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<a href="http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/633177.The_Iron_Dream?utm_medium=api&amp;utm_source=blog_review" style="float: left; padding-right: 20px"><img alt="The Iron Dream" border="0" src="http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1205740523m/633177.jpg" /></a> <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/633177.The_Iron_Dream?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_review">The Iron Dream</a> by <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/35864.Norman_Spinrad">Norman Spinrad</a> 
 <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/8247227?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_review"><h3>My review</h3></a>
 rating: 5 of 5 stars The Iron Dream is one of the true classics of science fiction. It is a core work in what I can only describe as a microgenre of sorts that appeared during the late 60's and early 70's -- Science Fiction as seriously black humor and revolutionary social commentary. The principle writers (that I can recall offhand -- I make no claim to this list being exhaustive) were Norman Spinrad and Harlan Ellison (<a href="/search/search?q=+I+Have+No+Mouth+But+I+Must+Scream&t=title"> I Have No Mouth But I Must Scream</a>, <a href="/search/search?q=+Dangerous+Visions&t=title"> Dangerous Visions</a>), but a number of other authors such as Larry Niven (especially his books on organlegging) or Fritz Leiber (e.g. <a href="/search/search?q=+A+Spectre+is+Haunting+Texas&t=title"> A Spectre is Haunting Texas</a>) contributed books or short stories that are arguably in the microgenre. Dangerous Visions (and Dangerous Visions II) collect a number of the short stories with the peculiar combination of sardonic darkness and flower power that arose out of the first generation of Vietnam war cynics who really took a hard look at our civilization.
 
 The Iron Dream stands alone at the top -- over the top. It is a deeply, deeply disturbing science fiction novel that was supposedly "written" by Adolph Hitler. It is a post-holocaust story -- the big nuclear war of <a href="/search/search?q=+Damnation+Alley&t=title"> Damnation Alley</a> or <a href="/search/search?q=+A+Boy+and+His+Dog&t=title"> A Boy and His Dog</a> has happened, and civilization has been reduced to a small group of white people who are undergoing a crisis as they are attacked by mutant hordes. A strong leader Feric Jaggar emerges and, surrounded by his jackbooted thugs, smashes his way to power in time to mobilize an army to save this tiny remnant of white civilization. Overcoming infiltration by mutant Semites and people of color with mind control powers, he creates an army that manages to utterly destroy the mutants at the cost of making the world too radioactive for stable sexual reproduction to work ever again.
 
 Not to worry! Jaggar triumphs over even this, and guarantees that blond haired, blue eyed white people will maintain eternal mastery over not only this world but the stars themselves!
 
 I think that many of the reviews of this story so far miss its fundamental point. It is intended to be pure "fun" for the sort of demented soul that can read it for the satire it is and not be offended by its "elevation" of a distortion of the real historical story of Nazi Germany and the Holocaust to an insane wish-fulfillment fantasy of an Adolph Hitler who became a hack SF writer in an alternate reality. The book pokes fun at so many things -- pulp SF in general, post-holocaust pulp like <a href="/search/search?q=+Battlefield+Earth&t=title"> Battlefield Earth</a> (which is almost the same story except that L. Ron Hubbard takes himself seriously and the bad guys are space aliens and hence "safe" instead of mutant semisemitic hordes), Nazi Germany, racism, White America (which was alive and well and fighting "gooks" when this was written).
 
 Its real point was to make you think (while entertaining you enormously). The reader comes away from the story both enlightened and annoyed. Spinrad makes you cheer for Jaggar in the narrow context of his fantasy even as you are repelled by the fact that you are cheering for a thinly veiled distortion for one of our most horrifying pieces of actual history. Thus he holds a dark mirror up to our souls, showing how there is a narrow line separating our legitimate wish not to be enslaved by mutant hordes in fantasy and the all-too common white-person fantasy in the real world that Jewish people, Black people, Oriental people, all are secretly mutant hordes that wish to enslave them so that the only defense is to enslave them first.
 
 Spinrad (I will admit) is one of my all-time favorite SF authors. Some of his books are mediocre, or so strange a vision that it is difficult to hold onto the thread of plot through the distractions of drugs and galactic cultures he invents, the uber-hippy mentality of his future universes. Some of them are just plain awesome and make you think even as they skewer society on many levels. The Iron Dream is one of them.
 
 (<a href="/search/search?q=+Bug+Jack+Barron&t=title"> Bug Jack Barron</a> is another, and I'll write a review of it one day as well...:-)
 
 rgb
 <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/list/538288?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_review">View all my reviews.</a>

rgb's review
rating:

recommended for: People who like insane over-the-top dystopia satire, black humor, strange mirrors of the human soul

The Iron Dream is one of the true classics of science fiction. It is a core work in what I can only describe as a microgenre of sorts that appeared during the late 60's and early 70's -- Science Fiction as seriously black humor and revolutionary social commentary. The principle writers (that I can recall offhand -- I make no claim to this list being exhaustive) were Norman Spinrad and Harlan Ellison ( I Have No Mouth But I Must Scream, Dangerous Visions), but a number of other authors such as Larry Niven (especially his books on organlegging) or Fritz Leiber (e.g. A Spectre is Haunting Texas) contributed books or short stories that are arguably in the microgenre. Dangerous Visions (and Dangerous Visions II) collect a number of the short stories with the peculiar combinatio...more

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