Invasion

Entry updated 10 November 2023. Tagged: Theme.

Futuristic fiction in the UK was given a tremendous boost by the success of George TChesney's clever piece of propaganda,The Battle of Dorking (May 1871Blackwood's Magazine;1871 chap), which put the case for army reform and rearmament by offering a dramatic illustration of the ease with which the UK might fall to an invading German army (seeBattle of Dorking). This became the foundation-stone of a subgenre ofFuture-War stories whose history is described in I FClarke's excellentVoices Prophesying War 1763-1984 (1966; rev1992). Significant exercises in similar alarmism published in the run-up to World War One includedThe Great War in England in 1897 (1894) by WilliamLe Queux,The Riddle of the Sands (1903) by ErskineChilders,The Invasion of 1910 (1906) by Le Queux andWhen William Came (1913) bySaki. P GWodehouse's early novel,The Swoop! (1909), was aParody of the subgenre. The invaders were usually German, but stories of French invasion were frequently used as cautionary tales against the folly of building a Channel Tunnel, such as MaxPemberton'sPro Patria (1901). UKScientific Romance was to a large extent an outgrowth and elaboration of this kind of fiction; and a crucialConceptual Breakthrough was made by H GWells inThe War of the Worlds (April-December 1897Pearson's;1898), which imagined that an invasion of the Earth by technologically superiorAliens might appear to Britons in much the same light as the eventually genocidal invasion of Tasmania by Europeans had appeared to the luckless Tasmanians (see alsoTheWar of the Worlds). Although it was (very narrowly) anticipated in some respects by KurdLaßwitz'sAuf zwei Planeten (1897; cut trans asTwo Planets1971), Wells's novel was far more influential in making the role of invader central to the fictional image of the alien for the next half-century.

Mundane invasions remained fairly commonplace in UK fiction between the wars, although the fear of occupationper se was outweighed and largely superseded by the fear of the aerial bombardment which might be its prelude; in the UK such stories far outnumbered stories of alien invasion, although there were some notable examples of the latter: G McLeodWinsor'sStation X (1919) and BohunLynch'sMenace from the Moon (1925), as well as the Martian invasion included in OlafStapledon's future historyLast and First Men (1930). This general dearth of alien-invasion stories is understandable. Separated from continental Europe by a mere 22 miles, the UK was especially vulnerable to the threat of invasion – and Britons understood how narrowly such a fate had been averted in 1588 and again in Napoleonic times.

The USA was far less vulnerable to such anxieties – although they found expression in such novels as ThomasDixon'sThe Fall of a Nation (1916) and FloydGibbons'sThe Red Napoleon (1929), as well as in various lurid accounts of theYellow Peril, including Parabellum's (FerdinandGrautoff's)Bansai! (1909), Philip FrancisNowlan'sBuck Rogers stories (1928-1929) and the series begun by Arthur LeoZagat with "Tomorrow" (27 May 1939ArgosyWeekly) – but in general the possibility of alien invasion probably seemed to US citizens not too much more remote than the probability of invasion by another nation.

Early pulp melodramas of alien invasion include JSchlossel's "Invaders from Outside" (January 1925Weird Tales), NictzinDyalhis's "When the Green Star Waned" (April 1925Weird Tales), Edgar RiceBurroughs'sThe Moon Maid (stories May 1923-September 1925ArgosyAll-Story Weekly; cut fixup1926), EdmondHamilton's "The Other Side of the Moon" (Fall 1929Amazing Stories Quarterly) and John WCampbell Jr'sInvaders from the Infinite (Spring 1932Amazing Stories Quarterly;1961). An interesting story by P SchuylerMiller in which the "invasion" is by spores (seePanspermia) rather than sentient beings is "The Arrhenius Horror" (September 1931Amazing), a theme which he recapitulated in "Spawn" (August 1939Weird Tales); a later development of it was JackFinney'sThe Body Snatchers (10-24 December 1954Collier's Weekly;1955; vtInvasion of the Body Snatchers1973; rev1978), filmed twice asInvasion of the Body Snatchers. Alien-invasion stories quickly became a staple of the specialist sf pulps, and Campbell went on to conduct a sober and rather peculiar analysis of the idea of alien conquest and the subjugation of humankind in four of his "Don A Stuart" stories: "The Invaders" (June 1935Astounding), "Rebellion" (August 1935Astounding), "Out of Night" (October 1937Astounding) and "Cloak of Aesir" (March 1939Astounding) – stories somewhat at odds with his later conviction that humanity was destined to get the better of any and all alien species. One of the side-effects of this later human chauvinism was Campbell's de-emphasizing of alien-invasion stories inAstounding Science-Fiction – it is surprising how few such stories appeared inAstounding in the decade separatingThe Dark Destroyers (December 1938-January 1939Astounding as "Nuisance Value";1959) by Manly WadeWellman from "Late Night Final" (December 1948Astounding) by Eric FrankRussell, even though such stories could certainly (as did both the examples cited) champion the human against the nonhuman. Joseph JMillard'sThe Gods Hate Kansas (November 1941Startling; rev1964) is a notable example from elsewhere.

A sparse but interesting line of stories featuring invasions launched fromUnder the Sea runs from OwenOliver's antique "Out of the Deep" (July 1904The London Magazine) and EdenPhillpotts'sThe Owl of Athene (1936) to JohnWyndham'sThe Kraken Wakes (1953; cut vtOut of the Deeps1953) and MurrayLeinster'sCreatures of the Abyss (1961). These often bring the typical features of mundane and alien invasion stories into uneasy combination.

Hypothetical Asian invasion continued to crop up occasionally inGenre SF – as in Robert AHeinlein'sSixth Column (January-March 1941Astounding as by Anson MacDonald;1949 as Heinlein; vtThe Day After Tomorrow1951) and C MKornbluth'sNot This August (14 May-1 June 1955Maclean's Magazine;1955; vtChristmas Eve) – although they were easily outnumbered by attempted and successful conquests of a more exotic kind, even if most of these were featured in the less prestigious magazines. Invasions came not only from outer space but from otherDimensions, as in MurrayLeinster's "The Incredible Invasion" (August-December 1936Astounding;1955 dos asThe Other Side of Here), from the microcosm, as in "Invaders from the Atom" (1937Tales of Wonder #1) by Maurice GHugi, and eventually from the future, as inInvasion from 2500 (1964) by Norman Edwards (TerryCarr and TedWhite). Among the more bizarre alien invasions is FredricBrown's "The Waveries" (January 1945Astounding), in which electrical energy-beings hijack our airwaves and put an end to electricalTechnology. Despite the sobering conclusion ofThe War of the Worlds, in which lowly bacteria must compensate for human impotence, confidence in human ability to repel alien invaders sooner or later always ran high in pulp sf, one lone man occasionally being adequate to the task, as in A Evan Vogt's "The Monster" (August 1948Astounding; vt "Resurrection" inThe Other Side of the Moon, anth1949, ed AugustDerleth). In some stories, of course, humans are themselves the alien invaders of other worlds, and works of this kind (which rarely appeared inAstounding) were often fiercely critical of such human follies as racism andImperialism; examples range from Edmond Hamilton's "A Conquest of Two Worlds" (February 1932Wonder Stories) through Robert Silverberg'sInvaders from Earth (1958 dos) andDownward to the Earth (1970) to Ursula KLe Guin'sThe Word for World Is Forest (inAgain, Dangerous Visions, anth1972, ed HarlanEllison;1976).

From their earliest inception, stories of invasion featured a paranoid anxiety that the invaders might already be lurking undetected in our midst. William Le Queux was an indefatigable propagator of the notion that a Fifth Column of German agents was already in the UK, preparing to play its part in open conflict, and many US Yellow-Peril novels likewise featured Fifth Columnists. This kind ofParanoia could be taken to extremes in sf, where aliens could easily be credited with the power to masquerade as humans. The notion was understandably attractive to low-budget film-makers, and it was extravagantly deployed in the magazines and in theCinema during the McCarthy witch-hunts of the earlyCold War period. The new wave of paranoid alien-invasion stories was launched by Murray Leinster'sThe Brain-Stealers (November 1947Startling as "The Man in the Iron Cap";1954) and RayBradbury's "Zero Hour" (Fall 1947Planet Stories), but it really hit its stride with Heinlein'sThe Puppet Masters (September-November 1951Galaxy;1951; text restored1990), quickly followed byInvaders from Mars (1953), Eric FrankRussell'sThree to Conquer (August-October 1955Astounding as "Call Him Dead";1955),Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956) andI Married a Monster from Outer Space (1958). By this time, however, the comic potential of alien invasion was being more widely exploited, too, in such works as Fredric Brown'sMartians Go Home! (1955) and RichardWilson'sThe Girls from Planet 5 (1955). The possibility of benign invasions was considered, notably by Arthur CClarke inChildhood's End (April 1950Famous Fantastic Mysteries as "Guardian Angel"; much exp1953; rev1990), by AlgisBudrys in "Silent Brother" (February 1956Astounding as by Paul Janvier) and (somewhat perversely) by TheodoreSturgeon inThe Cosmic Rape (1958).

By the 1960s the alien-invasion story appeared to be old hat, fit for cynical display in such stories as Thomas MDisch'sThe Genocides (1965), in which humans are relegated to the status of irrelevant vermin, and hisMankind under the Leash (1966; vtThe Puppies of Terra), in which they become pets; or surrealParody, in such works as KeithLaumer'sThe Monitors (1966) and Philip KDick's and RayNelson'sThe Ganymede Takeover (1967); or romantic nostalgia in such works as RobertSilverberg'sNightwings (September 1968Galaxy; fixup1969). Serious treatments of the theme were rare: William RBurkett'sSleeping Planet (July-September 1964Analog;1965) and PiersAnthony'sTriple Detente (March 1968Analog as "The Alien Rulers"; exp1974) do not quite qualify, although Gordon RDickson'sThe Alien Way (1965) and JohnBrunner'sThe Day of the Star Cities (1965; rev vtAge of Miracles1973) might. More recent attempts to revitalize the theme have been relatively few in number; by far the most determined and most successful isFootfall (1985) by LarryNiven and JerryPournelle, a conscientiously controlled melodrama. Other notable examples include Jack LChalker'sDancers in the Afterglow (1978), where the attack is on a colony world rather than Earth; the Earth "invasion" subplot of GregoryBenford'sAcross the Sea of Suns (1984); and HarryTurtledove'sAlternate-HistoryWorldwar sequence opening withWorldwar: In the Balance (1994), whose aliens invade with history-changing effect duringWorld War Two. See alsoXenoforming for further examples of Earth's invasion by entire alienEcologies which displace or attempt to displace our own.

In the tradition ofTheWar of the Worlds, furtherCinema depictions of alien invasion of our planet are numerous. Some examples with entries in this encyclopedia areThePurple Monster Strikes (1945; cut vtD-Day on Mars 1966),Radar Men from the Moon (1951),Target Earth! (1954),Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956),Quatermass II (1957; vtEnemy from Space US),The Brain Eaters (1958),Uchū Daisensō (1959; vtBattle in Outer Space; vtThe World of Space),TheDay Mars Invaded Earth (1962),Invasion of the Star Creatures (1962),Unearthly Stranger (1963),They Came from Beyond Space (1967),Strange Invaders (1983),TheAdventures of Buckaroo Banzai across the 8th Dimension (1984),Bad Taste (1987),Predator (1987),Body Snatchers (1993),Independence Day (1996),Mars Attacks! (1996),Signs (2002),TheInvasion (2007),Attack the Block (2011),Battle: Los Angeles (2011),Transformers: Dark of the Moon (2011) andOblivion (2013).

InTelevision the alien-invasion-of-Earth theme regularly recurs in multi-storyline series to which it is not central, notablyDoctor Who (1963-current) – with many repeat offenders, of whom the most notorious and persistent are theDaleks – andTorchwood (2006-2011). It is the essential backbone of several further series such asTheInvaders (1967-1968),"V" (1983,1984;2009-2011), the BBC adaptations (1984,1985) of John Christopher'sTripods tales,Earth: Final Conflict (1997-2002),TheEvent (2010-2011) andFalling Skies (2011-2015).