From: gharlane@nextnet.csus.edu (Gharlane of Eddore)
Subject: "VENUS ON THE HALF SHELL"
Followup-To: alt.dev.null
Summary:    Vonnegut <=> "out to lunch" <permanently>
Keywords:  Sharkko, Korshak, Zelazny, Kickaha, Trout, Vonnegut
Organization: Evil Beings From The Planet Eddore, Inc.
Distribution: usa
Date: Wed, 14 Oct 1992 06:06:19 GMT

(In-Reply-To: <01GPQQIM2PBQ90MUJL@VAX1.ACS.JMU.EDU>)
   FAC_PDEIGL@VAX1.ACS.JMU.EDU writes:
>
>Kilgore Trout is a recurring character in the novels of Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.
>He writes science fiction novels and one of these is called Venus on the
>Half-Shell.  In 1975 a book was published by Dell called Venus on the
>Half-Shell, written
>by Kilgore Trout.  The real author, however, is Philip Jose Farmer.  I have a
>few questions about all this and I would appreciate any information you have to
>share.  Why was the book written by Farmer and not Vonnegut?  What is the
>relationship between Vonnegut and Farmer?  How did the book come about and why
>was it written? I have found little on the subject and would love to know more.


"VENUS ON THE HALF-SHELL" was, indeed, written by Philip Jose Farmer.
It was both a joke and an exercise in literary style; and it was Farmer's
respectful contribution to Vonnegut's universe.   How Farmer became 
interested in doing things of this nature somewhat interesting.

 Farmer, one of the most unfettered and creative writers in existence in the
 fifties, entered a writing contest sponsored by Shasta Publishers, Inc. 
 This was primarily "Mel" Korshak, a publisher of such egomaniac rapacity 
 that it's amazing he ever bothered to send a check to *any* writer he 
 printed.  At one point he owed money to every major SF writer in existence.
 Shasta sponsored an SF novel contest, open to all.  Winner would get five
 grand (enough to buy a house in the early fifties!) and a publication 
 contract.   Phil Farmer had an incredibly original idea for a mystical-quest
 novel, a big, detailed, magnificent scenario that would allow him to mine 
 all of history for major characters.  He borrowed money for himself and his
 family to live on while he finished the novel.  (It was a very early, very
 compact version of the "Riverworld" books.)   Naturally, it won.  Farmer 
 leaned back and waited for the check to come in, and found to his horror 
 that the ownership of the book was tied up in Shasta's bankruptcy proceedings,
 and that NO money would be forthcoming.   For the next several years he 
 worked two jobs to pay his debts and feed his family, and churned out 
 highly salable crap during his few free hours, just to augment his income
 to the basic poverty level. (he used a *lot* of pen names, too!)
    From one of the most respected, innovative writers in the field, he'd 
 been forced to become one of the most unmitigated hacks.
     In the early sixties, he managed to recover rights to the "RIVERWORLD" 
 manuscript, and began a series of novels derived from it.   The increase in
 his income as his books began to stay in print allowed him breathing room,
 and he began to explore other areas of interest.  His creation of the 
 "Wold Newton Family" and consequent unitization of most of the extant 
 heroic and pulp fiction of the last few centuries was a scholastic tour
 de force that may never be equalled.
      At this time, he also began experimenting with other writers' styles, 
 seeking the key to creating new and unique styles of his own.  One of 
 the results of this period was "VENUS ON THE HALF SHELL," which he intended
 as a humorous tribute to Vonnegut, but which most people thought was *written*
 by Vonnegut, since Farmer used Vonnegut's style so superbly.  The result was
 that Vonnegut developed a severe attitude problem, and forbade the creation of 
 any sequels or the use of the "Kilgore Trout" name by Farmer, ever again.
 (He'd given his permission for the first one!)   Incidentally, Sturgeon
 vociferously denied that the character was based on him, and most folks
 who'd met Sturgeon agreed with him.

       My point here is that Vonnegut isn't much of a writer, and his florid,
 singy style with made-up science and technology isn't much of a style; 
 this is evidenced by the fact that Farmer did it better, and is the master 
 of many styles and techniques--- and Vonnegut is not.   Vonnegut spent most
 of the fifties writing "mainstream" novels that used plot elements derived
 from pulp SF magazines.... and using them poorly at that.  His publication 
 contracts always specifically stated that the words "Science Fiction" and 
 the abbreviation "SF" were *not* to appear on the dust jacket, or in 
 review announcements of his work.
 
       So:  Vonnegut was a conscienceless rip-off artist who mined pulp SF 
 for stories that he then peddled to the fifties mainstream people as 
 "brilliant speculation," and made oodles by being completely unabashed 
 about his plagiarization of technique and concept.    During that time, 
 Farmer was working two and often three shifts trying to pay his debts, 
 because he'd tried to sell a highly innovative novel within the genre---
 because the mainstream people wouldn't look at anything truly innovative.
   Come the sixties, Farmer had managed to get his career restarted, and
 was making about as much as Vonnegut, despite all of Vonnegut's mainstream
 best-sellers, sheerly on quantity... and on occasionaly pyrotechnic displays
 of raw talent, the like of which Vonnegut never achieved on his best day.
   The result of this was Vonnegut's petty attempt to keep Farmer from
 slopping around in Vonnegut's territory (this, despite the number of books
 Vonnegut had stolen, in whole or part, from pulp SF!)..... and by the
 seventies, Farmer, under all his pseudonyms and writing styles, was
 outselling Vonnegut two to one, and no longer felt much need to kowtow.
 
        I am delighted that Farmer's outlived Vonnegut by so many years,
 and been able to have such a good time doing it. 
  
 
Incidentally, when you re-read any of the "RIVERWORLD" yarns, note the 
perpetual presence of a slimy excrescence named "Lem Sharkko," who gets
killed an *awful* lot of times, in very excruciating ways.   Note that
"Lem Sharkko" is an anagram of "Mel Korshak," and you'll understand better...
 
  Most of Farmer's output is pure pulp drivel; he developed some bad habits
 during the desperate years, and the only things he's put real time and
 attention into are his heavy-research efforts.
  His biographies of Tarzan and Doc Savage, and the work that went into 
 them, are unmatchable in terms of adoring attention to detail, and loving
 respect for the work of others.   His own fictive forays into these worlds
 are interesting enough to be worth reading once, but suffer from a kind of 
 "series-itis...."  (Although I've heard it argued that this is entirely
 appropriate for the genre and milieu!)
   Suffice it that Farmer is more than worthy of respect. 
 
   In this light, I've been very interested in Roger Zelazny's comments
 on Farmer's "WORLD OF TIERS" series, which Zelazny says (in his intro to 
 one of the composite volumes) antedated, and to some extent sparked, his
 own visualization of the worlds of shadow in his "AMBER" series.  Of
 course, after Zelazny went full-time, there was a rather pulp-ish tack to
 the direction of *his* career, too...... but he's entitled to earn a
 living, just as Farmer is.
   I saw Zelazny in tears at the sight of Karen Schnaubelt's costume 
 designs for the Amber series at a major SF convention, some years back.
 The man may write pulp, but it's the *best* damn pulp he can write, and
 it means a lot to him.  The same holds for Farmer; these are men who 
 love their profession, the tools of their profession, and their 
 employers; and they strive to give good value, because they respect
 themselves and their profession.
 
   Vonnegut was in it strictly for the cash, and never acknowledged his 
 debt to his profession, or the predecessors he spurned when he left to 
 court the intelligentsia and literati who wouldn't stoop to look at 
 an issue of "ASTOUNDING" or "AMAZING."

   So don't take Vonnegut's attitudes toward "VENUS ON THE HALF SHELL"
 or P.J. Farmer too seriously; they are the attitudes of a drunken 
 curmudgeon faced with a talent superior to his own, and loudly decrying
 the ability of someone who did better work with less effort.