.

Since he sold his first story to Fantastic Universe magazine for $10 in 1958, Shea has earned at least a part of his living as a writer. A former editor at Playboy, he has been at it full time since 1978.

His first novel, "Illuminatus!," a three-volume science fiction tale he wrote with Robert Anton Wilson, was published in 1975, while "Shike," a historical work set in medieval Japan, appeared in 1981. Two other novels, both rooted in French history, are in various stages of completion.

All are produced in a small, cluttered office just off the kitchen of the two-story home he shares with his wife, Yvonne, a Chicago advertising agency executive, their 11-year-old son, Michael, and two family dogs.

The room is crammed with books, magazines and stacks of correspondence. A copy of "Dune" rests on a bookcase next to a volume titled "Zen," while the hum of his Apple IIe mingles with music from a cassette player on a shelf upon the wall.

"I can't say that every day I just rush to the word processor, but that's the ideal and it does happen sometime," he noted. "Other days, I have to cultivate habits."

Beginning at 9:30 a.m. today, and continuing for the following three Thursdays, Shea will help other writers cultivate professional habits when he appears as guest lecturer at the Off Campus Writers  Workshop in the Winnetka Community House, 620 Lincoln Ave. Admission to each three-hour session is $5, or $14 for the complete series.

Meetings, Shea said, will be devoted primarily to discussions of the participants' manuscripts ("Honest criticism -- I've heard they've got built-in baloney detectors," he said.)

The gregarious writer also will  spend time revealing "everything I know about magazine writing and writing historical  fiction."

In the latter category, he is sure to place a great deal of emphasis upon plot.

"Authors have got to realize that the main thing is to be a good storyteller," he said over coffee in his living room, filled with Victorian antiques and framed photographs of Shea family ancestors.

"Particularly when you're writing historical fiction, it's easy to get carried away showing off how much you know, dragging a thing in just because it is an amazing fact. But it can't get in the way of your story."

Accurate portrayal of fact is important in fiction, said the writer, who researches his novels  carefully, and plans a trip to France for his latest book, set in the Napoleonic period.

But accuracy is not always critical. Saul Bellow's "Henderson the Rain King," he pointed out, is set in an Africa that has nothing to do with the continent as it really is. "And nobody cares," he said. "It is such a wonderful piece of storytelling."

Shea takes best sellers very seriously. "They are fun to read, and that is the bottom line." And, while the long hours he has spent reading his way up and down best seller lists have not revealed any formulas for instant success, they have turned up some common characteristics among the published blockbusters.

"People are always in trouble and it is pretty bad trouble," he said. "Take 'The Thornbirds.' People suffer all the way through that."

The people, too, are crucial, particularly the hero, who had better act the part.

"Look at 'Shogun.' The main character is in a foreign land, he doesn't speak the language and everybody is hostile. In a situation like that, most people would lay down and die. But he doesn't. He is thinking all the time, about how to survive and prevail."

He has equally strong opinions about the villain.

"I want to like him as much as I like the hero," he said. "In real life, there really are no villains who set out to be villains. No one ever thinks they, themselves, are doing evil, and that is one of the truths I like to convey."

A graduate of Manhattan College, with a master of arts degree in English from Rutgers University, Shea has been reading and writing science fiction since he was a child growing up in New York City.

"I was the only kid in the neighborhood who read the stuff," he recalled.

He started selling stories, "at a penny a word," while in college, and met his "Illuminatus!" collaborator while at Playboy, where both were employed.

For their amusement, the men used to pass notes back and forth detailing the activities of the citizenry of an imaginary land of the future. One day, it occurred to them they might be on to something.

They were. The book, a combination of political satire, science fiction and fantasy, has developed what press releases call "a small, but highly intelligent cult following." Even better, when reissued as a single, very fat, volume in 1984, it earned a place on the trade paperback best seller list.

Shea planned his second novel to deal with a civil war in a faraway galaxy, but when his agent showed the five-page outline to a publisher, the publisher had other ideas.

"He said he liked the story, but that he couldn't bring out any more science fiction at that time," Shea recalled. "He said, 'How about moving it to Japan?' "

His wife recently had completed a course in Japanese  history, and Shea leafed through some of her books, coming upon an historic period that paralleled the one in his outline. The result, "Shike," (pronounced She-K), has sold well, both on this side of the Atlantic and in nine foreign countries.

He may have changed his idea to get  his story published, but he insisted he never would have done it had he not become fascinated witih feudal Japan. He counsels other writers to be equally intrigued by their subject matter.

"Many people see that romantic novels are selling, so they rush out and start writing romantic novels,"  he said. "But they're going to spend a year or maybe two or three on this work, and, if they are not interested in the subject, they are not going to be very happy."

If readers notice some elements of mysticism in his writing, it is no accident. Shea has been involved with mysticism ever since he read Ray Bradbury's "Zen and the Art of Writing," in Writer Magazine several years back. He now meditates 20 minutes a day, as a means of "getting close to whatever is out there, of trying to make contact with the ultimate reality.

"In his article, Bradbury implied that there was something about Zen that, if studied, could help people become more creative writers," he recalled. "So, like a lot of people, I got involved in mysticism thinking it would give me some practical benefit. But once you get into it, you lose that motivation. Writing becomes a way of getting closer to mysticism."

His basic goals, however, have not changed. He advises all writers to write as much as they can. Even if the work is not to be published, they should take pleasure in the process.

"I've never written for the literary critics, or to make a whole lot of money," he concluded. "I've always thought, 'Can I have fun writing this'?"

Robert Shea not only has fun, but he's managed to make a living at it as well.

Al Zuckerman's book dedication

When literary superagent Albert Zuckerman died (he was the agent for both Robert Anton Wilson and Robert Shea, see this earlier post), his book Writing the Blockbuster Novel went on sale cheap as a Kindle, and I picked it up. 

I want to share the book's dedication:

"I dedicate this book to some authors of mine who have written blockbuster novels that, for one reason or another, never achieved the huge recognition that they deserved.

"Michael Peterson for A Time of War,

"Robert Shea for Shike,

"F. Paul Wilson for The Keep,

"Tim Willocks for The Religion,

"and Jim Fergus for One Thousand White Women."

See Mike Shea and F. Paul Wilson's comments at the above link.

Robert Shea indeed did very well with Shike, his first published work as a solo author after Illuminatus!, although his subsequent novels did not sell as well. Mike Shea talks about that in last year's Hilaritas Podcast. If you want to know more about Shea and his literary career, you can check out my new book.

Al Zuckerman, star literary agent who represented Wilson and Shea, has died [UPDATED]

 

Dan Brown said this book "changed my life." 

Prominent literary agent Albert Zuckerman has died. He played a big role in the careers of both Robert Anton Wilson and Robert Shea, although they were  hardly his most famous clients.

As Clay Risen explains in his typically excellent New York Times obituary for Zuckerman, Zuckerman had many big successes, including boosting the career of Ken Follett:

"He had a knack for finding promising writers who, with a few pointers, could become rock stars. His first big score was with Mr. Follett, a Welsh novelist who wrote about the English working class until he hired Mr. Zuckerman, who encouraged him to write a thriller instead.

"The result, Eye of the Needle (1978), won an Edgar Award for best novel, sold briskly in Britain and the United States, and cemented Mr. Follett’s reputation as a bankable writer. His books have since sold nearly 200 million copies, and helped make Mr. Zuckerman, as The Irish Independent described it in a 1994 profile, 'the hero of the blockbuster'.”

Zuckerman also had a hand in A Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawking (25 million copies sold of a book about physics). Zuckerman wrote Writing the Blockbuster Novel, cited as a big influence by Dan Brown. 

But of course my main interest in Zuckerman was the role in played as Wilson and Shea's agent. He was not involved in selling Illuminatus! to Dell, but after that work's success, he became their agent.

I spoke to Zuckerman briefly in 2012, here is part of that blog post: "Zuckerman told me that he sold all of Wilson and Shea's subsequent novels, but that the two had sold Illuminatus! on their own, without using an agent."

Dell editor Fred Feldman, one of the editors who worked on Illuminatus!, introduced Wilson and Shea to Zuckerman. It was early in Zuckerman's career, as Feldman told me in my 2013 interview with the editor:

"Now, of course today, Al is one of the premiere agents in the business. He had a new client at that time, a young untested British guy by the name of Ken Follett. That seems to have worked out for them. Of course, Al has many other very important clients, a thriving agency, Writer’s House, and I think is a patriarch of the business at this point.

"But at the time, he didn’t have any clients. At the time, believe it or not, I’d sometimes vacate my office for a little time so he could use my phone. It was just a different time. He was just starting out. He got his first office, Writer’s House, and I remember going over to see it, I was so pleased. He’s older than me. He came from an academic background.

"But anyway, I introduced them both. I remember Bob Shea remembered doing a couple of historic Japanese sagas with Al that did very well, and then I kind of lost track of him."

I shared the news about Zuckerman yesterday with Mike Shea, Robert Shea's son. 

"My dad loved him a lot. I worked with Al regularly as well as my dad’s heir," Mike told me. 

"My dad really was in awe of him and changed a *lot* of what he did based on Al’s guidance. Shike was supposed to be a science fiction novel!"

Shike was Shea's first novel. It was written during a tough time in Shea's life. He had been laid off by Playboy magazine, a circumstance which got Shea to finally get serious about a career as a novelist. As Feldman relates, Shike was a big success and allowed Shea to pursue a career as a novelist until his death. 

Here is an anecdote from Dan Brown:

"Not long ago, I had an amusing experience meeting the author of a book I received as a gift nearly two decades ago — a book that in many ways changed my life. Almost 20 years ago, I was halfway through writing my first novel, Digital Fortress, when I was given a copy of Writing the Blockbuster Novel, by the legendary agent Albert Zuckerman. His book helped me complete my manuscript and get it published. Two months ago, by chance, I met Mr. Zuckerman for the first time. I gratefully told him that he had helped me write Digital Fortress. He jokingly replied that he planned to tell everyone that he had helped me write The Da Vinci Code.”

F. Paul Wilson (Repairman Jack novels, The Keep) has a nice piece up about Zuckerman:

"After my third novel, he said I needed to expand my horizons: Send him three ideas I’d like to work on, and we’ll choose. We settled on one set in WWII with a Romanian castle and a strange, malignant occupant.  I wrote it in about six months. Al was impressed, but said it needed work. So he got to work. His notes and edits shed new light on the book and I wrote the second draft with them in mind. The book was transformed. But Al wasn’t through yet. He decided to approach Hollywood before the publishers. It worked: We had a movie deal before he put the book up for auction.  It landed on the NY Times bestseller list.  And that is why The Keep is dedicated to Al Zuckerman."

UPDATE: If you want to get going on your bestselling novel, Amazon is selling a Kindle of Zuckerman's book for $3. 

A bit more on 'All Things Are Lights'

 

I've updated my Feb. 20 post on Robert Shea's All Things Are Lights. 

Here (in part) how Shea described the novel in an interview (reproduced in my new Shea book, Every Day Is a GOOD Day.) 

"The title comes from a medieval  philosopher, Scotus Erigena, who said, 'All that are, are lights.' The main characters have an outlook that is as mystical as that statement, only their mysticism is not of the orthodox variety. The main character is a troubadour who achieves illumination in an adulterous affair with a countess through the rites of courtly love, which I portray as a westernized version of tantric yoga. The troubadour is also in love with a woman minister of the heretical Cathar sect. Nowadays they tell women they can't be priests; in those days they burned them at the stake for trying." 

Robert Anton Wilson on 'All Things Are Lights' [UPDATED]

From a Sept. 4, 1986, letter written by Robert Anton Wilson to Kurt Smith:

"Shea is a nice guy and a good friend, so I told him All Things Are Lights was a wonderful adventure novel. That's my official opinion. I hate the bitchiness and nastiness that infests the literary world and I try to remember never to bum-rap anybody, but especially not old friends."

Via Michael Johnson, thank you Michael! Does anyone have any context, or any other comments by RAW about Shea's novels? I liked All Things Are Lights and it was a favorite of his widow, Patricia Monaghan. 

Update: In the comments, Eric Wagner writes, "Bob once sent me a Medaeval reading list. He told me he had sent a similar list to Bob Shea before he wrote All Things Are Lights." I forgot to ask Eric if he still has that list, but I'll ask now.

For the record, in the acknowledgements, Shea writes that "many people" helped him, and adds, "I would especially like to express my gratitude to Jeanne Bernkopf, Bernadette Bosky, Frances C. Bremseth, Gerald Bremseth, Ric Erickson, Christine Hayes, Dave Hickey, Dr. Joseph R. Kraft, Mary Kay Kraft, Neal Rest, Michael Erik Shea, Morrison Swift, Robert Anton Wilson, and Al Zuckerman." 

 

Bobby Campbell on the Robert Shea anthology

 

One more item, if I may, from Bobby Campbell's latest newsletter: 

"Wanted to make sure I mentioned this wonderful addition to the Illuminatus! canon, an excellently crafted spotlight on co-author Robert Shea. My enthusiastic review is enclosed below:

Meet Bob Shea! The legendary co-creator of Illuminatus!, Hodge to Robert Anton Wilson's Podge, a luminous man of letters, friendly suburban zen buddhist anarchist, and visionary creator of better tomorrows, that you are most welcome to enjoy today!

Tom Jackson has crafted a perfect introduction to Robert Shea's literary labyrinth, a guided tour of his revolutionary ouvré, wherein Shea's unique voice delivers enlightening epiphanies as casually as an old friend discussing the weather.

Make no mistake, the mystic mystery of Illuminatus! continues right here and now!

More on the book here. 

In a comment on my recent post about the latest Hilaritas podcast, podcast host Mike Gathers said the podcast on the Shea book and the Vincent Murphy podcast were two highlights in the 2025 podcasts. I thought the Shea podcast was good, too --- not because I was on it, but because Mike Shea told so many wonderful stories about his father. 

History lessons

A couple of history offerings that caught my eye, one of possible interest to RAW fans and one  that might interest Robert Shea fans.

RAW was a World War II revisionist, and I recent ran across an announcement from Thaddeus Russell for an online course, "World War II: The Great Blowback," scheduled for Feb. 9-12:

"To most Americans, World War II is the only 'good war'—the one conflict you’re not allowed to question without being accused of bad faith or worse.

"But over the last two decades, a growing number of of scholars has been assembling a very different narrative: that U.S. policy under Franklin Roosevelt turned regional wars into a truly global war, guaranteed the realization of the Holocaust, and was principally responsible for producing the greatest catastrophe in human history.

"This is the new history of the Second World War that I’ll be presenting in a 4-part live course at Unregistered Academy."

More information here.  

While I am open to World War II revisionism, I admit to being cool to the "Allies made Hitler did it" school. Speaking of which, Russell's Substack also has a recent interview with Darryl Cooper. 

Meanwhile, Tyler Cowen recently did a mini-review of Jack Weatherford's  Emperor of the Seas: Kublai Khan and the Making of China, which covers the period of history in Robert Shea's two Shike novels. Tyler wrote, "A fun and good book, think of it as explaining how Kublai Khan beat Song China but subsequently lost to Japan.  The Ainu play a role in a wide-ranging and still historically relevant story."

Hilaritas podcasts: John Zerzan and Nick Tharcher

I have two Hilaritas podcasts to mention this time.

The newest, above, is with John Zerzan, here's the description: "Hilaritas host Mike Gathers chats with John Zerzan about anarchist Max Stirner, and John's interest in Anarcho-primitivism, in episode 53 of the Hilaritas Podcast."

With the excitement over Maybe Night, I managed to miss December's podcast announcement, but it sounds like an interesting one: "Hilaritas host Mike Gathers chats with Nick Tharcher, publisher at The Original Falcon Press, about his many years in the publishing of occult books, in episode 52 of the Hilaritas Podcast." Listen here.  I liked Tharcher's first appearance on the the podcast, I'll bet this one is good, too. 

Not too late to listen to the November podcast, on Robert Shea, featuring Mike Shea (with me in a supporting role). Mike tells great stories about his father. 

I've linked to the Hilaritas Press podcast pages, but you should be able to find these episodes on your favorite podcasting app. Fifty three episodes and counting, browse them here. 

Hilaritas Press podcast spotlights Robert Shea book

The new Hilaritas Press podcast released today with regular host Mike Gathers features Mike Shea and myself, discussing the new Robert Shea anthology.

Official blurb: "Hilaritas host Mike Gathers chats with Mike Shea and Tom Jackson about the life of Robert Shea, and the new Robert Shea book, Every Day Is A GOOD Day, from Hilaritas Press in Episode 51 of the Hilaritas Press Podcast."

The podcast opens with Rasa's nifty animation of the book's cover. I thought it was a good episode when we recorded it -- not because of me, but because Mike Shea told so many good stories about his father. I thank the Mikes and Rasa for making this podcast happen. 

The delay of 'Illuminatus!' and five Robert Shea zines

As I wrote in yesterday's post, Bobby Campbell has released a lot of new Robert Anton Wilson material, but he also took the time to release PDFs of five Robert Shea zines. One of them illustrates that Shea and RAW originally thought Illuminatus! would be coming out much more quickly. It also confirms that the pair originally thought Dell would bring out one big book:

"Two Chicago authors (names kept secret for their protection) are threatening to produce a novel which will give the complete and total truth about the Ancient Illuminated Seers of Bavaria. Dell books is threatening of publish it. If all parties involved survive, the book could be out by 1971. Then the Apple will really hit the fan!" (The Universal Instructor in All Arts and Sciences and Pennsylvania Gazette (formerly the Saturday Evening Post, Number 25, April 4, 1970, available here). 

I will be checking out the RAW material, too, although probably not thoroughly until I can finish reading A Non-Euclidean Perspective: Robert Anton Wilson’s Political Commentaries 1960-2005. 

But I don't want Shea to be overlooked (as if you couldn't tell)  so I've started by looking at  five Shea zines, dating from 1969 to 1970).

Here is yesterday's blog post, with reading recommendations from Bobby and a link to the whole archive -- lots of RAW material -- and links to Shea's five zines in the archive. 

RAW Semantics on the new Shea book

 RAW Semantics on Bluesky: "I'm currently reading Robert Shea's 'Every Day is a GOOD Day' (the new collection edited by  @jacksontom.bsky.social - see my post above) & like it a lot. I've quickly warmed to Shea's voice, but I don't know enough about him to attempt a review such as this one."

Thanks, Brian, and thanks again for the review, Michael! As I noted earlier, Brian has posted notes on the new Robert Anton Wilson book, A Non-Euclidian Perspective. 

More here on Every Day is a Good Day. 

Oklahoma newspaper covers new Robert Shea book

 

My old newspaper back in Oklahoma, The Lawton Constitution, covers the new Robert Shea anthology I edited:

GRAND JUNCTION, COLO. — Hilaritas Press has published the first new book in more than 30 years by Robert Shea, best known for co-writing “Illuminatus!”, the popular cult novel written with his friend, Robert Anton Wilson.

The book “Every Day is a GOOD Day,” a collection of Shea’s writings, is edited by Tom Jackson, a former Lawton resident and reporter for The Lawton Constitution who now lives in Ohio. Jackson has often written about Shea at his RAWIllumination.net website.

Shea was known for his historical novels such as “Shike” and “All Things Are Lights,” books that still draw rave reviews from readers at websites such as Goodreads, Jackson said. When Shea died in 1994, an obituary announced that a book would come out collecting his short pieces. That plan has finally been realized 30 years later with the publication of “Every Day Is a GOOD Day.”

More here. 

Chicago area news site covers new Robert Shea book [UPDATED]

Robert Shea with a stack of pages from a novel manuscript. Photo provided by Mike Shea.

The Record North Shore, a Chicago area news site that covers the city's suburbs, has published a well written article on the new Robert Shea anthology, Every Day is a GOOD Day, put out by Hilaritas Press.

While I knew some of the information in the article written by Samuel Lisec, there were also some scoops. The photo, above, was one I hadn't seen before. And the article opens with an anecdote new to me:

One of Mike Shea’s favorite memories of his late father came from watching him write.

Robert Shea — the co-author of the popular series with a cult-following “Illuminatus!” and author of historical novels like “Shike” and “All Things Are Light” — drafted his works on typewriters before he purchased an early Apple IIe computer and backed up all his chapters on floppy disks, Mike recalled.

Once he completed a book, Shea would hand feed each page into a letter-quality printer over the course of two weeks to eventually produce a 10-inch stack of papers he could package and mail from his family’s home in Glencoe to his editor in New York. 

“I asked him, ‘God, isn’t this killing you?’” Mike said of his father’s printing process. “He said ‘No, this is the best part. This is the part where I take all of this stuff that’s been sitting in a computer, that doesn’t exist anywhere, and now I’m making it real, I’m physically making it real.’”'

Read the whole thing. 

UPDATE: I don't know what went wrong with my original links, but they are now fixed. 

News on the new Robert Shea book

 

Taking note of the new Robert Shea anthology issued by Hilaritas Press, Every Day Is a GOOD Day,  RAW Semantics writes on Bluesky, "Briefly breaking my break from social media, as I see this Robert Shea anthology is now available (ed. Tom Jackson @jacksontom.bsky.social). Aside from his co-authorship of Illuminatus!, I'm not too familiar with Shea's work. But the blurbs here seem warmly endorsing: www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0FQRNL8VP." Thanks, Brian!

Hilaritas Press has created an author page for Robert Shea. It includes the graphic, above, created by Rasa. 

Hilaritas releases my Robert Shea book

 

I am pleased to report that Hilaritas Press today released the Robert Shea anthology I put together, Every Day Is a GOOD Day.  You can read the Hilaritas Press announcement here. 

The book has been gradually popping up, as an ebook and trade paperback,  at various bookstore sites for the last few days. Buy at Amazon.  Or buy at Barnes and Noble.   Or buy at Bookshop.org and support a local bookstore. 

In the newsletter, Rasa writes:

"Bob Shea was one of Bob Wilson's closest friends, and reading this collection of Shea's writings gives you a lot of clues as to why the two men got along so well. Many RAW fans learned about the two Bob's by reading Illuminatus!, but not so many followed the further writings of Bob Shea. This new publication is a wonderful opportunity to find out that Shea was not only a really good writer, but also an exceptional human being. 

"Author Jesse Walker, books editor at Reason magazine, writes,

'One great paradox of Illuminatus! is that its cult following somehow transferred itself to just one of the book's two authors: Robert Anton Wilson still has a devoted cadre of fans two decades after his death, while Robert Shea's solo writings have run the risk of being forgotten. Thankfully, Every Day Is a GOOD Day is here to preserve the memory of this good-hearted, open-minded man – and to let more people enjoy his humane and freedom-loving writings.'

John Higgs, author of Love and Let Die and other books, writes, 

'Entertaining, thought provoking and richly varied, Every Day is a GOOD Day is a perfect introduction to the anarchistic principles and humane thinking of Robert Shea - a man more interested in finding flaws in his own beliefs than he is in forcing those beliefs on others.'

"If you like RAW's writings, you will easily get into reading Shea. If we may be so presumptuous, let us suggest that this is kinda essential reading for dedicated fans of RAW."

More endorsements here. 

I am pleased with the book, which took quite a bit of time and effort. l have been re-reading it now that I have a physical book in my hands. I've put together a book that I enjoy reading, my main definition of success. 

Various people helped me. I appreciate everyone who helped, and I want to thank a few people. Rasa did the cover, designed the book, got feedback from his board of advisors that improved the book, and in general worked very hard. I'm grateful to the five authors who took time to read the book and write blurbs for it: Jesse Walker, John Higgs, Daisy Campbell, Bobby Campbell and Eric Wagner. You can read what all five said.  And I want to thank Mike Shea, Robert Shea's son and literary executor, for giving me permission to do  the project, part of my crusade to bring new attention to Robert Shea.  UPDATE: I forgot to thank Spookah for his copyediting; he went through the whole book. I'm sure there are other people I should mention. 

Here is the book page.  There is also a Hilaritas Press page devoted to the book. 

As I wrote earlier, this month is the 50th anniversary of the publication of the first volume of Illuminatus! 

Hail Eris!

 

Wilson and Shea on 'Moon of Ice'

The late Brad Linaweaver won the Prometheus Award in 1989 for his novel, Moon of Ice. The book apparently has gone out of print, but I thought I would note that both Robert Anton Wilson and Robert Shea praised the book, and obviously anyone who wishes may hunt up a used copy. 

In Quantum Psychology, Chapter 16, Robert Anton Wilson writes, "The Nazis believed the Moon consisted of solid ice. Brad Linaweaver's superb science fiction novel, Moon of Ice, concerns a parallel universe where World War II ended in a truce, rather than total victory for the allies. In Nazi Europe, the "moon of ice" theory still reigns supreme in government-run universities, learned societies, etc. while in anarchist America (in that universe, we become pacifist, isolationist and finally anarchist) the orthodox model of the moon remains dominant. When tbe Nazis land a spaceship on the moon and find no ice, all the data of the flight becomes Top Secret and the Europeans never learn of it."

Robert Shea, in the summer 1989 issue of the Prometheus, newsletter of the Libertarian Futurist Society:

June 23, 1989

Dear Editor:

I quite agree with Victoria Varga that more favorable reviews of Moon of Ice by Brad Linaweaver may be redundant, but I can't resist adding a few more words of praise to her comments in the last issue of Prometheus. Moon of Ice, clearly the product of libertarian thinking, performs the valuable service of showing us what the U.S. might be like as a much more free society than the one we've got. It is also an artistic achievement with an ingenious structure that allows us to compare two opposite societies and two opposite personalities. Moon balances a U.S. better off than the one we've got today, portrayed in the frame story, against a Europe far worse off than the one that exists in the "real" world, as portrayed in the diaries of the Goebbels, father and daughter. The contrast of liberty and tyranny is carried through in the juxtaposition of the diaries of the anarchist Hilda Goebbels and her Nazi father Josef.

Both Hilda and Dr. Goebbels are wonderful characters. Hilda's dry—and sometimes gallows— humor is delightful. And not too many authors have been able to present us with a credible and understandable portrayal of the mind of one of the principal architects of Nazism. These two creations are feats of imaginative empathy. With all due respect to the other contenders, a Prometheus Award for Moon of Ice would be well deserved.

--Robert Shea

Philbrook's 'Shike' exhibit

Charging Samurai warriors

I am currently in Tulsa visiting my mother, and yesterday I went to a local art museum, Philbrook, formerly a 1920s period mansion owned by a rich oilman, converted into a museum. The current main exhibit is "SAMURAI: Armor from the Collection of Ann and Gabriel Barbier-Mueller," and the exhibition of samurai armor and weapons includes the time period of Robert Shea's first two "solo" novels, the Shike books. 

If you haven't read them, the Shike novels, Shike: Time of the Dragons and Shike: Last of the Zinja, are set in medieval Japan and cover fictionalized versions of two exciting events: A famous Japanese civil war and the Mongol invasion of Japan. As the Wikipedia article explains, secret societies also are part of the plot: "Shike posits a clan of grey-clad warrior monks, the "Zinja", which, it is stated by Abbot Taitaro, is related to several other secret societies throughout history, including specifically the White Lotus Society in China, the Hashishim (assassins) in the Middle East, and the Knights Templar in Europe, among others. Through an aside in All Things Are Lights, the Zinja are therefore linked, however tenuously, to Shea's other writings on secret societies, most notably his work with Robert Anton Wilson in The Illuminatus! Trilogy."

It was cool to see an exhibit that helped bring the Shike books to life. 

A naginata, a Japanese pole weapon, and a sword.

Robert Shea once published Thomas Pynchon

Cavalier magazine, March 1966

I have finally read some Thomas Pynchon. I finished The Crying of Lot 49 a few days ago. The book was published in 1966, and it is easy to see how it might have influenced Illuminatus! The plot concerns a woman stumbling upon the centuries-old machinations of a secret group. Is it real, or is she just paranoid and succumbing to conspiracy theories? There's even an element involving bodies at the bottom of a Euroopean lake, in this case a lake in Italy and the bodies of American soldiers.

As I have mentioned, I keep a copy of Eric Wagner's An Insider's Guide to Robert Anton Wilson on my phone for easy reference, and so I searched for "Pynchon" in the text and discovered that RAW has an entry for The Crying of Lot 49 in Everything Is Under Control. In that  entry, Wilson asserts that  the book's plot includes "a web spinning around  the Bavarian Illuminati (which is never mentioned by name)," but he doesn't offer any evidence, and when I asked Eric he didn't know what RAW was referring to. Can anyone help?

In any case, I have noticed something else which seems to strengthen the case that Lot 49 might have influenced Illuminatus! The front of the Harper Perennial  Deluxe Modern Classics edition I checked out from the library mentions that parts of the novel were published in Esquire and Cavalier magazines. 

The Cavalier bit stunned me, as Robert Shea was editor of the magazine from 1965 to 1967, before he went on to Playboy, where he met Wilson. A little rooting around on the Internet reveals that the Pynchon excerpt was published in the March 1966 issue, in about the middle of Shea's tenure. 

Retired English professor J. Kerry Grant, who wrote A Companion to The Crying of Lot 49, confirmed  in an email, " 'The Shrink Flips' appeared in the March, 1966 issue, so it seems likely that Shea oversaw the publication of the extract." I asked Professor Grant if his book would give me details about how "The Shrink  Flips" was placed in Cavalier, and he said, "I'm afraid not."

Shea was interviewed twice by Neal Wilgus, and in an interview published in 1985  in Science Fiction Review, there's the following exchange:

SFR: What contemporary authors do you get the most out of reading?

SHEA: The list is continually undergoing revision as my taste changes and my reasons for reading change, but John Fowles, Romain Gary, Norman Mailer, Yukio Mishima, Vladimir Nabokov, George Orwell, Thomas Pynchon, J.R.R. Tolkien and Robert Penn Warren seem to have taken up permanent residence in my literary pantheon.

Don't forget the Vineland online reading group, which starts in June. 

A Robert Shea 'commercial'

[This is a bit of prose from All Things Are Lights, one of my favorite novels by Robert Shea,  that appears at the front of the book. I've always thought it was a good "commercial" for the contents and decided to share it. All Things Are Lights is set in in medieval France; while  many characters in the historical novel are fictional, St. Louis, Louis IX (1214-1270) is one of the characters. Roland de Vency, a knight and troubadour,  is the protagonist of the novel. His friend the Templar also belongs to a secret society within the Templars. Free version in HTML, you should also be able to hunt up a used version that doesn't cost very much. The Mgt.]

“How much jousting have you done?”

“A little,” replied the young troubadour.

“A little!” the Templar said ironically. “In tournaments all over Europe, Count Amalric has bested hundreds of knights. Many times he has killed men. Of course, it is against the rules. But he is a master at making it look like an accident.” He looked at Roland with an almost fatherly kindness. “Indeed, Messire, the best advice I could give you would be not to enter the tournament at all.”

Roland laughed. “Such cautious advice from a Templar?”

“We fight for God, Messire. Have you as great a motive?”

“Yes, I do,” said Roland, seeing Nicolette’s eyes shining in the darkness before him. “I fight for love.”