Was the Dark Lord of Mordor the real hero of LoTR?
Jessica Martin
a thought suddenly struck me last night.
Perhaps the Dark Lord of Mordor was the real hero of the book. After
all, he was just trying to jump-start the industrial revolution and
bring a better standard of living to Middle Earth.
Who were his enemies? Reactionary wizards like Galdalf, trying to keep
the people in a state of rural 3rd world poverty and addicted to their
primitive magic power block.
Hobbits? Just witless pawns in a global Middle Earth conspiracy to
stop progress.
Jessica
http://www.sfcrowsnest.com
Europe's most popular science fiction and fantasy site
Est. 1994
Anna Feruglio Dal Dan
> Seeing all the Tolkien frenzy going on around the upcoming LoTR movie,
> a thought suddenly struck me last night.
>
> Perhaps the Dark Lord of Mordor was the real hero of the book. After
> all, he was just trying to jump-start the industrial revolution and
> bring a better standard of living to Middle Earth.
>
> Who were his enemies? Reactionary wizards like Galdalf, trying to keep
> the people in a state of rural 3rd world poverty and addicted to their
> primitive magic power block.
>
> Hobbits? Just witless pawns in a global Middle Earth conspiracy to
> stop progress.
Actually, I'd love to see it written from this point of view. I wanted
to write something along this lines once just to annoy the gloomy Heroic
Fantasy Party of Italian fandom.
--
Anna Feruglio Dal Dan
substitute tin to nit to mail me
http://www.fantascienza.net/sfpeople/elethiomel
Jordin Kare
ada...@nit.it.invalid (Anna Feruglio Dal Dan) wrote:
> Jessica Martin <sfcro...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Seeing all the Tolkien frenzy going on around the upcoming LoTR movie,
> > a thought suddenly struck me last night.
> >
> > Perhaps the Dark Lord of Mordor was the real hero of the book. After
> > all, he was just trying to jump-start the industrial revolution and
> > bring a better standard of living to Middle Earth.
> >
> > Who were his enemies? Reactionary wizards like Galdalf, trying to keep
> > the people in a state of rural 3rd world poverty and addicted to their
> > primitive magic power block.
> >
> > Hobbits? Just witless pawns in a global Middle Earth conspiracy to
> > stop progress.
>
> Actually, I'd love to see it written from this point of view. I wanted
> to write something along this lines once just to annoy the gloomy Heroic
> Fantasy Party of Italian fandom.
_The Hobbit Done Gone_
Jordin
Dorothy J Heydt
Jessica Martin <sfcro...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
>Perhaps the Dark Lord of Mordor was the real hero of the book. After
>all, he was just trying to jump-start the industrial revolution and
>bring a better standard of living to Middle Earth.
You would NEVER convince Tolkien that the Industrial Revolution
was a good thing.
Dorothy J. Heydt
Albany, California
djh...@kithrup.com
http://www.kithrup.com/~djheydt
Marcus L. Rowland
Feruglio Dal Dan <ada...@nit.it.invalid> writes
>
>Actually, I'd love to see it written from this point of view. I wanted
>to write something along this lines once just to annoy the gloomy Heroic
>Fantasy Party of Italian fandom.
Look out for an anthology called _Villains_, edited by Roz Kaveney and
Mary Gentle. Has several nice stories on this general theme - basically,
the view from the Dark Lord's camp. See also Mary Gentle's novel
_Grunts_.
--
Marcus L. Rowland
Forgotten Futures - The Scientific Romance Role Playing Game
http://www.ffutures.demon.co.uk/ http://www.forgottenfutures.com/
"We are all victims of this slime. They... ...fill our mailboxes with gibberish
that would get them indicted if people had time to press charges"
[Hunter S. Thompson predicts junk e-mail, 1985 (from Generation of Swine)]
Anna Feruglio Dal Dan
> > Actually, I'd love to see it written from this point of view. I wanted
> > to write something along this lines once just to annoy the gloomy Heroic
> > Fantasy Party of Italian fandom.
>
> _The Hobbit Done Gone_
ROTFL!
Anna Feruglio Dal Dan
> In article <1euy7eb.1xdqg54p0wnaiN%ada...@nit.it.invalid>, Anna
> Feruglio Dal Dan <ada...@nit.it.invalid> writes
> >
> >Actually, I'd love to see it written from this point of view. I wanted
> >to write something along this lines once just to annoy the gloomy Heroic
> >Fantasy Party of Italian fandom.
>
> Look out for an anthology called _Villains_, edited by Roz Kaveney and
> Mary Gentle. Has several nice stories on this general theme - basically,
> the view from the Dark Lord's camp. See also Mary Gentle's novel
> _Grunts_.
Oh, yes, I've been meaning to get _Grunts_ for ages, but Amazon.uk
doesn't have it, and right now I'm too broke to order from somewhere
else (he, because just bought a digital camera, actually. :-) ). But
it's going on my wish list immediately.
I'd love to be able to buy second-hand, but I have a problem with
postage. How do people manage to look for a bookshop that has more than
one title one wants? If I wanted to locate some place that has both
Villains and Grunts, for example?
trike
Anna Feruglio Dal Dan <ada...@nit.it.invalid> wrote in message
news:1euyiih.1kmy67xhqamaN%ada...@nit.it.invalid...
You can look here:
http://used.addall.com/Used/
A search of "mary gentle" and "grunts" pulled up 46 copies, some reasonably
priced.
I can't imagine shipping to be all that heinous from US to Italy.
--
Doug
--
Moviedogs v3.0: your favorite dogs in your favorite films:
http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/1910
Spike, Tiggy & Panda's Pug-A-Rama:
http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/1910
David G. Bell
djh...@kithrup.com "Dorothy J Heydt" wrote:
> In article <2984a678.01061...@posting.google.com>,
> Jessica Martin <sfcro...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> >
> >Perhaps the Dark Lord of Mordor was the real hero of the book. After
> >all, he was just trying to jump-start the industrial revolution and
> >bring a better standard of living to Middle Earth.
>
> You would NEVER convince Tolkien that the Industrial Revolution
> was a good thing.
Yet the Shire was in many ways a 19th Century rural idyll, which
ultimately depends on an industrial revolution to provide the tools to
support that state.
Or is Tolkein's utopia a post-industrial economy?
--
David G. Bell -- Farmer, SF Fan, Filker, and Punslinger.
If I were to go back to my schooldays, knowing what I know now, I would
pack cheese sandwiches for lunch.
Anna Feruglio Dal Dan
> You can look here:
> http://used.addall.com/Used/
>
> A search of "mary gentle" and "grunts" pulled up 46 copies, some reasonably
> priced.
>
> I can't imagine shipping to be all that heinous from US to Italy.
I can: Grunts, A Fantasy With Attitude, used copy, price 3$, Shipping
and Handling, 13.99$. :-((
Ordering from Amazon itself, a new copy, only costs me 7.68$. :-(
Not that ordering from the UK is much better...
This is why I try to consolidate orders.
With the exchange rates of both dollar and pound right now, I end up
spending, relatively speaking, a lot more money on books than you folks.
And remember that a very high portion of the books I buy and _all_ of
the English ones are bought on line. After all, I can't just walk into
the nearest bookseller. :-(
trike
Anna Feruglio Dal Dan <ada...@nit.it.invalid> wrote in message
> trike <tr...@cinci.rr.com> wrote:
>
> >
> > I can't imagine shipping to be all that heinous from US to Italy.
>
> I can: Grunts, A Fantasy With Attitude, used copy, price 3$, Shipping
> and Handling, 13.99$. :-((
Yoicks. Can't you get your godfather to do something about that? Make them
an offer they can't refuse.
Anna Feruglio Dal Dan
> Anna Feruglio Dal Dan <ada...@nit.it.invalid> wrote in message
> news:1euyon7.1ibjf691pcb1mzN%ada...@nit.it.invalid...
> > trike <tr...@cinci.rr.com> wrote:
> >
> > >
> > > I can't imagine shipping to be all that heinous from US to Italy.
> >
> > I can: Grunts, A Fantasy With Attitude, used copy, price 3$, Shipping
> > and Handling, 13.99$. :-((
>
> Yoicks. Can't you get your godfather to do something about that? Make them
> an offer they can't refuse.
I'm concentrating my power of unsubtle influence on winning the Urania
Award ("Say, Giuseppe, it's a long time since you last gave it to a
woman, isn't it?"). I'm one of the four finalist. On Monday I was giving
this talk on Sf and human rights which I managed to sidetrack into
discussing Egan, and one man began making disparaging remarks on his
style. I was getting colder and colder until I realized in a flash that
he was one of the jurors... :-)
O Deus
deragatory manner and the blackness of Mordor is excessively emphasized as a
racist code word. Meanwhile whiteness is associated with the fellowship and
they are even led by Gandalf the White.
The dark lord of Mordor suggests further racial refferences and the orc
invasion parralels Britain's fear of being overun by those peoples they
consider inferior races. These races are portrayed as bringing crime with
them, while being lazy, irresponsible and greedy. In short we have a grab
bag of racial stereotypes here.
And so LOTR's popularity clearly proves that everyone who likes it is a
racist. And now please give me my grant money which will fund the writing
and publication of "Klan Lord of the Rings: The true racist subtext of a
bigoted work of fantasy" Target date 2005.
Jessica Martin wrote in message
<2984a678.01061...@posting.google.com>...
P Nielsen Hayden
Anna Feruglio Dal Dan <ada...@nit.it.invalid> wrote:
>Jessica Martin <sfcro...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Seeing all the Tolkien frenzy going on around the upcoming LoTR movie,
>> a thought suddenly struck me last night.
>>
>> Perhaps the Dark Lord of Mordor was the real hero of the book. After
>> all, he was just trying to jump-start the industrial revolution and
>> bring a better standard of living to Middle Earth.
>>
>> Who were his enemies? Reactionary wizards like Galdalf, trying to keep
>> the people in a state of rural 3rd world poverty and addicted to their
>> primitive magic power block.
>>
>> Hobbits? Just witless pawns in a global Middle Earth conspiracy to
>> stop progress.
>
>Actually, I'd love to see it written from this point of view. I wanted
>to write something along this lines once just to annoy the gloomy Heroic
>Fantasy Party of Italian fandom.
Is it true that Tolkien fandom and neo-fascism tend to go together in
modern Italy? I've never quite gotten over reading, twenty years ago,
about Italian neo-fascists going on vacation in "hobbit camps."
I love Tolkien while recognizing his many defects. I'm also very
aware that cultural objects tend to wind up getting put to surprising
uses.
--
Patrick Nielsen Hayden : p...@panix.com : http://www.panix.com/~pnh
Weblog: http://www.panix.com/~pnh/electrolite.html
Anthologies: http://www.panix.com/~pnh/anthologies.html
Music: http://www.panix.com/~pnh/trouble.html
Jo Walton
ada...@nit.it.invalid "Anna Feruglio Dal Dan" writes:
> I can: Grunts, A Fantasy With Attitude, used copy, price 3$, Shipping
> and Handling, 13.99$. :-((
>
> Ordering from Amazon itself, a new copy, only costs me 7.68$. :-(
>
> Not that ordering from the UK is much better...
>
> This is why I try to consolidate orders.
>
> With the exchange rates of both dollar and pound right now, I end up
> spending, relatively speaking, a lot more money on books than you folks.
> And remember that a very high portion of the books I buy and _all_ of
> the English ones are bought on line. After all, I can't just walk into
> the nearest bookseller. :-(
You're going to be in Hay-on-Wye at the end of July. Hay-on-Wye is
full of second hand bookshops. I'd be very surprised if you can't
pick up a copy of _Grunts_ for a pound or two there, given even the
slightest effort to do so.
I'd recommend doing what I did when I lived in Greece and came back
for a visit -- bring an empty bag and take home a full one.
--
Jo J...@bluejo.demon.co.uk
I kissed a kif at Kefk
Locus Recommended First Novel: *THE KING'S PEACE* out now from Tor.
Sample Chapters, Map, Poems, & stuff at http://www.bluejo.demon.co.uk
Anna Feruglio Dal Dan
> Is it true that Tolkien fandom and neo-fascism tend to go together in
> modern Italy? I've never quite gotten over reading, twenty years ago,
> about Italian neo-fascists going on vacation in "hobbit camps."
Yes, completely true.
> I love Tolkien while recognizing his many defects. I'm also very
> aware that cultural objects tend to wind up getting put to surprising
> uses.
Yes, most fantasy is used this way in Italy, and the very sad thing is
that I see the beginnings of trying to put SF to the same use.
In fantasy, the neo-fascist (there are, to be sure, very different kinds
of fascism, there always were: futurism and esoterism are both aspects
of the fascist culture, but that would be a long story) element sees a
lot of things they approve of: the prevalence of mythos over history,
the extollment of "heroism" and the intrinsic, ancestral charisma of
authority figures, the recovery of a traditional wisdom that, in their
horror for any kind of advancement of learning, they recognize as the
only possible kind of knowledge. Of course, these elements are not
always present and sometimes can only be discerned through an extremely
distorted interpretation, but that's not an obstacle to people who
reason much like the esoterists in "Foucault's Pendulum". The only kind
of fantasy they really can't bend to their interpretation is funny
fantasy, so that not only Pratchett would seem an abomination to them,
but Leiber is highly suspect as well. Tolkien, though... Tolkien works
perfectly.
This is why the editor of my ex-publisher's fantasy line once told me
(around 1987) that when he was hired it had been on the condition that
he would never, ever have to publish Leiber, Wolfe, Cherryh or Moorcock.
(I'm not sure what the problem was with Wolfe: Cherryh and Moorkcock
both have anti-heroes as protagonists, and this may be the chief
complaint against them).
Fantasy fans are resisting this, though. They argue passionately against
Tolkien being, not fascist (which he wasn't by any strecth of the
imagination) but deeply conservatory and, let's say, usable in this way.
(We just had this discussion in the Italian fantasy group.) I disgree
with them, but I am heartened by the fact that they argue. Besides, the
little fantasy that is translated in Italy mostly comes from the US, and
tends not to go along the lines our beloved Cultural Fantasy Elite would
want it to go. I doubt they can get much mileage out of Martin, for
example.
But they try to derail it on their track. For a long time, Italian
national Conventions were run by two groups of people, a small press in
Courmayeur, Keltia, specializing in cute pictures of little elves and
Celtic fantasy (it would be long and difficult to explain why but Celtic
things are very near the heart of the esoteric Right, so that you get
neo-fascists rooting for IRA), and the owner of a library in Rimini that
held this convention in San Marino centered on fantasy and esoteric
thinking. SF fans have long suffered about this. The convention in San
Marino used to have titles like "It's always the time for Heroes" ("E'
sempre tempo di Eroi") and "Wind from the North" (which is what the Lega
calls itself, not coincidentally). And very little space was given to
SF.
When I hear moans about a specifically "Italian way to fantastic
literature", this is the kind of things I know they are talking about:
to be "Italian" one should ditch all this nonsense about science being
any good and either write terribly pessimistic dystopias about the Evils
of Science, or preferably write fantasy in which shining heroic figures
inbued with intrinsic auhtority residing in their blood or their
military might or spiritual greatness, heeding the forgotten wisdom of
the Ancients, redeem a world fallen into decadence, bringing it back to
the noble values of ancient Tradition. (The first kind of writing is
advocated also by people who think they're rather left-wing, actually.
There is one page in Egan's _Distress_, where new-agers opposers of
science are scathingly described, that made me keep jumping up and down
while reading it, shouting Yes! Yes! That's it! That's italian SF
fandom!)
Anyway, that is why I'd like to write a fantasy novel in which Sauron is
the hero. :-) (I won't, though: fantasy is really not my stuff).
Anna Feruglio Dal Dan
> You're going to be in Hay-on-Wye at the end of July. Hay-on-Wye is
> full of second hand bookshops. I'd be very surprised if you can't
> pick up a copy of _Grunts_ for a pound or two there, given even the
> slightest effort to do so.
Yes, that was my secret plan. :-)
>
> I'd recommend doing what I did when I lived in Greece and came back
> for a visit -- bring an empty bag and take home a full one.
I used to do that in the grim and terrible times before Amazon, before
even Andromeda. It used to puzzle custom people to no end. They had me
take all the books out the cabin baggage - they couldn't believe that it
was books, books, and books to the botton. There _had_ to be some coke
in there somewhere, they obviously thought.
Anna Mazzoldi
ada...@nit.it.invalid (Anna Feruglio Dal Dan) wrote:
> I'm concentrating my power of unsubtle influence on winning the Urania
> Award ("Say, Giuseppe, it's a long time since you last gave it to a
> woman, isn't it?").
[Cultural note: I think she means *the award*] ;-)
--
Anna Mazzoldi writing from Dublin, Ireland
http://www.iol.ie/~mazzoldi/ (Translation links and more)
Dorothy J Heydt
Anna Feruglio Dal Dan <ada...@nit.it.invalid> wrote:
>
>take all the books out the cabin baggage - they couldn't believe that it
>was books, books, and books to the botton. There _had_ to be some coke
>in there somewhere, they obviously thought.
Hm. How old were you at the time? On my one trip across the
pond, in 1985 I think it was, I returned with bags full of books
and nobody tried to search 'em. But I was already middle-aged
and I guess I didn't look likely.
When I had arrived in Britain the customs officials had just
waved me on past, as they stood along a long table turning out
every nook and cranny of some teenager's baggage, including
looking inside her lipsticks.
When I got back and confronted the US Customs fellow, I gave him
a several-page list of everything I had brought in and what it
cost. Mostly books. He looked it up and down and said only,
"What's a darning mushroom?" I explained, and he said, "Well,
I'm sorry to tell you that you have nothing here I can charge you
anything for," and sent me on my way.
It must've been the middle-aged face and shape, and the general
air of fatigue and distraction.
Kristopher
>
> ada...@nit.it.invalid (Anna Feruglio Dal Dan) wrote:
>
>> I'm concentrating my power of unsubtle influence on winning
>> the Urania Award ("Say, Giuseppe, it's a long time since you
>> last gave it to a woman, isn't it?").
>
> [Cultural note: I think she means *the award*] ;-)
Thank you. I'll be laughing about that all day.
Kristopher
--
There may be some discomfort as you are extracted from reality...
Anna Feruglio Dal Dan
> :
> ada...@nit.it.invalid (Anna Feruglio Dal Dan) wrote:
>
> > I'm concentrating my power of unsubtle influence on winning the Urania
> > Award ("Say, Giuseppe, it's a long time since you last gave it to a
> > woman, isn't it?").
>
> [Cultural note: I think she means *the award*] ;-)
That's cheap revenge, it is. :-))
Anna Feruglio Dal Dan
> In article <1euztyo.1u7ij5z18lp6zwN%ada...@nit.it.invalid>,
> Anna Feruglio Dal Dan <ada...@nit.it.invalid> wrote:
> >
> >....It used to puzzle custom people to no end. They had me
> >take all the books out the cabin baggage - they couldn't believe that it
> >was books, books, and books to the botton. There _had_ to be some coke
> >in there somewhere, they obviously thought.
>
> Hm. How old were you at the time? On my one trip across the
> pond, in 1985 I think it was, I returned with bags full of books
> and nobody tried to search 'em. But I was already middle-aged
> and I guess I didn't look likely.
It was in 1987, after the Brighton WorldCon - I was 21 at the time. It's
not as they were abusive about it, not at all. I was mostly amused at
their puzzlement.
Andrew Plotkin
> national Conventions were run by two groups of people, a small press in
> Courmayeur, Keltia, specializing in cute pictures of little elves and
> Celtic fantasy (it would be long and difficult to explain why but Celtic
> things are very near the heart of the esoteric Right, so that you get
I would like to observe at this time that *I do not understand my
birth species even a little bit*.
--Z
"And Aholibamah bare Jeush, and Jaalam, and Korah: these were the borogoves..."
*
* Votes count. Count votes.
Randolph Fritz
Anna Feruglio Dal Dan wrote:
>
> When I hear moans about a specifically "Italian way to fantastic
> literature", this is the kind of things I know they are talking about:
> to be "Italian" one should ditch all this nonsense about science being
> any good and either write terribly pessimistic dystopias about the Evils
> of Science, or preferably write fantasy in which shining heroic figures
> inbued with intrinsic auhtority residing in their blood or their
>
It seems to me that USers, being optimistic sorts by cultural
inclination, are more apt to put the shining heroism in the future.
Or even the present--as tnh once said, "we live in extremely
interesting ancient times." Tolkien was, so far as I know, deeply and
truly conservative, but USers responded to his conservatism by saying
it, perhaps, it might be part of the future; Tolkien was (and probably
remains) a powerful influence on US environmentalism, for instance.
Personally, I suspect that fantasy may turn out to be about the future
after all...but that's another article, and I'm way too tired to write
it now.
Randolph
Besides, global climate change is a story by Frank Herbert, right? :-)
Anna Feruglio Dal Dan
> It seems to me that USers, being optimistic sorts by cultural
> inclination, are more apt to put the shining heroism in the future.
Which is why people who don't subscribe to gloomy pessimism about Life,
the Universe and Everything are accused of being "Americans". That's why
I derive an evil glee from telling people that I enjoy all the trashy
Hollywood products they so thorougly despise - ID4 included.
Ross Smith
>
> inbued with intrinsic auhtority residing in their blood or their
> military might or spiritual greatness, heeding the forgotten wisdom of
> the Ancients, redeem a world fallen into decadence, bringing it back to
> the noble values of ancient Tradition.
Have you read Norman Spinrad's _The Iron Dream_? If not, you should.
(Not that I feel in any position to criticise Italians, of course. Most
of the New Zealand SF I've read tends to be either terminally trendy
political satire or more of that evils-of-science stuff you were on
about.)
--
Ross Smith ....................................... Auckland, New Zealand
r-s...@ihug.co.nz ......................... http://halflife.mani.ac.nz/
"A wise man learns from the mistakes of others; a fool
learns only from his own." -- Gen. Aleksandr Lebed
Anna Feruglio Dal Dan
> Anna Feruglio Dal Dan wrote:
> >
> > ... or preferably write fantasy in which shining heroic figures
> > inbued with intrinsic auhtority residing in their blood or their
> > military might or spiritual greatness, heeding the forgotten wisdom of
> > the Ancients, redeem a world fallen into decadence, bringing it back to
> > the noble values of ancient Tradition.
>
> Have you read Norman Spinrad's _The Iron Dream_? If not, you should.
I did. I must say it was preaching to the converted with me. I have the
sick feeling they wouldn't get the point, though. :-(
> (Not that I feel in any position to criticise Italians, of course. Most
> of the New Zealand SF I've read tends to be either terminally trendy
> political satire or more of that evils-of-science stuff you were on
> about.)
I have a theory that you have to reach a sort of critical mass to have
good literature - even popular, escapist literature. You have to have a
market to sell it to, so that people can make of it their life's work;
and you have to have a minimum number of good authors the aspiring
writer can look up to and try to best, or at least copy. If their're
surrounded by mediocre scribblers, even people with talent tend to lower
their standards, and it turns into a vicious circle fairly easily.
Anna Mazzoldi
ada...@nit.it.invalid (Anna Feruglio Dal Dan) wrote:
> Anna Mazzoldi <mazz...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> > :
> > ada...@nit.it.invalid (Anna Feruglio Dal Dan) wrote:
> >
> > > I'm concentrating my power of unsubtle influence on winning the Urania
> > > Award ("Say, Giuseppe, it's a long time since you last gave it to a
> > > woman, isn't it?").
> >
> > [Cultural note: I think she means *the award*] ;-)
>
> That's cheap revenge, it is. :-))
No, I swear. That's how I read it first time 'round. I was trying
to work out in what way insulting his virility would give you a
better chance of getting the prize, I thought there was some
subtle mafia reference there. Then it clicked, and I couldn't
resist sharing it with everybody else... ;-)
Nancy Lebovitz
Randolph Fritz <rand...@panix.com> wrote:
>
>Personally, I suspect that fantasy may turn out to be about the future
>after all...but that's another article, and I'm way too tired to write
>it now.
I've played with the notion that elves are time-travellers from
the future. Their tech is advanced enough that they don't feel
much emotional connection with us--they just do random favors
and pranks. The reason they're hanging around the present (more
likely, the past up till moderately recently) is that the one
thing you can't get in the future is a substantially undisturbed
ecosystem.
--
Nancy Lebovitz na...@netaxs.com www.nancybuttons.com
Randolph Fritz
Anna Feruglio Dal Dan wrote:
>
>> It seems to me that USers, being optimistic sorts by cultural
>> inclination, are more apt to put the shining heroism in the future.
>
> Which is why people who don't subscribe to gloomy pessimism about Life,
> the Universe and Everything are accused of being "Americans". That's why
> I derive an evil glee from telling people that I enjoy all the trashy
> Hollywood products they so thorougly despise - ID4 included.
>
Snort!
I'd honestly never thought of that as a virtue of those films, but
then I don't choose a media environment that is mostly pessimistic, so
there's no reason I would. If you couldn't avoid it, now, I can see
how those films could come as a breath of fresh air.
Civilized despair--bah!
Randolph
michael paine
"Dorothy J Heydt" <djh...@kithrup.com> wrote in message
news:GEvHu...@kithrup.com...
> In article <2984a678.01061...@posting.google.com>,
> Jessica Martin <sfcro...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> >
> >all, he was just trying to jump-start the industrial revolution and
> >bring a better standard of living to Middle Earth.
>
> was a good thing.
You'd have had your work cut out convincing him that the Renaissance was
a good thing.
michael paine
"Randolph Fritz" <rand...@panix.com> wrote in message
news:slrn9ijcij....@panix3.panix.com...
> In article <1euzjne.1mn460m89pgd4N%ada...@nit.it.invalid>,
> Anna Feruglio Dal Dan wrote:
> >
> > When I hear moans about a specifically "Italian way to fantastic
> > literature", this is the kind of things I know they are talking
about:
> > to be "Italian" one should ditch all this nonsense about science
being
> > any good and either write terribly pessimistic dystopias about the
Evils
> > of Science, or preferably write fantasy in which shining heroic
figures
> > inbued with intrinsic auhtority residing in their blood or their
> > military might or spiritual greatness, [...]
> >
>
> It seems to me that USers, being optimistic sorts by cultural
> inclination, are more apt to put the shining heroism in the future.
> Or even the present--as tnh once said, "we live in extremely
> interesting ancient times." Tolkien was, so far as I know, deeply and
> truly conservative, but USers responded to his conservatism by saying
> it, perhaps, it might be part of the future; Tolkien was (and probably
> remains) a powerful influence on US environmentalism, for instance.
I think it's more a zeitgeisty thing with Tolkien: Robert E Howard
springs to mind (and a far more suitable candidate for the right in many
ways). I'd be curious to know if David Icke read his Kull stories as a
youth.
Anna Feruglio Dal Dan
> No, I swear. That's how I read it first time 'round. I was trying
> to work out in what way insulting his virility would give you a
> better chance of getting the prize, I thought there was some
> subtle mafia reference there.
:-)
I have this theory that if the jurors absolutely loathe you, they'd be
drawn to lean in your favour just to demonstrate that they're
fair-minded.
Well, it worked last year with Grasso, didn't it?
And this far, I've managed to alienate only Curtoni. I have to work
harder at this...
But, with Lippi, "Lovecraft was a dumb old man who couldn't write" would
be far more unforgettable. :-)
Dorothy J Heydt
michael paine <mike...@extinction.freeserve.co.uk> wrote:
>
>
>You'd have had your work cut out convincing him that the Renaissance was
>a good thing.
Well, it wasn't Tolkien but his buddy C. S. Lewis who one day
remarked, "I have just determined that in England the Renaissance
never happened. Alternatively, that if it did it didn't make any
difference."
Ray Radlein
>
> Anna Feruglio Dal Dan <ada...@nit.it.invalid> wrote:
> > For a long time, Italian
> > national Conventions were run by two groups of people, a small
> > press in Courmayeur, Keltia, specializing in cute pictures of
> > little elves and Celtic fantasy (it would be long and difficult
> > to explain why but Celtic things are very near the heart of the
> > esoteric Right, so that you get neo-fascists rooting for IRA),
> > [...]
>
> I would like to observe at this time that *I do not understand my
> birth species even a little bit*.
Why not? The cloud-beings of Olcrozz IV have always seemed pretty
straight-forward to *me*, at least.
Well, aside from the emfozzing and the grestulating, of course. How
*do* you do that, anyway?
- Ray R.
--
*********************************************************************
"Right now, it looks like a hunter; but if you push this button,
here, and fold it like so, it turns into... a deer!"
"What a cute little doll!"
"Please! It's not a *doll* -- it's an *Actaeon Figure*!"
Ray Radlein - r...@learnlink.emory.edu
homepage coming soon! wooo, wooo.
*********************************************************************
Ken MacLeod
<djh...@kithrup.com> writes
>In article <9gdslh$gj5$2...@news8.svr.pol.co.uk>,
>michael paine <mike...@extinction.freeserve.co.uk> wrote:
>>
>>
>>You'd have had your work cut out convincing him that the Renaissance was
>>a good thing.
>
>Well, it wasn't Tolkien but his buddy C. S. Lewis who one day
>remarked, "I have just determined that in England the Renaissance
>never happened. Alternatively, that if it did it didn't make any
>difference."
>
Wasn't it Lewis who is supposed to have said: 'And then the Renaissance
came, and spoiled everything'?
--
Ken MacLeod
O Deus
about man's place in the universe.
So it's no surprise that it would be optimistic, though generally dark SF
films seem to sell better.
When you look at the top films like Blade Runner, Twelve Monkeys, Dark City,
The Matrix...it's all doom and gloom.
Randolph Fritz wrote in message ...
Jo'Asia
> Seeing all the Tolkien frenzy going on around the upcoming LoTR movie,
> a thought suddenly struck me last night.
> Perhaps the Dark Lord of Mordor was the real hero of the book. After
> all, he was just trying to jump-start the industrial revolution and
> bring a better standard of living to Middle Earth.
> Who were his enemies? Reactionary wizards like Galdalf, trying to keep
> the people in a state of rural 3rd world poverty and addicted to their
> primitive magic power block.
> Hobbits? Just witless pawns in a global Middle Earth conspiracy to
> stop progress.
It has already been written. Unfortunately, in Russian. It has been
translated to Polish, but I don't think an English translation could
be published without serious complaints (or lawsuit) from Tolkien Estate.
The book is called "The Last Ringbearer" and was written by Kiryl Yeskov.
I have to say I liked it a lot, my favourite part being the _real_ story
of Mordor commander-in-chief's death during the siege of Minas Tirith.
8)))
Jo'Asia
--
http://framzeta.art.pl Joanna Slupek http://rassun.art.pl
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I'm from SF and I'm okay, I read all night and write all day (Robson)
To write me replace 'rasun' with 'rassun' in my e-mail
Anna Feruglio Dal Dan
> The book is called "The Last Ringbearer" and was written by Kiryl Yeskov.
>
> I have to say I liked it a lot, my favourite part being the _real_ story
> of Mordor commander-in-chief's death during the siege of Minas Tirith.
> 8)))
Oh, please, do tell. :-)
Jo'Asia
<1ev5us0.14us8qumuj1j4N%ada...@nit.it.invalid>:
> Jo'Asia <JoA...@rasun.art.pl> wrote:
>> The book is called "The Last Ringbearer" and was written by Kiryl Yeskov.
>> I have to say I liked it a lot, my favourite part being the _real_ story
>> of Mordor commander-in-chief's death during the siege of Minas Tirith.
>> 8)))
> Oh, please, do tell. :-)
Well, first I shoud explain, that the Mordor commander wasn't a Nazgul but
a human. He accepted Aragorn's challenge to a honorable duel only to be
attacked from behind by Aragorn's army of undead. Then, before commander died,
Aragorn promised him that in the chronicles he will be remembered as
defeated in a fair duel, but then changed his mind and said that it
would be better to say that some hair-footed shorty killed him. Or, even
better, a women, and that's exactly what will be in the chronicles 8)))
Anna Feruglio Dal Dan
> but then changed his mind and said that it
> would be better to say that some hair-footed shorty killed him. Or, even
> better, a women,
Wicked. :-)
Kip Williams
> Anyway, that is why I'd like to write a fantasy novel in which Sauron is
> the hero. :-) (I won't, though: fantasy is really not my stuff).
_The Ring Done Melted_ (special guest: Wotan).
--
--Kip (Williams) ...at http://members.home.net/kipw/
I was offline for a few days. I'm back now, and catching up.
Doug Wickstrom
<3B2D49D8...@home.com>
Kip Williams <ki...@home.com> excited the ether to say:
>Anna Feruglio Dal Dan wrote:
>
>> Anyway, that is why I'd like to write a fantasy novel in which Sauron is
>> the hero. :-) (I won't, though: fantasy is really not my stuff).
>
>_The Ring Done Melted_ (special guest: Wotan).
With special appearances by the Rhine Maidens, and the Nibelungen
Liederkor?
--
Doug Wickstrom
"That lowdown scoundrel deserves to be kicked to death by a jackass, and I'm
just the one to do it." --a Texas congressional candidate
Doug Wickstrom
<9girf2.3...@sloth.hell.pl>
Jo'Asia <JoA...@rasun.art.pl> excited the ether to say:
Neat stuff, the neatest of which is that she wrote it. Welcome
to Rassef, if nobody has welcomed you already, and if you've
already been welcomed, consider this my personal welcome rather
than a collective one.
--
Doug Wickstrom
"We are all of us rooting for truffles, but some of us are hissssing at
the stars." --Ray Radlein
Kip Williams
>
> On Mon, 18 Jun 2001 00:25:28 GMT, in message
> <3B2D49D8...@home.com>
> Kip Williams <ki...@home.com> excited the ether to say:
>
> >Anna Feruglio Dal Dan wrote:
> >
> >> Anyway, that is why I'd like to write a fantasy novel in which Sauron is
> >> the hero. :-) (I won't, though: fantasy is really not my stuff).
> >
> >_The Ring Done Melted_ (special guest: Wotan).
>
> With special appearances by the Rhine Maidens, and the Nibelungen
> Liederkor?
Yes, and Frank Sinatra. Ring-a-ding-ding.
--
--Kip (Williams) ...at http://members.home.net/kipw/
Rooby rooby roo.
Ross Smith
>
> Jo'Asia <JoA...@rasun.art.pl> wrote:
>
> > but then changed his mind and said that it
> > would be better to say that some hair-footed shorty killed him. Or, even
> > better, a women,
>
> Wicked. :-)
You have _got_ to read _Grunts_.
'The history of an Age,' Oderic said ... 'I'm going to tell the
_real_ story about halflings, orcs, the Dark Lord and the final
victory. The halflings are going to be cheery and moral and know
their place; the orcs will be cowardly, and they'll lose; there
won't be _any_ mention of arms-trading, and at the end of it the
Dark Lord will be male, and very, very dead!'
Anna Feruglio Dal Dan
> You have _got_ to read _Grunts_.
>
> 'The history of an Age,' Oderic said ... 'I'm going to tell the
> _real_ story about halflings, orcs, the Dark Lord and the final
> victory. The halflings are going to be cheery and moral and know
> their place; the orcs will be cowardly, and they'll lose; there
> won't be _any_ mention of arms-trading, and at the end of it the
> Dark Lord will be male, and very, very dead!'
Yes, after that discussion in rasfw I'm more determined than ever in
getting my hands on one copy. Now I'll try to dredge the courage to try
my extremely rusty spoken English on the B&B people of Hay...
Thomas Yan
Anna Feruglio Dal Dan <ada...@nit.it.invalid> wrote:
>Jo'Asia <JoA...@rasun.art.pl> wrote:
>
>> but then changed his mind and said that it
>> would be better to say that some hair-footed shorty killed him. Or, even
>> better, a women,
>
>Wicked. :-)
Speaking of which, I really liked _Wicked: The Life and Times of the
Wicked Witch of the West_ by Gregory Maguire and immediate thought of
that book and author when I saw this thread. If Maguire were to write
a revisionist telling of LOTR, I'd read it. If someone else wrote it,
I'd wait to see others' reactions before deciding whether to read it.
--
Thomas Yan (ty...@cs.cornell.edu) I don't speak for Cornell University
Computer Science Department \\ Cornell University \\ Ithaca, NY 14853
(please pardon any lack of capitalization; my hands hurt from typing)
Cally Soukup
> Yes, after that discussion in rasfw I'm more determined than ever in
> getting my hands on one copy. Now I'll try to dredge the courage to try
> my extremely rusty spoken English on the B&B people of Hay...
Your written English is excellent. If your handwriting is likewise
good, you might consider bringing along a notepad and pencil. That
way, if they can't understand you, or you can't understand them, you
can have a written conversation!
--
"I may disagree with what you have to say, but I will defend
to the death your right to say it." -- Beatrice Hall
Cally Soukup sou...@pobox.com
Anna Feruglio Dal Dan
> Anna Feruglio Dal Dan <ada...@nit.it.invalid> wrote in article
> <1ev7d3x.18xgwwrtkim6eN%ada...@nit.it.invalid>:
>
> > Yes, after that discussion in rasfw I'm more determined than ever in
> > getting my hands on one copy. Now I'll try to dredge the courage to try
> > my extremely rusty spoken English on the B&B people of Hay...
>
> Your written English is excellent. If your handwriting is likewise good,
> you might consider bringing along a notepad and pencil. That way, if they
> can't understand you, or you can't understand them, you can have a written
> conversation!
My spoken English is not as good as my written one, but that's mainly a
problem with my accent, which I've never even tried to get rid of. It
usually takes me a couple of days to get back into gear in English, but
I can usually make myself understood; my main problem is with
understanding other people. I usually solve the problem talking
incessantly so that people can't get a word in between... :-)
But in this case, I meant that I have to pick up the phone and call the
various Bed and Breakfast to find a place to stay, and the phone makes
me very nervous even in my own language... so I'm procastinating. Well,
procastination is one thing I'm really famously good about. :-)
Anyway, if anybody sees a copy of _Grunts_ in Hay (or London for that
matter, I'm going there to stay next), would they tell me, please? Last
time I tried to find something in Hay I was seized by frustration and
despair.
Julian Warner
>
> Anna Feruglio Dal Dan wrote:
>
> > Anyway, that is why I'd like to write a fantasy novel in which Sauron is
> > the hero. :-) (I won't, though: fantasy is really not my stuff).
>
> _The Ring Done Melted_ (special guest: Wotan).
Surely you've forgotten that classic film: _The Ring Peace_ ?
Then of course it was re-made as _Carry On Up the Ring-Piece_
with Julian Clary replacing Charlton Heston in the lead role.
Julian.
--
Julian Warner, Brunswick, Victoria, Australia.
I'm sorry, your 30 seconds is up. I gotta go.
[Where was I?]
Marc Ortlieb
<jul...@cannizaro.com.au> wrote:
> Kip Williams wrote:
> >
> > Anna Feruglio Dal Dan wrote:
> >
> > > Anyway, that is why I'd like to write a fantasy novel in which Sauron is
> > > the hero. :-) (I won't, though: fantasy is really not my stuff).
> >
> > _The Ring Done Melted_ (special guest: Wotan).
>
> Surely you've forgotten that classic film: _The Ring Peace_ ?
>
> Then of course it was re-made as _Carry On Up the Ring-Piece_
> with Julian Clary replacing Charlton Heston in the lead role.
>
> Julian.
>
Stand by for half a dozen septics who are going to ask who Julian Clary is.
(And perhaps a few smart arsed Aussies to reply "Phil Cleary's brother.")
Cally Soukup
> Cally Soukup <sou...@pobox.com> wrote:
>> Your written English is excellent. If your handwriting is likewise good,
>> you might consider bringing along a notepad and pencil. That way, if they
>> can't understand you, or you can't understand them, you can have a written
>> conversation!
> My spoken English is not as good as my written one, but that's mainly a
> problem with my accent, which I've never even tried to get rid of. It
> usually takes me a couple of days to get back into gear in English, but
> I can usually make myself understood; my main problem is with
> understanding other people. I usually solve the problem talking
> incessantly so that people can't get a word in between... :-)
I can sympathise. I could, before I'd forgotten it all, make myself
understood in German (though I'm sure my accent was abominable), but I
had to be very sure to ask question that could best be answered "Ja" or
"Nein". Because otherwise I'd be drowned in a torrent of helpful
German, and only catch one word in every three or four. Those who
answered "slowly and loudly" were, surprisingly, the most helpful --
the loudness I could have done without, but the slowness was a Godsend.
And I didn't mind being addressed like an idiot or a small child when
that was all the useful vocabulary I had anyway <grin>.
> But in this case, I meant that I have to pick up the phone and call the
> various Bed and Breakfast to find a place to stay, and the phone makes
> me very nervous even in my own language... so I'm procastinating. Well,
> procastination is one thing I'm really famously good about. :-)
I don't blame you. I have a touch of phone-phobia myself. (Oddly,
though, once I'm actually *on* the phone, it's difficult to get me off
it. I think what I really have is phone-inertia.)
> Anyway, if anybody sees a copy of _Grunts_ in Hay (or London for that
> matter, I'm going there to stay next), would they tell me, please? Last
> time I tried to find something in Hay I was seized by frustration and
> despair.
The one time I got to Hay I never did find anything I was particularly
looking for, but I still had to buy a duffel bag to bring my purchases
home. When I look at books for too long I can get visually overwhelmed;
fortunately there was some nice scenery to rest my eyes on between
bookshops.
Thomas Yan
Cally Soukup <sou...@pobox.com> wrote:
>Anna Feruglio Dal Dan <ada...@nit.it.invalid> wrote in article
><1ev8suv.1dv1zr21ob8f9kN%ada...@nit.it.invalid>:
>> But in this case, I meant that I have to pick up the phone and call the
>> various Bed and Breakfast to find a place to stay, and the phone makes
>> me very nervous even in my own language... so I'm procastinating. Well,
>> procastination is one thing I'm really famously good about. :-)
>
>I don't blame you. I have a touch of phone-phobia myself. (Oddly,
>though, once I'm actually *on* the phone, it's difficult to get me off
>it. I think what I really have is phone-inertia.)
Me, too. It is perhaps a bit better now, but it is still the case
that even though I have a college degree, I can be mildly
uncomfortable about making a business call, even one as simple as
ordering pizza delivery. Once I'm on the phone, it is not too bad,
even if I get confused or stutter or stammer a bit, but there still is
the initial fear/inertia.
I feel a bit similarly about showers: I like the results, and during
the shower things are fine, even pleasurable, but sometimes I don't
like the anticipation of getting wet.
Marilee J. Layman
Apparently keyboards are good sources for sepsis:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A16133-2001Jun19.html
--
Marilee J. Layman
Bali Sterling Beads at Wholesale
http://www.basicbali.com