About Bob Dylan's Science Fiction Novel

@bobdylan

Bob Dylan on Instagram

Dylan posted the above on Instagram yesterday (my son Simon Vozick-Levinson alerted me to it this morning). On Instagram and Reddit, and probably in other places, people are speculating that if Dylan did write it, he used AI to write it. I’m no expert on AI, but I’ve been listening to Dylan’s lyrics since the 1960s, and the excerpt he posted certainly seems consonant with the style and content of his lyrics. 

 Lyrics often repeat ideas and feelings — indeed, that’s what choruses explicitly do. And the ideas and emotion presented in this excerpt feel like a lyric — a song without music, lamenting, protesting, objecting to the danger, the destruction of our democracy that we see happening all around us, every day. I’m glad to see a man who actually won the Nobel Peace prize come out and assess this, decry this, in his own inimitable way. 

His novel/lyric aim in particular at universities who acquiesce, crumble under the pressure of the Trump administration and his allies. I’m looking at you, Columbia University. 

And, by the way, Dylan’s no stranger to science fiction. His Frankenstein-like song, "My Own Version of You" in his Rough and Rowdy Ways LP in 2020, is a funny, great little piece of science fiction, in one of his best albums. We the people who believe in freedom and democracy need all the help we can get in these desperate days, and it’s welcome indeed to have Dylan stepping up and in any way he can.

See also Dylan's Murder Most Foul: From Then To Now

Frankenstein 2025: Unveiling the Real Monster

I just watched Guillermo del Toro's 2025 two-and-a-half hour take on Mary Shelley's 1818 Frankenstein on Netflix.  This year has been a great one for movies, and del Toro's Frankenstein continues that trend. 

Just about everyone knows something about this story, even if their main source of reference are the series of movies and remakes that were made in the 20th and 21st centuries, beginning in 1910 with Thomas Edison's 16-minute silent film .  Movie-making, of course, was primitive then, even in the one-hour talkie that really got the ball rolling in 1931, and these early Frankenstein movies almost seem cartoonish and comical. (There even was a 1948 Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein movie.)  After the first two talkies -- Frankenstein (1931) and The Bride of Frankenstein (1935) --  there was a very mixed resemblance to Shelley's novel in the thousand or so feature films, shorts, and TV appearances of Frankenstein's creation that followed, and to add insult to injury Mary Shelley's 75,000-word narrative has often been called a novella.  (I was President of the Science Fiction Writers of America 1998-2001, and SFWA has long defined a novella as 17,500-40,000 words).

The 2025 movie is masterfully filmed, making the movie both far more frightening and tender, at the same and different times, than any of the predecessors I've seen.  At times, the so-called monster seems more intensely human than most of the people around him, including the man who created him, and that makes his (the monster's) tale all the more memorable.  Although del Toro's movie has some differences with Shelley's novel, most notably in the ending, it feels as if Shelley was a consultant in the making of this movie.

One of the most impressive and important characteristics of Frankenstein's creation in Shelley's novel are the creation's nearly superpowers.  The exact reason for this is never quite explained, and the same is the case for the 2025 movie.  I'd always assumed it was the lightning, which not only jolted the stitched-together body parts into life, but literally energized the cells in the creation's body (actually, I really don't like calling him a monster) into a kind of durability verging on indestructibility.   I'm not sure if anyone else has made this point, but looked at in this way, Frankenstein's creation may well have inspired the creation of Superman.  Chances are the Jewish Golem inspired both.

The other aspect I really liked about the movie was the way it depicted the kindness and affinity Frankenstein's creation had for animals.  In Mary Shelley's novel he's an avowed vegetarian, and in del Toro's movie he's gentle with the creatures around him (unless they're wolves who are attacking him or the blind man).  The lesson here is that although he was created artificially (though the body parts and the lightning are certainly natural) he is indisputably a bonafide part of the greater natural world, maybe more so than his creator and his creator's (our) ilk.  We humans have to work hard at being a reliable citizen of the natural world.

And that may be the ultimate upshot of the novel and this movie, consistent with what has been remarked upon by readers and viewers for two centuries: the monster in this story -- if there is a monster -- is the creator not the creation.

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Dedicated to the late Lisa Nocks, my student in the MA in Media Studies program at the New School for Social Research, then my teaching assistant at Fordham University, who wrote her Master's thesis on Frankenstein and a variety of articles on the subject including Frankenstein: in a Better Light. 

The novel is an expansion of the short story that won the Mary Shelley Award for Outstanding Fiction, 2023.  Get the novel here. Read the short story here, FREE.

Dark Matter 1.9: Science Fiction and Horror

I have unsettled feelings about the season 1 finale of Dark Matter on Apple TV+ -- episode 1.9 -- and they all point to a series eminently worth watching and continuing.

[Spoilers ahead ... ]

I said last week that the multitude of Jasons showing up in one world gave cinematic verite to the poster for the series.  But that crucial scene near the end of 1.9, with all of those Jasons, marshalled by their leader to let our Jason -- Jason 1 -- have the life he deserved with Daniela and Charlie -- well, that scene epitomized the poster.

I also said last week that I didn't expect to see the happy ending that the ending of 1.8 was pointing to.  And we did see Jason 1 and Daniela 1 and Charlie 1 in family bliss for part of 1.9, only to have that taken away from them by a few of the marauding Jasons.  But Jason 2 saved them -- at least, I think that was Jason 2, I'm never 100% sure -- and got the crowd of Jasons to let the Jason 1 family go into a world where they could presumably have a very happy life.

That scene with the crowd of Jasons made me realize that I was watching not just a science fiction story but a horror story.  Crowds have been a part of horror at least since the notorious town folk with their torches in Frankenstein.  They weren't carrying torches in Dark Matter 1.9, and they were different versions of the same person, but they felt to me to have a kinship with those villagers in Frankenstein.  Mary Shelley's and Blake Crouch's stories, after all, are both vivid testaments to the horror that uncontrolled science can bring.  The Twilight Zone often focused on this field of dreams turned nightmares, too.

So, the Jason 1 family has a happy ending.  And Jason 2 sees the error of his ways and redeems himself. But there are an infinity of stories in that crowd of Jasons, and in this, our offscreen reality, I envision a Canterbury Tales of Dark Matter stories spanning years.

See also Dark Matter 1.1-1.2: Break-Neck Action and Philosophic Contemplation ... 1.3 Missing Fingers ... 1.4 The Multiverse Unveiled ... 1.5: The Lesson ... 1.6 "A Bunch of Chicagos" ... 1.7: Obama Tower ... 1.8: A Bevy Of Jasons

Films Before Frankenstein, Parts 1 and 2

I was invited by Phil De Parto to give a lecture/lead a discussion for the Science Fiction Association of Bergen County about science fiction and horror movies prior to Frankenstein, in May 2021.  That event went so well -- aka left so much more to be covered -- that Phil invited me back in August 2021 to give a Part 2 of that lecture/discussion.   Both were via Zoom and were recorded.  Here they are -- enjoy!

Dylan's Rough and Rowdy Ways: Well Worth the Wait

I reviewed Dylan's "Murder Most Foul" a few weeks ago.  It's a haunting, soul-adjusting masterpiece that's right up there or even better than "A Hard Rain's Gonna Fall" and "Desolation Row" and his very best from the 1960s.  That song, released on its own this past March, is one entire side of Dylan's Rough and Rowdy album released in June.  I thought it time that I listened to the rest, on the other side.

It was time well spent.  All of the songs are bursting with lyrics and allusions we haven't heard from Dylan in years.   Like "Murder Most Foul," they're painted with icons of the past half-century, and Dylan's wry commentary.  Here are my favorites:

"Key West (Philosopher Pirate)": I've long loved Key West, even though I've never been there.  It reminds me, and is probably even better than, Cape Cod, where I've been going with my family since 1982, except this past summer of Covid and its lockdowns.   I thought Bloodlines was excellent, in part because it took place in Key West.  I really like Dylan's rendition of that place in this song.  It's one of the ends of America, and the end of the rainbow.  It's the "place to find immortality".  Dylan already has that, he doesn't need to go to Key West to get it, but it's a tonic and a thrill to hear him sing about it, and tell his gravelly "story".

"My Own Version of You":  Dylan writing and singing science fiction?  Who'd have thunk it?  But that's what this song, Dylan's own Frankenstein story (as in, he's Dr. Frankenstein), is.  I added this to my Science Fiction and Fantasy song playlist, right between "Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots" and "Monster Mash" (there's also something about a "robot commando" in "My Own Version of You").

"I Contain Multitudes": It's fair to say just about all of Dylan's songs are autobiographical, but this little gem is especially so.  He has something of Poe in him, he paints nudes, has something of "those British bad boys, The Rolling Stones" in him, too, and he makes all of that rhyme.  With dudes, foods, and classical preludes.

"Black Rider":  Ok, one more.  This is the tougher Dylan.  "One of these days, I'll forget to be kind," he says to the rider who's been "visiting" the singer's wife.  And then he becomes much more graphic about what he might do to this masked marauder who's breaking into his life.  Don't mess with this wordsmith who can easily become a swordsmith in his songs.

Dylan took a long time to get back to this level of erudition and power.  Rough and Rowdy Ways was well worth the wait.

Further reading: Simon Vozick-Levinson's review of this album in Rolling Stone's 50 Best Albums of 2020 (Dylan's album is #4).

Raised by Wolves 1.8-9: Frankenstein and Motherhood

The story brought vividly home in Raised by Wolves 1.8 and 1.9, that androids can bear biological children, a hybrid of some sort of android and human, lifts this series into territory not even explored in a series as sophisticated as Westworld.   Of course, Westworld takes place on Earth, with a science a lot earlier in its development than what we see in Raised by Wolves, so I'm not criticizing Westworld on this account as much as noting the difference.  And that difference is about as profound as it gets.

A question I started addressing in the 1980s when I first began considering artificial intelligence was the connection between artificial intelligence and life.   Since the only intelligence that we know arose in living beings -- i.e.,  us, we humans - it struck me that an attempt to develop artificial intelligence truly worthy of the name without first understanding how intelligence arose out of our own DNA was "putting Descartes before the horse" (Mind at Large: Knowing in the Technological Age, 1988, p. 180; or see this if you don't want to read the book).   Yet most artificial intelligence, in science fiction as well as our real world laboratories, has proceeded on the basis of non-living circuitry.

In fiction, the monster created by Dr. Frankenstein -- colloquially known as Frankenstein, in Mary Shelley's 1818 novel of the same name -- can be considered the first modern android.  It is made of flesh and blood, and has a DNA-developed brain, so there is no reason he and his eventual almost-bride could not have had children -- indeed, it is Dr. Frankenstein fear of creating a species of monsters that gets him to abandon his project of giving the monster a mate.   Even in the Boris Karloff movies made over a century later, in which a bride of the monster is created, one catastrophe or another that befalls the "monsters" always preclude them from reproducing.  Which makes what was is happening in Raised by Wolves all the more remarkable.   

How exactly Mother, now on the way to being a completely biologically apt name for her, came to be impregnated is not completely clear, and she doesn't completely or even mostly understand herself.  She had virtual sex with her male human creator in a simulation.  Presumably this triggered a fetus that developed from what already was inside her, in contrast to the embryos that were implanted in her and we met in the first episode.

With only one more episode left this season, it will be fascinating to see where this -- "the future of humanity" -- goes.  It was good to see Father back to his senses, and all the children together, and Marcus get his comeuppance, though I hope he's not dead, he's too important and well-acted a character.  (It occurred to me as an outside possibly that possibly Marcus had sex with Mother at some point after he so nearly kissed her, that we didn't see.  Maybe that relates to that look on Mother's face that I talked about in my review last week.)   Not likely, I'll be definitely back here next week with some thoughts on the season finale.

See also Raised by Wolves 1.1: Fast Action and Deep Philosophy  ... Raised by Wolves 1.2-3: More than Meets the Eye ... Raised by Wolves 1.4-5: Halfway to Dune ...Raised by Wolves 1.6-7: The Look on Mother's Face

The Rook 1.2: Live Details

The July 4th weekend is over, episode 1.2 of The Rook was just on Starz, no more lazing around by me with leisurely reviews.

This new episode contained a bunch of important new details.   The two most important were:

1.  EVAs - people with Extreme Variant Abilities - are not limited to the British Checquy.  EVAs are known worldwide (less than one-percent of the population) and at least two other top-secret government organizations have them.  These would be American (from which presumably Monica hails) and Russian, at least thus far in the story.  Each organization has a suitably recondite name, and (unsurprisingly) the Russian is at odds if not war with the British and likely the American.   I said last week that The Rook was reminiscent of Counterpart, and it still is.  But this international scope is something that Counterpart never got around to.   Also, it's worth mentioning something that was just hinted at last week: EVAs have different super-talents.  That's what makes Myfanwy (I keep wanting to spell that My Fanny) so important.

2. Apparently one of the talents is coming back from the dead, apropos the last scene of a guy in the morgue rising.  Now that's a theme that runs all the way from Frankenstein to The Walking Dead.  But in The Rook, it holds all kinds of new possibilities.   In a sense, Myfanwy has come back from the dead, at least the dead zone of her memory.  It was nice to see this metaphor turn into a reality with the guy on the table getting up and walking out.   Presumably his memory is still intact.  Is he always invulnerable to death, or just the way it was meted out in his case?

Lots of interesting questions and areas for exploration in this compelling new series.  I'd like to learn more about the blond Gestalts.  I'll see you here next week with reflections on what I learn from the next episode.

See also:  The Rook 1.1: Dickian Pastiche

"As a genre-bending blend of police procedural and science fiction,
The Silk Code delivers on its promises." - The New York Times Book Review

Penny Dreadful: Intelligent, Shocking, and Promising

Penny Dreadful, which debuted on Showtime last night, was quite good!

The setting is post-Jack-the-Ripper London - a newspapers headlines which asked "Is Jack Back?" made me want to say yes, in 24: Live Another Day - but this is a good time and place for a tense, exciting, harrowing story.   It's already being mined with the BBC's Ripper Street, which I found a little too talky.  In Penny Dreadful, there's so far plenty of gore and horror and full frontal male nudity to go along with the talk, and the talk is highly and scientifically intelligent.

At its best, we have Dr. Frankenstein (played by Harry Treadaway, first encountered on Showtime in Meadowlands), revealed as such as the end of the episode, explaining to Sir Malcolm why he has such contempt for knowledge pursued for its own sake.  This was a disquisition on behalf of technology, or the application of knowledge, in contrast to pure science, that was worthy of being published in a philosophy of technology journal somewhere.  (More about this issue in my 1988 book, Mind at Large: Knowing in the Technological Age.)

The acting is also outstanding.  Timothy Dalton as Sir Malcolm is brilliant, and Eva Green as Vanessa was compelling - her eyes stole every scene she was in.   It was also good to see Josh Hartnett on hand as a Buffalo Bill Cody kind of character, quick with the charm and the gun.

The plot looks promising - Malcolm assembling a team to find his daughter, who has apparently been taken by the evil beings in residence in the city.   The timing of the Frankenstein character is somewhat off - Mary Shelley's novel was first published in 1818 - but the character has become so iconic that he transcends the time of his creation.    And the "monster" - the assemblage of parts of dead bodies that Dr. Frankenstein brings to life - may not be such a monster, and in fact even smiles.

The next episode is on Showtime Anytime, and I'll no doubt watch it in the next few days, but I'll save the review for next week.



not quite as shocking, in the present day

#SFWApro

Boardwalk Empire 2.3: Frankenstein and Victrola

Nucky finally confronts Jimmy in Boardwalk Empire 4.3 - in Babbette's restaurant, where Nucky goes out to dinner with Margaret and another couple, and Jimmy is dining with the Commodore and the Governor.   The immediate cause of the confrontation - what gets Nucky to walk over to Jimmy's table, and throw the Commodore's plate of lobster thermidor on the floor - is Nucky's frustration at Margaret's ordering of the lobster, only to be told that the last dish with lobster had just been served a few minutes ago.  There ensues a great scene in which Nucky calls Jimmy on his shift in loyalties and Jimmy has to be restrained by the Commodore from getting physical.

The real source of Nucky's fury, of course, is the systematic attack on his livelihood being mounted by the Commodore and Jimmy.   Not only has he been thrown in jail and subject to investigation by the authorities, but his booze trade is in serious peril as the Coast Guard, now in the Commodore's pocket, is blocking Nucky's shipments from the sea.   Nucky even calls the Federal Attorney General - appointed by the corrupt President Harding whom Nucky helped get in office - only to be told that the Feds have no jurisdiction in state matters.

About the only bright spot for Nucky - other than Margaret - is the IRA leader's man Owen who is staying behind in America, and is eager to help Nucky.   Owen goes gun to gun with Richard, to stop a delivery of the Commodore's liquor, in another fine scene, in which neither man fires.  The two have a mutual respect, and it will be interesting to see how that plays out. 

Speaking of Richard, he's earlier referred to as "Frankenstein" by Al Capone, in town to give Nucky yet more bad news.  The reference was a bit of an anachronism - although the Mary Shelley novel was published a century before, and the character certainly famous in a literary sense, the movie that put the name of the Doctor and the face of the monster on the map was not made until 1931.  Thomas Edison had made a Frankenstein movie in 1910, and it was indeed made in his New Jersey studios, but it is highly unlike that Al Capone in the 1920s would have known anything about it.

Eddie Cantor and his rolling eyes were certainly around in the 1920s, and his visit to pregnant Lucy was a pleasure to see (and hear - great Eddie Cantor accent by Stephen DeRosa).  Lucy's story in this episode at least had something of a happy ending, as Van Alden buys her the VV-80 Victrola she's been yearning for.

And I'm yearning for the next episode of this fine period drama.

See also Boardwalk Empire 2.1: Politics in an Age Before YouTube  ... Boardwalk Empire 2.2: The Woman Behind the Throne

And see also Boardwalk Emipre on HBO ... Boardwalk Empire 1.2: Lines and Centers Power ... Boardwalk Empire 1.10: Arnold Rothstein, Media Theorist  ... Season One Finale of Boardwalk Empire

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The Plot to Save Socrates



"challenging fun" - Entertainment Weekly

"a Da Vinci-esque thriller" - New York Daily News

"Sierra Waters is sexy as hell" - curled up with a good book

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