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On Wings of Song/Part One

2026-03-29T19:08:02Z

Eb: /* the P-W lozenge */

{{#addbodyclass: tiled-toc}}

{{SummaryCollapsed |
As a teenager in Amesville, where flying is outlawed and music is barely allowed, Daniel knows there must be more to life than this. A brief dalliance with forbidden activities—distributing a banned newspaper and visiting Minneapolis, with the boy he has an unacknowledged love for—lands him in prison. The eight-month ordeal drastically disillusions him, but also sparks his obsession with singing.
}}

== Chapter 1 ==

=== Amesville, Iowa ===

[[File:Iowa.jpg|thumb|left|400px|The Hawkeye State]] No such town exists, although there is a city of {{wp|Ames, Iowa|Ames}} in Iowa—not far from Des Moines, where Disch was born and lived until age 13. Amesville sounds smaller, and not so close to a big city; in chapter 2 we learn that it's 40 miles from {{wp|Fort Dodge, Iowa|Fort Dodge}}, and several references to Fort Dodge make it sound like that's the next largest town in the area. For more about where Amesville might be, see [[#Chapter 3|Chapter 3]].

=== She would sit watching him ... people shouldn't let fairies into their houses ===

Fairies, as we will learn quickly from context, are the invisible presences of people who are "flying." All other references to fairies in Daniel's childhood are steeped in paranoia about being observed—but his daydreams here are a reminder that being watched over by an unseen dead family member or guardian angel is a standard religious idea meant to be comforting to children. The crucial difference is that Daniel's mother is a living person.

Not coincidentally, "fairy" also has a long history as an anti-gay slur in the US and England—semi-archaic today, but still very recognizable in the 1970s and 80s. Of the many equivalent slurs in other languages, several refer to butterflies, birds, etc., consistent with the idea that being flighty and/or colorful is effeminate.

There's no particular passage in the book that summarizes exactly what's involved in flying, so this note is as good a place as any. Disch gives no details about the "flight apparatus" technology except for there being a wire that touches the head. It's important to the premise that both the technology and the mental state achieved by singing are necessary ingredients; there's never a hint of anyone being able to do it in another way, as people have claimed to do in the past via meditation or esoteric studies. The general idea of {{wp|astral projection}} has a long history, but what's happening here seems closest to a more specific idea that only became popular in the 19th and 20th centuries, and shows up a lot in 20th century science fiction: {{wp|remote viewing}}, that is, the ability to roam around as a disembodied point of view and observe things in the actual world. In ''On Wings of Song'', fairies don't travel to a separate reality, and they don't perceive any supernatural beings (except other fairies like themselves), but otherwise there are only a few limits to where they can go and what they can see. So there are at least three reasons for religious conservatives to be against flying: it's a transcendent experience that doesn't correspond to their own religion, it's against their desire to control other people's access to information in general, and it's a threat to their own personal privacy.

=== a collect call from New York ===

Throughout the 20th century there was a large price difference between local and long-distance calling, so {{wp|Collect call|calling collect}} would be a typical way for someone to call home from another state without affecting their phone bill. This is now rare since many phone providers no longer have a separate long-distance rate.

=== the Iowa Stamp Tax ===

A {{wp|Stamp duty|stamp tax}} is a tax on property purchases and other transactions, typically at the state level in the US.

=== Otto Hassler Park ===

If this is a historical reference, it would be a misspelling of {{wp|Otto Haesler}} (1880-1962), a German architect best known for social housing. There would be no obvious connection to this novel or to Disch's life, so it may be that this is just a random fictional name; Hassler, Haesler, Haessler, etc. would be plausible German names to find in Iowa.

=== to help him take up his indenture ===

This is only briefly mentioned in connection with Daniel's father's dentistry career; it's unclear what the terms are of this contract, whether it is more like an apprenticeship or {{wp|indentured servitude}}, but a later reference to him paying off his "debt to the county" indicates that there's overlap between the government and the private sector in this system, consistent with how capitalism in Iowa has taken a neo-feudal direction.

=== fans whirling everywhere you went ===

The way that fans and other spinning objects can harm fairies is described by Barbara Steiner [[#The faster I let myself spin the more exciting|later in chapter 4]].

== Chapter 2 ==

=== He listened to Eugene Mueller's stories ===

Disch later mentioned a childhood friend who may have been the model for the character of Eugene, in terms of his taking credit for plots that were really from old stories: "Bruce Burton, when we were both paperboys in Fairmont ... there were only the two of us [sharing stories] (unless one counts the storylines he was lifting, unbeknownst to me, from ''{{wp|Analog Science Fiction and Fact|Astounding}}'')."<ref>{{cite article|author=Disch, Thomas M.|date=May 8, 2006|title=Story tag|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140130091852/tomsdisch.livejournal.com/5997.html|publication=Endzone}} {{InternetArchive|date=January 30, 2014}} This title of this brief blog post referred to the elaborations that some readers had added in comments to his brief story idea about a vengeful chipmunk. (See [[Thomas M. Disch#cite_note-note-endzone-1|note about ''Endzone'']])</ref>

=== bowdlerized editions of ''Frankenstein'' and ''The War of the Worlds'' ===

{{wp|Expurgation|Bowdlerization}} refers generally to creating censored versions of books or other art. Fantasy literature has always been a common target of censorship. ''Frankenstein'' is an unusual case in that the best-known version of the novel, the 1831 edition, contained changes by the author that some have described as self-censorship to appease Victorian sensibilities (although the differences between the 1818 and 1831 editions are more complex)—but any version of ''Frankenstein'' would be problematic for fundamentalist Christians due to its basic premise.

As for why ''The War of the Worlds'', commonly thought of as a thrilling alien invasion adventure, would offend religious conservatives: besides H.G. Wells being famously an atheist, the novel's narrator repeatedly brings up evolution.<ref>{{cite book|author=McLean, Steven|date=2009|title=The Early Fiction of H.G. Wells: Fantasies of Science|url=https://link.springer.com/book/10.1057/9780230236639|publisher=Palgrave Macmillan|isbn=978-0-230-53562-6}}</ref>

=== their own artless Grand Guignol ===

[[File:Grand-guignol-1928.jpg|thumb|right|300px|''The Man Who Killed Death'', 1928]] This could refer literally to the style of horror theater made famous by the {{wp|Grand Guignol|Grand-Guignol}}, or more generally to any kind of horror-inspired bad-taste make-believe that a 14-year-old would enjoy.

=== a book of speeches by Herbert Hoover ===

Hoover remains the only US President to be born in Iowa.

=== destroyed most of Tel Aviv ===

There are just enough references to non-US places in the novel to establish that some of them have been ruined by war or terrorism, but that this was not a global disaster; Cairo and Tehran, for instance, are still vacation destinations (chapter 10), as is Rome although other parts of Italy have been bombed (chapter 11), and Switzerland seems fine (chapter 5).

=== Old Black Joe ===

An 1860 {{wp|Old Black Joe|Stephen Foster song}}. Foster is commonly thought of in connection with blackface minstrelsy, which is very relevant to this book. "Old Black Joe" is a choice that makes sense here as something a teacher might have picked: while it romanticizes Southern slaveholding culture like other Foster songs, it has more plausible deniability due to not being written in dialect.

=== undergoders .... they practically ran Iowa ===

The reason that the far-right evangelicals who are so prominent in Daniel's world are called "undergoders" is never spelled out, but to someone of Disch's generation it would clearly refer to the controversy over the wording of the {{wp|Pledge of Allegiance}}. "One nation" was changed to "One nation, under God" in 1954, as part of a Cold War trend of emphasizing American piety in contrast to the Soviets. This was clearly at odds with separation of church and state, and even though no legal challenge was made on that basis until {{wp|Elk Grove Unified School District v. Newdow|2000}}, it was a common focus of arguments about the overlap between religion and political conservatism—and a convenient phrase for the religious right to rally around.

Woven throughout this chapter, there are references to state/federal conflicts, Supreme Court decisions, etc., to establish what kind of dystopia Daniel is living in: not a nationwide theocracy like ''The Handmaid's Tale'', but something more contiguous with US history so far. Most of the repression is happening at the state level, and wasn't established by a coup, but by the same processes as right-wing politics today: a coalition of interests including sincere religious zealots, corrupt politicians, and businessmen who have no real ideology but are comfortable in an authoritarian setting. The undergoders don't make up a majority in Iowa, and haven't required everyone to adopt their own very strict lifestyle ("it was impossible to pretend to be an undergoder since it involved giving up almost anything you might enjoy")—but they have an outsize influence because they're so prominent in the agricultural industry, where the state's main economic power is.

The novel doesn't say exactly which states are dominated by undergoders, just that it's most of "the Farm Belt", which could refer to any subset of Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, and Ohio. In chapter 3 we see that at least some of Iowa's neighbor states, like Minnesota, have managed not to go this way.

=== Three days after Governor Brewster vetoed this law his only daughter was shot at ===

Besides being another reminder that the government hasn't uniformly fallen in line, this is an example of the other traditional instrument of local right-wing power: anonymous violence by individuals. You could call this stochastic terrorism, or just the kind of thing that the KKK and similar groups have always done; in many ways the undergoder regime in the Farm Belt states operates very much like the deep South in the 1950s and '60s, where authoritarianism existed on both formal and informal levels.

=== it was as though civilization had ground to a halt ===

To American readers in 1979, the fuel crisis depicted here would feel very timely: oil production dropped {{wp|1979 oil crisis|in that year}} for several reasons, and even though the impact of this on the US was not as dramatic as expected, it brought back bad memories of the much more severe {{wp|1973 oil crisis}} when Americans had experienced rationing for the first time since World War Two.

Much as in ''[[334]]'', the theme of American decline in ''On Wings of Song'', and the idea that any serious lowering of the familiar standard of middle-class comfort would be a harbinger of the collapse of civilization, are rooted in feelings that were very common in the 1970s across the political spectrum. The rise of Ronald Reagan—already clearly in progress when this book was written—was based on the premise that economic problems in America, and social unrest in general, were due to having strayed from old-fashioned values and free-market capitalism.

=== The real aristocracy of Iowa, the farmers ===

The idea that the "farmers" are all undergoders living a strict religious life is not quite right, but from the limited perspective of Daniel and his family, knowing only the farmers in and around Amesville, it makes sense that it would seem that way. Later in chapter 5 we'll see a different side of the aristocracy: agribusiness tycoons who live in secular luxury.

=== copies of ''The Star-Tribune'' ===

The ''Minneapolis Star-Tribune'' (renamed ''{{wp|Minnesota Star Tribune}}'' in 2024) is a real newspaper, although in 1979 this was a slightly ahead-of-its-time reference because the ''Star'' and the ''Tribune'' were technically still two separate papers owned by the same company.

Disch said of his childhood in {{wp|Fairmont, Minnesota}} (where he lived during grade school and middle school, before the family moved back to Minneapolis): "[F]rom age nine years onwards, I began to earn my living, delivering the ''Minneapolis Star'' and the ''Tribune'' to those more cosmopolitan folks not content with Fairmont's own ''[https://www.fairmontsentinel.com/ Sentinel]''."{{ref Disch autobio}}

== Chapter 3 ==

=== the Twin Cities were Sodom and Gomorrah ===

While there are many twin cities around the world, in the Midwest this exclusively means Minneapolis and St. Paul. Since the undergoders in this future have not managed to dominate Minnesota like Iowa, these are the nearest examples of urban decadence.

Calling {{wp|Sodom and Gomorrah}} "twin cities" is not original to Disch—they are often described that way, but the Bible really says nothing about them having any relationship to each other, just that they were in the same general part of the world (the Dead Sea plain), along with three other cities that may or may not (depending on which texts you read) have met the same fate.

=== they rode their bikes north as far as U.S. 18 ... Albert Lea to Minneapolis ===

[[File:Iowa-to-MN.jpg|thumb|right|350px|Getting from Amesville to Minneapolis]] Route 18 is about 25 miles from the Iowa-Minnesota border. For what it's worth, this may help to narrow down where the fictional Amesville might be. If you headed straight north from Fort Dodge, route 18 would be about 40 miles away—and Amesville is supposed to be 40 miles from Fort Dodge. So, unless the boys took either a very long bike ride or a very short one, they probably started somewhere northwest or northeast of Fort Dodge, like where the real villages of West Bend and Corwith are. This doesn't really matter except to emphasize that Daniel lives in a very rural area.

=== urging the enactment of the Twenty-Eighth Amendment ===

This was mentioned earlier in chapter 2 as "the national Anti-Flight Amendment."

=== ''Gold-Diggers of 1984'' ===

This is a reference to the movie musicals ''{{wp|Gold Diggers of 1933}}'', ''{{wp|Gold Diggers of 1935}}'', and ''{{wp|Gold Diggers of 1937}}'', which are all vehicles for elaborate Busby Berkeley numbers. They are loosely derived from the 1919 play ''{{wp|The Gold Diggers (1919 play)|The Gold Diggers}}'' in the sense that all of their plots involve women marrying rich men; despite the negative connotation of "gold-diggers", the women always succeed in doing so and it's a happy ending.

[[File:Gold-diggers-of-1933.jpg|thumb|left|350px|''Gold Diggers of 1933'']] The years in the titles are the years that those movies were made... so is this implying that ''On Wings of Song'' actually takes place in the '80s? Even though no year is ever given for this near-future story, everything else about the setting makes that unlikely; these political and social changes did not happen in just a few years. So the movie may have come from a wave of '80s nostalgia—not unlike the one we've been undergoing in real life for a while now, and, like the current one, of course it includes ridiculous anachronisms like a flight apparatus.

=== a comic tap dance in black face ===

This would be no surprise at any point in the first half of the 20th century, but casually mentioning its presence in a near-future movie is a jarring effect (as with the earlier reference to "Old Black Joe"), and a reminder that race is something that hasn't really come up at all in Daniel's homogenous upbringing. It won't be until Part Three that we learn the fairly disturbing details of how ideas about skin color have developed in other parts of America.

=== north to the icebergs of Baffin Island ===

The location of {{wp|Baffin Island}} makes it a logical ending point if you traveled due north from the American Midwest and kept going.

=== I DON'T CARE IF THE SUN DON'T SHINE. Or: GIVE US FIVE MINUTES MORE ===

It's deliberately unclear what these could mean as political protest slogans, but in this book it's probably not a coincidence that {{wp|I Don't Care If the Sun Don't Shine|"I Don't Care If the Sun Don't Shine"}} and {{wp|Five Minutes More|"Five Minutes More"}} are the names of mid-20th-century pop songs. The lyrics of [https://genius.com/Elvis-presley-i-dont-care-if-the-sun-dont-shine-lyrics the first one] don't seem to have any special relevance, but the line "you can sleep late" in the [https://genius.com/Frank-sinatra-five-minutes-more-lyrics second one] may take on a sadder meaning after the events of Chapter 10.

=== the opposing lawyer raised an objection ===

Another example of the kind of soft authoritarianism that distinguishes Amesville from other literary dystopias: all of the legal structures that we have today still exist in the future, they're just applied even less fairly than before.

== Chapter 4 ==

=== the compound at Spirit Lake ===

[[File:Spirit-lake-map.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Where the prison is, more or less]] Spirit Lake or {{wp|Big Spirit Lake}} is one of the "Iowa Great Lakes" that form a chain from Minnesota to northwestern Iowa; there's also a {{wp|Spirit Lake, Iowa|small town}} in that area with the same name, although the town is on the shore of the next lake down, Lake Okoboji.

The latter area was the site of the last violent attack by Sioux on US settlers in Iowa (in reprisal for various abuses by the settlers and the federal government), after which the state and federal governments became even more aggressive in driving out the Native population. These events took on legendary stature in the Midwest,<ref>{{cite book|author=Teakle, Thomas|title=The Spirit Lake Massacre|url=https://gutenberg.org/cache/epub/42074/pg42074-images.html|location=Cedar Rapids|publisher=Torch Press|date=1918}}</ref> especially since they included the capture and ransom of a white woman who then wrote a memoir.<ref>{{cite article|author=Prout, Katie|title=A History of Violence: Walking the Blood-Soaked Shores of Spirit Lake|url=https://lithub.com/crime-or-conflict-walking-the-blood-soaked-shores-of-spirit-lake/|publication=Literary Hub|date=March 1, 2017|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref>

All of this makes it a perversely appropriate location for an authoritarian regime with an ultra-American ideology to establish a prison. The fact that it's right at the edge of Iowa, close to a non-undergoder state, just emphasizes how sure the authorities are that escape is impossible.

=== this scene was rotated through ninety degrees and the flowing river became a wall ===

This echoes a line in ''[[Camp Concentration]]'', from a description of the mad scientist Dr. Skilliman's various interests:

<blockquote>He was trying to analyze the peculiar fascination of lakes, reservoirs, and suchlike large, standing bodies of water. He observed that it is only in these that nature presents us with the spectacle of the Euclidean plane stretching on without apparent limit. It represents that final submission to the law of gravity that is always at work on our cell tissues. From this he went on to observe that the great achievement of architecture is simply to take the notion of the Euclidean plane and stand it on its edge. A wall is such an impressive phenomenon because it is a body of water... stood on its side.</blockquote>

=== the P-W lozenge ===

The idea of prisoners having a remote-controlled bomb on or in their bodies was fairly popular in late 20th century science fiction. Often this was in the form of an explosive collar around the neck—which has an obvious narrative advantage in movies, since it's always visible and can have an ominous flashing light on it; examples include ''The Running Man'' (1987), ''Wedlock'' (1991), ''Battle Royale'' (2000), and ''Battlefield Earth'' (2000). Less visibly but more ickily, the bomb might be implanted inside someone's neck or head as in ''Escape from New York'' (1981).

[[File:Fortress.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Christopher Lambert in ''Fortress'']] I'm not sure whether ''On Wings of Song'' is the earliest example, but I'm fairly sure that this and the movie ''[https://letterboxd.com/hob/film/fortress-1992/ Fortress]'' (1992) are the only ones where you have to ''swallow'' the bomb—and that this was the first fictional depiction of a prison where instead of the bomb being the last-ditch mechanism to prevent escape, it's the only mechanism. In keeping with 1970s/80s conservative economic ideology, the Spirit Lake prison runs on an extreme laissez-faire model with basically no staff.

=== Basques in Spain, Jews in Russia, the Irish in England ... the decimation of Palestinians ===

As before, mentions of any society outside of the US are rare and brief, but this passage is an efficient and chilling way to convey that the Iowa style of authoritarianism is just one of many; every industrialized society adapts tools of control for its own purposes. Disch mentions that the US—unlike Spain, Russia, England, and Israel—only applies this technology within prisons and ''not'' to large groups of "potentially dissident civilians," but that doesn't make the situation in Iowa any less horrible, just different, in keeping with the overall less-centralized nature of the repression there.

=== Reverend Van Dyke ... head of Marble Collegiate Church ===

{{wp|Marble Collegiate Church|Marble Collegiate}} is a historic church in Manhattan which was famously associated with {{wp|Norman Vincent Peale}}. Peale's combination of feel-good self-help philosophy and chumminess with right-wing politicians makes him a clear model for Van Dyke.

=== to ''pretend'' to be good, devout, and faithful .... Eventually, saying makes it so ===

This theme will recur throughout the book—sometimes spelled out, other times [[On Wings of Song/Part Three#"I Whistle a Happy Tune"|more indirectly]].

=== Logomachies ===

Arguments about words.

=== his last year's homeroom teacher, Mrs. Norberg ===

Mrs. Norberg and her opinions will be described in much more detail in Chapter 6.

=== the breeding of a specially mutated form of termite ===

The idea that termites could become a major food source in the future has been around for a long time, mainly because people were already eating them.<ref>{{cite article|author=Reis de Figueirêdo, Vasconcellos, Policarpo, & Nóbrega Alves|title=Edible and medicinal termites: a global overview|url=https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4427943/|publication=Journal of Ethnobiology and Ethnomedicine|date=April 30, 2015|pub-date=Vol. 11, No. 29}}</ref> Academic discussion of the subject has increased in the 21st century due to increasing awareness of how agriculture suffers from climate change and contributes to it; unsurprisingly, as with everything related to climate change, this has also become the subject of right-wing conspiracy theories.<ref>{{cite article|author=Jingnan, Huo|title=From 4chan to international politics, a bug-eating conspiracy theory goes mainstream|url=https://www.npr.org/2023/03/31/1166649732/conspiracy-theory-eating-bugs-4chan|publication=All Things Considered|date=March 31, 2023|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref>

It's a matter of opinion whether Disch's portrayal of termite processing on an industrial scale is the grossest version of a food factory in science fiction (that honor might go to the giant underground chicken-heart blob in ''{{wp|The Space Merchants}}''), but it's one of the more plausible ones.

=== Beware of dogs, beware of evil workers ===

From [https://biblehub.com/kjv/philippians/3.htm Philippians 3:2-4, King James Version].

This is an example of Disch doing something he also [[334/334/Part_III#18._The_New_American_Catholic_Bible|did]] [[334/334/Part_VI#38._Father_Charmain|twice]] in ''334'': having a character land on a supposedly random Bible verse, when it's really the author being mischievous. Here Daniel has picked one of the most confusing Biblical passages that a casual reader could've possibly found—both because of the peculiar translation (the King James version uses the word "concision" in a way that I'm not sure it was ever used anywhere else in English literature), and because the meaning is so obscure without the context (the apostle Paul is ranting against other Christian factions of his time). Some [https://biblehub.com/nasb_/philippians/3.htm other translations] are a bit clearer, but only a bit.

The specific content of the passage may not be very important, but here's my best attempt to summarize it. After some general insults about "dogs" and "evil workers", Paul specifically complains about Christians who believe that circumcision and other traditional Jewish practices should remain important in their faith. He argues instead that "circumcision" should now be thought of as a spiritual condition, a matter of having the right faith—as the people in his own faction do. But as sort of a hedge and/or brag, he adds that if traditional circumcision is so important, i.e. if you really insist on having "confidence in the flesh", then he has that too since he was physically circumcised—and, since he used to be a very traditional Pharisee, maybe it should even count extra for him.

=== the windows were all sealed tight ===

Here we get one more bit of exposition about the rules of flying: fairies can travel effortlessly by willpower, but they can't go through solid objects.

=== The faster I let myself spin the more exciting ===

[[File:OWOS-cover-fsf.jpg|thumb|left|300px|Cover art by Ed Emshwiller]] And finally, the most important rule for fairies: if you go too close to any spinning thing, you'll be entranced and stuck there forever. The nature of a "fairy-trap" was left intentionally vague before, but in hindsight, every electric fan that we've heard about being used for this purpose indicates someone's willingness to cause someone else to die in a coma.

The idea that a particular physical structure could entice a disembodied spirit also appears in Disch's ''[[The Businessman#Chapter 43|The Businessman]]'', where Giselle's ghost is mystically intoxicated by the pattern on a potholder.

Ed Emshwiller's cover painting for ''The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction'' February 1979 issue—where the first part of ''On Wings of Song'' appeared—shows a group of ethereal figures drifting toward an object that is just abstract enough that if you don't yet know the story, you could easily assume it's some sort of alien portal, but if you do know, it's clearly a tabletop electric fan.

=== the one about purity of heart being to will one thing ===

Van Dyke got this from [https://www.religion-online.org/book/purity-of-heart-is-to-will-one-thing/ Kierkegaard].

=== to live at the end of such a civilization ===

Here I think ''On Wings of Song'' is echoing not just a general 1970s fear of American decline, but the specific angle that Disch explored in ''[[334]]'': the psychological ''appeal'' of imagining that you're in a crumbling empire, at least if you're a relatively privileged person.

=== Cairo and Bombay for the National Council of Churches' Triage Committee ===

Triage is the process of deciding who to help first in an emergency, and who to immediately give up on.

=== run into an iceberg and sink, like ... the lost city of Brasilia ===

[[File:Vila-amaury-1.jpeg|thumb|right|300px|Vila Amaury, 1959]][[File:Vila-amaury-2.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Vila Amaury, 2010]] This condensed metaphor might refer to Vila Amaury, the lost city ''within'' the city of Brasilia. It makes sense for Van Dyke to see Brasilia as an example of "the Civilization of the Business Man": it was a heavily planned city built by technocrats in relatively recent history, and in the process of its creation, Vila Amaury was created as a company shanty-town to house 15,000 migrant workers—who were then displaced because the plan for Brasilia included an artificial lake, created by the Lago Paranoá dam, entirely submerging the site of the town.<ref>{{cite article|author=Basques, Victoria|title=Vila Amaury, uma cidade submersa|url=https://medium.com/esquinaonline/vila-amaury-uma-cidade-submersa-9b3e48dc8d12|publication=Esquina On-line|date=November 14, 2018|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref>

=== you are a punk singer ===

Disch probably was not thinking of punk rock, which was still fairly new at the time, but he's using the word in the same sense that gave punk rock its name: unskilled, no good, lowlife. Not coincidentally, it's also an old derogatory word for a young man who is used for sex, especially in prison.

=== I am the captain of the Pinafore ===

From ''{{wp|H.M.S. Pinafore}}'' by Gilbert & Sullivan (1878). This is a call-and-response song, and Daniel is singing both parts, a little inaccurately; the actual lines are:

: CAPTAIN: I am the Captain of the Pinafore;
: CREW: And a right good captain, too!
: CAPTAIN: You're very, very good,
: And be it understood,
: I command a right good crew.

([https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OqWNmTXhI34 Recording of a performance by the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company, 1959])

== Footnotes ==
<references/>

{{On Wings of Song nav}}

On Wings of Song/Part One

2026-03-29T19:05:58Z

Eb: /* the P-W lozenge */

{{#addbodyclass: tiled-toc}}

{{SummaryCollapsed |
As a teenager in Amesville, where flying is outlawed and music is barely allowed, Daniel knows there must be more to life than this. A brief dalliance with forbidden activities—distributing a banned newspaper and visiting Minneapolis, with the boy he has an unacknowledged love for—lands him in prison. The eight-month ordeal drastically disillusions him, but also sparks his obsession with singing.
}}

== Chapter 1 ==

=== Amesville, Iowa ===

[[File:Iowa.jpg|thumb|left|400px|The Hawkeye State]] No such town exists, although there is a city of {{wp|Ames, Iowa|Ames}} in Iowa—not far from Des Moines, where Disch was born and lived until age 13. Amesville sounds smaller, and not so close to a big city; in chapter 2 we learn that it's 40 miles from {{wp|Fort Dodge, Iowa|Fort Dodge}}, and several references to Fort Dodge make it sound like that's the next largest town in the area. For more about where Amesville might be, see [[#Chapter 3|Chapter 3]].

=== She would sit watching him ... people shouldn't let fairies into their houses ===

Fairies, as we will learn quickly from context, are the invisible presences of people who are "flying." All other references to fairies in Daniel's childhood are steeped in paranoia about being observed—but his daydreams here are a reminder that being watched over by an unseen dead family member or guardian angel is a standard religious idea meant to be comforting to children. The crucial difference is that Daniel's mother is a living person.

Not coincidentally, "fairy" also has a long history as an anti-gay slur in the US and England—semi-archaic today, but still very recognizable in the 1970s and 80s. Of the many equivalent slurs in other languages, several refer to butterflies, birds, etc., consistent with the idea that being flighty and/or colorful is effeminate.

There's no particular passage in the book that summarizes exactly what's involved in flying, so this note is as good a place as any. Disch gives no details about the "flight apparatus" technology except for there being a wire that touches the head. It's important to the premise that both the technology and the mental state achieved by singing are necessary ingredients; there's never a hint of anyone being able to do it in another way, as people have claimed to do in the past via meditation or esoteric studies. The general idea of {{wp|astral projection}} has a long history, but what's happening here seems closest to a more specific idea that only became popular in the 19th and 20th centuries, and shows up a lot in 20th century science fiction: {{wp|remote viewing}}, that is, the ability to roam around as a disembodied point of view and observe things in the actual world. In ''On Wings of Song'', fairies don't travel to a separate reality, and they don't perceive any supernatural beings (except other fairies like themselves), but otherwise there are only a few limits to where they can go and what they can see. So there are at least three reasons for religious conservatives to be against flying: it's a transcendent experience that doesn't correspond to their own religion, it's against their desire to control other people's access to information in general, and it's a threat to their own personal privacy.

=== a collect call from New York ===

Throughout the 20th century there was a large price difference between local and long-distance calling, so {{wp|Collect call|calling collect}} would be a typical way for someone to call home from another state without affecting their phone bill. This is now rare since many phone providers no longer have a separate long-distance rate.

=== the Iowa Stamp Tax ===

A {{wp|Stamp duty|stamp tax}} is a tax on property purchases and other transactions, typically at the state level in the US.

=== Otto Hassler Park ===

If this is a historical reference, it would be a misspelling of {{wp|Otto Haesler}} (1880-1962), a German architect best known for social housing. There would be no obvious connection to this novel or to Disch's life, so it may be that this is just a random fictional name; Hassler, Haesler, Haessler, etc. would be plausible German names to find in Iowa.

=== to help him take up his indenture ===

This is only briefly mentioned in connection with Daniel's father's dentistry career; it's unclear what the terms are of this contract, whether it is more like an apprenticeship or {{wp|indentured servitude}}, but a later reference to him paying off his "debt to the county" indicates that there's overlap between the government and the private sector in this system, consistent with how capitalism in Iowa has taken a neo-feudal direction.

=== fans whirling everywhere you went ===

The way that fans and other spinning objects can harm fairies is described by Barbara Steiner [[#The faster I let myself spin the more exciting|later in chapter 4]].

== Chapter 2 ==

=== He listened to Eugene Mueller's stories ===

Disch later mentioned a childhood friend who may have been the model for the character of Eugene, in terms of his taking credit for plots that were really from old stories: "Bruce Burton, when we were both paperboys in Fairmont ... there were only the two of us [sharing stories] (unless one counts the storylines he was lifting, unbeknownst to me, from ''{{wp|Analog Science Fiction and Fact|Astounding}}'')."<ref>{{cite article|author=Disch, Thomas M.|date=May 8, 2006|title=Story tag|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140130091852/tomsdisch.livejournal.com/5997.html|publication=Endzone}} {{InternetArchive|date=January 30, 2014}} This title of this brief blog post referred to the elaborations that some readers had added in comments to his brief story idea about a vengeful chipmunk. (See [[Thomas M. Disch#cite_note-note-endzone-1|note about ''Endzone'']])</ref>

=== bowdlerized editions of ''Frankenstein'' and ''The War of the Worlds'' ===

{{wp|Expurgation|Bowdlerization}} refers generally to creating censored versions of books or other art. Fantasy literature has always been a common target of censorship. ''Frankenstein'' is an unusual case in that the best-known version of the novel, the 1831 edition, contained changes by the author that some have described as self-censorship to appease Victorian sensibilities (although the differences between the 1818 and 1831 editions are more complex)—but any version of ''Frankenstein'' would be problematic for fundamentalist Christians due to its basic premise.

As for why ''The War of the Worlds'', commonly thought of as a thrilling alien invasion adventure, would offend religious conservatives: besides H.G. Wells being famously an atheist, the novel's narrator repeatedly brings up evolution.<ref>{{cite book|author=McLean, Steven|date=2009|title=The Early Fiction of H.G. Wells: Fantasies of Science|url=https://link.springer.com/book/10.1057/9780230236639|publisher=Palgrave Macmillan|isbn=978-0-230-53562-6}}</ref>

=== their own artless Grand Guignol ===

[[File:Grand-guignol-1928.jpg|thumb|right|300px|''The Man Who Killed Death'', 1928]] This could refer literally to the style of horror theater made famous by the {{wp|Grand Guignol|Grand-Guignol}}, or more generally to any kind of horror-inspired bad-taste make-believe that a 14-year-old would enjoy.

=== a book of speeches by Herbert Hoover ===

Hoover remains the only US President to be born in Iowa.

=== destroyed most of Tel Aviv ===

There are just enough references to non-US places in the novel to establish that some of them have been ruined by war or terrorism, but that this was not a global disaster; Cairo and Tehran, for instance, are still vacation destinations (chapter 10), as is Rome although other parts of Italy have been bombed (chapter 11), and Switzerland seems fine (chapter 5).

=== Old Black Joe ===

An 1860 {{wp|Old Black Joe|Stephen Foster song}}. Foster is commonly thought of in connection with blackface minstrelsy, which is very relevant to this book. "Old Black Joe" is a choice that makes sense here as something a teacher might have picked: while it romanticizes Southern slaveholding culture like other Foster songs, it has more plausible deniability due to not being written in dialect.

=== undergoders .... they practically ran Iowa ===

The reason that the far-right evangelicals who are so prominent in Daniel's world are called "undergoders" is never spelled out, but to someone of Disch's generation it would clearly refer to the controversy over the wording of the {{wp|Pledge of Allegiance}}. "One nation" was changed to "One nation, under God" in 1954, as part of a Cold War trend of emphasizing American piety in contrast to the Soviets. This was clearly at odds with separation of church and state, and even though no legal challenge was made on that basis until {{wp|Elk Grove Unified School District v. Newdow|2000}}, it was a common focus of arguments about the overlap between religion and political conservatism—and a convenient phrase for the religious right to rally around.

Woven throughout this chapter, there are references to state/federal conflicts, Supreme Court decisions, etc., to establish what kind of dystopia Daniel is living in: not a nationwide theocracy like ''The Handmaid's Tale'', but something more contiguous with US history so far. Most of the repression is happening at the state level, and wasn't established by a coup, but by the same processes as right-wing politics today: a coalition of interests including sincere religious zealots, corrupt politicians, and businessmen who have no real ideology but are comfortable in an authoritarian setting. The undergoders don't make up a majority in Iowa, and haven't required everyone to adopt their own very strict lifestyle ("it was impossible to pretend to be an undergoder since it involved giving up almost anything you might enjoy")—but they have an outsize influence because they're so prominent in the agricultural industry, where the state's main economic power is.

The novel doesn't say exactly which states are dominated by undergoders, just that it's most of "the Farm Belt", which could refer to any subset of Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, and Ohio. In chapter 3 we see that at least some of Iowa's neighbor states, like Minnesota, have managed not to go this way.

=== Three days after Governor Brewster vetoed this law his only daughter was shot at ===

Besides being another reminder that the government hasn't uniformly fallen in line, this is an example of the other traditional instrument of local right-wing power: anonymous violence by individuals. You could call this stochastic terrorism, or just the kind of thing that the KKK and similar groups have always done; in many ways the undergoder regime in the Farm Belt states operates very much like the deep South in the 1950s and '60s, where authoritarianism existed on both formal and informal levels.

=== it was as though civilization had ground to a halt ===

To American readers in 1979, the fuel crisis depicted here would feel very timely: oil production dropped {{wp|1979 oil crisis|in that year}} for several reasons, and even though the impact of this on the US was not as dramatic as expected, it brought back bad memories of the much more severe {{wp|1973 oil crisis}} when Americans had experienced rationing for the first time since World War Two.

Much as in ''[[334]]'', the theme of American decline in ''On Wings of Song'', and the idea that any serious lowering of the familiar standard of middle-class comfort would be a harbinger of the collapse of civilization, are rooted in feelings that were very common in the 1970s across the political spectrum. The rise of Ronald Reagan—already clearly in progress when this book was written—was based on the premise that economic problems in America, and social unrest in general, were due to having strayed from old-fashioned values and free-market capitalism.

=== The real aristocracy of Iowa, the farmers ===

The idea that the "farmers" are all undergoders living a strict religious life is not quite right, but from the limited perspective of Daniel and his family, knowing only the farmers in and around Amesville, it makes sense that it would seem that way. Later in chapter 5 we'll see a different side of the aristocracy: agribusiness tycoons who live in secular luxury.

=== copies of ''The Star-Tribune'' ===

The ''Minneapolis Star-Tribune'' (renamed ''{{wp|Minnesota Star Tribune}}'' in 2024) is a real newspaper, although in 1979 this was a slightly ahead-of-its-time reference because the ''Star'' and the ''Tribune'' were technically still two separate papers owned by the same company.

Disch said of his childhood in {{wp|Fairmont, Minnesota}} (where he lived during grade school and middle school, before the family moved back to Minneapolis): "[F]rom age nine years onwards, I began to earn my living, delivering the ''Minneapolis Star'' and the ''Tribune'' to those more cosmopolitan folks not content with Fairmont's own ''[https://www.fairmontsentinel.com/ Sentinel]''."{{ref Disch autobio}}

== Chapter 3 ==

=== the Twin Cities were Sodom and Gomorrah ===

While there are many twin cities around the world, in the Midwest this exclusively means Minneapolis and St. Paul. Since the undergoders in this future have not managed to dominate Minnesota like Iowa, these are the nearest examples of urban decadence.

Calling {{wp|Sodom and Gomorrah}} "twin cities" is not original to Disch—they are often described that way, but the Bible really says nothing about them having any relationship to each other, just that they were in the same general part of the world (the Dead Sea plain), along with three other cities that may or may not (depending on which texts you read) have met the same fate.

=== they rode their bikes north as far as U.S. 18 ... Albert Lea to Minneapolis ===

[[File:Iowa-to-MN.jpg|thumb|right|350px|Getting from Amesville to Minneapolis]] Route 18 is about 25 miles from the Iowa-Minnesota border. For what it's worth, this may help to narrow down where the fictional Amesville might be. If you headed straight north from Fort Dodge, route 18 would be about 40 miles away—and Amesville is supposed to be 40 miles from Fort Dodge. So, unless the boys took either a very long bike ride or a very short one, they probably started somewhere northwest or northeast of Fort Dodge, like where the real villages of West Bend and Corwith are. This doesn't really matter except to emphasize that Daniel lives in a very rural area.

=== urging the enactment of the Twenty-Eighth Amendment ===

This was mentioned earlier in chapter 2 as "the national Anti-Flight Amendment."

=== ''Gold-Diggers of 1984'' ===

This is a reference to the movie musicals ''{{wp|Gold Diggers of 1933}}'', ''{{wp|Gold Diggers of 1935}}'', and ''{{wp|Gold Diggers of 1937}}'', which are all vehicles for elaborate Busby Berkeley numbers. They are loosely derived from the 1919 play ''{{wp|The Gold Diggers (1919 play)|The Gold Diggers}}'' in the sense that all of their plots involve women marrying rich men; despite the negative connotation of "gold-diggers", the women always succeed in doing so and it's a happy ending.

[[File:Gold-diggers-of-1933.jpg|thumb|left|350px|''Gold Diggers of 1933'']] The years in the titles are the years that those movies were made... so is this implying that ''On Wings of Song'' actually takes place in the '80s? Even though no year is ever given for this near-future story, everything else about the setting makes that unlikely; these political and social changes did not happen in just a few years. So the movie may have come from a wave of '80s nostalgia—not unlike the one we've been undergoing in real life for a while now, and, like the current one, of course it includes ridiculous anachronisms like a flight apparatus.

=== a comic tap dance in black face ===

This would be no surprise at any point in the first half of the 20th century, but casually mentioning its presence in a near-future movie is a jarring effect (as with the earlier reference to "Old Black Joe"), and a reminder that race is something that hasn't really come up at all in Daniel's homogenous upbringing. It won't be until Part Three that we learn the fairly disturbing details of how ideas about skin color have developed in other parts of America.

=== north to the icebergs of Baffin Island ===

The location of {{wp|Baffin Island}} makes it a logical ending point if you traveled due north from the American Midwest and kept going.

=== I DON'T CARE IF THE SUN DON'T SHINE. Or: GIVE US FIVE MINUTES MORE ===

It's deliberately unclear what these could mean as political protest slogans, but in this book it's probably not a coincidence that {{wp|I Don't Care If the Sun Don't Shine|"I Don't Care If the Sun Don't Shine"}} and {{wp|Five Minutes More|"Five Minutes More"}} are the names of mid-20th-century pop songs. The lyrics of [https://genius.com/Elvis-presley-i-dont-care-if-the-sun-dont-shine-lyrics the first one] don't seem to have any special relevance, but the line "you can sleep late" in the [https://genius.com/Frank-sinatra-five-minutes-more-lyrics second one] may take on a sadder meaning after the events of Chapter 10.

=== the opposing lawyer raised an objection ===

Another example of the kind of soft authoritarianism that distinguishes Amesville from other literary dystopias: all of the legal structures that we have today still exist in the future, they're just applied even less fairly than before.

== Chapter 4 ==

=== the compound at Spirit Lake ===

[[File:Spirit-lake-map.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Where the prison is, more or less]] Spirit Lake or {{wp|Big Spirit Lake}} is one of the "Iowa Great Lakes" that form a chain from Minnesota to northwestern Iowa; there's also a {{wp|Spirit Lake, Iowa|small town}} in that area with the same name, although the town is on the shore of the next lake down, Lake Okoboji.

The latter area was the site of the last violent attack by Sioux on US settlers in Iowa (in reprisal for various abuses by the settlers and the federal government), after which the state and federal governments became even more aggressive in driving out the Native population. These events took on legendary stature in the Midwest,<ref>{{cite book|author=Teakle, Thomas|title=The Spirit Lake Massacre|url=https://gutenberg.org/cache/epub/42074/pg42074-images.html|location=Cedar Rapids|publisher=Torch Press|date=1918}}</ref> especially since they included the capture and ransom of a white woman who then wrote a memoir.<ref>{{cite article|author=Prout, Katie|title=A History of Violence: Walking the Blood-Soaked Shores of Spirit Lake|url=https://lithub.com/crime-or-conflict-walking-the-blood-soaked-shores-of-spirit-lake/|publication=Literary Hub|date=March 1, 2017|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref>

All of this makes it a perversely appropriate location for an authoritarian regime with an ultra-American ideology to establish a prison. The fact that it's right at the edge of Iowa, close to a non-undergoder state, just emphasizes how sure the authorities are that escape is impossible.

=== this scene was rotated through ninety degrees and the flowing river became a wall ===

This echoes a line in ''[[Camp Concentration]]'', from a description of the mad scientist Dr. Skilliman's various interests:

<blockquote>He was trying to analyze the peculiar fascination of lakes, reservoirs, and suchlike large, standing bodies of water. He observed that it is only in these that nature presents us with the spectacle of the Euclidean plane stretching on without apparent limit. It represents that final submission to the law of gravity that is always at work on our cell tissues. From this he went on to observe that the great achievement of architecture is simply to take the notion of the Euclidean plane and stand it on its edge. A wall is such an impressive phenomenon because it is a body of water... stood on its side.</blockquote>

=== the P-W lozenge ===

The idea of prisoners having a remote-controlled bomb on or in their bodies was fairly popular in late 20th century science fiction. Often this was in the form of an explosive collar around the neck—which has an obvious narrative advantage in movies, since it's always visible and can have an ominous flashing light on it; examples include ''The Running Man'' (1987), ''Wedlock'' (1991), and ''Battlefield Earth'' (2000). Less visibly but more ickily, the bomb might be implanted inside someone's neck or head as in ''Escape from New York'' (1981).

[[File:Fortress.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Christopher Lambert in ''Fortress'']] I'm not sure whether ''On Wings of Song'' is the earliest example, but I'm fairly sure that this and the movie ''[https://letterboxd.com/hob/film/fortress-1992/ Fortress]'' (1992) are the only ones where you have to ''swallow'' the bomb—and that this was the first fictional depiction of a prison where instead of the bomb being the last-ditch mechanism to prevent escape, it's the only mechanism. In keeping with 1970s/80s conservative economic ideology, the Spirit Lake prison runs on an extreme laissez-faire model with basically no staff.

=== Basques in Spain, Jews in Russia, the Irish in England ... the decimation of Palestinians ===

As before, mentions of any society outside of the US are rare and brief, but this passage is an efficient and chilling way to convey that the Iowa style of authoritarianism is just one of many; every industrialized society adapts tools of control for its own purposes. Disch mentions that the US—unlike Spain, Russia, England, and Israel—only applies this technology within prisons and ''not'' to large groups of "potentially dissident civilians," but that doesn't make the situation in Iowa any less horrible, just different, in keeping with the overall less-centralized nature of the repression there.

=== Reverend Van Dyke ... head of Marble Collegiate Church ===

{{wp|Marble Collegiate Church|Marble Collegiate}} is a historic church in Manhattan which was famously associated with {{wp|Norman Vincent Peale}}. Peale's combination of feel-good self-help philosophy and chumminess with right-wing politicians makes him a clear model for Van Dyke.

=== to ''pretend'' to be good, devout, and faithful .... Eventually, saying makes it so ===

This theme will recur throughout the book—sometimes spelled out, other times [[On Wings of Song/Part Three#"I Whistle a Happy Tune"|more indirectly]].

=== Logomachies ===

Arguments about words.

=== his last year's homeroom teacher, Mrs. Norberg ===

Mrs. Norberg and her opinions will be described in much more detail in Chapter 6.

=== the breeding of a specially mutated form of termite ===

The idea that termites could become a major food source in the future has been around for a long time, mainly because people were already eating them.<ref>{{cite article|author=Reis de Figueirêdo, Vasconcellos, Policarpo, & Nóbrega Alves|title=Edible and medicinal termites: a global overview|url=https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4427943/|publication=Journal of Ethnobiology and Ethnomedicine|date=April 30, 2015|pub-date=Vol. 11, No. 29}}</ref> Academic discussion of the subject has increased in the 21st century due to increasing awareness of how agriculture suffers from climate change and contributes to it; unsurprisingly, as with everything related to climate change, this has also become the subject of right-wing conspiracy theories.<ref>{{cite article|author=Jingnan, Huo|title=From 4chan to international politics, a bug-eating conspiracy theory goes mainstream|url=https://www.npr.org/2023/03/31/1166649732/conspiracy-theory-eating-bugs-4chan|publication=All Things Considered|date=March 31, 2023|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref>

It's a matter of opinion whether Disch's portrayal of termite processing on an industrial scale is the grossest version of a food factory in science fiction (that honor might go to the giant underground chicken-heart blob in ''{{wp|The Space Merchants}}''), but it's one of the more plausible ones.

=== Beware of dogs, beware of evil workers ===

From [https://biblehub.com/kjv/philippians/3.htm Philippians 3:2-4, King James Version].

This is an example of Disch doing something he also [[334/334/Part_III#18._The_New_American_Catholic_Bible|did]] [[334/334/Part_VI#38._Father_Charmain|twice]] in ''334'': having a character land on a supposedly random Bible verse, when it's really the author being mischievous. Here Daniel has picked one of the most confusing Biblical passages that a casual reader could've possibly found—both because of the peculiar translation (the King James version uses the word "concision" in a way that I'm not sure it was ever used anywhere else in English literature), and because the meaning is so obscure without the context (the apostle Paul is ranting against other Christian factions of his time). Some [https://biblehub.com/nasb_/philippians/3.htm other translations] are a bit clearer, but only a bit.

The specific content of the passage may not be very important, but here's my best attempt to summarize it. After some general insults about "dogs" and "evil workers", Paul specifically complains about Christians who believe that circumcision and other traditional Jewish practices should remain important in their faith. He argues instead that "circumcision" should now be thought of as a spiritual condition, a matter of having the right faith—as the people in his own faction do. But as sort of a hedge and/or brag, he adds that if traditional circumcision is so important, i.e. if you really insist on having "confidence in the flesh", then he has that too since he was physically circumcised—and, since he used to be a very traditional Pharisee, maybe it should even count extra for him.

=== the windows were all sealed tight ===

Here we get one more bit of exposition about the rules of flying: fairies can travel effortlessly by willpower, but they can't go through solid objects.

=== The faster I let myself spin the more exciting ===

[[File:OWOS-cover-fsf.jpg|thumb|left|300px|Cover art by Ed Emshwiller]] And finally, the most important rule for fairies: if you go too close to any spinning thing, you'll be entranced and stuck there forever. The nature of a "fairy-trap" was left intentionally vague before, but in hindsight, every electric fan that we've heard about being used for this purpose indicates someone's willingness to cause someone else to die in a coma.

The idea that a particular physical structure could entice a disembodied spirit also appears in Disch's ''[[The Businessman#Chapter 43|The Businessman]]'', where Giselle's ghost is mystically intoxicated by the pattern on a potholder.

Ed Emshwiller's cover painting for ''The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction'' February 1979 issue—where the first part of ''On Wings of Song'' appeared—shows a group of ethereal figures drifting toward an object that is just abstract enough that if you don't yet know the story, you could easily assume it's some sort of alien portal, but if you do know, it's clearly a tabletop electric fan.

=== the one about purity of heart being to will one thing ===

Van Dyke got this from [https://www.religion-online.org/book/purity-of-heart-is-to-will-one-thing/ Kierkegaard].

=== to live at the end of such a civilization ===

Here I think ''On Wings of Song'' is echoing not just a general 1970s fear of American decline, but the specific angle that Disch explored in ''[[334]]'': the psychological ''appeal'' of imagining that you're in a crumbling empire, at least if you're a relatively privileged person.

=== Cairo and Bombay for the National Council of Churches' Triage Committee ===

Triage is the process of deciding who to help first in an emergency, and who to immediately give up on.

=== run into an iceberg and sink, like ... the lost city of Brasilia ===

[[File:Vila-amaury-1.jpeg|thumb|right|300px|Vila Amaury, 1959]][[File:Vila-amaury-2.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Vila Amaury, 2010]] This condensed metaphor might refer to Vila Amaury, the lost city ''within'' the city of Brasilia. It makes sense for Van Dyke to see Brasilia as an example of "the Civilization of the Business Man": it was a heavily planned city built by technocrats in relatively recent history, and in the process of its creation, Vila Amaury was created as a company shanty-town to house 15,000 migrant workers—who were then displaced because the plan for Brasilia included an artificial lake, created by the Lago Paranoá dam, entirely submerging the site of the town.<ref>{{cite article|author=Basques, Victoria|title=Vila Amaury, uma cidade submersa|url=https://medium.com/esquinaonline/vila-amaury-uma-cidade-submersa-9b3e48dc8d12|publication=Esquina On-line|date=November 14, 2018|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref>

=== you are a punk singer ===

Disch probably was not thinking of punk rock, which was still fairly new at the time, but he's using the word in the same sense that gave punk rock its name: unskilled, no good, lowlife. Not coincidentally, it's also an old derogatory word for a young man who is used for sex, especially in prison.

=== I am the captain of the Pinafore ===

From ''{{wp|H.M.S. Pinafore}}'' by Gilbert & Sullivan (1878). This is a call-and-response song, and Daniel is singing both parts, a little inaccurately; the actual lines are:

: CAPTAIN: I am the Captain of the Pinafore;
: CREW: And a right good captain, too!
: CAPTAIN: You're very, very good,
: And be it understood,
: I command a right good crew.

([https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OqWNmTXhI34 Recording of a performance by the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company, 1959])

== Footnotes ==
<references/>

{{On Wings of Song nav}}

On Wings of Song/Part Three

2025-11-25T02:56:31Z

Eb: /* I'm a temp myself */

{{#addbodyclass: tiled-toc}}

{{SummaryCollapsed |
On his own in New York City for years, with Boa still in a coma, Daniel lives as a hustler—under a false name, to avoid being tracked down by Grandison. Social and economic turmoil make it hard to survive in the city without wealthy friends; Daniel is helped by Boa's aunt, who keeps his secret and finds him a home with the eccentric Mrs. Schiff, but he runs out of options and signs himself over to a humiliating life with a sugar daddy, the great singer Ernesto Rey. With Rey's help he finally becomes a singer—still unable to fly. When Boa unexpectedly returns to her body (briefly, before leaving again for good), Grandison finds them, bringing media attention that accelerates Daniel's career. Daniel debuts his greatest performance, during which he will either fly or pretend to fly; we'll never know which, as death comes for him in the form of a zealot from his past.
}}

== Chapter 11 ==

=== I'm a temp myself ===

In ''[[334]]'', Disch used "temps" somewhat vaguely to describe people who had nowhere to live, having apparently fallen through the cracks in the city's welfare system, which otherwise generally provides at least basic necessities. Here, it seems to mean something more like being an immigrant who's still waiting for legal status, able to work to some degree but not much else. The harsher future New York in ''On Wings of Song'' either never had the socialist features of ''334'', or abandoned them after the series of economic and social injuries that are mentioned later in the chapter, so being a legal resident doesn't really get you much anyway except being allowed to rent an apartment.

=== Reichian therapist ===

Wilhelm Reich and his acolytes had a high profile in 1970s counterculture, and Disch had some personal experience; see [[334/Everyday Life in the Later Roman Empire#the Lowen School|''334'']].

=== Adonis, Inc., across Seventh Avenue from the doughnut shop ===

<mapframe align="left" text="approaching 7th Ave. from Sheridan Square" width="350" height="300" zoom="19" longitude="-74.002766" latitude="40.733405" /> This is one of the few New York settings in the book that's located very specifically. Daniel stopped for a doughnut on Sheridan Square, which doesn't quite touch 7th Ave. because there's a triangular traffic island with a subway stop in between, at West 4th and Grove. Crossing the avenue would mean that the Adonis gym is on the west side of 7th between Grove and Christopher. This tiny block is best known for the cigar store that was on the corner at Christopher for more than 100 years (last known as Village Cigars, it closed in 2024)—but the neighborhood in general is a historic center of LGBTQ life in Manhattan, especially in the '60s and '70s; the {{wp|Stonewall Inn|Stonewall}} and {{wp|Julius (restaurant)|Julius'}} are close by.<ref>{{cite article|author=Brechtel, Evan|date=November 8, 2018|title=Vibrant Queer Histories: Ever Present in the Village|url=https://www.wussymag.com/all/vibrant-queer-histories-ever-present-in-the-village|publication=Wussy|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref><ref>{{cite article|author=Weigle, Richard Eric|title=Pre-AIDS Greenwich Village: A Time Of 'Free Love', Open Sex And Tolerance|date|October 3, 2017|url=https://imfromdriftwood.com/story/pre-aids-greenwich-village-a-time-of-free-love-open-sex-and-tolerance/|publication=I'm From Driftwood: The LGBTQIA+ Story Archive|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref>

=== New York had reduced its (legal) population to two and a half million ===

Combined with the other 2.5 million who are "temps", this would make the city smaller than it had been since about 1910.

=== the Sheldonian, on Broadway at west 78th ===

This fictional welfare hotel is, I suspect, ironically named after the {{wp|Sheldonian Theatre}} in Oxford, a famous centuries-old university building used for music and theater performances.

=== Teatro Metastasio ===

Named after the 18th-century librettist {{wp|Pietro Metastasio}}—or rather, after his pseudonym, since he was born Pietro Trapassi. It seems appropriate that a place with so much significance in Daniel's new life is named after a pseudonym, especially one whose literal meaning—more or less a Greek translation of "Trapassi"—refers to movement or transition (either in a positive sense or, as in {{wp|Metastasis|medical usage}}, not so much).

=== the bel canto revival ===

Whether this future revival would count as the first one, or the latest of several, depends on what exactly is being revived.

To an opera lover in Disch's time, "the bel canto revival" would mean the surge of attention after World War Two—as seen for instance in the career of Maria Callas—toward certain 18th and early 19th century composers, especially Rossini, Bellini, and Donazetti. Very generally, the term has been used to describe both a particular vocal style, characterized by smooth and clear execution of long melodic passages, and the way that composers tended to write such passages during the time when that style was especially popular.<ref>{{cite article|author=Tommasini, Anthony|title=Bel Canto: Audiences Love It, but What Is it?|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/30/arts/music/30tomm.html|publication=New York Times|date=November 28, 2008}}</ref>

Proponents sometimes referred to the heyday of the bel canto style as a "golden age"—and the idea that this type of agile delivery of a solo aria was inherently more beautiful, or a truer expression of emotion, or showed a purer devotion to musical skill due to its technical qualities, has some obvious relevance to a story where "flying" depends on achieving a kind of ideal aesthetic harmony within the brain. The early 20th century composer and teacher Giulio Silva described the evolution of bel canto as a progress toward "true and lofty art", where expressiveness and technique were in proper balance: "The aim of the art of singing is to make of the human voice a potent agent of musical emotion, for when a human being is musically moved, he feels and communicates his emotion more strongly than in his usual psychological state."<ref>{{cite article|author=Silva, Giulio|date=1922|translator=Theodore Baker|title=The Beginnings of the Art of 'Bel Canto': Remarks on the Critical History of Singing|url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/737912?seq=6|publication=The Musical Quarterly|pub-date=Vol. 8, No. 1}}</ref>

[[File:Jacopo_amigoni,_il_cantante_farinelli_con_amici,_1750-52_circa.JPG|thumb|right|400px|The 18th century castrato singer {{wp|Farinelli}}; standing next to him is Metastasio]] Silva mentioned several factors in that evolution, including overall changes in how European music treated melody and rhythm, developments in musical education, the Italian language, and competitive innovation during the Renaissance. One that he did not mention, which other historians considered even more important, was the prominence in 18th century Italian opera of [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Castrato castrati]. The extreme value placed on male singers who had had orchiectomies as children was driven by a combination of all the things that drive people in ''On Wings of Song'': religious orthodoxy (female singers being excluded from sacred music), obsessive pursuit of an aesthetic ideal (castrati had a specific vocal timbre different from any other adults), and economic inequality (more and more parents subjected their children to this, and some children even allegedly volunteered, hoping for a career in music).<ref>{{cite book|author=Celletti, Rodolfo|translator=Frederick Fuller|title=A history of bel canto|url=https://archive.org/details/historyofbelcant0000cell/mode/2up|location=Oxford|publisher=Clarendon Press|date=1991|isbn=0193132095}} Celletti dispassionately observes that "The castrato has to be seen as a 'singing machine' constructed simply and solely by making use of the laws of biology."</ref> Also, anyone whose life had been so irrevocably changed for the sake of being the best possible singer, and who would be treated as a social pariah in any other context, had a very high incentive to devote himself to his craft to the exclusion of all else—so ideas about castrati having inherently superior voices, stronger lungs, etc., may have been partly self-fulfilling ones. Castrati became prominent not only as performers but as teachers of vocal technique, who were so central to the bel canto tradition that when they started to die off during the 19th century, some felt that students who had not learned from castrati could not really be part of that tradition.<ref>{{cite article|author=Robertson-Kirkland, Brianna|title=The Silencing of Bel Canto|date=2013|url=https://www.gla.ac.uk/media/Media_307347_smxx.pdf|publication=Esharp|pub-date=Vol. 21, No. 7}}</ref>

So, in the context of this novel, it's important that "the bel canto revival" means not only a certain kind of music becoming popular again, but also the return of a kind of sacrifice that would have been considered barbaric in our time—one that blurs the line between self-sacrifice and abuse, as anything involving money can do.

=== William Street checkpoint ===

[[File:OWOS-lower-manhattan.jpg|thumb|left|400px|Lower Manhattan as it is today, with dots for some of the expensive housing south of Wall. The area highlighted in yellow has been closed to traffic since 2001.]] William Street runs roughly north-south through the financial district, and crosses Wall Street one block away from the New York Stock Exchange. We're told that "the whole Wall Street area" is a high-security gated community; probably this means Daniel is heading south on William, and everything south of Wall Street would normally be off limits to him. In the present day, quite a few luxury apartment complexes are in that area.

The origin of {{wp|Wall Street}}'s name is just what it sounds like: it was the northern wall of a Dutch colony that occupied the south end of the island. The future elite have basically recreated that situation.

=== phoneys ===

Out of the novel's relatively few visibly futuristic touches, this may be the most deliberately uncomfortable: white urbanites have started making themselves look Black—not exactly to fool anyone, but out of some mixture of ironic fashion, boredom, and paranoia about the fact that whites have become a minority group in the city.

The idea of doing this via a medical technique was probably inspired by John Howard Griffin's notorious work of undercover journalism ''Black Like Me'' (1961) (and a similar project by Ray Sprigle in 1948). But whereas Griffin's purpose was to highlight the oppression of African-Americans in the South, Disch's "phonies" have an opposite view, since they believe—or at least act like they believe—that it's now easier to get ahead with dark skin.

Whether that's actually true in the novel is less clear. Disch's narration mentions that in some cities Black people have "begun to reap some of the political and social advantages of their majority status"—which has happened to some degree in the real world in some US cities that are now majority-Black. Of course, in the real world, that only meant that they got somewhere closer to parity, and it certainly didn't cause white residents to cling ''less'' to whiteness; racists simply moved to the suburbs even faster. But at the same time, the novel tells us (in the discussion of castrato singers) that the poorest people, who would sacrifice the most for a better life, are still generally not white. The status anxiety that drives the "phoneys" is the kind that affects people who were born into middle-class privilege—even if, like some of Daniel's peers, they've fallen on hard times since then—rather than people who grew up in an underclass.

Disch said of his own performing experience as a teenager:

<blockquote>Happily I wasn't a ''faux noir''. But in a way I was, because I was a supernumerary at the Met ... In ''Spartacus'' I was a black slave, in body paint. And I was also a black slave, face paint only, in ''Don Giovanni''.<ref name="atkins-interview">{{cite article|author=Atkins, Elliot|date=September 11, 1999|title=New York Gothic|publication=Foundation|pub-date=#80, Autumn 2000}} Cited by [https://web.archive.org/web/20180714223441/http://www.ukjarry1.talktalk.net/owos.htm Matthew Davis].</ref></blockquote>

(Note: in 1979, "African-American" was not yet common usage, and "black" or "Black" was standard—with no clear consensus as to whether it should be capitalized or not. Disch in this book sometimes uses "black" as a noun rather than "black person", which is jarring, certainly wouldn't be considered respectful today, and wasn't great in 1979 either, but was fairly typical for white writers.)

=== You didn't say what the position was ===

Daniel is understandably dismayed at being offered an usher job when he had imagined a singing role in the chorus, but another option that's never mentioned in this scene is the kind of {{wp|Supernumerary actor|supernumerary}} work that Disch had done in his youth—a non-singing (and usually non-speaking) background role. Soon after moving to New York at age 17, Disch lived with several dancers and got into this work through a friend of theirs.{{ref Disch autobio}} However, "super" work was so non-lucrative that Disch still needed two other jobs, so Daniel might not have been interested anyway.

=== We're doing ''Demofoönte'' ===

{{wp|Demofonte|That title}} could refer to any of more than 70 different operas that are all based on the same libretto by Metastasio. We're told a little later that what they're doing is "a pastiche of four composers' settings" of the libretto, but (unlike pretty much all of the other opera references in the book) Disch doesn't bother to name any of the composers, which suggests that he just doesn't like ''any'' of those operas.

=== claques ===

In 19th century theater and opera, claques were groups of paid audience members, planted to give the illusion of spontaneous applause for a particular show or performer (or, sometimes, to boo them).

=== Bladebridge ... had sung neither wisely nor too well ===

In ''Othello'', Act V, Scene 2, Othello—about to kill himself, after having been tricked into murdering his wife—describes his tragic flaw as having "loved not wisely but too well."

=== ''"Casta diva"'' ===

An aria from Bellini's {{wp|Norma (opera)|''Norma''}} (1831).

== Chapter 12 ==

=== at Lieto Fino and La Didone ===

''Lieto fine'' is Italian for a happy ending—a common term in describing 18th century opera. The restaurant's name here is written as "Fino" in every edition of the book I've seen, but given that there are other spelling errors also present in every edition, that's likely just a typo.<ref>Thanks to translator Johanna Bishop for her judgment that "fino" was very unlikely to be meant as a pun—or that if it was, it would be one that only a person not fluent in Italian would try to make.</ref>

The full name of the second restaurant is given later as ''La Didone Abbandonata'': "the abandoned Dido". {{wp|Didone (opera)|''La Didone''}} is a 1640 opera by Cavalli based on a story from the ''Aeneid'', except that when Dido is abandoned, instead of killing herself she finds love.

=== an insanity belt ===

This term is Disch's invention; the more familiar "{{wp|chastity belt}}" is never mentioned. One possible reason is that (in the popular imagination at least) male chastity devices were generally the kind of cage-like things Victorians had proposed for the purpose of keeping boys' hands off of their own genitals—but it's clear from how people talk about the "insanity belt" that it has an even more restrictive design to wall off absolutely everything below the waist, basically an impenetrable rigid diaper.

=== supposedly ad libitum passages of fioratura ===

''Ad libitum'', "as you wish", is what "ad lib" is shortened from. ''Fioratura'' are major embellishments to a melody.

== Chapter 13 ==

=== mignon ... migniard ===

''Mignon'' is French for cute and little. ''Migniard'' is the same but with a suffix that makes it into a noun describing a person, like "cute little [guy]".

=== L'Engouement Noir ===

''Engouement'' means excitement or infatuation—this restaurant's name could be translated as "the black craze", presumably referring to phoneys.

=== Incubus ===

Alicia's nice little dog is named after a type of {{wp|Incubus|sex demon}}. It may be that there is some opera/classical music inside joke here, but I'm not aware of it.

== Chapter 14 ==

=== what was billed as Sarro's ''Achille in Sciro'' ===

''Achille in Sciro'' is another Pietro Metastasio libretto that several composers wrote scores for. In Disch's time, the {{wp|version by Sarro}} was a forgotten work that no one had performed in more than 200 years, so it was plausible that an audience wouldn't know the difference between this and Alicia's score.

== Chapter 15 ==

=== the da Ponte libretto ===

{{wp|Lorenzo Da Ponte}} is probably best known now for his work with Mozart, but ''{{wp|Axur, re d'Ormus}}'' was a Salieri opera, making it a slightly less grandiose choice for Alicia to write her own score for.

== Chapter 16 ==

=== No one was quite sure what marked the commencement of this brighter era ===

In dystopian fiction, it's rare for anything to improve without it being ascribed to some particular dramatic event; that's another way that ''On Wings of Song'' doesn't follow familiar genre patterns, as we see the country taking a more liberal direction, at both state and federal levels, for no clear reason except that time has passed. There's a hint here that some kind of political conflict may have happened behind the scenes ("a lot of problems had disappeared from the headlines along with a number of people"), but we never learn more about that—which is consistent with the novel's point of view being mainly limited to what Daniel, and other people who aren't very concerned with the big picture, would know.

Besides flight being decriminalized in ''some'' of the Farm Belt, we'll hear a few more details in the epilogue: Amesville now has a non-Republican mayor, and Midwestern teenagers have started adopting "phoney" style for apparently more idealistic reasons than what we saw in New York (Daniel's brother-in-law's girlfriend calls it "an affirmation"). Whether those are meaningful developments or not, the culture has clearly moved on since Daniel's childhood—but not uniformly, since the undergoders are still around and hoping to regain influence. This fits with Disch's statements about how science fiction relates to time, and to his own experience:

<blockquote>It's either about the present or about the historically accessible past. The plot I wanted for ''On Wings of Song'' was ... someone learning to become an artist over an historical period. In the twentieth century, you can't write about a span of twenty years and not have the historical panorama it's set against change—it just does. In my own lifetime it's changed a whole lot. So the historical pattern of ''On Wings of Song'' mirrors my growing up from 1952 to 1975 ... At the same time ... I was perfectly aware that I was portraying a future that I could see happening out of the present. History has its cycles, and one of the basic cycles is that it alternates between liberation and oppression.<ref>{{cite article|author=Galbraith, David, & Wilson, Alexander|date=July 1980|title=Taking Flight with Thomas Disch|publication=The Body Politic|pub-date=December 1981}} Cited by [https://web.archive.org/web/20180714223441/http://www.ukjarry1.talktalk.net/owos.htm Matthew Davis].</ref></blockquote>

=== the Puritan Renewal League .... pledging allegiance to a flag ===

The Pledge of Allegiance is likely what [[On Wings of Song/Part One#undergoders .... they practically ran Iowa|gave the undergoders their name]], but we haven't seen the Pledge itself emphasized much so far; it sounds like this latest faction of them has doubled down on it to emphasize their nationalist credentials. This ritual will return in the very last paragraph of the book.

The League's uniform is described as "black stetsons, stiff white collars, red rayon bow-ties, and insignia-blazoned denim jackets." There's an obvious US flag motif in the colors of the last three items—but the ''first'' three would be Nazi colors.

=== all ''Sehnsucht'' and impatience ===

''Sehnsucht'' is yearning, with a lofty spiritual connotation due to its use by German Romantic writers. See Schiller's "Sehnsucht"<ref>{{cite article|author=Schiller, Friedrich|translator=David B. Gosselin|title=Longing|url=https://classicalpoets.org/2018/05/29/a-translation-of-longing-by-friedrich-schiller/|pub-date=2018}}</ref> and Goethe's "Selige Sehnsucht"<ref>{{cite article|author=Goethe, Johann Wolfgang|translator=Emily Ezust|title=Blissful yearning|date=1814|url=https://www.lieder.net/lieder/get_text.html?TextId=6619|publication=LiederNet Archive|pub-date=1995}}</ref>.

=== "I Whistle a Happy Tune" ===

In ''[[The Brave Little Toaster]]'' (written around the same time), we're told that this is [[The Brave Little Toaster#the toaster's own favorite melody, "I Whistle a Happy Tune"|the toaster's favorite song]]. Both there and in ''On Wings of Song'', it's one of many references to the idea of faking it till you make it.

=== a fauvish pastel portrait of Rey in the role of Semiramide ===

Semiramide is the queen of Babylon in the {{wp|Semiramide|Bellini opera}} of the same name.

== Chapter 17 ==

=== Pelion on Ossa! ===

A very melodramatic choice of [https://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/pile+Pelion+on+Ossa reference] to express that Daniel's troubles are even worse than Shelly thought (because he doesn't drink).

=== My dear old Mammy ===

"{{wp|My Mammy}}" (1918) is best known for Al Jolson's several on-screen renditions of it in blackface. The actual content of the song is straightforward: an over-the-top (yet totally nonspecific) praise of the singer's mother, or maybe a substitute {{wp|https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mammy_stereotype|mother figure}}, back in "Alabammy"; this couldn't be further from Daniel's distant and cautious relationship with his mother, and his total lack of nostalgia for home. Jolson's performance style is so manic and gestural that it's hard to imagine how Daniel would go about "exaggerating the body language," but it also has a formality that fits with Daniel's idea of a performance "more like kabuki than schmaltz."

([https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PIaj7FNHnjQ Jolson's "Mammy" scene in ''The Jazz Singer''] and in [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQQL5V3Bi2U ''Rose of Washington Square''])

=== ''"Nun wandre Maria"'' from Wolf's ''Spanisches Liederbuch'' ===

{{wp|https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanisches_Liederbuch_(Wolf)|''Spanisches Liederbuch''}} (1891) is another of this novel's many references to works of poetry set to music. Wolf divided this collection into a "spiritual" half and a "worldly" half; "Nun wandre, Maria" is from the former, an exhortation by Joseph to Mary to keep going till Bethlehem.<ref>{{cite article|author=Heyse, Paul|translator=Peter Low|title=Keep going now, Mary, keep going my dear|date=1852|url=https://www.lieder.net/lieder/get_text.html?TextId=18909|publication=LiederNet Archive|pub-date=2003}}</ref>

== Chapter 18 ==

=== Had Schumann written a violin concerto? ===

He had—{{wp|Violin Concerto (Schumann)|just one}}, which wasn't performed until the 20th century, making it more plausible that Alicia could've overlooked it.

=== ''Actus Tragicus'' ===

A {{wp|Actus Tragicus|Bach cantata}} on the theme of death. The passage Daniel had difficulty with, "Bestelle dein Haus", is named after the Biblical injunction to "Set your house in order" (because you will die).

== Chapter 19 ==

=== the Betti Bailey Memorial Clinic ===

Years ago in Chapter 3, Betti Bailey, star of ''[[On Wings of Song/Part One#Gold-Diggers of 1984|Gold-Diggers of 1984]]'', was still alive and comatose in an L.A. hospital after having "hooked in and taken off" to be a fairy.

== Epilogue ==

=== He'd been called up for National Guard duty ===

Daniel predicted that this could happen to Carl back in chapter 9, when Grandison made the offer of firing Carl for him.

=== ''The Chicken Consubstantial with the Egg'' ===

This is a theology joke: the words {{wp|Consubstantiality|consubstantial}} and {{wp|https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consubstantiation|consubstantiation}} are almost exclusively used in the context of Catholic doctrines about the Trinity and the Eucharist.

=== St. Olaf's College in Mason City ===

There's no such college in Iowa now, but there is a long-standing one {{wp|St. Olaf College|in Minnesota}}.

=== ''a la turca'' march-tune ===

This name for a particular aggressively energetic march style was popularized by Mozart in his {{wp|Piano Sonata No. 11 (Mozart)|Piano Sonata No. 11}}.

If Daniel is following the same set list here that he used in his ABC TV special in chapter 19, then this song probably corresponds to the "recreation of the 'March of the Businessmen' from ''[[On Wings of Song/Part One#Gold-Diggers of 1984|Gold-Diggers of 1984]]''."

=== The dials of the apparatus showed that Daniel was in flight ===

Whether this is entirely a fraud, or is secretly true despite the dials being rigged, is left to the reader's imagination here—but Disch did express his own opinions about it elsewhere, so you should stop reading this if you don't want to know what those were.

In 1984, he addressed it somewhat indirectly:

<blockquote>The ending of ''On Wings of Song'' is positive for me but only if you interpret Daniel's end as a moral triumph according to a certain secularist view of Christianity that the book sets forward in its own pages ... for Daniel to be a kind of exemplary figure of the artist as a kind of secularized figure of Christ. And insofar as he fulfills the Christian paradigm with his last great stage show and his redeeming lie, he's become a figure of the particular ironical Christ that the book has been talking about.<ref>{{cite Disch Edelman}}</ref></blockquote>

His comments in 1999 ended on a blunter note:

<blockquote>In a way it doesn't make any difference, because morally he has done something. In holding faith with Boadicea for so long and in making a career of a singer (of whatever sort) he has met the two major moral challenges of his life. I think that the book does really say ... that there's no afterlife. You can't beat the odds on the grave—everyone dies. There is only art, and that's the transcendence that's there for us in whatever form you want it. And Daniel's had that to the degree that he can. And so, no, he hasn't escaped as a fairy. He was killed before that, and he probably never would have escaped.<ref name="atkins-interview"/></blockquote>

== Footnotes ==
<references/>

{{On Wings of Song nav}}

On Wings of Song/Part Two

2025-07-15T06:02:17Z

Eb: /* Most of the village's former residents lived in Worry now */

{{#addbodyclass: tiled-toc}}

{{SummaryCollapsed |
Boadicea Whiting, returning from a "finishing school" in Europe, meets Daniel after his release from prison. They become lovers, under the approving but manipulative eye of her ultra-wealthy father Grandison who runs a feudal compound near Amesville. After a hasty forced marriage, they plan an overseas honeymoon—stopping first in New York, where they finally get to try a flight apparatus. Daniel can't get into the necessary mental state to fly, but Boa does. Her mind does not return. Watching over her body, Daniel learns that there's been a plane crash and the world now thinks they're both dead.
}}

== Chapter 5 ==

=== Ste. Ursule ===

According to legend {{wp|Saint Ursula|St. Ursula}} was the daughter of a king, making this school's name especially appropriate for Boadicea. In the Catholic Church she is the patron saint of schoolgirls, so there are many schools named after her, but this one is fictional.

=== Consolidated Food Systems ===

The termite-farming company that Daniel worked for during his prison term.

=== Serjeant ... Alethea ===

Boadicea and her brother are named after {{wp|Boudica|an ancient queen}} and {{wp|Serjeant (horse)|a racehorse}}. Alethea's name could refer to any of several British historical figures, but given her father's extremely cynical philosophy, an especially ironic choice would be {{wp|Alethea Lewis}}.

=== Worry ===

The name of Grandison Whiting's neo-feudal estate is never explained, and could be assumed to refer generally to the anxieties that accompany money and power.

However... ''if'' it's a more specific joke or reference that Disch just didn't feel like unpacking (and I have no reason to think so, except that it would've been in character), then one possible candidate would be the saying "Worry is interest paid on trouble before it falls due," commonly misattributed to {{wp|William Ralph Inge}}. Even though Inge wasn't the original author<ref>{{cite article|author=Popik, Barry|title=Worry is interest paid on trouble before it falls due|url=https://barrypopik.com/blog/worry_is_interest_paid_on_trouble_before_it_falls_due|publication=The Big Apple|date=July 4, 2012|accessed=January 25, 2025}} Garson O'Toole at ''[https://quoteinvestigator.com/2024/12/20/worry-debt/ Quote Investigator]'' adds more details; the misattribution was spread by ''Reader's Digest''.</ref>, Disch wouldn't necessarily have known that... and Inge would fit with Whiting's disdain for democracy, praise of inequality, and Anglophilia. The saying itself is normally understood to mean something like "don't bother worrying about things that may never happen"—but a cynical businessman like Whiting assumes trouble ''will'' fall due, and could regard worry as a prudent expense in advance. This is all admittedly a stretch.

=== What Eisenstein had done for Stalin, what Riefenstahl had done for Hitler ===

There's a double irony here: not only Boadicea is comparing her beloved father to Stalin and Hitler, but her metaphor doesn't exactly work even for someone who thinks that's OK. {{wp|Sergei Eisenstein|Eisenstein}} had a complicated relationship with the Soviet government, and when he was commissioned to direct the propaganda film ''October: Ten Days that Shook the World'', he ended up having to drastically re-edit the film to keep Stalin happy—after which the government called his film a failure anyway.<ref>{{cite article|author=Landler, Edward|title='October' Surprise: The Revolution Will be Edited|url=https://cinemontage.org/october-surprisethe-revolution-will-edited/|publication=CineMontage|date=December 8, 2017|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref> {{wp|Triumph of the Will|Riefenstahl}} had much better luck in terms of Hitler's approval of her worshipful film, but ''Triumph of the Will'' was not widely seen in Germany after its original theatrical run, and clips from it were often used outside Germany in ''anti''-Nazi propaganda.

=== Iowa Council of Churches ===

There is an ecumenical {{wp|National Council of Churches}}, and a fundamentalist {{wp|American Council of Churches}}, but there have never been state-level organizations by that name as far as I know; this may be a satirical hint that the undergoders' nationalist pride really only applies to their own state.

=== ''Toora-Loora Turandot'', a weary old Irish musical ===

A cross between Puccini's Orientalist opera ''{{wp|Turandot}}'' (1926) and the faux-Irish song "{{wp|Too Ra Loo Ra Loo Ral|Too-Ra-Loo-Ra-Loo-Ral (That's an Irish Lullaby)}}" (1913).

=== The Elmore Roller-Rink Roadhouse ===

{{wp|Elmore, Minnesota}} is a very small town (slightly larger in 1979, but not much) that is right up against the state border to Iowa—about 30 miles from Disch's childhood home of {{wp|Fairmont, Minnesota|Fairmont}}.

[[File:OWOS-rink-club.jpg|thumb|right|300px|The Rush in Cottage Grove, MN, circa 2007—example of a former roller rink that went through many changes<ref>{{cite article|author=Shaw, Bob|date=February 6, 2015|title=‘The Rush’ is over: Cottage Grove to demolish former nightclub|url=https://www.twincities.com/2015/02/16/the-rush-is-over-cottage-grove-to-demolish-former-nightclub/|publication=Twin Cities Pioneer Press}}</ref>]] The Roadhouse here is described as having once been a roller rink, "long ago", which makes it sound like a reference to a real place Disch had seen; if so, it wasn't in the Elmore area, which as far as I can tell never had enough population to keep such a business active. But roller skating went through multiple periods of great popularity in the Midwest—not only in the disco era, but earlier in the 1880s—and it's natural for any building with a large central space to be repurposed for various uses over the years.<ref>{{cite article|author=Millett, Larry|title=One of the quirkiest buildings in downtown Minneapolis began as a roller rink|url=https://www.startribune.com/one-of-the-quirkiest-buildings-in-downtown-minneapolis-began-as-a-roller-rink/572992342|publication=The Minnesota Star-Tribune|date=November 7, 2020}}</ref><ref>{{cite article|title=Rink History: Minnesota|url=https://rink-history.weebly.com/minnesota.html|publication=International Roller Skating Rink History Foundation|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref>

=== a new polka had started up ===

Both Iowa and Minnesota have long relationships with polka music due to their history of Central European immigration. As a couples dance, polka is a little like a fast-paced waltz but in 2/4 time.<ref>{{cite article|author=March, Rick|date=2015|title=Polka Heartland: Why the Midwest Loves to Polka|url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/26389332?mag=the-rebellious-scandalous-origins-of-polka&seq=1|publication=Wisconsin Magazine of History|pub-date=Vol. 99, No. 1}}</ref>

== Chapter 6 ==

=== vendetta against the A.C.L.U. ===

The {{wp|American Civil Liberties Union}} has a long record of supporting the separation of church and state, most famously by defending the teacher John Scopes for teaching about evolution, but they especially became a target of conservative anger due to their civil rights work and their defense of Vietnam War protesters in the '60s and '70s.

=== the F.D.A., the ''bete noir'' of the Farm Belt ===

The {{wp|Food and Drug Administration}} would presumably be resented by Iowa's agribusiness elite due to its regulatory authority over food products and animal feed.

== Chapter 7 ==

=== Most of the village's former residents lived in Worry now ===

Worry seems to be a cross between several kinds of historical communities: a walled city; a feudal estate, where Grandison Whiting is in effect the local government for the 500 tenants whose land he owns; and the company towns that were common in early 20th century industry.

=== His nose and forehead ... straight out of the most arrogantly lovely Ghirlandaio ===

[[File:Pala degli innocenti, ghirlandaio, autoritratto.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Ghirlandaio, probably, in a detail from ''Adoration of the Magi'' (1488)]] This could be any of the four Ghirlandaio brothers who were Renaissance painters, but probably the most successful one, {{wp|Domenico Ghirlandaio}}. His figures were often portraits of aristocratic patrons placed in roles of religious legend, most of whom were not handsome young men—but the artist also painted his own face on background characters in a few paintings, so Boadicea might be thinking that Daniel looks like Ghirlandaio himself.

=== degrees of bon ton ===

''Bon ton'', literally "good tone": high society style.

=== we began, some twenty years ago, to make the prisons ... less congenial places ===

Probably not even Grandison Whiting really believes that they were ever ''congenial'', but the history of prisons in Iowa did include a series of incremental reforms over the course of the 20th century. Two that might have particularly irritated Whiting: in 1918 Iowa outlawed the practice of leasing prisoners as labor to private industry, and in the 1940s counseling programs were introduced.<ref>{{cite article|author=McKay, Joyce|title=Reforming Prisoners and Prisons: Iowa's State Prisons—The First Hundred Years|url=https://pubs.lib.uiowa.edu/annals-of-iowa/article/4324/galley/113206/view/|publication=Annals of Iowa|date=2001|pub-date=Spring 2001|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref>

Since the novel is deliberately vague about when it's set, here's no indication as to whether "twenty years ago" is in our present, past, or future. In 1979, the incarceration rate had already begun to rise due to the War on Drugs but was nowhere near today's level, and privatized prisons did not yet exist.

== Chapter 8 ==

=== interpretations of a Duparc song ===

Probably {{wp|Henri Duparc (composer)|Henri Duparc}} (1848-1933), who set texts by several Romantic poets to music. One of those was Baudelaire's "L'invitation au voyage" from ''Les fleurs du mal'', a text that is especially appropriate to ''On Wings of Song'' (and also the source of the phrase "luxe, calme et volupté", which Disch referenced in ''[[The Businessman#Chapter 27|The Businessman]]''). One English translation renders part of it as: "Think of the rapture of living together there .... The misty sunlight of those cloudy skies .... There all is order and beauty, luxury, peace and pleasure."<ref>{{cite book|author=Baudelaire, Charles|translator=William Aggeler|date=1857|title=The Flowers of Evil|url=https://fleursdumal.org/poem/148|location=Fresno|publisher=Academy Library Guild|pub-date=1954}}</ref>

=== the great castrato Ernesto Rey ===

This casual mention of a ''living'' opera singer being a castrato won't be elaborated on until [[On Wings of Song/Part Three#the bel canto revival|Part Three]].

=== Raynor Taylor's music was dust from the tomb ===

A {{wp|Raynor Taylor|19th century composer}} who is mainly known for his theatrical work.

== Chapter 9 ==

=== Moussorgsky, who was a civil servant ===

The 19th century Romantic {{wp|Modest Mussorgsky}}, known especially for ''Boris Gudonov'' and ''Night on Bald Mountain''. Whiting (who may or may not know much about music) is oversimplifying the story quite a bit: Mussorgsky worked off and on in government jobs in parallel with his work as a composer, but this arguably did not work out very well for him, as he lost his last job at age 41 due to alcoholism and died a year later.

=== the good life cannot be led for less than ten thousand a year ===

If Whiting means dollars, then the value of US currency has been revised drastically in the future, since even in 1979 $10,000 was a low salary and inflation has only made it lower. But this is probably less meaningful as a number than as a gesture to remind us of the social stratum we're dealing with here. Readers of 19th century English literature will be familiar with statements that some character "has X thousand a year", which refers not to a salary, but to income generated by capital and land—that is, investments and rents from tenants. Grandison is speaking as a member of the landed gentry.

== Chapter 10 ==

=== in the airline's own magazine, an article about trout fishing written by one of the country's top novelists ===

This may be a joke referencing Richard Brautigan's ''{{wp|Trout Fishing in America}}'' (1967), a highly digressive experimental novel that is not especially about trout fishing.

=== He had chosen Mahler's ''Ich bin der Welt abhanden gekommen'' ===

A 1901 Gustav Mahler composition using the text of a [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friedrich_R%C3%BCckert Friedrich Rückert] poem, known in English as "I am lost to the world." In Emily Ezust's [https://www.lieder.net/lieder/get_text.html?TextId=14001 translation], the last lines are "I live alone in my heaven, in my love and my song." ([https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ggLutM-7_Qw Recording of a performance by Elīna Garanča, 2021])

=== his two favorite songs from ''Die Winterreise'' ... a sincere, droopy ''Weltschmerz'' ===

An 1808 {{wp|Winterreise|song cycle}} by Franz Schubert based on poems by {{wp|Wilhelm Müller}}. There's no clue as to which of the 24 songs are Daniel's favorites, but the texts of all of them describe a slow grueling journey shadowed by grief; ''Weltschmerz'', literally "world pain", is a flavor of existential despair popularized by German Romantics. ([https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mXO7wvLgVy0 Recording of a performance by Ian Bostridge, 2009])

=== the oldest cowboy movie ever made ... the massacre on Superstition Mountain ===

This sounds like it has something to do with the {{wp|Lost Dutchman's Gold Mine|Lost Dutchman's Mine}} legend, but the only movie I can think of is ''{{wp|Lust for Gold}}'' (1947), whose plot doesn't match this description.

=== Haydn's ''The Seasons'' ===

An {{wp|The Seasons (Haydn)|1801 oratorio}}. ([https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PurqKfTbSRE Recording of a performance by the London Classical Players, 1982])

== Footnotes ==
<references/>

{{On Wings of Song nav}}

On Wings of Song/Part One

2025-07-15T05:57:43Z

Eb: /* Beware of dogs, beware of evil workers */

{{#addbodyclass: tiled-toc}}

{{SummaryCollapsed |
As a teenager in Amesville, where flying is outlawed and music is barely allowed, Daniel knows there must be more to life than this. A brief dalliance with forbidden activities—distributing a banned newspaper and visiting Minneapolis, with the boy he has an unacknowledged love for—lands him in prison. The eight-month ordeal drastically disillusions him, but also sparks his obsession with singing.
}}

== Chapter 1 ==

=== Amesville, Iowa ===

[[File:Iowa.jpg|thumb|left|400px|The Hawkeye State]] No such town exists, although there is a city of {{wp|Ames, Iowa|Ames}} in Iowa—not far from Des Moines, where Disch was born and lived until age 13. Amesville sounds smaller, and not so close to a big city; in chapter 2 we learn that it's 40 miles from {{wp|Fort Dodge, Iowa|Fort Dodge}}, and several references to Fort Dodge make it sound like that's the next largest town in the area. For more about where Amesville might be, see [[#Chapter 3|Chapter 3]].

=== She would sit watching him ... people shouldn't let fairies into their houses ===

Fairies, as we will learn quickly from context, are the invisible presences of people who are "flying." All other references to fairies in Daniel's childhood are steeped in paranoia about being observed—but his daydreams here are a reminder that being watched over by an unseen dead family member or guardian angel is a standard religious idea meant to be comforting to children. The crucial difference is that Daniel's mother is a living person.

Not coincidentally, "fairy" also has a long history as an anti-gay slur in the US and England—semi-archaic today, but still very recognizable in the 1970s and 80s. Of the many equivalent slurs in other languages, several refer to butterflies, birds, etc., consistent with the idea that being flighty and/or colorful is effeminate.

There's no particular passage in the book that summarizes exactly what's involved in flying, so this note is as good a place as any. Disch gives no details about the "flight apparatus" technology except for there being a wire that touches the head. It's important to the premise that both the technology and the mental state achieved by singing are necessary ingredients; there's never a hint of anyone being able to do it in another way, as people have claimed to do in the past via meditation or esoteric studies. The general idea of {{wp|astral projection}} has a long history, but what's happening here seems closest to a more specific idea that only became popular in the 19th and 20th centuries, and shows up a lot in 20th century science fiction: {{wp|remote viewing}}, that is, the ability to roam around as a disembodied point of view and observe things in the actual world. In ''On Wings of Song'', fairies don't travel to a separate reality, and they don't perceive any supernatural beings (except other fairies like themselves), but otherwise there are only a few limits to where they can go and what they can see. So there are at least three reasons for religious conservatives to be against flying: it's a transcendent experience that doesn't correspond to their own religion, it's against their desire to control other people's access to information in general, and it's a threat to their own personal privacy.

=== a collect call from New York ===

Throughout the 20th century there was a large price difference between local and long-distance calling, so {{wp|Collect call|calling collect}} would be a typical way for someone to call home from another state without affecting their phone bill. This is now rare since many phone providers no longer have a separate long-distance rate.

=== the Iowa Stamp Tax ===

A {{wp|Stamp duty|stamp tax}} is a tax on property purchases and other transactions, typically at the state level in the US.

=== Otto Hassler Park ===

If this is a historical reference, it would be a misspelling of {{wp|Otto Haesler}} (1880-1962), a German architect best known for social housing. There would be no obvious connection to this novel or to Disch's life, so it may be that this is just a random fictional name; Hassler, Haesler, Haessler, etc. would be plausible German names to find in Iowa.

=== to help him take up his indenture ===

This is only briefly mentioned in connection with Daniel's father's dentistry career; it's unclear what the terms are of this contract, whether it is more like an apprenticeship or {{wp|indentured servitude}}, but a later reference to him paying off his "debt to the county" indicates that there's overlap between the government and the private sector in this system, consistent with how capitalism in Iowa has taken a neo-feudal direction.

=== fans whirling everywhere you went ===

The way that fans and other spinning objects can harm fairies is described by Barbara Steiner [[#The faster I let myself spin the more exciting|later in chapter 4]].

== Chapter 2 ==

=== He listened to Eugene Mueller's stories ===

Disch later mentioned a childhood friend who may have been the model for the character of Eugene, in terms of his taking credit for plots that were really from old stories: "Bruce Burton, when we were both paperboys in Fairmont ... there were only the two of us [sharing stories] (unless one counts the storylines he was lifting, unbeknownst to me, from ''{{wp|Analog Science Fiction and Fact|Astounding}}'')."<ref>{{cite article|author=Disch, Thomas M.|date=May 8, 2006|title=Story tag|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140130091852/tomsdisch.livejournal.com/5997.html|publication=Endzone}} {{InternetArchive|date=January 30, 2014}} This title of this brief blog post referred to the elaborations that some readers had added in comments to his brief story idea about a vengeful chipmunk. (See [[Thomas M. Disch#cite_note-note-endzone-1|note about ''Endzone'']])</ref>

=== bowdlerized editions of ''Frankenstein'' and ''The War of the Worlds'' ===

{{wp|Expurgation|Bowdlerization}} refers generally to creating censored versions of books or other art. Fantasy literature has always been a common target of censorship. ''Frankenstein'' is an unusual case in that the best-known version of the novel, the 1831 edition, contained changes by the author that some have described as self-censorship to appease Victorian sensibilities (although the differences between the 1818 and 1831 editions are more complex)—but any version of ''Frankenstein'' would be problematic for fundamentalist Christians due to its basic premise.

As for why ''The War of the Worlds'', commonly thought of as a thrilling alien invasion adventure, would offend religious conservatives: besides H.G. Wells being famously an atheist, the novel's narrator repeatedly brings up evolution.<ref>{{cite book|author=McLean, Steven|date=2009|title=The Early Fiction of H.G. Wells: Fantasies of Science|url=https://link.springer.com/book/10.1057/9780230236639|publisher=Palgrave Macmillan|isbn=978-0-230-53562-6}}</ref>

=== their own artless Grand Guignol ===

[[File:Grand-guignol-1928.jpg|thumb|right|300px|''The Man Who Killed Death'', 1928]] This could refer literally to the style of horror theater made famous by the {{wp|Grand Guignol|Grand-Guignol}}, or more generally to any kind of horror-inspired bad-taste make-believe that a 14-year-old would enjoy.

=== a book of speeches by Herbert Hoover ===

Hoover remains the only US President to be born in Iowa.

=== destroyed most of Tel Aviv ===

There are just enough references to non-US places in the novel to establish that some of them have been ruined by war or terrorism, but that this was not a global disaster; Cairo and Tehran, for instance, are still vacation destinations (chapter 10), as is Rome although other parts of Italy have been bombed (chapter 11), and Switzerland seems fine (chapter 5).

=== Old Black Joe ===

An 1860 {{wp|Old Black Joe|Stephen Foster song}}. Foster is commonly thought of in connection with blackface minstrelsy, which is very relevant to this book. "Old Black Joe" is a choice that makes sense here as something a teacher might have picked: while it romanticizes Southern slaveholding culture like other Foster songs, it has more plausible deniability due to not being written in dialect.

=== undergoders .... they practically ran Iowa ===

The reason that the far-right evangelicals who are so prominent in Daniel's world are called "undergoders" is never spelled out, but to someone of Disch's generation it would clearly refer to the controversy over the wording of the {{wp|Pledge of Allegiance}}. "One nation" was changed to "One nation, under God" in 1954, as part of a Cold War trend of emphasizing American piety in contrast to the Soviets. This was clearly at odds with separation of church and state, and even though no legal challenge was made on that basis until {{wp|Elk Grove Unified School District v. Newdow|2000}}, it was a common focus of arguments about the overlap between religion and political conservatism—and a convenient phrase for the religious right to rally around.

Woven throughout this chapter, there are references to state/federal conflicts, Supreme Court decisions, etc., to establish what kind of dystopia Daniel is living in: not a nationwide theocracy like ''The Handmaid's Tale'', but something more contiguous with US history so far. Most of the repression is happening at the state level, and wasn't established by a coup, but by the same processes as right-wing politics today: a coalition of interests including sincere religious zealots, corrupt politicians, and businessmen who have no real ideology but are comfortable in an authoritarian setting. The undergoders don't make up a majority in Iowa, and haven't required everyone to adopt their own very strict lifestyle ("it was impossible to pretend to be an undergoder since it involved giving up almost anything you might enjoy")—but they have an outsize influence because they're so prominent in the agricultural industry, where the state's main economic power is.

The novel doesn't say exactly which states are dominated by undergoders, just that it's most of "the Farm Belt", which could refer to any subset of Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, and Ohio. In chapter 3 we see that at least some of Iowa's neighbor states, like Minnesota, have managed not to go this way.

=== Three days after Governor Brewster vetoed this law his only daughter was shot at ===

Besides being another reminder that the government hasn't uniformly fallen in line, this is an example of the other traditional instrument of local right-wing power: anonymous violence by individuals. You could call this stochastic terrorism, or just the kind of thing that the KKK and similar groups have always done; in many ways the undergoder regime in the Farm Belt states operates very much like the deep South in the 1950s and '60s, where authoritarianism existed on both formal and informal levels.

=== it was as though civilization had ground to a halt ===

To American readers in 1979, the fuel crisis depicted here would feel very timely: oil production dropped {{wp|1979 oil crisis|in that year}} for several reasons, and even though the impact of this on the US was not as dramatic as expected, it brought back bad memories of the much more severe {{wp|1973 oil crisis}} when Americans had experienced rationing for the first time since World War Two.

Much as in ''[[334]]'', the theme of American decline in ''On Wings of Song'', and the idea that any serious lowering of the familiar standard of middle-class comfort would be a harbinger of the collapse of civilization, are rooted in feelings that were very common in the 1970s across the political spectrum. The rise of Ronald Reagan—already clearly in progress when this book was written—was based on the premise that economic problems in America, and social unrest in general, were due to having strayed from old-fashioned values and free-market capitalism.

=== The real aristocracy of Iowa, the farmers ===

The idea that the "farmers" are all undergoders living a strict religious life is not quite right, but from the limited perspective of Daniel and his family, knowing only the farmers in and around Amesville, it makes sense that it would seem that way. Later in chapter 5 we'll see a different side of the aristocracy: agribusiness tycoons who live in secular luxury.

=== copies of ''The Star-Tribune'' ===

The ''Minneapolis Star-Tribune'' (renamed ''{{wp|Minnesota Star Tribune}}'' in 2024) is a real newspaper, although in 1979 this was a slightly ahead-of-its-time reference because the ''Star'' and the ''Tribune'' were technically still two separate papers owned by the same company.

Disch said of his childhood in {{wp|Fairmont, Minnesota}} (where he lived during grade school and middle school, before the family moved back to Minneapolis): "[F]rom age nine years onwards, I began to earn my living, delivering the ''Minneapolis Star'' and the ''Tribune'' to those more cosmopolitan folks not content with Fairmont's own ''[https://www.fairmontsentinel.com/ Sentinel]''."{{ref Disch autobio}}

== Chapter 3 ==

=== the Twin Cities were Sodom and Gomorrah ===

While there are many twin cities around the world, in the Midwest this exclusively means Minneapolis and St. Paul. Since the undergoders in this future have not managed to dominate Minnesota like Iowa, these are the nearest examples of urban decadence.

Calling {{wp|Sodom and Gomorrah}} "twin cities" is not original to Disch—they are often described that way, but the Bible really says nothing about them having any relationship to each other, just that they were in the same general part of the world (the Dead Sea plain), along with three other cities that may or may not (depending on which texts you read) have met the same fate.

=== they rode their bikes north as far as U.S. 18 ... Albert Lea to Minneapolis ===

[[File:Iowa-to-MN.jpg|thumb|right|350px|Getting from Amesville to Minneapolis]] Route 18 is about 25 miles from the Iowa-Minnesota border. For what it's worth, this may help to narrow down where the fictional Amesville might be. If you headed straight north from Fort Dodge, route 18 would be about 40 miles away—and Amesville is supposed to be 40 miles from Fort Dodge. So, unless the boys took either a very long bike ride or a very short one, they probably started somewhere northwest or northeast of Fort Dodge, like where the real villages of West Bend and Corwith are. This doesn't really matter except to emphasize that Daniel lives in a very rural area.

=== urging the enactment of the Twenty-Eighth Amendment ===

This was mentioned earlier in chapter 2 as "the national Anti-Flight Amendment."

=== ''Gold-Diggers of 1984'' ===

This is a reference to the movie musicals ''{{wp|Gold Diggers of 1933}}'', ''{{wp|Gold Diggers of 1935}}'', and ''{{wp|Gold Diggers of 1937}}'', which are all vehicles for elaborate Busby Berkeley numbers. They are loosely derived from the 1919 play ''{{wp|The Gold Diggers (1919 play)|The Gold Diggers}}'' in the sense that all of their plots involve women marrying rich men; despite the negative connotation of "gold-diggers", the women always succeed in doing so and it's a happy ending.

[[File:Gold-diggers-of-1933.jpg|thumb|left|350px|''Gold Diggers of 1933'']] The years in the titles are the years that those movies were made... so is this implying that ''On Wings of Song'' actually takes place in the '80s? Even though no year is ever given for this near-future story, everything else about the setting makes that unlikely; these political and social changes did not happen in just a few years. So the movie may have come from a wave of '80s nostalgia—not unlike the one we've been undergoing in real life for a while now, and, like the current one, of course it includes ridiculous anachronisms like a flight apparatus.

=== a comic tap dance in black face ===

This would be no surprise at any point in the first half of the 20th century, but casually mentioning its presence in a near-future movie is a jarring effect (as with the earlier reference to "Old Black Joe"), and a reminder that race is something that hasn't really come up at all in Daniel's homogenous upbringing. It won't be until Part Three that we learn the fairly disturbing details of how ideas about skin color have developed in other parts of America.

=== north to the icebergs of Baffin Island ===

The location of {{wp|Baffin Island}} makes it a logical ending point if you traveled due north from the American Midwest and kept going.

=== I DON'T CARE IF THE SUN DON'T SHINE. Or: GIVE US FIVE MINUTES MORE ===

It's deliberately unclear what these could mean as political protest slogans, but in this book it's probably not a coincidence that {{wp|I Don't Care If the Sun Don't Shine|"I Don't Care If the Sun Don't Shine"}} and {{wp|Five Minutes More|"Five Minutes More"}} are the names of mid-20th-century pop songs. The lyrics of [https://genius.com/Elvis-presley-i-dont-care-if-the-sun-dont-shine-lyrics the first one] don't seem to have any special relevance, but the line "you can sleep late" in the [https://genius.com/Frank-sinatra-five-minutes-more-lyrics second one] may take on a sadder meaning after the events of Chapter 10.

=== the opposing lawyer raised an objection ===

Another example of the kind of soft authoritarianism that distinguishes Amesville from other literary dystopias: all of the legal structures that we have today still exist in the future, they're just applied even less fairly than before.

== Chapter 4 ==

=== the compound at Spirit Lake ===

[[File:Spirit-lake-map.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Where the prison is, more or less]] Spirit Lake or {{wp|Big Spirit Lake}} is one of the "Iowa Great Lakes" that form a chain from Minnesota to northwestern Iowa; there's also a {{wp|Spirit Lake, Iowa|small town}} in that area with the same name, although the town is on the shore of the next lake down, Lake Okoboji.

The latter area was the site of the last violent attack by Sioux on US settlers in Iowa (in reprisal for various abuses by the settlers and the federal government), after which the state and federal governments became even more aggressive in driving out the Native population. These events took on legendary stature in the Midwest,<ref>{{cite book|author=Teakle, Thomas|title=The Spirit Lake Massacre|url=https://gutenberg.org/cache/epub/42074/pg42074-images.html|location=Cedar Rapids|publisher=Torch Press|date=1918}}</ref> especially since they included the capture and ransom of a white woman who then wrote a memoir.<ref>{{cite article|author=Prout, Katie|title=A History of Violence: Walking the Blood-Soaked Shores of Spirit Lake|url=https://lithub.com/crime-or-conflict-walking-the-blood-soaked-shores-of-spirit-lake/|publication=Literary Hub|date=March 1, 2017|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref>

All of this makes it a perversely appropriate location for an authoritarian regime with an ultra-American ideology to establish a prison. The fact that it's right at the edge of Iowa, close to a non-undergoder state, just emphasizes how sure the authorities are that escape is impossible.

=== this scene was rotated through ninety degrees and the flowing river became a wall ===

This echoes a line in ''[[Camp Concentration]]'', from a description of the mad scientist Dr. Skilliman's various interests:

<blockquote>He was trying to analyze the peculiar fascination of lakes, reservoirs, and suchlike large, standing bodies of water. He observed that it is only in these that nature presents us with the spectacle of the Euclidean plane stretching on without apparent limit. It represents that final submission to the law of gravity that is always at work on our cell tissues. From this he went on to observe that the great achievement of architecture is simply to take the notion of the Euclidean plane and stand it on its edge. A wall is such an impressive phenomenon because it is a body of water... stood on its side.</blockquote>

=== the P-W lozenge ===

The idea of prisoners having a remote-controlled bomb on or in their bodies was fairly popular in late 20th century science fiction. Often this was in the form of an explosive collar around the neck—which has an obvious narrative advantage in movies, since it's always visible and can have an ominous flashing light on it; examples include ''The Running Man'' (1987), ''Wedlock'' (1991), and ''Battlefield Earth'' (2000). Less cinematically but more ickily, the bomb might be implanted inside someone's neck or skull.

[[File:Fortress.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Christopher Lambert in ''Fortress'']] I'm not sure whether ''On Wings of Song'' is the earliest example, but I'm fairly sure that this and the movie ''[https://letterboxd.com/hob/film/fortress-1992/ Fortress]'' (1992) are the only ones where you have to swallow the bomb—and that this was the first fictional depiction of a prison where instead of the bomb being the last-ditch mechanism to prevent escape, it's the ''only'' mechanism. In keeping with 1970s/80s conservative economic ideology, the Spirit Lake prison runs on an extreme laissez-faire model with basically no staff.

=== Basques in Spain, Jews in Russia, the Irish in England ... the decimation of Palestinians ===

As before, mentions of any society outside of the US are rare and brief, but this passage is an efficient and chilling way to convey that the Iowa style of authoritarianism is just one of many; every industrialized society adapts tools of control for its own purposes. Disch mentions that the US—unlike Spain, Russia, England, and Israel—only applies this technology within prisons and ''not'' to large groups of "potentially dissident civilians," but that doesn't make the situation in Iowa any less horrible, just different, in keeping with the overall less-centralized nature of the repression there.

=== Reverend Van Dyke ... head of Marble Collegiate Church ===

{{wp|Marble Collegiate Church|Marble Collegiate}} is a historic church in Manhattan which was famously associated with {{wp|Norman Vincent Peale}}. Peale's combination of feel-good self-help philosophy and chumminess with right-wing politicians makes him a clear model for Van Dyke.

=== to ''pretend'' to be good, devout, and faithful .... Eventually, saying makes it so ===

This theme will recur throughout the book—sometimes spelled out, other times [[On Wings of Song/Part Three#"I Whistle a Happy Tune"|more indirectly]].

=== Logomachies ===

Arguments about words.

=== his last year's homeroom teacher, Mrs. Norberg ===

Mrs. Norberg and her opinions will be described in much more detail in Chapter 6.

=== the breeding of a specially mutated form of termite ===

The idea that termites could become a major food source in the future has been around for a long time, mainly because people were already eating them.<ref>{{cite article|author=Reis de Figueirêdo, Vasconcellos, Policarpo, & Nóbrega Alves|title=Edible and medicinal termites: a global overview|url=https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4427943/|publication=Journal of Ethnobiology and Ethnomedicine|date=April 30, 2015|pub-date=Vol. 11, No. 29}}</ref> Academic discussion of the subject has increased in the 21st century due to increasing awareness of how agriculture suffers from climate change and contributes to it; unsurprisingly, as with everything related to climate change, this has also become the subject of right-wing conspiracy theories.<ref>{{cite article|author=Jingnan, Huo|title=From 4chan to international politics, a bug-eating conspiracy theory goes mainstream|url=https://www.npr.org/2023/03/31/1166649732/conspiracy-theory-eating-bugs-4chan|publication=All Things Considered|date=March 31, 2023|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref>

It's a matter of opinion whether Disch's portrayal of termite processing on an industrial scale is the grossest version of a food factory in science fiction (that honor might go to the giant underground chicken-heart blob in ''{{wp|The Space Merchants}}''), but it's one of the more plausible ones.

=== Beware of dogs, beware of evil workers ===

From [https://biblehub.com/kjv/philippians/3.htm Philippians 3:2-4, King James Version].

This is an example of Disch doing something he also [[334/334/Part_III#18._The_New_American_Catholic_Bible|did]] [[334/334/Part_VI#38._Father_Charmain|twice]] in ''334'': having a character land on a supposedly random Bible verse, when it's really the author being mischievous. Here Daniel has picked one of the most confusing Biblical passages that a casual reader could've possibly found—both because of the peculiar translation (the King James version uses the word "concision" in a way that I'm not sure it was ever used anywhere else in English literature), and because the meaning is so obscure without the context (the apostle Paul is ranting against other Christian factions of his time). Some [https://biblehub.com/nasb_/philippians/3.htm other translations] are a bit clearer, but only a bit.

The specific content of the passage may not be very important, but here's my best attempt to summarize it. After some general insults about "dogs" and "evil workers", Paul specifically complains about Christians who believe that circumcision and other traditional Jewish practices should remain important in their faith. He argues instead that "circumcision" should now be thought of as a spiritual condition, a matter of having the right faith—as the people in his own faction do. But as sort of a hedge and/or brag, he adds that if traditional circumcision is so important, i.e. if you really insist on having "confidence in the flesh", then he has that too since he was physically circumcised—and, since he used to be a very traditional Pharisee, maybe it should even count extra for him.

=== the windows were all sealed tight ===

Here we get one more bit of exposition about the rules of flying: fairies can travel effortlessly by willpower, but they can't go through solid objects.

=== The faster I let myself spin the more exciting ===

[[File:OWOS-cover-fsf.jpg|thumb|left|300px|Cover art by Ed Emshwiller]] And finally, the most important rule for fairies: if you go too close to any spinning thing, you'll be entranced and stuck there forever. The nature of a "fairy-trap" was left intentionally vague before, but in hindsight, every electric fan that we've heard about being used for this purpose indicates someone's willingness to cause someone else to die in a coma.

The idea that a particular physical structure could entice a disembodied spirit also appears in Disch's ''[[The Businessman#Chapter 43|The Businessman]]'', where Giselle's ghost is mystically intoxicated by the pattern on a potholder.

Ed Emshwiller's cover painting for ''The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction'' February 1979 issue—where the first part of ''On Wings of Song'' appeared—shows a group of ethereal figures drifting toward an object that is just abstract enough that if you don't yet know the story, you could easily assume it's some sort of alien portal, but if you do know, it's clearly a tabletop electric fan.

=== the one about purity of heart being to will one thing ===

Van Dyke got this from [https://www.religion-online.org/book/purity-of-heart-is-to-will-one-thing/ Kierkegaard].

=== to live at the end of such a civilization ===

Here I think ''On Wings of Song'' is echoing not just a general 1970s fear of American decline, but the specific angle that Disch explored in ''[[334]]'': the psychological ''appeal'' of imagining that you're in a crumbling empire, at least if you're a relatively privileged person.

=== Cairo and Bombay for the National Council of Churches' Triage Committee ===

Triage is the process of deciding who to help first in an emergency, and who to immediately give up on.

=== run into an iceberg and sink, like ... the lost city of Brasilia ===

[[File:Vila-amaury-1.jpeg|thumb|right|300px|Vila Amaury, 1959]][[File:Vila-amaury-2.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Vila Amaury, 2010]] This condensed metaphor might refer to Vila Amaury, the lost city ''within'' the city of Brasilia. It makes sense for Van Dyke to see Brasilia as an example of "the Civilization of the Business Man": it was a heavily planned city built by technocrats in relatively recent history, and in the process of its creation, Vila Amaury was created as a company shanty-town to house 15,000 migrant workers—who were then displaced because the plan for Brasilia included an artificial lake, created by the Lago Paranoá dam, entirely submerging the site of the town.<ref>{{cite article|author=Basques, Victoria|title=Vila Amaury, uma cidade submersa|url=https://medium.com/esquinaonline/vila-amaury-uma-cidade-submersa-9b3e48dc8d12|publication=Esquina On-line|date=November 14, 2018|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref>

=== you are a punk singer ===

Disch probably was not thinking of punk rock, which was still fairly new at the time, but he's using the word in the same sense that gave punk rock its name: unskilled, no good, lowlife. Not coincidentally, it's also an old derogatory word for a young man who is used for sex, especially in prison.

=== I am the captain of the Pinafore ===

From ''{{wp|H.M.S. Pinafore}}'' by Gilbert & Sullivan (1878). This is a call-and-response song, and Daniel is singing both parts, a little inaccurately; the actual lines are:

: CAPTAIN: I am the Captain of the Pinafore;
: CREW: And a right good captain, too!
: CAPTAIN: You're very, very good,
: And be it understood,
: I command a right good crew.

([https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OqWNmTXhI34 Recording of a performance by the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company, 1959])

== Footnotes ==
<references/>

{{On Wings of Song nav}}

On Wings of Song/Part One

2025-07-15T05:48:16Z

Eb: /* bowdlerized editions of Frankenstein and The War of the Worlds */

{{#addbodyclass: tiled-toc}}

{{SummaryCollapsed |
As a teenager in Amesville, where flying is outlawed and music is barely allowed, Daniel knows there must be more to life than this. A brief dalliance with forbidden activities—distributing a banned newspaper and visiting Minneapolis, with the boy he has an unacknowledged love for—lands him in prison. The eight-month ordeal drastically disillusions him, but also sparks his obsession with singing.
}}

== Chapter 1 ==

=== Amesville, Iowa ===

[[File:Iowa.jpg|thumb|left|400px|The Hawkeye State]] No such town exists, although there is a city of {{wp|Ames, Iowa|Ames}} in Iowa—not far from Des Moines, where Disch was born and lived until age 13. Amesville sounds smaller, and not so close to a big city; in chapter 2 we learn that it's 40 miles from {{wp|Fort Dodge, Iowa|Fort Dodge}}, and several references to Fort Dodge make it sound like that's the next largest town in the area. For more about where Amesville might be, see [[#Chapter 3|Chapter 3]].

=== She would sit watching him ... people shouldn't let fairies into their houses ===

Fairies, as we will learn quickly from context, are the invisible presences of people who are "flying." All other references to fairies in Daniel's childhood are steeped in paranoia about being observed—but his daydreams here are a reminder that being watched over by an unseen dead family member or guardian angel is a standard religious idea meant to be comforting to children. The crucial difference is that Daniel's mother is a living person.

Not coincidentally, "fairy" also has a long history as an anti-gay slur in the US and England—semi-archaic today, but still very recognizable in the 1970s and 80s. Of the many equivalent slurs in other languages, several refer to butterflies, birds, etc., consistent with the idea that being flighty and/or colorful is effeminate.

There's no particular passage in the book that summarizes exactly what's involved in flying, so this note is as good a place as any. Disch gives no details about the "flight apparatus" technology except for there being a wire that touches the head. It's important to the premise that both the technology and the mental state achieved by singing are necessary ingredients; there's never a hint of anyone being able to do it in another way, as people have claimed to do in the past via meditation or esoteric studies. The general idea of {{wp|astral projection}} has a long history, but what's happening here seems closest to a more specific idea that only became popular in the 19th and 20th centuries, and shows up a lot in 20th century science fiction: {{wp|remote viewing}}, that is, the ability to roam around as a disembodied point of view and observe things in the actual world. In ''On Wings of Song'', fairies don't travel to a separate reality, and they don't perceive any supernatural beings (except other fairies like themselves), but otherwise there are only a few limits to where they can go and what they can see. So there are at least three reasons for religious conservatives to be against flying: it's a transcendent experience that doesn't correspond to their own religion, it's against their desire to control other people's access to information in general, and it's a threat to their own personal privacy.

=== a collect call from New York ===

Throughout the 20th century there was a large price difference between local and long-distance calling, so {{wp|Collect call|calling collect}} would be a typical way for someone to call home from another state without affecting their phone bill. This is now rare since many phone providers no longer have a separate long-distance rate.

=== the Iowa Stamp Tax ===

A {{wp|Stamp duty|stamp tax}} is a tax on property purchases and other transactions, typically at the state level in the US.

=== Otto Hassler Park ===

If this is a historical reference, it would be a misspelling of {{wp|Otto Haesler}} (1880-1962), a German architect best known for social housing. There would be no obvious connection to this novel or to Disch's life, so it may be that this is just a random fictional name; Hassler, Haesler, Haessler, etc. would be plausible German names to find in Iowa.

=== to help him take up his indenture ===

This is only briefly mentioned in connection with Daniel's father's dentistry career; it's unclear what the terms are of this contract, whether it is more like an apprenticeship or {{wp|indentured servitude}}, but a later reference to him paying off his "debt to the county" indicates that there's overlap between the government and the private sector in this system, consistent with how capitalism in Iowa has taken a neo-feudal direction.

=== fans whirling everywhere you went ===

The way that fans and other spinning objects can harm fairies is described by Barbara Steiner [[#The faster I let myself spin the more exciting|later in chapter 4]].

== Chapter 2 ==

=== He listened to Eugene Mueller's stories ===

Disch later mentioned a childhood friend who may have been the model for the character of Eugene, in terms of his taking credit for plots that were really from old stories: "Bruce Burton, when we were both paperboys in Fairmont ... there were only the two of us [sharing stories] (unless one counts the storylines he was lifting, unbeknownst to me, from ''{{wp|Analog Science Fiction and Fact|Astounding}}'')."<ref>{{cite article|author=Disch, Thomas M.|date=May 8, 2006|title=Story tag|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140130091852/tomsdisch.livejournal.com/5997.html|publication=Endzone}} {{InternetArchive|date=January 30, 2014}} This title of this brief blog post referred to the elaborations that some readers had added in comments to his brief story idea about a vengeful chipmunk. (See [[Thomas M. Disch#cite_note-note-endzone-1|note about ''Endzone'']])</ref>

=== bowdlerized editions of ''Frankenstein'' and ''The War of the Worlds'' ===

{{wp|Expurgation|Bowdlerization}} refers generally to creating censored versions of books or other art. Fantasy literature has always been a common target of censorship. ''Frankenstein'' is an unusual case in that the best-known version of the novel, the 1831 edition, contained changes by the author that some have described as self-censorship to appease Victorian sensibilities (although the differences between the 1818 and 1831 editions are more complex)—but any version of ''Frankenstein'' would be problematic for fundamentalist Christians due to its basic premise.

As for why ''The War of the Worlds'', commonly thought of as a thrilling alien invasion adventure, would offend religious conservatives: besides H.G. Wells being famously an atheist, the novel's narrator repeatedly brings up evolution.<ref>{{cite book|author=McLean, Steven|date=2009|title=The Early Fiction of H.G. Wells: Fantasies of Science|url=https://link.springer.com/book/10.1057/9780230236639|publisher=Palgrave Macmillan|isbn=978-0-230-53562-6}}</ref>

=== their own artless Grand Guignol ===

[[File:Grand-guignol-1928.jpg|thumb|right|300px|''The Man Who Killed Death'', 1928]] This could refer literally to the style of horror theater made famous by the {{wp|Grand Guignol|Grand-Guignol}}, or more generally to any kind of horror-inspired bad-taste make-believe that a 14-year-old would enjoy.

=== a book of speeches by Herbert Hoover ===

Hoover remains the only US President to be born in Iowa.

=== destroyed most of Tel Aviv ===

There are just enough references to non-US places in the novel to establish that some of them have been ruined by war or terrorism, but that this was not a global disaster; Cairo and Tehran, for instance, are still vacation destinations (chapter 10), as is Rome although other parts of Italy have been bombed (chapter 11), and Switzerland seems fine (chapter 5).

=== Old Black Joe ===

An 1860 {{wp|Old Black Joe|Stephen Foster song}}. Foster is commonly thought of in connection with blackface minstrelsy, which is very relevant to this book. "Old Black Joe" is a choice that makes sense here as something a teacher might have picked: while it romanticizes Southern slaveholding culture like other Foster songs, it has more plausible deniability due to not being written in dialect.

=== undergoders .... they practically ran Iowa ===

The reason that the far-right evangelicals who are so prominent in Daniel's world are called "undergoders" is never spelled out, but to someone of Disch's generation it would clearly refer to the controversy over the wording of the {{wp|Pledge of Allegiance}}. "One nation" was changed to "One nation, under God" in 1954, as part of a Cold War trend of emphasizing American piety in contrast to the Soviets. This was clearly at odds with separation of church and state, and even though no legal challenge was made on that basis until {{wp|Elk Grove Unified School District v. Newdow|2000}}, it was a common focus of arguments about the overlap between religion and political conservatism—and a convenient phrase for the religious right to rally around.

Woven throughout this chapter, there are references to state/federal conflicts, Supreme Court decisions, etc., to establish what kind of dystopia Daniel is living in: not a nationwide theocracy like ''The Handmaid's Tale'', but something more contiguous with US history so far. Most of the repression is happening at the state level, and wasn't established by a coup, but by the same processes as right-wing politics today: a coalition of interests including sincere religious zealots, corrupt politicians, and businessmen who have no real ideology but are comfortable in an authoritarian setting. The undergoders don't make up a majority in Iowa, and haven't required everyone to adopt their own very strict lifestyle ("it was impossible to pretend to be an undergoder since it involved giving up almost anything you might enjoy")—but they have an outsize influence because they're so prominent in the agricultural industry, where the state's main economic power is.

The novel doesn't say exactly which states are dominated by undergoders, just that it's most of "the Farm Belt", which could refer to any subset of Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, and Ohio. In chapter 3 we see that at least some of Iowa's neighbor states, like Minnesota, have managed not to go this way.

=== Three days after Governor Brewster vetoed this law his only daughter was shot at ===

Besides being another reminder that the government hasn't uniformly fallen in line, this is an example of the other traditional instrument of local right-wing power: anonymous violence by individuals. You could call this stochastic terrorism, or just the kind of thing that the KKK and similar groups have always done; in many ways the undergoder regime in the Farm Belt states operates very much like the deep South in the 1950s and '60s, where authoritarianism existed on both formal and informal levels.

=== it was as though civilization had ground to a halt ===

To American readers in 1979, the fuel crisis depicted here would feel very timely: oil production dropped {{wp|1979 oil crisis|in that year}} for several reasons, and even though the impact of this on the US was not as dramatic as expected, it brought back bad memories of the much more severe {{wp|1973 oil crisis}} when Americans had experienced rationing for the first time since World War Two.

Much as in ''[[334]]'', the theme of American decline in ''On Wings of Song'', and the idea that any serious lowering of the familiar standard of middle-class comfort would be a harbinger of the collapse of civilization, are rooted in feelings that were very common in the 1970s across the political spectrum. The rise of Ronald Reagan—already clearly in progress when this book was written—was based on the premise that economic problems in America, and social unrest in general, were due to having strayed from old-fashioned values and free-market capitalism.

=== The real aristocracy of Iowa, the farmers ===

The idea that the "farmers" are all undergoders living a strict religious life is not quite right, but from the limited perspective of Daniel and his family, knowing only the farmers in and around Amesville, it makes sense that it would seem that way. Later in chapter 5 we'll see a different side of the aristocracy: agribusiness tycoons who live in secular luxury.

=== copies of ''The Star-Tribune'' ===

The ''Minneapolis Star-Tribune'' (renamed ''{{wp|Minnesota Star Tribune}}'' in 2024) is a real newspaper, although in 1979 this was a slightly ahead-of-its-time reference because the ''Star'' and the ''Tribune'' were technically still two separate papers owned by the same company.

Disch said of his childhood in {{wp|Fairmont, Minnesota}} (where he lived during grade school and middle school, before the family moved back to Minneapolis): "[F]rom age nine years onwards, I began to earn my living, delivering the ''Minneapolis Star'' and the ''Tribune'' to those more cosmopolitan folks not content with Fairmont's own ''[https://www.fairmontsentinel.com/ Sentinel]''."{{ref Disch autobio}}

== Chapter 3 ==

=== the Twin Cities were Sodom and Gomorrah ===

While there are many twin cities around the world, in the Midwest this exclusively means Minneapolis and St. Paul. Since the undergoders in this future have not managed to dominate Minnesota like Iowa, these are the nearest examples of urban decadence.

Calling {{wp|Sodom and Gomorrah}} "twin cities" is not original to Disch—they are often described that way, but the Bible really says nothing about them having any relationship to each other, just that they were in the same general part of the world (the Dead Sea plain), along with three other cities that may or may not (depending on which texts you read) have met the same fate.

=== they rode their bikes north as far as U.S. 18 ... Albert Lea to Minneapolis ===

[[File:Iowa-to-MN.jpg|thumb|right|350px|Getting from Amesville to Minneapolis]] Route 18 is about 25 miles from the Iowa-Minnesota border. For what it's worth, this may help to narrow down where the fictional Amesville might be. If you headed straight north from Fort Dodge, route 18 would be about 40 miles away—and Amesville is supposed to be 40 miles from Fort Dodge. So, unless the boys took either a very long bike ride or a very short one, they probably started somewhere northwest or northeast of Fort Dodge, like where the real villages of West Bend and Corwith are. This doesn't really matter except to emphasize that Daniel lives in a very rural area.

=== urging the enactment of the Twenty-Eighth Amendment ===

This was mentioned earlier in chapter 2 as "the national Anti-Flight Amendment."

=== ''Gold-Diggers of 1984'' ===

This is a reference to the movie musicals ''{{wp|Gold Diggers of 1933}}'', ''{{wp|Gold Diggers of 1935}}'', and ''{{wp|Gold Diggers of 1937}}'', which are all vehicles for elaborate Busby Berkeley numbers. They are loosely derived from the 1919 play ''{{wp|The Gold Diggers (1919 play)|The Gold Diggers}}'' in the sense that all of their plots involve women marrying rich men; despite the negative connotation of "gold-diggers", the women always succeed in doing so and it's a happy ending.

[[File:Gold-diggers-of-1933.jpg|thumb|left|350px|''Gold Diggers of 1933'']] The years in the titles are the years that those movies were made... so is this implying that ''On Wings of Song'' actually takes place in the '80s? Even though no year is ever given for this near-future story, everything else about the setting makes that unlikely; these political and social changes did not happen in just a few years. So the movie may have come from a wave of '80s nostalgia—not unlike the one we've been undergoing in real life for a while now, and, like the current one, of course it includes ridiculous anachronisms like a flight apparatus.

=== a comic tap dance in black face ===

This would be no surprise at any point in the first half of the 20th century, but casually mentioning its presence in a near-future movie is a jarring effect (as with the earlier reference to "Old Black Joe"), and a reminder that race is something that hasn't really come up at all in Daniel's homogenous upbringing. It won't be until Part Three that we learn the fairly disturbing details of how ideas about skin color have developed in other parts of America.

=== north to the icebergs of Baffin Island ===

The location of {{wp|Baffin Island}} makes it a logical ending point if you traveled due north from the American Midwest and kept going.

=== I DON'T CARE IF THE SUN DON'T SHINE. Or: GIVE US FIVE MINUTES MORE ===

It's deliberately unclear what these could mean as political protest slogans, but in this book it's probably not a coincidence that {{wp|I Don't Care If the Sun Don't Shine|"I Don't Care If the Sun Don't Shine"}} and {{wp|Five Minutes More|"Five Minutes More"}} are the names of mid-20th-century pop songs. The lyrics of [https://genius.com/Elvis-presley-i-dont-care-if-the-sun-dont-shine-lyrics the first one] don't seem to have any special relevance, but the line "you can sleep late" in the [https://genius.com/Frank-sinatra-five-minutes-more-lyrics second one] may take on a sadder meaning after the events of Chapter 10.

=== the opposing lawyer raised an objection ===

Another example of the kind of soft authoritarianism that distinguishes Amesville from other literary dystopias: all of the legal structures that we have today still exist in the future, they're just applied even less fairly than before.

== Chapter 4 ==

=== the compound at Spirit Lake ===

[[File:Spirit-lake-map.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Where the prison is, more or less]] Spirit Lake or {{wp|Big Spirit Lake}} is one of the "Iowa Great Lakes" that form a chain from Minnesota to northwestern Iowa; there's also a {{wp|Spirit Lake, Iowa|small town}} in that area with the same name, although the town is on the shore of the next lake down, Lake Okoboji.

The latter area was the site of the last violent attack by Sioux on US settlers in Iowa (in reprisal for various abuses by the settlers and the federal government), after which the state and federal governments became even more aggressive in driving out the Native population. These events took on legendary stature in the Midwest,<ref>{{cite book|author=Teakle, Thomas|title=The Spirit Lake Massacre|url=https://gutenberg.org/cache/epub/42074/pg42074-images.html|location=Cedar Rapids|publisher=Torch Press|date=1918}}</ref> especially since they included the capture and ransom of a white woman who then wrote a memoir.<ref>{{cite article|author=Prout, Katie|title=A History of Violence: Walking the Blood-Soaked Shores of Spirit Lake|url=https://lithub.com/crime-or-conflict-walking-the-blood-soaked-shores-of-spirit-lake/|publication=Literary Hub|date=March 1, 2017|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref>

All of this makes it a perversely appropriate location for an authoritarian regime with an ultra-American ideology to establish a prison. The fact that it's right at the edge of Iowa, close to a non-undergoder state, just emphasizes how sure the authorities are that escape is impossible.

=== this scene was rotated through ninety degrees and the flowing river became a wall ===

This echoes a line in ''[[Camp Concentration]]'', from a description of the mad scientist Dr. Skilliman's various interests:

<blockquote>He was trying to analyze the peculiar fascination of lakes, reservoirs, and suchlike large, standing bodies of water. He observed that it is only in these that nature presents us with the spectacle of the Euclidean plane stretching on without apparent limit. It represents that final submission to the law of gravity that is always at work on our cell tissues. From this he went on to observe that the great achievement of architecture is simply to take the notion of the Euclidean plane and stand it on its edge. A wall is such an impressive phenomenon because it is a body of water... stood on its side.</blockquote>

=== the P-W lozenge ===

The idea of prisoners having a remote-controlled bomb on or in their bodies was fairly popular in late 20th century science fiction. Often this was in the form of an explosive collar around the neck—which has an obvious narrative advantage in movies, since it's always visible and can have an ominous flashing light on it; examples include ''The Running Man'' (1987), ''Wedlock'' (1991), and ''Battlefield Earth'' (2000). Less cinematically but more ickily, the bomb might be implanted inside someone's neck or skull.

[[File:Fortress.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Christopher Lambert in ''Fortress'']] I'm not sure whether ''On Wings of Song'' is the earliest example, but I'm fairly sure that this and the movie ''[https://letterboxd.com/hob/film/fortress-1992/ Fortress]'' (1992) are the only ones where you have to swallow the bomb—and that this was the first fictional depiction of a prison where instead of the bomb being the last-ditch mechanism to prevent escape, it's the ''only'' mechanism. In keeping with 1970s/80s conservative economic ideology, the Spirit Lake prison runs on an extreme laissez-faire model with basically no staff.

=== Basques in Spain, Jews in Russia, the Irish in England ... the decimation of Palestinians ===

As before, mentions of any society outside of the US are rare and brief, but this passage is an efficient and chilling way to convey that the Iowa style of authoritarianism is just one of many; every industrialized society adapts tools of control for its own purposes. Disch mentions that the US—unlike Spain, Russia, England, and Israel—only applies this technology within prisons and ''not'' to large groups of "potentially dissident civilians," but that doesn't make the situation in Iowa any less horrible, just different, in keeping with the overall less-centralized nature of the repression there.

=== Reverend Van Dyke ... head of Marble Collegiate Church ===

{{wp|Marble Collegiate Church|Marble Collegiate}} is a historic church in Manhattan which was famously associated with {{wp|Norman Vincent Peale}}. Peale's combination of feel-good self-help philosophy and chumminess with right-wing politicians makes him a clear model for Van Dyke.

=== to ''pretend'' to be good, devout, and faithful .... Eventually, saying makes it so ===

This theme will recur throughout the book—sometimes spelled out, other times [[On Wings of Song/Part Three#"I Whistle a Happy Tune"|more indirectly]].

=== Logomachies ===

Arguments about words.

=== his last year's homeroom teacher, Mrs. Norberg ===

Mrs. Norberg and her opinions will be described in much more detail in Chapter 6.

=== the breeding of a specially mutated form of termite ===

The idea that termites could become a major food source in the future has been around for a long time, mainly because people were already eating them.<ref>{{cite article|author=Reis de Figueirêdo, Vasconcellos, Policarpo, & Nóbrega Alves|title=Edible and medicinal termites: a global overview|url=https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4427943/|publication=Journal of Ethnobiology and Ethnomedicine|date=April 30, 2015|pub-date=Vol. 11, No. 29}}</ref> Academic discussion of the subject has increased in the 21st century due to increasing awareness of how agriculture suffers from climate change and contributes to it; unsurprisingly, as with everything related to climate change, this has also become the subject of right-wing conspiracy theories.<ref>{{cite article|author=Jingnan, Huo|title=From 4chan to international politics, a bug-eating conspiracy theory goes mainstream|url=https://www.npr.org/2023/03/31/1166649732/conspiracy-theory-eating-bugs-4chan|publication=All Things Considered|date=March 31, 2023|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref>

It's a matter of opinion whether Disch's portrayal of termite processing on an industrial scale is the grossest version of a food factory in science fiction (that honor might go to the giant underground chicken-heart blob in ''{{wp|The Space Merchants}}''), but it's one of the more plausible ones.

=== Beware of dogs, beware of evil workers ===

From [https://biblehub.com/kjv/philippians/3.htm Philippians 3:2-4, King James Version].

This is an example of Disch doing something he also [[334/334/Part_III#18._The_New_American_Catholic_Bible|did]] [[334/334/Part_VI#38._Father_Charmain|twice]] in ''334'': having a character land on a supposedly random Bible verse, when it's really the author being mischievous. Here Daniel has picked one of the most confusing Biblical passages that a casual reader could've possibly found—both because of the peculiar translation (the King James version uses the word "concision" in a way that I'm not sure it was ever used anywhere else in English literature), and because the meaning is so obscure without the context (the apostle Paul is ranting against other Christian factions of his time). Some [https://biblehub.com/nasb_/philippians/3.htm other translations] are a bit clearer, but only a bit.

The specific content of the passage may not be very important, but here's my best attempt to summarize it. After some general insults about "dogs" and "evil workers", Paul specifically complains about Christians who believe that circumcision and other traditional Jewish practices should remain important in their faith. He argues instead that "circumcision" should now be thought of as a spiritual condition, a matter of having the right faith—as the people in his own faction do. But as sort of a hedge and/or brag, he adds that if traditional circumcision is so important, i.e. if you really insist on having "confidence in the flesh", then he has that too since he was physically circumcised—and that maybe it should even count extra for him, since he used to be a very traditional Pharisee.

=== the windows were all sealed tight ===

Here we get one more bit of exposition about the rules of flying: fairies can travel effortlessly by willpower, but they can't go through solid objects.

=== The faster I let myself spin the more exciting ===

[[File:OWOS-cover-fsf.jpg|thumb|left|300px|Cover art by Ed Emshwiller]] And finally, the most important rule for fairies: if you go too close to any spinning thing, you'll be entranced and stuck there forever. The nature of a "fairy-trap" was left intentionally vague before, but in hindsight, every electric fan that we've heard about being used for this purpose indicates someone's willingness to cause someone else to die in a coma.

The idea that a particular physical structure could entice a disembodied spirit also appears in Disch's ''[[The Businessman#Chapter 43|The Businessman]]'', where Giselle's ghost is mystically intoxicated by the pattern on a potholder.

Ed Emshwiller's cover painting for ''The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction'' February 1979 issue—where the first part of ''On Wings of Song'' appeared—shows a group of ethereal figures drifting toward an object that is just abstract enough that if you don't yet know the story, you could easily assume it's some sort of alien portal, but if you do know, it's clearly a tabletop electric fan.

=== the one about purity of heart being to will one thing ===

Van Dyke got this from [https://www.religion-online.org/book/purity-of-heart-is-to-will-one-thing/ Kierkegaard].

=== to live at the end of such a civilization ===

Here I think ''On Wings of Song'' is echoing not just a general 1970s fear of American decline, but the specific angle that Disch explored in ''[[334]]'': the psychological ''appeal'' of imagining that you're in a crumbling empire, at least if you're a relatively privileged person.

=== Cairo and Bombay for the National Council of Churches' Triage Committee ===

Triage is the process of deciding who to help first in an emergency, and who to immediately give up on.

=== run into an iceberg and sink, like ... the lost city of Brasilia ===

[[File:Vila-amaury-1.jpeg|thumb|right|300px|Vila Amaury, 1959]][[File:Vila-amaury-2.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Vila Amaury, 2010]] This condensed metaphor might refer to Vila Amaury, the lost city ''within'' the city of Brasilia. It makes sense for Van Dyke to see Brasilia as an example of "the Civilization of the Business Man": it was a heavily planned city built by technocrats in relatively recent history, and in the process of its creation, Vila Amaury was created as a company shanty-town to house 15,000 migrant workers—who were then displaced because the plan for Brasilia included an artificial lake, created by the Lago Paranoá dam, entirely submerging the site of the town.<ref>{{cite article|author=Basques, Victoria|title=Vila Amaury, uma cidade submersa|url=https://medium.com/esquinaonline/vila-amaury-uma-cidade-submersa-9b3e48dc8d12|publication=Esquina On-line|date=November 14, 2018|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref>

=== you are a punk singer ===

Disch probably was not thinking of punk rock, which was still fairly new at the time, but he's using the word in the same sense that gave punk rock its name: unskilled, no good, lowlife. Not coincidentally, it's also an old derogatory word for a young man who is used for sex, especially in prison.

=== I am the captain of the Pinafore ===

From ''{{wp|H.M.S. Pinafore}}'' by Gilbert & Sullivan (1878). This is a call-and-response song, and Daniel is singing both parts, a little inaccurately; the actual lines are:

: CAPTAIN: I am the Captain of the Pinafore;
: CREW: And a right good captain, too!
: CAPTAIN: You're very, very good,
: And be it understood,
: I command a right good crew.

([https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OqWNmTXhI34 Recording of a performance by the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company, 1959])

== Footnotes ==
<references/>

{{On Wings of Song nav}}

The Brave Little Toaster

2025-07-03T02:34:40Z

Eb:

{{#addbodyclass: tiled-toc tiled-toc-no-chapters}}
'''''The Brave Little Toaster: A Bedtime Story for Small Appliances''''' (1980) is a novella by [[Thomas M. Disch]], later published as a children's book and adapted into an {{wp|The Brave Little Toaster|animated movie}}. It describes the quest of five appliances leaving their cottage, whose owner has been away for several years, to find him in the city.

This was Disch's first work for children,<ref>Others are ''The Brave Little Toaster Goes to Mars'', ''A Child's Garden of Grammar'', and an autobiographical essay in the ''Something About the Author'' series. [https://compassrosebooks.blogspot.com/2016/12/tom-disch-1940-2008-was-gifted-poet.html ''The Tale of Dan de Lion''] arguably qualifies too, although this tiny picture-book poem can't have been seen by many children, as it appeared only in a very limited edition.</ref> but it originally appeared in ''The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction''. Book publishers were uninterested at first; according to Disch, they felt kids would not care about talking inanimate objects. Fifteen years later, ''Toy Story'' thoroughly disproved that theory—and this was a precursor to ''Toy Story'' in more ways than one: the Disney employee who had read the novella and convinced Disney to buy the film rights was John Lasseter, later a co-founder of Pixar, who originally pitched it as a computer-animated project.

Once the movie was in production (funded by Disney but made by Hyperion Pictures, more cheaply and without computers), Doubleday published the book. These notes refer to the 1986 Doubleday edition, with illustrations by Karen Lee Schmidt; see '''[[/Editions/]]''' for others.

Doubleday also published Disch's sequel ''{{wp|The Brave Little Toaster Goes to Mars}}'', which Disney made a much less successful direct-to-video movie from. His last experience with that industry left him even more disappointed: he wrote the original story treatment for the massively successful ''The Lion King'', but it was uncredited work-for-hire that paid badly since writers on animated projects were not covered by the WGA at the time.<ref>{{cite article|author=Chandler, David|date=2018|title=Creating ''The Lion King'': Story development, authorship and accreditation in the Disney renaissance|url=https://intellectdiscover.com/docserver/fulltext/josc/9/3/josc.9.3.329_1.pdf?expires=1738030973&id=id&accname=guest&checksum=FF0E10964B0DDEF23FA50C8F2B9DE475|publication=Journal of Screenwriting|pub-date=Vol. 9, No. 3|accessed=January 28, 2025}}</ref>

== Major characters ==

* The toaster
* The vacuum cleaner
* The radio alarm clock
* The lamp
* The electric blanket

== Epigram ==

The epigram is a take-off on [https://www.scottishpoetrylibrary.org.uk/poem/breathes-there-man/ a stanza] from Sir Walter Scott's ''{{wp|The Lay of the Last Minstrel}}'' (1805), which begins:

: Breathes there the man, with soul so dead,
: Who never to himself has said,
: This is my own, my native land!
: Whose heart hath ne’er within him burn’d ...

Disch's version is:

: Lives there a man with soul so dead
: He's never to his toaster said:
: "You are my friend; I see in you
: An object sturdy, staunch, and true;
: A fellow mettlesome and trim;
: A brightness that the years can't dim.
: Then let us praise this brave appliance
: In which we place this just reliance
: And offer it with each fresh slice
: Such words of friendship and advice
: As "How are things with you tonight?"
: Or "Not too dark but not too light."

The final line refers to toast, but is also a reasonable description of the story. While the movie version has a reputation of being unusually dark for its time, a lot of the parts that give it that reputation were added by the filmmakers (or expanded from a brief bit in the book: for instance, the narrator mentions in the first paragraph that the old miserable air conditioner has stopped working, but in the movie it gets a full death scene). There's relatively little physical danger in the original, but still plenty of existential dread in terms of the prospect of getting discarded at the city dump.

== Notes ==

=== the vacuum cleaner, being the oldest ... it was a Hoover ===

(p. 9) How old is this oldest of the appliances? This story begins on March 8, 1976, and the appliances were abandoned in the cottage on September 25, 1973,<ref>''The Brave Little Toaster'', p. 12.</ref> after having been brought from the city "years and years and years ago" (except for the toaster, who arrived at some point after that). Appliances did generally last longer in those days than now, so "the master" (who isn't as young as he is in the movie) could've had some items from 20 years earlier—but then he might've been more attached to them as antiques and wouldn't have left them behind. So let's say they're early '70s or late '60s devices.

[[File:Dialamatic-ad.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Hoover Dial-a-Matic Model 1170 (1969)]] However—if one really cares about being historically consistent (which I have no reason to think Disch really cared about, but he might have done so for fun)—the vacuum, and therefore all the other appliances, arguably can't be older than 1969. That's the year when {{wp|The Hoover Company|Hoover}} released its first ''self-propelled'' vacuum, the Dial-a-Matic Model 1170 (shown at right); the vacuum being able to roll around via its own motor is an important plot point in this story. (That doesn't mean fully self-directed like a {{wp|Roomba}}—just that the Model 1170 could keep going in whatever direction you pushed it.) You might argue that all of these appliances seem to be able to crawl around on their own anyway, but since we're told that this vacuum is envious of newer vacuums for their other design features like disposable dust bags<ref>''The Brave Little Toaster'', p. 11.</ref> and ''not'' for being self-propelled, I feel confident that it does have that as a mechanical feature and not just a magic/anthropomorphic one.

The vacuum cleaner portrayed in Schmidt's illustrations doesn't seem to be any particular Hoover; it's kind of a cross between the 1170 and later '70s models that didn't have such a tall center piece.

=== an off-white plastic alarm clock/radio (AM only) ===

Digital clocks were already around in the '70s, but I think we can assume this is an analog one since Disch would've been likely to mention its glowing numbers otherwise. FM radio was also around, but FM {{wp|FM broadcasting#History|took a while to catch on}} in the US. Here's a slightly older analog AM-only model.

[[File:Toaster-clock-radio.jpg|thumb|left|300px|General Electric C4245 clock/radio (c. 1968)]]

=== a cheerful yellow electric blanket ===

[[File:Toaster-blanket.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Northern Electric blanket (1970)]] Assuming the unseen "master" is an adult of average size, the blanket might be something like the one in the relaxing scene at right.

=== a Tensor lamp who had come from a savings bank ===

The {{wp|Tensor lamp}} was popular throughout the '60s and '70s, with many different styles but always having a smaller-than-usual bulb ("the lamp could never regard an ordinary 100-watt bulb without a twinge of envy"<ref>''The Brave Little Toaster'', p. 11.</ref>) and a movable arm. Schmidt's illustrations show one with a curved gooseneck, like the one at left; older models would've more likely had a jointed arm.

[[File:Tensor-il-355.jpg|thumb|left|300px|Tensor lamp model IL 355 (early 1970s)]]

=== the toaster, a bright little Sunbeam ===

Sunbeam toasters were made from 1949 to 1997.<ref>{{cite article|title=Sunbeam Models & Years|url=https://www.timstoasters.com/models-years/|publication=Tim's Toasters|accessed=December 31, 2024}}</ref> The main thing that made a Sunbeam different from other toasters, besides being especially brave and optimistic, was its fully automatic system: instead of pushing down a lever, just dropping in the bread triggered a mechanism that lowered the bread and started the heating element, and after reaching the right temperature it would smoothly raise the bread up again.

A common early-1970s model was the AT-W:

[[File:Sunbeam-vt-40-1.jpg|thumb|center|300px|Our hero?]]

Another distinctive feature of Sunbeams—all of them, as far as I know—is that the toast slots were crosswise, as shown above. Schmidt's artwork shows a toaster with the more familiar lengthwise design, but clearly she was taking artistic license anyway since she also drew a push-down lever. So what kind of toaster is Thomas M. Disch gazing at his reflection in on the back cover photo—with lengthwise toast slots? We may never know, but the biographical note at the end of the book says his toaster "has been working with the author for over fifteen years."<br clear="all">

=== taken back to the city ... [like] the Water Pik ===

[[File:Water-pik.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Water-Pik (1975)]] (p. 10) This brand of tooth-cleaning device is still around; in the ’70s it looked like the photo at right. I’m not sure if I really would lug the thing around with me on vacation, as this guy apparently had been doing.

=== a tiny knife sharpener that worked by being rolled ===

(p. 17) Many variations on a rolling knife sharpener, both modern and vintage, are easy to find online... but we're also told here that it has "a single wheel ... one and a half inches in diameter." All the ones I've seen are either bigger than that or have two wheels.

=== ELECTRICITY IS VERY DANGEROUS ... ask a major appliance ===

(p. 21) While there's an obvious public service here for any human children who might be reading the story, the way this passage is written is also a reminder that the book's intended audience is, allegedly, young appliances.

=== whenever human beings are observing them they must remain perfectly still ===

(p. 23) Such rules develop naturally in any story about inorganic objects being alive, to explain why we normally don't see them walking around, so the ''Toy Story'' movies probably would've included a similar idea even if John Lasseter hadn't read this. In that series it's never 100% clear whether it's a law of nature that the toys are physically unable to resist, or it's voluntary and they're just very consistent about it. But in this story it does seem to be a law of nature, since a bit later the toaster finds itself unexpectedly frozen ("the same force preventing it from moving prevented its speech as well")<ref>''The Brave Little Toaster'', p. 51.</ref> even before it notices that there's a human nearby. Later developments indicate that they can work around this via various loopholes like being under a sheet or on the phone.

=== the danger of pirates ===

(p. 23) Disch declines to explain what kind of "pirates" might be found on land until quite a bit later, when we learn that to an appliance "pirates" are any "people who take things that belong to other people"<ref>''The Brave Little Toaster'', p. 48.</ref>—which, since the things are secretly alive, is the same as kidnapping and forced servitude.

=== a long comic jingle about Barneys' Hi-Styles for Guys and Gals ===

(p. 24) It's unclear whether this is the {{wp|Barneys New York|Barneys}} department store chain or a fictional store, but I'm guessing it's the former (even though Barneys was still writing its name as "Barney's" in 1980). Barneys in the 1970s had just finished remaking itself from a discount outlet into a fancier place full of designer brands. Here's a [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l7n61Z62PAY 1975 TV spot] with a goofy quality similar to what's described here, aimed at convincing young professional "guys and gals" that they could now afford nice things.

=== a rough sort of octosyllabic doggerel ===

(p. 26) The daisy is exclusively using {{wp|iambic tetrameter}} (sometimes cheating by dropping the first beat) in rhymed couplets, AA-BB-CC etc. as boringly as possible despite the very flowery language. Disch, in his other career as a poet, would be among the "more evolved species" that the narrator says prefer "sestinas, rondeaux, and villanelles of the highest order."

=== You tell him .... Tell ''them'' ===

(p. 33) The whole scene of the comically old-fashioned squirrels refusing to understand that traditional gender distinctions are irrelevant to appliances may seem ahead of its time now, but ideas about alternatives to gendered language were already around in the '80s—especially in science fiction. Ursula K. Le Guin's ''The Left Hand of Darkness'' (1969) depicted a world of intersex people where "he" was the only pronoun; later, the society in Samuel Delany's ''Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand'' (1984) used "he" and "she" in a completely different way that depended on the speaker's level of attraction to the person being described.

The joke in this passage is a sly one about using English grammar in a passive-aggressive way. Marjorie the squirrel refuses to acknowledge that "it" is the toaster's preferred pronoun, but Marjorie hasn't decided to use a singular "them" here—since just a minute later, she's referring to the toaster as "he." Instead, she's decided to just change this sentence to refer to the whole group of appliances.

=== From each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs ===

(p. 49) A socialist motto {{wp|From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs|popularized by Karl Marx}}.

=== humming the poignant theme song from ''Doctor Zhivago'' ===

(p. 52) Also known as {{wp|Lara's Theme|"Lara's Theme"}}, from the score by Maurice Jarre. A version with lyrics added was extremely popular in the '60s and then became a hit again in 1973—so the fact that it's described here as a film theme, instead of as the tune of "Somewhere My Love", suggests that either the narrator or "the master" might be a bit of a film nerd who isn't very into pop music.

=== listened to the radio sing song after song ===

(p. 54) The idea that the radio is always ''performing'', rather than just passively conveying other people's performances, is used heavily in the movie adaptation where the dialogue voiced by Jon Lovitz includes free-association medleys of songs and commercials.

One thing Lovitz sings in the movie, very briefly, that viewers who recognize it might find a wee bit odd or inappropriate, is ''not'' from this book: the Al Jolson version of {{wp|My Mammy|"My Mammy"}}. However, there is a Disch connection there and I strongly suspect it was an inside joke by the filmmakers rather than a coincidence. Disch's science fiction novel ''[[On Wings of Song]]''—published in the same magazine as ''The Brave Little Toaster'', one year earlier—was a bitter satire involving the rise of a pop star who is famous for a combination of bel canto opera and blackface minstrel songs, including that one.

=== the toaster's own favorite melody, "I Whistle a Happy Tune" ===

(p. 54) {{wp|I Whistle a Happy Tune|This song}} is from ''The King and I'' (1951). Its lyrics aren't quoted for the reader, but if you know them, they cast an ironic light on the title of the book, and the character of the toaster... since they're about pretending to be brave and hoping to convince yourself:

: While shivering in my shoes
: I strike a careless pose
: And whistle a happy tune
: And no one ever knows I'm afraid ...
: Make believe you're brave
: And the trick will take you far
: You may be as brave
: As you make believe you are

=== listener-supported radio station KHOP ===

(p. 75) A California radio station has been using that {{wp|Call signs in the United States|call sign}} since 1996; I don't know if there was one anywhere in 1980. "K" stations could be anywhere in the midwestern or western US.

=== KL5-9120 ===

(p. 75) Using letters for the first digits of a phone number was a relic of the old {{wp|Telephone exchange names|exchange name}} system, and would've still been recognizable in 1976 when the story takes place (although maybe not for children in 1980; Disch may have been hoping to make readers curious enough to ask a major appliance about it). KL5 is the same as 555, the US standard for fake phone numbers in movies and TV.

=== Whether or not it's against the rules ... many appliances ... do use the phone system regularly ===

(p. 76) Unlike the rule that forces them to freeze if a human being "observes" them, this one is more of a guideline that they can choose to break, and it seems that being heard (by someone who can't see that they're appliances) doesn't count as being observed. ''Toy Story 4'' makes use of a similar loophole, when the toys' speech can be heard by a human as long as they're pretending to be a GPS system.

== Footnotes ==
<references/>

The Brave Little Toaster

2025-07-03T02:34:07Z

Eb:

{{#addbodyclass: tiled-toc tiled-toc-no-chapters}}
'''''The Brave Little Toaster: A Bedtime Story for Small Appliances''''' (1980) is a novella by [[Thomas M. Disch]], later published as a children's book and adapted into an {{wp|The Brave Little Toaster|animated movie}}. It describes the quest of five appliances leaving their cottage, whose owner has been away for several years, to find him in the city.

This was Disch's first work for children,<ref>Others are ''The Brave Little Toaster Goes to Mars'', ''A Child's Garden of Grammar'', and an autobiographical essay in the ''Something About the Author'' series. [https://compassrosebooks.blogspot.com/2016/12/tom-disch-1940-2008-was-gifted-poet.html ''The Tale of Dan de Lion''] arguably qualifies too, although this tiny picture-book poem can't have been seen by many children, as it appeared only in a very limited edition.</ref>, but it originally appeared in ''The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction''. Book publishers were uninterested at first; according to Disch, they felt kids would not care about talking inanimate objects. Fifteen years later, ''Toy Story'' thoroughly disproved that theory—and this was a precursor to ''Toy Story'' in more ways than one: the Disney employee who had read the novella and convinced Disney to buy the film rights was John Lasseter, later a co-founder of Pixar, who originally pitched it as a computer-animated project.

Once the movie was in production (funded by Disney but made by Hyperion Pictures, more cheaply and without computers), Doubleday published the book. These notes refer to the 1986 Doubleday edition, with illustrations by Karen Lee Schmidt; see '''[[/Editions/]]''' for others.

Doubleday also published Disch's sequel ''{{wp|The Brave Little Toaster Goes to Mars}}'', which Disney made a much less successful direct-to-video movie from. His last experience with that industry left him even more disappointed: he wrote the original story treatment for the massively successful ''The Lion King'', but it was uncredited work-for-hire that paid badly since writers on animated projects were not covered by the WGA at the time.<ref>{{cite article|author=Chandler, David|date=2018|title=Creating ''The Lion King'': Story development, authorship and accreditation in the Disney renaissance|url=https://intellectdiscover.com/docserver/fulltext/josc/9/3/josc.9.3.329_1.pdf?expires=1738030973&id=id&accname=guest&checksum=FF0E10964B0DDEF23FA50C8F2B9DE475|publication=Journal of Screenwriting|pub-date=Vol. 9, No. 3|accessed=January 28, 2025}}</ref>

== Major characters ==

* The toaster
* The vacuum cleaner
* The radio alarm clock
* The lamp
* The electric blanket

== Epigram ==

The epigram is a take-off on [https://www.scottishpoetrylibrary.org.uk/poem/breathes-there-man/ a stanza] from Sir Walter Scott's ''{{wp|The Lay of the Last Minstrel}}'' (1805), which begins:

: Breathes there the man, with soul so dead,
: Who never to himself has said,
: This is my own, my native land!
: Whose heart hath ne’er within him burn’d ...

Disch's version is:

: Lives there a man with soul so dead
: He's never to his toaster said:
: "You are my friend; I see in you
: An object sturdy, staunch, and true;
: A fellow mettlesome and trim;
: A brightness that the years can't dim.
: Then let us praise this brave appliance
: In which we place this just reliance
: And offer it with each fresh slice
: Such words of friendship and advice
: As "How are things with you tonight?"
: Or "Not too dark but not too light."

The final line refers to toast, but is also a reasonable description of the story. While the movie version has a reputation of being unusually dark for its time, a lot of the parts that give it that reputation were added by the filmmakers (or expanded from a brief bit in the book: for instance, the narrator mentions in the first paragraph that the old miserable air conditioner has stopped working, but in the movie it gets a full death scene). There's relatively little physical danger in the original, but still plenty of existential dread in terms of the prospect of getting discarded at the city dump.

== Notes ==

=== the vacuum cleaner, being the oldest ... it was a Hoover ===

(p. 9) How old is this oldest of the appliances? This story begins on March 8, 1976, and the appliances were abandoned in the cottage on September 25, 1973,<ref>''The Brave Little Toaster'', p. 12.</ref> after having been brought from the city "years and years and years ago" (except for the toaster, who arrived at some point after that). Appliances did generally last longer in those days than now, so "the master" (who isn't as young as he is in the movie) could've had some items from 20 years earlier—but then he might've been more attached to them as antiques and wouldn't have left them behind. So let's say they're early '70s or late '60s devices.

[[File:Dialamatic-ad.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Hoover Dial-a-Matic Model 1170 (1969)]] However—if one really cares about being historically consistent (which I have no reason to think Disch really cared about, but he might have done so for fun)—the vacuum, and therefore all the other appliances, arguably can't be older than 1969. That's the year when {{wp|The Hoover Company|Hoover}} released its first ''self-propelled'' vacuum, the Dial-a-Matic Model 1170 (shown at right); the vacuum being able to roll around via its own motor is an important plot point in this story. (That doesn't mean fully self-directed like a {{wp|Roomba}}—just that the Model 1170 could keep going in whatever direction you pushed it.) You might argue that all of these appliances seem to be able to crawl around on their own anyway, but since we're told that this vacuum is envious of newer vacuums for their other design features like disposable dust bags<ref>''The Brave Little Toaster'', p. 11.</ref> and ''not'' for being self-propelled, I feel confident that it does have that as a mechanical feature and not just a magic/anthropomorphic one.

The vacuum cleaner portrayed in Schmidt's illustrations doesn't seem to be any particular Hoover; it's kind of a cross between the 1170 and later '70s models that didn't have such a tall center piece.

=== an off-white plastic alarm clock/radio (AM only) ===

Digital clocks were already around in the '70s, but I think we can assume this is an analog one since Disch would've been likely to mention its glowing numbers otherwise. FM radio was also around, but FM {{wp|FM broadcasting#History|took a while to catch on}} in the US. Here's a slightly older analog AM-only model.

[[File:Toaster-clock-radio.jpg|thumb|left|300px|General Electric C4245 clock/radio (c. 1968)]]

=== a cheerful yellow electric blanket ===

[[File:Toaster-blanket.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Northern Electric blanket (1970)]] Assuming the unseen "master" is an adult of average size, the blanket might be something like the one in the relaxing scene at right.

=== a Tensor lamp who had come from a savings bank ===

The {{wp|Tensor lamp}} was popular throughout the '60s and '70s, with many different styles but always having a smaller-than-usual bulb ("the lamp could never regard an ordinary 100-watt bulb without a twinge of envy"<ref>''The Brave Little Toaster'', p. 11.</ref>) and a movable arm. Schmidt's illustrations show one with a curved gooseneck, like the one at left; older models would've more likely had a jointed arm.

[[File:Tensor-il-355.jpg|thumb|left|300px|Tensor lamp model IL 355 (early 1970s)]]

=== the toaster, a bright little Sunbeam ===

Sunbeam toasters were made from 1949 to 1997.<ref>{{cite article|title=Sunbeam Models & Years|url=https://www.timstoasters.com/models-years/|publication=Tim's Toasters|accessed=December 31, 2024}}</ref> The main thing that made a Sunbeam different from other toasters, besides being especially brave and optimistic, was its fully automatic system: instead of pushing down a lever, just dropping in the bread triggered a mechanism that lowered the bread and started the heating element, and after reaching the right temperature it would smoothly raise the bread up again.

A common early-1970s model was the AT-W:

[[File:Sunbeam-vt-40-1.jpg|thumb|center|300px|Our hero?]]

Another distinctive feature of Sunbeams—all of them, as far as I know—is that the toast slots were crosswise, as shown above. Schmidt's artwork shows a toaster with the more familiar lengthwise design, but clearly she was taking artistic license anyway since she also drew a push-down lever. So what kind of toaster is Thomas M. Disch gazing at his reflection in on the back cover photo—with lengthwise toast slots? We may never know, but the biographical note at the end of the book says his toaster "has been working with the author for over fifteen years."<br clear="all">

=== taken back to the city ... [like] the Water Pik ===

[[File:Water-pik.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Water-Pik (1975)]] (p. 10) This brand of tooth-cleaning device is still around; in the ’70s it looked like the photo at right. I’m not sure if I really would lug the thing around with me on vacation, as this guy apparently had been doing.

=== a tiny knife sharpener that worked by being rolled ===

(p. 17) Many variations on a rolling knife sharpener, both modern and vintage, are easy to find online... but we're also told here that it has "a single wheel ... one and a half inches in diameter." All the ones I've seen are either bigger than that or have two wheels.

=== ELECTRICITY IS VERY DANGEROUS ... ask a major appliance ===

(p. 21) While there's an obvious public service here for any human children who might be reading the story, the way this passage is written is also a reminder that the book's intended audience is, allegedly, young appliances.

=== whenever human beings are observing them they must remain perfectly still ===

(p. 23) Such rules develop naturally in any story about inorganic objects being alive, to explain why we normally don't see them walking around, so the ''Toy Story'' movies probably would've included a similar idea even if John Lasseter hadn't read this. In that series it's never 100% clear whether it's a law of nature that the toys are physically unable to resist, or it's voluntary and they're just very consistent about it. But in this story it does seem to be a law of nature, since a bit later the toaster finds itself unexpectedly frozen ("the same force preventing it from moving prevented its speech as well")<ref>''The Brave Little Toaster'', p. 51.</ref> even before it notices that there's a human nearby. Later developments indicate that they can work around this via various loopholes like being under a sheet or on the phone.

=== the danger of pirates ===

(p. 23) Disch declines to explain what kind of "pirates" might be found on land until quite a bit later, when we learn that to an appliance "pirates" are any "people who take things that belong to other people"<ref>''The Brave Little Toaster'', p. 48.</ref>—which, since the things are secretly alive, is the same as kidnapping and forced servitude.

=== a long comic jingle about Barneys' Hi-Styles for Guys and Gals ===

(p. 24) It's unclear whether this is the {{wp|Barneys New York|Barneys}} department store chain or a fictional store, but I'm guessing it's the former (even though Barneys was still writing its name as "Barney's" in 1980). Barneys in the 1970s had just finished remaking itself from a discount outlet into a fancier place full of designer brands. Here's a [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l7n61Z62PAY 1975 TV spot] with a goofy quality similar to what's described here, aimed at convincing young professional "guys and gals" that they could now afford nice things.

=== a rough sort of octosyllabic doggerel ===

(p. 26) The daisy is exclusively using {{wp|iambic tetrameter}} (sometimes cheating by dropping the first beat) in rhymed couplets, AA-BB-CC etc. as boringly as possible despite the very flowery language. Disch, in his other career as a poet, would be among the "more evolved species" that the narrator says prefer "sestinas, rondeaux, and villanelles of the highest order."

=== You tell him .... Tell ''them'' ===

(p. 33) The whole scene of the comically old-fashioned squirrels refusing to understand that traditional gender distinctions are irrelevant to appliances may seem ahead of its time now, but ideas about alternatives to gendered language were already around in the '80s—especially in science fiction. Ursula K. Le Guin's ''The Left Hand of Darkness'' (1969) depicted a world of intersex people where "he" was the only pronoun; later, the society in Samuel Delany's ''Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand'' (1984) used "he" and "she" in a completely different way that depended on the speaker's level of attraction to the person being described.

The joke in this passage is a sly one about using English grammar in a passive-aggressive way. Marjorie the squirrel refuses to acknowledge that "it" is the toaster's preferred pronoun, but Marjorie hasn't decided to use a singular "them" here—since just a minute later, she's referring to the toaster as "he." Instead, she's decided to just change this sentence to refer to the whole group of appliances.

=== From each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs ===

(p. 49) A socialist motto {{wp|From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs|popularized by Karl Marx}}.

=== humming the poignant theme song from ''Doctor Zhivago'' ===

(p. 52) Also known as {{wp|Lara's Theme|"Lara's Theme"}}, from the score by Maurice Jarre. A version with lyrics added was extremely popular in the '60s and then became a hit again in 1973—so the fact that it's described here as a film theme, instead of as the tune of "Somewhere My Love", suggests that either the narrator or "the master" might be a bit of a film nerd who isn't very into pop music.

=== listened to the radio sing song after song ===

(p. 54) The idea that the radio is always ''performing'', rather than just passively conveying other people's performances, is used heavily in the movie adaptation where the dialogue voiced by Jon Lovitz includes free-association medleys of songs and commercials.

One thing Lovitz sings in the movie, very briefly, that viewers who recognize it might find a wee bit odd or inappropriate, is ''not'' from this book: the Al Jolson version of {{wp|My Mammy|"My Mammy"}}. However, there is a Disch connection there and I strongly suspect it was an inside joke by the filmmakers rather than a coincidence. Disch's science fiction novel ''[[On Wings of Song]]''—published in the same magazine as ''The Brave Little Toaster'', one year earlier—was a bitter satire involving the rise of a pop star who is famous for a combination of bel canto opera and blackface minstrel songs, including that one.

=== the toaster's own favorite melody, "I Whistle a Happy Tune" ===

(p. 54) {{wp|I Whistle a Happy Tune|This song}} is from ''The King and I'' (1951). Its lyrics aren't quoted for the reader, but if you know them, they cast an ironic light on the title of the book, and the character of the toaster... since they're about pretending to be brave and hoping to convince yourself:

: While shivering in my shoes
: I strike a careless pose
: And whistle a happy tune
: And no one ever knows I'm afraid ...
: Make believe you're brave
: And the trick will take you far
: You may be as brave
: As you make believe you are

=== listener-supported radio station KHOP ===

(p. 75) A California radio station has been using that {{wp|Call signs in the United States|call sign}} since 1996; I don't know if there was one anywhere in 1980. "K" stations could be anywhere in the midwestern or western US.

=== KL5-9120 ===

(p. 75) Using letters for the first digits of a phone number was a relic of the old {{wp|Telephone exchange names|exchange name}} system, and would've still been recognizable in 1976 when the story takes place (although maybe not for children in 1980; Disch may have been hoping to make readers curious enough to ask a major appliance about it). KL5 is the same as 555, the US standard for fake phone numbers in movies and TV.

=== Whether or not it's against the rules ... many appliances ... do use the phone system regularly ===

(p. 76) Unlike the rule that forces them to freeze if a human being "observes" them, this one is more of a guideline that they can choose to break, and it seems that being heard (by someone who can't see that they're appliances) doesn't count as being observed. ''Toy Story 4'' makes use of a similar loophole, when the toys' speech can be heard by a human as long as they're pretending to be a GPS system.

== Footnotes ==
<references/>

The Businessman

2025-02-10T18:16:34Z

Eb: /* Other reading */

{{#css:The Businessman.css}}{{#addbodyclass: tiled-toc}}
These are notes for '''''The Businessman: A Tale of Terror''''' (1984), the first book in [[Thomas M. Disch]]'s series of fantasy/horror novels now known as ''Supernatural Minnesota''. Set in Minneapolis and St. Paul in the early 1980s, it deals with hauntings, demonic possessions, and the unusual rules of the afterlife.

All notes refer to the 2010 University of Minnesota Press edition, which features an excellent introduction by John Crowley. For others, see '''[[/Editions/]]'''.

== Major characters ==

* Robert Glandier, executive.
* Giselle Glandier, Robert's ex-wife, deceased.
* Joy-Ann Anker, Giselle's mother.
* Bing Anker, Giselle's brother.
* John Berryman, poet, deceased.
* Adah Menken, actor and poet, deceased.

== Epigram ==

<blockquote>The issue always and at bottom is spiritual. ''—Dwight D. Eisenhower''</blockquote>

The only citation I can find for this alleged Eisenhower quote is the 1956 historical work ''The Crucial Decade''<ref>{{cite book|author=Goldman, Eric F.|title=The Crucial Decade: America, 1945-1955|date=1956|url=https://archive.org/stream/crucialdecadeame006464mbp/crucialdecadeame006464mbp_djvu.txt|location=New York|publisher=Knopf|isbn=0394701836}}</ref>, which places it in quotation marks near a mention of Eisenhower, but doesn't clearly indicate whether he said it or in what context.

== Chapter 1 ==

=== spiritual analog of sight ===

The idea that there are "spiritual senses" corresponding in some way to the physical senses has a long tradition in Catholic mysticism. The Jesuit writer Augustin Poulain discusses this tradition in ''The Graces of Interior Prayer''<ref>{{cite book|author=Poulin, Augustin|title=The Graces of Interior Prayer|date=1901}}</ref>.

=== The worms crawl in ===

"The Worms Crawl In" or "{{wp|The Hearse Song}}" is at least as old as World War I. There are many variations, all of which describe processes of bodily decay in comically gruesome detail—as Disch alludes to in chapter 4 ("the liquifying tissues of her dead body ... entered upon some new and more drastic stage of disintegration").

== Chapter 2 ==

=== Glandier ===
Glandier has never been a common last name in the US. In French, it's an archaic synonym for ''glandifère'', meaning "having glands or bearing fruit", and also the name of a rural area in northwestern France.

== Chapter 3 ==

=== the belted suit from Dayton's ===
A Minnesota-based {{wp|Dayton's|chain of department stores}}.

== Chapter 4 ==

=== Some derelict on Hennepin Avenue ===

Hennepin runs through many neighborhoods in Minneapolis, so it's unclear where this derelict would be found.

== Chapter 5 ==

=== a corner lot on Calumet Avenue ===
There's no such street in the Twin Cities, although there are many places called Calumet throughout the Midwest. Joy-Ann's house is later described (in chapter 35) as being on "the corner of Calumet and Carver"; there's no street called Carver either.

=== The Roman matron who said that her children were her jewels ===
{{wp|Cornelia Africana}}, who is perhaps best known in the Midwest for {{wp|Cornelia Africana#Modern representations|representing the state of Ohio in public statuary}}. The reference here is ironic, since Cornelia's statement is normally taken to mean that her children are admirable, not that they're expensive.

=== I wish they'd wear habits ... And do the mass in Latin again ===
The use of local languages rather than Latin for the liturgy, and the use of plain clothes by religious orders, became common after the {{wp|Second Vatican Council}} (Vatican II) in the early 1960s. Reaction against Vatican II gave rise to the Traditionalist Catholic movement; while the movement was mostly driven by theological and political beliefs (and went on to have significant influence in secular right-wing politics in the US), for Joy-Ann as a non-practicing Catholic it seems to be mostly about nostalgia. Disch later depicted a more dramatic fictional schism within the Church in ''[[The M.D.]]''

=== encased in Fabulon ===
A brand of polyurethane varnish.

== Chapter 6 ==

=== M chalked on the back of his jacket ===
A reference to Fritz Lang's ''{{wp|M (1931 film)|M}}'', in which this chalk initial is used to identify a serial killer. Glandier does in fact get an M written on his jacket later, in chapter 52.

== Chapter 7 ==

=== The singer, Giselle McKenzie ===
A misspelling of {{wp|Gisele MacKenzie}}. Perhaps not coincidentally, Giselle (with two Ls) is also the name of a {{wp|Giselle|19th century ballet}} whose dead title character returns as a ghost to protect her unfaithful lover from other, less merciful ghosts.

== Chapter 8 ==

=== ''And These Thy Gifts'' by Claire Cullen ===
Not a real book, probably a parody of some 1980s inspirational literature; described further in chapter 13.

== Chapter 9 ==

=== I've come here to sell you something ===
During Disch's childhood in Fairmont, Minnesota, he had a similar job selling "MagnaPad magnetic potholders, which I was able to exhibit without even being invited into the kitchen by hanging the potholder right on the screen door"; his sales career ended when he "stopped being a cute little kid who could charm bored housewives and had become a pimply and not-so-charming teenager".{{ref Disch child}}

== Chapter 10 ==

=== The fiction of John Norman ===
{{wp|John Norman}} (real name John Lange) wrote 34 ''Gor'' novels, which have inspired a specific sub-subculture among BDSM practitioners.

Disch discussed Gor briefly in his critical study ''The Dreams Our Stuff Is Made Of'', arguing that while Norman's work had no great literary value, it might have been taken more seriously if it were simply kinky erotica like ''The Story of O'' rather than kinky ''science fiction'' erotica—and that this might be considered partly a class issue since Norman's writing, like most pulp, was "addressed to a Budweiser audience" (although conflating class and cultural preference in this way doesn’t really apply to Robert Glandier, who is uncouth but not working-class).<ref>{{cite book|author=Disch, Thomas M||title=The Dreams Our Stuff Is Made Of: How Science Fiction Conquered the World|location=New York|publisher=Free Press|date=1998|isbn=0684824051}}</ref>

This is one of only two mentions of science fiction—Disch's own main genre—in the Supernatural Minnesota novels, and they're both heavily ironic (for the other, see ''The Priest''). If Norman weren't a real writer, one might suspect he was an author's self-parody along the lines of {{wp|Kilgore Trout}}, representing other paths Disch might have taken: both he and Disch were well-read Midwesterners who settled in New York, and were famously cranky and combative about the politics of the SF genre<ref>{{cite article|author=Norman, John|date=October 14, 2001|title=Letters|url=http://www.locusmag.com/2001/Departments/Letters10Norman.html|publication=Locus Online|accessed=August 25, 2017}}</ref>—but Norman is extremely prolific and successful, having found a large following by catering to heterosexual power fantasies. In the satirical cosmology of Disch's Minnesota series, there's (almost) no justice... so of course the only science fiction fan we meet is the worst person ever, and he mostly just reads Gor books.

== Chapter 12 ==

=== I am going to kill you ===
The self-fulfilling prophecy is a traditional tragic device that Disch also explored in ''[[The M.D.]]'' Here, although Glandier might well have ended up murdering Giselle some day anyway, the reason that this happens "the next time we meet" is that they don't meet again for some time—since she's been frightened away by this vision.

== Chapter 13 ==

=== my old seventy-eights .... "Black Magic," and then "Blue Skies" ===
Since almost no 78 RPM albums were produced after 1950, it's likely that Joy-Ann owns two 1940s big-band arrangements: Benny Goodman's recording of "{{wp|Blue Skies (Irving Berlin song)|Blue Skies}}" and Glenn Miller's recording of "{{wp|That Old Black Magic}}".

The lyrics of both songs fit with the spiritual action of the book, with "That Old Black Magic" describing a passionate but destructive relationship, and "Blue Skies" a state of ecstatic liberation. Joy-Ann has put them in an order that tells a hopeful story (also, alphabetical order), although Giselle is heading in the opposite direction.

=== Erle Stanley Gardner ===
Author of the {{wp|Perry Mason}} mysteries.

== Chapter 14 ==

=== she soared upward in her freedom ===
Disch speculated about the liberating experience of astral travel, as well as its possible dangers, in his later novel ''[[On Wings of Song]]''.

== Chapter 16 ==

=== The Gold Diggers of 1980 ===
A joke on the Busby Berkeley musical film ''{{wp|Gold Diggers of 1933}}'' (and its several sequels). Disch was fond of this title: in ''[[On Wings of Song]]'', there's a mid-21st-century film called ''Gold-Diggers of 1984''.

== Chapter 19 ==

=== elms you used to see shading Calumet Avenue in the days before the blight ===
Dutch elm disease arrived in Minnesota in the early 1960s<ref>{{cite article|author=French, David W.|url=https://conservancy.umn.edu/items/b61d5115-e99f-46f8-b801-a745affd0d2c|title=History of Dutch Elm Disease in Minnesota|publisher=University of Minnesota|date=1993|accessed=January 24, 2025}}</ref> and wiped out most of the elm trees in Minneapolis over the next 20 years.

== Chapter 21 ==

=== its cocoon of Munsingwear ===
A {{wp|Munsingwear|brand of underwear}} (supposedly extra-warm) manufactured in Minnesota.

=== Get yourself a bottle of Geritol ===
{{wp|Geritol}} is a vitamin supplement. This jingle (invented by Disch as far as I know) is a parody of "{{wp|Joshua Fit the Battle of Jericho}}".

== Chapter 22 ==

=== Father Windakiewiczowa ===

While there are plenty of long {{wp|Polish name|Polish surnames}} in the Midwest, this one is a bit unlikely: "-owa" is an old-fashioned suffix used for married women, i.e. "Mrs. Windakiewiczowa" is how you might refer to the wife of Mr. Windakiewicz.

=== Father Mabbley's nickname ... was Queen Mab ===
A traditional name for a fairy queen, popularized by ''Romeo and Juliet''. Mabbley will return as a prominent supporting character in ''[[The Priest]]''.

== Chapter 23 ==

=== Reagan had been elected president ... someone had tried to shoot him ===
{{wp|Attempted assassination of Ronald Reagan|Evidence}} that the main story takes place in 1981.

== Chapter 24 ==

=== had been, she claimed, a world-famous actress and poet ===
{{wp|Adah Menken}}'s self-description is accurate, though she was not exactly famous ''for'' her acting and poetry as she implies. She might have been more likely to introduce herself by her stage name, Adah Isaacs Menken, but having changed her name several times already it's plausible that she changed it again after death.

Menken had no connection to Minnesota as far as I know; her role here seems to be largely dictated by Disch's interest in her as a celebrity figure (he wrote briefly about her in his critical work ''The Castle of Indolence'')<ref>{{cite book|author=Disch, Thomas M|title=The Castle of Indolence: On Poetry, Poets, and Poetasters|location=New York|publisher=St. Martin's Press|date=1995|isbn=0312145594}}</ref> and by how much she would be likely to annoy John Berryman.

== Chapter 27 ==

=== all the flowers beginning with B ===

While still alive in Chapter 8, Joy-Ann did a word-search puzzle consisting of these.

=== "I Dreamt I Dwelt..." ===

Probably "{{wp|I Dreamt I Dwelt in Marble Halls}}", from the opera ''The Bohemian Girl''.

=== ''Luxe'' ... ''calme, et volupté'' ===

"Luxury, peace, and pleasure"—from Baudelaire's ''{{wp|Les fleurs du mal}}''.

=== what Samuel Goldwyn said to me ===

{{wp|Samuel Goldwyn#Goldwynisms|Goldwyn}} was credited (sometimes wrongly) with many comic aphorisms. This one seems to be Disch's own invention.

== Chapter 31 ==

=== the Lake Street Bridge ===

The current concrete version of {{wp|Lake Street-Marshall Bridge|this bridge}} dates from 1989; Joy-Ann and Giselle are going over the original wrought-iron bridge.

== Chapter 33 ==

=== The assault on immortality begins ===

The first lines of an untitled poem published posthumously in ''Henry's Fate & Other Poems''.<ref>{{cite book|author=Berryman, John|title=Henry's Fate & Other Poems, 1967-1972|publisher=Farrar Straus & Giroux|date=1977|isbn=0374169500}}</ref>

=== entitled (meaninglessly) "Resurgam" ===

Menken's title means "I will rise again."

=== whose ''one'' well-chosen word is its title, ''Infelicia'' ===

"Unfortunate."

== Chapter 42 ==

=== you and Miss Plath ... and that other one ===
Assuming "that other one" is a poet who committed suicide at some point prior to 1981, but later than Menken's death in 1868—and even if Menken only had jurisdiction over US writers (no such rule is stated in the book; her section of Paradise does seem America-centric, but in chapter 56 it seems that she's been in charge of "the entire Earth")—the "other one" could still be any one of a dozen people. If Menken has only noticed three suicides in 113 years, she clearly isn't very familiar with the field of poetry. It's also possible that she did notice the rest and originally barred them all from Paradise, but that only three of them refused to praise her writing.

Disch himself joined the ranks of poet-suicides in 2008.

=== even Brunhilde's horse ===
John is thinking of Wagner's opera ''Twilight of the Gods'', in which Brünnhilde rides her horse Grane into the flames of Siegfried's funeral pyre where presumably they die. This is Wagner's invention; in the mythology he drew from, Grane was not Brünnhilde's horse and did not meet that fate. The horse is not a major character (and did not really die for love of the Ring so much as for Brünnhilde's broken heart), but would be memorable to opera fans due to the difficulty of staging this final scene.<ref>{{cite article|author=Quinn, Terry|date=September 16, 2013|title=Brünnhilde's Horse|url=https://onstageandbackstage.wordpress.com/2013/09/16/brunnhildes-horse/|publication=Onstage and Backstage|accessed=September 11, 2017}}</ref>

== Chapter 43 ==

=== she had entered the space ... a pattern of crossed lines ===
The idea that an incorporeal spirit could be pulled in and trapped by a particular geometric design is a major plot point in ''[[On Wings of Song]]'', where any radially symmetrical rotating structure can be a "fairy trap."

== Chapter 52 ==

=== Woodman, spare that tree! ===
Berryman is quoting from [http://www.bartleby.com/248/131.html the poem of the same name] by George Pope Morris.

=== Sleep's two gates ===
Possibly the {{wp|gates of horn and ivory}}, although those were said to be gates for dreams, not for the sleepers themselves.

== Chapter 55 ==

=== in the Sheehys' burning home ===
A final confrontation set in a burning house is a recurring feature of the Supernatural Minnesota books, as well as [[334/334/Part VI#The entire Hanson apartment was on fire|''334'']].

== Chapter 59 ==

=== a referendum here some years ago ===
Bing is referring to the 1978 referendum in St. Paul that re-legalized discrimination based on sexual orientation (by striking down a civil rights law passed in 1974). This was in turn reversed by a similar anti-discrimination law passed in 1990.<ref>{{cite article|author=Hillbery, Rhonda|date=November 2, 1991|title=Showdown Nears in St. Paul Over Repealing Gay Rights Law|url=http://articles.latimes.com/1991-11-02/news/mn-717_1_gay-rights|publication=Los Angeles Times}}</ref>

== Other reading ==
* [https://reactormag.com/guided-tour-supernatural-minnesota-businessman/ University of Minnesota Press page] for their edition {{InternetArchive|date=October 27, 2020}}
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20180714223409/http://www.ukjarry1.talktalk.net/bus.htm Matthew Davis's page] for the book {{InternetArchive|date=July 4, 2018}}
* [https://reactormag.com/guided-tour-supernatural-minnesota-businessman/ Review and discussion] by Ron Hogan on ''Reactor''

== Footnotes ==
<references/>

{{Supernatural Minnesota nav}}

The M.D.

2025-02-10T18:15:10Z

Eb: /* Other reading */

{{#css:The M.D.css}}{{#addbodyclass: tiled-toc}}
'''''The M.D.: A Horror Story''''' (1991) is [[Thomas M. Disch]]'s second ''Supernatural Minnesota'' novel. Sharing most of its setting and time period with ''[[The Businessman]]'' (although, unlike that book, there is also a speculative part of the story that takes place in the then-near-future of 1999), it describes the rise and fall of Billy Michaels, a medical doctor with dangerous magic powers over health and disease.

All notes refer to the 2010 University of Minnesota Press edition, which has a very good introduction by John Clute. For others, see '''[[/Editions/]]'''.

== Major characters ==
* Billy Michaels, later Dr. William Michaels.
* Henry Michaels, his father.
* Sondra Winckelmeyer, his mother, now married to Ben Winckelmeyer.
* Madge Michaels, Henry's wife.
* Mrs. Obstschmecker, Madge's mother.
* Ned Hill, Madge's son from her first marriage.
* Lance Hill, Ned's father.
* Judith Winckelmeyer, Sondra's stepdaughter.
* Mercury, a.k.a. Santa Claus, a god.

== Epigram ==
: The young murderer doesn't come from a typical American family. The average American parent doesn't need to fear being murdered.
: —Dr. Elissa P. Benedek, as quoted in "Children Who Kill," ''New York Times'', Oct. 11, 1983

The cited ''New York Times'' article<ref>{{cite article|author=Nelson, Bryce|url=http://www.nytimes.com/1983/10/11/science/children-who-kill-personality-patterns-are-identified.html?pagewanted=all&mcubz=1|title=Children Who Kill|publication=New York Times|date=October 11, 1983|accessed=September 11, 2017}}</ref> is ironic in the context of ''The M.D.'', since it emphasizes the role of severe early trauma in molding a homicidal child. Billy Michaels may be what the article describes as a "nonempathic murderer," one of those without "the psychological ability to put themselves in the place of another," but his relatively sheltered childhood is almost exactly the opposite of people in that category who are said to have "a history of assaultive behavior, severe reading problems and inability to cope with stress." Disch may be implying that if such a person can in fact develop simply through intellectual curiosity, then it's not really the case that "the average American parent doesn't need to fear being murdered."

== Chapter 1 ==

=== Sister Mary Symphorosa ===
Named after a {{wp|Symphorosa|2nd century martyr}}. Disch wrote in "My Life as a Child" that this character and her crusade against Santa Claus were based on a nun who taught him in kindergarten at St. Paul's Convent School in Fairmont, Minnesota (where there was also a Sister Fidelis; we'll see in chapter 57 that Sister Fidelis, the more benevolent of the nuns, ends up joining a liberal reform movement in the Church).{{ref Disch child}} Despite her abusive behavior, he was not without sympathy: "I think I give her honorable reasons for doing what she did .... [she's] right in saying that Santa Claus is pernicious, that teaching people to believe something you know they're going to find out is a lie is teaching them disbelief."{{ref Disch SF Eye}}

=== When meat isn't properly preserved ===
This passage foreshadows two important events later in the book, one involving contaminated meat, the other about an effective way to preserve corpses.

== Chapter 2 ==

=== Mrs. Obstschmecker ===
Her last name in German means "fruit-taster." Of the real-life inspiration for this character, Disch wrote that "Grandma Disch was resurrected to play the role of Grandma Obstschmecker,"{{ref Disch child}} and called her "a crippled, mean-spirited, small-minded German Catholic."{{ref Disch autobio}} However, whereas his own grandmother punished one of her daughters for marrying a divorced man by never speaking to her again, Mrs. O. is somewhat more forgiving (or at least less assertive) and expresses her disapproval of Madge's marriage only passive-aggressively.

=== the entire length of Calumet ===
The same [[The Businessman#a corner lot on Calumet Avenue|fictional street]] where Joy-Ann Anker lives in ''[[The Businessman]]''. All of the other place names in the book are also fictional, or at least belong to other cities rather than Minneapolis/St. Paul.

== Chapter 3 ==

=== when they got Dutch Elm disease ===
See [[The Businessman#elms you used to see shading Calumet Avenue in the days before the blight|''The Businessman'']].

=== Billy could only see things this other way ===
One of two hints (the other being in chapter 6) that Billy has an innate psychic gift and/or a neurological disease even before he makes his deal with Mercury.

== Chapter 5 ==

=== Father Windakiewiczowa ===
See [[The Businessman#Father Windakiewiczowa|''The Businessman'']].

== Chapter 7 ==

=== impeaching the president ===
Books One and Two take place in 1973-74, when Billy is 6 and 7. Billy turns 13 in Book Three, placing the middle section of the novel in 1980-81 like ''[[The Businessman]]''.

=== Billy Graham was on the news ===
{{wp|Billy Graham|Graham}}, as the first evangelical minister to develop a mass following on television, is an obvious forerunner to the digital-age Brother Orson later in the novel.

== Chapter 8 ==

=== horror movie called ''The Exorcist'' ===
''The Exorcist'' was released on December 26, 1973, just a day before this scene.

=== his caduceus is now a symbol of the science of medicine ===
This is true in a way, but the story isn't so straightforward. The traditional medical symbol was for thousands of years, and technically still is, the {{wp|rod of Asclepius}}—similar to the caduceus, but with just one snake and no wings. The {{wp|caduceus as a symbol of medicine}} does have some historical roots, but its widespread adoption didn't really happen until the 20th century, basically by mistake.<ref>{{cite article|author=Garrison, F.H.|title=The use of the caduceus in the insignia of the Army medical officer|url=https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC234831/?page=1|date=1919|publication=Bulletin of the Medical Library Association|pub-date=9(2):13–16}} The symbol was popularized by the U.S. Army Medical Corps, and in this article the Army medical historian {{wp|Fielding Hudson Garrison|Fielding Garrison}} justified its use to mean that Army medical workers were ''noncombatants''—based on past use of the caduceus as a symbol for a messenger or herald, someone who should have in effect diplomatic immunity. But it's unclear who actually started this usage, and Garrison may have been only guessing as to their rationale; he also mentions that some earlier appearances of the caduceus in medical history have no clear explanation, so you could, if you felt like it, see these as cases of Mercury manipulating people behind the scenes.</ref> Unlike Asclepius, Mercury/Hermes in mythology was not directly associated with healing; his main attributes were as a messenger (often an untrustworthy one), a transporter of dead souls, and a facilitator of commerce, and the caduceus was not even specific to him but was a general accessory for messengers and heralds. If one believed Mercury to be a real entity who's still with us, then the current role of the caduceus in the human imagination could be seen as evidence of his great skill at deceptive self-promotion; that's consistent with the characterizations of both Mercury and Billy in ''The M.D.'', since they're both unscrupulous and acquisitive people who are happy to take credit they don't deserve. Billy often isn't honest with himself either, and maybe the same is true of Mercury, who tells two contradictory stories about the caduceus in Chapter 10 and claims that he can't actually remember which is right.

But there are other reasons for the caduceus to be symbolically appropriate in this book. One is Mercury's association with business, since Billy's adult life will be devoted to amassing not just magical power but also corporate power. Another is the double-snake design; Disch pointed out that this could express "duality and balance, corresponding to the scientific view that for every action there's a reaction"—and that it resembles the double helix of DNA.<ref name="disch-finkle-interview">{{cite article|author=Finkle, David|date=April 19, 1991|title=Thomas M. Disch: versatile and prolific, he has written books
in nearly every genre|publication=Publishers Weekly|pub-date=Vol. 238, Issue 18}}</ref>

=== Watch out—I'm going to touch you with the poison stick ===
Ned's unwise bullying of his little brother is based on a childhood memory Disch described in an interview:

<blockquote>The particular experience ... was of a neighbor called Ricky, who lived in the same four-plex that we did. He was two or three years older than me, and he was a bully and a tease. And when I was four years old or five—it's amazing one can be so credulous, even at that age—he told me he had a poison stick, and he would chase me around the yard threatening me with it. .... What if [it] had actually worked? What if the force of the child's faith could empower?<ref name="disch-finkle-interview"/></blockquote>

=== his real father ... sold the ''Junior Universe of Knowledge Encyclopedia'' ===
Disch's father was a door-to-door salesman dealing in, among other things, the ''Britannica Junior''.{{ref Disch autobio}}

=== if the bad witch was making people sick, the good witch could make them better ===
An ironic statement considering how Billy's magic will work: the good and bad witch are the same person, and can never undo a curse once it's been made.

== Chapter 9 ==

=== the king of Bowling Pin Kingdom ===
As a kindergartener, the young Disch liked to play with "two sets of bowling pins (children and grown-ups) in enactments of my own fairy tales."{{ref Disch autobio}} In the same essay, he mentions having been able as a child to "cross my eyes, stare up at the ceiling, and watch self-projected home movies in wide-screen color" much as Billy does.

=== the Hanging Gardens of Wyomia ===
Could be just a child's wordplay on Wyoming, or a reference to the sprinter {{wp|Wyomia Tyus}} who would have been in the news in 1973.

== Chapter 12 ==

=== Power is never free. It must be paid for ===
Mercury is clearly implying that he is bestowing this power on Billy, which is probably the impression most readers come away with. But—given the earlier hints that Billy was already special in some way, and the careful wording of Mercury's promise in chapter 10 that he would ''tell'' Billy how to use the caduceus—another possible interpretation is that Billy always had the ability to use it, and only lacked knowledge of the rules. If that's the case, he's just been tricked into signing his soul away for basically nothing.

== Chapter 13 ==

=== Billy was only just turned seven ===
In a story with so strongly Catholic a setting, the age of seven is significant because it's traditionally the {{wp|Person (canon law)#Age of Reason|age of reason}}, after which a child is said to have moral responsibility. Billy made his bargain with Mercury just before turning seven, so according to this tradition he can't be considered responsible for it; but his first use of the caduceus to harm a person happens after his seventh birthday.

== Chapter 16 ==

=== the Vigil of Saman ... the Druid god of Death ===
Although the kind of children's encyclopedia Disch is imitating here might well have given such an explanation, it's etymologically wrong: {{wp|Samhain#Etymology|several sources concur}} that Shamhna/Samhain is derived from words referring more generically to the idea of a festival or a season. Bruce Robinson argues that there is little to no evidence that the holiday was named after any "god of Death," but that Christian writers started perpetuating this error in the 18th century and have spread it into popular culture.<ref>{{cite article|author=Robinson, Bruce|url=http://www.religioustolerance.org/hallo_sa.htm|title=About Halloween: The myth about the 'Celtic god of the dead'|publication=Religious Tolerance|date=October 22, 2015|accessed=September 11, 2017}}</ref> But, as with all of Mercury's/Santa's other statements so far, any inaccuracies that could be the author's fault could also be blamed on the god just reflecting back to Billy whatever ideas Billy has already picked up.

=== What rhymed with "now"? ===
Since we never see the words of the curse Billy eventually writes for this purpose, Disch seems to be inviting the reader to guess what this rhyme is from context. Based on the events of chapter 19 when the curse takes effect, a logical conclusion would be that Billy attached the curse to Madge's fifth of vodka in the freezer—although if so, either he didn't do it till later or else it had a long delay, since Madge was able to have a drink with no problem in chapter 18. In any case, I can't think what the rhyme would be.

== Chapter 21 ==

=== She's not a witch .... She's St. Clare ===
{{wp|Clare of Assisi}} was a follower of St. Francis. As she was not a martyr and was not known for any visually distinctive miracles, a St. Clare costume would simply consist of cheap ascetic clothes. She is also officially the patron saint of television.

== Chapter 30 ==

=== Dr. Helbron ===
This character appears briefly in ''[[The Businessman]]'' as the psychiatrist for both Robert Glandier and Jack Sheehy.

== Chapter 31 ==

=== Bishop Cretin High School ===
A real school that Disch attended in the 1950s.{{ref Disch child}}

=== Willowville, New Hope, and the other north-lying suburbs ===
Willowville, where the Winckelmeyer family lives, is fictional, and is mentioned briefly in ''[[The Businessman]]''. New Hope is about five miles northwest of downtown Minneapolis.

== Chapter 33 ==

=== a girl in New Jersey or somewhere like that ===
{{wp|Karen Ann Quinlan}} was from Pennsylvania, but ended up in a coma in New Jersey (at St. Clare's Hospital) after an overdose. In 1980, she was still alive, having already survived for four years after her parents decided to remove her from the ventilator (but to continue the feeding tube).

== Chapter 41 ==

=== Ondine's curse ... was also connected with sleeping ===
This is correct: {{wp|central hypoventilation syndrome}} normally shows up during sleep. Disch never spells out why Billy's victim died immediately instead, but one possibility is that the curse relied only on the literal words Billy had read about the disease, which did not specify sleep, rather than his logical assumptions about it.

=== Mississippi—Father of Waters ===
The statue described here is "Father of Waters" by Larkin Goldsmith Mead, which in reality is at {{wp|Minneapolis City Hall#Interior|Minneapolis City Hall}}.

== Chapter 44 ==

=== honor that king, and make the day of his birth their holiday ===
Although Icksy started out by talking about her son Reinhardt, this prophecy might refer to a different King: {{wp|Martin Luther King Jr. Day}} was designated a federal holiday in 1983. There is a strong strain of racial paranoia running throughout Billy's childhood—realistically portrayed as something he's picked up from many casual remarks from the adults in his life—so it's not surprising that his dream depicts this vengeful character as being Black. A more sympathetic portrayal of African-Americans will have to wait for Book Five, when we escape from the point of view of Billy and his immediate family.

=== that child shall have no name ===
This prophecy is fulfilled in chapter 52.

=== your judge's name is— ===
We'll meet this person in chapter 56.

== Chapter 46 ==

=== The Population Explosion ===
This is also the title of a [[Camp Concentration/Book Two#Riesman|satirical story]] written by the narrator of ''[[Camp Concentration]]'' about the sociopathic scientist Dr. Skilliman; in the story, Skilliman decides to address the titular problem by murdering a single baby.

== Chapter 52 ==

=== Bradley-Chambers syndrome ===
This congenital disorder is fictional, and combines the features of many real kinds of birth defects. It is referenced, with language clearly derived from ''The M.D.'', in fantasy author James Morrow's play ''The Soap Opera''.<ref>{{cite article|author=Morrow, James|date=1996|title=Bible Stories for Adults, No. 46: The Soap Opera|publication=Bible Stories for Adults|publisher=Mariner Books|isbn=0156002442}}</ref>

== Chapter 56 ==

=== priests getting married and women becoming priests ===
One of the non-technological signs that we are now in a speculative near-future world: a branch of the Catholic Church has split off from Roman authority and embraced many liberal reforms. This will be explored in more detail in the next chapter.

Disch had been thinking about such a possibility at least 20 years earlier, when he included something similar as a minor detail in the future world of ''[[334]]''. Whether it was ever likely in the real United States is hard to say. During much of the 20th century, the Catholic Church in America was associated with political progressivism in terms of civil rights, class issues, and immigration. In terms of sexuality, it was not; but so many practicing Catholics were more liberal than the Church in that regard that one could easily imagine the hierarchy eventually moving that way too. Instead, from the 1980s onward, anti-abortion politics and backlash to LGBTQ rights created an increasing alliance between Catholics and right-wing Protestants, and the most conservative elements have gained influence in the US as the demographics of the Church have changed.<ref>{{cite article|url=https://www.ncronline.org/news/step-back-time-americas-catholic-church-sees-immense-shift-toward-old-ways|title='A step back in time': America's Catholic Church sees an immense shift toward the old ways|publication=National Catholic Reporter|date=May 6, 2024|accessed=January 1, 2025}}</ref> It's now arguably more plausible that a US/Rome schism would produce a US Church that is further right than the Pope.

=== a follower of Brother Orson ===
Brother Orson will be described in chapter 58.

== Chapter 57 ==

=== Imani Temple ===
''Imani'', Swahili for "faith," is probably best known in the US as one of the principles of {{wp|Kwanzaa}}.

=== his favorite Josephan detox center ===
That is, a detox center devoted to St. Joseph (whose name is used by many medical facilities across the country). Disch said this about the character of Youngermann: "Half the priests in the country are in and out of detox. It's the chief occupational hazard of being a Roman Catholic priest, because they have to drink wine every morning."{{ref Disch SF Eye}}

=== Fathers .... not always around when you need them ===
William Michaels embodies this idea in several ways: his biological father, Henry, died as an indirect result of William's actions; his stepfather, Ben, went to jail, also indirectly thanks to William; and William was an absentee father during his own son Judge's formative years. While it might have been a good thing for Judge to be out of his father's influence, his growing up in the Bible Belt due to William's destruction of Judith's family probably contributed to his conversion to radical fundamentalism.

=== strikes down anyone it takes a fancy to ===
Lyman is referring to the reason ARVIDS is named as it is: "acute random-vector immune dysfunction syndrome" (see chapter 73). A vector is an organism or substance that carries the disease-causing agent, so this is simply saying that unlike AIDS, there's no known pattern of who gets the new plague, or how.

== Chapter 58 ==

=== the Kiss of Peace ===
The kiss or {{wp|Kiss of peace|sign of peace}} has been a part of regular Catholic Mass since 1969, but in many US congregations it is replaced with a handshake.

=== Brother Orson holds out little hope of salvation for the sons of Ham ===
In other words, Brother Orson's movement is an explicitly racist one along the lines of {{wp|Christian Identity}}. "Sons of Ham" in this sense dates back to the 17th or 18th century, from the idea that the biblical {{wp|curse of Ham}} had been passed down to Africans who were therefore predestined to be enslaved. Lyman is basically daring Judge to disavow this extremely offensive phrase, and Judge fails the test.

=== some book that was sealed with seven seals ===
Judge is holding forth about the {{wp|Book of Revelation}}, which is commonly interpreted in evangelical Protestantism as a prophecy of the end of the world, but in Catholicism is considered more of a metaphorical curiosity and not part of the Bible.

=== the image you ''see'' on the TV ... it's like a cartoon ===
Lyman is describing a computer-animated figure that responds to individual viewers (although not every viewer has this "interactive capability," which presumably is a premium service). That this is described as a TV program rather than an online service is a sign of the book being written in 1990-91 rather than a few years later—although, with the rise of streaming Internet channels that are commonly described as "TV," it's become a more accurate prediction again.

=== those little dots sprinkled on the TV screen ===
Reminiscent of how Billy's early visions of Mercury are described in chapter 3.

=== Oliver North ===
Former Marine Lieutenant Colonel {{wp|Oliver North}} was best known for participating in the Reagan administration's illegal arms sales to Iran, covert support of the Nicaraguan Contras, and cover-ups of these actions. His convictions on three related crimes in 1989 were later reversed, and he became a hero to right-wingers who supported Reagan's Central American policies. Disch's idea that North would end up in the US Senate was only a slight exaggeration: North ran for the Senate in 1994, but lost by a three-percent margin.

== Chapter 59 ==

=== a chain of hotels, a prison system, and a realty and construction company ===
In the US, {{wp|Private prison#In the United States|privatized prisons}} in the modern sense began in 1984, and were immediately controversial but have continued to grow ever since. Disch anticipated this trend in a somewhat different way five years earlier in ''[[On Wings of Song]]'', where the prisons are set up on such a laissez-faire model that they have hardly any staff.

=== To keep Northwestern out of Onamia ===
{{wp|Onamia, Minnesota}} is a small town about 90 miles north of Minneapolis.

== Chapter 60 ==

=== dangers from father, brother, and son ===
Disch quoted this in an interview as "father, brother, ''or'' son"{{ref Disch SF Eye}}, which makes the pun of "Brother Orson" more explicit. (In the same interview, Disch responded to a suggestion that Brother Orson might also have been named for a fellow SF author, such as the notably right-wing Orson Scott Card, by drily stating, "I can't think of any science fiction figure by that name.") Still, the word is "and" in the first edition of the novel<ref>Thanks to John Stick for confirming this.</ref> as well as the most recent one.

In any case, William does in fact face dangers from ''all'' of those: his son Judge and his stepbrother Ned will become significant figures in his downfall, and his dead father Henry contributed supernaturally to Judge's conception (chapter 51) as well as providing an important genetic factor.

It is probably not a coincidence that almost this exact language—"father, brother, or son"—is commonly used on medical history questionnaires, patient education literature, etc.<ref>See, for instance, the results of a web search for [https://www.google.com/search?q=%22father+brother+or+son%22+medical+history "father brother or son" medical history].</ref> when discussing heritable conditions that could show up in a close male relative.

=== unforeseen and unfortunate results ===
Mercury is of course not giving William enough information to actually avoid the trap he will fall into; in light of later events, this whole passage could be considered a self-fulfilling prophecy similar to [[The Businessman#I am going to kill you|the one in ''The Businessman'']]—since the decision William makes in chapter 61, based on his fear of the prophecy, leads to much worse problems for him than if he had gone ahead with his original plan.

Chains of cause and effect are prominent throughout the book, despite usually not being spelled out; at this point, virtually every aspect of the condition of Billy's extended family is either a direct or indirect result of one of his curses.

== Chapter 61 ==

=== The Great Plains are drying up ===
It's never explicitly stated that William is in some way responsible for these signs of climate change, but it's possible given his previous experiments on plant and insect life.

=== You'll linger half-alive for years ===
It should be no surprise that this curse will eventually find a target; this happens in chapter 66.

== Chapter 62 ==

=== the parents ... had lived at the extreme edge of destitution ===
This is one of the clearest examples of a less dramatic side to William's corruption: besides cursing countless people, he's also so disconnected from regular human concerns, and from his own childhood, that in his millionaire years he hasn't given any thought or help to people like his former neighbors. His creation of the clinic where Bubby ends up, though it benefits many people, is arguably motivated by guilt over Ned; similarly, his impulsive decision to try to help a stranger in chapter 66, which contributes to his doom, isn't purely altruistic since the stranger only needed help because of William's destructive schemes.

== Chapter 63 ==

=== After the Fourth it'll be too late ===
Since Madge's instructions to her mother in chapter 62 established that it's now June, Judge's birthday must be the {{wp|Independence Day (United States)|fourth of July}}.

== Chapter 68 ==

=== the first to be blighted by William's curse .... The fabric was unraveling ===
For such a significant plot development as Ned's emergence from paralysis, Disch's refusal (even as an omniscient narrator) to state its exact cause is somewhat frustrating, but typical. In the context of just this chapter, one might assume that there's something special about Lance's touch that broke the spell. But a simpler explanation is an event that took place without any fanfare in chapter 62: William put a curative spell on Robert Corning, who, though William didn't realize it, was "Bubby"—and the curse on Ned in chapter 13, rather than specifying a particular disease, compelled him to ''be like Bubby''.

As for why this would set off such a dramatic series of failures in all of William's magic: two rules Mercury has emphasized again and again are that the caduceus's power depends on consistently harming more people than it helps, and that a curse cannot be undone. William has accidentally found a loophole to the second rule (Ned is healed by healing someone else who was not cursed)—and has annulled the curse that had provided the power, like a seed investment, for all his subsequent actions.

== Chapter 70 ==

=== plenty of room in the freezer ===
A character ''almost'' discovering murder evidence in a freezer is also [[Roderick/Book Two#Rogers and his ultra-modern kitchen ... I tried to get into his freezer|a plot point]] in ''[[Roderick]]'', by Disch's friend John Sladek.

== Chapter 71 ==

=== that plague had raged, and then, for no known reason, it had stopped ===
Disch may be implying that a predecessor to William Michaels was responsible for the {{wp|Black Death}}.

== Chapter 73 ==

=== ''Mycoplasma incognitus'' ===
The idea that ARVIDS has a known microbial agent may seem odd since we've previously heard that its mode of transmission can't be identified. However, ''{{wp|Mycoplasma}}'' organisms are so small that they often cannot be seen microscopically (more sensitive {{wp|PCR}}-based tests were not as common in 1991 as they are now), so researchers might know that this microbe is only found in plague victims but still be unable to determine how people are acquiring it.

This does not necessarily contradict the plague's magical origins; as seen in ''[[Camp Concentration]]'', Disch was very familiar with Thomas Mann's ''Doctor Faustus'', in which the syphilis bacteria infecting the protagonist's brain are described as being the low-level agents of his deal with the Devil.

== Chapter 79 ==

=== MEAT—8 pounds ===
Judge's guess is not far off: the average weight of a human head, depending on whom you ask,<ref>{{cite article|author=Gekhman, Dmitriy|url=https://hypertextbook.com/facts/2006/DmitriyGekhman.shtml|title=Mass of a Human Head|publication=The Physics Factbook|date=2006|accessed=September 15, 2017}}</ref> is somewhere between 8 and 12 pounds.

== Chapter 81 ==

=== a simple compound beat, systole and diastole ===
Two phases of a {{wp|cardiac cycle|heartbeat}}.

== Chapter 82 ==

=== The room was full of smoke ===
The second instance in the Supernatural Minnesota series of a [[The Businessman#in the Sheehys.27 burning home|burning house]].

== Other reading ==
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20201025031431/https://www.upress.umn.edu/book-division/books/the-m-d University of Minnesota Press page] for their edition {{InternetArchive|date=October 27, 2020}}
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20180714223451/http://www.ukjarry1.talktalk.net/md.htm Matthew Davis's page] for the book {{InternetArchive|date=July 4, 2018}}
* [https://reactormag.com/guided-tour-supernatural-minnesota-md/ Review and discussion] by Ron Hogan on ''Reactor''

== Footnotes ==
<references/>

{{Supernatural Minnesota nav}}

334/334/Part V

2025-02-09T23:33:20Z

Eb: /* A Nation of Slaves is always prepared to applaud the clemency of their Master */

{{#addbodyclass: tiled-toc}}
The fifth part of the [[334 novella]] is subtitled '''Shrimp'''.

{{SummaryCollapsed|
Shrimp, mostly in dialogue with other characters.
}}

== 27. Having Babies ==
''(2024 - Shrimp - reality)''

=== pregnancies and the contractual months of motherhood ===
Shrimp is being paid to conceive children because the Regents Board considers her genetically desirable, but the fact that she bears the children herself is a strikingly anti-futuristic touch. ''In vitro'' fertilization and gestation in an artificial environment have been science fiction commonplaces since at least 1931 ''(Brave New World)''— and in fact do seem to be possible in ''334'', as described in the end of "[[Emancipation]]"— but here Disch has chosen to limit the technology to, more or less, what already existed in 1972.

=== ''The Black Rabbit'' and ''Billy McGlory'' ===
Neither of these movies exists. The title of ''Billy McGlory'' refers to [[wikipedia:Billy McGlory|a 19th-century New York crime boss]]; ''The Black Rabbit'' might be a reference to the angel of death in ''{{wp|Watership Down}}''.

== 28. 53 Movies ==
''(2024 - Shrimp - fantasy)''

=== the pocket theaters on 1st Avenue ===
Tiny revival houses showing multiple double features per week were a New York cultural institution that is sadly almost gone, so in this one respect ''334'' can now be seen as a ''utopian'' version of the city. One of the last holdouts was [http://forgotten-ny.com/1999/08/the-stars-of-st-marks-place/ Theatre 80], on St. Mark's Place and 1st Avenue, which started screening movies in 1971, but went back to being a live theater venue in the 1990s. It really would have been possible for a very dedicated person to see 53 different movies in six weeks, as Shrimp does, at Theatre 80 alone. For a less packed schedule but an equally wide variety of movies, Jonas Mekas's [http://anthologyfilmarchives.org Anthology Film Archives] is operating to this day on 2nd Avenue, although in 1972 it was more of a museum collection without its own screens.

=== she saw a total of 53 movies ===
The titles listed here are a mix of actual movies, imaginary movies that are adaptations of other actual works (although in some cases a movie with the same title now exists, but didn't exist in 1972), and imaginary movies with unfamiliar titles.

Actual movies:
* ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0044079/ Strangers on a Train]'' (1951)
* ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0031983/ The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle]'' (1939)
* ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0045152/ Singin' in the Rain]'' (1952)
* ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0058650/ Thomas l'Imposteur]'' (1965)
* [Franju's] ''Jude'' - probably an error for Franju's ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0057207/ Judex]'' (1963)
* ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0033563/ Dumbo]'' (1941)
* ''Candide'' - possibly the [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0054719/ 1960 version] or could be some future adaptation
* ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0047296/ On the Waterfront]'' (1954)
* ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0048424/ The Night of the Hunter]'' (1955)
* ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0055047/ King of Kings]'' (1961)
* ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0049833/ The Ten Commandments]'' (1956)
* ''Sunflower'' - probably the [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0065782/ De Sica film] (1970)
* ''The Zany World of Abbott and Costello'' - error or alternate title for ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0059921/ The World of Abbott and Costello]'' (1965)
* ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0059742/ The Sound of Music]'' (1965)
* [Garbo in] ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0028683/ Camille]'' (1936)
* [Garbo in] ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0020641/ Anna Christie]'' (1930)
* "Emshwiller's ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0196499/ Walden]''" (1969) - actually made by Jonas Mekas, but Emshwiller appears in it; giving him credit for the movie may be less of an error and more of a deliberate homage by Disch, since he was also a prolific [https://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/ea.cgi?550 science fiction illustrator]
* ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0197574/ Image, Flesh, and Voice]'' (1970)
* ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0034583/ Casablanca]'' (1942)
* ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0040160/ The Big Clock]'' (1948)
* ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0051584/ The Temple of the Golden Pavilion]'' (1958)
* "the complete ten-hour ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0006206/ Les Vampires]''" (1915) - the whole series is only 6.5 hours long, may be an error due to there being ten episodes

Imaginary adaptations:
* ''Melmoth'', probably from the novel ''{{wp|Melmoth the Wanderer}}'' by Charles Maturin (1820)
* ''Hellbottom'', from the novel by [[334#Dedication|Jerrold Mundis]] (to whom ''334'' is dedicated) (1972); directed by "Penn", possibly [http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0671957/ Arthur Penn]
* ''The Confessions of St. Augustine'', from the [[wikipedia:Confessions (St._Augustine)|memoir]] by Augustine (397)
* ''Daniel Deronda'', from the [[wikipedia:Daniel_Deronda|novel]] by George Eliot (1876)
* ''Behold the Man'', probably from the [[wikipedia:Behold the Man (novel)|novel]] by Michael Moorcock (1969), Disch's editor in ''New Worlds''
* ''The Hills of Switzerland'', from the fictional volume of poetry by Disch's character Louis Sacchetti in ''[[Camp Concentration]]''
* ''Zarlah the Martian'', from the [http://www.gutenberg.org/files/13423/13423-h/13423-h.htm novel] by R. Norman Grisewood (1909)
* "the remake of ''Equinox''", possibly of the [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0067055/ 1970 horror movie]
* ''Valentine Vox'', possibly from ''The Life and Adventures of Valentine Vox, the Ventriloquist'' by [[wikipedia:Henry_Cockton|Henry Cockton]] (1840)
* ''Pale Fire'', from the unfilmable [[wikipedia:Pale Fire|novel]] by Vladimir Nabokov (1962)
* ''The Day of the Locust'', from the [[wikipedia:The Day of the Locust|novel]] by Nathaniel West (1939) - later [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0072848/ filmed] in 1975
* ''Three Christs of Ypsilanti'', from the [[wikipedia:The Three Christs of Ypsilanti|psychiatric case study]] by Milton Rokeach (1964) - later [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Christs filmed] in 2017
* ''On the Yard'', from the novel by {{wp|Malcolm Braly}} (1967) - later [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0079665/ filmed] in 1978

Imaginary/unknown:
* ''Stanford White'' - probably about the [[wikipedia:Stanford White|architect]] famously murdered in 1906
* ''Escape from Cuernavaca''
* ''Snow White and Juliet''
* ''Down There'' - with Marlon Brando
* ''Black Eyes and Lemonade'' - title is from ''Intercepted Letters, or the Two-Penny Post Bag'' by {{wp|Thomas Moore}}
* ''Owens and Darwin'' - may mean "Owen", Charles Darwin's rival Richard Owen
* ''Star * Gut''
* ''The Best of {{wp|Judy Canova}}''
* ''Felix Culp'' - title refers to the "[[wikipedia:Felix culpa|fortunate fall]]"; Disch's friend John Sladek named a character Felix Culpa in ''[[Roderick/Book One#a signature on the white plaster: Felix Culpa|Roderick]]''
* ''The Greek Berets'' - this was corrected in recent [[334/Editions|editions]] to ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0063035/ The Green Berets]'' but, knowing Disch, may have been an intentional joke
* ''Wednesdays Off''
* "both parts of ''Stinky in the Land of Poop''"
* ''The Possibilities of Defeat'' - title refers to what [http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Victoria_of_the_United_Kingdom Victoria] denied the existence of
* ''Things in the World''

== 29. The White Uniform, continued ==
''(2021 - Shrimp - fantasy)''

== 30. Beauty and the Beast ==
''(2021 - Shrimp - reality)''

=== A Nation of Slaves is always prepared to applaud the clemency of their Master ===
A quote from Edward Gibbon's ''The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'' (1776-1788). Though his anti-clericalism would appeal to January, Gibbon was also racist enough that he would probably be disconcerted to see his words delivered on this poster by "a black Spartacus."

== 31. A Desirable Job, continued ==
''(2021 - Lottie - reality)''

=== the sex was nothing ===
It's possible that Lottie's experience with sex work is what Shrimp is referring to in [[334 Part I (5)|scene 5]] three years later, when she tells Williken she "talked to a prostitute once, mentioning no names"— although it's not clear whether Lottie would have confided in her sister about this, or why Shrimp would make it sound more enjoyable than it apparently was.

== 32. Lottie, in Stuyvesant Square ==
''(2021 - Lottie - monolog)''

Stuyvesant Square is a small park [https://maps.google.com/maps?q=Stuyvesant+Square,+New+York,+NY&hl=en&ll=40.734348,-73.983994&spn=0.009089,0.017231&sll=37.269174,-119.306607&sspn=9.768935,17.644043&oq=stuyvesant+square&t=m&z=16&iwloc=A a few blocks from 334]. Lottie's monologue here is actually a response to Shrimp's monologue in the following scene.

=== The object's to be able to say what you ''want'' ===
Mrs. Hanson, who isn't part of this conversation, nevertheless provides an answer in the final line of the novel.

== 33. Shrimp, in Stuyvesant Square ==
''(2021 - Shrimp - monolog)''

== 34. Shrimp, at the Asylum ==
''(2024 - Shrimp - monolog)''

The group therapeutic exercise Shrimp is taking part in is reminiscent of the Synanon [http://www.lauriepepper.com/art_the_gallery/a-synanon-gamewm.html Game]. The latter is usually described as being more hostile and coercive, but Shrimp's complaint in the next scene that "no one at the Asylum had bothered even to scream at her" suggests that that's usually the case.

== 35. Richard M. Williken, continued ==
''(2024 - Shrimp - another POV)''

{{334 nav}}

334/334/Part V

2025-02-09T23:22:43Z

Eb: /* she saw a total of 53 movies */

{{#addbodyclass: tiled-toc}}
The fifth part of the [[334 novella]] is subtitled '''Shrimp'''.

{{SummaryCollapsed|
Shrimp, mostly in dialogue with other characters.
}}

== 27. Having Babies ==
''(2024 - Shrimp - reality)''

=== pregnancies and the contractual months of motherhood ===
Shrimp is being paid to conceive children because the Regents Board considers her genetically desirable, but the fact that she bears the children herself is a strikingly anti-futuristic touch. ''In vitro'' fertilization and gestation in an artificial environment have been science fiction commonplaces since at least 1931 ''(Brave New World)''— and in fact do seem to be possible in ''334'', as described in the end of "[[Emancipation]]"— but here Disch has chosen to limit the technology to, more or less, what already existed in 1972.

=== ''The Black Rabbit'' and ''Billy McGlory'' ===
Neither of these movies exists. The title of ''Billy McGlory'' refers to [[wikipedia:Billy McGlory|a 19th-century New York crime boss]]; ''The Black Rabbit'' might be a reference to the angel of death in ''{{wp|Watership Down}}''.

== 28. 53 Movies ==
''(2024 - Shrimp - fantasy)''

=== the pocket theaters on 1st Avenue ===
Tiny revival houses showing multiple double features per week were a New York cultural institution that is sadly almost gone, so in this one respect ''334'' can now be seen as a ''utopian'' version of the city. One of the last holdouts was [http://forgotten-ny.com/1999/08/the-stars-of-st-marks-place/ Theatre 80], on St. Mark's Place and 1st Avenue, which started screening movies in 1971, but went back to being a live theater venue in the 1990s. It really would have been possible for a very dedicated person to see 53 different movies in six weeks, as Shrimp does, at Theatre 80 alone. For a less packed schedule but an equally wide variety of movies, Jonas Mekas's [http://anthologyfilmarchives.org Anthology Film Archives] is operating to this day on 2nd Avenue, although in 1972 it was more of a museum collection without its own screens.

=== she saw a total of 53 movies ===
The titles listed here are a mix of actual movies, imaginary movies that are adaptations of other actual works (although in some cases a movie with the same title now exists, but didn't exist in 1972), and imaginary movies with unfamiliar titles.

Actual movies:
* ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0044079/ Strangers on a Train]'' (1951)
* ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0031983/ The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle]'' (1939)
* ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0045152/ Singin' in the Rain]'' (1952)
* ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0058650/ Thomas l'Imposteur]'' (1965)
* [Franju's] ''Jude'' - probably an error for Franju's ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0057207/ Judex]'' (1963)
* ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0033563/ Dumbo]'' (1941)
* ''Candide'' - possibly the [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0054719/ 1960 version] or could be some future adaptation
* ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0047296/ On the Waterfront]'' (1954)
* ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0048424/ The Night of the Hunter]'' (1955)
* ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0055047/ King of Kings]'' (1961)
* ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0049833/ The Ten Commandments]'' (1956)
* ''Sunflower'' - probably the [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0065782/ De Sica film] (1970)
* ''The Zany World of Abbott and Costello'' - error or alternate title for ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0059921/ The World of Abbott and Costello]'' (1965)
* ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0059742/ The Sound of Music]'' (1965)
* [Garbo in] ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0028683/ Camille]'' (1936)
* [Garbo in] ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0020641/ Anna Christie]'' (1930)
* "Emshwiller's ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0196499/ Walden]''" (1969) - actually made by Jonas Mekas, but Emshwiller appears in it; giving him credit for the movie may be less of an error and more of a deliberate homage by Disch, since he was also a prolific [https://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/ea.cgi?550 science fiction illustrator]
* ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0197574/ Image, Flesh, and Voice]'' (1970)
* ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0034583/ Casablanca]'' (1942)
* ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0040160/ The Big Clock]'' (1948)
* ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0051584/ The Temple of the Golden Pavilion]'' (1958)
* "the complete ten-hour ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0006206/ Les Vampires]''" (1915) - the whole series is only 6.5 hours long, may be an error due to there being ten episodes

Imaginary adaptations:
* ''Melmoth'', probably from the novel ''{{wp|Melmoth the Wanderer}}'' by Charles Maturin (1820)
* ''Hellbottom'', from the novel by [[334#Dedication|Jerrold Mundis]] (to whom ''334'' is dedicated) (1972); directed by "Penn", possibly [http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0671957/ Arthur Penn]
* ''The Confessions of St. Augustine'', from the [[wikipedia:Confessions (St._Augustine)|memoir]] by Augustine (397)
* ''Daniel Deronda'', from the [[wikipedia:Daniel_Deronda|novel]] by George Eliot (1876)
* ''Behold the Man'', probably from the [[wikipedia:Behold the Man (novel)|novel]] by Michael Moorcock (1969), Disch's editor in ''New Worlds''
* ''The Hills of Switzerland'', from the fictional volume of poetry by Disch's character Louis Sacchetti in ''[[Camp Concentration]]''
* ''Zarlah the Martian'', from the [http://www.gutenberg.org/files/13423/13423-h/13423-h.htm novel] by R. Norman Grisewood (1909)
* "the remake of ''Equinox''", possibly of the [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0067055/ 1970 horror movie]
* ''Valentine Vox'', possibly from ''The Life and Adventures of Valentine Vox, the Ventriloquist'' by [[wikipedia:Henry_Cockton|Henry Cockton]] (1840)
* ''Pale Fire'', from the unfilmable [[wikipedia:Pale Fire|novel]] by Vladimir Nabokov (1962)
* ''The Day of the Locust'', from the [[wikipedia:The Day of the Locust|novel]] by Nathaniel West (1939) - later [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0072848/ filmed] in 1975
* ''Three Christs of Ypsilanti'', from the [[wikipedia:The Three Christs of Ypsilanti|psychiatric case study]] by Milton Rokeach (1964) - later [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Christs filmed] in 2017
* ''On the Yard'', from the novel by {{wp|Malcolm Braly}} (1967) - later [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0079665/ filmed] in 1978

Imaginary/unknown:
* ''Stanford White'' - probably about the [[wikipedia:Stanford White|architect]] famously murdered in 1906
* ''Escape from Cuernavaca''
* ''Snow White and Juliet''
* ''Down There'' - with Marlon Brando
* ''Black Eyes and Lemonade'' - title is from ''Intercepted Letters, or the Two-Penny Post Bag'' by {{wp|Thomas Moore}}
* ''Owens and Darwin'' - may mean "Owen", Charles Darwin's rival Richard Owen
* ''Star * Gut''
* ''The Best of {{wp|Judy Canova}}''
* ''Felix Culp'' - title refers to the "[[wikipedia:Felix culpa|fortunate fall]]"; Disch's friend John Sladek named a character Felix Culpa in ''[[Roderick/Book One#a signature on the white plaster: Felix Culpa|Roderick]]''
* ''The Greek Berets'' - this was corrected in recent [[334/Editions|editions]] to ''[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0063035/ The Green Berets]'' but, knowing Disch, may have been an intentional joke
* ''Wednesdays Off''
* "both parts of ''Stinky in the Land of Poop''"
* ''The Possibilities of Defeat'' - title refers to what [http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Victoria_of_the_United_Kingdom Victoria] denied the existence of
* ''Things in the World''

== 29. The White Uniform, continued ==
''(2021 - Shrimp - fantasy)''

== 30. Beauty and the Beast ==
''(2021 - Shrimp - reality)''

=== A Nation of Slaves is always prepared to applaud the clemency of their Master ===
This is a quote from Edward Gibbon's ''The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'' (1776-1788). Though January would approve of Gibbon's anti-clericalism, Gibbon would probably be disconcerted to see his words delivered by "a black Spartacus."

== 31. A Desirable Job, continued ==
''(2021 - Lottie - reality)''

=== the sex was nothing ===
It's possible that Lottie's experience with sex work is what Shrimp is referring to in [[334 Part I (5)|scene 5]] three years later, when she tells Williken she "talked to a prostitute once, mentioning no names"— although it's not clear whether Lottie would have confided in her sister about this, or why Shrimp would make it sound more enjoyable than it apparently was.

== 32. Lottie, in Stuyvesant Square ==
''(2021 - Lottie - monolog)''

Stuyvesant Square is a small park [https://maps.google.com/maps?q=Stuyvesant+Square,+New+York,+NY&hl=en&ll=40.734348,-73.983994&spn=0.009089,0.017231&sll=37.269174,-119.306607&sspn=9.768935,17.644043&oq=stuyvesant+square&t=m&z=16&iwloc=A a few blocks from 334]. Lottie's monologue here is actually a response to Shrimp's monologue in the following scene.

=== The object's to be able to say what you ''want'' ===
Mrs. Hanson, who isn't part of this conversation, nevertheless provides an answer in the final line of the novel.

== 33. Shrimp, in Stuyvesant Square ==
''(2021 - Shrimp - monolog)''

== 34. Shrimp, at the Asylum ==
''(2024 - Shrimp - monolog)''

The group therapeutic exercise Shrimp is taking part in is reminiscent of the Synanon [http://www.lauriepepper.com/art_the_gallery/a-synanon-gamewm.html Game]. The latter is usually described as being more hostile and coercive, but Shrimp's complaint in the next scene that "no one at the Asylum had bothered even to scream at her" suggests that that's usually the case.

== 35. Richard M. Williken, continued ==
''(2024 - Shrimp - another POV)''

{{334 nav}}

334

2025-02-09T23:20:28Z

Eb: /* Dedication */

__NOTOC__
These are notes for '''''334''''' by [[Thomas M. Disch]].

First published as a novel in 1972, ''334'' is a [[wikipedia:Fix-up|fix-up]] composed of five previously published novellas, plus a longer novella also titled "334"— all about a group of interconnected characters living in New York City in the years 2021-2026. The sections in order:

* '''[[/The Death of Socrates/]]'''
* '''[[/Bodies/]]'''
* '''[[/Everyday Life in the Later Roman Empire/]]'''
* '''[[/Emancipation/]]'''
* '''[[/Angouleme/]]'''
* '''[[/334/]]'''

All notes refer to the 1999 Vintage Books trade paperback edition; see '''[[/Editions/]]''' for others.

{{SummaryWarning}}

== Dedication ==

<blockquote>To Jerry Mundis, who lived here.</blockquote>

{{wp|Jerrold Mundis}}, another Midwesterner who made his home in New York City, was a long-time friend of Disch.<ref>{{Cite Disch Crowley}}</ref> Mundis wrote in many fiction genres under a variety of pseudonyms, while also having a successful career as a self-help writer and speaker. His "Shame and Glory" series of historical fiction/adventure/exploitation novels (written as Eric Corder, a name he also used for the novelization of ''The Deer Hunter'') included ''Hellbottom'' (1972), which is mentioned as one of the nonexistent film adaptations in [[334 Part V (28)]]; ''Hellbottom'''s dedication is "For Tom Disch and a decade of deep friendship."<ref>{{cite book|author=Mundis, Jerrold (as Eric Corder)|date=1972|title=Hellbottom|publisher=Pocket Books|isbn=9780671781989|url=https://archive.org/details/hellbottom0000jerr}}</ref>

== Major characters ==
* Nora Hanson, a resident of the public housing complex at 334 E. 11th St., unemployed.
* Lottie (Loretta) Hanson, Nora's younger daughter, intermittently employed. Her children Amparo and Mickey.
* Shrimp (Shirley) Hanson, Nora's older daughter, paid by the government to have children due to her high IQ.
* Boz Hanson, Nora's son, Milly Holt's husband, unemployed.
* Juan Martinez, Lottie's husband, morgue attendant at Bellevue Hospital.
* Ab Holt, resident of 334, morgue attendant and black market dealer.
* Milly Holt, his daughter, Boz Hanson's wife, public school "hygiene demonstrator."
* Birdie Ludd, resident of 334, student, Milly's ex-lover.
* Arnold Chapel, hospital porter at Bellevue.
* Frances Schaap, resident of 334 and patient at Bellevue.
* Alexa Miller, welfare agency middle management. Her son Tancred.
* Bill Harper a.k.a. Little Mister Kissy Lips, classmate of Tancred and Amparo.
* January, Shrimp's lover, unemployed.
* Len Rude, graduate student and social worker in Alexa's department.
* Richard Williken, resident of 334, photographer, unemployed.

== Other reading ==
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20180714223410/http://www.ukjarry1.talktalk.net/334.htm Matthew Davis's page] for the book {{InternetArchive|date=July 4, 2018}}
* ''The American Shore'' by Samuel R. Delany - see notes for "[[Angouleme]]"

== Footnotes ==
<references/>

{{334 nav}}

[[Category:Thomas M. Disch]]

334

2025-02-09T22:57:36Z

Eb: /* Dedication */

__NOTOC__
These are notes for '''''334''''' by [[Thomas M. Disch]].

First published as a novel in 1972, ''334'' is a [[wikipedia:Fix-up|fix-up]] composed of five previously published novellas, plus a longer novella also titled "334"— all about a group of interconnected characters living in New York City in the years 2021-2026. The sections in order:

* '''[[/The Death of Socrates/]]'''
* '''[[/Bodies/]]'''
* '''[[/Everyday Life in the Later Roman Empire/]]'''
* '''[[/Emancipation/]]'''
* '''[[/Angouleme/]]'''
* '''[[/334/]]'''

All notes refer to the 1999 Vintage Books trade paperback edition; see '''[[/Editions/]]''' for others.

{{SummaryWarning}}

== Dedication ==
"To Jerry Mundis, who lived here."

The novelist Jerry Mundis, author of ''Slave Ship'' and ''Hellbottom,'' was a friend of Disch.<ref>{{Cite Disch Crowley}}</ref> One of his novels is mentioned in the list of (nonexistent) film adaptations in [[334 Part V (28)]].

== Major characters ==
* Nora Hanson, a resident of the public housing complex at 334 E. 11th St., unemployed.
* Lottie (Loretta) Hanson, Nora's younger daughter, intermittently employed. Her children Amparo and Mickey.
* Shrimp (Shirley) Hanson, Nora's older daughter, paid by the government to have children due to her high IQ.
* Boz Hanson, Nora's son, Milly Holt's husband, unemployed.
* Juan Martinez, Lottie's husband, morgue attendant at Bellevue Hospital.
* Ab Holt, resident of 334, morgue attendant and black market dealer.
* Milly Holt, his daughter, Boz Hanson's wife, public school "hygiene demonstrator."
* Birdie Ludd, resident of 334, student, Milly's ex-lover.
* Arnold Chapel, hospital porter at Bellevue.
* Frances Schaap, resident of 334 and patient at Bellevue.
* Alexa Miller, welfare agency middle management. Her son Tancred.
* Bill Harper a.k.a. Little Mister Kissy Lips, classmate of Tancred and Amparo.
* January, Shrimp's lover, unemployed.
* Len Rude, graduate student and social worker in Alexa's department.
* Richard Williken, resident of 334, photographer, unemployed.

== Other reading ==
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20180714223410/http://www.ukjarry1.talktalk.net/334.htm Matthew Davis's page] for the book {{InternetArchive|date=July 4, 2018}}
* ''The American Shore'' by Samuel R. Delany - see notes for "[[Angouleme]]"

== Footnotes ==
<references/>

{{334 nav}}

[[Category:Thomas M. Disch]]

Thomas M. Disch

2025-02-09T22:55:39Z

Eb: /* Other reading */

'''Thomas M. Disch''' (1940-2008), New Wave SF visionary, poet, anatomist of New York City and Minnesota, Gothic experimenter, critic, crank. Did a lot of different things. Sorely missed.

Notes are here for these books:

* '''''[[334]]''''' (1967-1972)
* '''''[[Camp Concentration]]''''' (1967-1968)
* '''''[[On Wings of Song]]''''' (1979)
* '''''[[The Brave Little Toaster]]''''' (1980)
* '''''[[The Businessman]]''''' (1984)
* '''''[[The M.D.]]''''' (1991)

== Other reading ==

* {{wp|Thomas M. Disch|Wikipedia}} - biography etc.
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20180714223436/http://www.ukjarry1.talktalk.net/tmd.htm Schrödinger's Cake] - archive of a fan site by Matthew Davis with many interview excerpts and a comprehensive bibliography. {{InternetArchive|date=July 4, 2018}} I'm heavily indebted in general to Davis's commentary in discussions of science fiction over multiple decades, and his research which is much more diligent than mine. His [https://ukjarry.wordpress.com/ more recent web page], also called ''Schrödinger's Cake'', contains a large collection of nonfiction material by Disch: essays, reviews, etc. Accessed on January 26, 2025.
* {{Cite Disch Crowley}}
* {{cite article|author=Auerbach, David|date=April 2, 2010|url=http://www.themillions.com/2010/04/the-prescient-science-fiction-of-thomas-m-disch.html|title=The Prescient Science Fiction of Thomas M. Disch|publication=The Millions|accessed=January 24, 2025}}
* {{cite article|author=Yezzi, David|date=2008|url=https://www.cprw.com/Yezzi/disch.htm|title=Thomas M., Meet Tom|publication=Contemporary Poetry Review|accessed=January 24, 2025}}
* Disch's long autobiographical essays in ''Something About the Author Autobiography Series'', vol. 15, and ''Contemporary Authors Autobiography Series'', vol. 4 (Gale), both of which are widely available from library reference desks: ''Something About...'' is aimed at children and ''Contemporary Authors'' is not, but Disch's pieces in both of them (written in the mid-1980s) are informative and drily funny. The former piece, "My Life as a Child", also appeared in the October and November 1992 issues of ''Amazing Stories''.
* {{cite book|author=Disch, Thomas|date=2006-2008|title=Endzone|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100108042338/http://tomsdisch.livejournal.com/}} {{InternetArchive|date=January 8, 2010}}<ref name="note-endzone">Disch published the ''Endzone'' blog during the last two years of his life. Its content included some light-hearted posts and some good poems, but at other times was very dark and likely to be upsetting to people who love his other writing: Disch was increasingly in despair over the death of his partner Charles Naylor and a series of other misfortunes, and had descended into a heavily xenophobic type of misanthropy that overlapped with far-right politics even though he still considered himself on the left. Readers and friends engaged with him in the comment section in various ways up to the end.</ref>

''Interviews:''
* {{cite article|author=Horwich, David|date=July 30, 2001|title=Interview: Thomas M. Disch|publication=Strange Horizons|url=http://strangehorizons.com/non-fiction/articles/interview-thomas-m-disch/|accessed=January 24, 2025}}
* {{cite Disch Francavilla}}
* {{cite Disch Edelman}}
* {{cite article|author=Champion, Edward|date=July 6, 2008|title=Thomas M. Disch|publication=The Bat Segundo Show|url=http://www.edrants.com/segundo/thomas-m-disch-bss-219/|accessed=January 28, 2025}} An audio interview from shortly before his death, focusing mainly on his final novel ''The Word of God''.

== Footnotes ==
<references/>

{{Authornav}}

[[Category:Thomas M. Disch]]

Template:Cite Disch Crowley

2025-02-09T22:54:19Z

Eb: Created page with "{{cite article|author=Crowley, John|date=January 1, 2009|url=https://www.bostonreview.net/articles/john-crowley-thomas-disch-worldmaker/|title=Worldmaker: Remembering Thomas D..."

{{cite article|author=Crowley, John|date=January 1, 2009|url=https://www.bostonreview.net/articles/john-crowley-thomas-disch-worldmaker/|title=Worldmaker: Remembering Thomas Disch|publication=Boston Review|accessed=January 24, 2025}}

On Wings of Song/Editions

2025-02-03T00:25:04Z

Eb: /* US */

{{#addbodyclass:horiz-toc}}

Sources include {{ISFDB title|1439}}, {{WorldCat editions|6853276}}, and {{Disch Index Translationum}}.

== US ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-fsf.jpg|desc=Serialized in three parts in ''The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction'': {{ISFDB|61102|February}}, {{ISFDB|61271|March}}, and {{ISFDB|60967|April}} 1979.|cover-by=Ed Emshwiller}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-st-martins.jpg|desc=St. Martin's Press, 1979. Hardcover.|cover-by=Michael Mariano|isbn=0312584660}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-bantam-1980.jpg|desc=Bantam Books, 1980. Paperback.<ref>The back cover says it's about "America, a generation from now. Not as it should be, but as it will be."</ref>|cover-by=Lou Feck|isbn=0553136674}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-bantam-1985.jpg|desc=Bantam Books, 1985. Paperback.|cover-by=Kid Kane|isbn=0553250760}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-carroll-graf-1988.jpg|desc=Carroll & Graf, 1988. Trade paperback.|cover-by=same as 1985, alas|isbn=0881844438}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-easton.jpg|desc=Easton Press, 1993. Limited edition hardcover. Illustrations by Pat Morrissey, introduction by James K. Morrow.<ref>Morrissey's artwork for this edition consists of three black-and-white scratchboard drawings, one color frontispiece painting, and (I assume) the Art-Nouveauish line drawing that's embossed on the cover. The illustrations aren't entirely my cup of tea, but I appreciate that it has some. This was one of many books in Easton's "Masterpieces of Science Fiction" series.</ref> No ISBN.}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-carroll-graf-2003.jpg|desc=Carroll & Graf, 2003. Trade paperback.|isbn=0786711221}}
</div>

== UK ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-gollancz.jpg|desc=Gollancz, 1979. Hardcover.<ref>The book jacket text starts like this: "Beneath this highly diverting tale lies the seemingly preposterous proposition that the human spirit might fly out of its physical body propelled on the waves of its own singing voice—literally borne on wings of song. It is Disch's zestful skill which has us swallowing this possibility, hook, line and sinker." One might expect this somewhat defensive attitude toward an SF/fantasy premise from a mainstream literary fiction publisher or critic, but by the 1970s Gollancz already had a heavy focus on SF, so I'm not sure what was going on there.</ref>|cover-by=Malcolm Ashman|isbn=0575025476}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-magnum.jpg|desc=Magnum, 1981. Paperback.|cover-by=Chris Moore|isbn=0417055803}}
</div>

== Translations ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-fr-denoel.jpg|language=French|translator=Jean Bonnefoy|alt-title=Sur les ailes du chant|desc=Denoël, 1980. Paperback.|cover-by=Stéphane Dumont}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-ja-1980.jpg|language=Japanese|translator=Yasuko Tomoeda|alt-title=Uta no tsubasa ni|desc=Kokushokankōkai, 1980. Hardcover.|isbn=9784336051165}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-de-hohenheim.jpg|language=German|translator=Irene Holicki|alt-title=Auf Flügeln des Gesangs|desc=Hohenheim, 1982. Hardcover.|cover-by=Oliviero Berni|isbn=3-8147-0025-2}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-he-1983.jpg|language=Hebrew|translator=Zofia Lassman|alt-title=Al kanfe ha-shir|desc=Keter, 1983. Softcover.}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-de-heyne.jpg|language=German|translator=Irene Holicki|alt-title=Auf Flügeln des Gesangs|desc=Heyne, 1986. Paperback.|cover-by=Ulf Herholz|isbn=3-453-31218-X}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-it-mondadori.jpg|language=Italian|translator=Paola Tomaselli|alt-title=Le ali della mente|desc=Mondadori, 1996. Trade paperback.|cover-by=Oscar Chicone}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-fr-denoel-2001.jpg|language=French|translator=Jean Bonnefoy|alt-title=Sur les ailes du chant|desc=Denoël, 2001. Paperback.|cover-by=Barrett Foster|isbn=2-07-041798-0}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-es-bibliopolis.jpg|language=Spanish|translator=Luis G. Prado|alt-title=En alas de la canción|desc=Bibliópolis, 2003. Trade paperback.|cover-by=Roberto Uriel & Manuel de los Galanes|isbn=84-932836-5-7}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-pl-solaris.jpg|language=Polish|translator=Michał Raginiak|alt-title=Na skrzydłach pieśni|desc=Solaris, 2007. Hardcover.|isbn=8389951843}}
</div>

== E-book ==

Chu Hartley Publishers, 2016. No cover art.

== Textual differences ==

The ''Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction'' serialization is slightly shorter than the full novel. Most of the cuts are of incidental flourishes without much effect on the story or the ideas, but one bit stands out in its absence: the paragraph in chapter 3 where Daniel, at the movie theater in Minneapolis, is both shocked and intrigued to notice two men sharing a bathroom stall.

The epigram doesn't appear in the serialization, nor in the first British hardcover from Gollancz.

Editing in this book has been inconsistent. I haven't seen the first US hardcover (St. Martin's), or the latest trade paperback, but both of the other US editions (Bantam and Easton Press) have a variety of errors—the same ones in each, suggesting that the St. Martin's one was the source, since the British hardcover doesn't have them. Most are minor copyediting issues, but at least one passage (the paragraph in Chapter 4 that ends with "hope was part of the punishment") is fairly garbled by a piece of out-of-place text.

== Footnotes ==
<references/>

{{On Wings of Song nav}}

On Wings of Song/Editions

2025-02-03T00:16:37Z

Eb: /* UK */

{{#addbodyclass:horiz-toc}}

Sources include {{ISFDB title|1439}}, {{WorldCat editions|6853276}}, and {{Disch Index Translationum}}.

== US ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-fsf.jpg|desc=Serialized in three parts in ''The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction'': {{ISFDB|61102|February}}, {{ISFDB|61271|March}}, and {{ISFDB|60967|April}} 1979.|cover-by=Ed Emshwiller}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-st-martins.jpg|desc=St. Martin's Press, 1979. Hardcover.|cover-by=Michael Mariano|isbn=0312584660}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-bantam-1980.jpg|desc=Bantam Books, 1980. Paperback.<ref>The back cover says it's about "America, a generation from now. Not as it should be, but as it will be."</ref>|cover-by=Lou Feck|isbn=0553136674}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-bantam-1985.jpg|desc=Bantam Books, 1985. Paperback.|cover-by=Kid Kane|isbn=0553250760}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-carroll-graf-1988.jpg|desc=Carroll & Graf, 1988. Trade paperback.|cover-by=same as 1985, alas|isbn=0881844438}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-easton.jpg|desc=Easton Press, 1993. Limited edition hardcover. Illustrations by Pat Morrissey, introduction by James K. Morrow. No ISBN.}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-carroll-graf-2003.jpg|desc=Carroll & Graf, 2003. Trade paperback.|isbn=0786711221}}
</div>

== UK ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-gollancz.jpg|desc=Gollancz, 1979. Hardcover.<ref>The book jacket text starts like this: "Beneath this highly diverting tale lies the seemingly preposterous proposition that the human spirit might fly out of its physical body propelled on the waves of its own singing voice—literally borne on wings of song. It is Disch's zestful skill which has us swallowing this possibility, hook, line and sinker." One might expect this somewhat defensive attitude toward an SF/fantasy premise from a mainstream literary fiction publisher or critic, but by the 1970s Gollancz already had a heavy focus on SF, so I'm not sure what was going on there.</ref>|cover-by=Malcolm Ashman|isbn=0575025476}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-magnum.jpg|desc=Magnum, 1981. Paperback.|cover-by=Chris Moore|isbn=0417055803}}
</div>

== Translations ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-fr-denoel.jpg|language=French|translator=Jean Bonnefoy|alt-title=Sur les ailes du chant|desc=Denoël, 1980. Paperback.|cover-by=Stéphane Dumont}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-ja-1980.jpg|language=Japanese|translator=Yasuko Tomoeda|alt-title=Uta no tsubasa ni|desc=Kokushokankōkai, 1980. Hardcover.|isbn=9784336051165}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-de-hohenheim.jpg|language=German|translator=Irene Holicki|alt-title=Auf Flügeln des Gesangs|desc=Hohenheim, 1982. Hardcover.|cover-by=Oliviero Berni|isbn=3-8147-0025-2}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-he-1983.jpg|language=Hebrew|translator=Zofia Lassman|alt-title=Al kanfe ha-shir|desc=Keter, 1983. Softcover.}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-de-heyne.jpg|language=German|translator=Irene Holicki|alt-title=Auf Flügeln des Gesangs|desc=Heyne, 1986. Paperback.|cover-by=Ulf Herholz|isbn=3-453-31218-X}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-it-mondadori.jpg|language=Italian|translator=Paola Tomaselli|alt-title=Le ali della mente|desc=Mondadori, 1996. Trade paperback.|cover-by=Oscar Chicone}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-fr-denoel-2001.jpg|language=French|translator=Jean Bonnefoy|alt-title=Sur les ailes du chant|desc=Denoël, 2001. Paperback.|cover-by=Barrett Foster|isbn=2-07-041798-0}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-es-bibliopolis.jpg|language=Spanish|translator=Luis G. Prado|alt-title=En alas de la canción|desc=Bibliópolis, 2003. Trade paperback.|cover-by=Roberto Uriel & Manuel de los Galanes|isbn=84-932836-5-7}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-pl-solaris.jpg|language=Polish|translator=Michał Raginiak|alt-title=Na skrzydłach pieśni|desc=Solaris, 2007. Hardcover.|isbn=8389951843}}
</div>

== E-book ==

Chu Hartley Publishers, 2016. No cover art.

== Textual differences ==

The ''Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction'' serialization is slightly shorter than the full novel. Most of the cuts are of incidental flourishes without much effect on the story or the ideas, but one bit stands out in its absence: the paragraph in chapter 3 where Daniel, at the movie theater in Minneapolis, is both shocked and intrigued to notice two men sharing a bathroom stall.

The epigram doesn't appear in the serialization, nor in the first British hardcover from Gollancz.

Editing in this book has been inconsistent. I haven't seen the first US hardcover (St. Martin's), or the latest trade paperback, but both of the other US editions (Bantam and Easton Press) have a variety of errors—the same ones in each, suggesting that the St. Martin's one was the source, since the British hardcover doesn't have them. Most are minor copyediting issues, but at least one passage (the paragraph in Chapter 4 that ends with "hope was part of the punishment") is fairly garbled by a piece of out-of-place text.

== Footnotes ==
<references/>

{{On Wings of Song nav}}

On Wings of Song/Editions

2025-02-03T00:11:12Z

Eb:

{{#addbodyclass:horiz-toc}}

Sources include {{ISFDB title|1439}}, {{WorldCat editions|6853276}}, and {{Disch Index Translationum}}.

== US ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-fsf.jpg|desc=Serialized in three parts in ''The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction'': {{ISFDB|61102|February}}, {{ISFDB|61271|March}}, and {{ISFDB|60967|April}} 1979.|cover-by=Ed Emshwiller}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-st-martins.jpg|desc=St. Martin's Press, 1979. Hardcover.|cover-by=Michael Mariano|isbn=0312584660}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-bantam-1980.jpg|desc=Bantam Books, 1980. Paperback.<ref>The back cover says it's about "America, a generation from now. Not as it should be, but as it will be."</ref>|cover-by=Lou Feck|isbn=0553136674}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-bantam-1985.jpg|desc=Bantam Books, 1985. Paperback.|cover-by=Kid Kane|isbn=0553250760}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-carroll-graf-1988.jpg|desc=Carroll & Graf, 1988. Trade paperback.|cover-by=same as 1985, alas|isbn=0881844438}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-easton.jpg|desc=Easton Press, 1993. Limited edition hardcover. Illustrations by Pat Morrissey, introduction by James K. Morrow. No ISBN.}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-carroll-graf-2003.jpg|desc=Carroll & Graf, 2003. Trade paperback.|isbn=0786711221}}
</div>

== UK ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-gollancz.jpg|desc=Gollancz, 1979. Hardcover.|cover-by=Malcolm Ashman|isbn=0575025476}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-magnum.jpg|desc=Magnum, 1981. Paperback.|cover-by=Chris Moore|isbn=0417055803}}
</div>

== Translations ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-fr-denoel.jpg|language=French|translator=Jean Bonnefoy|alt-title=Sur les ailes du chant|desc=Denoël, 1980. Paperback.|cover-by=Stéphane Dumont}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-ja-1980.jpg|language=Japanese|translator=Yasuko Tomoeda|alt-title=Uta no tsubasa ni|desc=Kokushokankōkai, 1980. Hardcover.|isbn=9784336051165}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-de-hohenheim.jpg|language=German|translator=Irene Holicki|alt-title=Auf Flügeln des Gesangs|desc=Hohenheim, 1982. Hardcover.|cover-by=Oliviero Berni|isbn=3-8147-0025-2}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-he-1983.jpg|language=Hebrew|translator=Zofia Lassman|alt-title=Al kanfe ha-shir|desc=Keter, 1983. Softcover.}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-de-heyne.jpg|language=German|translator=Irene Holicki|alt-title=Auf Flügeln des Gesangs|desc=Heyne, 1986. Paperback.|cover-by=Ulf Herholz|isbn=3-453-31218-X}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-it-mondadori.jpg|language=Italian|translator=Paola Tomaselli|alt-title=Le ali della mente|desc=Mondadori, 1996. Trade paperback.|cover-by=Oscar Chicone}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-fr-denoel-2001.jpg|language=French|translator=Jean Bonnefoy|alt-title=Sur les ailes du chant|desc=Denoël, 2001. Paperback.|cover-by=Barrett Foster|isbn=2-07-041798-0}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-es-bibliopolis.jpg|language=Spanish|translator=Luis G. Prado|alt-title=En alas de la canción|desc=Bibliópolis, 2003. Trade paperback.|cover-by=Roberto Uriel & Manuel de los Galanes|isbn=84-932836-5-7}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-pl-solaris.jpg|language=Polish|translator=Michał Raginiak|alt-title=Na skrzydłach pieśni|desc=Solaris, 2007. Hardcover.|isbn=8389951843}}
</div>

== E-book ==

Chu Hartley Publishers, 2016. No cover art.

== Textual differences ==

The ''Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction'' serialization is slightly shorter than the full novel. Most of the cuts are of incidental flourishes without much effect on the story or the ideas, but one bit stands out in its absence: the paragraph in chapter 3 where Daniel, at the movie theater in Minneapolis, is both shocked and intrigued to notice two men sharing a bathroom stall.

The epigram doesn't appear in the serialization, nor in the first British hardcover from Gollancz.

Editing in this book has been inconsistent. I haven't seen the first US hardcover (St. Martin's), or the latest trade paperback, but both of the other US editions (Bantam and Easton Press) have a variety of errors—the same ones in each, suggesting that the St. Martin's one was the source, since the British hardcover doesn't have them. Most are minor copyediting issues, but at least one passage (the paragraph in Chapter 4 that ends with "hope was part of the punishment") is fairly garbled by a piece of out-of-place text.

== Footnotes ==
<references/>

{{On Wings of Song nav}}

On Wings of Song/Editions

2025-02-03T00:10:52Z

Eb: /* US */

{{#addbodyclass:horiz-toc}}

Sources include {{ISFDB title|1439}}, {{WorldCat editions|6853276}}, and {{Disch Index Translationum}}.

== US ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-fsf.jpg|desc=Serialized in three parts in ''The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction'': {{ISFDB|61102|February}}, {{ISFDB|61271|March}}, and {{ISFDB|60967|April}} 1979.|cover-by=Ed Emshwiller}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-st-martins.jpg|desc=St. Martin's Press, 1979. Hardcover.|cover-by=Michael Mariano|isbn=0312584660}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-bantam-1980.jpg|desc=Bantam Books, 1980. Paperback.<ref>The back cover says it's about "America, a generation from now. Not as it should be, but as it will be."</ref>|cover-by=Lou Feck|isbn=0553136674}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-bantam-1985.jpg|desc=Bantam Books, 1985. Paperback.|cover-by=Kid Kane|isbn=0553250760}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-carroll-graf-1988.jpg|desc=Carroll & Graf, 1988. Trade paperback.|cover-by=same as 1985, alas|isbn=0881844438}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-easton.jpg|desc=Easton Press, 1993. Limited edition hardcover. Illustrations by Pat Morrissey, introduction by James K. Morrow. No ISBN.}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-carroll-graf-2003.jpg|desc=Carroll & Graf, 2003. Trade paperback.|isbn=0786711221}}
</div>

== UK ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-gollancz.jpg|desc=Gollancz, 1979. Hardcover.|cover-by=Malcolm Ashman|isbn=0575025476}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-magnum.jpg|desc=Magnum, 1981. Paperback.|cover-by=Chris Moore|isbn=0417055803}}
</div>

== Translations ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-fr-denoel.jpg|language=French|translator=Jean Bonnefoy|alt-title=Sur les ailes du chant|desc=Denoël, 1980. Paperback.|cover-by=Stéphane Dumont}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-ja-1980.jpg|language=Japanese|translator=Yasuko Tomoeda|alt-title=Uta no tsubasa ni|desc=Kokushokankōkai, 1980. Hardcover.|isbn=9784336051165}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-de-hohenheim.jpg|language=German|translator=Irene Holicki|alt-title=Auf Flügeln des Gesangs|desc=Hohenheim, 1982. Hardcover.|cover-by=Oliviero Berni|isbn=3-8147-0025-2}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-he-1983.jpg|language=Hebrew|translator=Zofia Lassman|alt-title=Al kanfe ha-shir|desc=Keter, 1983. Softcover.}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-de-heyne.jpg|language=German|translator=Irene Holicki|alt-title=Auf Flügeln des Gesangs|desc=Heyne, 1986. Paperback.|cover-by=Ulf Herholz|isbn=3-453-31218-X}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-it-mondadori.jpg|language=Italian|translator=Paola Tomaselli|alt-title=Le ali della mente|desc=Mondadori, 1996. Trade paperback.|cover-by=Oscar Chicone}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-fr-denoel-2001.jpg|language=French|translator=Jean Bonnefoy|alt-title=Sur les ailes du chant|desc=Denoël, 2001. Paperback.|cover-by=Barrett Foster|isbn=2-07-041798-0}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-es-bibliopolis.jpg|language=Spanish|translator=Luis G. Prado|alt-title=En alas de la canción|desc=Bibliópolis, 2003. Trade paperback.|cover-by=Roberto Uriel & Manuel de los Galanes|isbn=84-932836-5-7}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-pl-solaris.jpg|language=Polish|translator=Michał Raginiak|alt-title=Na skrzydłach pieśni|desc=Solaris, 2007. Hardcover.|isbn=8389951843}}
</div>

== E-book ==

Chu Hartley Publishers, 2016. No cover art.

== Textual differences ==

The ''Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction'' serialization is slightly shorter than the full novel. Most of the cuts are of incidental flourishes without much effect on the story or the ideas, but one bit stands out in its absence: the paragraph in chapter 3 where Daniel, at the movie theater in Minneapolis, is both shocked and intrigued to notice two men sharing a bathroom stall.

The epigram doesn't appear in the serialization, nor in the first British hardcover from Gollancz.

Editing in this book has been inconsistent. I haven't seen the first US hardcover (St. Martin's), or the latest trade paperback, but both of the other US editions (Bantam and Easton Press) have a variety of errors—the same ones in each, suggesting that the St. Martin's one was the source, since the British hardcover doesn't have them. Most are minor copyediting issues, but at least one passage (the paragraph in Chapter 4 that ends with "hope was part of the punishment") is fairly garbled by a piece of out-of-place text.

{{On Wings of Song nav}}

On Wings of Song/Editions

2025-02-03T00:10:41Z

Eb: /* US */

{{#addbodyclass:horiz-toc}}

Sources include {{ISFDB title|1439}}, {{WorldCat editions|6853276}}, and {{Disch Index Translationum}}.

== US ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-fsf.jpg|desc=Serialized in three parts in ''The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction'': {{ISFDB|61102|February}}, {{ISFDB|61271|March}}, and {{ISFDB|60967|April}} 1979.|cover-by=Ed Emshwiller}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-st-martins.jpg|desc=St. Martin's Press, 1979. Hardcover.|cover-by=Michael Mariano|isbn=0312584660}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-bantam-1980.jpg|desc=Bantam Books, 1980. Paperback.<ref>The back cover says it's about "America, a generation from now. Not as it should be, but as it will be."<ref>|cover-by=Lou Feck|isbn=0553136674}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-bantam-1985.jpg|desc=Bantam Books, 1985. Paperback.|cover-by=Kid Kane|isbn=0553250760}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-carroll-graf-1988.jpg|desc=Carroll & Graf, 1988. Trade paperback.|cover-by=same as 1985, alas|isbn=0881844438}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-easton.jpg|desc=Easton Press, 1993. Limited edition hardcover. Illustrations by Pat Morrissey, introduction by James K. Morrow. No ISBN.}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-carroll-graf-2003.jpg|desc=Carroll & Graf, 2003. Trade paperback.|isbn=0786711221}}
</div>

== UK ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-gollancz.jpg|desc=Gollancz, 1979. Hardcover.|cover-by=Malcolm Ashman|isbn=0575025476}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-magnum.jpg|desc=Magnum, 1981. Paperback.|cover-by=Chris Moore|isbn=0417055803}}
</div>

== Translations ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-fr-denoel.jpg|language=French|translator=Jean Bonnefoy|alt-title=Sur les ailes du chant|desc=Denoël, 1980. Paperback.|cover-by=Stéphane Dumont}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-ja-1980.jpg|language=Japanese|translator=Yasuko Tomoeda|alt-title=Uta no tsubasa ni|desc=Kokushokankōkai, 1980. Hardcover.|isbn=9784336051165}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-de-hohenheim.jpg|language=German|translator=Irene Holicki|alt-title=Auf Flügeln des Gesangs|desc=Hohenheim, 1982. Hardcover.|cover-by=Oliviero Berni|isbn=3-8147-0025-2}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-he-1983.jpg|language=Hebrew|translator=Zofia Lassman|alt-title=Al kanfe ha-shir|desc=Keter, 1983. Softcover.}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-de-heyne.jpg|language=German|translator=Irene Holicki|alt-title=Auf Flügeln des Gesangs|desc=Heyne, 1986. Paperback.|cover-by=Ulf Herholz|isbn=3-453-31218-X}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-it-mondadori.jpg|language=Italian|translator=Paola Tomaselli|alt-title=Le ali della mente|desc=Mondadori, 1996. Trade paperback.|cover-by=Oscar Chicone}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-fr-denoel-2001.jpg|language=French|translator=Jean Bonnefoy|alt-title=Sur les ailes du chant|desc=Denoël, 2001. Paperback.|cover-by=Barrett Foster|isbn=2-07-041798-0}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-es-bibliopolis.jpg|language=Spanish|translator=Luis G. Prado|alt-title=En alas de la canción|desc=Bibliópolis, 2003. Trade paperback.|cover-by=Roberto Uriel & Manuel de los Galanes|isbn=84-932836-5-7}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-pl-solaris.jpg|language=Polish|translator=Michał Raginiak|alt-title=Na skrzydłach pieśni|desc=Solaris, 2007. Hardcover.|isbn=8389951843}}
</div>

== E-book ==

Chu Hartley Publishers, 2016. No cover art.

== Textual differences ==

The ''Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction'' serialization is slightly shorter than the full novel. Most of the cuts are of incidental flourishes without much effect on the story or the ideas, but one bit stands out in its absence: the paragraph in chapter 3 where Daniel, at the movie theater in Minneapolis, is both shocked and intrigued to notice two men sharing a bathroom stall.

The epigram doesn't appear in the serialization, nor in the first British hardcover from Gollancz.

Editing in this book has been inconsistent. I haven't seen the first US hardcover (St. Martin's), or the latest trade paperback, but both of the other US editions (Bantam and Easton Press) have a variety of errors—the same ones in each, suggesting that the St. Martin's one was the source, since the British hardcover doesn't have them. Most are minor copyediting issues, but at least one passage (the paragraph in Chapter 4 that ends with "hope was part of the punishment") is fairly garbled by a piece of out-of-place text.

{{On Wings of Song nav}}

On Wings of Song/Part One

2025-02-03T00:05:38Z

Eb: /* undergoders .... they practically ran Iowa */

{{#addbodyclass: tiled-toc}}

{{SummaryCollapsed |
As a teenager in Amesville, where flying is outlawed and music is barely allowed, Daniel knows there must be more to life than this. A brief dalliance with forbidden activities—distributing a banned newspaper and visiting Minneapolis, with the boy he has an unacknowledged love for—lands him in prison. The eight-month ordeal drastically disillusions him, but also sparks his obsession with singing.
}}

== Chapter 1 ==

=== Amesville, Iowa ===

[[File:Iowa.jpg|thumb|left|400px|The Hawkeye State]] No such town exists, although there is a city of {{wp|Ames, Iowa|Ames}} in Iowa—not far from Des Moines, where Disch was born and lived until age 13. Amesville sounds smaller, and not so close to a big city; in chapter 2 we learn that it's 40 miles from {{wp|Fort Dodge, Iowa|Fort Dodge}}, and several references to Fort Dodge make it sound like that's the next largest town in the area. For more about where Amesville might be, see [[#Chapter 3|Chapter 3]].

=== She would sit watching him ... people shouldn't let fairies into their houses ===

Fairies, as we will learn quickly from context, are the invisible presences of people who are "flying." All other references to fairies in Daniel's childhood are steeped in paranoia about being observed—but his daydreams here are a reminder that being watched over by an unseen dead family member or guardian angel is a standard religious idea meant to be comforting to children. The crucial difference is that Daniel's mother is a living person.

Not coincidentally, "fairy" also has a long history as an anti-gay slur in the US and England—semi-archaic today, but still very recognizable in the 1970s and 80s. Of the many equivalent slurs in other languages, several refer to butterflies, birds, etc., consistent with the idea that being flighty and/or colorful is effeminate.

There's no particular passage in the book that summarizes exactly what's involved in flying, so this note is as good a place as any. Disch gives no details about the "flight apparatus" technology except for there being a wire that touches the head. It's important to the premise that both the technology and the mental state achieved by singing are necessary ingredients; there's never a hint of anyone being able to do it in another way, as people have claimed to do in the past via meditation or esoteric studies. The general idea of {{wp|astral projection}} has a long history, but what's happening here seems closest to a more specific idea that only became popular in the 19th and 20th centuries, and shows up a lot in 20th century science fiction: {{wp|remote viewing}}, that is, the ability to roam around as a disembodied point of view and observe things in the actual world. In ''On Wings of Song'', fairies don't travel to a separate reality, and they don't perceive any supernatural beings (except other fairies like themselves), but otherwise there are only a few limits to where they can go and what they can see. So there are at least three reasons for religious conservatives to be against flying: it's a transcendent experience that doesn't correspond to their own religion, it's against their desire to control other people's access to information in general, and it's a threat to their own personal privacy.

=== a collect call from New York ===

Throughout the 20th century there was a large price difference between local and long-distance calling, so {{wp|Collect call|calling collect}} would be a typical way for someone to call home from another state without affecting their phone bill. This is now rare since many phone providers no longer have a separate long-distance rate.

=== the Iowa Stamp Tax ===

A {{wp|Stamp duty|stamp tax}} is a tax on property purchases and other transactions, typically at the state level in the US.

=== Otto Hassler Park ===

If this is a historical reference, it would be a misspelling of {{wp|Otto Haesler}} (1880-1962), a German architect best known for social housing. There would be no obvious connection to this novel or to Disch's life, so it may be that this is just a random fictional name; Hassler, Haesler, Haessler, etc. would be plausible German names to find in Iowa.

=== to help him take up his indenture ===

This is only briefly mentioned in connection with Daniel's father's dentistry career; it's unclear what the terms are of this contract, whether it is more like an apprenticeship or {{wp|indentured servitude}}, but a later reference to him paying off his "debt to the county" indicates that there's overlap between the government and the private sector in this system, consistent with how capitalism in Iowa has taken a neo-feudal direction.

=== fans whirling everywhere you went ===

The way that fans and other spinning objects can harm fairies is described by Barbara Steiner [[#The faster I let myself spin the more exciting|later in chapter 4]].

== Chapter 2 ==

=== He listened to Eugene Mueller's stories ===

Disch later mentioned a childhood friend who may have been the model for the character of Eugene, in terms of his taking credit for plots that were really from old stories: "Bruce Burton, when we were both paperboys in Fairmont ... there were only the two of us [sharing stories] (unless one counts the storylines he was lifting, unbeknownst to me, from ''{{wp|Analog Science Fiction and Fact|Astounding}}'')."<ref>{{cite article|author=Disch, Thomas M.|date=May 8, 2006|title=Story tag|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140130091852/tomsdisch.livejournal.com/5997.html|publication=Endzone}} {{InternetArchive|date=January 30, 2014}} This title of this brief blog post referred to the elaborations that some readers had added in comments to his brief story idea about a vengeful chipmunk. (See [[Thomas M. Disch#cite_note-note-endzone-1|note about ''Endzone'']])</ref>

=== bowdlerized editions of ''Frankenstein'' and ''The War of the Worlds'' ===

{{wp|Expurgation|Bowdlerization}} refers generally to creating censored versions of books or other art. Fantasy literature has always been a common target of censorship. ''Frankenstein'' is an unusual case in that the best-known version of the novel, the 1831 edition, contained changes by the author that some have described as self-censorship to appease Victorian sensibilities (although the differences between the 1818 and 1838 editions are more complex)—but any version of ''Frankenstein'' would be problematic for fundamentalist Christians due to its basic premise.

As for why ''The War of the Worlds'', commonly thought of as a thrilling alien invasion adventure, would offend religious conservatives: besides H.G. Wells being famously an atheist, the novel's narrator repeatedly brings up evolution.<ref>{{cite book|author=McLean, Steven|date=2009|title=The Early Fiction of H.G. Wells: Fantasies of Science|url=https://link.springer.com/book/10.1057/9780230236639|publisher=Palgrave Macmillan|isbn=978-0-230-53562-6}}</ref>

=== their own artless Grand Guignol ===

[[File:Grand-guignol-1928.jpg|thumb|right|300px|''The Man Who Killed Death'', 1928]] This could refer literally to the style of horror theater made famous by the {{wp|Grand Guignol|Grand-Guignol}}, or more generally to any kind of horror-inspired bad-taste make-believe that a 14-year-old would enjoy.

=== a book of speeches by Herbert Hoover ===

Hoover remains the only US President to be born in Iowa.

=== destroyed most of Tel Aviv ===

There are just enough references to non-US places in the novel to establish that some of them have been ruined by war or terrorism, but that this was not a global disaster; Cairo and Tehran, for instance, are still vacation destinations (chapter 10), as is Rome although other parts of Italy have been bombed (chapter 11), and Switzerland seems fine (chapter 5).

=== Old Black Joe ===

An 1860 {{wp|Old Black Joe|Stephen Foster song}}. Foster is commonly thought of in connection with blackface minstrelsy, which is very relevant to this book. "Old Black Joe" is a choice that makes sense here as something a teacher might have picked: while it romanticizes Southern slaveholding culture like other Foster songs, it has more plausible deniability due to not being written in dialect.

=== undergoders .... they practically ran Iowa ===

The reason that the far-right evangelicals who are so prominent in Daniel's world are called "undergoders" is never spelled out, but to someone of Disch's generation it would clearly refer to the controversy over the wording of the {{wp|Pledge of Allegiance}}. "One nation" was changed to "One nation, under God" in 1954, as part of a Cold War trend of emphasizing American piety in contrast to the Soviets. This was clearly at odds with separation of church and state, and even though no legal challenge was made on that basis until {{wp|Elk Grove Unified School District v. Newdow|2000}}, it was a common focus of arguments about the overlap between religion and political conservatism—and a convenient phrase for the religious right to rally around.

Woven throughout this chapter, there are references to state/federal conflicts, Supreme Court decisions, etc., to establish what kind of dystopia Daniel is living in: not a nationwide theocracy like ''The Handmaid's Tale'', but something more contiguous with US history so far. Most of the repression is happening at the state level, and wasn't established by a coup, but by the same processes as right-wing politics today: a coalition of interests including sincere religious zealots, corrupt politicians, and businessmen who have no real ideology but are comfortable in an authoritarian setting. The undergoders don't make up a majority in Iowa, and haven't required everyone to adopt their own very strict lifestyle ("it was impossible to pretend to be an undergoder since it involved giving up almost anything you might enjoy")—but they have an outsize influence because they're so prominent in the agricultural industry, where the state's main economic power is.

The novel doesn't say exactly which states are dominated by undergoders, just that it's most of "the Farm Belt", which could refer to any subset of Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, and Ohio. In chapter 3 we see that at least some of Iowa's neighbor states, like Minnesota, have managed not to go this way.

=== Three days after Governor Brewster vetoed this law his only daughter was shot at ===

Besides being another reminder that the government hasn't uniformly fallen in line, this is an example of the other traditional instrument of local right-wing power: anonymous violence by individuals. You could call this stochastic terrorism, or just the kind of thing that the KKK and similar groups have always done; in many ways the undergoder regime in the Farm Belt states operates very much like the deep South in the 1950s and '60s, where authoritarianism existed on both formal and informal levels.

=== it was as though civilization had ground to a halt ===

To American readers in 1979, the fuel crisis depicted here would feel very timely: oil production dropped {{wp|1979 oil crisis|in that year}} for several reasons, and even though the impact of this on the US was not as dramatic as expected, it brought back bad memories of the much more severe {{wp|1973 oil crisis}} when Americans had experienced rationing for the first time since World War Two.

Much as in ''[[334]]'', the theme of American decline in ''On Wings of Song'', and the idea that any serious lowering of the familiar standard of middle-class comfort would be a harbinger of the collapse of civilization, are rooted in feelings that were very common in the 1970s across the political spectrum. The rise of Ronald Reagan—already clearly in progress when this book was written—was based on the premise that economic problems in America, and social unrest in general, were due to having strayed from old-fashioned values and free-market capitalism.

=== The real aristocracy of Iowa, the farmers ===

The idea that the "farmers" are all undergoders living a strict religious life is not quite right, but from the limited perspective of Daniel and his family, knowing only the farmers in and around Amesville, it makes sense that it would seem that way. Later in chapter 5 we'll see a different side of the aristocracy: agribusiness tycoons who live in secular luxury.

=== copies of ''The Star-Tribune'' ===

The ''Minneapolis Star-Tribune'' (renamed ''{{wp|Minnesota Star Tribune}}'' in 2024) is a real newspaper, although in 1979 this was a slightly ahead-of-its-time reference because the ''Star'' and the ''Tribune'' were technically still two separate papers owned by the same company.

Disch said of his childhood in {{wp|Fairmont, Minnesota}} (where he lived during grade school and middle school, before the family moved back to Minneapolis): "[F]rom age nine years onwards, I began to earn my living, delivering the ''Minneapolis Star'' and the ''Tribune'' to those more cosmopolitan folks not content with Fairmont's own ''[https://www.fairmontsentinel.com/ Sentinel]''."{{ref Disch autobio}}

== Chapter 3 ==

=== the Twin Cities were Sodom and Gomorrah ===

While there are many twin cities around the world, in the Midwest this exclusively means Minneapolis and St. Paul. Since the undergoders in this future have not managed to dominate Minnesota like Iowa, these are the nearest examples of urban decadence.

Calling {{wp|Sodom and Gomorrah}} "twin cities" is not original to Disch—they are often described that way, but the Bible really says nothing about them having any relationship to each other, just that they were in the same general part of the world (the Dead Sea plain), along with three other cities that may or may not (depending on which texts you read) have met the same fate.

=== they rode their bikes north as far as U.S. 18 ... Albert Lea to Minneapolis ===

[[File:Iowa-to-MN.jpg|thumb|right|350px|Getting from Amesville to Minneapolis]] Route 18 is about 25 miles from the Iowa-Minnesota border. For what it's worth, this may help to narrow down where the fictional Amesville might be. If you headed straight north from Fort Dodge, route 18 would be about 40 miles away—and Amesville is supposed to be 40 miles from Fort Dodge. So, unless the boys took either a very long bike ride or a very short one, they probably started somewhere northwest or northeast of Fort Dodge, like where the real villages of West Bend and Corwith are. This doesn't really matter except to emphasize that Daniel lives in a very rural area.

=== urging the enactment of the Twenty-Eighth Amendment ===

This was mentioned earlier in chapter 2 as "the national Anti-Flight Amendment."

=== ''Gold-Diggers of 1984'' ===

This is a reference to the movie musicals ''{{wp|Gold Diggers of 1933}}'', ''{{wp|Gold Diggers of 1935}}'', and ''{{wp|Gold Diggers of 1937}}'', which are all vehicles for elaborate Busby Berkeley numbers. They are loosely derived from the 1919 play ''{{wp|The Gold Diggers (1919 play)|The Gold Diggers}}'' in the sense that all of their plots involve women marrying rich men; despite the negative connotation of "gold-diggers", the women always succeed in doing so and it's a happy ending.

[[File:Gold-diggers-of-1933.jpg|thumb|left|350px|''Gold Diggers of 1933'']] The years in the titles are the years that those movies were made... so is this implying that ''On Wings of Song'' actually takes place in the '80s? Even though no year is ever given for this near-future story, everything else about the setting makes that unlikely; these political and social changes did not happen in just a few years. So the movie may have come from a wave of '80s nostalgia—not unlike the one we've been undergoing in real life for a while now, and, like the current one, of course it includes ridiculous anachronisms like a flight apparatus.

=== a comic tap dance in black face ===

This would be no surprise at any point in the first half of the 20th century, but casually mentioning its presence in a near-future movie is a jarring effect (as with the earlier reference to "Old Black Joe"), and a reminder that race is something that hasn't really come up at all in Daniel's homogenous upbringing. It won't be until Part Three that we learn the fairly disturbing details of how ideas about skin color have developed in other parts of America.

=== north to the icebergs of Baffin Island ===

The location of {{wp|Baffin Island}} makes it a logical ending point if you traveled due north from the American Midwest and kept going.

=== I DON'T CARE IF THE SUN DON'T SHINE. Or: GIVE US FIVE MINUTES MORE ===

It's deliberately unclear what these could mean as political protest slogans, but in this book it's probably not a coincidence that {{wp|I Don't Care If the Sun Don't Shine|"I Don't Care If the Sun Don't Shine"}} and {{wp|Five Minutes More|"Five Minutes More"}} are the names of mid-20th-century pop songs. The lyrics of [https://genius.com/Elvis-presley-i-dont-care-if-the-sun-dont-shine-lyrics the first one] don't seem to have any special relevance, but the line "you can sleep late" in the [https://genius.com/Frank-sinatra-five-minutes-more-lyrics second one] may take on a sadder meaning after the events of Chapter 10.

=== the opposing lawyer raised an objection ===

Another example of the kind of soft authoritarianism that distinguishes Amesville from other literary dystopias: all of the legal structures that we have today still exist in the future, they're just applied even less fairly than before.

== Chapter 4 ==

=== the compound at Spirit Lake ===

[[File:Spirit-lake-map.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Where the prison is, more or less]] Spirit Lake or {{wp|Big Spirit Lake}} is one of the "Iowa Great Lakes" that form a chain from Minnesota to northwestern Iowa; there's also a {{wp|Spirit Lake, Iowa|small town}} in that area with the same name, although the town is on the shore of the next lake down, Lake Okoboji.

The latter area was the site of the last violent attack by Sioux on US settlers in Iowa (in reprisal for various abuses by the settlers and the federal government), after which the state and federal governments became even more aggressive in driving out the Native population. These events took on legendary stature in the Midwest,<ref>{{cite book|author=Teakle, Thomas|title=The Spirit Lake Massacre|url=https://gutenberg.org/cache/epub/42074/pg42074-images.html|location=Cedar Rapids|publisher=Torch Press|date=1918}}</ref> especially since they included the capture and ransom of a white woman who then wrote a memoir.<ref>{{cite article|author=Prout, Katie|title=A History of Violence: Walking the Blood-Soaked Shores of Spirit Lake|url=https://lithub.com/crime-or-conflict-walking-the-blood-soaked-shores-of-spirit-lake/|publication=Literary Hub|date=March 1, 2017|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref>

All of this makes it a perversely appropriate location for an authoritarian regime with an ultra-American ideology to establish a prison. The fact that it's right at the edge of Iowa, close to a non-undergoder state, just emphasizes how sure the authorities are that escape is impossible.

=== this scene was rotated through ninety degrees and the flowing river became a wall ===

This echoes a line in ''[[Camp Concentration]]'', from a description of the mad scientist Dr. Skilliman's various interests:

<blockquote>He was trying to analyze the peculiar fascination of lakes, reservoirs, and suchlike large, standing bodies of water. He observed that it is only in these that nature presents us with the spectacle of the Euclidean plane stretching on without apparent limit. It represents that final submission to the law of gravity that is always at work on our cell tissues. From this he went on to observe that the great achievement of architecture is simply to take the notion of the Euclidean plane and stand it on its edge. A wall is such an impressive phenomenon because it is a body of water... stood on its side.</blockquote>

=== the P-W lozenge ===

The idea of prisoners having a remote-controlled bomb on or in their bodies was fairly popular in late 20th century science fiction. Often this was in the form of an explosive collar around the neck—which has an obvious narrative advantage in movies, since it's always visible and can have an ominous flashing light on it; examples include ''The Running Man'' (1987), ''Wedlock'' (1991), and ''Battlefield Earth'' (2000). Less cinematically but more ickily, the bomb might be implanted inside someone's neck or skull.

[[File:Fortress.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Christopher Lambert in ''Fortress'']] I'm not sure whether ''On Wings of Song'' is the earliest example, but I'm fairly sure that this and the movie ''[https://letterboxd.com/hob/film/fortress-1992/ Fortress]'' (1992) are the only ones where you have to swallow the bomb—and that this was the first fictional depiction of a prison where instead of the bomb being the last-ditch mechanism to prevent escape, it's the ''only'' mechanism. In keeping with 1970s/80s conservative economic ideology, the Spirit Lake prison runs on an extreme laissez-faire model with basically no staff.

=== Basques in Spain, Jews in Russia, the Irish in England ... the decimation of Palestinians ===

As before, mentions of any society outside of the US are rare and brief, but this passage is an efficient and chilling way to convey that the Iowa style of authoritarianism is just one of many; every industrialized society adapts tools of control for its own purposes. Disch mentions that the US—unlike Spain, Russia, England, and Israel—only applies this technology within prisons and ''not'' to large groups of "potentially dissident civilians," but that doesn't make the situation in Iowa any less horrible, just different, in keeping with the overall less-centralized nature of the repression there.

=== Reverend Van Dyke ... head of Marble Collegiate Church ===

{{wp|Marble Collegiate Church|Marble Collegiate}} is a historic church in Manhattan which was famously associated with {{wp|Norman Vincent Peale}}. Peale's combination of feel-good self-help philosophy and chumminess with right-wing politicians makes him a clear model for Van Dyke.

=== to ''pretend'' to be good, devout, and faithful .... Eventually, saying makes it so ===

This theme will recur throughout the book—sometimes spelled out, other times [[On Wings of Song/Part Three#"I Whistle a Happy Tune"|more indirectly]].

=== Logomachies ===

Arguments about words.

=== his last year's homeroom teacher, Mrs. Norberg ===

Mrs. Norberg and her opinions will be described in much more detail in Chapter 6.

=== the breeding of a specially mutated form of termite ===

The idea that termites could become a major food source in the future has been around for a long time, mainly because people were already eating them.<ref>{{cite article|author=Reis de Figueirêdo, Vasconcellos, Policarpo, & Nóbrega Alves|title=Edible and medicinal termites: a global overview|url=https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4427943/|publication=Journal of Ethnobiology and Ethnomedicine|date=April 30, 2015|pub-date=Vol. 11, No. 29}}</ref> Academic discussion of the subject has increased in the 21st century due to increasing awareness of how agriculture suffers from climate change and contributes to it; unsurprisingly, as with everything related to climate change, this has also become the subject of right-wing conspiracy theories.<ref>{{cite article|author=Jingnan, Huo|title=From 4chan to international politics, a bug-eating conspiracy theory goes mainstream|url=https://www.npr.org/2023/03/31/1166649732/conspiracy-theory-eating-bugs-4chan|publication=All Things Considered|date=March 31, 2023|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref>

It's a matter of opinion whether Disch's portrayal of termite processing on an industrial scale is the grossest version of a food factory in science fiction (that honor might go to the giant underground chicken-heart blob in ''{{wp|The Space Merchants}}''), but it's one of the more plausible ones.

=== Beware of dogs, beware of evil workers ===

From [https://biblehub.com/kjv/philippians/3.htm Philippians 3:2-4, King James Version].

This is an example of Disch doing something he also [[334/334/Part_III#18._The_New_American_Catholic_Bible|did]] [[334/334/Part_VI#38._Father_Charmain|twice]] in ''334'': having a character land on a supposedly random Bible verse, when it's really the author being mischievous. Here Daniel has picked one of the most confusing Biblical passages that a casual reader could've possibly found—both because of the peculiar translation (the King James version uses the word "concision" in a way that I'm not sure it was ever used anywhere else in English literature), and because the meaning is so obscure without the context (the apostle Paul is ranting against other Christian factions of his time). Some [https://biblehub.com/nasb_/philippians/3.htm other translations] are a bit clearer, but only a bit.

The specific content of the passage may not be very important, but here's my best attempt to summarize it. After some general insults about "dogs" and "evil workers", Paul specifically complains about Christians who believe that circumcision and other traditional Jewish practices should remain important in their faith. He argues instead that "circumcision" should now be thought of as a spiritual condition, a matter of having the right faith—as the people in his own faction do. But as sort of a hedge and/or brag, he adds that if traditional circumcision is so important, i.e. if you really insist on having "confidence in the flesh", then he has that too since he was physically circumcised—and that maybe it should even count extra for him, since he used to be a very traditional Pharisee.

=== the windows were all sealed tight ===

Here we get one more bit of exposition about the rules of flying: fairies can travel effortlessly by willpower, but they can't go through solid objects.

=== The faster I let myself spin the more exciting ===

[[File:OWOS-cover-fsf.jpg|thumb|left|300px|Cover art by Ed Emshwiller]] And finally, the most important rule for fairies: if you go too close to any spinning thing, you'll be entranced and stuck there forever. The nature of a "fairy-trap" was left intentionally vague before, but in hindsight, every electric fan that we've heard about being used for this purpose indicates someone's willingness to cause someone else to die in a coma.

The idea that a particular physical structure could entice a disembodied spirit also appears in Disch's ''[[The Businessman#Chapter 43|The Businessman]]'', where Giselle's ghost is mystically intoxicated by the pattern on a potholder.

Ed Emshwiller's cover painting for ''The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction'' February 1979 issue—where the first part of ''On Wings of Song'' appeared—shows a group of ethereal figures drifting toward an object that is just abstract enough that if you don't yet know the story, you could easily assume it's some sort of alien portal, but if you do know, it's clearly a tabletop electric fan.

=== the one about purity of heart being to will one thing ===

Van Dyke got this from [https://www.religion-online.org/book/purity-of-heart-is-to-will-one-thing/ Kierkegaard].

=== to live at the end of such a civilization ===

Here I think ''On Wings of Song'' is echoing not just a general 1970s fear of American decline, but the specific angle that Disch explored in ''[[334]]'': the psychological ''appeal'' of imagining that you're in a crumbling empire, at least if you're a relatively privileged person.

=== Cairo and Bombay for the National Council of Churches' Triage Committee ===

Triage is the process of deciding who to help first in an emergency, and who to immediately give up on.

=== run into an iceberg and sink, like ... the lost city of Brasilia ===

[[File:Vila-amaury-1.jpeg|thumb|right|300px|Vila Amaury, 1959]][[File:Vila-amaury-2.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Vila Amaury, 2010]] This condensed metaphor might refer to Vila Amaury, the lost city ''within'' the city of Brasilia. It makes sense for Van Dyke to see Brasilia as an example of "the Civilization of the Business Man": it was a heavily planned city built by technocrats in relatively recent history, and in the process of its creation, Vila Amaury was created as a company shanty-town to house 15,000 migrant workers—who were then displaced because the plan for Brasilia included an artificial lake, created by the Lago Paranoá dam, entirely submerging the site of the town.<ref>{{cite article|author=Basques, Victoria|title=Vila Amaury, uma cidade submersa|url=https://medium.com/esquinaonline/vila-amaury-uma-cidade-submersa-9b3e48dc8d12|publication=Esquina On-line|date=November 14, 2018|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref>

=== you are a punk singer ===

Disch probably was not thinking of punk rock, which was still fairly new at the time, but he's using the word in the same sense that gave punk rock its name: unskilled, no good, lowlife. Not coincidentally, it's also an old derogatory word for a young man who is used for sex, especially in prison.

=== I am the captain of the Pinafore ===

From ''{{wp|H.M.S. Pinafore}}'' by Gilbert & Sullivan (1878). This is a call-and-response song, and Daniel is singing both parts, a little inaccurately; the actual lines are:

: CAPTAIN: I am the Captain of the Pinafore;
: CREW: And a right good captain, too!
: CAPTAIN: You're very, very good,
: And be it understood,
: I command a right good crew.

([https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OqWNmTXhI34 Recording of a performance by the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company, 1959])

== Footnotes ==
<references/>

{{On Wings of Song nav}}

On Wings of Song/Part One

2025-02-03T00:00:03Z

Eb: /* the windows were all sealed tight */

{{#addbodyclass: tiled-toc}}

{{SummaryCollapsed |
As a teenager in Amesville, where flying is outlawed and music is barely allowed, Daniel knows there must be more to life than this. A brief dalliance with forbidden activities—distributing a banned newspaper and visiting Minneapolis, with the boy he has an unacknowledged love for—lands him in prison. The eight-month ordeal drastically disillusions him, but also sparks his obsession with singing.
}}

== Chapter 1 ==

=== Amesville, Iowa ===

[[File:Iowa.jpg|thumb|left|400px|The Hawkeye State]] No such town exists, although there is a city of {{wp|Ames, Iowa|Ames}} in Iowa—not far from Des Moines, where Disch was born and lived until age 13. Amesville sounds smaller, and not so close to a big city; in chapter 2 we learn that it's 40 miles from {{wp|Fort Dodge, Iowa|Fort Dodge}}, and several references to Fort Dodge make it sound like that's the next largest town in the area. For more about where Amesville might be, see [[#Chapter 3|Chapter 3]].

=== She would sit watching him ... people shouldn't let fairies into their houses ===

Fairies, as we will learn quickly from context, are the invisible presences of people who are "flying." All other references to fairies in Daniel's childhood are steeped in paranoia about being observed—but his daydreams here are a reminder that being watched over by an unseen dead family member or guardian angel is a standard religious idea meant to be comforting to children. The crucial difference is that Daniel's mother is a living person.

Not coincidentally, "fairy" also has a long history as an anti-gay slur in the US and England—semi-archaic today, but still very recognizable in the 1970s and 80s. Of the many equivalent slurs in other languages, several refer to butterflies, birds, etc., consistent with the idea that being flighty and/or colorful is effeminate.

There's no particular passage in the book that summarizes exactly what's involved in flying, so this note is as good a place as any. Disch gives no details about the "flight apparatus" technology except for there being a wire that touches the head. It's important to the premise that both the technology and the mental state achieved by singing are necessary ingredients; there's never a hint of anyone being able to do it in another way, as people have claimed to do in the past via meditation or esoteric studies. The general idea of {{wp|astral projection}} has a long history, but what's happening here seems closest to a more specific idea that only became popular in the 19th and 20th centuries, and shows up a lot in 20th century science fiction: {{wp|remote viewing}}, that is, the ability to roam around as a disembodied point of view and observe things in the actual world. In ''On Wings of Song'', fairies don't travel to a separate reality, and they don't perceive any supernatural beings (except other fairies like themselves), but otherwise there are only a few limits to where they can go and what they can see. So there are at least three reasons for religious conservatives to be against flying: it's a transcendent experience that doesn't correspond to their own religion, it's against their desire to control other people's access to information in general, and it's a threat to their own personal privacy.

=== a collect call from New York ===

Throughout the 20th century there was a large price difference between local and long-distance calling, so {{wp|Collect call|calling collect}} would be a typical way for someone to call home from another state without affecting their phone bill. This is now rare since many phone providers no longer have a separate long-distance rate.

=== the Iowa Stamp Tax ===

A {{wp|Stamp duty|stamp tax}} is a tax on property purchases and other transactions, typically at the state level in the US.

=== Otto Hassler Park ===

If this is a historical reference, it would be a misspelling of {{wp|Otto Haesler}} (1880-1962), a German architect best known for social housing. There would be no obvious connection to this novel or to Disch's life, so it may be that this is just a random fictional name; Hassler, Haesler, Haessler, etc. would be plausible German names to find in Iowa.

=== to help him take up his indenture ===

This is only briefly mentioned in connection with Daniel's father's dentistry career; it's unclear what the terms are of this contract, whether it is more like an apprenticeship or {{wp|indentured servitude}}, but a later reference to him paying off his "debt to the county" indicates that there's overlap between the government and the private sector in this system, consistent with how capitalism in Iowa has taken a neo-feudal direction.

=== fans whirling everywhere you went ===

The way that fans and other spinning objects can harm fairies is described by Barbara Steiner [[#The faster I let myself spin the more exciting|later in chapter 4]].

== Chapter 2 ==

=== He listened to Eugene Mueller's stories ===

Disch later mentioned a childhood friend who may have been the model for the character of Eugene, in terms of his taking credit for plots that were really from old stories: "Bruce Burton, when we were both paperboys in Fairmont ... there were only the two of us [sharing stories] (unless one counts the storylines he was lifting, unbeknownst to me, from ''{{wp|Analog Science Fiction and Fact|Astounding}}'')."<ref>{{cite article|author=Disch, Thomas M.|date=May 8, 2006|title=Story tag|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140130091852/tomsdisch.livejournal.com/5997.html|publication=Endzone}} {{InternetArchive|date=January 30, 2014}} This title of this brief blog post referred to the elaborations that some readers had added in comments to his brief story idea about a vengeful chipmunk. (See [[Thomas M. Disch#cite_note-note-endzone-1|note about ''Endzone'']])</ref>

=== bowdlerized editions of ''Frankenstein'' and ''The War of the Worlds'' ===

{{wp|Expurgation|Bowdlerization}} refers generally to creating censored versions of books or other art. Fantasy literature has always been a common target of censorship. ''Frankenstein'' is an unusual case in that the best-known version of the novel, the 1831 edition, contained changes by the author that some have described as self-censorship to appease Victorian sensibilities (although the differences between the 1818 and 1838 editions are more complex)—but any version of ''Frankenstein'' would be problematic for fundamentalist Christians due to its basic premise.

As for why ''The War of the Worlds'', commonly thought of as a thrilling alien invasion adventure, would offend religious conservatives: besides H.G. Wells being famously an atheist, the novel's narrator repeatedly brings up evolution.<ref>{{cite book|author=McLean, Steven|date=2009|title=The Early Fiction of H.G. Wells: Fantasies of Science|url=https://link.springer.com/book/10.1057/9780230236639|publisher=Palgrave Macmillan|isbn=978-0-230-53562-6}}</ref>

=== their own artless Grand Guignol ===

[[File:Grand-guignol-1928.jpg|thumb|right|300px|''The Man Who Killed Death'', 1928]] This could refer literally to the style of horror theater made famous by the {{wp|Grand Guignol|Grand-Guignol}}, or more generally to any kind of horror-inspired bad-taste make-believe that a 14-year-old would enjoy.

=== a book of speeches by Herbert Hoover ===

Hoover remains the only US President to be born in Iowa.

=== destroyed most of Tel Aviv ===

There are just enough references to non-US places in the novel to establish that some of them have been ruined by war or terrorism, but that this was not a global disaster; Cairo and Tehran, for instance, are still vacation destinations (chapter 10), as is Rome although other parts of Italy have been bombed (chapter 11), and Switzerland seems fine (chapter 5).

=== Old Black Joe ===

An 1860 {{wp|Old Black Joe|Stephen Foster song}}. Foster is commonly thought of in connection with blackface minstrelsy, which is very relevant to this book. "Old Black Joe" is a choice that makes sense here as something a teacher might have picked: while it romanticizes Southern slaveholding culture like other Foster songs, it has more plausible deniability due to not being written in dialect.

=== undergoders .... they practically ran Iowa ===

The reason that the far-right evangelicals who are so prominent in Daniel's world are called "undergoders" is never spelled out, but to someone of Disch's generation it would clearly refer to the controversy over the wording of the {{wp|Pledge of Allegiance}}. "One nation" was changed to "One nation, under God" in 1954, as part of a Cold War trend of emphasizing American piety in contrast to the Soviets. This was clearly at odds with separation of church and state, and even though no legal challenge was made on that basis until {{wp|Elk Grove Unified School District v. Newdow|2000}}, it was a common focus of arguments about the overlap between religion and political conservatism—and a convenient phrase for the religious right to rally around.

Woven throughout this chapter, there are references to state/federal conflicts, Supreme Court decisions, etc., to establish what kind of dystopia Daniel is living in: not a nationwide theocracy like ''The Handmaid's Tale'', but something more contiguous with US history so far. Most of the repression is happening at the state level, and wasn't established by a coup, but by the same processes as right-wing politics today: a coalition of interests including sincere religious zealots, corrupt politicians, and businessmen who have no real ideology but are comfortable in an authoritarian setting. The undergoders don't make up a majority in Iowa, and haven't really forced everyone to live like they do ("it was impossible to pretend to be an undergoder since it involved giving up almost anything you might enjoy")—but they're over-represented in the agricultural industry where the state's main economic power is.

The novel doesn't say exactly which states are dominated by undergoders, just that it's most of "the Farm Belt", which could refer to any subset of Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, and Ohio. In chapter 3 we see that at least some of Iowa's neighbor states, like Minnesota, have managed not to go this way.

=== Three days after Governor Brewster vetoed this law his only daughter was shot at ===

Besides being another reminder that the government hasn't uniformly fallen in line, this is an example of the other traditional instrument of local right-wing power: anonymous violence by individuals. You could call this stochastic terrorism, or just the kind of thing that the KKK and similar groups have always done; in many ways the undergoder regime in the Farm Belt states operates very much like the deep South in the 1950s and '60s, where authoritarianism existed on both formal and informal levels.

=== it was as though civilization had ground to a halt ===

To American readers in 1979, the fuel crisis depicted here would feel very timely: oil production dropped {{wp|1979 oil crisis|in that year}} for several reasons, and even though the impact of this on the US was not as dramatic as expected, it brought back bad memories of the much more severe {{wp|1973 oil crisis}} when Americans had experienced rationing for the first time since World War Two.

Much as in ''[[334]]'', the theme of American decline in ''On Wings of Song'', and the idea that any serious lowering of the familiar standard of middle-class comfort would be a harbinger of the collapse of civilization, are rooted in feelings that were very common in the 1970s across the political spectrum. The rise of Ronald Reagan—already clearly in progress when this book was written—was based on the premise that economic problems in America, and social unrest in general, were due to having strayed from old-fashioned values and free-market capitalism.

=== The real aristocracy of Iowa, the farmers ===

The idea that the "farmers" are all undergoders living a strict religious life is not quite right, but from the limited perspective of Daniel and his family, knowing only the farmers in and around Amesville, it makes sense that it would seem that way. Later in chapter 5 we'll see a different side of the aristocracy: agribusiness tycoons who live in secular luxury.

=== copies of ''The Star-Tribune'' ===

The ''Minneapolis Star-Tribune'' (renamed ''{{wp|Minnesota Star Tribune}}'' in 2024) is a real newspaper, although in 1979 this was a slightly ahead-of-its-time reference because the ''Star'' and the ''Tribune'' were technically still two separate papers owned by the same company.

Disch said of his childhood in {{wp|Fairmont, Minnesota}} (where he lived during grade school and middle school, before the family moved back to Minneapolis): "[F]rom age nine years onwards, I began to earn my living, delivering the ''Minneapolis Star'' and the ''Tribune'' to those more cosmopolitan folks not content with Fairmont's own ''[https://www.fairmontsentinel.com/ Sentinel]''."{{ref Disch autobio}}

== Chapter 3 ==

=== the Twin Cities were Sodom and Gomorrah ===

While there are many twin cities around the world, in the Midwest this exclusively means Minneapolis and St. Paul. Since the undergoders in this future have not managed to dominate Minnesota like Iowa, these are the nearest examples of urban decadence.

Calling {{wp|Sodom and Gomorrah}} "twin cities" is not original to Disch—they are often described that way, but the Bible really says nothing about them having any relationship to each other, just that they were in the same general part of the world (the Dead Sea plain), along with three other cities that may or may not (depending on which texts you read) have met the same fate.

=== they rode their bikes north as far as U.S. 18 ... Albert Lea to Minneapolis ===

[[File:Iowa-to-MN.jpg|thumb|right|350px|Getting from Amesville to Minneapolis]] Route 18 is about 25 miles from the Iowa-Minnesota border. For what it's worth, this may help to narrow down where the fictional Amesville might be. If you headed straight north from Fort Dodge, route 18 would be about 40 miles away—and Amesville is supposed to be 40 miles from Fort Dodge. So, unless the boys took either a very long bike ride or a very short one, they probably started somewhere northwest or northeast of Fort Dodge, like where the real villages of West Bend and Corwith are. This doesn't really matter except to emphasize that Daniel lives in a very rural area.

=== urging the enactment of the Twenty-Eighth Amendment ===

This was mentioned earlier in chapter 2 as "the national Anti-Flight Amendment."

=== ''Gold-Diggers of 1984'' ===

This is a reference to the movie musicals ''{{wp|Gold Diggers of 1933}}'', ''{{wp|Gold Diggers of 1935}}'', and ''{{wp|Gold Diggers of 1937}}'', which are all vehicles for elaborate Busby Berkeley numbers. They are loosely derived from the 1919 play ''{{wp|The Gold Diggers (1919 play)|The Gold Diggers}}'' in the sense that all of their plots involve women marrying rich men; despite the negative connotation of "gold-diggers", the women always succeed in doing so and it's a happy ending.

[[File:Gold-diggers-of-1933.jpg|thumb|left|350px|''Gold Diggers of 1933'']] The years in the titles are the years that those movies were made... so is this implying that ''On Wings of Song'' actually takes place in the '80s? Even though no year is ever given for this near-future story, everything else about the setting makes that unlikely; these political and social changes did not happen in just a few years. So the movie may have come from a wave of '80s nostalgia—not unlike the one we've been undergoing in real life for a while now, and, like the current one, of course it includes ridiculous anachronisms like a flight apparatus.

=== a comic tap dance in black face ===

This would be no surprise at any point in the first half of the 20th century, but casually mentioning its presence in a near-future movie is a jarring effect (as with the earlier reference to "Old Black Joe"), and a reminder that race is something that hasn't really come up at all in Daniel's homogenous upbringing. It won't be until Part Three that we learn the fairly disturbing details of how ideas about skin color have developed in other parts of America.

=== north to the icebergs of Baffin Island ===

The location of {{wp|Baffin Island}} makes it a logical ending point if you traveled due north from the American Midwest and kept going.

=== I DON'T CARE IF THE SUN DON'T SHINE. Or: GIVE US FIVE MINUTES MORE ===

It's deliberately unclear what these could mean as political protest slogans, but in this book it's probably not a coincidence that {{wp|I Don't Care If the Sun Don't Shine|"I Don't Care If the Sun Don't Shine"}} and {{wp|Five Minutes More|"Five Minutes More"}} are the names of mid-20th-century pop songs. The lyrics of [https://genius.com/Elvis-presley-i-dont-care-if-the-sun-dont-shine-lyrics the first one] don't seem to have any special relevance, but the line "you can sleep late" in the [https://genius.com/Frank-sinatra-five-minutes-more-lyrics second one] may take on a sadder meaning after the events of Chapter 10.

=== the opposing lawyer raised an objection ===

Another example of the kind of soft authoritarianism that distinguishes Amesville from other literary dystopias: all of the legal structures that we have today still exist in the future, they're just applied even less fairly than before.

== Chapter 4 ==

=== the compound at Spirit Lake ===

[[File:Spirit-lake-map.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Where the prison is, more or less]] Spirit Lake or {{wp|Big Spirit Lake}} is one of the "Iowa Great Lakes" that form a chain from Minnesota to northwestern Iowa; there's also a {{wp|Spirit Lake, Iowa|small town}} in that area with the same name, although the town is on the shore of the next lake down, Lake Okoboji.

The latter area was the site of the last violent attack by Sioux on US settlers in Iowa (in reprisal for various abuses by the settlers and the federal government), after which the state and federal governments became even more aggressive in driving out the Native population. These events took on legendary stature in the Midwest,<ref>{{cite book|author=Teakle, Thomas|title=The Spirit Lake Massacre|url=https://gutenberg.org/cache/epub/42074/pg42074-images.html|location=Cedar Rapids|publisher=Torch Press|date=1918}}</ref> especially since they included the capture and ransom of a white woman who then wrote a memoir.<ref>{{cite article|author=Prout, Katie|title=A History of Violence: Walking the Blood-Soaked Shores of Spirit Lake|url=https://lithub.com/crime-or-conflict-walking-the-blood-soaked-shores-of-spirit-lake/|publication=Literary Hub|date=March 1, 2017|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref>

All of this makes it a perversely appropriate location for an authoritarian regime with an ultra-American ideology to establish a prison. The fact that it's right at the edge of Iowa, close to a non-undergoder state, just emphasizes how sure the authorities are that escape is impossible.

=== this scene was rotated through ninety degrees and the flowing river became a wall ===

This echoes a line in ''[[Camp Concentration]]'', from a description of the mad scientist Dr. Skilliman's various interests:

<blockquote>He was trying to analyze the peculiar fascination of lakes, reservoirs, and suchlike large, standing bodies of water. He observed that it is only in these that nature presents us with the spectacle of the Euclidean plane stretching on without apparent limit. It represents that final submission to the law of gravity that is always at work on our cell tissues. From this he went on to observe that the great achievement of architecture is simply to take the notion of the Euclidean plane and stand it on its edge. A wall is such an impressive phenomenon because it is a body of water... stood on its side.</blockquote>

=== the P-W lozenge ===

The idea of prisoners having a remote-controlled bomb on or in their bodies was fairly popular in late 20th century science fiction. Often this was in the form of an explosive collar around the neck—which has an obvious narrative advantage in movies, since it's always visible and can have an ominous flashing light on it; examples include ''The Running Man'' (1987), ''Wedlock'' (1991), and ''Battlefield Earth'' (2000). Less cinematically but more ickily, the bomb might be implanted inside someone's neck or skull.

[[File:Fortress.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Christopher Lambert in ''Fortress'']] I'm not sure whether ''On Wings of Song'' is the earliest example, but I'm fairly sure that this and the movie ''[https://letterboxd.com/hob/film/fortress-1992/ Fortress]'' (1992) are the only ones where you have to swallow the bomb—and that this was the first fictional depiction of a prison where instead of the bomb being the last-ditch mechanism to prevent escape, it's the ''only'' mechanism. In keeping with 1970s/80s conservative economic ideology, the Spirit Lake prison runs on an extreme laissez-faire model with basically no staff.

=== Basques in Spain, Jews in Russia, the Irish in England ... the decimation of Palestinians ===

As before, mentions of any society outside of the US are rare and brief, but this passage is an efficient and chilling way to convey that the Iowa style of authoritarianism is just one of many; every industrialized society adapts tools of control for its own purposes. Disch mentions that the US—unlike Spain, Russia, England, and Israel—only applies this technology within prisons and ''not'' to large groups of "potentially dissident civilians," but that doesn't make the situation in Iowa any less horrible, just different, in keeping with the overall less-centralized nature of the repression there.

=== Reverend Van Dyke ... head of Marble Collegiate Church ===

{{wp|Marble Collegiate Church|Marble Collegiate}} is a historic church in Manhattan which was famously associated with {{wp|Norman Vincent Peale}}. Peale's combination of feel-good self-help philosophy and chumminess with right-wing politicians makes him a clear model for Van Dyke.

=== to ''pretend'' to be good, devout, and faithful .... Eventually, saying makes it so ===

This theme will recur throughout the book—sometimes spelled out, other times [[On Wings of Song/Part Three#"I Whistle a Happy Tune"|more indirectly]].

=== Logomachies ===

Arguments about words.

=== his last year's homeroom teacher, Mrs. Norberg ===

Mrs. Norberg and her opinions will be described in much more detail in Chapter 6.

=== the breeding of a specially mutated form of termite ===

The idea that termites could become a major food source in the future has been around for a long time, mainly because people were already eating them.<ref>{{cite article|author=Reis de Figueirêdo, Vasconcellos, Policarpo, & Nóbrega Alves|title=Edible and medicinal termites: a global overview|url=https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4427943/|publication=Journal of Ethnobiology and Ethnomedicine|date=April 30, 2015|pub-date=Vol. 11, No. 29}}</ref> Academic discussion of the subject has increased in the 21st century due to increasing awareness of how agriculture suffers from climate change and contributes to it; unsurprisingly, as with everything related to climate change, this has also become the subject of right-wing conspiracy theories.<ref>{{cite article|author=Jingnan, Huo|title=From 4chan to international politics, a bug-eating conspiracy theory goes mainstream|url=https://www.npr.org/2023/03/31/1166649732/conspiracy-theory-eating-bugs-4chan|publication=All Things Considered|date=March 31, 2023|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref>

It's a matter of opinion whether Disch's portrayal of termite processing on an industrial scale is the grossest version of a food factory in science fiction (that honor might go to the giant underground chicken-heart blob in ''{{wp|The Space Merchants}}''), but it's one of the more plausible ones.

=== Beware of dogs, beware of evil workers ===

From [https://biblehub.com/kjv/philippians/3.htm Philippians 3:2-4, King James Version].

This is an example of Disch doing something he also [[334/334/Part_III#18._The_New_American_Catholic_Bible|did]] [[334/334/Part_VI#38._Father_Charmain|twice]] in ''334'': having a character land on a supposedly random Bible verse, when it's really the author being mischievous. Here Daniel has picked one of the most confusing Biblical passages that a casual reader could've possibly found—both because of the peculiar translation (the King James version uses the word "concision" in a way that I'm not sure it was ever used anywhere else in English literature), and because the meaning is so obscure without the context (the apostle Paul is ranting against other Christian factions of his time). Some [https://biblehub.com/nasb_/philippians/3.htm other translations] are a bit clearer, but only a bit.

The specific content of the passage may not be very important, but here's my best attempt to summarize it. After some general insults about "dogs" and "evil workers", Paul specifically complains about Christians who believe that circumcision and other traditional Jewish practices should remain important in their faith. He argues instead that "circumcision" should now be thought of as a spiritual condition, a matter of having the right faith—as the people in his own faction do. But as sort of a hedge and/or brag, he adds that if traditional circumcision is so important, i.e. if you really insist on having "confidence in the flesh", then he has that too since he was physically circumcised—and that maybe it should even count extra for him, since he used to be a very traditional Pharisee.

=== the windows were all sealed tight ===

Here we get one more bit of exposition about the rules of flying: fairies can travel effortlessly by willpower, but they can't go through solid objects.

=== The faster I let myself spin the more exciting ===

[[File:OWOS-cover-fsf.jpg|thumb|left|300px|Cover art by Ed Emshwiller]] And finally, the most important rule for fairies: if you go too close to any spinning thing, you'll be entranced and stuck there forever. The nature of a "fairy-trap" was left intentionally vague before, but in hindsight, every electric fan that we've heard about being used for this purpose indicates someone's willingness to cause someone else to die in a coma.

The idea that a particular physical structure could entice a disembodied spirit also appears in Disch's ''[[The Businessman#Chapter 43|The Businessman]]'', where Giselle's ghost is mystically intoxicated by the pattern on a potholder.

Ed Emshwiller's cover painting for ''The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction'' February 1979 issue—where the first part of ''On Wings of Song'' appeared—shows a group of ethereal figures drifting toward an object that is just abstract enough that if you don't yet know the story, you could easily assume it's some sort of alien portal, but if you do know, it's clearly a tabletop electric fan.

=== the one about purity of heart being to will one thing ===

Van Dyke got this from [https://www.religion-online.org/book/purity-of-heart-is-to-will-one-thing/ Kierkegaard].

=== to live at the end of such a civilization ===

Here I think ''On Wings of Song'' is echoing not just a general 1970s fear of American decline, but the specific angle that Disch explored in ''[[334]]'': the psychological ''appeal'' of imagining that you're in a crumbling empire, at least if you're a relatively privileged person.

=== Cairo and Bombay for the National Council of Churches' Triage Committee ===

Triage is the process of deciding who to help first in an emergency, and who to immediately give up on.

=== run into an iceberg and sink, like ... the lost city of Brasilia ===

[[File:Vila-amaury-1.jpeg|thumb|right|300px|Vila Amaury, 1959]][[File:Vila-amaury-2.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Vila Amaury, 2010]] This condensed metaphor might refer to Vila Amaury, the lost city ''within'' the city of Brasilia. It makes sense for Van Dyke to see Brasilia as an example of "the Civilization of the Business Man": it was a heavily planned city built by technocrats in relatively recent history, and in the process of its creation, Vila Amaury was created as a company shanty-town to house 15,000 migrant workers—who were then displaced because the plan for Brasilia included an artificial lake, created by the Lago Paranoá dam, entirely submerging the site of the town.<ref>{{cite article|author=Basques, Victoria|title=Vila Amaury, uma cidade submersa|url=https://medium.com/esquinaonline/vila-amaury-uma-cidade-submersa-9b3e48dc8d12|publication=Esquina On-line|date=November 14, 2018|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref>

=== you are a punk singer ===

Disch probably was not thinking of punk rock, which was still fairly new at the time, but he's using the word in the same sense that gave punk rock its name: unskilled, no good, lowlife. Not coincidentally, it's also an old derogatory word for a young man who is used for sex, especially in prison.

=== I am the captain of the Pinafore ===

From ''{{wp|H.M.S. Pinafore}}'' by Gilbert & Sullivan (1878). This is a call-and-response song, and Daniel is singing both parts, a little inaccurately; the actual lines are:

: CAPTAIN: I am the Captain of the Pinafore;
: CREW: And a right good captain, too!
: CAPTAIN: You're very, very good,
: And be it understood,
: I command a right good crew.

([https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OqWNmTXhI34 Recording of a performance by the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company, 1959])

== Footnotes ==
<references/>

{{On Wings of Song nav}}

On Wings of Song/Part One

2025-02-02T23:59:40Z

Eb: /* fans whirling everywhere you went */

{{#addbodyclass: tiled-toc}}

{{SummaryCollapsed |
As a teenager in Amesville, where flying is outlawed and music is barely allowed, Daniel knows there must be more to life than this. A brief dalliance with forbidden activities—distributing a banned newspaper and visiting Minneapolis, with the boy he has an unacknowledged love for—lands him in prison. The eight-month ordeal drastically disillusions him, but also sparks his obsession with singing.
}}

== Chapter 1 ==

=== Amesville, Iowa ===

[[File:Iowa.jpg|thumb|left|400px|The Hawkeye State]] No such town exists, although there is a city of {{wp|Ames, Iowa|Ames}} in Iowa—not far from Des Moines, where Disch was born and lived until age 13. Amesville sounds smaller, and not so close to a big city; in chapter 2 we learn that it's 40 miles from {{wp|Fort Dodge, Iowa|Fort Dodge}}, and several references to Fort Dodge make it sound like that's the next largest town in the area. For more about where Amesville might be, see [[#Chapter 3|Chapter 3]].

=== She would sit watching him ... people shouldn't let fairies into their houses ===

Fairies, as we will learn quickly from context, are the invisible presences of people who are "flying." All other references to fairies in Daniel's childhood are steeped in paranoia about being observed—but his daydreams here are a reminder that being watched over by an unseen dead family member or guardian angel is a standard religious idea meant to be comforting to children. The crucial difference is that Daniel's mother is a living person.

Not coincidentally, "fairy" also has a long history as an anti-gay slur in the US and England—semi-archaic today, but still very recognizable in the 1970s and 80s. Of the many equivalent slurs in other languages, several refer to butterflies, birds, etc., consistent with the idea that being flighty and/or colorful is effeminate.

There's no particular passage in the book that summarizes exactly what's involved in flying, so this note is as good a place as any. Disch gives no details about the "flight apparatus" technology except for there being a wire that touches the head. It's important to the premise that both the technology and the mental state achieved by singing are necessary ingredients; there's never a hint of anyone being able to do it in another way, as people have claimed to do in the past via meditation or esoteric studies. The general idea of {{wp|astral projection}} has a long history, but what's happening here seems closest to a more specific idea that only became popular in the 19th and 20th centuries, and shows up a lot in 20th century science fiction: {{wp|remote viewing}}, that is, the ability to roam around as a disembodied point of view and observe things in the actual world. In ''On Wings of Song'', fairies don't travel to a separate reality, and they don't perceive any supernatural beings (except other fairies like themselves), but otherwise there are only a few limits to where they can go and what they can see. So there are at least three reasons for religious conservatives to be against flying: it's a transcendent experience that doesn't correspond to their own religion, it's against their desire to control other people's access to information in general, and it's a threat to their own personal privacy.

=== a collect call from New York ===

Throughout the 20th century there was a large price difference between local and long-distance calling, so {{wp|Collect call|calling collect}} would be a typical way for someone to call home from another state without affecting their phone bill. This is now rare since many phone providers no longer have a separate long-distance rate.

=== the Iowa Stamp Tax ===

A {{wp|Stamp duty|stamp tax}} is a tax on property purchases and other transactions, typically at the state level in the US.

=== Otto Hassler Park ===

If this is a historical reference, it would be a misspelling of {{wp|Otto Haesler}} (1880-1962), a German architect best known for social housing. There would be no obvious connection to this novel or to Disch's life, so it may be that this is just a random fictional name; Hassler, Haesler, Haessler, etc. would be plausible German names to find in Iowa.

=== to help him take up his indenture ===

This is only briefly mentioned in connection with Daniel's father's dentistry career; it's unclear what the terms are of this contract, whether it is more like an apprenticeship or {{wp|indentured servitude}}, but a later reference to him paying off his "debt to the county" indicates that there's overlap between the government and the private sector in this system, consistent with how capitalism in Iowa has taken a neo-feudal direction.

=== fans whirling everywhere you went ===

The way that fans and other spinning objects can harm fairies is described by Barbara Steiner [[#The faster I let myself spin the more exciting|later in chapter 4]].

== Chapter 2 ==

=== He listened to Eugene Mueller's stories ===

Disch later mentioned a childhood friend who may have been the model for the character of Eugene, in terms of his taking credit for plots that were really from old stories: "Bruce Burton, when we were both paperboys in Fairmont ... there were only the two of us [sharing stories] (unless one counts the storylines he was lifting, unbeknownst to me, from ''{{wp|Analog Science Fiction and Fact|Astounding}}'')."<ref>{{cite article|author=Disch, Thomas M.|date=May 8, 2006|title=Story tag|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140130091852/tomsdisch.livejournal.com/5997.html|publication=Endzone}} {{InternetArchive|date=January 30, 2014}} This title of this brief blog post referred to the elaborations that some readers had added in comments to his brief story idea about a vengeful chipmunk. (See [[Thomas M. Disch#cite_note-note-endzone-1|note about ''Endzone'']])</ref>

=== bowdlerized editions of ''Frankenstein'' and ''The War of the Worlds'' ===

{{wp|Expurgation|Bowdlerization}} refers generally to creating censored versions of books or other art. Fantasy literature has always been a common target of censorship. ''Frankenstein'' is an unusual case in that the best-known version of the novel, the 1831 edition, contained changes by the author that some have described as self-censorship to appease Victorian sensibilities (although the differences between the 1818 and 1838 editions are more complex)—but any version of ''Frankenstein'' would be problematic for fundamentalist Christians due to its basic premise.

As for why ''The War of the Worlds'', commonly thought of as a thrilling alien invasion adventure, would offend religious conservatives: besides H.G. Wells being famously an atheist, the novel's narrator repeatedly brings up evolution.<ref>{{cite book|author=McLean, Steven|date=2009|title=The Early Fiction of H.G. Wells: Fantasies of Science|url=https://link.springer.com/book/10.1057/9780230236639|publisher=Palgrave Macmillan|isbn=978-0-230-53562-6}}</ref>

=== their own artless Grand Guignol ===

[[File:Grand-guignol-1928.jpg|thumb|right|300px|''The Man Who Killed Death'', 1928]] This could refer literally to the style of horror theater made famous by the {{wp|Grand Guignol|Grand-Guignol}}, or more generally to any kind of horror-inspired bad-taste make-believe that a 14-year-old would enjoy.

=== a book of speeches by Herbert Hoover ===

Hoover remains the only US President to be born in Iowa.

=== destroyed most of Tel Aviv ===

There are just enough references to non-US places in the novel to establish that some of them have been ruined by war or terrorism, but that this was not a global disaster; Cairo and Tehran, for instance, are still vacation destinations (chapter 10), as is Rome although other parts of Italy have been bombed (chapter 11), and Switzerland seems fine (chapter 5).

=== Old Black Joe ===

An 1860 {{wp|Old Black Joe|Stephen Foster song}}. Foster is commonly thought of in connection with blackface minstrelsy, which is very relevant to this book. "Old Black Joe" is a choice that makes sense here as something a teacher might have picked: while it romanticizes Southern slaveholding culture like other Foster songs, it has more plausible deniability due to not being written in dialect.

=== undergoders .... they practically ran Iowa ===

The reason that the far-right evangelicals who are so prominent in Daniel's world are called "undergoders" is never spelled out, but to someone of Disch's generation it would clearly refer to the controversy over the wording of the {{wp|Pledge of Allegiance}}. "One nation" was changed to "One nation, under God" in 1954, as part of a Cold War trend of emphasizing American piety in contrast to the Soviets. This was clearly at odds with separation of church and state, and even though no legal challenge was made on that basis until {{wp|Elk Grove Unified School District v. Newdow|2000}}, it was a common focus of arguments about the overlap between religion and political conservatism—and a convenient phrase for the religious right to rally around.

Woven throughout this chapter, there are references to state/federal conflicts, Supreme Court decisions, etc., to establish what kind of dystopia Daniel is living in: not a nationwide theocracy like ''The Handmaid's Tale'', but something more contiguous with US history so far. Most of the repression is happening at the state level, and wasn't established by a coup, but by the same processes as right-wing politics today: a coalition of interests including sincere religious zealots, corrupt politicians, and businessmen who have no real ideology but are comfortable in an authoritarian setting. The undergoders don't make up a majority in Iowa, and haven't really forced everyone to live like they do ("it was impossible to pretend to be an undergoder since it involved giving up almost anything you might enjoy")—but they're over-represented in the agricultural industry where the state's main economic power is.

The novel doesn't say exactly which states are dominated by undergoders, just that it's most of "the Farm Belt", which could refer to any subset of Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, and Ohio. In chapter 3 we see that at least some of Iowa's neighbor states, like Minnesota, have managed not to go this way.

=== Three days after Governor Brewster vetoed this law his only daughter was shot at ===

Besides being another reminder that the government hasn't uniformly fallen in line, this is an example of the other traditional instrument of local right-wing power: anonymous violence by individuals. You could call this stochastic terrorism, or just the kind of thing that the KKK and similar groups have always done; in many ways the undergoder regime in the Farm Belt states operates very much like the deep South in the 1950s and '60s, where authoritarianism existed on both formal and informal levels.

=== it was as though civilization had ground to a halt ===

To American readers in 1979, the fuel crisis depicted here would feel very timely: oil production dropped {{wp|1979 oil crisis|in that year}} for several reasons, and even though the impact of this on the US was not as dramatic as expected, it brought back bad memories of the much more severe {{wp|1973 oil crisis}} when Americans had experienced rationing for the first time since World War Two.

Much as in ''[[334]]'', the theme of American decline in ''On Wings of Song'', and the idea that any serious lowering of the familiar standard of middle-class comfort would be a harbinger of the collapse of civilization, are rooted in feelings that were very common in the 1970s across the political spectrum. The rise of Ronald Reagan—already clearly in progress when this book was written—was based on the premise that economic problems in America, and social unrest in general, were due to having strayed from old-fashioned values and free-market capitalism.

=== The real aristocracy of Iowa, the farmers ===

The idea that the "farmers" are all undergoders living a strict religious life is not quite right, but from the limited perspective of Daniel and his family, knowing only the farmers in and around Amesville, it makes sense that it would seem that way. Later in chapter 5 we'll see a different side of the aristocracy: agribusiness tycoons who live in secular luxury.

=== copies of ''The Star-Tribune'' ===

The ''Minneapolis Star-Tribune'' (renamed ''{{wp|Minnesota Star Tribune}}'' in 2024) is a real newspaper, although in 1979 this was a slightly ahead-of-its-time reference because the ''Star'' and the ''Tribune'' were technically still two separate papers owned by the same company.

Disch said of his childhood in {{wp|Fairmont, Minnesota}} (where he lived during grade school and middle school, before the family moved back to Minneapolis): "[F]rom age nine years onwards, I began to earn my living, delivering the ''Minneapolis Star'' and the ''Tribune'' to those more cosmopolitan folks not content with Fairmont's own ''[https://www.fairmontsentinel.com/ Sentinel]''."{{ref Disch autobio}}

== Chapter 3 ==

=== the Twin Cities were Sodom and Gomorrah ===

While there are many twin cities around the world, in the Midwest this exclusively means Minneapolis and St. Paul. Since the undergoders in this future have not managed to dominate Minnesota like Iowa, these are the nearest examples of urban decadence.

Calling {{wp|Sodom and Gomorrah}} "twin cities" is not original to Disch—they are often described that way, but the Bible really says nothing about them having any relationship to each other, just that they were in the same general part of the world (the Dead Sea plain), along with three other cities that may or may not (depending on which texts you read) have met the same fate.

=== they rode their bikes north as far as U.S. 18 ... Albert Lea to Minneapolis ===

[[File:Iowa-to-MN.jpg|thumb|right|350px|Getting from Amesville to Minneapolis]] Route 18 is about 25 miles from the Iowa-Minnesota border. For what it's worth, this may help to narrow down where the fictional Amesville might be. If you headed straight north from Fort Dodge, route 18 would be about 40 miles away—and Amesville is supposed to be 40 miles from Fort Dodge. So, unless the boys took either a very long bike ride or a very short one, they probably started somewhere northwest or northeast of Fort Dodge, like where the real villages of West Bend and Corwith are. This doesn't really matter except to emphasize that Daniel lives in a very rural area.

=== urging the enactment of the Twenty-Eighth Amendment ===

This was mentioned earlier in chapter 2 as "the national Anti-Flight Amendment."

=== ''Gold-Diggers of 1984'' ===

This is a reference to the movie musicals ''{{wp|Gold Diggers of 1933}}'', ''{{wp|Gold Diggers of 1935}}'', and ''{{wp|Gold Diggers of 1937}}'', which are all vehicles for elaborate Busby Berkeley numbers. They are loosely derived from the 1919 play ''{{wp|The Gold Diggers (1919 play)|The Gold Diggers}}'' in the sense that all of their plots involve women marrying rich men; despite the negative connotation of "gold-diggers", the women always succeed in doing so and it's a happy ending.

[[File:Gold-diggers-of-1933.jpg|thumb|left|350px|''Gold Diggers of 1933'']] The years in the titles are the years that those movies were made... so is this implying that ''On Wings of Song'' actually takes place in the '80s? Even though no year is ever given for this near-future story, everything else about the setting makes that unlikely; these political and social changes did not happen in just a few years. So the movie may have come from a wave of '80s nostalgia—not unlike the one we've been undergoing in real life for a while now, and, like the current one, of course it includes ridiculous anachronisms like a flight apparatus.

=== a comic tap dance in black face ===

This would be no surprise at any point in the first half of the 20th century, but casually mentioning its presence in a near-future movie is a jarring effect (as with the earlier reference to "Old Black Joe"), and a reminder that race is something that hasn't really come up at all in Daniel's homogenous upbringing. It won't be until Part Three that we learn the fairly disturbing details of how ideas about skin color have developed in other parts of America.

=== north to the icebergs of Baffin Island ===

The location of {{wp|Baffin Island}} makes it a logical ending point if you traveled due north from the American Midwest and kept going.

=== I DON'T CARE IF THE SUN DON'T SHINE. Or: GIVE US FIVE MINUTES MORE ===

It's deliberately unclear what these could mean as political protest slogans, but in this book it's probably not a coincidence that {{wp|I Don't Care If the Sun Don't Shine|"I Don't Care If the Sun Don't Shine"}} and {{wp|Five Minutes More|"Five Minutes More"}} are the names of mid-20th-century pop songs. The lyrics of [https://genius.com/Elvis-presley-i-dont-care-if-the-sun-dont-shine-lyrics the first one] don't seem to have any special relevance, but the line "you can sleep late" in the [https://genius.com/Frank-sinatra-five-minutes-more-lyrics second one] may take on a sadder meaning after the events of Chapter 10.

=== the opposing lawyer raised an objection ===

Another example of the kind of soft authoritarianism that distinguishes Amesville from other literary dystopias: all of the legal structures that we have today still exist in the future, they're just applied even less fairly than before.

== Chapter 4 ==

=== the compound at Spirit Lake ===

[[File:Spirit-lake-map.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Where the prison is, more or less]] Spirit Lake or {{wp|Big Spirit Lake}} is one of the "Iowa Great Lakes" that form a chain from Minnesota to northwestern Iowa; there's also a {{wp|Spirit Lake, Iowa|small town}} in that area with the same name, although the town is on the shore of the next lake down, Lake Okoboji.

The latter area was the site of the last violent attack by Sioux on US settlers in Iowa (in reprisal for various abuses by the settlers and the federal government), after which the state and federal governments became even more aggressive in driving out the Native population. These events took on legendary stature in the Midwest,<ref>{{cite book|author=Teakle, Thomas|title=The Spirit Lake Massacre|url=https://gutenberg.org/cache/epub/42074/pg42074-images.html|location=Cedar Rapids|publisher=Torch Press|date=1918}}</ref> especially since they included the capture and ransom of a white woman who then wrote a memoir.<ref>{{cite article|author=Prout, Katie|title=A History of Violence: Walking the Blood-Soaked Shores of Spirit Lake|url=https://lithub.com/crime-or-conflict-walking-the-blood-soaked-shores-of-spirit-lake/|publication=Literary Hub|date=March 1, 2017|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref>

All of this makes it a perversely appropriate location for an authoritarian regime with an ultra-American ideology to establish a prison. The fact that it's right at the edge of Iowa, close to a non-undergoder state, just emphasizes how sure the authorities are that escape is impossible.

=== this scene was rotated through ninety degrees and the flowing river became a wall ===

This echoes a line in ''[[Camp Concentration]]'', from a description of the mad scientist Dr. Skilliman's various interests:

<blockquote>He was trying to analyze the peculiar fascination of lakes, reservoirs, and suchlike large, standing bodies of water. He observed that it is only in these that nature presents us with the spectacle of the Euclidean plane stretching on without apparent limit. It represents that final submission to the law of gravity that is always at work on our cell tissues. From this he went on to observe that the great achievement of architecture is simply to take the notion of the Euclidean plane and stand it on its edge. A wall is such an impressive phenomenon because it is a body of water... stood on its side.</blockquote>

=== the P-W lozenge ===

The idea of prisoners having a remote-controlled bomb on or in their bodies was fairly popular in late 20th century science fiction. Often this was in the form of an explosive collar around the neck—which has an obvious narrative advantage in movies, since it's always visible and can have an ominous flashing light on it; examples include ''The Running Man'' (1987), ''Wedlock'' (1991), and ''Battlefield Earth'' (2000). Less cinematically but more ickily, the bomb might be implanted inside someone's neck or skull.

[[File:Fortress.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Christopher Lambert in ''Fortress'']] I'm not sure whether ''On Wings of Song'' is the earliest example, but I'm fairly sure that this and the movie ''[https://letterboxd.com/hob/film/fortress-1992/ Fortress]'' (1992) are the only ones where you have to swallow the bomb—and that this was the first fictional depiction of a prison where instead of the bomb being the last-ditch mechanism to prevent escape, it's the ''only'' mechanism. In keeping with 1970s/80s conservative economic ideology, the Spirit Lake prison runs on an extreme laissez-faire model with basically no staff.

=== Basques in Spain, Jews in Russia, the Irish in England ... the decimation of Palestinians ===

As before, mentions of any society outside of the US are rare and brief, but this passage is an efficient and chilling way to convey that the Iowa style of authoritarianism is just one of many; every industrialized society adapts tools of control for its own purposes. Disch mentions that the US—unlike Spain, Russia, England, and Israel—only applies this technology within prisons and ''not'' to large groups of "potentially dissident civilians," but that doesn't make the situation in Iowa any less horrible, just different, in keeping with the overall less-centralized nature of the repression there.

=== Reverend Van Dyke ... head of Marble Collegiate Church ===

{{wp|Marble Collegiate Church|Marble Collegiate}} is a historic church in Manhattan which was famously associated with {{wp|Norman Vincent Peale}}. Peale's combination of feel-good self-help philosophy and chumminess with right-wing politicians makes him a clear model for Van Dyke.

=== to ''pretend'' to be good, devout, and faithful .... Eventually, saying makes it so ===

This theme will recur throughout the book—sometimes spelled out, other times [[On Wings of Song/Part Three#"I Whistle a Happy Tune"|more indirectly]].

=== Logomachies ===

Arguments about words.

=== his last year's homeroom teacher, Mrs. Norberg ===

Mrs. Norberg and her opinions will be described in much more detail in Chapter 6.

=== the breeding of a specially mutated form of termite ===

The idea that termites could become a major food source in the future has been around for a long time, mainly because people were already eating them.<ref>{{cite article|author=Reis de Figueirêdo, Vasconcellos, Policarpo, & Nóbrega Alves|title=Edible and medicinal termites: a global overview|url=https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4427943/|publication=Journal of Ethnobiology and Ethnomedicine|date=April 30, 2015|pub-date=Vol. 11, No. 29}}</ref> Academic discussion of the subject has increased in the 21st century due to increasing awareness of how agriculture suffers from climate change and contributes to it; unsurprisingly, as with everything related to climate change, this has also become the subject of right-wing conspiracy theories.<ref>{{cite article|author=Jingnan, Huo|title=From 4chan to international politics, a bug-eating conspiracy theory goes mainstream|url=https://www.npr.org/2023/03/31/1166649732/conspiracy-theory-eating-bugs-4chan|publication=All Things Considered|date=March 31, 2023|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref>

It's a matter of opinion whether Disch's portrayal of termite processing on an industrial scale is the grossest version of a food factory in science fiction (that honor might go to the giant underground chicken-heart blob in ''{{wp|The Space Merchants}}''), but it's one of the more plausible ones.

=== Beware of dogs, beware of evil workers ===

From [https://biblehub.com/kjv/philippians/3.htm Philippians 3:2-4, King James Version].

This is an example of Disch doing something he also [[334/334/Part_III#18._The_New_American_Catholic_Bible|did]] [[334/334/Part_VI#38._Father_Charmain|twice]] in ''334'': having a character land on a supposedly random Bible verse, when it's really the author being mischievous. Here Daniel has picked one of the most confusing Biblical passages that a casual reader could've possibly found—both because of the peculiar translation (the King James version uses the word "concision" in a way that I'm not sure it was ever used anywhere else in English literature), and because the meaning is so obscure without the context (the apostle Paul is ranting against other Christian factions of his time). Some [https://biblehub.com/nasb_/philippians/3.htm other translations] are a bit clearer, but only a bit.

The specific content of the passage may not be very important, but here's my best attempt to summarize it. After some general insults about "dogs" and "evil workers", Paul specifically complains about Christians who believe that circumcision and other traditional Jewish practices should remain important in their faith. He argues instead that "circumcision" should now be thought of as a spiritual condition, a matter of having the right faith—as the people in his own faction do. But as sort of a hedge and/or brag, he adds that if traditional circumcision is so important, i.e. if you really insist on having "confidence in the flesh", then he has that too since he was physically circumcised—and that maybe it should even count extra for him, since he used to be a very traditional Pharisee.

=== the windows were all sealed tight ===

Here we get one more bit of exposition about the rules of flying: "fairies" can travel effortlessly by willpower, but they can't go through solid objects.

=== The faster I let myself spin the more exciting ===

[[File:OWOS-cover-fsf.jpg|thumb|left|300px|Cover art by Ed Emshwiller]] And finally, the most important rule for fairies: if you go too close to any spinning thing, you'll be entranced and stuck there forever. The nature of a "fairy-trap" was left intentionally vague before, but in hindsight, every electric fan that we've heard about being used for this purpose indicates someone's willingness to cause someone else to die in a coma.

The idea that a particular physical structure could entice a disembodied spirit also appears in Disch's ''[[The Businessman#Chapter 43|The Businessman]]'', where Giselle's ghost is mystically intoxicated by the pattern on a potholder.

Ed Emshwiller's cover painting for ''The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction'' February 1979 issue—where the first part of ''On Wings of Song'' appeared—shows a group of ethereal figures drifting toward an object that is just abstract enough that if you don't yet know the story, you could easily assume it's some sort of alien portal, but if you do know, it's clearly a tabletop electric fan.

=== the one about purity of heart being to will one thing ===

Van Dyke got this from [https://www.religion-online.org/book/purity-of-heart-is-to-will-one-thing/ Kierkegaard].

=== to live at the end of such a civilization ===

Here I think ''On Wings of Song'' is echoing not just a general 1970s fear of American decline, but the specific angle that Disch explored in ''[[334]]'': the psychological ''appeal'' of imagining that you're in a crumbling empire, at least if you're a relatively privileged person.

=== Cairo and Bombay for the National Council of Churches' Triage Committee ===

Triage is the process of deciding who to help first in an emergency, and who to immediately give up on.

=== run into an iceberg and sink, like ... the lost city of Brasilia ===

[[File:Vila-amaury-1.jpeg|thumb|right|300px|Vila Amaury, 1959]][[File:Vila-amaury-2.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Vila Amaury, 2010]] This condensed metaphor might refer to Vila Amaury, the lost city ''within'' the city of Brasilia. It makes sense for Van Dyke to see Brasilia as an example of "the Civilization of the Business Man": it was a heavily planned city built by technocrats in relatively recent history, and in the process of its creation, Vila Amaury was created as a company shanty-town to house 15,000 migrant workers—who were then displaced because the plan for Brasilia included an artificial lake, created by the Lago Paranoá dam, entirely submerging the site of the town.<ref>{{cite article|author=Basques, Victoria|title=Vila Amaury, uma cidade submersa|url=https://medium.com/esquinaonline/vila-amaury-uma-cidade-submersa-9b3e48dc8d12|publication=Esquina On-line|date=November 14, 2018|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref>

=== you are a punk singer ===

Disch probably was not thinking of punk rock, which was still fairly new at the time, but he's using the word in the same sense that gave punk rock its name: unskilled, no good, lowlife. Not coincidentally, it's also an old derogatory word for a young man who is used for sex, especially in prison.

=== I am the captain of the Pinafore ===

From ''{{wp|H.M.S. Pinafore}}'' by Gilbert & Sullivan (1878). This is a call-and-response song, and Daniel is singing both parts, a little inaccurately; the actual lines are:

: CAPTAIN: I am the Captain of the Pinafore;
: CREW: And a right good captain, too!
: CAPTAIN: You're very, very good,
: And be it understood,
: I command a right good crew.

([https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OqWNmTXhI34 Recording of a performance by the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company, 1959])

== Footnotes ==
<references/>

{{On Wings of Song nav}}

On Wings of Song/Part One

2025-02-02T23:58:14Z

Eb: /* She would sit watching him ... people shouldn't let fairies into their houses */

{{#addbodyclass: tiled-toc}}

{{SummaryCollapsed |
As a teenager in Amesville, where flying is outlawed and music is barely allowed, Daniel knows there must be more to life than this. A brief dalliance with forbidden activities—distributing a banned newspaper and visiting Minneapolis, with the boy he has an unacknowledged love for—lands him in prison. The eight-month ordeal drastically disillusions him, but also sparks his obsession with singing.
}}

== Chapter 1 ==

=== Amesville, Iowa ===

[[File:Iowa.jpg|thumb|left|400px|The Hawkeye State]] No such town exists, although there is a city of {{wp|Ames, Iowa|Ames}} in Iowa—not far from Des Moines, where Disch was born and lived until age 13. Amesville sounds smaller, and not so close to a big city; in chapter 2 we learn that it's 40 miles from {{wp|Fort Dodge, Iowa|Fort Dodge}}, and several references to Fort Dodge make it sound like that's the next largest town in the area. For more about where Amesville might be, see [[#Chapter 3|Chapter 3]].

=== She would sit watching him ... people shouldn't let fairies into their houses ===

Fairies, as we will learn quickly from context, are the invisible presences of people who are "flying." All other references to fairies in Daniel's childhood are steeped in paranoia about being observed—but his daydreams here are a reminder that being watched over by an unseen dead family member or guardian angel is a standard religious idea meant to be comforting to children. The crucial difference is that Daniel's mother is a living person.

Not coincidentally, "fairy" also has a long history as an anti-gay slur in the US and England—semi-archaic today, but still very recognizable in the 1970s and 80s. Of the many equivalent slurs in other languages, several refer to butterflies, birds, etc., consistent with the idea that being flighty and/or colorful is effeminate.

There's no particular passage in the book that summarizes exactly what's involved in flying, so this note is as good a place as any. Disch gives no details about the "flight apparatus" technology except for there being a wire that touches the head. It's important to the premise that both the technology and the mental state achieved by singing are necessary ingredients; there's never a hint of anyone being able to do it in another way, as people have claimed to do in the past via meditation or esoteric studies. The general idea of {{wp|astral projection}} has a long history, but what's happening here seems closest to a more specific idea that only became popular in the 19th and 20th centuries, and shows up a lot in 20th century science fiction: {{wp|remote viewing}}, that is, the ability to roam around as a disembodied point of view and observe things in the actual world. In ''On Wings of Song'', fairies don't travel to a separate reality, and they don't perceive any supernatural beings (except other fairies like themselves), but otherwise there are only a few limits to where they can go and what they can see. So there are at least three reasons for religious conservatives to be against flying: it's a transcendent experience that doesn't correspond to their own religion, it's against their desire to control other people's access to information in general, and it's a threat to their own personal privacy.

=== a collect call from New York ===

Throughout the 20th century there was a large price difference between local and long-distance calling, so {{wp|Collect call|calling collect}} would be a typical way for someone to call home from another state without affecting their phone bill. This is now rare since many phone providers no longer have a separate long-distance rate.

=== the Iowa Stamp Tax ===

A {{wp|Stamp duty|stamp tax}} is a tax on property purchases and other transactions, typically at the state level in the US.

=== Otto Hassler Park ===

If this is a historical reference, it would be a misspelling of {{wp|Otto Haesler}} (1880-1962), a German architect best known for social housing. There would be no obvious connection to this novel or to Disch's life, so it may be that this is just a random fictional name; Hassler, Haesler, Haessler, etc. would be plausible German names to find in Iowa.

=== to help him take up his indenture ===

This is only briefly mentioned in connection with Daniel's father's dentistry career; it's unclear what the terms are of this contract, whether it is more like an apprenticeship or {{wp|indentured servitude}}, but a later reference to him paying off his "debt to the county" indicates that there's overlap between the government and the private sector in this system, consistent with how capitalism in Iowa has taken a neo-feudal direction.

=== fans whirling everywhere you went ===

The way that fans and other spinning objects can harm "fairies" is described by Barbara Steiner [[#The faster I let myself spin the more exciting|later in chapter 4]].

== Chapter 2 ==

=== He listened to Eugene Mueller's stories ===

Disch later mentioned a childhood friend who may have been the model for the character of Eugene, in terms of his taking credit for plots that were really from old stories: "Bruce Burton, when we were both paperboys in Fairmont ... there were only the two of us [sharing stories] (unless one counts the storylines he was lifting, unbeknownst to me, from ''{{wp|Analog Science Fiction and Fact|Astounding}}'')."<ref>{{cite article|author=Disch, Thomas M.|date=May 8, 2006|title=Story tag|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140130091852/tomsdisch.livejournal.com/5997.html|publication=Endzone}} {{InternetArchive|date=January 30, 2014}} This title of this brief blog post referred to the elaborations that some readers had added in comments to his brief story idea about a vengeful chipmunk. (See [[Thomas M. Disch#cite_note-note-endzone-1|note about ''Endzone'']])</ref>

=== bowdlerized editions of ''Frankenstein'' and ''The War of the Worlds'' ===

{{wp|Expurgation|Bowdlerization}} refers generally to creating censored versions of books or other art. Fantasy literature has always been a common target of censorship. ''Frankenstein'' is an unusual case in that the best-known version of the novel, the 1831 edition, contained changes by the author that some have described as self-censorship to appease Victorian sensibilities (although the differences between the 1818 and 1838 editions are more complex)—but any version of ''Frankenstein'' would be problematic for fundamentalist Christians due to its basic premise.

As for why ''The War of the Worlds'', commonly thought of as a thrilling alien invasion adventure, would offend religious conservatives: besides H.G. Wells being famously an atheist, the novel's narrator repeatedly brings up evolution.<ref>{{cite book|author=McLean, Steven|date=2009|title=The Early Fiction of H.G. Wells: Fantasies of Science|url=https://link.springer.com/book/10.1057/9780230236639|publisher=Palgrave Macmillan|isbn=978-0-230-53562-6}}</ref>

=== their own artless Grand Guignol ===

[[File:Grand-guignol-1928.jpg|thumb|right|300px|''The Man Who Killed Death'', 1928]] This could refer literally to the style of horror theater made famous by the {{wp|Grand Guignol|Grand-Guignol}}, or more generally to any kind of horror-inspired bad-taste make-believe that a 14-year-old would enjoy.

=== a book of speeches by Herbert Hoover ===

Hoover remains the only US President to be born in Iowa.

=== destroyed most of Tel Aviv ===

There are just enough references to non-US places in the novel to establish that some of them have been ruined by war or terrorism, but that this was not a global disaster; Cairo and Tehran, for instance, are still vacation destinations (chapter 10), as is Rome although other parts of Italy have been bombed (chapter 11), and Switzerland seems fine (chapter 5).

=== Old Black Joe ===

An 1860 {{wp|Old Black Joe|Stephen Foster song}}. Foster is commonly thought of in connection with blackface minstrelsy, which is very relevant to this book. "Old Black Joe" is a choice that makes sense here as something a teacher might have picked: while it romanticizes Southern slaveholding culture like other Foster songs, it has more plausible deniability due to not being written in dialect.

=== undergoders .... they practically ran Iowa ===

The reason that the far-right evangelicals who are so prominent in Daniel's world are called "undergoders" is never spelled out, but to someone of Disch's generation it would clearly refer to the controversy over the wording of the {{wp|Pledge of Allegiance}}. "One nation" was changed to "One nation, under God" in 1954, as part of a Cold War trend of emphasizing American piety in contrast to the Soviets. This was clearly at odds with separation of church and state, and even though no legal challenge was made on that basis until {{wp|Elk Grove Unified School District v. Newdow|2000}}, it was a common focus of arguments about the overlap between religion and political conservatism—and a convenient phrase for the religious right to rally around.

Woven throughout this chapter, there are references to state/federal conflicts, Supreme Court decisions, etc., to establish what kind of dystopia Daniel is living in: not a nationwide theocracy like ''The Handmaid's Tale'', but something more contiguous with US history so far. Most of the repression is happening at the state level, and wasn't established by a coup, but by the same processes as right-wing politics today: a coalition of interests including sincere religious zealots, corrupt politicians, and businessmen who have no real ideology but are comfortable in an authoritarian setting. The undergoders don't make up a majority in Iowa, and haven't really forced everyone to live like they do ("it was impossible to pretend to be an undergoder since it involved giving up almost anything you might enjoy")—but they're over-represented in the agricultural industry where the state's main economic power is.

The novel doesn't say exactly which states are dominated by undergoders, just that it's most of "the Farm Belt", which could refer to any subset of Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, and Ohio. In chapter 3 we see that at least some of Iowa's neighbor states, like Minnesota, have managed not to go this way.

=== Three days after Governor Brewster vetoed this law his only daughter was shot at ===

Besides being another reminder that the government hasn't uniformly fallen in line, this is an example of the other traditional instrument of local right-wing power: anonymous violence by individuals. You could call this stochastic terrorism, or just the kind of thing that the KKK and similar groups have always done; in many ways the undergoder regime in the Farm Belt states operates very much like the deep South in the 1950s and '60s, where authoritarianism existed on both formal and informal levels.

=== it was as though civilization had ground to a halt ===

To American readers in 1979, the fuel crisis depicted here would feel very timely: oil production dropped {{wp|1979 oil crisis|in that year}} for several reasons, and even though the impact of this on the US was not as dramatic as expected, it brought back bad memories of the much more severe {{wp|1973 oil crisis}} when Americans had experienced rationing for the first time since World War Two.

Much as in ''[[334]]'', the theme of American decline in ''On Wings of Song'', and the idea that any serious lowering of the familiar standard of middle-class comfort would be a harbinger of the collapse of civilization, are rooted in feelings that were very common in the 1970s across the political spectrum. The rise of Ronald Reagan—already clearly in progress when this book was written—was based on the premise that economic problems in America, and social unrest in general, were due to having strayed from old-fashioned values and free-market capitalism.

=== The real aristocracy of Iowa, the farmers ===

The idea that the "farmers" are all undergoders living a strict religious life is not quite right, but from the limited perspective of Daniel and his family, knowing only the farmers in and around Amesville, it makes sense that it would seem that way. Later in chapter 5 we'll see a different side of the aristocracy: agribusiness tycoons who live in secular luxury.

=== copies of ''The Star-Tribune'' ===

The ''Minneapolis Star-Tribune'' (renamed ''{{wp|Minnesota Star Tribune}}'' in 2024) is a real newspaper, although in 1979 this was a slightly ahead-of-its-time reference because the ''Star'' and the ''Tribune'' were technically still two separate papers owned by the same company.

Disch said of his childhood in {{wp|Fairmont, Minnesota}} (where he lived during grade school and middle school, before the family moved back to Minneapolis): "[F]rom age nine years onwards, I began to earn my living, delivering the ''Minneapolis Star'' and the ''Tribune'' to those more cosmopolitan folks not content with Fairmont's own ''[https://www.fairmontsentinel.com/ Sentinel]''."{{ref Disch autobio}}

== Chapter 3 ==

=== the Twin Cities were Sodom and Gomorrah ===

While there are many twin cities around the world, in the Midwest this exclusively means Minneapolis and St. Paul. Since the undergoders in this future have not managed to dominate Minnesota like Iowa, these are the nearest examples of urban decadence.

Calling {{wp|Sodom and Gomorrah}} "twin cities" is not original to Disch—they are often described that way, but the Bible really says nothing about them having any relationship to each other, just that they were in the same general part of the world (the Dead Sea plain), along with three other cities that may or may not (depending on which texts you read) have met the same fate.

=== they rode their bikes north as far as U.S. 18 ... Albert Lea to Minneapolis ===

[[File:Iowa-to-MN.jpg|thumb|right|350px|Getting from Amesville to Minneapolis]] Route 18 is about 25 miles from the Iowa-Minnesota border. For what it's worth, this may help to narrow down where the fictional Amesville might be. If you headed straight north from Fort Dodge, route 18 would be about 40 miles away—and Amesville is supposed to be 40 miles from Fort Dodge. So, unless the boys took either a very long bike ride or a very short one, they probably started somewhere northwest or northeast of Fort Dodge, like where the real villages of West Bend and Corwith are. This doesn't really matter except to emphasize that Daniel lives in a very rural area.

=== urging the enactment of the Twenty-Eighth Amendment ===

This was mentioned earlier in chapter 2 as "the national Anti-Flight Amendment."

=== ''Gold-Diggers of 1984'' ===

This is a reference to the movie musicals ''{{wp|Gold Diggers of 1933}}'', ''{{wp|Gold Diggers of 1935}}'', and ''{{wp|Gold Diggers of 1937}}'', which are all vehicles for elaborate Busby Berkeley numbers. They are loosely derived from the 1919 play ''{{wp|The Gold Diggers (1919 play)|The Gold Diggers}}'' in the sense that all of their plots involve women marrying rich men; despite the negative connotation of "gold-diggers", the women always succeed in doing so and it's a happy ending.

[[File:Gold-diggers-of-1933.jpg|thumb|left|350px|''Gold Diggers of 1933'']] The years in the titles are the years that those movies were made... so is this implying that ''On Wings of Song'' actually takes place in the '80s? Even though no year is ever given for this near-future story, everything else about the setting makes that unlikely; these political and social changes did not happen in just a few years. So the movie may have come from a wave of '80s nostalgia—not unlike the one we've been undergoing in real life for a while now, and, like the current one, of course it includes ridiculous anachronisms like a flight apparatus.

=== a comic tap dance in black face ===

This would be no surprise at any point in the first half of the 20th century, but casually mentioning its presence in a near-future movie is a jarring effect (as with the earlier reference to "Old Black Joe"), and a reminder that race is something that hasn't really come up at all in Daniel's homogenous upbringing. It won't be until Part Three that we learn the fairly disturbing details of how ideas about skin color have developed in other parts of America.

=== north to the icebergs of Baffin Island ===

The location of {{wp|Baffin Island}} makes it a logical ending point if you traveled due north from the American Midwest and kept going.

=== I DON'T CARE IF THE SUN DON'T SHINE. Or: GIVE US FIVE MINUTES MORE ===

It's deliberately unclear what these could mean as political protest slogans, but in this book it's probably not a coincidence that {{wp|I Don't Care If the Sun Don't Shine|"I Don't Care If the Sun Don't Shine"}} and {{wp|Five Minutes More|"Five Minutes More"}} are the names of mid-20th-century pop songs. The lyrics of [https://genius.com/Elvis-presley-i-dont-care-if-the-sun-dont-shine-lyrics the first one] don't seem to have any special relevance, but the line "you can sleep late" in the [https://genius.com/Frank-sinatra-five-minutes-more-lyrics second one] may take on a sadder meaning after the events of Chapter 10.

=== the opposing lawyer raised an objection ===

Another example of the kind of soft authoritarianism that distinguishes Amesville from other literary dystopias: all of the legal structures that we have today still exist in the future, they're just applied even less fairly than before.

== Chapter 4 ==

=== the compound at Spirit Lake ===

[[File:Spirit-lake-map.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Where the prison is, more or less]] Spirit Lake or {{wp|Big Spirit Lake}} is one of the "Iowa Great Lakes" that form a chain from Minnesota to northwestern Iowa; there's also a {{wp|Spirit Lake, Iowa|small town}} in that area with the same name, although the town is on the shore of the next lake down, Lake Okoboji.

The latter area was the site of the last violent attack by Sioux on US settlers in Iowa (in reprisal for various abuses by the settlers and the federal government), after which the state and federal governments became even more aggressive in driving out the Native population. These events took on legendary stature in the Midwest,<ref>{{cite book|author=Teakle, Thomas|title=The Spirit Lake Massacre|url=https://gutenberg.org/cache/epub/42074/pg42074-images.html|location=Cedar Rapids|publisher=Torch Press|date=1918}}</ref> especially since they included the capture and ransom of a white woman who then wrote a memoir.<ref>{{cite article|author=Prout, Katie|title=A History of Violence: Walking the Blood-Soaked Shores of Spirit Lake|url=https://lithub.com/crime-or-conflict-walking-the-blood-soaked-shores-of-spirit-lake/|publication=Literary Hub|date=March 1, 2017|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref>

All of this makes it a perversely appropriate location for an authoritarian regime with an ultra-American ideology to establish a prison. The fact that it's right at the edge of Iowa, close to a non-undergoder state, just emphasizes how sure the authorities are that escape is impossible.

=== this scene was rotated through ninety degrees and the flowing river became a wall ===

This echoes a line in ''[[Camp Concentration]]'', from a description of the mad scientist Dr. Skilliman's various interests:

<blockquote>He was trying to analyze the peculiar fascination of lakes, reservoirs, and suchlike large, standing bodies of water. He observed that it is only in these that nature presents us with the spectacle of the Euclidean plane stretching on without apparent limit. It represents that final submission to the law of gravity that is always at work on our cell tissues. From this he went on to observe that the great achievement of architecture is simply to take the notion of the Euclidean plane and stand it on its edge. A wall is such an impressive phenomenon because it is a body of water... stood on its side.</blockquote>

=== the P-W lozenge ===

The idea of prisoners having a remote-controlled bomb on or in their bodies was fairly popular in late 20th century science fiction. Often this was in the form of an explosive collar around the neck—which has an obvious narrative advantage in movies, since it's always visible and can have an ominous flashing light on it; examples include ''The Running Man'' (1987), ''Wedlock'' (1991), and ''Battlefield Earth'' (2000). Less cinematically but more ickily, the bomb might be implanted inside someone's neck or skull.

[[File:Fortress.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Christopher Lambert in ''Fortress'']] I'm not sure whether ''On Wings of Song'' is the earliest example, but I'm fairly sure that this and the movie ''[https://letterboxd.com/hob/film/fortress-1992/ Fortress]'' (1992) are the only ones where you have to swallow the bomb—and that this was the first fictional depiction of a prison where instead of the bomb being the last-ditch mechanism to prevent escape, it's the ''only'' mechanism. In keeping with 1970s/80s conservative economic ideology, the Spirit Lake prison runs on an extreme laissez-faire model with basically no staff.

=== Basques in Spain, Jews in Russia, the Irish in England ... the decimation of Palestinians ===

As before, mentions of any society outside of the US are rare and brief, but this passage is an efficient and chilling way to convey that the Iowa style of authoritarianism is just one of many; every industrialized society adapts tools of control for its own purposes. Disch mentions that the US—unlike Spain, Russia, England, and Israel—only applies this technology within prisons and ''not'' to large groups of "potentially dissident civilians," but that doesn't make the situation in Iowa any less horrible, just different, in keeping with the overall less-centralized nature of the repression there.

=== Reverend Van Dyke ... head of Marble Collegiate Church ===

{{wp|Marble Collegiate Church|Marble Collegiate}} is a historic church in Manhattan which was famously associated with {{wp|Norman Vincent Peale}}. Peale's combination of feel-good self-help philosophy and chumminess with right-wing politicians makes him a clear model for Van Dyke.

=== to ''pretend'' to be good, devout, and faithful .... Eventually, saying makes it so ===

This theme will recur throughout the book—sometimes spelled out, other times [[On Wings of Song/Part Three#"I Whistle a Happy Tune"|more indirectly]].

=== Logomachies ===

Arguments about words.

=== his last year's homeroom teacher, Mrs. Norberg ===

Mrs. Norberg and her opinions will be described in much more detail in Chapter 6.

=== the breeding of a specially mutated form of termite ===

The idea that termites could become a major food source in the future has been around for a long time, mainly because people were already eating them.<ref>{{cite article|author=Reis de Figueirêdo, Vasconcellos, Policarpo, & Nóbrega Alves|title=Edible and medicinal termites: a global overview|url=https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4427943/|publication=Journal of Ethnobiology and Ethnomedicine|date=April 30, 2015|pub-date=Vol. 11, No. 29}}</ref> Academic discussion of the subject has increased in the 21st century due to increasing awareness of how agriculture suffers from climate change and contributes to it; unsurprisingly, as with everything related to climate change, this has also become the subject of right-wing conspiracy theories.<ref>{{cite article|author=Jingnan, Huo|title=From 4chan to international politics, a bug-eating conspiracy theory goes mainstream|url=https://www.npr.org/2023/03/31/1166649732/conspiracy-theory-eating-bugs-4chan|publication=All Things Considered|date=March 31, 2023|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref>

It's a matter of opinion whether Disch's portrayal of termite processing on an industrial scale is the grossest version of a food factory in science fiction (that honor might go to the giant underground chicken-heart blob in ''{{wp|The Space Merchants}}''), but it's one of the more plausible ones.

=== Beware of dogs, beware of evil workers ===

From [https://biblehub.com/kjv/philippians/3.htm Philippians 3:2-4, King James Version].

This is an example of Disch doing something he also [[334/334/Part_III#18._The_New_American_Catholic_Bible|did]] [[334/334/Part_VI#38._Father_Charmain|twice]] in ''334'': having a character land on a supposedly random Bible verse, when it's really the author being mischievous. Here Daniel has picked one of the most confusing Biblical passages that a casual reader could've possibly found—both because of the peculiar translation (the King James version uses the word "concision" in a way that I'm not sure it was ever used anywhere else in English literature), and because the meaning is so obscure without the context (the apostle Paul is ranting against other Christian factions of his time). Some [https://biblehub.com/nasb_/philippians/3.htm other translations] are a bit clearer, but only a bit.

The specific content of the passage may not be very important, but here's my best attempt to summarize it. After some general insults about "dogs" and "evil workers", Paul specifically complains about Christians who believe that circumcision and other traditional Jewish practices should remain important in their faith. He argues instead that "circumcision" should now be thought of as a spiritual condition, a matter of having the right faith—as the people in his own faction do. But as sort of a hedge and/or brag, he adds that if traditional circumcision is so important, i.e. if you really insist on having "confidence in the flesh", then he has that too since he was physically circumcised—and that maybe it should even count extra for him, since he used to be a very traditional Pharisee.

=== the windows were all sealed tight ===

Here we get one more bit of exposition about the rules of flying: "fairies" can travel effortlessly by willpower, but they can't go through solid objects.

=== The faster I let myself spin the more exciting ===

[[File:OWOS-cover-fsf.jpg|thumb|left|300px|Cover art by Ed Emshwiller]] And finally, the most important rule for fairies: if you go too close to any spinning thing, you'll be entranced and stuck there forever. The nature of a "fairy-trap" was left intentionally vague before, but in hindsight, every electric fan that we've heard about being used for this purpose indicates someone's willingness to cause someone else to die in a coma.

The idea that a particular physical structure could entice a disembodied spirit also appears in Disch's ''[[The Businessman#Chapter 43|The Businessman]]'', where Giselle's ghost is mystically intoxicated by the pattern on a potholder.

Ed Emshwiller's cover painting for ''The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction'' February 1979 issue—where the first part of ''On Wings of Song'' appeared—shows a group of ethereal figures drifting toward an object that is just abstract enough that if you don't yet know the story, you could easily assume it's some sort of alien portal, but if you do know, it's clearly a tabletop electric fan.

=== the one about purity of heart being to will one thing ===

Van Dyke got this from [https://www.religion-online.org/book/purity-of-heart-is-to-will-one-thing/ Kierkegaard].

=== to live at the end of such a civilization ===

Here I think ''On Wings of Song'' is echoing not just a general 1970s fear of American decline, but the specific angle that Disch explored in ''[[334]]'': the psychological ''appeal'' of imagining that you're in a crumbling empire, at least if you're a relatively privileged person.

=== Cairo and Bombay for the National Council of Churches' Triage Committee ===

Triage is the process of deciding who to help first in an emergency, and who to immediately give up on.

=== run into an iceberg and sink, like ... the lost city of Brasilia ===

[[File:Vila-amaury-1.jpeg|thumb|right|300px|Vila Amaury, 1959]][[File:Vila-amaury-2.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Vila Amaury, 2010]] This condensed metaphor might refer to Vila Amaury, the lost city ''within'' the city of Brasilia. It makes sense for Van Dyke to see Brasilia as an example of "the Civilization of the Business Man": it was a heavily planned city built by technocrats in relatively recent history, and in the process of its creation, Vila Amaury was created as a company shanty-town to house 15,000 migrant workers—who were then displaced because the plan for Brasilia included an artificial lake, created by the Lago Paranoá dam, entirely submerging the site of the town.<ref>{{cite article|author=Basques, Victoria|title=Vila Amaury, uma cidade submersa|url=https://medium.com/esquinaonline/vila-amaury-uma-cidade-submersa-9b3e48dc8d12|publication=Esquina On-line|date=November 14, 2018|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref>

=== you are a punk singer ===

Disch probably was not thinking of punk rock, which was still fairly new at the time, but he's using the word in the same sense that gave punk rock its name: unskilled, no good, lowlife. Not coincidentally, it's also an old derogatory word for a young man who is used for sex, especially in prison.

=== I am the captain of the Pinafore ===

From ''{{wp|H.M.S. Pinafore}}'' by Gilbert & Sullivan (1878). This is a call-and-response song, and Daniel is singing both parts, a little inaccurately; the actual lines are:

: CAPTAIN: I am the Captain of the Pinafore;
: CREW: And a right good captain, too!
: CAPTAIN: You're very, very good,
: And be it understood,
: I command a right good crew.

([https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OqWNmTXhI34 Recording of a performance by the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company, 1959])

== Footnotes ==
<references/>

{{On Wings of Song nav}}

On Wings of Song/Part One

2025-02-02T23:57:05Z

Eb: /* She would sit watching him ... people shouldn't let fairies into their houses */

{{#addbodyclass: tiled-toc}}

{{SummaryCollapsed |
As a teenager in Amesville, where flying is outlawed and music is barely allowed, Daniel knows there must be more to life than this. A brief dalliance with forbidden activities—distributing a banned newspaper and visiting Minneapolis, with the boy he has an unacknowledged love for—lands him in prison. The eight-month ordeal drastically disillusions him, but also sparks his obsession with singing.
}}

== Chapter 1 ==

=== Amesville, Iowa ===

[[File:Iowa.jpg|thumb|left|400px|The Hawkeye State]] No such town exists, although there is a city of {{wp|Ames, Iowa|Ames}} in Iowa—not far from Des Moines, where Disch was born and lived until age 13. Amesville sounds smaller, and not so close to a big city; in chapter 2 we learn that it's 40 miles from {{wp|Fort Dodge, Iowa|Fort Dodge}}, and several references to Fort Dodge make it sound like that's the next largest town in the area. For more about where Amesville might be, see [[#Chapter 3|Chapter 3]].

=== She would sit watching him ... people shouldn't let fairies into their houses ===

Fairies, as we will learn quickly from context, are the invisible presences of people who are "flying." All other references to fairies in Daniel's childhood are steeped in paranoia about being observed—but his daydreams here are a reminder that being watched over by an unseen dead family member or guardian angel is a standard religious idea meant to be comforting to children. The crucial difference is that Daniel's mother is a living person.

Not coincidentally, "fairy" also has a long history as an anti-gay slur in the US and England—semi-archaic today, but still very recognizable in the 1970s and 80s. Of the many equivalent slurs in other languages, several refer to butterflies, birds, etc., consistent with the idea that being flighty and/or colorful is effeminate.

There's no particular passage in the book that summarizes exactly what's involved in flying, so this note is as good a place as any. Disch gives no details about the "flight apparatus" technology except for there being a wire that touches the head. It's important to the premise that both the technology and the mental state achieved by singing are necessary ingredients; there's never a hint of anyone being able to do it in another way, as people have claimed to do in the past via meditation or esoteric studies. The general idea of {{wp|astral projection}} has a long history, but what's happening here seems closest to a more specific idea that only became popular in the 19th and 20th centuries, and shows up a lot in 20th century science fiction: {{wp|remote viewing}}, that is, the ability to roam around as a disembodied point of view and invisibly observe things in the actual world. In ''On Wings of Song'', fairies don't travel to a separate reality, and they don't perceive any supernatural beings (except other fairies like themselves), but otherwise there are only a few limits to where they can go and what they can see. So there are at least three reasons for religious conservatives to be against flying: it's a transcendent experience that doesn't correspond to their own religion, it's against their desire to control other people's access to information in general, and it's a threat to their own personal privacy.

=== a collect call from New York ===

Throughout the 20th century there was a large price difference between local and long-distance calling, so {{wp|Collect call|calling collect}} would be a typical way for someone to call home from another state without affecting their phone bill. This is now rare since many phone providers no longer have a separate long-distance rate.

=== the Iowa Stamp Tax ===

A {{wp|Stamp duty|stamp tax}} is a tax on property purchases and other transactions, typically at the state level in the US.

=== Otto Hassler Park ===

If this is a historical reference, it would be a misspelling of {{wp|Otto Haesler}} (1880-1962), a German architect best known for social housing. There would be no obvious connection to this novel or to Disch's life, so it may be that this is just a random fictional name; Hassler, Haesler, Haessler, etc. would be plausible German names to find in Iowa.

=== to help him take up his indenture ===

This is only briefly mentioned in connection with Daniel's father's dentistry career; it's unclear what the terms are of this contract, whether it is more like an apprenticeship or {{wp|indentured servitude}}, but a later reference to him paying off his "debt to the county" indicates that there's overlap between the government and the private sector in this system, consistent with how capitalism in Iowa has taken a neo-feudal direction.

=== fans whirling everywhere you went ===

The way that fans and other spinning objects can harm "fairies" is described by Barbara Steiner [[#The faster I let myself spin the more exciting|later in chapter 4]].

== Chapter 2 ==

=== He listened to Eugene Mueller's stories ===

Disch later mentioned a childhood friend who may have been the model for the character of Eugene, in terms of his taking credit for plots that were really from old stories: "Bruce Burton, when we were both paperboys in Fairmont ... there were only the two of us [sharing stories] (unless one counts the storylines he was lifting, unbeknownst to me, from ''{{wp|Analog Science Fiction and Fact|Astounding}}'')."<ref>{{cite article|author=Disch, Thomas M.|date=May 8, 2006|title=Story tag|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140130091852/tomsdisch.livejournal.com/5997.html|publication=Endzone}} {{InternetArchive|date=January 30, 2014}} This title of this brief blog post referred to the elaborations that some readers had added in comments to his brief story idea about a vengeful chipmunk. (See [[Thomas M. Disch#cite_note-note-endzone-1|note about ''Endzone'']])</ref>

=== bowdlerized editions of ''Frankenstein'' and ''The War of the Worlds'' ===

{{wp|Expurgation|Bowdlerization}} refers generally to creating censored versions of books or other art. Fantasy literature has always been a common target of censorship. ''Frankenstein'' is an unusual case in that the best-known version of the novel, the 1831 edition, contained changes by the author that some have described as self-censorship to appease Victorian sensibilities (although the differences between the 1818 and 1838 editions are more complex)—but any version of ''Frankenstein'' would be problematic for fundamentalist Christians due to its basic premise.

As for why ''The War of the Worlds'', commonly thought of as a thrilling alien invasion adventure, would offend religious conservatives: besides H.G. Wells being famously an atheist, the novel's narrator repeatedly brings up evolution.<ref>{{cite book|author=McLean, Steven|date=2009|title=The Early Fiction of H.G. Wells: Fantasies of Science|url=https://link.springer.com/book/10.1057/9780230236639|publisher=Palgrave Macmillan|isbn=978-0-230-53562-6}}</ref>

=== their own artless Grand Guignol ===

[[File:Grand-guignol-1928.jpg|thumb|right|300px|''The Man Who Killed Death'', 1928]] This could refer literally to the style of horror theater made famous by the {{wp|Grand Guignol|Grand-Guignol}}, or more generally to any kind of horror-inspired bad-taste make-believe that a 14-year-old would enjoy.

=== a book of speeches by Herbert Hoover ===

Hoover remains the only US President to be born in Iowa.

=== destroyed most of Tel Aviv ===

There are just enough references to non-US places in the novel to establish that some of them have been ruined by war or terrorism, but that this was not a global disaster; Cairo and Tehran, for instance, are still vacation destinations (chapter 10), as is Rome although other parts of Italy have been bombed (chapter 11), and Switzerland seems fine (chapter 5).

=== Old Black Joe ===

An 1860 {{wp|Old Black Joe|Stephen Foster song}}. Foster is commonly thought of in connection with blackface minstrelsy, which is very relevant to this book. "Old Black Joe" is a choice that makes sense here as something a teacher might have picked: while it romanticizes Southern slaveholding culture like other Foster songs, it has more plausible deniability due to not being written in dialect.

=== undergoders .... they practically ran Iowa ===

The reason that the far-right evangelicals who are so prominent in Daniel's world are called "undergoders" is never spelled out, but to someone of Disch's generation it would clearly refer to the controversy over the wording of the {{wp|Pledge of Allegiance}}. "One nation" was changed to "One nation, under God" in 1954, as part of a Cold War trend of emphasizing American piety in contrast to the Soviets. This was clearly at odds with separation of church and state, and even though no legal challenge was made on that basis until {{wp|Elk Grove Unified School District v. Newdow|2000}}, it was a common focus of arguments about the overlap between religion and political conservatism—and a convenient phrase for the religious right to rally around.

Woven throughout this chapter, there are references to state/federal conflicts, Supreme Court decisions, etc., to establish what kind of dystopia Daniel is living in: not a nationwide theocracy like ''The Handmaid's Tale'', but something more contiguous with US history so far. Most of the repression is happening at the state level, and wasn't established by a coup, but by the same processes as right-wing politics today: a coalition of interests including sincere religious zealots, corrupt politicians, and businessmen who have no real ideology but are comfortable in an authoritarian setting. The undergoders don't make up a majority in Iowa, and haven't really forced everyone to live like they do ("it was impossible to pretend to be an undergoder since it involved giving up almost anything you might enjoy")—but they're over-represented in the agricultural industry where the state's main economic power is.

The novel doesn't say exactly which states are dominated by undergoders, just that it's most of "the Farm Belt", which could refer to any subset of Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, and Ohio. In chapter 3 we see that at least some of Iowa's neighbor states, like Minnesota, have managed not to go this way.

=== Three days after Governor Brewster vetoed this law his only daughter was shot at ===

Besides being another reminder that the government hasn't uniformly fallen in line, this is an example of the other traditional instrument of local right-wing power: anonymous violence by individuals. You could call this stochastic terrorism, or just the kind of thing that the KKK and similar groups have always done; in many ways the undergoder regime in the Farm Belt states operates very much like the deep South in the 1950s and '60s, where authoritarianism existed on both formal and informal levels.

=== it was as though civilization had ground to a halt ===

To American readers in 1979, the fuel crisis depicted here would feel very timely: oil production dropped {{wp|1979 oil crisis|in that year}} for several reasons, and even though the impact of this on the US was not as dramatic as expected, it brought back bad memories of the much more severe {{wp|1973 oil crisis}} when Americans had experienced rationing for the first time since World War Two.

Much as in ''[[334]]'', the theme of American decline in ''On Wings of Song'', and the idea that any serious lowering of the familiar standard of middle-class comfort would be a harbinger of the collapse of civilization, are rooted in feelings that were very common in the 1970s across the political spectrum. The rise of Ronald Reagan—already clearly in progress when this book was written—was based on the premise that economic problems in America, and social unrest in general, were due to having strayed from old-fashioned values and free-market capitalism.

=== The real aristocracy of Iowa, the farmers ===

The idea that the "farmers" are all undergoders living a strict religious life is not quite right, but from the limited perspective of Daniel and his family, knowing only the farmers in and around Amesville, it makes sense that it would seem that way. Later in chapter 5 we'll see a different side of the aristocracy: agribusiness tycoons who live in secular luxury.

=== copies of ''The Star-Tribune'' ===

The ''Minneapolis Star-Tribune'' (renamed ''{{wp|Minnesota Star Tribune}}'' in 2024) is a real newspaper, although in 1979 this was a slightly ahead-of-its-time reference because the ''Star'' and the ''Tribune'' were technically still two separate papers owned by the same company.

Disch said of his childhood in {{wp|Fairmont, Minnesota}} (where he lived during grade school and middle school, before the family moved back to Minneapolis): "[F]rom age nine years onwards, I began to earn my living, delivering the ''Minneapolis Star'' and the ''Tribune'' to those more cosmopolitan folks not content with Fairmont's own ''[https://www.fairmontsentinel.com/ Sentinel]''."{{ref Disch autobio}}

== Chapter 3 ==

=== the Twin Cities were Sodom and Gomorrah ===

While there are many twin cities around the world, in the Midwest this exclusively means Minneapolis and St. Paul. Since the undergoders in this future have not managed to dominate Minnesota like Iowa, these are the nearest examples of urban decadence.

Calling {{wp|Sodom and Gomorrah}} "twin cities" is not original to Disch—they are often described that way, but the Bible really says nothing about them having any relationship to each other, just that they were in the same general part of the world (the Dead Sea plain), along with three other cities that may or may not (depending on which texts you read) have met the same fate.

=== they rode their bikes north as far as U.S. 18 ... Albert Lea to Minneapolis ===

[[File:Iowa-to-MN.jpg|thumb|right|350px|Getting from Amesville to Minneapolis]] Route 18 is about 25 miles from the Iowa-Minnesota border. For what it's worth, this may help to narrow down where the fictional Amesville might be. If you headed straight north from Fort Dodge, route 18 would be about 40 miles away—and Amesville is supposed to be 40 miles from Fort Dodge. So, unless the boys took either a very long bike ride or a very short one, they probably started somewhere northwest or northeast of Fort Dodge, like where the real villages of West Bend and Corwith are. This doesn't really matter except to emphasize that Daniel lives in a very rural area.

=== urging the enactment of the Twenty-Eighth Amendment ===

This was mentioned earlier in chapter 2 as "the national Anti-Flight Amendment."

=== ''Gold-Diggers of 1984'' ===

This is a reference to the movie musicals ''{{wp|Gold Diggers of 1933}}'', ''{{wp|Gold Diggers of 1935}}'', and ''{{wp|Gold Diggers of 1937}}'', which are all vehicles for elaborate Busby Berkeley numbers. They are loosely derived from the 1919 play ''{{wp|The Gold Diggers (1919 play)|The Gold Diggers}}'' in the sense that all of their plots involve women marrying rich men; despite the negative connotation of "gold-diggers", the women always succeed in doing so and it's a happy ending.

[[File:Gold-diggers-of-1933.jpg|thumb|left|350px|''Gold Diggers of 1933'']] The years in the titles are the years that those movies were made... so is this implying that ''On Wings of Song'' actually takes place in the '80s? Even though no year is ever given for this near-future story, everything else about the setting makes that unlikely; these political and social changes did not happen in just a few years. So the movie may have come from a wave of '80s nostalgia—not unlike the one we've been undergoing in real life for a while now, and, like the current one, of course it includes ridiculous anachronisms like a flight apparatus.

=== a comic tap dance in black face ===

This would be no surprise at any point in the first half of the 20th century, but casually mentioning its presence in a near-future movie is a jarring effect (as with the earlier reference to "Old Black Joe"), and a reminder that race is something that hasn't really come up at all in Daniel's homogenous upbringing. It won't be until Part Three that we learn the fairly disturbing details of how ideas about skin color have developed in other parts of America.

=== north to the icebergs of Baffin Island ===

The location of {{wp|Baffin Island}} makes it a logical ending point if you traveled due north from the American Midwest and kept going.

=== I DON'T CARE IF THE SUN DON'T SHINE. Or: GIVE US FIVE MINUTES MORE ===

It's deliberately unclear what these could mean as political protest slogans, but in this book it's probably not a coincidence that {{wp|I Don't Care If the Sun Don't Shine|"I Don't Care If the Sun Don't Shine"}} and {{wp|Five Minutes More|"Five Minutes More"}} are the names of mid-20th-century pop songs. The lyrics of [https://genius.com/Elvis-presley-i-dont-care-if-the-sun-dont-shine-lyrics the first one] don't seem to have any special relevance, but the line "you can sleep late" in the [https://genius.com/Frank-sinatra-five-minutes-more-lyrics second one] may take on a sadder meaning after the events of Chapter 10.

=== the opposing lawyer raised an objection ===

Another example of the kind of soft authoritarianism that distinguishes Amesville from other literary dystopias: all of the legal structures that we have today still exist in the future, they're just applied even less fairly than before.

== Chapter 4 ==

=== the compound at Spirit Lake ===

[[File:Spirit-lake-map.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Where the prison is, more or less]] Spirit Lake or {{wp|Big Spirit Lake}} is one of the "Iowa Great Lakes" that form a chain from Minnesota to northwestern Iowa; there's also a {{wp|Spirit Lake, Iowa|small town}} in that area with the same name, although the town is on the shore of the next lake down, Lake Okoboji.

The latter area was the site of the last violent attack by Sioux on US settlers in Iowa (in reprisal for various abuses by the settlers and the federal government), after which the state and federal governments became even more aggressive in driving out the Native population. These events took on legendary stature in the Midwest,<ref>{{cite book|author=Teakle, Thomas|title=The Spirit Lake Massacre|url=https://gutenberg.org/cache/epub/42074/pg42074-images.html|location=Cedar Rapids|publisher=Torch Press|date=1918}}</ref> especially since they included the capture and ransom of a white woman who then wrote a memoir.<ref>{{cite article|author=Prout, Katie|title=A History of Violence: Walking the Blood-Soaked Shores of Spirit Lake|url=https://lithub.com/crime-or-conflict-walking-the-blood-soaked-shores-of-spirit-lake/|publication=Literary Hub|date=March 1, 2017|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref>

All of this makes it a perversely appropriate location for an authoritarian regime with an ultra-American ideology to establish a prison. The fact that it's right at the edge of Iowa, close to a non-undergoder state, just emphasizes how sure the authorities are that escape is impossible.

=== this scene was rotated through ninety degrees and the flowing river became a wall ===

This echoes a line in ''[[Camp Concentration]]'', from a description of the mad scientist Dr. Skilliman's various interests:

<blockquote>He was trying to analyze the peculiar fascination of lakes, reservoirs, and suchlike large, standing bodies of water. He observed that it is only in these that nature presents us with the spectacle of the Euclidean plane stretching on without apparent limit. It represents that final submission to the law of gravity that is always at work on our cell tissues. From this he went on to observe that the great achievement of architecture is simply to take the notion of the Euclidean plane and stand it on its edge. A wall is such an impressive phenomenon because it is a body of water... stood on its side.</blockquote>

=== the P-W lozenge ===

The idea of prisoners having a remote-controlled bomb on or in their bodies was fairly popular in late 20th century science fiction. Often this was in the form of an explosive collar around the neck—which has an obvious narrative advantage in movies, since it's always visible and can have an ominous flashing light on it; examples include ''The Running Man'' (1987), ''Wedlock'' (1991), and ''Battlefield Earth'' (2000). Less cinematically but more ickily, the bomb might be implanted inside someone's neck or skull.

[[File:Fortress.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Christopher Lambert in ''Fortress'']] I'm not sure whether ''On Wings of Song'' is the earliest example, but I'm fairly sure that this and the movie ''[https://letterboxd.com/hob/film/fortress-1992/ Fortress]'' (1992) are the only ones where you have to swallow the bomb—and that this was the first fictional depiction of a prison where instead of the bomb being the last-ditch mechanism to prevent escape, it's the ''only'' mechanism. In keeping with 1970s/80s conservative economic ideology, the Spirit Lake prison runs on an extreme laissez-faire model with basically no staff.

=== Basques in Spain, Jews in Russia, the Irish in England ... the decimation of Palestinians ===

As before, mentions of any society outside of the US are rare and brief, but this passage is an efficient and chilling way to convey that the Iowa style of authoritarianism is just one of many; every industrialized society adapts tools of control for its own purposes. Disch mentions that the US—unlike Spain, Russia, England, and Israel—only applies this technology within prisons and ''not'' to large groups of "potentially dissident civilians," but that doesn't make the situation in Iowa any less horrible, just different, in keeping with the overall less-centralized nature of the repression there.

=== Reverend Van Dyke ... head of Marble Collegiate Church ===

{{wp|Marble Collegiate Church|Marble Collegiate}} is a historic church in Manhattan which was famously associated with {{wp|Norman Vincent Peale}}. Peale's combination of feel-good self-help philosophy and chumminess with right-wing politicians makes him a clear model for Van Dyke.

=== to ''pretend'' to be good, devout, and faithful .... Eventually, saying makes it so ===

This theme will recur throughout the book—sometimes spelled out, other times [[On Wings of Song/Part Three#"I Whistle a Happy Tune"|more indirectly]].

=== Logomachies ===

Arguments about words.

=== his last year's homeroom teacher, Mrs. Norberg ===

Mrs. Norberg and her opinions will be described in much more detail in Chapter 6.

=== the breeding of a specially mutated form of termite ===

The idea that termites could become a major food source in the future has been around for a long time, mainly because people were already eating them.<ref>{{cite article|author=Reis de Figueirêdo, Vasconcellos, Policarpo, & Nóbrega Alves|title=Edible and medicinal termites: a global overview|url=https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4427943/|publication=Journal of Ethnobiology and Ethnomedicine|date=April 30, 2015|pub-date=Vol. 11, No. 29}}</ref> Academic discussion of the subject has increased in the 21st century due to increasing awareness of how agriculture suffers from climate change and contributes to it; unsurprisingly, as with everything related to climate change, this has also become the subject of right-wing conspiracy theories.<ref>{{cite article|author=Jingnan, Huo|title=From 4chan to international politics, a bug-eating conspiracy theory goes mainstream|url=https://www.npr.org/2023/03/31/1166649732/conspiracy-theory-eating-bugs-4chan|publication=All Things Considered|date=March 31, 2023|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref>

It's a matter of opinion whether Disch's portrayal of termite processing on an industrial scale is the grossest version of a food factory in science fiction (that honor might go to the giant underground chicken-heart blob in ''{{wp|The Space Merchants}}''), but it's one of the more plausible ones.

=== Beware of dogs, beware of evil workers ===

From [https://biblehub.com/kjv/philippians/3.htm Philippians 3:2-4, King James Version].

This is an example of Disch doing something he also [[334/334/Part_III#18._The_New_American_Catholic_Bible|did]] [[334/334/Part_VI#38._Father_Charmain|twice]] in ''334'': having a character land on a supposedly random Bible verse, when it's really the author being mischievous. Here Daniel has picked one of the most confusing Biblical passages that a casual reader could've possibly found—both because of the peculiar translation (the King James version uses the word "concision" in a way that I'm not sure it was ever used anywhere else in English literature), and because the meaning is so obscure without the context (the apostle Paul is ranting against other Christian factions of his time). Some [https://biblehub.com/nasb_/philippians/3.htm other translations] are a bit clearer, but only a bit.

The specific content of the passage may not be very important, but here's my best attempt to summarize it. After some general insults about "dogs" and "evil workers", Paul specifically complains about Christians who believe that circumcision and other traditional Jewish practices should remain important in their faith. He argues instead that "circumcision" should now be thought of as a spiritual condition, a matter of having the right faith—as the people in his own faction do. But as sort of a hedge and/or brag, he adds that if traditional circumcision is so important, i.e. if you really insist on having "confidence in the flesh", then he has that too since he was physically circumcised—and that maybe it should even count extra for him, since he used to be a very traditional Pharisee.

=== the windows were all sealed tight ===

Here we get one more bit of exposition about the rules of flying: "fairies" can travel effortlessly by willpower, but they can't go through solid objects.

=== The faster I let myself spin the more exciting ===

[[File:OWOS-cover-fsf.jpg|thumb|left|300px|Cover art by Ed Emshwiller]] And finally, the most important rule for fairies: if you go too close to any spinning thing, you'll be entranced and stuck there forever. The nature of a "fairy-trap" was left intentionally vague before, but in hindsight, every electric fan that we've heard about being used for this purpose indicates someone's willingness to cause someone else to die in a coma.

The idea that a particular physical structure could entice a disembodied spirit also appears in Disch's ''[[The Businessman#Chapter 43|The Businessman]]'', where Giselle's ghost is mystically intoxicated by the pattern on a potholder.

Ed Emshwiller's cover painting for ''The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction'' February 1979 issue—where the first part of ''On Wings of Song'' appeared—shows a group of ethereal figures drifting toward an object that is just abstract enough that if you don't yet know the story, you could easily assume it's some sort of alien portal, but if you do know, it's clearly a tabletop electric fan.

=== the one about purity of heart being to will one thing ===

Van Dyke got this from [https://www.religion-online.org/book/purity-of-heart-is-to-will-one-thing/ Kierkegaard].

=== to live at the end of such a civilization ===

Here I think ''On Wings of Song'' is echoing not just a general 1970s fear of American decline, but the specific angle that Disch explored in ''[[334]]'': the psychological ''appeal'' of imagining that you're in a crumbling empire, at least if you're a relatively privileged person.

=== Cairo and Bombay for the National Council of Churches' Triage Committee ===

Triage is the process of deciding who to help first in an emergency, and who to immediately give up on.

=== run into an iceberg and sink, like ... the lost city of Brasilia ===

[[File:Vila-amaury-1.jpeg|thumb|right|300px|Vila Amaury, 1959]][[File:Vila-amaury-2.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Vila Amaury, 2010]] This condensed metaphor might refer to Vila Amaury, the lost city ''within'' the city of Brasilia. It makes sense for Van Dyke to see Brasilia as an example of "the Civilization of the Business Man": it was a heavily planned city built by technocrats in relatively recent history, and in the process of its creation, Vila Amaury was created as a company shanty-town to house 15,000 migrant workers—who were then displaced because the plan for Brasilia included an artificial lake, created by the Lago Paranoá dam, entirely submerging the site of the town.<ref>{{cite article|author=Basques, Victoria|title=Vila Amaury, uma cidade submersa|url=https://medium.com/esquinaonline/vila-amaury-uma-cidade-submersa-9b3e48dc8d12|publication=Esquina On-line|date=November 14, 2018|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref>

=== you are a punk singer ===

Disch probably was not thinking of punk rock, which was still fairly new at the time, but he's using the word in the same sense that gave punk rock its name: unskilled, no good, lowlife. Not coincidentally, it's also an old derogatory word for a young man who is used for sex, especially in prison.

=== I am the captain of the Pinafore ===

From ''{{wp|H.M.S. Pinafore}}'' by Gilbert & Sullivan (1878). This is a call-and-response song, and Daniel is singing both parts, a little inaccurately; the actual lines are:

: CAPTAIN: I am the Captain of the Pinafore;
: CREW: And a right good captain, too!
: CAPTAIN: You're very, very good,
: And be it understood,
: I command a right good crew.

([https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OqWNmTXhI34 Recording of a performance by the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company, 1959])

== Footnotes ==
<references/>

{{On Wings of Song nav}}

On Wings of Song/Part One

2025-02-02T23:56:22Z

Eb: /* She would sit watching him ... people shouldn't let fairies into their houses */

{{#addbodyclass: tiled-toc}}

{{SummaryCollapsed |
As a teenager in Amesville, where flying is outlawed and music is barely allowed, Daniel knows there must be more to life than this. A brief dalliance with forbidden activities—distributing a banned newspaper and visiting Minneapolis, with the boy he has an unacknowledged love for—lands him in prison. The eight-month ordeal drastically disillusions him, but also sparks his obsession with singing.
}}

== Chapter 1 ==

=== Amesville, Iowa ===

[[File:Iowa.jpg|thumb|left|400px|The Hawkeye State]] No such town exists, although there is a city of {{wp|Ames, Iowa|Ames}} in Iowa—not far from Des Moines, where Disch was born and lived until age 13. Amesville sounds smaller, and not so close to a big city; in chapter 2 we learn that it's 40 miles from {{wp|Fort Dodge, Iowa|Fort Dodge}}, and several references to Fort Dodge make it sound like that's the next largest town in the area. For more about where Amesville might be, see [[#Chapter 3|Chapter 3]].

=== She would sit watching him ... people shouldn't let fairies into their houses ===

Fairies, as we will learn quickly from context, are the invisible presences of people who are "flying." All other references to fairies in Daniel's childhood are steeped in paranoia about being observed—but his daydreams here are a reminder that being watched over by an unseen dead family member or guardian angel is a standard religious idea meant to be comforting to children. The crucial difference is that Daniel's mother is a living person.

Not coincidentally, "fairy" also has a long history as an anti-gay slur in the US and England—semi-archaic today, but still very recognizable in the 1970s and 80s. Of the many equivalent slurs in other languages, several refer to butterflies, birds, etc., consistent with the idea that being flighty and/or colorful is effeminate.

There's no particular passage in the book that summarizes exactly what's involved in flying, so this note is as good a place as any. Disch gives no details about the "flight apparatus" technology except for there being a wire that touches the head. It's important to the premise that both the technology and the mental state achieved by singing are necessary ingredients; there's never a hint of anyone being able to do it in another way, as people have claimed to do in the past via meditation or esoteric studies. The general idea of {{wp|astral projection}} has a long history, but what's happening here seems closest to a more specific idea that only became popular in the late 19th and 20th centuries, and shows up a lot in 20th century science fiction: {{wp|remote viewing}}, that is, the ability to roam around as a disembodied point of view and invisibly observe things in the actual world. In ''On Wings of Song'', fairies don't travel to a separate reality, and they don't perceive any supernatural beings (except other fairies like themselves), but otherwise there are only a few limits to where they can go and what they can see. So there are at least three reasons for religious conservatives to be against flying: it's a transcendent experience that doesn't correspond to their own religion, it's against their desire to control other people's access to information in general, and it's a threat to their own personal privacy.

=== a collect call from New York ===

Throughout the 20th century there was a large price difference between local and long-distance calling, so {{wp|Collect call|calling collect}} would be a typical way for someone to call home from another state without affecting their phone bill. This is now rare since many phone providers no longer have a separate long-distance rate.

=== the Iowa Stamp Tax ===

A {{wp|Stamp duty|stamp tax}} is a tax on property purchases and other transactions, typically at the state level in the US.

=== Otto Hassler Park ===

If this is a historical reference, it would be a misspelling of {{wp|Otto Haesler}} (1880-1962), a German architect best known for social housing. There would be no obvious connection to this novel or to Disch's life, so it may be that this is just a random fictional name; Hassler, Haesler, Haessler, etc. would be plausible German names to find in Iowa.

=== to help him take up his indenture ===

This is only briefly mentioned in connection with Daniel's father's dentistry career; it's unclear what the terms are of this contract, whether it is more like an apprenticeship or {{wp|indentured servitude}}, but a later reference to him paying off his "debt to the county" indicates that there's overlap between the government and the private sector in this system, consistent with how capitalism in Iowa has taken a neo-feudal direction.

=== fans whirling everywhere you went ===

The way that fans and other spinning objects can harm "fairies" is described by Barbara Steiner [[#The faster I let myself spin the more exciting|later in chapter 4]].

== Chapter 2 ==

=== He listened to Eugene Mueller's stories ===

Disch later mentioned a childhood friend who may have been the model for the character of Eugene, in terms of his taking credit for plots that were really from old stories: "Bruce Burton, when we were both paperboys in Fairmont ... there were only the two of us [sharing stories] (unless one counts the storylines he was lifting, unbeknownst to me, from ''{{wp|Analog Science Fiction and Fact|Astounding}}'')."<ref>{{cite article|author=Disch, Thomas M.|date=May 8, 2006|title=Story tag|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140130091852/tomsdisch.livejournal.com/5997.html|publication=Endzone}} {{InternetArchive|date=January 30, 2014}} This title of this brief blog post referred to the elaborations that some readers had added in comments to his brief story idea about a vengeful chipmunk. (See [[Thomas M. Disch#cite_note-note-endzone-1|note about ''Endzone'']])</ref>

=== bowdlerized editions of ''Frankenstein'' and ''The War of the Worlds'' ===

{{wp|Expurgation|Bowdlerization}} refers generally to creating censored versions of books or other art. Fantasy literature has always been a common target of censorship. ''Frankenstein'' is an unusual case in that the best-known version of the novel, the 1831 edition, contained changes by the author that some have described as self-censorship to appease Victorian sensibilities (although the differences between the 1818 and 1838 editions are more complex)—but any version of ''Frankenstein'' would be problematic for fundamentalist Christians due to its basic premise.

As for why ''The War of the Worlds'', commonly thought of as a thrilling alien invasion adventure, would offend religious conservatives: besides H.G. Wells being famously an atheist, the novel's narrator repeatedly brings up evolution.<ref>{{cite book|author=McLean, Steven|date=2009|title=The Early Fiction of H.G. Wells: Fantasies of Science|url=https://link.springer.com/book/10.1057/9780230236639|publisher=Palgrave Macmillan|isbn=978-0-230-53562-6}}</ref>

=== their own artless Grand Guignol ===

[[File:Grand-guignol-1928.jpg|thumb|right|300px|''The Man Who Killed Death'', 1928]] This could refer literally to the style of horror theater made famous by the {{wp|Grand Guignol|Grand-Guignol}}, or more generally to any kind of horror-inspired bad-taste make-believe that a 14-year-old would enjoy.

=== a book of speeches by Herbert Hoover ===

Hoover remains the only US President to be born in Iowa.

=== destroyed most of Tel Aviv ===

There are just enough references to non-US places in the novel to establish that some of them have been ruined by war or terrorism, but that this was not a global disaster; Cairo and Tehran, for instance, are still vacation destinations (chapter 10), as is Rome although other parts of Italy have been bombed (chapter 11), and Switzerland seems fine (chapter 5).

=== Old Black Joe ===

An 1860 {{wp|Old Black Joe|Stephen Foster song}}. Foster is commonly thought of in connection with blackface minstrelsy, which is very relevant to this book. "Old Black Joe" is a choice that makes sense here as something a teacher might have picked: while it romanticizes Southern slaveholding culture like other Foster songs, it has more plausible deniability due to not being written in dialect.

=== undergoders .... they practically ran Iowa ===

The reason that the far-right evangelicals who are so prominent in Daniel's world are called "undergoders" is never spelled out, but to someone of Disch's generation it would clearly refer to the controversy over the wording of the {{wp|Pledge of Allegiance}}. "One nation" was changed to "One nation, under God" in 1954, as part of a Cold War trend of emphasizing American piety in contrast to the Soviets. This was clearly at odds with separation of church and state, and even though no legal challenge was made on that basis until {{wp|Elk Grove Unified School District v. Newdow|2000}}, it was a common focus of arguments about the overlap between religion and political conservatism—and a convenient phrase for the religious right to rally around.

Woven throughout this chapter, there are references to state/federal conflicts, Supreme Court decisions, etc., to establish what kind of dystopia Daniel is living in: not a nationwide theocracy like ''The Handmaid's Tale'', but something more contiguous with US history so far. Most of the repression is happening at the state level, and wasn't established by a coup, but by the same processes as right-wing politics today: a coalition of interests including sincere religious zealots, corrupt politicians, and businessmen who have no real ideology but are comfortable in an authoritarian setting. The undergoders don't make up a majority in Iowa, and haven't really forced everyone to live like they do ("it was impossible to pretend to be an undergoder since it involved giving up almost anything you might enjoy")—but they're over-represented in the agricultural industry where the state's main economic power is.

The novel doesn't say exactly which states are dominated by undergoders, just that it's most of "the Farm Belt", which could refer to any subset of Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, and Ohio. In chapter 3 we see that at least some of Iowa's neighbor states, like Minnesota, have managed not to go this way.

=== Three days after Governor Brewster vetoed this law his only daughter was shot at ===

Besides being another reminder that the government hasn't uniformly fallen in line, this is an example of the other traditional instrument of local right-wing power: anonymous violence by individuals. You could call this stochastic terrorism, or just the kind of thing that the KKK and similar groups have always done; in many ways the undergoder regime in the Farm Belt states operates very much like the deep South in the 1950s and '60s, where authoritarianism existed on both formal and informal levels.

=== it was as though civilization had ground to a halt ===

To American readers in 1979, the fuel crisis depicted here would feel very timely: oil production dropped {{wp|1979 oil crisis|in that year}} for several reasons, and even though the impact of this on the US was not as dramatic as expected, it brought back bad memories of the much more severe {{wp|1973 oil crisis}} when Americans had experienced rationing for the first time since World War Two.

Much as in ''[[334]]'', the theme of American decline in ''On Wings of Song'', and the idea that any serious lowering of the familiar standard of middle-class comfort would be a harbinger of the collapse of civilization, are rooted in feelings that were very common in the 1970s across the political spectrum. The rise of Ronald Reagan—already clearly in progress when this book was written—was based on the premise that economic problems in America, and social unrest in general, were due to having strayed from old-fashioned values and free-market capitalism.

=== The real aristocracy of Iowa, the farmers ===

The idea that the "farmers" are all undergoders living a strict religious life is not quite right, but from the limited perspective of Daniel and his family, knowing only the farmers in and around Amesville, it makes sense that it would seem that way. Later in chapter 5 we'll see a different side of the aristocracy: agribusiness tycoons who live in secular luxury.

=== copies of ''The Star-Tribune'' ===

The ''Minneapolis Star-Tribune'' (renamed ''{{wp|Minnesota Star Tribune}}'' in 2024) is a real newspaper, although in 1979 this was a slightly ahead-of-its-time reference because the ''Star'' and the ''Tribune'' were technically still two separate papers owned by the same company.

Disch said of his childhood in {{wp|Fairmont, Minnesota}} (where he lived during grade school and middle school, before the family moved back to Minneapolis): "[F]rom age nine years onwards, I began to earn my living, delivering the ''Minneapolis Star'' and the ''Tribune'' to those more cosmopolitan folks not content with Fairmont's own ''[https://www.fairmontsentinel.com/ Sentinel]''."{{ref Disch autobio}}

== Chapter 3 ==

=== the Twin Cities were Sodom and Gomorrah ===

While there are many twin cities around the world, in the Midwest this exclusively means Minneapolis and St. Paul. Since the undergoders in this future have not managed to dominate Minnesota like Iowa, these are the nearest examples of urban decadence.

Calling {{wp|Sodom and Gomorrah}} "twin cities" is not original to Disch—they are often described that way, but the Bible really says nothing about them having any relationship to each other, just that they were in the same general part of the world (the Dead Sea plain), along with three other cities that may or may not (depending on which texts you read) have met the same fate.

=== they rode their bikes north as far as U.S. 18 ... Albert Lea to Minneapolis ===

[[File:Iowa-to-MN.jpg|thumb|right|350px|Getting from Amesville to Minneapolis]] Route 18 is about 25 miles from the Iowa-Minnesota border. For what it's worth, this may help to narrow down where the fictional Amesville might be. If you headed straight north from Fort Dodge, route 18 would be about 40 miles away—and Amesville is supposed to be 40 miles from Fort Dodge. So, unless the boys took either a very long bike ride or a very short one, they probably started somewhere northwest or northeast of Fort Dodge, like where the real villages of West Bend and Corwith are. This doesn't really matter except to emphasize that Daniel lives in a very rural area.

=== urging the enactment of the Twenty-Eighth Amendment ===

This was mentioned earlier in chapter 2 as "the national Anti-Flight Amendment."

=== ''Gold-Diggers of 1984'' ===

This is a reference to the movie musicals ''{{wp|Gold Diggers of 1933}}'', ''{{wp|Gold Diggers of 1935}}'', and ''{{wp|Gold Diggers of 1937}}'', which are all vehicles for elaborate Busby Berkeley numbers. They are loosely derived from the 1919 play ''{{wp|The Gold Diggers (1919 play)|The Gold Diggers}}'' in the sense that all of their plots involve women marrying rich men; despite the negative connotation of "gold-diggers", the women always succeed in doing so and it's a happy ending.

[[File:Gold-diggers-of-1933.jpg|thumb|left|350px|''Gold Diggers of 1933'']] The years in the titles are the years that those movies were made... so is this implying that ''On Wings of Song'' actually takes place in the '80s? Even though no year is ever given for this near-future story, everything else about the setting makes that unlikely; these political and social changes did not happen in just a few years. So the movie may have come from a wave of '80s nostalgia—not unlike the one we've been undergoing in real life for a while now, and, like the current one, of course it includes ridiculous anachronisms like a flight apparatus.

=== a comic tap dance in black face ===

This would be no surprise at any point in the first half of the 20th century, but casually mentioning its presence in a near-future movie is a jarring effect (as with the earlier reference to "Old Black Joe"), and a reminder that race is something that hasn't really come up at all in Daniel's homogenous upbringing. It won't be until Part Three that we learn the fairly disturbing details of how ideas about skin color have developed in other parts of America.

=== north to the icebergs of Baffin Island ===

The location of {{wp|Baffin Island}} makes it a logical ending point if you traveled due north from the American Midwest and kept going.

=== I DON'T CARE IF THE SUN DON'T SHINE. Or: GIVE US FIVE MINUTES MORE ===

It's deliberately unclear what these could mean as political protest slogans, but in this book it's probably not a coincidence that {{wp|I Don't Care If the Sun Don't Shine|"I Don't Care If the Sun Don't Shine"}} and {{wp|Five Minutes More|"Five Minutes More"}} are the names of mid-20th-century pop songs. The lyrics of [https://genius.com/Elvis-presley-i-dont-care-if-the-sun-dont-shine-lyrics the first one] don't seem to have any special relevance, but the line "you can sleep late" in the [https://genius.com/Frank-sinatra-five-minutes-more-lyrics second one] may take on a sadder meaning after the events of Chapter 10.

=== the opposing lawyer raised an objection ===

Another example of the kind of soft authoritarianism that distinguishes Amesville from other literary dystopias: all of the legal structures that we have today still exist in the future, they're just applied even less fairly than before.

== Chapter 4 ==

=== the compound at Spirit Lake ===

[[File:Spirit-lake-map.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Where the prison is, more or less]] Spirit Lake or {{wp|Big Spirit Lake}} is one of the "Iowa Great Lakes" that form a chain from Minnesota to northwestern Iowa; there's also a {{wp|Spirit Lake, Iowa|small town}} in that area with the same name, although the town is on the shore of the next lake down, Lake Okoboji.

The latter area was the site of the last violent attack by Sioux on US settlers in Iowa (in reprisal for various abuses by the settlers and the federal government), after which the state and federal governments became even more aggressive in driving out the Native population. These events took on legendary stature in the Midwest,<ref>{{cite book|author=Teakle, Thomas|title=The Spirit Lake Massacre|url=https://gutenberg.org/cache/epub/42074/pg42074-images.html|location=Cedar Rapids|publisher=Torch Press|date=1918}}</ref> especially since they included the capture and ransom of a white woman who then wrote a memoir.<ref>{{cite article|author=Prout, Katie|title=A History of Violence: Walking the Blood-Soaked Shores of Spirit Lake|url=https://lithub.com/crime-or-conflict-walking-the-blood-soaked-shores-of-spirit-lake/|publication=Literary Hub|date=March 1, 2017|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref>

All of this makes it a perversely appropriate location for an authoritarian regime with an ultra-American ideology to establish a prison. The fact that it's right at the edge of Iowa, close to a non-undergoder state, just emphasizes how sure the authorities are that escape is impossible.

=== this scene was rotated through ninety degrees and the flowing river became a wall ===

This echoes a line in ''[[Camp Concentration]]'', from a description of the mad scientist Dr. Skilliman's various interests:

<blockquote>He was trying to analyze the peculiar fascination of lakes, reservoirs, and suchlike large, standing bodies of water. He observed that it is only in these that nature presents us with the spectacle of the Euclidean plane stretching on without apparent limit. It represents that final submission to the law of gravity that is always at work on our cell tissues. From this he went on to observe that the great achievement of architecture is simply to take the notion of the Euclidean plane and stand it on its edge. A wall is such an impressive phenomenon because it is a body of water... stood on its side.</blockquote>

=== the P-W lozenge ===

The idea of prisoners having a remote-controlled bomb on or in their bodies was fairly popular in late 20th century science fiction. Often this was in the form of an explosive collar around the neck—which has an obvious narrative advantage in movies, since it's always visible and can have an ominous flashing light on it; examples include ''The Running Man'' (1987), ''Wedlock'' (1991), and ''Battlefield Earth'' (2000). Less cinematically but more ickily, the bomb might be implanted inside someone's neck or skull.

[[File:Fortress.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Christopher Lambert in ''Fortress'']] I'm not sure whether ''On Wings of Song'' is the earliest example, but I'm fairly sure that this and the movie ''[https://letterboxd.com/hob/film/fortress-1992/ Fortress]'' (1992) are the only ones where you have to swallow the bomb—and that this was the first fictional depiction of a prison where instead of the bomb being the last-ditch mechanism to prevent escape, it's the ''only'' mechanism. In keeping with 1970s/80s conservative economic ideology, the Spirit Lake prison runs on an extreme laissez-faire model with basically no staff.

=== Basques in Spain, Jews in Russia, the Irish in England ... the decimation of Palestinians ===

As before, mentions of any society outside of the US are rare and brief, but this passage is an efficient and chilling way to convey that the Iowa style of authoritarianism is just one of many; every industrialized society adapts tools of control for its own purposes. Disch mentions that the US—unlike Spain, Russia, England, and Israel—only applies this technology within prisons and ''not'' to large groups of "potentially dissident civilians," but that doesn't make the situation in Iowa any less horrible, just different, in keeping with the overall less-centralized nature of the repression there.

=== Reverend Van Dyke ... head of Marble Collegiate Church ===

{{wp|Marble Collegiate Church|Marble Collegiate}} is a historic church in Manhattan which was famously associated with {{wp|Norman Vincent Peale}}. Peale's combination of feel-good self-help philosophy and chumminess with right-wing politicians makes him a clear model for Van Dyke.

=== to ''pretend'' to be good, devout, and faithful .... Eventually, saying makes it so ===

This theme will recur throughout the book—sometimes spelled out, other times [[On Wings of Song/Part Three#"I Whistle a Happy Tune"|more indirectly]].

=== Logomachies ===

Arguments about words.

=== his last year's homeroom teacher, Mrs. Norberg ===

Mrs. Norberg and her opinions will be described in much more detail in Chapter 6.

=== the breeding of a specially mutated form of termite ===

The idea that termites could become a major food source in the future has been around for a long time, mainly because people were already eating them.<ref>{{cite article|author=Reis de Figueirêdo, Vasconcellos, Policarpo, & Nóbrega Alves|title=Edible and medicinal termites: a global overview|url=https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4427943/|publication=Journal of Ethnobiology and Ethnomedicine|date=April 30, 2015|pub-date=Vol. 11, No. 29}}</ref> Academic discussion of the subject has increased in the 21st century due to increasing awareness of how agriculture suffers from climate change and contributes to it; unsurprisingly, as with everything related to climate change, this has also become the subject of right-wing conspiracy theories.<ref>{{cite article|author=Jingnan, Huo|title=From 4chan to international politics, a bug-eating conspiracy theory goes mainstream|url=https://www.npr.org/2023/03/31/1166649732/conspiracy-theory-eating-bugs-4chan|publication=All Things Considered|date=March 31, 2023|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref>

It's a matter of opinion whether Disch's portrayal of termite processing on an industrial scale is the grossest version of a food factory in science fiction (that honor might go to the giant underground chicken-heart blob in ''{{wp|The Space Merchants}}''), but it's one of the more plausible ones.

=== Beware of dogs, beware of evil workers ===

From [https://biblehub.com/kjv/philippians/3.htm Philippians 3:2-4, King James Version].

This is an example of Disch doing something he also [[334/334/Part_III#18._The_New_American_Catholic_Bible|did]] [[334/334/Part_VI#38._Father_Charmain|twice]] in ''334'': having a character land on a supposedly random Bible verse, when it's really the author being mischievous. Here Daniel has picked one of the most confusing Biblical passages that a casual reader could've possibly found—both because of the peculiar translation (the King James version uses the word "concision" in a way that I'm not sure it was ever used anywhere else in English literature), and because the meaning is so obscure without the context (the apostle Paul is ranting against other Christian factions of his time). Some [https://biblehub.com/nasb_/philippians/3.htm other translations] are a bit clearer, but only a bit.

The specific content of the passage may not be very important, but here's my best attempt to summarize it. After some general insults about "dogs" and "evil workers", Paul specifically complains about Christians who believe that circumcision and other traditional Jewish practices should remain important in their faith. He argues instead that "circumcision" should now be thought of as a spiritual condition, a matter of having the right faith—as the people in his own faction do. But as sort of a hedge and/or brag, he adds that if traditional circumcision is so important, i.e. if you really insist on having "confidence in the flesh", then he has that too since he was physically circumcised—and that maybe it should even count extra for him, since he used to be a very traditional Pharisee.

=== the windows were all sealed tight ===

Here we get one more bit of exposition about the rules of flying: "fairies" can travel effortlessly by willpower, but they can't go through solid objects.

=== The faster I let myself spin the more exciting ===

[[File:OWOS-cover-fsf.jpg|thumb|left|300px|Cover art by Ed Emshwiller]] And finally, the most important rule for fairies: if you go too close to any spinning thing, you'll be entranced and stuck there forever. The nature of a "fairy-trap" was left intentionally vague before, but in hindsight, every electric fan that we've heard about being used for this purpose indicates someone's willingness to cause someone else to die in a coma.

The idea that a particular physical structure could entice a disembodied spirit also appears in Disch's ''[[The Businessman#Chapter 43|The Businessman]]'', where Giselle's ghost is mystically intoxicated by the pattern on a potholder.

Ed Emshwiller's cover painting for ''The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction'' February 1979 issue—where the first part of ''On Wings of Song'' appeared—shows a group of ethereal figures drifting toward an object that is just abstract enough that if you don't yet know the story, you could easily assume it's some sort of alien portal, but if you do know, it's clearly a tabletop electric fan.

=== the one about purity of heart being to will one thing ===

Van Dyke got this from [https://www.religion-online.org/book/purity-of-heart-is-to-will-one-thing/ Kierkegaard].

=== to live at the end of such a civilization ===

Here I think ''On Wings of Song'' is echoing not just a general 1970s fear of American decline, but the specific angle that Disch explored in ''[[334]]'': the psychological ''appeal'' of imagining that you're in a crumbling empire, at least if you're a relatively privileged person.

=== Cairo and Bombay for the National Council of Churches' Triage Committee ===

Triage is the process of deciding who to help first in an emergency, and who to immediately give up on.

=== run into an iceberg and sink, like ... the lost city of Brasilia ===

[[File:Vila-amaury-1.jpeg|thumb|right|300px|Vila Amaury, 1959]][[File:Vila-amaury-2.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Vila Amaury, 2010]] This condensed metaphor might refer to Vila Amaury, the lost city ''within'' the city of Brasilia. It makes sense for Van Dyke to see Brasilia as an example of "the Civilization of the Business Man": it was a heavily planned city built by technocrats in relatively recent history, and in the process of its creation, Vila Amaury was created as a company shanty-town to house 15,000 migrant workers—who were then displaced because the plan for Brasilia included an artificial lake, created by the Lago Paranoá dam, entirely submerging the site of the town.<ref>{{cite article|author=Basques, Victoria|title=Vila Amaury, uma cidade submersa|url=https://medium.com/esquinaonline/vila-amaury-uma-cidade-submersa-9b3e48dc8d12|publication=Esquina On-line|date=November 14, 2018|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref>

=== you are a punk singer ===

Disch probably was not thinking of punk rock, which was still fairly new at the time, but he's using the word in the same sense that gave punk rock its name: unskilled, no good, lowlife. Not coincidentally, it's also an old derogatory word for a young man who is used for sex, especially in prison.

=== I am the captain of the Pinafore ===

From ''{{wp|H.M.S. Pinafore}}'' by Gilbert & Sullivan (1878). This is a call-and-response song, and Daniel is singing both parts, a little inaccurately; the actual lines are:

: CAPTAIN: I am the Captain of the Pinafore;
: CREW: And a right good captain, too!
: CAPTAIN: You're very, very good,
: And be it understood,
: I command a right good crew.

([https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OqWNmTXhI34 Recording of a performance by the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company, 1959])

== Footnotes ==
<references/>

{{On Wings of Song nav}}

On Wings of Song/Part One

2025-02-02T23:55:42Z

Eb: /* She would sit watching him ... people shouldn't let fairies into their houses */

{{#addbodyclass: tiled-toc}}

{{SummaryCollapsed |
As a teenager in Amesville, where flying is outlawed and music is barely allowed, Daniel knows there must be more to life than this. A brief dalliance with forbidden activities—distributing a banned newspaper and visiting Minneapolis, with the boy he has an unacknowledged love for—lands him in prison. The eight-month ordeal drastically disillusions him, but also sparks his obsession with singing.
}}

== Chapter 1 ==

=== Amesville, Iowa ===

[[File:Iowa.jpg|thumb|left|400px|The Hawkeye State]] No such town exists, although there is a city of {{wp|Ames, Iowa|Ames}} in Iowa—not far from Des Moines, where Disch was born and lived until age 13. Amesville sounds smaller, and not so close to a big city; in chapter 2 we learn that it's 40 miles from {{wp|Fort Dodge, Iowa|Fort Dodge}}, and several references to Fort Dodge make it sound like that's the next largest town in the area. For more about where Amesville might be, see [[#Chapter 3|Chapter 3]].

=== She would sit watching him ... people shouldn't let fairies into their houses ===

Fairies, as we will learn quickly from context, are the invisible presences of people who are "flying." All other references to fairies in Daniel's childhood are steeped in paranoia about being observed—but his daydreams here are a reminder that being watched over by an unseen dead family member or guardian angel is a standard religious idea meant to be comforting to children. The crucial difference is that Daniel's mother is a living person.

Not coincidentally, "fairy" also has a long history as an anti-gay slur in the US and England—semi-archaic today, but still very recognizable in the 1970s and 80s. Of the many equivalent slurs in other languages, several refer to butterflies, birds, etc., consistent with the idea that being flighty and/or colorful is effeminate.

There's no particular passage in the book that summarizes exactly what's involved in flying—it's sketched out a bit a time through context—so this note is as good a place as any. Disch gives no details about the "flight apparatus" technology except for there being a wire that touches the head. It's important to the premise that both the technology and the mental state achieved by singing are necessary ingredients; there's never a hint of anyone being able to do it in another way, as people have claimed to do in the past via meditation or esoteric studies. The general idea of {{wp|astral projection}} has a long history, but what's happening here seems closest to a more specific idea that only became popular in the late 19th and 20th centuries, and shows up a lot in 20th century science fiction: {{wp|remote viewing}}, that is, the ability to roam around as a disembodied point of view and invisibly observe things in the actual world. In ''On Wings of Song'', fairies don't travel to a separate reality, and they don't perceive any supernatural beings (except other fairies like themselves), but otherwise there are only a few limits to where they can go and what they can see. So there are at least three reasons for religious conservatives to be against flying: it's a transcendent experience that doesn't correspond to their own religion, it's against their desire to control other people's access to information in general, and it's a threat to their own personal privacy.

=== a collect call from New York ===

Throughout the 20th century there was a large price difference between local and long-distance calling, so {{wp|Collect call|calling collect}} would be a typical way for someone to call home from another state without affecting their phone bill. This is now rare since many phone providers no longer have a separate long-distance rate.

=== the Iowa Stamp Tax ===

A {{wp|Stamp duty|stamp tax}} is a tax on property purchases and other transactions, typically at the state level in the US.

=== Otto Hassler Park ===

If this is a historical reference, it would be a misspelling of {{wp|Otto Haesler}} (1880-1962), a German architect best known for social housing. There would be no obvious connection to this novel or to Disch's life, so it may be that this is just a random fictional name; Hassler, Haesler, Haessler, etc. would be plausible German names to find in Iowa.

=== to help him take up his indenture ===

This is only briefly mentioned in connection with Daniel's father's dentistry career; it's unclear what the terms are of this contract, whether it is more like an apprenticeship or {{wp|indentured servitude}}, but a later reference to him paying off his "debt to the county" indicates that there's overlap between the government and the private sector in this system, consistent with how capitalism in Iowa has taken a neo-feudal direction.

=== fans whirling everywhere you went ===

The way that fans and other spinning objects can harm "fairies" is described by Barbara Steiner [[#The faster I let myself spin the more exciting|later in chapter 4]].

== Chapter 2 ==

=== He listened to Eugene Mueller's stories ===

Disch later mentioned a childhood friend who may have been the model for the character of Eugene, in terms of his taking credit for plots that were really from old stories: "Bruce Burton, when we were both paperboys in Fairmont ... there were only the two of us [sharing stories] (unless one counts the storylines he was lifting, unbeknownst to me, from ''{{wp|Analog Science Fiction and Fact|Astounding}}'')."<ref>{{cite article|author=Disch, Thomas M.|date=May 8, 2006|title=Story tag|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140130091852/tomsdisch.livejournal.com/5997.html|publication=Endzone}} {{InternetArchive|date=January 30, 2014}} This title of this brief blog post referred to the elaborations that some readers had added in comments to his brief story idea about a vengeful chipmunk. (See [[Thomas M. Disch#cite_note-note-endzone-1|note about ''Endzone'']])</ref>

=== bowdlerized editions of ''Frankenstein'' and ''The War of the Worlds'' ===

{{wp|Expurgation|Bowdlerization}} refers generally to creating censored versions of books or other art. Fantasy literature has always been a common target of censorship. ''Frankenstein'' is an unusual case in that the best-known version of the novel, the 1831 edition, contained changes by the author that some have described as self-censorship to appease Victorian sensibilities (although the differences between the 1818 and 1838 editions are more complex)—but any version of ''Frankenstein'' would be problematic for fundamentalist Christians due to its basic premise.

As for why ''The War of the Worlds'', commonly thought of as a thrilling alien invasion adventure, would offend religious conservatives: besides H.G. Wells being famously an atheist, the novel's narrator repeatedly brings up evolution.<ref>{{cite book|author=McLean, Steven|date=2009|title=The Early Fiction of H.G. Wells: Fantasies of Science|url=https://link.springer.com/book/10.1057/9780230236639|publisher=Palgrave Macmillan|isbn=978-0-230-53562-6}}</ref>

=== their own artless Grand Guignol ===

[[File:Grand-guignol-1928.jpg|thumb|right|300px|''The Man Who Killed Death'', 1928]] This could refer literally to the style of horror theater made famous by the {{wp|Grand Guignol|Grand-Guignol}}, or more generally to any kind of horror-inspired bad-taste make-believe that a 14-year-old would enjoy.

=== a book of speeches by Herbert Hoover ===

Hoover remains the only US President to be born in Iowa.

=== destroyed most of Tel Aviv ===

There are just enough references to non-US places in the novel to establish that some of them have been ruined by war or terrorism, but that this was not a global disaster; Cairo and Tehran, for instance, are still vacation destinations (chapter 10), as is Rome although other parts of Italy have been bombed (chapter 11), and Switzerland seems fine (chapter 5).

=== Old Black Joe ===

An 1860 {{wp|Old Black Joe|Stephen Foster song}}. Foster is commonly thought of in connection with blackface minstrelsy, which is very relevant to this book. "Old Black Joe" is a choice that makes sense here as something a teacher might have picked: while it romanticizes Southern slaveholding culture like other Foster songs, it has more plausible deniability due to not being written in dialect.

=== undergoders .... they practically ran Iowa ===

The reason that the far-right evangelicals who are so prominent in Daniel's world are called "undergoders" is never spelled out, but to someone of Disch's generation it would clearly refer to the controversy over the wording of the {{wp|Pledge of Allegiance}}. "One nation" was changed to "One nation, under God" in 1954, as part of a Cold War trend of emphasizing American piety in contrast to the Soviets. This was clearly at odds with separation of church and state, and even though no legal challenge was made on that basis until {{wp|Elk Grove Unified School District v. Newdow|2000}}, it was a common focus of arguments about the overlap between religion and political conservatism—and a convenient phrase for the religious right to rally around.

Woven throughout this chapter, there are references to state/federal conflicts, Supreme Court decisions, etc., to establish what kind of dystopia Daniel is living in: not a nationwide theocracy like ''The Handmaid's Tale'', but something more contiguous with US history so far. Most of the repression is happening at the state level, and wasn't established by a coup, but by the same processes as right-wing politics today: a coalition of interests including sincere religious zealots, corrupt politicians, and businessmen who have no real ideology but are comfortable in an authoritarian setting. The undergoders don't make up a majority in Iowa, and haven't really forced everyone to live like they do ("it was impossible to pretend to be an undergoder since it involved giving up almost anything you might enjoy")—but they're over-represented in the agricultural industry where the state's main economic power is.

The novel doesn't say exactly which states are dominated by undergoders, just that it's most of "the Farm Belt", which could refer to any subset of Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, and Ohio. In chapter 3 we see that at least some of Iowa's neighbor states, like Minnesota, have managed not to go this way.

=== Three days after Governor Brewster vetoed this law his only daughter was shot at ===

Besides being another reminder that the government hasn't uniformly fallen in line, this is an example of the other traditional instrument of local right-wing power: anonymous violence by individuals. You could call this stochastic terrorism, or just the kind of thing that the KKK and similar groups have always done; in many ways the undergoder regime in the Farm Belt states operates very much like the deep South in the 1950s and '60s, where authoritarianism existed on both formal and informal levels.

=== it was as though civilization had ground to a halt ===

To American readers in 1979, the fuel crisis depicted here would feel very timely: oil production dropped {{wp|1979 oil crisis|in that year}} for several reasons, and even though the impact of this on the US was not as dramatic as expected, it brought back bad memories of the much more severe {{wp|1973 oil crisis}} when Americans had experienced rationing for the first time since World War Two.

Much as in ''[[334]]'', the theme of American decline in ''On Wings of Song'', and the idea that any serious lowering of the familiar standard of middle-class comfort would be a harbinger of the collapse of civilization, are rooted in feelings that were very common in the 1970s across the political spectrum. The rise of Ronald Reagan—already clearly in progress when this book was written—was based on the premise that economic problems in America, and social unrest in general, were due to having strayed from old-fashioned values and free-market capitalism.

=== The real aristocracy of Iowa, the farmers ===

The idea that the "farmers" are all undergoders living a strict religious life is not quite right, but from the limited perspective of Daniel and his family, knowing only the farmers in and around Amesville, it makes sense that it would seem that way. Later in chapter 5 we'll see a different side of the aristocracy: agribusiness tycoons who live in secular luxury.

=== copies of ''The Star-Tribune'' ===

The ''Minneapolis Star-Tribune'' (renamed ''{{wp|Minnesota Star Tribune}}'' in 2024) is a real newspaper, although in 1979 this was a slightly ahead-of-its-time reference because the ''Star'' and the ''Tribune'' were technically still two separate papers owned by the same company.

Disch said of his childhood in {{wp|Fairmont, Minnesota}} (where he lived during grade school and middle school, before the family moved back to Minneapolis): "[F]rom age nine years onwards, I began to earn my living, delivering the ''Minneapolis Star'' and the ''Tribune'' to those more cosmopolitan folks not content with Fairmont's own ''[https://www.fairmontsentinel.com/ Sentinel]''."{{ref Disch autobio}}

== Chapter 3 ==

=== the Twin Cities were Sodom and Gomorrah ===

While there are many twin cities around the world, in the Midwest this exclusively means Minneapolis and St. Paul. Since the undergoders in this future have not managed to dominate Minnesota like Iowa, these are the nearest examples of urban decadence.

Calling {{wp|Sodom and Gomorrah}} "twin cities" is not original to Disch—they are often described that way, but the Bible really says nothing about them having any relationship to each other, just that they were in the same general part of the world (the Dead Sea plain), along with three other cities that may or may not (depending on which texts you read) have met the same fate.

=== they rode their bikes north as far as U.S. 18 ... Albert Lea to Minneapolis ===

[[File:Iowa-to-MN.jpg|thumb|right|350px|Getting from Amesville to Minneapolis]] Route 18 is about 25 miles from the Iowa-Minnesota border. For what it's worth, this may help to narrow down where the fictional Amesville might be. If you headed straight north from Fort Dodge, route 18 would be about 40 miles away—and Amesville is supposed to be 40 miles from Fort Dodge. So, unless the boys took either a very long bike ride or a very short one, they probably started somewhere northwest or northeast of Fort Dodge, like where the real villages of West Bend and Corwith are. This doesn't really matter except to emphasize that Daniel lives in a very rural area.

=== urging the enactment of the Twenty-Eighth Amendment ===

This was mentioned earlier in chapter 2 as "the national Anti-Flight Amendment."

=== ''Gold-Diggers of 1984'' ===

This is a reference to the movie musicals ''{{wp|Gold Diggers of 1933}}'', ''{{wp|Gold Diggers of 1935}}'', and ''{{wp|Gold Diggers of 1937}}'', which are all vehicles for elaborate Busby Berkeley numbers. They are loosely derived from the 1919 play ''{{wp|The Gold Diggers (1919 play)|The Gold Diggers}}'' in the sense that all of their plots involve women marrying rich men; despite the negative connotation of "gold-diggers", the women always succeed in doing so and it's a happy ending.

[[File:Gold-diggers-of-1933.jpg|thumb|left|350px|''Gold Diggers of 1933'']] The years in the titles are the years that those movies were made... so is this implying that ''On Wings of Song'' actually takes place in the '80s? Even though no year is ever given for this near-future story, everything else about the setting makes that unlikely; these political and social changes did not happen in just a few years. So the movie may have come from a wave of '80s nostalgia—not unlike the one we've been undergoing in real life for a while now, and, like the current one, of course it includes ridiculous anachronisms like a flight apparatus.

=== a comic tap dance in black face ===

This would be no surprise at any point in the first half of the 20th century, but casually mentioning its presence in a near-future movie is a jarring effect (as with the earlier reference to "Old Black Joe"), and a reminder that race is something that hasn't really come up at all in Daniel's homogenous upbringing. It won't be until Part Three that we learn the fairly disturbing details of how ideas about skin color have developed in other parts of America.

=== north to the icebergs of Baffin Island ===

The location of {{wp|Baffin Island}} makes it a logical ending point if you traveled due north from the American Midwest and kept going.

=== I DON'T CARE IF THE SUN DON'T SHINE. Or: GIVE US FIVE MINUTES MORE ===

It's deliberately unclear what these could mean as political protest slogans, but in this book it's probably not a coincidence that {{wp|I Don't Care If the Sun Don't Shine|"I Don't Care If the Sun Don't Shine"}} and {{wp|Five Minutes More|"Five Minutes More"}} are the names of mid-20th-century pop songs. The lyrics of [https://genius.com/Elvis-presley-i-dont-care-if-the-sun-dont-shine-lyrics the first one] don't seem to have any special relevance, but the line "you can sleep late" in the [https://genius.com/Frank-sinatra-five-minutes-more-lyrics second one] may take on a sadder meaning after the events of Chapter 10.

=== the opposing lawyer raised an objection ===

Another example of the kind of soft authoritarianism that distinguishes Amesville from other literary dystopias: all of the legal structures that we have today still exist in the future, they're just applied even less fairly than before.

== Chapter 4 ==

=== the compound at Spirit Lake ===

[[File:Spirit-lake-map.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Where the prison is, more or less]] Spirit Lake or {{wp|Big Spirit Lake}} is one of the "Iowa Great Lakes" that form a chain from Minnesota to northwestern Iowa; there's also a {{wp|Spirit Lake, Iowa|small town}} in that area with the same name, although the town is on the shore of the next lake down, Lake Okoboji.

The latter area was the site of the last violent attack by Sioux on US settlers in Iowa (in reprisal for various abuses by the settlers and the federal government), after which the state and federal governments became even more aggressive in driving out the Native population. These events took on legendary stature in the Midwest,<ref>{{cite book|author=Teakle, Thomas|title=The Spirit Lake Massacre|url=https://gutenberg.org/cache/epub/42074/pg42074-images.html|location=Cedar Rapids|publisher=Torch Press|date=1918}}</ref> especially since they included the capture and ransom of a white woman who then wrote a memoir.<ref>{{cite article|author=Prout, Katie|title=A History of Violence: Walking the Blood-Soaked Shores of Spirit Lake|url=https://lithub.com/crime-or-conflict-walking-the-blood-soaked-shores-of-spirit-lake/|publication=Literary Hub|date=March 1, 2017|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref>

All of this makes it a perversely appropriate location for an authoritarian regime with an ultra-American ideology to establish a prison. The fact that it's right at the edge of Iowa, close to a non-undergoder state, just emphasizes how sure the authorities are that escape is impossible.

=== this scene was rotated through ninety degrees and the flowing river became a wall ===

This echoes a line in ''[[Camp Concentration]]'', from a description of the mad scientist Dr. Skilliman's various interests:

<blockquote>He was trying to analyze the peculiar fascination of lakes, reservoirs, and suchlike large, standing bodies of water. He observed that it is only in these that nature presents us with the spectacle of the Euclidean plane stretching on without apparent limit. It represents that final submission to the law of gravity that is always at work on our cell tissues. From this he went on to observe that the great achievement of architecture is simply to take the notion of the Euclidean plane and stand it on its edge. A wall is such an impressive phenomenon because it is a body of water... stood on its side.</blockquote>

=== the P-W lozenge ===

The idea of prisoners having a remote-controlled bomb on or in their bodies was fairly popular in late 20th century science fiction. Often this was in the form of an explosive collar around the neck—which has an obvious narrative advantage in movies, since it's always visible and can have an ominous flashing light on it; examples include ''The Running Man'' (1987), ''Wedlock'' (1991), and ''Battlefield Earth'' (2000). Less cinematically but more ickily, the bomb might be implanted inside someone's neck or skull.

[[File:Fortress.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Christopher Lambert in ''Fortress'']] I'm not sure whether ''On Wings of Song'' is the earliest example, but I'm fairly sure that this and the movie ''[https://letterboxd.com/hob/film/fortress-1992/ Fortress]'' (1992) are the only ones where you have to swallow the bomb—and that this was the first fictional depiction of a prison where instead of the bomb being the last-ditch mechanism to prevent escape, it's the ''only'' mechanism. In keeping with 1970s/80s conservative economic ideology, the Spirit Lake prison runs on an extreme laissez-faire model with basically no staff.

=== Basques in Spain, Jews in Russia, the Irish in England ... the decimation of Palestinians ===

As before, mentions of any society outside of the US are rare and brief, but this passage is an efficient and chilling way to convey that the Iowa style of authoritarianism is just one of many; every industrialized society adapts tools of control for its own purposes. Disch mentions that the US—unlike Spain, Russia, England, and Israel—only applies this technology within prisons and ''not'' to large groups of "potentially dissident civilians," but that doesn't make the situation in Iowa any less horrible, just different, in keeping with the overall less-centralized nature of the repression there.

=== Reverend Van Dyke ... head of Marble Collegiate Church ===

{{wp|Marble Collegiate Church|Marble Collegiate}} is a historic church in Manhattan which was famously associated with {{wp|Norman Vincent Peale}}. Peale's combination of feel-good self-help philosophy and chumminess with right-wing politicians makes him a clear model for Van Dyke.

=== to ''pretend'' to be good, devout, and faithful .... Eventually, saying makes it so ===

This theme will recur throughout the book—sometimes spelled out, other times [[On Wings of Song/Part Three#"I Whistle a Happy Tune"|more indirectly]].

=== Logomachies ===

Arguments about words.

=== his last year's homeroom teacher, Mrs. Norberg ===

Mrs. Norberg and her opinions will be described in much more detail in Chapter 6.

=== the breeding of a specially mutated form of termite ===

The idea that termites could become a major food source in the future has been around for a long time, mainly because people were already eating them.<ref>{{cite article|author=Reis de Figueirêdo, Vasconcellos, Policarpo, & Nóbrega Alves|title=Edible and medicinal termites: a global overview|url=https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4427943/|publication=Journal of Ethnobiology and Ethnomedicine|date=April 30, 2015|pub-date=Vol. 11, No. 29}}</ref> Academic discussion of the subject has increased in the 21st century due to increasing awareness of how agriculture suffers from climate change and contributes to it; unsurprisingly, as with everything related to climate change, this has also become the subject of right-wing conspiracy theories.<ref>{{cite article|author=Jingnan, Huo|title=From 4chan to international politics, a bug-eating conspiracy theory goes mainstream|url=https://www.npr.org/2023/03/31/1166649732/conspiracy-theory-eating-bugs-4chan|publication=All Things Considered|date=March 31, 2023|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref>

It's a matter of opinion whether Disch's portrayal of termite processing on an industrial scale is the grossest version of a food factory in science fiction (that honor might go to the giant underground chicken-heart blob in ''{{wp|The Space Merchants}}''), but it's one of the more plausible ones.

=== Beware of dogs, beware of evil workers ===

From [https://biblehub.com/kjv/philippians/3.htm Philippians 3:2-4, King James Version].

This is an example of Disch doing something he also [[334/334/Part_III#18._The_New_American_Catholic_Bible|did]] [[334/334/Part_VI#38._Father_Charmain|twice]] in ''334'': having a character land on a supposedly random Bible verse, when it's really the author being mischievous. Here Daniel has picked one of the most confusing Biblical passages that a casual reader could've possibly found—both because of the peculiar translation (the King James version uses the word "concision" in a way that I'm not sure it was ever used anywhere else in English literature), and because the meaning is so obscure without the context (the apostle Paul is ranting against other Christian factions of his time). Some [https://biblehub.com/nasb_/philippians/3.htm other translations] are a bit clearer, but only a bit.

The specific content of the passage may not be very important, but here's my best attempt to summarize it. After some general insults about "dogs" and "evil workers", Paul specifically complains about Christians who believe that circumcision and other traditional Jewish practices should remain important in their faith. He argues instead that "circumcision" should now be thought of as a spiritual condition, a matter of having the right faith—as the people in his own faction do. But as sort of a hedge and/or brag, he adds that if traditional circumcision is so important, i.e. if you really insist on having "confidence in the flesh", then he has that too since he was physically circumcised—and that maybe it should even count extra for him, since he used to be a very traditional Pharisee.

=== the windows were all sealed tight ===

Here we get one more bit of exposition about the rules of flying: "fairies" can travel effortlessly by willpower, but they can't go through solid objects.

=== The faster I let myself spin the more exciting ===

[[File:OWOS-cover-fsf.jpg|thumb|left|300px|Cover art by Ed Emshwiller]] And finally, the most important rule for fairies: if you go too close to any spinning thing, you'll be entranced and stuck there forever. The nature of a "fairy-trap" was left intentionally vague before, but in hindsight, every electric fan that we've heard about being used for this purpose indicates someone's willingness to cause someone else to die in a coma.

The idea that a particular physical structure could entice a disembodied spirit also appears in Disch's ''[[The Businessman#Chapter 43|The Businessman]]'', where Giselle's ghost is mystically intoxicated by the pattern on a potholder.

Ed Emshwiller's cover painting for ''The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction'' February 1979 issue—where the first part of ''On Wings of Song'' appeared—shows a group of ethereal figures drifting toward an object that is just abstract enough that if you don't yet know the story, you could easily assume it's some sort of alien portal, but if you do know, it's clearly a tabletop electric fan.

=== the one about purity of heart being to will one thing ===

Van Dyke got this from [https://www.religion-online.org/book/purity-of-heart-is-to-will-one-thing/ Kierkegaard].

=== to live at the end of such a civilization ===

Here I think ''On Wings of Song'' is echoing not just a general 1970s fear of American decline, but the specific angle that Disch explored in ''[[334]]'': the psychological ''appeal'' of imagining that you're in a crumbling empire, at least if you're a relatively privileged person.

=== Cairo and Bombay for the National Council of Churches' Triage Committee ===

Triage is the process of deciding who to help first in an emergency, and who to immediately give up on.

=== run into an iceberg and sink, like ... the lost city of Brasilia ===

[[File:Vila-amaury-1.jpeg|thumb|right|300px|Vila Amaury, 1959]][[File:Vila-amaury-2.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Vila Amaury, 2010]] This condensed metaphor might refer to Vila Amaury, the lost city ''within'' the city of Brasilia. It makes sense for Van Dyke to see Brasilia as an example of "the Civilization of the Business Man": it was a heavily planned city built by technocrats in relatively recent history, and in the process of its creation, Vila Amaury was created as a company shanty-town to house 15,000 migrant workers—who were then displaced because the plan for Brasilia included an artificial lake, created by the Lago Paranoá dam, entirely submerging the site of the town.<ref>{{cite article|author=Basques, Victoria|title=Vila Amaury, uma cidade submersa|url=https://medium.com/esquinaonline/vila-amaury-uma-cidade-submersa-9b3e48dc8d12|publication=Esquina On-line|date=November 14, 2018|accessed=January 25, 2025}}</ref>

=== you are a punk singer ===

Disch probably was not thinking of punk rock, which was still fairly new at the time, but he's using the word in the same sense that gave punk rock its name: unskilled, no good, lowlife. Not coincidentally, it's also an old derogatory word for a young man who is used for sex, especially in prison.

=== I am the captain of the Pinafore ===

From ''{{wp|H.M.S. Pinafore}}'' by Gilbert & Sullivan (1878). This is a call-and-response song, and Daniel is singing both parts, a little inaccurately; the actual lines are:

: CAPTAIN: I am the Captain of the Pinafore;
: CREW: And a right good captain, too!
: CAPTAIN: You're very, very good,
: And be it understood,
: I command a right good crew.

([https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OqWNmTXhI34 Recording of a performance by the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company, 1959])

== Footnotes ==
<references/>

{{On Wings of Song nav}}

File:Turtle-cover-de-2005.jpg

2025-01-30T02:51:18Z

Eb: Eb uploaded a new version of File:Turtle-cover-de-2005.jpg

== Summary ==
Cover for a German translation of ''[[Turtle Diary]]''.

Turtle Diary/Editions

2025-01-30T02:50:08Z

Eb: /* Translations */

{{#css:Turtle Diary.css}}{{#addbodyclass:horiz-toc}}
Sources include {{WorldCat editions|808413354}} and [https://www.unesco.org/xtrans/bsresult.aspx?lg=0&a=Hoban%20Russell&fr=0 UNESCO Index Translationum].

== US ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|image=Turtle-cover-random-house.jpg|desc=Random House, 1976. Hardcover.|isbn=0394401999 }}
{{Edition tile|image=Turtle-cover-avon.jpg|desc=Avon Books, 1982. Paperback.|isbn=0380390817}}
{{Edition tile|image=Turtle-cover-pocket-books.jpg|desc=Pocket Books, 1986. Paperback (movie tie-in).|isbn=0671618334}}
{{Edition tile|image=Turtle-cover-omnibus.jpg|desc=In ''A Russell Hoban Omnibus'', Indiana University Press, 1999. Hardcover.|isbn=0253335868}}
{{Edition tile|image=Turtle-cover-nyrb.jpg|desc=NYRB Classics, 2013. Trade paperback. Introduction by Ed Park.|cover-by=ROA & Marc Schmidt|
isbn=1590176464}}

</div>

== UK ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|image=Turtle-cover-cape.jpg|desc=Jonathan Cape, 1975. Hardcover.|isbn=0224010859}}
{{Edition tile|image=Turtle-cover-picador.jpg|desc=Picador, 1977. Trade paperback.}}
{{Edition tile|image=Turtle-cover-picador-1987.jpg|desc=Picador, 1987. Softcover (movie tie-in).}}
{{Edition tile|image=Turtle-cover-picador-1991.jpg|desc=Picador, 1991. Paperback.|isbn=0330250507}}
{{Edition tile|image=Turtle-cover-bloomsbury.jpg|desc=Bloomsbury, 2001. Trade paperback.|isbn=0747548315}}
{{Edition tile|image=Turtle-cover-penguin.jpg|desc=Penguin Classics, 2021. Trade paperback.|cover-by=Eduardo Paolozzi|isbn=0241485762}}
</div>

== Translations ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|language=Dutch|translator=J.J. De Wit|alt-title=Schildpaddagboek|image=Turtle-cover-nl-1985.jpeg|desc=Agathon, 1985. Paperback.|isbn=9026970382}}
{{Edition tile|language=German|translator=Annette Charpentier|alt-title=Ozeanische Gefühle: ein Schildkrötenroman|image=Turtle-cover-de-1985.jpg|desc=E. Diederichs Verlag, 1985. Hardcover.|isbn=3424008621}}
{{Edition tile|language=Italian|translator=Delfina Vezzoli|alt-title=Diario della tartaruga|image=Turtle-cover-it-feltrinelli.jpg|desc=Feltrinelli, 1986. Paperback.|isbn=8807050366}}
{{Edition tile|language=Danish|translator=Poul Pedersen|alt-title=Skildpaddedagbog|image=Turtle-cover-da-1986.jpg|desc=Gyldendal, 1986.}}
{{Edition tile|language=Swedish|translator=Maria Ekman|alt-title=Sköldpaddsdagabok|image=Turtle-cover-sv-1987.jpg|desc=Litteraturfrämjandet, 1987.|isbn=918648821X}}
{{Edition tile|language=German|translator=Annette Charpentier|alt-title=Ozeanische Gefühle|image=Turtle-cover-de-1988.jpg|desc=Schürmann und Kiewning, 1988. Hardcover.|isbn=9783499121920}}
{{Edition tile|language=Catalan|translator=Enric Canals|alt-title=Diari de tortugues|image=Turtle-cover-ca-1990.jpg|desc=Edicions 62, 1990. Paperback.|isbn=8429731229}}
{{Edition tile|language=Spanish|translator=Teofilo de Lozoya|alt-title=Diario de las tortugas|image=Turtle-cover-es-1990.jpg|desc=Edhasa, 1990. Paperback.|isbn=9789753631211}}
{{Edition tile|language=Swedish|translator=Maria Ekman|alt-title=Sköldpaddsdagabok|image=Turtle-cover-sv-1991.jpg|desc=Ellerström, 1991.|isbn=91-7448-647-0}}
{{Edition tile|language=Turkish|translator=Armağan İlkin|alt-title=Kaplumbağa Güncesi|image=Turtle-cover-tr-1992.jpg|desc=Yapı Kredi Yayınları, 1992. Paperback.|isbn=9753631219}}
{{Edition tile|language=German|translator=Annette Charpentier|alt-title=Ozeanische Gefühle|image=Turtle-cover-de-2005.jpg|desc=Heinrich und Hahn, 2005. Hardcover.|isbn=9783865970350}}
{{Edition tile|language=Polish|translator=Michał Kłobukowski|alt-title=Żółwi dziennik|image=Turtle-cover-pl.jpg|desc=Baobab, 2009. Paperback.|isbn=838964214X}}
{{Edition tile|language=Hebrew|translator=Rana Werbin|alt-title=Yoman Tzavim|image=Turtle-cover-he-2018.jpeg|desc=Arvi Nahal, 2018. Paperback.|cover-by=Nir Darom|isbn=9655647102}}
{{Edition tile|language=Turkish|translator=Banu Karakaş|alt-title=Kaplumbağa Günlüğü|image=Turtle-cover-tr-2020.jpg|desc=Yedi Yayınları, 2020. Paperback.|isbn=6058050065}}
</div>

''Couldn't find a cover image for:''

{{Edition desc|language=French|translator=Brigitte Gyr|alt-title=Le journal d'une tortue|desc=Flammarion, 1982.|}}

{{Edition desc|language=Japanese|translator=Yumiko Inui|alt-title=Sorezore no umi e|desc=Hyôronsya, 1987.}}

== E-books & Audio ==

Bloomsbury, 2012, Kindle edition. {{ISBN|1408835282}}

NYRB Classics, 2013, Kindle edition. {{ISBN|1590176472}}

Penguin, 2021, Kindle edition. ASIN B08DXVXDL8

Audible Audio, 2021. Read by Harry Myers and Lucy Patterson. ASIN B08XY3KBQL

File:Turtle-cover-de-2005.jpg

2025-01-30T02:44:55Z

Eb: Cover for a German translation of ''Turtle Diary''.

== Summary ==
Cover for a German translation of ''[[Turtle Diary]]''.

File:Turtle-cover-de-1988.jpg

2025-01-30T02:41:56Z

Eb: Cover for a German translation of ''Turtle Diary''.

== Summary ==
Cover for a German translation of ''[[Turtle Diary]]''.

File:Turtle-cover-sv-1991.jpg

2025-01-30T02:38:33Z

Eb: Cover for a Swedish translation of ''Turtle Diary''.

== Summary ==
Cover for a Swedish translation of ''[[Turtle Diary]]''.

File:Turtle-cover-sv-1987.jpg

2025-01-30T02:34:49Z

Eb: Cover for a Swedish translation of ''Turtle Diary''.

== Summary ==
Cover for a Swedish translation of ''[[Turtle Diary]]''.

File:Turtle-cover-da-1986.jpg

2025-01-30T02:33:17Z

Eb: Cover for a Danish translation of ''Turtle Diary''.

== Summary ==
Cover for a Danish translation of ''[[Turtle Diary]]''.

Turtle Diary/Editions

2025-01-30T02:28:13Z

Eb:

{{#css:Turtle Diary.css}}{{#addbodyclass:horiz-toc}}
Sources include {{WorldCat editions|808413354}} and [https://www.unesco.org/xtrans/bsresult.aspx?lg=0&a=Hoban%20Russell&fr=0 UNESCO Index Translationum].

== US ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|image=Turtle-cover-random-house.jpg|desc=Random House, 1976. Hardcover.|isbn=0394401999 }}
{{Edition tile|image=Turtle-cover-avon.jpg|desc=Avon Books, 1982. Paperback.|isbn=0380390817}}
{{Edition tile|image=Turtle-cover-pocket-books.jpg|desc=Pocket Books, 1986. Paperback (movie tie-in).|isbn=0671618334}}
{{Edition tile|image=Turtle-cover-omnibus.jpg|desc=In ''A Russell Hoban Omnibus'', Indiana University Press, 1999. Hardcover.|isbn=0253335868}}
{{Edition tile|image=Turtle-cover-nyrb.jpg|desc=NYRB Classics, 2013. Trade paperback. Introduction by Ed Park.|cover-by=ROA & Marc Schmidt|
isbn=1590176464}}

</div>

== UK ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|image=Turtle-cover-cape.jpg|desc=Jonathan Cape, 1975. Hardcover.|isbn=0224010859}}
{{Edition tile|image=Turtle-cover-picador.jpg|desc=Picador, 1977. Trade paperback.}}
{{Edition tile|image=Turtle-cover-picador-1987.jpg|desc=Picador, 1987. Softcover (movie tie-in).}}
{{Edition tile|image=Turtle-cover-picador-1991.jpg|desc=Picador, 1991. Paperback.|isbn=0330250507}}
{{Edition tile|image=Turtle-cover-bloomsbury.jpg|desc=Bloomsbury, 2001. Trade paperback.|isbn=0747548315}}
{{Edition tile|image=Turtle-cover-penguin.jpg|desc=Penguin Classics, 2021. Trade paperback.|cover-by=Eduardo Paolozzi|isbn=0241485762}}
</div>

== Translations ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|language=Dutch|translator=J.J. De Wit|alt-title=Schildpaddagboek|image=Turtle-cover-nl-1985.jpeg|desc=Agathon, 1985. Paperback.|isbn=9026970382}}
{{Edition tile|language=German|translator=Annette Charpentier|alt-title=Ozeanische Gefühle: ein Schildkrötenroman|image=Turtle-cover-de-1985.jpg|desc=E. Diederichs Verlag, 1985. Hardcover.|isbn=3424008621}}
{{Edition tile|language=Italian|translator=Delfina Vezzoli|alt-title=Diario della tartaruga|image=Turtle-cover-it-feltrinelli.jpg|desc=Feltrinelli, 1986. Paperback.|isbn=8807050366}}
{{Edition tile|language=Catalan|translator=Enric Canals|alt-title=Diari de tortugues|image=Turtle-cover-ca-1990.jpg|desc=Edicions 62, 1990. Paperback.|isbn=8429731229}}
{{Edition tile|language=Spanish|translator=Teofilo de Lozoya|alt-title=Diario de las tortugas|image=Turtle-cover-es-1990.jpg|desc=Edhasa, 1990. Paperback.|isbn=9789753631211}}
{{Edition tile|language=Turkish|translator=Armağan İlkin|alt-title=Kaplumbağa Güncesi|image=Turtle-cover-tr-1992.jpg|desc=Yapı Kredi Yayınları, 1992. Paperback.|isbn=9753631219}}
{{Edition tile|language=Polish|translator=Michał Kłobukowski|alt-title=Żółwi dziennik|image=Turtle-cover-pl.jpg|desc=Baobab, 2009. Paperback.|isbn=838964214X}}
{{Edition tile|language=Hebrew|translator=Rana Werbin|alt-title=Yoman Tzavim|image=Turtle-cover-he-2018.jpeg|desc=Arvi Nahal, 2018. Paperback.|cover-by=Nir Darom|isbn=9655647102}}
{{Edition tile|language=Turkish|translator=Banu Karakaş|alt-title=Kaplumbağa Günlüğü|image=Turtle-cover-tr-2020.jpg|desc=Yedi Yayınları, 2020. Paperback.|isbn=6058050065}}
</div>

== E-books & Audio ==

Bloomsbury, 2012, Kindle edition. {{ISBN|1408835282}}

NYRB Classics, 2013, Kindle edition. {{ISBN|1590176472}}

Penguin, 2021, Kindle edition. ASIN B08DXVXDL8

Audible Audio, 2021. Read by Harry Myers and Lucy Patterson. ASIN B08XY3KBQL

The Businessman/Editions

2025-01-30T02:11:26Z

Eb: /* Translations */

{{#addbodyclass: horiz-toc}}{{#css:The Businessman.css}}
Sources include {{ISFDB title|2297}}, {{WorldCat editions|10072358}}, and {{Disch Index Translationum}}.

== US ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|image=Businessman-cover-harper-row.jpg|desc=Harper & Row, 1984. Hardcover.|cover-by=Terrence M. Fehr|isbn=0-06-015292-3}}
{{Edition tile|image=Businessman-cover-berkley.jpg|desc=Berkley Books, 1993. Paperback.|isbn=0-425-13746-5}}
{{Edition tile|image=Businessman-cover-uminn.jpg|desc=University of Minnesota Press, 2010. Trade paperback. Introduction by John Crowley.|isbn=0-8166-7208-3}}
</div>

== UK ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|image=Businessman-cover-cape.jpg|desc=Jonathan Cape, 1984. Hardcover.|cover-by=Ian Pollock|isbn=0-224-02204-0}}
{{Edition tile|image=Businessman-cover-paladin.jpg|desc=Triad Paladin, 1986. Trade paperback.|cover-by=Neil Breedon|isbn=0-586-08562-9}}
</div>

== Translations ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|language=French|translator=Alain Dorémieux|alt-title=Le businessman|image=Businessman-cover-fr-denoel.jpg|desc=Denoël, 1984. Paperback.|cover-by=Gérard Duboscq|isbn=2-207-30377-2}}
{{Edition tile|language=French|translator=Rolf Jurkeit|alt-title=Das Geschäft mit dem Grauen: Die Ausgeburt des Bösen|image=Businessman-cover-de-heyne.jpg|desc=Heyne, 1984. Paperback.|isbn=3-453-44065-X}}
{{Edition tile|language=Spanish|translator=María José Rodellar|alt-title=El ejecutivo|image=Businessman-cover-es-alcor.jpg|desc=Alcor, 1990. Paperback.|cover-by=Neil Breedon|isbn=8427014368}}
{{Edition tile|language=Japanese|translator=Yōko Hosomi|alt-title=|image=Businessman-cover-ja-1990.jpeg|desc=Sogensha, 1990. Paperback.|isbn=9784488551018}}
{{Edition tile|language=Spanish|translator=María José Rodellar|alt-title=El ejecutivo|image=Businessman-cover-es-martinez-roca.jpg|desc=Martínez Roca Bolsillo, 1994. Paperback.|cover-by=Mónica Pasamón|isbn=842701869X}}
</div>

File:Businessman-cover-ja-1990.jpeg

2025-01-30T02:10:13Z

Eb: Cover of a Japanese translation of ''The Businessman''.

== Summary ==
Cover of a Japanese translation of ''[[The Businessman]]''.

The Businessman/Editions

2025-01-30T02:06:09Z

Eb:

{{#addbodyclass: horiz-toc}}{{#css:The Businessman.css}}
Sources include {{ISFDB title|2297}}, {{WorldCat editions|10072358}}, and {{Disch Index Translationum}}.

== US ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|image=Businessman-cover-harper-row.jpg|desc=Harper & Row, 1984. Hardcover.|cover-by=Terrence M. Fehr|isbn=0-06-015292-3}}
{{Edition tile|image=Businessman-cover-berkley.jpg|desc=Berkley Books, 1993. Paperback.|isbn=0-425-13746-5}}
{{Edition tile|image=Businessman-cover-uminn.jpg|desc=University of Minnesota Press, 2010. Trade paperback. Introduction by John Crowley.|isbn=0-8166-7208-3}}
</div>

== UK ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|image=Businessman-cover-cape.jpg|desc=Jonathan Cape, 1984. Hardcover.|cover-by=Ian Pollock|isbn=0-224-02204-0}}
{{Edition tile|image=Businessman-cover-paladin.jpg|desc=Triad Paladin, 1986. Trade paperback.|cover-by=Neil Breedon|isbn=0-586-08562-9}}
</div>

== Translations ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|language=French|translator=Alain Dorémieux|alt-title=Le businessman|image=Businessman-cover-fr-denoel.jpg|desc=Denoël, 1984. Paperback.|cover-by=Gérard Duboscq|isbn=2-207-30377-2}}
{{Edition tile|language=French|translator=Rolf Jurkeit|alt-title=Das Geschäft mit dem Grauen: Die Ausgeburt des Bösen|image=Businessman-cover-de-heyne.jpg|desc=Heyne, 1984. Paperback.|isbn=3-453-44065-X}}
{{Edition tile|language=Spanish|translator=María José Rodellar|alt-title=El ejecutivo|image=Businessman-cover-es-alcor.jpg|desc=Alcor, 1990. Paperback.|cover-by=Neil Breedon|isbn=8427014368}}
{{Edition tile|language=Spanish|translator=María José Rodellar|alt-title=El ejecutivo|image=Businessman-cover-es-martinez-roca.jpg|desc=Martínez Roca Bolsillo, 1994. Paperback.|cover-by=Mónica Pasamón|isbn=842701869X}}
</div>

<references/>

The M.D./Editions

2025-01-30T01:47:00Z

Eb: /* Translations */

{{#addbodyclass: horiz-toc}}{{#css:The M.D.css}}
Sources include {{ISFDB title|1596}}, {{WorldCat editions|617508643}}, and {{Disch Index Translationum}}.

== US ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|image=MD-cover-knopf.jpg|desc=Alfred A. Knopf, 1991. Hardcover.|cover-by=Archie Ferguson|isbn=0-394-58662-X}}
{{Edition tile|image=MD-cover-berkley.jpg|desc=Berkley Books, 1992. Paperback.|cover-by=Geoffrey Spear|isbn=0-425-13261-7}}
{{Edition tile|image=MD-cover-uminn.jpg|desc=University of Minnesota Press, 2010. Trade paperback. Foreword by John Clute.|isbn=0-8166-7209-1}}
</div>

== UK ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|image=MD-cover-harpercollins.jpg|desc=HarperCollins UK, 1991. Hardcover.|cover-by=Mike Timmins|isbn=0-246-13148-9}}
{{Edition tile|image=MD-cover-grafton.jpg|desc=Grafton, 1993. Paperback.|cover-by=Chris Brown|isbn=0-586-07284-5}}
</div>

== Translations ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|language=Dutch|translator=Knut Azimuth|alt-title=De duivelsstaf|image=MD-cover-nl-meulenhoff.jpg|desc=Meulenhoff, 1992. Trade paperback.|cover-by=Nico Keulers|isbn=90-290-4428-4}}
{{Edition tile|language=Spanish|translator=Gemma Moral Bartolomé|alt-title=Doctor en medicina|image=MD-cover-es-ediciones-b.jpg|desc=Ediciones B, 1992. Trade paperback.|cover-by=Jordi Vallhonesta|isbn=84-406-2931-1}}
{{Edition tile|language=German|translator=Joachim Honnef|alt-title=Der Merkurstab|image=MD-cover-de-bastei-luebbe.jpg|desc=Bastei Lübbe, 1993. Paperback.|cover-by=Nico Keulers|isbn=3-404-13459-1}}
{{Edition tile|language=Polish|translator=Wojciech Soporek|alt-title=Lekarz|image=MD-cover-pl-1993.jpg|desc=Amber, 1993. Paperback.|isbn=83-7082-255-X}}
{{Edition tile|language=Czech|translator=Sylva Kajdošová|alt-title=M.D. – V osidlech pohanského boha|image=MD-cover-cz-adam.jpg|desc=Adam, 1993. Hardcover.|isbn=8090158307}}
{{Edition tile|language=French|translator=Natalie Zimmermann|alt-title=Le caducée maléfique|image=MD-cover-fr-julliard.jpg|desc=Julliard, 1993. Paperback.|isbn=2260009573}}
{{Edition tile|language=French|translator=Natalie Zimmermann|alt-title=Le caducée maléfique|image=MD-cover-fr-presses.jpg|desc=Presses Pocket, 1994. Paperback.|cover-by=Pierre-Olivier Templier|isbn=2-266-00477-8}}
{{Edition tile|language=Italian|translator=Nuccia Agazzi|alt-title=Il taummaturgo|image=MD-cover-it-sperling.jpg|desc=Sperling & Kupfer, 1995. Hardcover.|cover-by=Archie Ferguson|isbn=8820020920}}
{{Edition tile|language=Japanese|translator=Tsuyoshi Matsumoto|alt-title=M D. 3|image=MD-cover-ja-1996.jpg|desc=Bungeishunjū, 1996.|isbn=9784167218270}}
</div>

<references/>

File:MD-cover-pl-1993.jpg

2025-01-30T01:40:43Z

Eb: Cover of a Polish translation of ''The M.D.''.

== Summary ==
Cover of a Polish translation of ''[[The M.D.]]''.

File:MD-cover-ja-1996.jpg

2025-01-30T01:40:16Z

Eb: Cover of a Japanese translation of ''The M.D.''.

== Summary ==
Cover of a Japanese translation of ''[[The M.D.]]''.

The M.D./Editions

2025-01-30T01:33:53Z

Eb:

{{#addbodyclass: horiz-toc}}{{#css:The M.D.css}}
Sources include {{ISFDB title|1596}}, {{WorldCat editions|617508643}}, and {{Disch Index Translationum}}.

== US ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|image=MD-cover-knopf.jpg|desc=Alfred A. Knopf, 1991. Hardcover.|cover-by=Archie Ferguson|isbn=0-394-58662-X}}
{{Edition tile|image=MD-cover-berkley.jpg|desc=Berkley Books, 1992. Paperback.|cover-by=Geoffrey Spear|isbn=0-425-13261-7}}
{{Edition tile|image=MD-cover-uminn.jpg|desc=University of Minnesota Press, 2010. Trade paperback. Foreword by John Clute.|isbn=0-8166-7209-1}}
</div>

== UK ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|image=MD-cover-harpercollins.jpg|desc=HarperCollins UK, 1991. Hardcover.|cover-by=Mike Timmins|isbn=0-246-13148-9}}
{{Edition tile|image=MD-cover-grafton.jpg|desc=Grafton, 1993. Paperback.|cover-by=Chris Brown|isbn=0-586-07284-5}}
</div>

== Translations ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|language=Dutch|translator=Knut Azimuth|alt-title=De duivelsstaf|image=MD-cover-nl-meulenhoff.jpg|desc=Meulenhoff, 1992. Trade paperback.|cover-by=Nico Keulers|isbn=90-290-4428-4}}
{{Edition tile|language=Spanish|translator=Gemma Moral Bartolomé|alt-title=Doctor en medicina|image=MD-cover-es-ediciones-b.jpg|desc=Ediciones B, 1992. Trade paperback.|cover-by=Jordi Vallhonesta|isbn=84-406-2931-1}}
{{Edition tile|language=German|translator=Joachim Honnef|alt-title=Der Merkurstab|image=MD-cover-de-bastei-luebbe.jpg|desc=Bastei Lübbe, 1993. Paperback.|cover-by=Nico Keulers|isbn=3-404-13459-1}}
{{Edition tile|language=Czech|translator=Sylva Kajdošová|alt-title=M.D. – V osidlech pohanského boha|image=MD-cover-cz-adam.jpg|desc=Adam, 1993. Hardcover.|isbn=8090158307}}
{{Edition tile|language=French|translator=Natalie Zimmermann|alt-title=Le caducée maléfique|image=MD-cover-fr-julliard.jpg|desc=Julliard, 1993. Paperback.|isbn=2260009573}}
{{Edition tile|language=French|translator=Natalie Zimmermann|alt-title=Le caducée maléfique|image=MD-cover-fr-presses.jpg|desc=Presses Pocket, 1994. Paperback.|cover-by=Pierre-Olivier Templier|isbn=2-266-00477-8}}
{{Edition tile|language=Italian|translator=Nuccia Agazzi|alt-title=Il taumaturgo|image=MD-cover-it-sperling.jpg|desc=Sperling & Kupfer, 1995. Hardcover.|cover-by=Archie Ferguson|isbn=8820020920}}

</div>

<references/>

Camp Concentration/Editions

2025-01-30T01:30:10Z

Eb: /* Translations */

{{#css:Camp Concentration.css}}{{#addbodyclass:horiz-toc}}
Sources include {{ISFDB title|2285}}, {{WorldCat editions|36006}}, and {{Disch Index Translationum}}.

All the notes on the rest of this site refer to the 1999 Vintage Books edition.

== US ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|image=camp-cover-doubleday.jpg|desc=Doubleday, 1969. Hardcover.|cover-by=Saul Lambert}}
{{Edition tile|image=camp-cover-avon.jpg|desc=Avon, 1971. Paperback.|isbn=0380023482}}
{{Edition tile|image=camp-cover-bantam.jpg|desc=Bantam Books, 1980. Paperback.|isbn=0553131176}}
{{Edition tile|image=camp-cover-carroll-graf.jpg|desc=Carroll & Graf, 1988.<ref>The 1988 Carroll & Graf paperback features a peculiar back cover blurb about "a frightening future world when Third World guerrillas are busy at work undermining the shaky foundations of Western democracies," which bears no resemblance to the backstory in the novel: Disch was clearly referencing the Vietnam War from a leftist perspective, didn't imply that the US was defending any democracies, and said nothing about whether the other side was a guerrilla force or a nation or multiple nations. In the context of 1988, the blurb sounds like a Reaganite spin on the Latin American wars where the US supported brutally repressive factions in the name of anticommunism. Matthew Davis in correspondence suggested to me that this sounded like "a scenario for an Oliver Stone remake of ''The Fury'' starring Christopher Walken and {{wp|William J. Casey}}"—which might be slightly backwards since Stone's point of view would likely resemble Disch's more than the blurb, but Davis also came across an unexpected coincidence in that regard: Norman Kagan, one of whose stories ("The Dreadful Has Already Happened") was collected in Disch's anthology ''The Ruins of Earth'', wrote a 1995 book on Oliver Stone whose epigram includes a quote from ''Camp Concentration''.</ref> Paperback.|cover-by=Stephen Hall|isbn=0881843865}}
{{Edition tile|image=camp-cover-vintage.jpg|desc=Vintage Books (Random House), 1999. Trade paperback.|cover-by=Jana Sturbek|isbn=0375705457}}
</div>

== UK & Australia ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|image=Camp-cover-new-worlds.jpg|desc=Serialized in four parts in ''New Worlds'': {{ISFDB|251475|July}}, {{ISFDB|251476|August}}, {{ISFDB|251477|September}}, and {{ISFDB|251478|October}} 1967.|}}
{{Edition tile|image=Camp-cover-hart-davis.jpg|desc=Hart-Davis, 1968. Hardcover.|cover-by=Ken Reilly|isbn=0246973528}}
{{Edition tile|image=Camp-cover-panther-1969.jpg|desc=Panther, 1969. Paperback.|cover-by=Rickards/Vargo|isbn=0586028463}}
{{Edition tile|image=Camp-cover-panther-1973.jpg|desc=Panther, 1973. Paperback.|isbn=0586028463}}
{{Edition tile|image=Camp-cover-panther-granada.jpg|desc=Panther, 1977. Paperback.|cover-by=Rickards/Vargo|isbn=0586028463}}
</div>

== Translations ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|language=Dutch|translator=Fred Schmidt|alt-title=Kamp concentratie|image=Camp-cover-nl-meulenhoff.jpg|desc=Meulenhoff, 1970. Paperback.|cover-by=Ruurd Groot}}
{{Edition tile|language=French|translator=Marcel Battin|alt-title=Genocides / Camp de concentration|image=Camp-cover-fr-opta.jpg|desc=OPTA, 1970.<ref>A combined edition with Disch's ''The Genocides''. Translation of cover text: "Are we worms in fruit? Has power declared war on intelligence? Two journeys into the shadows, from an American who is afraid."</ref> Hardcover.}}
{{Edition tile|language=German|translator=Gertrud Baruch|image=Camp-cover-de-lichtenberg.jpg|desc=Lichtenberg, 1971. Trade paperback.|cover-by=E. Baum & W. Baum|isbn=3-7852-2014-6}}
{{Edition tile|language=French|translator=Gertrud Baruch|image=Camp-cover-fr-rencontre.jpg|desc=Éditions Recontre, 1971. Hardcover.}}
{{Edition tile|language=Italian|translator=Gian Paolo Cossato & Sandro Sandrelli|alt-title=Campo Archimede|image=Camp-cover-it-galassia.jpg|desc=Casa Editrice La Tribuna, 1972. Published as issue #160 of ''Galassia''.|cover-by=Antonio Atza|isbn=3-7852-2014-6}}
{{Edition tile|language=German|translator=Gertrud Baruch|image=Camp-cover-de-heyne.jpg|desc=Heyne, 1974. Paperback.|cover-by=Karel Thole|isbn=3-453-30300-8}}
{{Edition tile|language=Spanish|translator=Andrés Esteban Machalski|alt-title=La Casa de la Muerte|image=Camp-cover-es-intersea.jpg|desc=Intersea, 1976. Paperback.}}
{{Edition tile|language=French|translator=Marcel Battin|alt-title=Camp de concentration|image=Camp-cover-fr-laffont.jpg|desc=Robert Laffont, 1978. Paperback.}}
{{Edition tile|language=Serbian|translator=Vukica Đilas|alt-title=Logor koncentracije|image=Camp-cover-sr-jugoslavija.jpg|desc=Jugoslavija, 1978. Trade paperback.}}
{{Edition tile|language=Spanish|translator=Alberto Laurent|alt-title=Campo de concentración|image=Camp-cover-es-adiax.jpg|desc=Adiax, 1983. Trade paperback.|isbn=84-85963-42-3}}
{{Edition tile|language=French|translator=Marcel Battin|alt-title=Camp de concentration|image=Camp-cover-fr-jailu.jpg|desc=J'ai Lu, 1983. Paperback.|cover-by=Barclay Shaw|isbn=2-277-21492-2}}
{{Edition tile|language=Japanese|translator=Yukio Noguchi|alt-title=Kyampu konsentorêshon|image=Camp-cover-ja-1986.jpg|desc=Sanrio, 1986. Paperback.|isbn=9784387861461}}
{{Edition tile|language=Italian|translator=Gian Paolo Cossato & Sandro Sandrelli|alt-title=Campo Archimede|image=Camp-cover-it-mondadori.jpg|desc=Mondadori, 1989.|cover-by=Oscar Chichoni}}
{{Edition tile|language=Greek|translator=Orestēs Schinas|alt-title=Stratopedo A|image=Camp-cover-el-ars-longa.jpg|desc=Ars Longa, 1989. Paperback.}}
{{Edition tile|language=Spanish|translator=Alberto Laurent|alt-title=Campo de concentración|image=Camp-cover-es-ultramar.jpg|desc=Ultramar, 1989. Paperback.|isbn=8473865308}}
{{Edition tile|language=Turkish|translator=Mehmet Moralı|alt-title=Kobaylar Kampi|image=Camp-cover-tr-metis.jpg|desc=Metis Yayincilik, 1998.|cover-by=Bruce Pennington|isbn=9753422105}}
{{Edition tile|language=Polish|translator=Kopociński Dariusz|alt-title=Obóz koncentracji|image=Camp-cover-pl-solaris.jpg|desc=Solaris, 2008. Paperback.|isbn=8389951851}}
</div>

== Footnotes ==
<references/>

{{Camp Concentration nav}}

Camp Concentration/Editions

2025-01-30T01:27:55Z

Eb: /* Translations */

{{#css:Camp Concentration.css}}{{#addbodyclass:horiz-toc}}
Sources include {{ISFDB title|2285}}, {{WorldCat editions|36006}}, and {{Disch Index Translationum}}.

All the notes on the rest of this site refer to the 1999 Vintage Books edition.

== US ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|image=camp-cover-doubleday.jpg|desc=Doubleday, 1969. Hardcover.|cover-by=Saul Lambert}}
{{Edition tile|image=camp-cover-avon.jpg|desc=Avon, 1971. Paperback.|isbn=0380023482}}
{{Edition tile|image=camp-cover-bantam.jpg|desc=Bantam Books, 1980. Paperback.|isbn=0553131176}}
{{Edition tile|image=camp-cover-carroll-graf.jpg|desc=Carroll & Graf, 1988.<ref>The 1988 Carroll & Graf paperback features a peculiar back cover blurb about "a frightening future world when Third World guerrillas are busy at work undermining the shaky foundations of Western democracies," which bears no resemblance to the backstory in the novel: Disch was clearly referencing the Vietnam War from a leftist perspective, didn't imply that the US was defending any democracies, and said nothing about whether the other side was a guerrilla force or a nation or multiple nations. In the context of 1988, the blurb sounds like a Reaganite spin on the Latin American wars where the US supported brutally repressive factions in the name of anticommunism. Matthew Davis in correspondence suggested to me that this sounded like "a scenario for an Oliver Stone remake of ''The Fury'' starring Christopher Walken and {{wp|William J. Casey}}"—which might be slightly backwards since Stone's point of view would likely resemble Disch's more than the blurb, but Davis also came across an unexpected coincidence in that regard: Norman Kagan, one of whose stories ("The Dreadful Has Already Happened") was collected in Disch's anthology ''The Ruins of Earth'', wrote a 1995 book on Oliver Stone whose epigram includes a quote from ''Camp Concentration''.</ref> Paperback.|cover-by=Stephen Hall|isbn=0881843865}}
{{Edition tile|image=camp-cover-vintage.jpg|desc=Vintage Books (Random House), 1999. Trade paperback.|cover-by=Jana Sturbek|isbn=0375705457}}
</div>

== UK & Australia ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|image=Camp-cover-new-worlds.jpg|desc=Serialized in four parts in ''New Worlds'': {{ISFDB|251475|July}}, {{ISFDB|251476|August}}, {{ISFDB|251477|September}}, and {{ISFDB|251478|October}} 1967.|}}
{{Edition tile|image=Camp-cover-hart-davis.jpg|desc=Hart-Davis, 1968. Hardcover.|cover-by=Ken Reilly|isbn=0246973528}}
{{Edition tile|image=Camp-cover-panther-1969.jpg|desc=Panther, 1969. Paperback.|cover-by=Rickards/Vargo|isbn=0586028463}}
{{Edition tile|image=Camp-cover-panther-1973.jpg|desc=Panther, 1973. Paperback.|isbn=0586028463}}
{{Edition tile|image=Camp-cover-panther-granada.jpg|desc=Panther, 1977. Paperback.|cover-by=Rickards/Vargo|isbn=0586028463}}
</div>

== Translations ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|language=Dutch|translator=Fred Schmidt|alt-title=Kamp concentratie|image=Camp-cover-nl-meulenhoff.jpg|desc=Meulenhoff, 1970. Paperback.|cover-by=Ruurd Groot}}
{{Edition tile|language=French|translator=Marcel Battin|alt-title=Genocides / Camp de concentration|image=Camp-cover-fr-opta.jpg|desc=OPTA, 1970.<ref>A combined edition with Disch's ''The Genocides''. Translation of cover text: "Are we worms in fruit? Has power declared war on intelligence? Two journeys into the shadows, from an American who is afraid."</ref> Hardcover.}}
{{Edition tile|language=German|translator=Gertrud Baruch|image=Camp-cover-de-lichtenberg.jpg|desc=Lichtenberg, 1971. Trade paperback.|cover-by=E. Baum & W. Baum|isbn=3-7852-2014-6}}
{{Edition tile|language=French|translator=Gertrud Baruch|image=Camp-cover-fr-rencontre.jpg|desc=Éditions Recontre, 1971. Hardcover.}}
{{Edition tile|language=Italian|translator=Gian Paolo Cossato & Sandro Sandrelli|alt-title=Campo Archimede|image=Camp-cover-it-galassia.jpg|desc=Casa Editrice La Tribuna, 1972. Published as issue #160 of ''Galassia''.|cover-by=Antonio Atza|isbn=3-7852-2014-6}}
{{Edition tile|language=German|translator=Gertrud Baruch|image=Camp-cover-de-heyne.jpg|desc=Heyne, 1974. Paperback.|cover-by=Karel Thole|isbn=3-453-30300-8}}
{{Edition tile|language=Spanish|translator=Andrés Esteban Machalski|alt-title=La Casa de la Muerte|image=Camp-cover-es-intersea.jpg|desc=Intersea, 1976. Paperback.}}
{{Edition tile|language=French|translator=Marcel Battin|alt-title=Camp de concentration|image=Camp-cover-fr-laffont.jpg|desc=Robert Laffont, 1978. Paperback.}}
{{Edition tile|language=Serbian|translator=Vukica Đilas|alt-title=Logor koncentracije|image=Camp-cover-sr-jugoslavija.jpg|desc=Jugoslavija, 1978. Trade paperback.}}
{{Edition tile|language=Spanish|translator=Alberto Laurent|alt-title=Campo de concentración|image=Camp-cover-es-adiax.jpg|desc=Adiax, 1983. Trade paperback.|isbn=84-85963-42-3}}
{{Edition tile|language=French|translator=Marcel Battin|alt-title=Camp de concentration|image=Camp-cover-fr-jailu.jpg|desc=J'ai Lu, 1983. Paperback.|cover-by=Barclay Shaw|isbn=2-277-21492-2}}
{{Edition tile|language=Japanese|translator=Yukio Noguchi|alt-title=Kyampu konsentorêshon|image=Camp-cover-ja-1986.jpg|desc=Sanrio, 1986. Paperback.|isbn=9784387861461}}
{{Edition tile|language=Italian|translator=Gian Paolo Cossato & Sandro Sandrelli|alt-title=Campo Archimede|image=Camp-cover-it-mondadori.jpg|desc=Mondadori, 1989.|cover-by=Oscar Chichoni}}
{{Edition tile|language=Greek|translator=Orestēs Schinas|alt-title=Stratopedo A|image=Camp-cover-el-ars-longa.jpg|desc=Ars Longa, 1989. Paperback.}}
{{Edition tile|language=Spanish|translator=Alberto Laurent|alt-title=Campo de concentración|image=Camp-cover-es-ultramar.jpg|desc=Ultramar, 1989. Paperback.|isbn=8473865308}}
{{Edition tile|language=Polish|translator=Kopociński Dariusz|alt-title=Obóz koncentracji|image=Camp-cover-pl-solaris.jpg|desc=Solaris, 2008. Paperback.|isbn=8389951851}}
{{Edition tile|language=Turkish|translator=Mehmet Moralı|alt-title=Kobaylar Kampi|image=Camp-cover-tr-metis.jpg|desc=Metis Yayincilik, 2015.|cover-by=Bruce Pennington|isbn=9753422105}}
</div>

== Footnotes ==
<references/>

{{Camp Concentration nav}}

File:Camp-cover-ja-1986.jpg

2025-01-30T01:23:30Z

Eb: Cover of a Japanese translation of ''Camp Concentration''.

== Summary ==
Cover of a Japanese translation of ''[[Camp Concentration]]''.

Camp Concentration/Editions

2025-01-30T01:18:29Z

Eb:

{{#css:Camp Concentration.css}}{{#addbodyclass:horiz-toc}}
Sources include {{ISFDB title|2285}}, {{WorldCat editions|36006}}, and {{Disch Index Translationum}}.

All the notes on the rest of this site refer to the 1999 Vintage Books edition.

== US ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|image=camp-cover-doubleday.jpg|desc=Doubleday, 1969. Hardcover.|cover-by=Saul Lambert}}
{{Edition tile|image=camp-cover-avon.jpg|desc=Avon, 1971. Paperback.|isbn=0380023482}}
{{Edition tile|image=camp-cover-bantam.jpg|desc=Bantam Books, 1980. Paperback.|isbn=0553131176}}
{{Edition tile|image=camp-cover-carroll-graf.jpg|desc=Carroll & Graf, 1988.<ref>The 1988 Carroll & Graf paperback features a peculiar back cover blurb about "a frightening future world when Third World guerrillas are busy at work undermining the shaky foundations of Western democracies," which bears no resemblance to the backstory in the novel: Disch was clearly referencing the Vietnam War from a leftist perspective, didn't imply that the US was defending any democracies, and said nothing about whether the other side was a guerrilla force or a nation or multiple nations. In the context of 1988, the blurb sounds like a Reaganite spin on the Latin American wars where the US supported brutally repressive factions in the name of anticommunism. Matthew Davis in correspondence suggested to me that this sounded like "a scenario for an Oliver Stone remake of ''The Fury'' starring Christopher Walken and {{wp|William J. Casey}}"—which might be slightly backwards since Stone's point of view would likely resemble Disch's more than the blurb, but Davis also came across an unexpected coincidence in that regard: Norman Kagan, one of whose stories ("The Dreadful Has Already Happened") was collected in Disch's anthology ''The Ruins of Earth'', wrote a 1995 book on Oliver Stone whose epigram includes a quote from ''Camp Concentration''.</ref> Paperback.|cover-by=Stephen Hall|isbn=0881843865}}
{{Edition tile|image=camp-cover-vintage.jpg|desc=Vintage Books (Random House), 1999. Trade paperback.|cover-by=Jana Sturbek|isbn=0375705457}}
</div>

== UK & Australia ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|image=Camp-cover-new-worlds.jpg|desc=Serialized in four parts in ''New Worlds'': {{ISFDB|251475|July}}, {{ISFDB|251476|August}}, {{ISFDB|251477|September}}, and {{ISFDB|251478|October}} 1967.|}}
{{Edition tile|image=Camp-cover-hart-davis.jpg|desc=Hart-Davis, 1968. Hardcover.|cover-by=Ken Reilly|isbn=0246973528}}
{{Edition tile|image=Camp-cover-panther-1969.jpg|desc=Panther, 1969. Paperback.|cover-by=Rickards/Vargo|isbn=0586028463}}
{{Edition tile|image=Camp-cover-panther-1973.jpg|desc=Panther, 1973. Paperback.|isbn=0586028463}}
{{Edition tile|image=Camp-cover-panther-granada.jpg|desc=Panther, 1977. Paperback.|cover-by=Rickards/Vargo|isbn=0586028463}}
</div>

== Translations ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|language=Dutch|translator=Fred Schmidt|alt-title=Kamp concentratie|image=Camp-cover-nl-meulenhoff.jpg|desc=Meulenhoff, 1970. Paperback.|cover-by=Ruurd Groot}}
{{Edition tile|language=French|translator=Marcel Battin|alt-title=Genocides / Camp de concentration|image=Camp-cover-fr-opta.jpg|desc=OPTA, 1970.<ref>A combined edition with Disch's ''The Genocides''. Translation of cover text: "Are we worms in fruit? Has power declared war on intelligence? Two journeys into the shadows, from an American who is afraid."</ref> Hardcover.}}
{{Edition tile|language=German|translator=Gertrud Baruch|image=Camp-cover-de-lichtenberg.jpg|desc=Lichtenberg, 1971. Trade paperback.|cover-by=E. Baum & W. Baum|isbn=3-7852-2014-6}}
{{Edition tile|language=French|translator=Gertrud Baruch|image=Camp-cover-fr-rencontre.jpg|desc=Éditions Recontre, 1971. Hardcover.}}
{{Edition tile|language=Italian|translator=Gian Paolo Cossato & Sandro Sandrelli|alt-title=Campo Archimede|image=Camp-cover-it-galassia.jpg|desc=Casa Editrice La Tribuna, 1972. Published as issue #160 of ''Galassia''.|cover-by=Antonio Atza|isbn=3-7852-2014-6}}
{{Edition tile|language=German|translator=Gertrud Baruch|image=Camp-cover-de-heyne.jpg|desc=Heyne, 1974. Paperback.|cover-by=Karel Thole|isbn=3-453-30300-8}}
{{Edition tile|language=Spanish|translator=Andrés Esteban Machalski|alt-title=La Casa de la Muerte|image=Camp-cover-es-intersea.jpg|desc=Intersea, 1976. Paperback.}}
{{Edition tile|language=French|translator=Marcel Battin|alt-title=Camp de concentration|image=Camp-cover-fr-laffont.jpg|desc=Robert Laffont, 1978. Paperback.}}
{{Edition tile|language=Serbian|translator=Vukica Đilas|alt-title=Logor koncentracije|image=Camp-cover-sr-jugoslavija.jpg|desc=Jugoslavija, 1978. Trade paperback.}}
{{Edition tile|language=Spanish|translator=Alberto Laurent|alt-title=Campo de concentración|image=Camp-cover-es-adiax.jpg|desc=Adiax, 1983. Trade paperback.|isbn=84-85963-42-3}}
{{Edition tile|language=French|alt-title=Camp de concentration|image=Camp-cover-fr-jailu.jpg|desc=J'ai Lu, 1983. Paperback.|cover-by=Barclay Shaw|isbn=2-277-21492-2}}
{{Edition tile|language=Italian|translator=Gian Paolo Cossato & Sandro Sandrelli|alt-title=Campo Archimede|image=Camp-cover-it-mondadori.jpg|desc=Mondadori, 1989.|cover-by=Oscar Chichoni}}
{{Edition tile|language=Greek|translator=Orestēs Schinas|alt-title=Stratopedo A|image=Camp-cover-el-ars-longa.jpg|desc=Ars Longa, 1989. Paperback.}}
{{Edition tile|language=Spanish|translator=Alberto Laurent|alt-title=Campo de concentración|image=Camp-cover-es-ultramar.jpg|desc=Ultramar, 1989. Paperback.|isbn=8473865308}}
{{Edition tile|language=Polish|translator=Kopociński Dariusz|alt-title=Obóz koncentracji|image=Camp-cover-pl-solaris.jpg|desc=Solaris, 2008. Paperback.|isbn=8389951851}}
{{Edition tile|language=Turkish|translator=Mehmet Moralı|alt-title=Kobaylar Kampi|image=Camp-cover-tr-metis.jpg|desc=Metis Yayincilik, 2015.|cover-by=Bruce Pennington|isbn=9753422105}}
</div>

== Footnotes ==
<references/>

{{Camp Concentration nav}}

334/Editions

2025-01-30T01:16:31Z

Eb:

{{#addbodyclass:horiz-toc}}
Sources include {{ISFDB title|2481}}, {{WorldCat editions|40714634}}, and {{Disch Index Translationum}}.

All the notes on the rest of this site refer to the 1999 Vintage Books edition.

== US ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|desc=Avon Books, 1974. Paperback.|image=334-cover-avon.jpg}}
{{Edition tile|desc=Gregg Press, 1976. Hardcover (exact reprint of the Avon Books paperback edition). Introduction by M. John Harrison.|image=334-cover-gregg.jpg|isbn=0839823312}}
{{Edition tile|desc=Carroll & Graf, 1987. Paperback.|image=334-cover-carroll-graf.jpg|cover-by=Roy Colmer|isbn=0881843407}}
{{Edition tile|desc=Vintage Books (Random House), 1999. Trade paperback.|image=334-cover-vintage.jpg|cover-by=Elliot Erwitt|isbn=0375705449}}
</div>

== UK & Australia ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|desc=MacGibbon & Kee, 1972. Hardcover.|image=334-cover-macgibbon-kee.jpg|cover-by=Michael Hasted|isbn=0261632833}}
{{Edition tile|desc=Sphere, 1974. Paperback.|image=334-cover-sphere.jpg|cover-by=Tony Roberts|isbn=0722129734}}
{{Edition tile|desc=Magnum, 1981. Paperback.|image=334-cover-magnum.jpg|isbn=0417060807}}
</div>

== Translations ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|language=Italian|translator=Roberta Rambelli|desc=Fanucci Editore, 1976. Trade paperback.|image=334-cover-it-fanucci.jpg|cover-by=Karel Thole}}
{{Edition tile|language=French|translator=Ronald Blunden|desc=Denoël, 1976. Paperback.|image=334-cover-fr-denoel.jpg|cover-by=R. Leygue}}
{{Edition tile|language=German|translator=Walter Brumm|alt-title=Angoulême|desc=Heyne, 1977. Paperback.|image=334-cover-de-heyne.jpg|cover-by=Karel Thole|isbn=3-453-30906-5}}
{{Edition tile|language=Japanese|translator=Masuda Mamoru|alt-title=Sanbyaku sanjū shi|desc=Sanrio, 1979. Paperback.|image=334-cover-ja-1979.jpg}}
{{Edition tile|language=Italian|translator=Roberta Rambelli|desc=Fanucci Editore, 1989. Trade paperback.|image=334-cover-it-fanucci-1989.jpeg|cover-by=Michele Marsan|isbn=88-347-0118-6}}
{{Edition tile|language=Spanish|translator=Albert Solé|desc=Martínez Roca, 1993. Trade paperback.|image=334-cover-es-martinez-roca.jpg|cover-by=Tone Høverstad|isbn=84-270-1703-0}}
</div>

== Textual differences ==

There are a few differences between earlier and later editions that might either be corrections, or misguided "corrections" by an over-zealous copyeditor— in speculative fiction, especially with a playful author, it's not always easy to tell what is a mistake. Here's how the Vintage trade paperback <small>(B)</small> differs from all earlier US editions <small>(A)</small>:

* "US gorillas" <small>(A)</small> -> "[[334/The Death of Socrates#kids in black masks—U.S. guerrillas|US guerrillas]]" <small>(B)</small>
* "mickeymouse" <small>(A)</small> -> "[[334/Everyday Life in the Later Roman Empire#a frantic Mickey Mouse|Mickey Mouse]]" <small>(B)</small>
* "sexlife" <small>(A)</small> -> "[[334/Emancipation#tell me about your sex life|sex life]]" <small>(B)</small>
* "The Greek Berets" <small>(A)</small> -> "[[334/334/Part V#28. 53 Movies|The Green Berets]]" <small>(B)</small>

{{334 nav}}

On Wings of Song/Editions

2025-01-30T01:12:02Z

Eb:

{{#addbodyclass:horiz-toc}}

Sources include {{ISFDB title|1439}}, {{WorldCat editions|6853276}}, and {{Disch Index Translationum}}.

== US ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-fsf.jpg|desc=Serialized in three parts in ''The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction'': {{ISFDB|61102|February}}, {{ISFDB|61271|March}}, and {{ISFDB|60967|April}} 1979.|cover-by=Ed Emshwiller}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-st-martins.jpg|desc=St. Martin's Press, 1979. Hardcover.|cover-by=Michael Mariano|isbn=0312584660}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-bantam-1980.jpg|desc=Bantam Books, 1980. Paperback.|cover-by=Lou Feck|isbn=0553136674}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-bantam-1985.jpg|desc=Bantam Books, 1985. Paperback.|cover-by=Kid Kane|isbn=0553250760}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-carroll-graf-1988.jpg|desc=Carroll & Graf, 1988. Trade paperback.|cover-by=same as 1985, alas|isbn=0881844438}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-easton.jpg|desc=Easton Press, 1993. Limited edition hardcover. Illustrations by Pat Morrissey, introduction by James K. Morrow. No ISBN.}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-carroll-graf-2003.jpg|desc=Carroll & Graf, 2003. Trade paperback.|isbn=0786711221}}
</div>

== UK ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-gollancz.jpg|desc=Gollancz, 1979. Hardcover.|cover-by=Malcolm Ashman|isbn=0575025476}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-magnum.jpg|desc=Magnum, 1981. Paperback.|cover-by=Chris Moore|isbn=0417055803}}
</div>

== Translations ==

<div class="edition-tiles">
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-fr-denoel.jpg|language=French|translator=Jean Bonnefoy|alt-title=Sur les ailes du chant|desc=Denoël, 1980. Paperback.|cover-by=Stéphane Dumont}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-ja-1980.jpg|language=Japanese|translator=Yasuko Tomoeda|alt-title=Uta no tsubasa ni|desc=Kokushokankōkai, 1980. Hardcover.|isbn=9784336051165}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-de-hohenheim.jpg|language=German|translator=Irene Holicki|alt-title=Auf Flügeln des Gesangs|desc=Hohenheim, 1982. Hardcover.|cover-by=Oliviero Berni|isbn=3-8147-0025-2}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-he-1983.jpg|language=Hebrew|translator=Zofia Lassman|alt-title=Al kanfe ha-shir|desc=Keter, 1983. Softcover.}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-de-heyne.jpg|language=German|translator=Irene Holicki|alt-title=Auf Flügeln des Gesangs|desc=Heyne, 1986. Paperback.|cover-by=Ulf Herholz|isbn=3-453-31218-X}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-it-mondadori.jpg|language=Italian|translator=Paola Tomaselli|alt-title=Le ali della mente|desc=Mondadori, 1996. Trade paperback.|cover-by=Oscar Chicone}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-fr-denoel-2001.jpg|language=French|translator=Jean Bonnefoy|alt-title=Sur les ailes du chant|desc=Denoël, 2001. Paperback.|cover-by=Barrett Foster|isbn=2-07-041798-0}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-es-bibliopolis.jpg|language=Spanish|translator=Luis G. Prado|alt-title=En alas de la canción|desc=Bibliópolis, 2003. Trade paperback.|cover-by=Roberto Uriel & Manuel de los Galanes|isbn=84-932836-5-7}}
{{Edition tile|image=OWOS-cover-pl-solaris.jpg|language=Polish|translator=Michał Raginiak|alt-title=Na skrzydłach pieśni|desc=Solaris, 2007. Hardcover.|isbn=8389951843}}
</div>

== E-book ==

Chu Hartley Publishers, 2016. No cover art.

== Textual differences ==

The ''Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction'' serialization is slightly shorter than the full novel. Most of the cuts are of incidental flourishes without much effect on the story or the ideas, but one bit stands out in its absence: the paragraph in chapter 3 where Daniel, at the movie theater in Minneapolis, is both shocked and intrigued to notice two men sharing a bathroom stall.

The epigram doesn't appear in the serialization, nor in the first British hardcover from Gollancz.

Editing in this book has been inconsistent. I haven't seen the first US hardcover (St. Martin's), or the latest trade paperback, but both of the other US editions (Bantam and Easton Press) have a variety of errors—the same ones in each, suggesting that the St. Martin's one was the source, since the British hardcover doesn't have them. Most are minor copyediting issues, but at least one passage (the paragraph in Chapter 4 that ends with "hope was part of the punishment") is fairly garbled by a piece of out-of-place text.

{{On Wings of Song nav}}

Template:Disch Index Translationum

2025-01-30T01:11:50Z

Eb: Created page with "[https://www.unesco.org/xtrans/bsresult.aspx?lg=0&a=Disch%20Thomas%20M.&fr=0 UNESCO Index Translationum]"

[https://www.unesco.org/xtrans/bsresult.aspx?lg=0&a=Disch%20Thomas%20M.&fr=0 UNESCO Index Translationum]