- CLEMENT, Hal
- Working name used for his sf by US writer Harry Clement Stubbs (1922-); he uses his surname for science articles and paints as George Richard. He holds degrees in astronomy, chemistry and education, and was long employed as a highschool science teacher. From the beginning of his career HC was associated with ASF, where his first story, "Proof", appeared in 1942, at the peak of the GOLDEN AGE OF SF. His work has from the first been characterized by the complexity and compelling interest of the scientific (or at any rate scientifically literate) ideas which dominate each story. He is not noted as a stylist, nor is his interest in character depiction very strong. Many of his books can for pages read like a dramatized exposition of ideas, absorbing though at times disconcerting for the novel reader. This is certainly the case with Needle (1949 ASF; exp 1950; vt From Outer Space 1957), his first novel, a rather ponderous alien- INVASION story with detection elements and a juvenile protagonist in a tale where the invader is a police-parasite chasing another (malign) parasite that has possessed the boy's father; the boy, with the good alien in tow, helps to drive the bad alien from his Dad. It is a highly loaded theme, but is told without any of the necessary resonance, nor does its sequel, Through the Eye of a Needle (1978), written as a juvenile, manage to cope any better with the human implications of its material.HC's most famous - and far better - work is contained in his main series, a loose sequence consisting of MISSION OF GRAVITY (ASF 1953; cut 1954; text restored with additions and 1 added story, as coll 1978), Close to Critical (1958 ASF; 1964) and Star Light (1971). The third volume is a direct sequel to the first, while some of the characters in the second appear in the third as well, Elise ("Easy") Rich in Close to Critical being the "Easy" Hoffman of Star Light, 25 years older. MISSION OF GRAVITY, one of the best loved novels in sf, is set on the intriguingly plausible high-gravity planet of Mesklin, inhabited by HC's most interesting ALIENS. The plot concerns the efforts of the Mesklinite Captain Barlennan and his crew to assist a human team in extracting a vital component from a crashed space probe; the humans cannot perform the feat, because Mesklin's GRAVITY varies from an equatorial 3g to a polar 700g. Barlennan's arduous trek is inherently fascinating, but perhaps even more engaging is HC's presentation of the captain as a kind of Competent Man in extremis, a born engineer, a lover of knowledge. These characteristics permeate the texts of everything that HC writes, even those stories whose protagonists are no more than pretexts for the unfolding of the genuine text - which is the physical Universe itself.HC's most successful novels apply the basic plot of MISSION OF GRAVITY to fundamentally similar basic storylines - a character, usually human, must cope with an alien environment, with or without the help of natives, as in Iceworld (1953), Cycle of Fire (1957) and the stories assembled in Natives of Space (coll 1965) and Small Changes (coll 1969; vt Space Lash 1969). HC's only collaboration, "Planet for Plunder" (1957) with Sam MERWIN Jr, demonstrates his fascination with alien environments and viewpoints, as he initially wrote the story entirely from a nonhuman standpoint; Merwin, acting for Satellite Magazine, where it appeared, wrote an additional 10,000 words from a human standpoint.HC brought a new seriousness to the extrapolative HARD-SF physical-sciences story, and his vividness of imagination - his sense that the Universe is wonderful - has generally overcome the awkwardness of his narrative technique. He is a figure of importance to the genre.JCOther works: Ranger Boys in Space (1956), a juvenile; Some Notes on XI Bootis (1960 chap), a lecture; First Flights to the Moon (anth 1970), nonfiction; Ocean on Top (1967 If; 1973); The Best of Hal Clement (coll 1979); The Nitrogen Fix (1980); Intuit (coll of linked stories 1987), four Laird Cunningham tales; Still River (1987); Isaac's Universe: Fossil* (1993), tied to the works of Isaac ASIMOV.About the author: Hal Clement (1982) by Donald M. HASSLER; Hal Clement, Scientist with a Mission: A Working Bibliography (1989 chap) by Gordon BENSON Jr.
Science Fiction and Fantasy Encyclopedia. Academic. 2011.
