Five Books Featuring World-Changing Visionaries

A sultana finds herself strolling through city streets. To her discomfort, she is unveiled. However, no men use this as a pretext to pester her. This is because the sultana is no longer in the land of her birth, but rather in Ladyland, a nation where women are free and men carefully sequestered, as one might do with any dangerous animal.

How did this state of affairs come about? Thank a visionary queen who, when the men of her nation failed abjectly in the face of foreign aggression, stepped in with her superior female intellect. First, she convinced the few surviving men to retreat to the zenana. Second, the queen used a highly advanced sun-ray to incinerate the invaders. Third (and most important), the queen did not free the men, instead handing all the mechanisms of society to the intellectually superior (and thanks to the queen, universally educated) women. With the troublesome men out of the way, utopian progress and tranquility is easily achieved.

In accordance with the conventions of utopian narratives, The Sultana’s Dream has events, but very little in the way of plot. Instead, the dreaming sultana is taken on a tour of a nation that could be, during which all of this new nation’s virtues are highlighted and every possible objection easily dismissed.

Huey “Kingfish” Long took time from his busy political career to pen what became an alternate history work (although critics might claim the book a fantasy from the get-go). In this short volume, the noted populist paid loving tribute to Long’s favourite visionary politician—Huey Long—by detailing the wonders that might be realized if only the voters would see fit to elect Long to the American presidency.

With Long in power, Americans would benefit from a modernized air force, the wealthy and the banks brought to heel, transformed transportation networks, even an end to the dust storms then plaguing America. Issues that proved intractable for lesser politicians would be easily handled by President Long.

Would Long have in reality enjoyed the easy success he does in this entertaining account? Would an America governed by a demagogue populist have gone badly off the rails? We shall never know, as he did not live long enough to give voters the opportunity to select him.

The bumpkins of backwoods Harlowe, New Hampshire, too timid to change, are content with their rustic squalor. Yet change comes to Harlowe in the form of a real estate transaction: Out-of-towner Perly Dunsmore has purchased the Fawkes estate, which was left vacant by the violent murder of its previous owner.

Perly is charming, persuasive, and seemingly irresistible. Harlowe’s residents are cajoled into donating goods for a charity auction. As Perly secures his hold on power, requests become demands. Nothing is outside Perly’s bold commercial vision. Even the town’s children are assessed for sale to desperate, wealthy, childless couples. Only John Moore has the will to resist Perly… and John is an inarticulate brute incapable of attracting allies.

The Auctioneer is a horror novel, but one without significant supernatural elements. Perly doesn’t need satanic powers to take over Harlowe. All he needs to do is bribe a few strategically positioned officials, forestall resistance by appealing to greed, and intimidate anyone who resists. It’s a good thing nobody ever thought of trying that in real life.

President Charles Foster Kane and his robber baron supporters dismiss the righteous discontent of the American people. Kane and company mismanage the American economy. They lead America into an unwinnable war in Europe. Economic chaos provides Eugene Debs and his supporters opportunity. Cue glorious revolution and the rise of the United Socialist States of America.

Alas, the reality of the USSA falls short of its lofty dreams. Debs dies in 1926, replaced by Al Capone. Under Capone, the USSA rapidly transitions into a brutal autocracy where dissent earns prison terms or far worse. But even the most ruthless dictatorship can prove surprisingly ephemeral, given the right circumstances.

Yes, this is the USSR but in America. It’s also a bit unfair to Debs, although not to Al Capone. Putting a gangster in charge of the US seems like a pretty bad idea, so nobody would really do that.

Obscure island nation Patusan is ideally located as the base of an orbital elevator. The LK Group, a Korean megacorporation, has graciously encouraged—compelled, really—Patusan to capitalize on their convenient location. Legions of imported workers, far outnumbering the indigenous population, work tirelessly on the elevator. The grand project of affordable space travel is well underway.

The Patusan Liberation Front sees itself as freedom fighters. LK External Affairs chief Mac sees the PLF as just another potential asset, if properly manipulated, for LK’s transformative project. It’s no surprise that Mac is not the only mastermind on Patusan trying to guide events. What is astonishing is that Mac’s rival is a corpse for whom even death is but a minor inconvenience.