Book Review: THE IRON DREAM by Norman Spinrad
The darkest satire of Science Fiction & Fantasy ever written?
Book Review: THE IRON DREAM (1972) by Norman Spinrad
In the 1970s, Adolf Hitler's famous science-fiction novel Lord of the Swastika appeared in paperback reprint, to critical acclaim:
"NORMAN SPINRAD PRESENTS ADOLF HITLER'S SF CLASSIC... AND THE CRITICS RAVE!
"MICHAEL MOORCOCK: 'To compare this novel with the works of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, G.K. Chesterton and Sir Oswald Mosley is not, I feel, saying too much... this exciting and tense fantasy adventure... is the very quintessence of sword and sorcery. It is bound to earn Hitler the credit he so richly deserves!'"
(The Iron Dream, Panther Books paperback edition, 1974)
Spoiler: Michael Moorcock is in on the joke. What's really going on here is a satire almost unlike any other.
Norman Spinrad's book THE IRON DREAM takes place in an alternate timeline where World War II never happened. In this alternate history, Adolf Hitler never became the leader of Germany. He emigrated to America, and ended his life as a modestly successful, syphilitic hack science-fiction writer. (He was a popular guest at sci-fi conventions, too!)
And his final novel — “Lord of the Swastika by Adolf Hitler" — is the book-within-the-book of THE IRON DREAM.
Norman Spinrad succeeds with his conceit "What If Hitler Wrote SF?" The style and content of Lord of the Swastika reads like the fever dream of a fanatical madman. Its level of obsession escalates with each chapter, until the text becomes quite difficult to stomach (which is the point).
Lord of the Swastika is, in essence, the alternate-universe Hitler's fantasy version of what the real-life Hitler aspired to.
The protagonist of Lord of the Swastika, Feric Jaggar, is a blond blue-eyed super-fascist. He bludgeons, shoots, massacres and marches his way to genocidal victory over the "Empire of Zind" (dehumanized stand-ins for “non-Aryans”) — and the outwardly human-looking race of "Dominators" (dehumanized stand-ins for Jews).
Feric Jaggar is an insanely homicidal character, never shocked or traumatized by even the most extreme carnage. Violence is his go-to solution to everything. When he isn’t making speeches about racial purity, virtually all he does is incite murder, order murder, or commit murder — mainly by using his magical phallic baton:
"Monster after slobbering monster ran howling at Feric only to be dashed to a pulp by the Great Truncheon of Held; soon the shaft of the Steel Commander was lubricated with thick red blood and the shiny black leather of Feric's uniform was set off with a hundred scarlet splatters. The hand-to-hand fighting went on for what seemed like days, but could hardly have been an hour. It was impossible for Feric to judge the course of the battle, for his universe was contained by solid walls of hairy, stinking, drooling giants with an unquenchable thirst for true human blood. As fast as these creatures smashed through the barricade of corpses that Feric had piled around his motorcycle, they themselves felt the bone-crushing wrath of the Steel Commander. Nevertheless, the creatures kept coming, as if filled with some crazed and powerful longing to meet their own dooms." (The Iron Dream, Chapter 12, p. 213)
It gets worse later on; the quote needs no explanation. (Words fail me.)
The punchline is the fictional afterword to Lord of the Swastika, by "Homer Whipple." Whipple confidently explains that such a morbid, xenophobic, war-mongering tyrant as Feric Jaggar could of course never seize power in the real world. Surely no sane people would ever follow a leader who wiped out entire peoples and enforced a relentless policy of "racial purity"?
The real sting in THE IRON DREAM, however, is aimed at genre fiction. Books, movies and games about “heroic” mass killing are not just the obscure and reviled products of hacks. They are also the bestsellers and cash cows of popular culture.
I have noticed how some middle-aged Tolkien fans reacted with anger when the TV series Rings of Power tried to depict Orcs as a little less subhuman. Orcs, the show tried to suggest, may have families and children too. And they might hesitate about being sent to war and get killed…
Sacrilege! the middle-aged men declared on their YouTube channels. You’re not supposed to humanize Orcs. Those misshapen mutants are supposed to be inherently evil, filthy, cursed hordes. (Whose fate is to be slaughtered en masse by the handsome, superior, clean, inherently good heroes… but the angry fans did not say the quiet part out loud.)
I have also noticed how Paul Verhoeven’s movie STARSHIP TROOPERS has many fans — not for the satire that it is, but because certain fans seem to miss the satirical point and unironically admire its fictional fascist society. (And they unironically (?) quote and “meme” slogans that are a parody of fascist propaganda.)
Now, don’t go about calling these people names — that’s rude — but the tendencies I’ve noticed are wide-open targets for mockery. That’s one reason why I think this novel from 1972 is still relevant.
THE IRON DREAM is a pitch-black satire of the grubbiest undercurrents in speculative fiction. Recommended for readers who are literate and mature enough to get the point … and for Science Fiction/Fantasy fans who can take a bloody joke.
Further reading:
- My review of ENDER’S GAME by Orson Scott Card
- The essay “The Embarrassments of Science Fiction” by Thomas M. Disch