Are the Blish novelizations canon?

[Mysterion]

Might have something to do with the Earth being prominently featured in the Empire's emblem: https://i.pinimg.com/originals/a9/5e/18/a95e1864c3d7ef12ab77a0565a74c746.jpg
http://tos.trekcore.com/hd/albums/2x04hd/mirrormirrorhd0142.jpg

 

[hbquikcomjamesl]

That's interesting. I wonder what made Berman coin that term way back in the '70s, . . . .

All I know is that the very first time I heard it used in DS9, I knew the term had been promoted to canon, from something I'd first read from a non-canon source, back in the Bantam era.

I just wasn't sure how non-canonical it was. And unlike SNW, a large portion of NV1 and NV2 did first see print in 'zines.

 

[Daddy Todd]

Did some become official fanon if nothing else?

What the what now? "Official Fanon" seems like an oxymoron. Who would be declaring which fannish concept ("fanon") is "official"?

Blish was influential in Star Trek fandom. In the days before the VCR (or even the Fotonovels) his books were THE handy reference fans could turn to when they wanted to research a point -- or just relive a treasured mission. However, there was a LOT of controversy in fan circles over the liberties taken in the novelizations. I recently read through some '70's letterzines (The Halkan Council, A Piece of the Action), and lots of Trekfen couldn't find anything good to say about Blish, Lawrence & Lawrence's work.

I don't agree; the first Star Trek book I ever bought was Star Trek 6, sometime in 1972. 48 years later, here I still am, buying and reading Star Trek fiction.

Why did he for instance write Where No Man Has Gone Before in his eighth novel instead of the first and after By Any Other Name? It's really Baffling!

Because Blish never intended to novelize every single episode! He just picked out the scripts that appealed to him, and novelized those. I think he pretty much thought he was done with Star Trek after his fourth book, Spock Must Die! But the sales kept going up, so Bantam requested more novelizations, even increasing publication from one a year (Star Trek through Star Trek 4) to a staggering four volumes (Star Trek 5 - Star Trek 8) in 1972! Then back to one volume a year (Star Trek 9 - Mudd's Angels) with a one-year gap between Star Trek 11 & Star Trek 12, due to Blish's death in 1975.

Upon rereading the Blish books last year in publication order, it appears that Blish's ghostwriters (wife Judy Blish/J.A. Lawrence and MIL Muriel Lawrence) did the bulk of the writing after SMD! There is a definite change in style starting with Star Trek 4. The adaptations were quite definitely longer, and much more faithful to the finished episodes starting with ST4. That may be due to the demands of the editor/publisher, or because the writing had been turned over to actual fans of the show (which Blish himself never really was).

 

[hbquikcomjamesl]

There is a definite change in style starting with Star Trek 4. The adaptations were quite definitely longer, and much more faithful to the finished episodes starting with ST4.

I'd noticed that myself, but (having never read anything else Blish wrote) I never attributed it to his turning the job over to his wife. (I do, however, recall strongly disagreeing with his gushing praise of the music of "The Way to Eden"; then again, over 98% of my recorded music library is classical [or classically-styled film scores], and most of the rest is strictly acoustic jazz.)

 

[Christopher]

All I know is that the very first time I heard it used in DS9, I knew the term had been promoted to canon, from something I'd first read from a non-canon source, back in the Bantam era.

DS9 never used the phrase "Terran Empire." It only used "Terran" as a synonym for "human" or "Earthling," which has been a common science fiction usage going back to at least the 1940s (and was often used in TOS, TAS, and TNG to refer to Earth people and things, so it's been in canon all along, just not specifically to the Mirror Universe). It was the Reeves-Stevens novels and later "In a Mirror, Darkly" (on which the Reeves-Stevenses were story editors) that put DS9's "Terran" usage for Mirror humans together with TOS's "Empire" usage and produced "Terran Empire."

Heck, if anything, that was a mistake. DS9 used "Terran" as a slur used by the Klingon-Cardassian Alliance to refer to humans; it wasn't the humans' term for themselves. So the later decision to have the humans call their own empire "Terran" was kind of missing the point.

 

[Harvey]

I recently read through some '70's letterzines (The Halkan Council, A Piece of the Action), and lots of Trekfen couldn't find anything good to say about Blish, Lawrence & Lawrence's work.

Ooh. Are those available online somewhere?

Is there an in-print omnibus collection of the Blish novelizations?

The 1991 omnibus editions can still be picked up used. They're the ones I picked up when I wanted to have all of the adaptations in print in one place (although they're missing the two Harry Mudd adaptations).

 

[mb22]

SMD![/I] There is a definite change in style starting with Star Trek 4. The adaptations were quite definitely longer, and much more faithful to the finished episodes starting with ST4. That may be due to the demands of the editor/publisher, or because the writing had been turned over to actual fans of the show (which Blish himself never really was).

Would you say that includes the adaptation of "The Cage" he did for "The Menagerie"?

 

[Qonundrum]

(waits for the reflexive onslaught of "NOOOOOOOs!" )

I don't mean canon canon -- obviously, the definition of canon is what appeared on screen.

And yet, the Blish (and Foster) novelizations were "official". They were the actual episodes in books that said Star Trek by a real science fiction author.

So, at least back in the day, how influential were these stories? Did concepts get incorporated into official Trek canon? Did some become official fanon if nothing else?

At a time when no new Trek was being made, how much were these adaptations slurped up and the concepts introduced, such as they weren't in the original episodes, accepted as official?

Is the novelization of TMP, which includes such neat things as microchip implants?

Perhaps. What have the Blish books covered that could still fit in with ease or convincingly? (Contrast to TMP where microchip bits added doesn't hold up.)

 

[Doc Mugatu]

....
I don't mean canon canon -- obviously, the definition of canon is what appeared on screen.

And yet, the Blish (and Foster) novelizations were "official". They were the actual episodes in books that said Star Trek by a real science fiction author.

So, at least back in the day, how influential were these stories? ...

I have a personal fondness for the James Blish adaptions as I lived in an area that didn't get Star Trek reruns until the mid-1970s. My recollection, honestly, is that "back in the day" fans were not quite as "canon" retentive. Fandom was bit more "go with the flow." Blish's adaptions, if I remember correctly, were based on the scripts. Scripts in which rewrites were often being rushed onto the set as they were filming therefore there were often (if not always) differences between the two. I guess if pushed came to shove the episodes would trump the adaptions but it was never that big of deal.

Others may recall it differently, but I don't remember "canon" being an issue until the original novels started coming out and didn't become a really big deal until people started looking for things to fight about on message boards when the internet first started taking flight. Nowadays everything seems to be a pretext for a fight.

 

[Doc Mugatu]

Is there an in-print omnibus collection of the Blish novelizations?

I still find the individual collections in used book stores and recommend them for the various covers over a giant omnibus.

Having said that: James Blish's Star Trek Omnibus

 

[Ssosmcin]

Upon rereading the Blish books last year in publication order, it appears that Blish's ghostwriters (wife Judy Blish/J.A. Lawrence and MIL Muriel Lawrence) did the bulk of the writing after SMD! There is a definite change in style starting with Star Trek 4. The adaptations were quite definitely longer, and much more faithful to the finished episodes starting with ST4. That may be due to the demands of the editor/publisher, or because the writing had been turned over to actual fans of the show (which Blish himself never really was).

I'm thinking that Blish was given more accurate scripts to adapt instead of the earlier drafts. Didn't the Trek staff read and object to the first few volumes? Roddenberry, from what I've read, made a fuss after D.C. Fontana pointed out some major deviations in the second book.

 

[Daddy Todd]

I still find the individual collections in used book stores and recommend them for the various covers over a giant omnibus.

Having said that: James Blish's Star Trek Omnibus

That omnibus only includes a bit over half the episodes.

The original collections are very common. You can pick up a complete run pretty cheaply on eBay.

I strongly recommend reading them in order (including Spock Must Die!) Blish added some very, very light continuity that is only apparent when you read them as published.

 

[Doc Mugatu]

I'm thinking that Blish was given more accurate scripts to adapt instead of the earlier drafts. Didn't the Trek staff read and object to the first few volumes? Roddenberry, from what I've read, made a fuss after D.C. Fontana pointed out some major deviations in the second book.

That's funny considering Roddenberry constantly rewriting things until the last moment was probably the single biggest reason for the discrepancies in the first place.

If the problem lessened than I would guess it was in S3 when Roddenberry was gone.

 

[Daddy Todd]

Ooh. Are those available online somewhere?

Not that I’ve ever found. I’ve been collecting vintage ‘zines on eBay. Many are surprisingly cheap! Oh sure, you get the occasional seller trying to sell you a 16-page fanzine for $80, but that’s pretty rare. I got a near-complete run of The Halkan Council for $55 last year. I was happy with that price.

The 1991 omnibus editions can still be picked up used. They're the ones I picked up when I wanted to have all of the adaptations in print in one place (although they're missing the two Harry Mudd adaptations).

Pick up a copy of Mudd’s Angels (aka Mudd’s Enterprise) and your collection is complete.

 

[Christopher]

I'm thinking that Blish was given more accurate scripts to adapt instead of the earlier drafts. Didn't the Trek staff read and object to the first few volumes? Roddenberry, from what I've read, made a fuss after D.C. Fontana pointed out some major deviations in the second book.

I find that hard to believe. At the time, it was normal for novelizations to take major liberties. Nobody expected them to be slavish copies, and there were many novelizations in the '60s and '70s that went even further afield than Blish's did. Heck, Fontana's own 1974 novelization of the Roddenberry pilot The Questor Tapes took some significant liberties, adding in a whole new section of the story that altered the sequence of events in the third act in order to fill it out to novel length. And as mentioned above, Roddenberry's own TMP novelization inserted some ideas and scenes not present in the film. (Although I can see Roddenberry being hypocritical and egotistical enough to complain that somebody else took liberties with his precious ideas.)

IIRC, Blish (or his ghostwriters) said in the prefaces to the later volumes that it was the fans who wrote letters complaining about the divergences from the episodes and asking that they be more accurate. Also, it became easier to adapt them faithfully once the episodes were rerunning constantly in syndication.

 

[hbquikcomjamesl]

Pick up a copy of Mudd’s Angels (aka Mudd’s Enterprise) and your collection is complete.

More than complete, given that MA is rounded out with a novella (of debatable quality at best) serving as a sequel.

 

[Harvey]

I find that hard to believe. At the time, it was normal for novelizations to take major liberties. Nobody expected them to be slavish copies, and there were many novelizations in the '60s and '70s that went even further afield than Blish's did. Heck, Fontana's own 1974 novelization of the Roddenberry pilot The Questor Tapes took some significant liberties, adding in a whole new section of the story that altered the sequence of events in the third act in order to fill it out to novel length. And as mentioned above, Roddenberry's own TMP novelization inserted some ideas and scenes not present in the film. (Although I can see Roddenberry being hypocritical and egotistical enough to complain that somebody else took liberties with his precious ideas.)

I have a memo from Dorothy about Star Trek 2 that is very critical of Blish's adaptation, complains that the wrong draft of "Operation -- Annihilate!" was sent to him, and suggests they get a new writer for future books. The staff sent Blish comments about Star Trek 1, too, but I only have Roddenberry's cover letter, not the attached comments themselves.

 

[Christopher]

I still say Blish's "Annihilate!" is better than the episode we got.

 

[hbquikcomjamesl]

I still say Blish's "Annihilate!" is better than the episode we got.

That assertion has some merit. Although backtracking the blastoneurons to their origin world would have taken more time than was available in the episode, and one could argue that sterilizing the surface of that origin world would be an even more far-fetched solution than irradiating Deneva with high-intensity UV. Also, I liked the angle with Sam and his family, which was absent in the Blish version.

 

[Christopher]

Also, I liked the angle with Sam and his family, which was absent in the Blish version.

Sure, that made it more personal -- although it's overkill having it come right after "City on the Edge of Forever." Kirk would've been a basket case after losing the love of his life and his brother and sister-in-law consecutively.

But the rest of the final episode was a complete mess and made no damn sense. The Blish version avoided most of the stuff that was stupidest in the aired version.