Textual Analysis
The Hounds of Tindalos
The Hounds of Tindalos is a short science fiction story containing many and varied elements that have been long associated with the genre of science fiction. This essay will identify these elements, examining their placement within this short text and also the interchange of these elements with the characteristics of other genres, more specifically, horror. Belknap Long, the author, was clearly intent of incorporating the elements of horror within the genre of science fiction and this amalgamation of these two genres was a popular combination employed by future horror and SF writers. Perhaps the inclusion of horror within the SF genre is a comment in itself about perceptions of SF held by writers, the elements of horror being a cautionary warning to those in the science world.
Long's main character is Halpin Chalmers, a self proclaimed "rebel and champion of originality and lost causes". From the start it is clear there are present within this text some elements of the SF genre that seem to be in just about every SF story, beginning with the main character. Many writers have as their main characters people who are non-conformists, who wish to boldly go where no one has gone before and who are willing to take seemingly illogical and irrational risks in the hope of furthering makinds' scientific discoveries. Chalmers is no exception in this as he willingly partakes in an ancient Chinese drug that is a known powerful hallucinogen in a bid to go back in time. There is of course the proverbial "wet blanket" in the shape of the narrator, known only as Frank, who believes his friend Chalmers to be quite mad, but who never-the-less agrees to aid his friend in his bizarre experiment despite the risks he is taking. Frank represents all those characters in SF stories who are the skeptics, the non believers, who have a solid faith in the science of the ...