The Time Traveller's Almanac Read online

  Approaching a time travel story with a dogmatic measuring stick in hand also denies the unique pleasure that the genre affords tinkerers. A good story’s internal logic is flawless, and everything in between its first and last word makes sense on its own terms. In that way, it presents the tinkerer with the literary equivalent of an Escher drawing. Internally, step by step, the logic of Escher’s staircase makes (or makes you believe it makes) nefariously perfect sense, and its dissonance with what we know to be possible is not something you have to “just accept and get over to enjoy it,” but is the very source of what’s enjoyable about it.

  For all its pleasures, though, the untangling-game cannot sustain a story, let alone a sub-genre that has thrived for so many years. Something about the concept of time travel snaps into our selves like a jigsaw-puzzle piece, just like invisibility or the power of flight. It is wish fulfillment on a primeval level of the psyche. When I fly in my dreams I’m not doing any of the “wouldn’t it be cool to…” things that our conscious minds wish for, like saving time getting across town or arriving at parties through the window or having lunch on top of the Empire State Building. In my dreams I’m just flying, and just that feeling of soaring through the air feels like it scratches some deeply rooted itch.

  Meeting Abraham Lincoln, hunting dinosaurs, making a fortune on the stock market, giving your younger self one piece of advice, all these “wouldn’t it be cool” reasons we’d like to time travel do not get to the root of why we really want to time travel. I think partly it has to do with the cruel cold clockwork of this defined span of years each of us is assigned, the linear piece of chain we’re all rolling across like a gear from beginning to inevitable end. Few wishes in life go deeper than the desire to give that chain the finger.

  There’s also something deeply familiar about time travel. It feels like something that is not at all foreign to our brains; it makes sense in an odd way. How much of our lives do we live in the past or future, looking forward or looking back, whether regretting or pining or fearing? Speaking for myself, the answer is a sheepish “lots.” Time travel stories give us the dual pleasure of the carrot and the stick, on one hand letting us imagine going physically to where our minds can only take us, to re-experience that perfect day or change that awful thing, and on the other hand warning us that actually doing this would not turn out well, and that our place is in the present.

  Ultimately, though, there is only one base ingredient that everything in this book absolutely has in common: they are all damn good stories by damn good storytellers.

  But I don’t have to tell you this. You’ve already read them. And I feel bad about that. Wouldn’t it be nice to be able to go back and experience all these incredible stories for the first time again?

  Rian Johnson

  TOP TEN TIPS FOR TIME TRAVELLERS

  Charles Yu

  1. Here’s the thing: you’re doing something that you don’t understand. That’s not a knock on you. It’s just a fact. Humans can’t wrap their heads around time travel, and it’s not a software thing. It’s hardware. Our brains just don’t get it. Not yet. Maybe someday. But that will take, for lack of a better word, time. We could evolve, as a species, but that would require a selection pressure, some environmental advantage for minds unburdened by the illusion of temporal sequence, of the notion of cause and effect. But that’s not what we have. What we have is the opposite. What we have are minds that are very good at being trapped in time. We are geniuses, each and every one of us. We are unbelievable machines, capable of incredible feats of psychological athleticism. We are full-grown, half-starved Bengal tigers, pacing in our cages, and we know every inch of the space in front of us, and behind, and to either side. We have evolved to survive as prisoners, and so, when one of us manages to get free, we look for walls, for a ceiling. We want to get back indoors, back inside time. We look for our cages. We look for rules.

  2. So, the most important thing is, forget any rules. If you’re really going to do this, you’re going to have to open your mind. If you go into it with preconceived notions about what time is, what causality is, well, then, you’re only going to see it through those conceptual lenses. You’ll understand it, of course, because that’s what we do. We understand things. But sometimes understanding gets in the way. Especially when something can’t be understood.

  3. But, but, but, you say. What do you mean? What could it even mean to understand something that can’t be understood? Well, that’s easy. When things can’t be understood, and you understand them, well, then, what you’re doing is just making stuff up. A circle looks at a sphere, and it understands it as a circle. A cross-section, it understands it exactly to the extent that it already makes sense to it.

  4. So if you can’t understand it, then what are you supposed to do? Well, not supposed to do, that’s not right. You can’t suppose anything, that’s the point. You are free. As free as any human who has ever lived. You broke out. Of the ultimate constraint. There have been a few others – go look in your library books. Maybe in your religious texts – they’ve got stories of people who have done the same. Although you might not think of them as time travellers, that’s what they were. We tend to worship them, tell stories about them. People might tell stories about you, too, depending on how you handle this.

  So get rid of the concept of supposed to do. Suppose anything. You can, you know. Suppose that you are a time traveller. Sounds like some kind of philosophical experiment, doesn’t it? And that’s the thing. You’re travelling in time, my friend. That’s pretty philosophical. And the ultimate experiment.

  5. Which is not to say you are imagining this. This is as real as anything.

  6. What kinds of tips are these? You thought you were going to get some advice about avoiding paradoxes. About ripple effects and avoiding stable time loops and all of that. Don’t kill grandma, do kill Hitler, don’t step on that twig. No kissing family members. All good ideas, to be sure. Don’t need to repeat them here.

  Or maybe you wanted a brochure. A guide from the tourism office. Some good times to visit, catch the show. Back-row seats at some key moments in the history of the world. Crucial moments in the history of the world.

  But that’s not what you’re getting.

  What you’re getting is this instead. Ask yourself, who am I? Am I important?

  7. You are. You’re very important. By definition. You’re a time traveller, and with that comes some level of responsibility. Think about it. Your whole life, you’ve imagined time travel. You have the power to affect the flow of events, the lives of other people, the course of the universe, in a way that is unique and ineffably strange. How did you get to be one of these select, chosen few? What makes you so special?

  8. Here is what makes you so special: you remember. You always had a gift, a knack, a predisposition to this. You look ahead. You knew there was more to it. That there had to be, if not a way out, a way up, and around, and back in. That there was something fishy about the whole infrastructure. Why build roads if no one can go anywhere? Why do we have all of this temporal equipment inside of us, if we can never use it? You were right. You didn’t know how right you were. Everyone thought it was poetic. A grand metaphor. A way of thinking about our psychology. You knew it was more, waited for the moment, waited for this moment. You were right, and you had no idea how right you were.

  9. Here is what you need to ask yourself: how did you come to be a time traveller? Did you choose this, or did it choose you? Are you on some kind of mission? Do you feel like you might be stuck in a stable time loop? Is there anyone in your life who you need to go see in the past? Have you ever had dreams about the future that might not be dreams but premonitions? Are you lost and adrift outside of time and if so do you want to get back in? Who is asking you these rhetorical questions? Why are you looking for tips, and especially from someone or something that you don’t know anything about? How do you know you’re not asking yourself these questions, that this isn’t your own diary you are r
eading, from the past or the future or the present and that you haven’t read this eleven million seven hundred ninety three thousand four hundred sixty one times? And will read it an infinite number of times more? That these tips are all that you have, all that there ever will be, or ever was, which is the same thing, because nothing has ever existed that has not always existed, that you live in an eternal block universe, timeless and frozen, and that time, as you knew it when you started this, that time is in the past, but it’s still there, and you can go back, and then you can come back here, and you have, and you will.

  You wanted some tips. You have some tips. Probably not quite what you were expecting. But what were you expecting? Time travel is a lonely activity. Time travel means you can never go home again. But maybe it also means always being able to see home from here. Don’t you remember? These tips are what got you into trouble in the first place.

  10. Now that you know this information, go back to tip number 2 above. Go back to the time when you first read that, and read it again. There are no rules. Okay? None. Now: what a concept. Now. Now: you’ve got your whole life, what came before and what will come after, gathered up here in this little area here, the whole thing. What are you going to do with your life? What was it, what is it, what will it be?

  EXPERIMENTS

  DEATH SHIP

  Richard Matheson

  Richard Matheson was an American author and screenwriter most known for his work in fantasy, horror, and science fiction. Some of his best-known works are The Shrinking Man, Hell House and I Am Legend (the latter having been made into full-length films three times). In addition to the many feature films adapted from his work, he also wrote several episodes of The Twilight Zone original series in the 1960s. “Death Ship” was first published in Fantastic Story Magazine in 1953 and then later adapted for television as Episode 6, Season 4, of The Twilight Zone in 1963.

  Mason saw it first.

  He was sitting in front of the lateral viewer taking notes as the ship cruised over the new planet. His pen moved quickly over the graph-spaced chart he held before him. In a little while they’d land and take specimens. Mineral, vegetable, animal – if there were any. Put them in the storage lockers and take them back to Earth. There the technicians would evaluate, appraise, judge. And, if everything was acceptable, stamp the big, black inhabitable on their brief and open another planet for colonization from overcrowded Earth.

  Mason was jotting down items about general topography when the glitter caught his eye.

  “I saw something,” he said.

  He flicked the viewer to reverse lensing position.

  “Saw what?” Ross asked from the control board.

  “Didn’t you see a flash?”

  Ross looked into his own screen.

  “We went over a lake, you know,” he said.

  “No, it wasn’t that,” Mason said. “This was in that clearing beside the lake.”

  “I’ll look,” said Ross, “but it probably was the lake.”

  His fingers typed out a command on the board and the big ship wheeled around in a smooth arc and headed back.

  “Keep your eyes open now,” Ross said. “Make sure. We haven’t got any time to waste.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Mason kept his unblinking gaze on the viewer, watching the earth below move past like a slowly rolled tapestry of woods and fields and rivers. He was thinking, in spite of himself, that maybe the moment had arrived at last. The moment in which Earthmen would come upon life beyond Earth, a race evolved from other cells and other muds. It was an exciting thought. 1997 might be the year. And he and Ross and Carter might now be riding a new Santa Maria of discovery, a silvery, bulleted galleon of space.

  “There!” he said. “There it is!”

  He looked over at Ross. The captain was gazing into his viewer plate. His face bore the expression Mason knew well. A look of smug analysis, of impending decision.

  “What do you think it is?” Mason asked, playing the strings of vanity in his captain.

  “Might be a ship, might not be,” pronounced Ross.

  Well, for God’s sake, let’s go down and see, Mason wanted to say, but knew he couldn’t. It would have to be Ross’s decision. Otherwise they might not even stop.

  “I guess it’s nothing,” he prodded.

  He watched Ross impatiently, watched the stubby fingers flick buttons for the viewer. “We might stop,” Ross said. “We have to take samples anyway. Only thing I’m afraid of is...”

  He shook his head. Land, man! The words bubbled up in Mason’s throat. For God’s sake, let’s go down!

  Ross evaluated. His thickish lips pressed together appraisingly. Mason held his breath.

  Then Ross’s head bobbed once in that curt movement which indicated consummated decision. Mason breathed again. He watched the captain spin, push and twist dials. Felt the ship begin its tilt to upright position. Felt the cabin shuddering slightly as the gyroscope kept it on an even keel. The sky did a ninety-degree turn, clouds appeared through the thick ports. Then the ship was pointed at the planet’s sun and Ross switched off the cruising engines. The ship hesitated, suspended a split second, then began dropping toward the earth.

  “Hey, we settin’ down already?”

  Mickey Carter looked at them questioningly from the port door that led to the storage lockers. He was rubbing greasy hands over his green jumper legs.

  “We saw something down there,” Mason said.

  “No kiddin’,” Mickey said, coming over to Mason’s viewer. “Let’s see.”

  Mason flicked on the rear lens. The two of them watched the planet billowing up at them.

  “I don’t know whether you can... oh, yes, there it is,” Mason said. He looked over at Ross.

  “Two degrees east,” he said.

  Ross twisted a dial and the ship then changed its downward movement slightly.

  “What do you think it is?” Mickey asked. “Hey!”

  Mickey looked into the viewer with even greater interest. His wide eyes examined the shiny speck enlarging on the screen. “Could be a ship,” he said. “Could be.”

  Then he stood there silently, behind Mason, watching the earth rushing up.

  “Reactors,” said Mason.

  Ross jabbed efficiently at the button and the ship’s engines spouted out their flaming gases. Speed decreased. The rocket eased down on its roaring fire jets. Ross guided.

  “What do you think it is?” Mickey asked Mason.

  “I don’t know,” Mason answered. “But if it’s a ship,” he added, half wishfully thinking, “I don’t see how it could possibly be from Earth. We’ve got this run all to ourselves.”

  “Maybe they got off course,” Mickey dampened without knowing.

  Mason shrugged. “I doubt it,” he said.

  “What if it is a ship?” Mickey said. “And it’s not ours?”

  Mason looked at him and Carter licked his lips.

  “Man,” he said, “that’d be somethin’.”

  “Air spring,” Ross ordered.

  Mason threw the switch that set the air spring into operation. The unit which made possible a landing without then having to stretch out on thick-cushioned couches. They could stand on deck and hardly feel the impact. It was an innovation on the newer government ships.

  The ship hit on its rear braces.

  There was a sensation of jarring, a sense of slight bouncing. Then the ship was still, its pointed nose straight up, glittering brilliantly in the bright sunlight.

  “I want us to stay together,” Ross was saying. “No one takes any risks. That’s an order.”

  He got up from his seat and pointed at the wall switch that let atmosphere into the small chamber in the corner of the cabin.

  “Three to one we need our helmets,” Mickey said to Mason.

  “You’re on,” Mason said, setting into play their standing bet about the air or lack of it in every new planet they found. Mickey always bet on the need for apparatus. Mason for
unaided lung use. So far, they’d come out about even.

  Mason threw the switch and there was a muffled sound of hissing in the chamber. Mickey got the helmet from his locker and dropped it over his head. Then he went through the double doors. Mason listened to him clamping the doors behind him. He kept wanting to switch on the side viewers and see if he could locate what they’d spotted. But he didn’t. He let himself enjoy the delicate nibbling of suspense.

  Through the intercom they heard Mickey’s voice.

  “Removing helmet,” he said.

  Silence. They waited. Finally, a sound of disgust.

  “I lose again,” Mickey said.

  The others followed him out.

  “God, did they hit!”

  Mickey’s face had an expression of dismayed shock on it. The three of them stood there on the greenish-blue grass and looked.

  It was a ship. Or what was left of a ship for, apparently, it had struck the earth at terrible velocity, nose first. The main structure had driven itself about fifteen feet into the hard ground. Jagged pieces of superstructure had been ripped off by the crash and were lying strewn over the field. The heavy engines had been torn loose and nearly crushed the cabin. Everything was deathly silent, and the wreckage was so complete they could hardly make out what type of ship it was. It was as if some enormous child had lost fancy with the toy model and had dashed it to earth, stamped on it, banged on it insanely with a rock.

  Mason shuddered. It had been a long time since he’d seen a rocket crash. He’d almost forgotten the everpresent menace of lost control, of whistling fall through space, of violent impact. Most talk had been about being lost in an orbit. This reminded him of the other threat in his calling. His throat moved unconsciously as he watched.