Saturday 19th December 2009
2pm-6pm
FREE - REGISTRATION REQUIRED
Glasgow School of Art

Speakers include:
Jo Littler
Author of
Radical Consumption

Alec Badenoch
Co-Author of
Chocolate, A Global History

An Antidote to Christmas Shopping!
WINE - DISCUSSION - TOMBOLA!

Supported by the Arts and Humanities Research Council
Register at http://notjustforchristmas.org

Maajid says assertively: "You know, back when I was an Islamist, I thought our ideology was like communism – and I still do. That makes me optimistic. Because what happened to communism? It was discredited as an idea. It lost. Who joins the Communist Party today?"

From an article on recovering jihadis. That's one of my dreams: A future museum where people come to laugh at the quaint old crazies: the jihadis, the Marxists, the fetus fans, the homophobes…

Reeve, P. (2009). No Such Thing as Dragons, Scholastic.
Ansel is mute and his father sells him cheap to the traveling dragon slayer who passes by. But Ansel is still disappointed to learn there are no such things as dragons. Or are there? This story is another in the Here Lies Arthur mode. I do like Reeve's science fiction a great deal, but it is in these historicals where he really seems to write well.

Happy birthday, anne_jumps, blackfyr, and ksp24

Thank you to the anonymous snowflake donor, whoever you are.

Well, this answers that question.

I headed over to Silver Spring, Maryland, this morning to catch the documentary Will Eisner: Portrait of a Sequential Artist. Had it not been the D.C.-area premiere, with director Andrew D. Cooke scheduled to be present for a Q&A, I might have instead waited for the DVD. But since it had the feel of an event, I thought it might be fun, and worth the drive. (After all, I'm about an hour and 45 minutes away.) Also, I was intrigued to see whether serendipity would throw me together with any other members of the comics and/or science-fiction tribe.

I'd never been to the AFI Silver Theatre before, so I made sure to get there early and scope the place out. While waiting in line wondering whether I'd see any familiar faces, who should appear but local fan Kyle Scott McAbee, someone I'd often seen at Capclave, Balticon, and even a few Worldcons. While we waited to be let in, we chatted about Walter Karig, the novel Zotz!, and the Stratemeyer Syndicate. I'd have liked to have kept talking, but unfortunately, we parted once we were let in, since he wanted to sit in the back row and I preferred to sit closer to the front. (Sorry, Kyle!)

The audience was an interesting mix of people who had no idea who Will Eisner was and were just there because this was one of many films being shown as part of the 20th Washington Jewish Film Festival and people know knew exactly who Will Eisner was and were there to see him celebrated. Each group came to the film with different expectations. The first just wanted to be entertained for an afternoon, the second wanted to see whether someone make a documentary about a comic-book god ... and not get it wrong.

I'm happy to say that director Andrew D. Cooke (seen to my right below) did not get it wrong.

Eisner had already told his story in the autobiographical graphic novel The Dreamer, and Cooke merged that together with video interviews with Eisner and his peers, plus audio interviews Eisner had done with his peers himself in the '80s in what he called his Shop Talk tapes, managing to pull all of this raw material together into a coherent picture of a life. Cooke made good use of what his research had uncovered. One of the images that made me smile was a home movie of Eisner's proud Dad reading one of the early Spirit newspaper inserts while his Mom and sister watched.

Those who came knowing nothing enjoyed it, but what I think it more important is that those who came knowing everything were pleased. You know how it is when a subculture gets put under the microscope. Something is usually wrong, some egregious error which makes insiders wince. There was nary a wince here. Cooke told Eisner's story and told it true.

I should add that I looked at this doc quite differently than most people. For me, this was about my family. When I watched Gil Kane being interviewed, I remembered him hanging out in the Marvel Bullpen with me, and handing in his pencils for the cover to my first Scarecrow story. When I saw pictures of Phil Seuling, I remembered all of the times as a kid when I sat in the front row at conventions looking up at him. When Stan Lee was on the screen, I remembered the years I channeled his voice while writing Bullpen Bulletins. When Jerry Robinson spoke, I remember the drawing he did for me, long before I started working in comics, that showed his creation Robin, the Boy Wonder, telling me he hoped I'd work in comics someday. And so on.



So you can see that I approached this documentary very personally, and if Cooke had made a wrong move, I'd have pounced on any misstep. There weren't any. I plan to purchase a copy of the film on DVD as soon as it's out in March, as should you. And even if the doc itself doesn't interest you, a complete set of Eisner's Shop Talk tapes will be included as a DVD extra, featuring interviews with Jack Kirby, Joe Kubert, and many more influential artists. So keep checking the official site for more info.

Afte the screening, Cooke took questions from the audience. You can download the 23-minute Q&A (it's 10.67MB) that took place after the screening here. A few of the Q's are faint, but all of the A's are strong and clear. (Unfortunately, the mike on my digital recorder is so sensitive that from time to time you can also hear the guy next to me who couldn't stop chewing on his ice!)

After the official Q&A, Cooke hung around chatting with us diehards for another hour, and in the process I bumped into another one of those who, like me, had attended early July 4th Phil Seuling conventions, only this guy—Mitch Berger—had arrived on the scene even earlier them me. My first con was in 1970, but his was in 1968, if I'm remembering correctly. And so after Cooke left, Berger and I kept talking about the old days, including Vaughn Bode's slideshows, Phil Seuling's creation of the direct market, and more.

It was a very satisfying family reunion. I'm sure that many of you know exactly what I mean. And that's satisfying, too.

You can find more photos of my day here.

1 cup of coffee.
4 slices of dense, chewy walnut and olive bread spread with herbed goat cheese.
1 small Dungeness crab.
1 small salad with lettuce, broccoli and carrots, bleu cheese dressing.
1 orange.

*heaven*

http://www.tor.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=blog&id=58426

Of course there is a dog: Page 1—“Merlin led the way, seemingly indifferent to the spoor of the deer and the possibility of glimpsing the white flags of their tails ahead of him. He was a three-year-old, 160-pound Irish wolfhound, thirty-six inches tall, measured from his withers to the ground, his head higher on a muscular neck.”

Of course the hero has hidden strengths: Before retiring to the Colorado Rockies, Grady Adams was a military sharp shooter. He assassinated a lot of bad guys.

[Read  more about what to expect from Breathless, with very minor spoilers, after the break...]

Of course his love interest had an abused childhood: Camillia Rivers, the local veterinarian was kidnapped and systematically tortured for years by her stepfather before she put an end to him, and went on to graduate with honors from Colorado State University’s renowned veterinary school.

Of course the antagonists are amoral villains. In this case we have a serial rapist who kills his victims; several agents, officers and scientists involved in a massive cover-up; an identical twin who offs his brother so he can take over his identity; and even (gasp) an unethical lawyer with murderous intentions.

And there are a lot more Dean Koontz trappings in Breathless that you can discover for yourself.

<input ... >In his rapid-fire thriller Koontz takes on the government, religion, human rights, predestination and the theory of evolution, among other ideas and institutions.

Back on page 1, as Grady and Merlin are wandering through the woods, they spot a pair of white animals like nothing they have ever seen. Eventually the exceptionally bright and cute animals come to Grady’s home to play with his dog. When astounded Cammy, the vet, sends some pictures of the animals to her former teachers, the professors pass them on to the government.  Homeland Security gets involved, and the plot takes off.

Meanwhile, not far away, Henry Rouvroy kills his twin brother and his twin brother’s wife. He stole a lot of money and plans to hide out at their farm for a long time. He has inside information that something bad is going to happen to the world. Henry is paranoid: he hears voices; he sees things that aren’t there.

Also meanwhile, an expert in chaos theory plays blackjack in Las Vegas and wins significant amounts of money, but he always gives his winnings away. He is one of the few good guys who works for the government.

Also meanwhile, on a Seattle golf course, the nefarious lawyer arranges for the serial rapist he successfully defended in court to murder his wife and child.

And finally, meanwhile, a vagrant drug addict living in a cave next to the Pacific Ocean sees something that changes his life and begins a long walk.

All of this happens in the first few pages, so I haven't given much away.

Like most of Dean Koontz’s 50+ novels Breathless is a fun and fast read. Although the book follows a similar pattern to most of the other books, this one has an element of science fiction—or maybe fantasy—that is unique.

I do have a few criticisms. As usual Dean has a plethora of seemingly unrelated subplots that are brought together at the end. This time there may be too many. And the book ends too quickly. With just a few pages to go, things are still unravelling, and, all of a sudden, most of them get “ravelled” way too fast, leaving a couple of loose ends.

Still, Breathless is bound to keep you reading, maybe even breathlessly. It may even make you think just a little bit.

---

Mark Graham reviewed books for the Rocky Mountain News from 1977 until the paper closed its doors in February 2009. His “Unreal Worlds” column on science fiction and fantasy appeared regularly in the paper for over 20 years. He has reviewed well over 1,000 genre books. If you see a Rocky Mountain News blurb on a book, it is likely from a review or interview he wrote. Graham also created and taught Unreal Literature, a high school science fiction class, for nearly 30 years in the Jefferson County Colorado public schools.

Caught a matinee of this yesterday. I didn't just love it, but I did really enjoy it, especially the look of the thing. It's definitely a Wes Anderson film, both in the brittle self-reference and in the troublesome, narcissistic father figure and the cast of eccentrics who surround him. Mr. Fox is a self-centered jerk, but he is clever and powerful and charismatic at the same time. The story revolves around his animal need to raid farms and the threat of destruction that his lack of self-control brings down on his family and friends.

It's based on a Roald Dahl story, which may be the source of some of the best aspects of the movie: the large cast of eccentric animal and human characters, and the knowing dilemma of the animal characters, who are, as it were, neither fish nor fowl. They are humanoid characters based on animal traits, and they are quite aware of the contradictions.

The visual design, however, is almost certainly down to Wes Anderson. As others have commented, this animated movie makes you realize that he's been making animated movies all along. His set designs have always had a toylike, miniaturist quality. The pocket universe created for this movie is simply wonderful, and the handmade, household-material style of stop-motion animation (with water made from plastic foil, for example) is reminiscent of Michel Gondry.

One thing that nagged at me throughout was that the main farmer figure looked familiar. I was sure his face was based on an actual British actor, and I thought it might be the one who did the voice. That ended up being Michael Gough Gambon, however, and that's definitely not who it looks like. He looks a little bit like Ben Kingsley, but that's not it either. Maybe somebody I've seen on TV, I dunno. I kept getting flashes of this actor's face, half-shaved and glumly brooding. It was a little bit distracting at times.

Happy birthday, laughingrat

* Geneviève Bergeron, 21, was a second year scholarship student in civil engineering.
* Hélène Colgan, 23, was in her final year of mechanical engineering and planned to take her Master’s degree.
* Nathalie Croteau, 23, was in her final year of mechanical engineering.
* Barbara Daigneault, 22, was in her final year of mechanical engineering and held a teaching assistantship.
* Anne-Marie Edward, 21, was a first year student in chemical engineering.
* Maud Haviernick, 29, was a second year student in engineering materials, and a graduate in environmental design.
* Barbara Maria Klucznik, 31, was a second year engineering student specializing in engineering materials.
* Maryse Laganière, 25, worked in the budget department of the Polytechnique.
* Maryse Leclair, 23, was a fourth year student in engineering materials.
* Anne-Marie Lemay, 27, was a fourth year student in mechanical engineering.
* Sonia Pelletier, 28, was to graduate the next day in mechanical engineering. She was awarded a degree posthumously.
* Michèle Richard, 21, was a second year student in engineering materials.
* Annie St-Arneault, 23, was a mechanical engineering student.
* Annie Turcotte, 21, was a materials engineering student.

They died 20 years ago at L'Ecole Polytechnique because some shithead thought that women shouldn't be feminists, or engineers, or smart, or something like that. That sort of thinking, if that is the word I'm looking for, is still around.

This sounds like a great 2010! Thanks, garunya!

At last night's annual festive gathering to read short selections by the fire (it's a gas fire now, and it's controlled with a remote: o such a brave new world we live in), my offerings were non-fiction and came from library books rather than my collection.

There's a long-standing rumor in Tolkien fandom, dating back to the Sixties themselves, that the Beatles were once seriously thinking of filming The Lord of the Rings. That rumor turns out to be true, though the casting list often given apparently isn't. The full story is told by Denis O'Dell, a movie producer who worked with and for the Beatles for much of the group's career (and is not to be confused with Denis O'Brien, George Harrison's later-day shady business partner) in his memoir At the Apple's Core (Owen, 2002). Seeking to resurrect the Beatles' moribund movie contract with United Artists, O'Dell suggested to the studio a film of LotR as a project big enough to attract interest. (He says it was easy because UA already owned the rights. Something is wrong here, because this was early 1968 and other sources say the film rights weren't bought till the following year.)

That idea sold, the next step was to tell the Beatles about it. So O'Dell went to India where John, Paul, and George (Ringo had already gone home) were sitting at the feet of the Maharishi and writing songs for The White Album. "Rather than each having to read the books from cover to cover, each was given one of the books. Paul read the first, The Fellowship of the Ring, John read The Two Towers and George The Return of the King." Amazingly, this worked and they liked the idea.

Now to find a big-name director. David Lean had the epic sweep (and would have been appropriate because, unknown possibly to Lean himself and certainly to O'Dell and everybody else involved, Lean's brother had founded the original Inklings) but was otherwise occupied. Well, then, how about Stanley Kubrick? He hadn't read LotR either, so O'Dell sent him a copy. Kubrick liked the book, but the Beatles lost interest and the project squelched to a halt after Kubrick declared unequivocally that it was unfilmable by him or anybody else.

Bless Stanley Kubrick! Based on subsequent evidence to date he was, sad to say, absolutely right. I've always had a high opinion of Kubrick, but never higher than when I read this.

For my other reading, another movie story: William Shatner's amusing account in his memoirs, Up Till Now (Dunne, 2008) of making a movie entirely in Esperanto, a language neither he nor anybody else on set knew.

One of our other attendees announced triumphantly that her long-mislaid copy of William McGonagall had been found, and we had a fine reading of the epic adventures of a man setting out to buy a Christmas goose. Also saucily chosen, but without McGonagall's unique, shall we say talent, a selection from Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, which redoubled my absolute determination to ignore this book and all others like it. Also a recording of Christmas carols for Cthulhu, a project with some potential, but during which I could hear the bottom of a barrel being vigorously scraped.

Dubai is built on slave labor and is ecologically disastrous, and is going bankrupt anyway.

Thanx to Making Light.

The No Fear Scarlet Letter, with the original and an "easy-to-understand translation" on facing pages.

I'd be grateful if people could link to this.

Class Leaders:
Istvan Csicsery-Ronay
Roz Kaveney
Justina Robson
 

The Science Fiction Foundation (SFF) will be holding the fourth annual Masterclass in sf criticism in 2010.


Dates: 11th June to 13th June 2010

Location: Middlesex University, London (the Hendon Campus, nearest underground, Hendon).

Delegate costs will be £180 per person, excluding accommodation.
Accommodation: students are asked to find their own accommodation, but help is available from the administrator (farah.sf@gmail.com)

 
Applicants should write to Farah Mendlesohn at farah.sf@gmail.com. Applicants will be asked to provide a CV and writing sample; these will be assessed by an Applications Committee consisting of Farah Mendlesohn, Paul Kincaid, Adam Roberts.

Completed applications must be received by 28th February 2010.

That was intense. Stanford barely won tonight. St. Mary's was solid as a rock in defense and never seemed to fall apart mentally. Stanford, on the other hand, lost its marbles a few times. But they won, so they advance to the Sweet Sixteen next weekend, playing Michigan. If they win that, and they should, they will play the winner of Illinois versus Hawaii. It's going to be really exciting.

After that, volleyball is over for the season as far as me getting to any games. I may have withdrawal.

Or I may check out the gymnastics meets in January. I love gymnastics. It's the only team sport I was part of in school. It's probably hard to believe now, but I was kind of a shrimp until high school when I grew five inches and developed a saucy figure. The shrimpiness meant my dreams of being a ballerina were always doomed, though I did not realize it until fifth grade. My build meant I was never destined to be any kind of professional athlete, but truthfully, I never had the passion for it. I could have been a ski bum pretty happily. However, my parents insisted I go to college instead.

I do love watching young people play sports, though. I hope Stanford wins the NCAA championship. And you, lucky people, do not have to read me babbling about volleyball for another nine months now.

I was going through some old comics to prepare them for sale (a story for another time) when I noticed something on the cover of Strange Adventures #71, the August 1956 issue.

Floating above the image of an interplanetary clock counting down the time until the death of Earth was a banner which read "EXCITING NEWS! GIGANTIC CONTEST!" And what did you have to do to win one of those "5000 PRIZES?" Simply come up with a new slogan to describe DC Comics.

DC provided a few (rather lame) examples, such as "I buy when I see DC," "DC Comics are Decent Comics," and "Your reading key is the symbol DC."

[Click on the images several times to view at a readable size. I'm sorry the interior pages aren't crisp and clear, but considering the comics' age and value, scanning was out of the question, so I simply snapped the best photos I could.]



There were no details yet on how to enter. That was to come later, as announced on the cover of Mystery in Space #34, the October/November 1956 issue. Three inner pages provided a list of prizes and an entry form.



What kid wouldn't want a chance to win Sweet Sue (the Queen of Dolls) or Bonomo's Turkish Taffy?



There was a catch, however. As you can see on the third page above, you had to submit your slogan with FIVE coupons from that month's issues. Of course, comics were only a dime back then, but still ... that seems like asking a lot.

But OK—you spent you 50 cents, sent in your coupons and slogan. Now what? Who won?

Well, since there were 5,000 prizes, there were 5,000 winners, some of who were listed in Blackhawk #112, the May 1957 issue, and announced on the top of the cover below.



It took three pages to list just some of the winners, which were split up and divided up among seven sets of comics. The list below is of those winners whose names began with O, S, V, or Z. Recognize any of them?



I couldn't find any comic listing the winning slogan itself, but luckily, a search of the interwebs answered that question, in the only blog posting I could turn up on the subject, over at Booksteve's Library.

The winning entry was: "For the best in comics entertainment: Superman/DC/National Comics, the Line of Stars!" (Though the suggestion offered on that site by Mxyzptlk, "DC Comics ... everyone who works in management is an asshole," is far more entertaining.)

But that doesn't answer the question—what was the ultimate winner's name? Who was it who actually came up with that winning slogan? Was it ever announced?

Any ideas?

• 07:34 Happy Red Balloon Day! www.ispyaredballoon.com/ #redballoon #
• 07:35 @Shell_man Thank you! #

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This Time for Keeps (1947)

(I haven't seen this Esther Williams movie, and the still is from DVD Beaver's review of TCM Spotlight: Esther Williams, Vol. 2.)