Tal Goreans,
Greetings visitors,

Welcome once again to the Booknotes column.

As icicles hang by the wall, and all that, we reach an unusual point in the Gor saga, in which our usual commentator Tarl Cabot hands over the reins to another Earthman for a three-book series of his own. This is Jason Marshall, whose adventures begin in volume 14 of the Counter-Earth Saga, “Fighting Slave of Gor”; for which reason I turn the cover and begin, thus:

Chapter One

The story begins on Earth, as did Tarl’s and one of the women who have stepped in for a single book of their own, and we find our narrator entertaining a young lady to dinner. She, Beverly Henderson, is twenty-two years old and well gifted with both brains and beauty; and she has just asked Jason’s leave to “speak intimately” to him. Jason remarks that she, a graduate student in English literature, is much better looking than the typical female of her department, but normally tries to pass as one of them – mannish garb and deportment, and so on. He does not think that she does very well at this, and for his own part, Jason dreams of her often, naked and collared in steel.

Beverly seems confused and ill at ease. She responds to Jason’s touch on her hand by breaking into some stereotypical feminist utterances: that she is not a sex object, that she has a mind, that she is a person, and that the sexes are identical for all practical purposes. Jason muses on the peculiarity of women who hate men and yet wish to be men. A brief discussion on the word “sexist” leads nowhere much. Beverly says that she has noticed that Jason is different from other men on the campus, and that he has frightened her, though by no deed of his. She has noticed his masculinity and is not sure what to make of it, causing Jason to tease her over whether she expected him to order her to go into the kitchen and cook, or into the bedroom and strip.

However all of this may be, Beverly has not troubled to hide her femininity on this occasion; and she reveals that she has been experiencing feminine feelings and urges, which it seems she expected Jason to understand better than most. Indeed, she has dreamed of being a female slave – which aligns rather compatibly with Jason’s own thoughts concerning her – and has found no satisfaction in talking this over with psychiatrists, for the first she tried, a man, told her that her feelings were normal, while the second, a woman, became enraged with her. Jason merely remarks that there are head-doctors in plenty and if Beverly shops around she can surely find someone who will tell her what she wishes to hear. He adds, politely enough, that it is perfectly possible that she is indeed a female slave in her heart, and that it is not wrong for her to be herself.

The conversation then turns to Gor, which as it happens Jason has heard of, though he naturally believes that it is fictional. Beverly however has been carrying out her own research and believes there may be more to it that that. She reads much into how the author includes much detail that no-one would include “who was concerned to construct spare, well-made pieces of fiction”, and I have to say that I agree with her. Indeed she says that she has met John Norman and does not believe him to be the author. Also she has received a mysterious telephone call from someone who promised to tell her more about Gor, if she was really interested. She acted on this and found herself made to expose herself and serve wine to a complete stranger. This was two days ago and she is still, understandably, distressed by it.

The time comes to pay the bill (Brit for “check”) and Beverly insists on paying her share of it. However, in the banter that follows it is clear that Jason is still adamant on treating her like a woman, and Beverly both relishes this and fights it, until their evening is spoiled by the arrival of a pair of mannish women, probably lesbians, from the college; and Beverly, who is dependent on their good opinion for her own academic success, is distressed at the thought that she has been seen acting feminine by them. Jason comforts her, reassuring her that she is many times a truer woman than they, and there is more of the slave banter mentioned earlier until Beverly suddenly snaps, perhaps driven closer to a particular piece of self-knowledge than she is ready for.

Unfortunately Jason is slapped with the realization that, on Earth at least, women call the tune and men have to do as they are told, and he is crestfallen at the thought that he may have driven Beverly away for good. He is still apologising when the cab arrives, but humbly asks permission to share the cab, to which Beverly ungraciously assents. This means that he is unfortunate enough to be a passenger when the driver suddenly fills the rear of the cab with knockout gas. This gas is not instant in its effect, and Beverly has time to plead for mercy and offer a whole succession of favours to the driver, beginning with money, then a kiss, and finally sex. The last offer enrages Jason, partly because he would rather she offered herself to him and partly because a slave has no business bargaining with Masters. On this note, Jason loses consciousness.

Chapter Two

In a deserted garage or similar, Beverly is drugged, crated and packed off to a slave ship for Gor. It then becomes apparent, as the men who have done this prepare to go about their business, that Jason has inconveniently seen and heard what he ought not to, and is now in the way. First they offer to shoot him and then decide to garotte him instead. Jason, understandably, pleads for mercy, attracting the scorn of his captors, and of all things, a philosophical discussion ensues, in which one of the captors charges Jason with treason to his own sex. They are considering putting him to death for this crime, but decide that his large, attractive body might be of interest in certain quarters, and instead give him the same as they gave Beverly: a dose of some unknown drug, and a slave crate.

Chapter Three

Jason is awakened by a whipping, and finds himself in the keeping of a woman got up like a regular dominatrix, all but the mask. She turns out to speak “a little English”, including such common parlance as “the girls become quickly acclimated to their chains and collars in a unilingual environment”, and she informs him that Beverly will be sold soon, she does not know where, and that he himself is now a slave. When Jason denies this, she summons a couple of burly guards and holds a short conversation with them in Gorean including the word “sleen”, which of course rings the appropriate bells with us, though we are forced to wonder how Jason picked out this one significant word among all the other unintelligible verbiage.

Shortly, as Jason is lowered on a rope’s end into a pit of slavering, ravenous six-legged carnivores, he finds himself obliged to plead for mercy once again, which fortunately is granted him, and he is made to kneel at the woman’s feet and pronounce himself slave. That point established, she returns him to his cell, spurning the offer of an escort by one of the two burly guards, for she opines that Jason is “tamed”, and he does not demur.

She trains him in a few of the basics – how to kneel, how to accept food from his mistress – and removes his name before conferring “Jason” on him as a slave name. She expresses contempt for the men of Earth, who have let their manhood be plundered from them by values, propaganda and women. But she also informs Jason that if he works hard at being pleasing, she can be not too strict a mistress, and even kind upon occasion, and that she can even have a woman thrown to him – if he, a man of Earth, would know what to do with one. And, telling him that her name is Lady Gina and that she teaches men to give pleasure to women, she leaves Jason in his cell.

Chapter Four

Lady Gina fits Jason out with a loincloth, as his lessons will feature slave girls and they, the lustful little beasts, are apt to become restless at the sight of male nakedness. He is introduced to Lola and Tela, two almost unimaginably attractive and exciting females, who will be his tutors in Gorean. They have another purpose too, as they display themselves before him and he is whipped for finding them attractive: simple aversion therapy. He is to be taught to fear and suppress his sexuality, and Lady Gina goes off into quite a rant for someone who supposedly speaks little English. It seems that she is one of these women who hates men because she is not one, as per chapter one, but on Gor her only expression for this is in the training pens, as the broad mass of Gorean manhood is not about to give her anything like the sympathetic consideration her kind are afforded on Earth. Indeed, she holds out more hope for the success of neuterism on Earth than anything she can accomplish, and Jason is forced to wonder why Lady Gina would not wish to go to Earth herself. She replies that she is not, after all, that keen to witness the downfall of humanity; and she remarks, not to Jason’s face but for his hearing, that on Gor they would not break even their male slaves as the men of Earth are broken.

Chapter Five

Jason’s lessons continue with his being taught to serve wine, and the slave Lola has developed something of a dislike for him, finding excuses to have him pulled up for any minor infraction and to have him punished. Apparently she is like this all the time and is not well liked by anyone, and is possibly trying Lady Gina’s patience. She deliberately spills wine and blames him for it, so that he will be whipped.

After Jason has been whipped, Lady Gina visits him. She mentions that she saw what Lola did and wonders why he did not blame Lola, but Jason says that he did not want Lola punished. Lady Gina approves of this, thinking that he means that he wanted to punish her himself, but Jason explains that Earthmen do not punish women. This Lady Gina does not understand at all. She is emphatic that women are natural slaves, longing for their masters, and that Jason is a fool for thinking otherwise. But, after scolding him for falling prey to the morality that would make virtues of weakness and cowardice, she bids him get to his rest, as he is to be viewed on the morrow by woman slavers of the market of Tima. Finally, she remarks that the exercises he has been put on are improving him, as he is gaining muscle mass and definition. This she seems to admire, saying that it is too bad that Jason is fit only to be a slave.

Chapter Six

Five woman slavers inspect Jason, remarking his vaccination scar and a dental filling, both extremely unGorean and previously seen only in slave girls of Earth origin. The good ladies are curious to see whether Jason and his fellow male slaves are “vital”, and a slave girl is summoned for a demonstration. It is none other than Lola, who is made to embrace and kiss each of the male slaves in turn. This she does reluctantly, for male slaves are the lowest of the low, and more reluctantly than ever when it is Jason’s turn, to the point of having to be warned for being slow to obey an order. But it seems that she responds to Jason and he to her, to the amusement and delight of the slavers; and one of these, Lady Tima, seems to pay him some extra attention before the slavers retire to discuss business.

So we leave for now the slave Jason, as yet showing no signs of doing any of the fighting mentioned in the title, no doubt to continue his studies in deportment and language and possibly to be sold quite soon. He has rather come down in the world – indeed, there is no creature lower on Gor than the male slave – and yet one senses that there might be a little something to him. Can his own almost Gorean attitudes expressed in the first chapter have disappeared without trace? Is it for nothing that the Lady Gina herself seems to have a surprising amount of time for a mere male slave? To find the answers to these questions, and possibly more besides, I urge the reader to join me a month from now, when we shall take a second look at “Fighting Slave of Gor”.

I wish you well,

Socrates