“How Erg the Self-Inducting Slew a Paleface” by Stanislaw Lem is story #47 of 52 from The World Treasury of Science Fiction edited by David G. Hartwell (1989), an anthology my short story club is group reading. Stories are discussed on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays. “How Erg the Self-Inducting Slew a Paleface,” a 1964 Polish story was first published in English in Mortal Engines in 1971.

I won’t argue that “How Erg the Self-Inducting Slew a Paleface” is not science fiction, because people are tired of me doing that, but just listen to this audiobook version of the story in Mortal Engines.

I found Lem’s prose charming and dazzling, and “How Erg the Self-Inducting Slew a Paleface” is a fun fairytale about a cybernetic king who captures a human for his collection of curiosities. Unfortunately, the wily human tricks the king’s daughter into giving him her windup key and forces the king into letting him go. But the human doesn’t keep his part of the bargain to return the key. The princess winds down, and the king announces to his kingdom that anyone who returns the key can marry his daughter.

Hartwell’s introduction makes me wonder why he included this story in his anthology.

My hunch as I read “How Erg the Self-Inducting Slew a Paleface” was Lem holds science fiction in contempt, and his story is poking fun at science fiction readers. Now, that’s not saying this story isn’t impressive. Of course, Lem shows quite a bit of disdain for humanity too. But read this page to see if you agree with me. This could be my own aging cynicism reading into Lem, so you decide.

I liked this story despite it not being the kind of story I wanted to find in this anthology.

James Wallace Harris, 8/22/23

p.s. – I missed reviewing several stories from The World Treasury of Science Fiction because I’ve been having back trouble and can’t sit at the computer for long, and for two weeks we lost our connection to the internet. I might go back and review them in the future.