"There is no science in it at all, merely cheap jargon, cheap tricks, old shuffling; a wink here, a dance there, all of it shaped only toward one end and that the most drastic of all because we give it no name. But enough. Enough of this."
Joachim Boaz blogged about The Empty People back in 2014 but I promise I don't remember what he said; after I've drafted my own take here I'll read his and respond to it at the end of this post.
Malzberg, of course, is a failed literary writer who, initially at least, wanted a career more like Saul Bellow's or Vladimir Nabokov's than Robert Heinlein's or Isaac Asimov's, and chapter one of The Empty People is all about typical mainstream mid-century literary concerns--we've got unfaithful childless suburban housewife Della Archer who feels unfulfilled; everybody tells her she is very smart, so she could have had some big career, but didn't, and maybe if she had children they would give her life meaning, but she is sterile. Malzberg is also a critic of science fiction with a broad and deep knowledge of the field, and chapter one is very "meta," with our housewife being captured by saucer-flying aliens during their invasion (which leaves New York City in flaming ruins) and thrust into a cell stocked with a fulsome supply of sleaze and science fiction paperbacks. The captive Della has nothing to do but read the books, giving Malzberg a chance to voice the opinion (his own or a parody of critics'?) that science fiction is a bunch of nonsense.
At least one other person has been put in solitary confinement with stacks of books by the invaders, whom one prisoner believes are called "Keepers" because they are keeping all the human race imprisoned, or because they are the most clever and advanced of the many races throughout the galaxy and are dedicated to keeping the peace. (And don't overlook the possible Biblical reference.) Others come to believe that the invaders are known as the X'Ching (Malzberg spoofing the I'Ching?), sadistic natives of our solar system who mercilessly crush any other rising civilization in the system.
The guy who calls the invaders "the Keepers" Malzberg calls "the Poet;" his memory has almost entirely been erased by the aliens. His cell is chock full of poetry books, so he figures E.T. wants him to write a poem. The man struggles to come up with some good verses, but the Keepers don't care--what they want is for him to terrorize a human woman, to pursue her and let her escape again and again before finally murdering and perhaps raping her--I suspect this is Malzberg parodying crime and horror fiction. When the poet refuses, the aliens torture him until he agrees.
We get entertaining flashback chapters about Della's husband William...or is it James? William/James is found to have an inoperable brain tumor by family doctor Perkins, one of the men Della is having an affair with. Della contacts a sort of mad scientist figure, an American scientist who fled to Switzerland when the authorities felt his techniques too radical (like our beloved Peter Cushing in a Frankenstein movie, this mad doctor and Perkins bitch and moan that the medical establishment is reactionary and blocks progress) and he arrives to try experimental treatment on Della's comatose husband.
As we expect in a Malzberg story, there are many suggestions the science fiction elements of the story are not real but the products of the characters' dreaming or suffering mental illness or brain damage. The different chapters seem like they are from different universes or timelines, or different dreams or delusions--why is Della's spouse sometimes called William and other times James? In one chapter we are told Della is sterile--in another, that her husband is the sterile one. Is the mad scientist of chapter six the same guy as the gynecologist in chapter seven?--both these jokers lack an ear and have some kind of robotic leg, after all.
The tone and themes of The Empty People are hopelessness and disappointment; again and again it is brought home to us that life is inexplicable and without meaning and your plans and desires will be frustrated and any reliance on others is a mistake, that those with authority and influence manipulate you for their own impossible-to-comprehend purposes. You are alone and nothing will work out for you. Even the Keepers/X'Ching, who at times seem capable, both technologically and morally, of anything, hint that they are at the mercy of forces beyond their control.
"Despite its ambiguity to you, the energetic way in which we have forced purposes on you has a meaning. But you would not have the patience. You want easy answers, easy turns. There are no easy answers, you see."
"I don't know what you're talking about."
"No one ever does. But what can you do?"
In the second half of The Empty People (besides the resolution of the Rogers bit) we learn the poet's name is James after the Keepers release him into a simulacrum of beautiful New York City with an automatic pistol and instructions to chase down the woman, who of course is Della. Della, for her part, has been told by the X'Ching that she is to be released into NYC to find and help (or destroy?) one man while avoiding the interference of a second man, an enemy. Malzberg's descriptions of Coney Island and Manhattan struck a chord with your humble blogger, who every day regrets leaving Manhattan, and Malzberg's portrayal of the thoughts and feelings of James and Della, at odds for no reason they can discern, is also very effective. Malzberg really is capable of writing crime and horror material, getting into the minds of people obsessed and despairing.
In what we might call the climax, James the poet throws away the weapon provided him by the Keepers and tries to make a human connection with Della, with only brief and limited success--Della has lost all hope and wants to die. We get some imagery that reminded me of The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway that suggests all human beings are one, but then comes the resolution in the final chapter which is only half a page--all the business we have seen involving aliens is merely dreams suffered by Della's husband as he lays in the hospital dying of his brain tumor--James the poet and Della have the same face because they are just aspects of the cancer victim's own personality, not because we are all one in the eyes of God or share a destiny because of our common humanity or anything nice and uplifting like that.
Before we check to see what Joachim thought of The Empty People lo eleven years ago, let's play a little devil's advocate and see what gripes people might have about the book. The superfluous Rogers section is the weak link of the novel--Rogers is essentially alone and so there is little human drama; the Della and James/William Archer sequences are good because they are about Della's relationships with her husband, with her captors, with the mad doctor and with her lover. I guess we might see the Rogers chapters as an attack on religious people but Malzberg only gestures in that direction, doesn't do much with that theme. I'm not saying the Rogers material is bad, as it is kind of funny, but while reading it I wanted to get back to Della and the men in her life.
Others might find the "it was all a dream" ending frustrating.
Another possible complaint is that the novel is misogynistic or at least not feminist. It is hinted that Della is an everywoman--the final line of one chapter is "She was a normal woman"-- and compared to James/William and the mad scientist she is selfish and also weak, crumbling under pressure rather than energetically pursuing a goal. This doesn't faze me, but you know what it is like out there, my droogs.
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I think Joachim and I are essentially on the same page when it comes to The Empty People, though I probably enjoyed it more than he did; he also focuses more on the novel as a vehicle for hostile criticism of SF than I have. It is likely these differences are the result of the fact that I genuinely like pulpy old ideas like alien invasion and mad scientists. But I can't really disagree with anything Joachim has to say, so no fireworks.
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I think we'll be headed back to the early 1940s and Weird Tales next time we convene, so if that is your bag, see you then!
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