children of the Lens ; the Sequel (rated R)

Visual Novel Community Off Topic
#1

You know what I’m thinking of doing one of these days? Write a [totally] unauthorized and [probably] inflammatory sequel to E. E. Smith’s “Children of the Lens.” If you’re at all familiar with the Lensman series, you may remember that the children of the title-a boy and two sets of twin sisters-were the offspring of Kimball Kinnison [the Gray Lensman] and Clarissa MacDougal [the ¬ëhot’ Lens(wo)man]. Smith dropped the series like a hot potato after that, and years later, Robert Heinlein hinted at the reason why:

“The Lensman [series] was left unfinished. There was to have been a seventh volume¬ÖDoc had worked it out in great detail, but never (so far as I know) wrote it down because it was unpublishable then¬ÖAll I will say is that the ending develops by inescapable logic from clues in Children of the Lens.”

And what might those clues be? Well, if you remember, the Children of the Lens are the Ultimate Beings, the end result of billions of years of genetic manipulation by the godlike Arisians, and more perfect than Milla Jovovich. In fact, they are so highly evolved that there’s no one for them to date except each other. Get my drift? Space Opper and incest! Yummier that a whole box of hostess Twinkies.

And yet¬Öthis idea is so logical that I can’t believe someone hasn’t already done it. Can any one out there tell me if it has? How about you, Narg?

#2

The last book pretty much insinuates that massive multicest was the only course left to the five siblings (one brother and two set of twin sisters), since mating with any other being besides themselves, would be like a human mating with a fly. It was also described that the sisters could not conceive of living without their brother, who was the focus of their attention and became the center of their collective mind. We also know that third stage Lensmen were born in the future, which only could have been possible by sexual reproduction of second-stage Lensmen (the five siblings being the only second stage in the Universe).

To be honest, I’ve always felt the “publication taboo” was rather silly, given that incest between godlike beings goes back to ancient mythology. The children of Adam and Eve - the Biblical version - would have committed incest. Izanagi and Izanami were siblings (probably twins even). The Greek/Roman deities were committing all sorts of incest, rape, and zoophilia. But this was back in the 1950’s, when Blacks were considered inferior because of their skin color, so I’m certainly not surprised at the stupidity of people at the time.

Far as I know, no one has bothered “completing” Lensman, out of respect to the original author. The transcript that Heinlein claims to have read, was never found… and Heinlein would never go into detail about what he supposedly read. You do have Green Lantern and Babylon 5 as obvious homages though.

#3

I never considered whether or not Izanagi and Izanami were twins, but that sounds about right, doesn’t it. Of course, their story had a kind of a bad ending. And, yes, the children of Adam and Eve would have had to commit incest in order to propagate the human race. But what about Adam and Eve, themselves, were they twins? I think they probably were, In a strange sort of way. Their story ended badly, too.

#4

Izanami went yandere, so it ain’t so bad an end. :wink:

#5