SFBC 1973
James Nicoll
List courtesy of Andrew Wheeler.
Since the anthology is still important and since the SFBC went
to multiple releases in the '70s, expect a much slower rate of posting.
It kills me that I can do a 400-500 line post every day or two
and not make the top five most prolific posters in this group.
1973
January THUVIA, MAID OF MARS & THE CHESSMEN OF MARS by Edgar Rice Burroughs
If I read these, I then forgot them. O merciful Providence!
ORBIT 11 edited by Damon Knight
Contents:
Alien Stones (Gene Wolfe)
Spectra (Vonda N. McIntyre)
I Remember a Winter (Frederic Pohl)
Doucement, Si'l Vous Plait (James Sallis)
The Summer of the Irish Sea (Charles L. Grant)
Goodbye, Shelley, Shirley, Charlotte, Charlene (Robert Thurston)
Father's in the Basement (Philip Jose Farmer)
Down By the Old Maelstrom (Edward Wellen)
Things Go Better (George Alec Effinger)
Dissolve (Gary K. Wolf)
Dune's Edge (Edward Bryant)
The Drum Lollipop (Jack M. Dann)
Machine of Loving Grace (Gardner R. Dozois)
They Cope (David Skal)
Counterpoint (Joe Haldeman)
Old Soul (Steve Herbst)
New York Times (Charles Platt)
Chrystallization of the Myth (John Barfoot)
To Plant a Seed (Hank Davis)
On the Road to Honeyville (Kate Wilhelm)
Well, at least I recognise the authors, if not their
stories. Thurston was one of those people whose writing seemed
ok but whose careers never seemed to quite gell. I think that's
frustrating, although not as bad as people who show early promise
squandered on ST tie-ins, whose post ST books are markedly inferior
to the ones written before hand (This is a specific case-type, not
a general tendency).
Winter THE WIND FROM THE SUN by Arthur C. Clarke
Contents:
Preface
Food of the Gods
Maelstrom II
The Shining Ones
The Wind from the Sun
The Secret
The Last Command
Dial "F" for Frankenstein
Reunion
Playback*
The Light of Darkness*
The Longest Science Fiction Story Ever Told*
Herbert George Morley Roberts Wells, Esq.*
Love That Universe*
Crusade
The Cruel Sky
The Neutron Tide
Transit of Earth
A Meeting with Medusa
A solid collection, although I must admit I forget the asterisked
stories entirely. As I recall, the Sunjammer story came out at almost
the same time as a Poul Anderson (Winston Sanders) sunjammer story
and _Neutron Tide_ came out at about the same time as Niven's
_Neutron Star_. Poor Clarke.
I sheepishly admit I nicked the factoid from Crusade for
the background of a high school short story about a honeypot world
and why it existed.
The most influential story in this bunch is probably Medusa,
whose scene of Jovian life have strongly influenced similar scenes
in other books or so it seems to me.
THE MOLECULE MEN by Fred & Geoffrey Hoyle
I missed this.
February CITIES IN FLIGHT by James Blish
This was an omnibus of four linked novels:
A Life for the Stars
In which the decay of the USA is showed and a new space drive
discovered.
A Life for the Stars
A Young Adult novel in which pluck and opportunity propel
a young man to a position of some power in the star faring city of
New York.
Earthman, Come Home
In which the economy of the galaxy takes a Canada Goose through
its jet engine, prompting violent actions of various sorts, from a march
on Earth to the invasion of a planet in the Magellenic Clouds.
The Truimph of Time
In which Blish ensures the non-existance of sequels by pushing
the entire universe over Richenbach Falls.
I liked the books as a teen but Blish's NYC seems so bland
and tasteless compared to the real NYC. Hard to belive the NYC of 1950
was supposed to become this.
AND WALK NOW GENTLY THROUGH THE FIRE edited by Roger Elwood
Aha! The Spectre of Elwood looms! At one point he was 1/4th of
the NorAm market for short stories all by himself. Contento puts him
next to Ellison *snrf*.
Introduction (Marsha Daly)
Stella (Ted White)
Making It Through (Barry N. Malzberg)
And Walk Now Gently Through the Fire (R.A. Laffery)
The Gift of Nothing (Joan C. Holly)
Forever and Amen (Robert Bloch)
And the Power (Rachel Cosgrove Payes)
Caught in the Organ Draft (Robert Silverberg)
A Sense of Difference (Pamela Sargent)
Mother Earth Wants You (Philip Jose Farmer)
Chronicles of a Comer (K.M. O'Donnell)
And although I only recall one of these stories (Organ Draft,
in which the yout' of today lay down their arms and other tranplantable
bits for the adults) I liked it at the time.
March NEBULA AWARD STORIES SEVEN edited by Lloyd Biggle,Jr.
Contents
Introduction (Lloyd Biggle, Jr.)
1971: The YEar in Science Fiction (Damon Knight)
The Queen of Air and Darkness (Poul Anderson)
The Last Ghost (Stephen Goldin)
The Encounter (Kate Wilhelm)
Sky (R.A. Lafferty)
Mount Charity (Edgar Pangborn)
Good News from the Vatican (Robert Silverberg)
Horse of Air (Gardner R. Dozois)
Heathen God (George Zebrowski)
Poor Man, Beggar Man (Joanna Russ)
The Giberel (Doris Pitkin Buck)
The Missing Man (Katherine MacLean)
Nebula Awards SF, 1965-1970: the science (Poul Anderson)
Nebula Awards SF, 1965-1970: the Fiction (Theodore Sturgeon)
Goldin is another fellow whose career never seemed to quite be
as successful as I thought it should be. The stories in here that I
have read (and as I have said before, I am daily gaining a greater
idea of how much SF I have missed) were ok, although the Anderson has
a plot detail that is absurd (telepathy has apparently not been a
topic of discussion since about our time).
I'd love to read the last two essays. Must hunt this collection
down.
THE MAN WHO FOLDED HIMSELF by David Gerrold
Young man uses time belt to create alternative versions of
himself with whom to have sex. "Folded" may not be the verb Gerrold
wanted, here.
April CEMETERY WORLD by Clifford D. Simak
Earth as holy land, sort of, except mostly it is used to
store dead people. If I recall correctly there's a robot that meets
the problem of losing his maintainance base in here.
FLASHING SWORDS! #1 edited by Lin Carter
Of Swordsmen and Sorcerers (Lin Carter)
The Sadness of the Executioner (Fritz Leiber)
Morreion (Jack Vance)
The Merman's Children (Poul Anderson)
The Higher Heresies of Oolimar (Lin Carter)
Carter was a better editor than he was a writer but the only
one of these I have read is the novel version of Children.
Carter is also on my list of SF people I wish had had less
horrible deaths. As I recall, Carter lost much of his face to cancer,
becoming a recluse who then died of a respiratory ailment that could
have been treated, had Carter been willing to go out in public.
May THE SCIENCE FICTION HALL OF FAME, Volume 2A edited by Ben Bova
Contents:
Introduction (Ben Bova)
Call Me Joe (Poul Anderson)
Who Goes There (John W. Campbell, Jr)
Nerves (Lester del Rey)
Universe (Robert A. Heinlein)
The Marching Morons (C.M. Kornbluth)
Vintage Season (Henry Kuttner & C.L. Moore)
...And Then There Were None (Eric Frank Russell)
The Ballad of Lost C'Mell (Cordwainer Smith)
Baby is Three (Theodore Sturgeon)
The Time Machine (H.G. Wells)
With Folded Hands...(Jack WIlliamson)
Using the 'Did James Read These' test, this scores
a near 100% rating, except for the Russell. On the other hand,
I have a rough idea of what the Russell is about, which must
say something for it. I could quibble over the inclusion of
the *particular* RAH story Bova chose but not having a RAH
in there.
If I didn't own all of these in at least one version,
I would be out looking for it.
THE OVERLORDS OF WAR by Gerard Klein, translated by John Brunner
Never saw this. Or rather, I might have seen a DAW version
of this but didn't read it.
June THE SCIENCE FICTION HALL OF FAME, Volume 2B edited by Ben Bova
Contents:
Introduction (Ben Bova)
The Martian Way (Isaac Asimov)
Earthman, Come Home (James Blish)
Rogue Moon (Algis Budrys)
The Spectre General (Theodore R. Cogswell)
The Machine Stops (E.M. Forster)
The Midas Plague (Frederic Pohl)
The Witches of Karres (James H. Schmitz)
E for Effort (T.L. Sherred)
In Hiding (Walter H. Shiras)
The Big Front Yard (Clifford D. Simak)
The Moon Moth (Jack Vance)
This scores less well than volume 2a, but it still looks pretty
gooda. I will note many people feel the short version is the best version
of Schmitz' WoK story.
The only story I would call actively bad is the Pohl, about
the perils of abundence badly handled, if I recall correctly.
FORERUNNER FORAY by Andre Norton
Don't remember this well enough to comment.
Summer AN ALIEN HEAT by Michael Moorcock
And I missed this as well.
THE STAR ROAD by Gordon R. Dickson
Contents:
Whatever Gods There be
Hilifter
Building on the Line
The Christmas Present
Three-Part Puzzle
On Messenger Mountain
The Catch
Jackel's Meal
The Mousetrap
I own a dog-eared copy of this but the only two stories that
left lasting impressions are "Hilifter", about a fellow who hijacks
starships for all the right reasons, and "Building on the Line", about
the problems of expanding a teleporter networker when aided by R&D.
July AN EXALTATION OF STARS edited by Terry Carr
Introduction (Terry Carr)
The Feast of St. Dionysus (Robert Silverberg)
'Kjawlll'kje'k'koothialll'kje'k (Roger Zelazny)
My Brother Leopold (Edgar Pangborn)
I missed the Silverberg, I think. The Zelazny is one of
three with a protagonist who managed to avoid being included in the
big recording of society and the title is either dolphinese or Zelazny
being extremely cruel to copy editors and compositers. The Pangborn
is one set in the same world as _Davy_, although not the same period
I think.
Decent collection, if you didn't have the components elsewhere
and I can't see how you'd have Carr.
DEEP SPACE edited by Robert Silverberg
Introduction (Robert Silverberg)
Blood's a Rover (Chad Oliver)
Noise (Jack Vance)
Life Hutch (Harlan Ellison)
Ticket to Anywhere (Damon Knight)
The Sixth Palace (Robert Silverberg)
Lunungomeena (Gordon R. Dickson)
The Dance of the Changer and the Three (Terry Carr)
Far Centarus (A.E. Van Vogt)
I -think- the AEVV is about people travelling to Alpha C
slower than light, only to discover FTL opened the system long
before they got arrived.
August THE 1973 ANNUAL WORLD'S BEST SF edited by Donald A. Wollheim
Contents:
Introduction (Donald A. Wollheim)
Goat Song (Poul Anderson)
The Man Who Walked Home (James Tiptree, Jr.)
Oh, Valinda! (Michael G. Coney)
The Gold at the Starbow's End (Frederic Pohl)
To Walk a City Street (Clifford D. Simak)
Rorqual Maru (T.J. Bass)
Changing Woman (Wallace Macfarlane)
"Willie's Blues" (Robert J. Tilley)
Long Shot (Vernor Vinge)
Thus Love Betrays Us (Phyllis MacLennon)
Good year for short SF judging by the ones I read. "Goat Song"
is an SF retelling of Orpheus. The Tiptree is about an unfortunate
time traveller. Starbow is about a crew of astronauts who are the victims
of their government's ulterior motives (and sadly turned out to not only
have an error in astronomy that Pohl knew was wrong but forgot but also
used a nifty idea, the starbow, that turns out not to exist). "Long Shot"
is the story of a star probe using barely adequate technology for its
job.
TO DIE IN ITALBAR by Roger Zelazny
I am fairly certain I never read this.
September CAGE A MAN by F.M. Busby
I recently tried to reread a different Busby and couldn't get past
the dialogue. In any case I never read this. Might be in the universe
where aliens are reshaping other species to be like them.
FLASHING SWORDS! #2 edited by Lin Carter
Flashing Swords and Black Magicians (Lin Carter)
The Rug and the Bull (L. Sprague de Camp)
The Jade Man's Eyes (Michael Moorcock)
Toads of Grimmerdale (Andre Norton)
Ghoul's Garden (John Jakes)
I haven't read any of these, not even the de Camp.
October RENDEZVOUS WITH RAMA by Arthur C. Clarke
A very large spaceship is falling through the solar system.
Only one ship is in a position to intercept it. In the hands of other
authors horrible things would have happened at this point but this is
Clarke and most of the crises are human-caused, from fear or ignorance.
Not a lot happens but it happens so charmingly I can forgive that.
There were no sequels.
NEW DIMENSIONS 3 edited by Robert Silverberg
Contents:
Introduction (Robert Silverberg)
The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas (Ursula K. Le Guin)
Down There (Damon Knight)
How Shall We Conquer? (Wallace Macfarlane)
They Live on Levels (Terry Carr)
The Girl Who Was Plugged In (James Tiptree, Jr.)
Days of Grass, Days of Straw (R.A. Lafferty)
Notes Leading Down tot he Conquest (Barry N. Malzberg)
At the Bran Foundry (George Alec Effinger)
Tell Me All About Yourself (F.M. Busby)
Three Comedians (Gordon Eklund)
The Last Day of July (Gardner R. Dozois)
Clean miss.
Effinger would be a good subject for an advocacy thread.
Fall ORBIT 12 edited by Damon Knight
Contents:
Shark (Edward Bryant)
Direction of the Road (Ursula K. Le Guin)
The Windows in Dante's Hell (Michael Bishop)
Serpent Burning on an Altar (Brian W. Aldiss)
The Young Soldier's Horoscope (Brian W. Aldiss)
Castle Scene with Penitents (Brian W. Aldiss)
The Red Canary (Kate Wilhelm)
What's the Matter with Herbie (Mel Gilden)
Pinup (Edward Bryant)
The Genius Freaks (Vonda K. McIntyre)
Burger Creature (Steve Chapman)
Half the Kingdom (Doris Piserchia)
COntinuing Westward (Gene Wolfe)
Arcs & Secants (misc material)
Another clean miss. Odd to see multiple stories by the same
author in a multi-author collection...
CLONE by Richard Cowper
I read this but it didn't leave much of an impression. Clones
were hot in the 1970s. I seem to recall dodgy science featured in this one,
with maybe a little telepathy.
November HELLSTROM'S HIVE by Frank Herbert
Generally well regarded but I have not read it yet.
UNIVERSE 3 edited by Terry Carr
Introduction (Terry Carr)
The Death of Doctor Island (Gene Wolfe)
The Ghost Writer (George Alec Effinger)
Many Mansions (Robert Silverberg)
Randy-Tandy Man (Ross Rocklynne)
The World is a Sphere (Edgar Pangborn)
The Legend of Cougar Lou Landis (Edward Bryant)
Free City Blues (Gordon Eklund)
The Pangborn is a Davy-verse story, I think and the Bryant
part of the contents of _Cinnabar_. Otherwise, clean miss (Too stupid
to read Gene Wolfe, that's why).
December THE INFERNO by Fred & Geoffrey Hoyle
As in Known Space and _The Sins of Fathers_, the galaxy has gone
seyfert and Earth is almost certainly doomed to become a crispy critter.
Unfortunately unlike in KS or SotF, in Hoyle's universe humans do not
have superluminal abilities and we only learn of the danger when our doom
is almost upon us. This is about how people deal with the situation, in
particular a cranky Scottish scientist and his neighbors.
Short and to the point. I still enjoy this one, especially
when one compares
SPOILERS
Hoyle's alien, powerful and unknowable, who intervenes to
save us at the last moment to the aliens in Sins, who do not demonstrate
the abilities they should have from the information we are given.
CHAINS OF THE SEA edited by Robert Silverberg
Introduction (Robert Silverberg)
And Us, Too, I Guess (George Alec Effinger)
Chains of the Sea (Gardner R. Dozois)
The Shrine of Sebastion (Gordon Eklund)
Another clean miss. Whatever happened to Eklund, anyway?
--
"About this time, I started getting depressed. Probably the late
hour and the silence. I decided to put on some music.
Boy, that Billie Holiday can sing."
_Why I Hate Saturn_, Kyle Baker
Margaret Young
>
> List courtesy of Andrew Wheeler.
>
> Since the anthology is still important and since the SFBC went
>to multiple releases in the '70s, expect a much slower rate of posting.
>
> It kills me that I can do a 400-500 line post every day or two
>and not make the top five most prolific posters in this group.
>
>
That is because you actually post about sf (written or your life--the
latter being stranger)
>1973
>January THUVIA, MAID OF MARS & THE CHESSMEN OF MARS by Edgar Rice Burroughs
>
> If I read these, I then forgot them. O merciful Providence!
>
>
I KNOW I read ALL the Burroughs Mars books[1], but apparently my brain
has refused to retain any memory of either of the above.
>February CITIES IN FLIGHT by James Blish
>
> This was an omnibus of four linked novels:
>
> A Life for the Stars
? _They Shall Have Stars_ ???
>
> In which the decay of the USA is showed and a new space drive
>discovered.
>
>
> A Life for the Stars
>
> A Young Adult novel in which pluck and opportunity propel
>a young man to a position of some power in the star faring city of
>New York.
>
>
> Earthman, Come Home
>
> In which the economy of the galaxy takes a Canada Goose through
>its jet engine, prompting violent actions of various sorts, from a march
>on Earth to the invasion of a planet in the Magellenic Clouds.
>
>
> The Truimph of Time
>
> In which Blish ensures the non-existance of sequels by pushing
>the entire universe over Richenbach Falls.
>
>
> I liked the books as a teen but Blish's NYC seems so bland
>and tasteless compared to the real NYC. Hard to belive the NYC of 1950
>was supposed to become this.
>
>
Read these earlier, individually and in the wrong order. Stumbled upon
Earthman, Come Home in a Montreal bookstore while at Expo 67. My second
"real" SF book (the first was _Tales of the White Hart_. Read Earthman,
Triumph, A Life then They Shall. The first two were a let down after the
last two.
Important books in _my_ development as a SF reader.
>
> THE MAN WHO FOLDED HIMSELF by David Gerrold
>
> Young man uses time belt to create alternative versions of
>himself with whom to have sex. "Folded" may not be the verb Gerrold
>wanted, here.
>
>
disappointed me
> TO DIE IN ITALBAR by Roger Zelazny
>
> I am fairly certain I never read this.
>
Loved the title, the book has slipped entirely from my memory
>October RENDEZVOUS WITH RAMA by Arthur C. Clarke
>
> A very large spaceship is falling through the solar system.
>Only one ship is in a position to intercept it. In the hands of other
>authors horrible things would have happened at this point but this is
>Clarke and most of the crises are human-caused, from fear or ignorance.
>Not a lot happens but it happens so charmingly I can forgive that.
>
> There were no sequels.
Of course not
>November HELLSTROM'S HIVE by Frank Herbert
>
> Generally well regarded but I have not read it yet.
Read it. Tried to figure out why I didn't like it. In a broad sense it
is another book that filters the entire world through male
sensibilities.
[1] I was a kid in Ontario, I read what I could get my hands on.
--
Margaret Young
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Come the apocalypse there will be cockroaches, Keith Richards and the
faint smell of cat pee.
James Nicoll
Margaret Young <mmy...@umich.edu> wrote:
>On 24 Mar 2003 07:51:22 -0500, jdni...@panix.com (James Nicoll) wrote:
>
>>February CITIES IN FLIGHT by James Blish
>>
>> This was an omnibus of four linked novels:
>>
>> A Life for the Stars
>
>? _They Shall Have Stars_ ???
D'oh!
>> A Life for the Stars
>> Earthman, Come Home
>> The Truimph of Time
>
>Read these earlier, individually and in the wrong order. Stumbled upon
>Earthman, Come Home in a Montreal bookstore while at Expo 67. My second
>"real" SF book (the first was _Tales of the White Hart_. Read Earthman,
>Triumph, A Life then They Shall. The first two were a let down after the
>last two.
I didn't get to go to Expo '67. Instead my parents went and
left us with a caretaker named Mrs. White who 1: wouldn't allow me
to go to an evening function at my grade school I had been looking
forward to all month (It was grade one and my time horizon was about
4 weeks) and 2: who proved capable of ruining Kraft Dinner. !
>Important books in _my_ development as a SF reader.
I learned to cook as a result of Expo '67...
>>
>> THE MAN WHO FOLDED HIMSELF by David Gerrold
>>
>> Young man uses time belt to create alternative versions of
>>himself with whom to have sex. "Folded" may not be the verb Gerrold
>>wanted, here.
>
>disappointed me
I think it helps to be a teenage male when you read it.
>
>> TO DIE IN ITALBAR by Roger Zelazny
>>
>> I am fairly certain I never read this.
>>
>
>Loved the title, the book has slipped entirely from my memory
Oddly enough a lot of Zelazny does that for me.
>
>>October RENDEZVOUS WITH RAMA by Arthur C. Clarke
>>
>> A very large spaceship is falling through the solar system.
As God is my witness I thought this sentence had the word 'alien'
between 'large' and 'spaceship'.
>>November HELLSTROM'S HIVE by Frank Herbert
>>
>> Generally well regarded but I have not read it yet.
>
>Read it. Tried to figure out why I didn't like it. In a broad sense it
>is another book that filters the entire world through male
>sensibilities.
>
>
>[1] I was a kid in Ontario, I read what I could get my hands on.
You know the utterly weird thing was discovering that America,
!Land of the Bookstore! had cities that didn't have the bookstore
variety of San Francisco, which was the part of the US I was most
familiar with as a kid. In fact, if I remember what Lis has said
about Boston, the US had major cities* with universities and not many good
bookstores. How can you have a university and not have good bookstores?
I remember getting to new schools and beginning an orderly read
of the library starting with A in September and Z sometime in March. And
being forced to spend at most 30 minutes a day in the library, even
though I had no need for further socialization, given the material I
had to work with in the form of my fellow students. I think I had
arrogance without actual accomplishment down to a fine art by grade
eight but on the other hand, would it have killed my fellow students
to worship me like a pagan God? These social contract things do go
both ways.
James Nicoll
* Definition: the library is open more than 3 days out of 7 and can
be found without the help of a wise elder.
Richard Horton
wrote:
> It kills me that I can do a 400-500 line post every day or two
>and not make the top five most prolific posters in this group.
>
Well, you know the solution to that. Write lots of one-liners about
gnus, Eye-wrack, or the like.
Though Thurston has returned to the field with a recent couple of
stories in F&SF. (Not much to my liking, but still.)
My reaction is the same as yours -- I recognize the authors, even a
couple of titles, but I have no memory of any of the actual stories.
And he had the whole _Fountains of Paradise_ thing with Sheffield's
novel coming up!
Well, it's satire. I liked it, didn't believe it.
This second half of the novellas collection is slightly my favorite, I
suppose because of the Vance and the Budrys, two truly great stories,
as well as a couple of obscure stories that folks ought to read -- "E
for Effort" (a great time-viewer story), and "In Hiding". (The
Cogswell is obscure, too, I suppose, a rather Russellian story of the
sort Campbell loved, but I reread it recently and was underwhelmed.)
>July AN EXALTATION OF STARS edited by Terry Carr
>
> Introduction (Terry Carr)
> The Feast of St. Dionysus (Robert Silverberg)
> 'Kjawlll'kje'k'koothialll'kje'k (Roger Zelazny)
> My Brother Leopold (Edgar Pangborn)
>
>
> I missed the Silverberg, I think. The Zelazny is one of
>three with a protagonist who managed to avoid being included in the
>big recording of society and the title is either dolphinese or Zelazny
>being extremely cruel to copy editors and compositers. The Pangborn
>is one set in the same world as _Davy_, although not the same period
>I think.
>
> Decent collection, if you didn't have the components elsewhere
>and I can't see how you'd have Carr.
>
I remember the Pangborn with particular fondness -- one of my favorite
of his post-holocaust stories.
Also some really silly math. I still liked the story a lot, though.
> "Long Shot"
>is the story of a star probe using barely adequate technology for its
>job.
>
> TO DIE IN ITALBAR by Roger Zelazny
>
> I am fairly certain I never read this.
>
>
>September CAGE A MAN by F.M. Busby
>
> I recently tried to reread a different Busby and couldn't get past
>the dialogue. In any case I never read this. Might be in the universe
>where aliens are reshaping other species to be like them.
>
This was one of the first SFBC books I bought after my initial order.
I think partly because when I bought it it was one of the last that
was still only $1.49 instead of $1.98. I thought it OK at the time
but I doubt it would hold up.
>
>
> NEW DIMENSIONS 3 edited by Robert Silverberg
>
> Contents:
>
> Introduction (Robert Silverberg)
> The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas (Ursula K. Le Guin)
> Down There (Damon Knight)
> How Shall We Conquer? (Wallace Macfarlane)
> They Live on Levels (Terry Carr)
> The Girl Who Was Plugged In (James Tiptree, Jr.)
> Days of Grass, Days of Straw (R.A. Lafferty)
> Notes Leading Down tot he Conquest (Barry N. Malzberg)
> At the Bran Foundry (George Alec Effinger)
> Tell Me All About Yourself (F.M. Busby)
> Three Comedians (Gordon Eklund)
> The Last Day of July (Gardner R. Dozois)
>
> Clean miss.
The Tiptree won either the Nebula or Hugo -- it's a very good story.
The Le Guin gets discussed every so often on rasfw -- I like it, too.
I don't remember the Carr or Knight well but I do recall liking them
at the time -- the Dozois too.
And wouldn't Eklund be another candidate for an author who once seemed
like he coulda been a contenduh, and somehow faded away?
>Fall ORBIT 12 edited by Damon Knight
>
> Contents:
> Shark (Edward Bryant)
> Direction of the Road (Ursula K. Le Guin)
> The Windows in Dante's Hell (Michael Bishop)
> Serpent Burning on an Altar (Brian W. Aldiss)
> The Young Soldier's Horoscope (Brian W. Aldiss)
> Castle Scene with Penitents (Brian W. Aldiss)
> The Red Canary (Kate Wilhelm)
> What's the Matter with Herbie (Mel Gilden)
> Pinup (Edward Bryant)
> The Genius Freaks (Vonda K. McIntyre)
> Burger Creature (Steve Chapman)
> Half the Kingdom (Doris Piserchia)
> COntinuing Westward (Gene Wolfe)
> Arcs & Secants (misc material)
>
> Another clean miss. Odd to see multiple stories by the same
>author in a multi-author collection...
I think the Aldiss stories are all really short. The Bishop is one of
his early "Future Atlanta" stories. The LeGuin is cute. Steve
Chapman now writes as Stepan Chapman -- his novel _The Troika_ won an
award a few years ago, and his novelette "Minutes of the Last
Meeting", from Leviathan 2, is really neat.
>
> UNIVERSE 3 edited by Terry Carr
>
> Introduction (Terry Carr)
> The Death of Doctor Island (Gene Wolfe)
> The Ghost Writer (George Alec Effinger)
> Many Mansions (Robert Silverberg)
> Randy-Tandy Man (Ross Rocklynne)
> The World is a Sphere (Edgar Pangborn)
> The Legend of Cougar Lou Landis (Edward Bryant)
> Free City Blues (Gordon Eklund)
>
>
> The Pangborn is a Davy-verse story,
Yes, and a good one.
>I think and the Bryant
>part of the contents of _Cinnabar_. Otherwise, clean miss (Too stupid
>to read Gene Wolfe, that's why).
>
>
>December THE INFERNO by Fred & Geoffrey Hoyle
>
> As in Known Space and _The Sins of Fathers_, the galaxy has gone
>seyfert and Earth is almost certainly doomed to become a crispy critter.
>Unfortunately unlike in KS or SotF, in Hoyle's universe humans do not
>have superluminal abilities and we only learn of the danger when our doom
>is almost upon us. This is about how people deal with the situation, in
>particular a cranky Scottish scientist and his neighbors.
>
> Short and to the point. I still enjoy this one, especially
>when one compares
>
> SPOILERS
>
>
>
> Hoyle's alien, powerful and unknowable, who intervenes to
>save us at the last moment to the aliens in Sins, who do not demonstrate
>the abilities they should have from the information we are given.
>
>
> CHAINS OF THE SEA edited by Robert Silverberg
>
> Introduction (Robert Silverberg)
> And Us, Too, I Guess (George Alec Effinger)
> Chains of the Sea (Gardner R. Dozois)
> The Shrine of Sebastion (Gordon Eklund)
>
> Another clean miss. Whatever happened to Eklund, anyway?
Oh, I see you did get around to mentioning Eklund!
--
Rich Horton | Stable Email: mailto://richard...@sff.net
Home Page: http://www.sff.net/people/richard.horton
Also visit SF Site (http://www.sfsite.com) and Tangent Online (http://www.tangentonline.com)
Chuck Bridgeland
> April CEMETERY WORLD by Clifford D. Simak
>
> Earth as holy land, sort of, except mostly it is used to
> store dead people. If I recall correctly there's a robot that meets
> the problem of losing his maintainance base in here.
Are you thinking of the robot who lubes itself with bear grease? That was
in a different Simak novel (_A heritage of Stars_, I think).
> DEEP SPACE edited by Robert Silverberg
>
> Introduction (Robert Silverberg)
> Blood's a Rover (Chad Oliver)
> Noise (Jack Vance)
> Life Hutch (Harlan Ellison)
> Ticket to Anywhere (Damon Knight)
> The Sixth Palace (Robert Silverberg)
> Lunungomeena (Gordon R. Dickson)
> The Dance of the Changer and the Three (Terry Carr)
> Far Centarus (A.E. Van Vogt)
>
> I -think- the AEVV is about people travelling to Alpha C
> slower than light, only to discover FTL opened the system long
> before they got arrived.
yup.
> September CAGE A MAN by F.M. Busby
>
> I recently tried to reread a different Busby and couldn't get past
> the dialogue. In any case I never read this. Might be in the universe
> where aliens are reshaping other species to be like them.
yup.
> October RENDEZVOUS WITH RAMA by Arthur C. Clarke
>
> A very large spaceship is falling through the solar system.
> Only one ship is in a position to intercept it. In the hands of other
> authors horrible things would have happened at this point but this is
> Clarke and most of the crises are human-caused, from fear or ignorance.
> Not a lot happens but it happens so charmingly I can forgive that.
>
> There were no sequels.
No sequels (we repeat as we tamp down the dirt on the Memory Hole).
--
War. Win, loose or draw, we get a depression afterwards. 2004 or
2008, we get President Hillary and her Homeland Security brownshirts.
chuck bridgeland, chuckbri at computerdyn dot com
http://www.essex1.com/people/chuckbri
Niall McAuley
> 1973
> January THUVIA, MAID OF MARS & THE CHESSMEN OF MARS by Edgar Rice Burroughs
>
> If I read these, I then forgot them. O merciful Providence!
Thuvia is something of a drop in quality from the earlier Mars books, but _Chessmen_
is pretty good.
> Playback*
A dying space travellers conscioussness is accidently caught on
an alien recording medium.
> Love That Universe*
Desperate efforts needed to contact alien empaths.
Both minor.
--
Niall [real address ends in se, not es.invalid]
Nyrath the nearly wise
Clarke seems to have telepathy. He independently comes
out with a sunjammer story simultaneously with Anderson,
a neutron star story simultaneously with Niven,
a beanstalk story (THE FOUNTAINS OF PARADISE)
simultaneously with Charles Sheffield (THE WEB BETWEEN
THE WORLDS) and a zero point energy story (THE SONG OF
DISTANT EARTH) simultaneously with Sheffield
("The Colors of Vacuum").
> February CITIES IN FLIGHT by James Blish
> I liked the books as a teen but Blish's NYC seems so bland
> and tasteless compared to the real NYC.
Most interesting was the appendix written by
a Blish critic in the back. The critic discusses
the Spengler theory of history influence in CITIES.
But everybody loved the chart of the stages
all cultures go through.
I'm sure more than one SF author used that chart,
and I know for a fact it was used in a computer
game and an RPG game.
> May THE SCIENCE FICTION HALL OF FAME, Volume 2A edited by Ben Bova
>
> Contents:
> Introduction (Ben Bova)
> Call Me Joe (Poul Anderson)
> Who Goes There (John W. Campbell, Jr)
> Nerves (Lester del Rey)
> Universe (Robert A. Heinlein)
> The Marching Morons (C.M. Kornbluth)
> Vintage Season (Henry Kuttner & C.L. Moore)
> ...And Then There Were None (Eric Frank Russell)
> The Ballad of Lost C'Mell (Cordwainer Smith)
> Baby is Three (Theodore Sturgeon)
> The Time Machine (H.G. Wells)
> With Folded Hands...(Jack WIlliamson)
The Marching Morons is interesting.
Discussion of this story regularly causes
heated flamewars, many in this very newsgroup.
It should be read, if only so one understands
what all the shouting is about.
> DEEP SPACE edited by Robert Silverberg
>
> Introduction (Robert Silverberg)
> Blood's a Rover (Chad Oliver)
> Noise (Jack Vance)
> Life Hutch (Harlan Ellison)
> Ticket to Anywhere (Damon Knight)
> The Sixth Palace (Robert Silverberg)
> Lunungomeena (Gordon R. Dickson)
> The Dance of the Changer and the Three (Terry Carr)
> Far Centarus (A.E. Van Vogt)
Ticket to Anywhere is one of my all-time favorites.
It is an exceedingly haunting story
about an alien teleportation network.
But on a deeper level it talks about the
price of "secure society", and what does
it mean to be a man.
James Nicoll
Nyrath the nearly wise <nyr...@projectrho.com.invalid> wrote:
>xmit t: 3/24/2003 7:51 AM src: James Nicoll:
>
>> Winter THE WIND FROM THE SUN by Arthur C. Clarke
>>
>> Contents:
>>
>>
>> A solid collection, although I must admit I forget the asterisked
>> stories entirely. As I recall, the Sunjammer story came out at almost
>> the same time as a Poul Anderson (Winston Sanders) sunjammer story
>> and _Neutron Tide_ came out at about the same time as Niven's
>> _Neutron Star_. Poor Clarke.
>
> Clarke seems to have telepathy. He independently comes
> out with a sunjammer story simultaneously with Anderson,
> a neutron star story simultaneously with Niven,
> a beanstalk story (THE FOUNTAINS OF PARADISE)
> simultaneously with Charles Sheffield (THE WEB BETWEEN
> THE WORLDS) and a zero point energy story (THE SONG OF
> DISTANT EARTH) simultaneously with Sheffield
> ("The Colors of Vacuum").
The pity about Fountains is that Clarke, as I recall, was
aware of the initial Soviet invention of the idea(1) in the 1960s
and commented on it in one of his essay collection but didn't
use it in fiction until 1979.
I wonder how many authors subscribe to the same small number of
science magazines?
1: There have been three unconnected inventions of the idea. At one
point I could have told you it was in each case.
>
>> February CITIES IN FLIGHT by James Blish
>> I liked the books as a teen but Blish's NYC seems so bland
>> and tasteless compared to the real NYC.
>
> Most interesting was the appendix written by
> a Blish critic in the back. The critic discusses
> the Spengler theory of history influence in CITIES.
> But everybody loved the chart of the stages
> all cultures go through.
By Blish, I think.
> I'm sure more than one SF author used that chart,
> and I know for a fact it was used in a computer
> game and an RPG game.
? I think you told me before but what RPG?
James Nicoll
I should have mentioned Skal as well. I can't say I enjoyed
reading his books but they were always memorable, the way a molten
sugar accident is.
>>
>>June THE SCIENCE FICTION HALL OF FAME, Volume 2B edited by Ben Bova
>>
>> Contents:
>>
>> Introduction (Ben Bova)
>> The Martian Way (Isaac Asimov)
>> Earthman, Come Home (James Blish)
>> Rogue Moon (Algis Budrys)
>> The Spectre General (Theodore R. Cogswell)
>> The Machine Stops (E.M. Forster)
>> The Midas Plague (Frederic Pohl)
>> The Witches of Karres (James H. Schmitz)
>> E for Effort (T.L. Sherred)
>> In Hiding (Walter H. Shiras)
>> The Big Front Yard (Clifford D. Simak)
>> The Moon Moth (Jack Vance)
>>
>>
>> This scores less well than volume 2a, but it still looks pretty
>>gooda. I will note many people feel the short version is the best version
>>of Schmitz' WoK story.
>>
>> The only story I would call actively bad is the Pohl, about
>>the perils of abundence badly handled, if I recall correctly.
>>
>
>Well, it's satire. I liked it, didn't believe it.
I think satire works better if the situation isn't
entirely unbelievable (Taking into account real world events
like PM King and his Talking Dog of Political Accumen).
>>July AN EXALTATION OF STARS edited by Terry Carr
>>
>> Introduction (Terry Carr)
>> The Feast of St. Dionysus (Robert Silverberg)
>> 'Kjawlll'kje'k'koothialll'kje'k (Roger Zelazny)
>> My Brother Leopold (Edgar Pangborn)
>>
>>
>> I missed the Silverberg, I think. The Zelazny is one of
>>three with a protagonist who managed to avoid being included in the
>>big recording of society and the title is either dolphinese or Zelazny
>>being extremely cruel to copy editors and compositers. The Pangborn
>>is one set in the same world as _Davy_, although not the same period
>>I think.
>>
>> Decent collection, if you didn't have the components elsewhere
>>and I can't see how you'd have Carr.
>>
>
>I remember the Pangborn with particular fondness -- one of my favorite
>of his post-holocaust stories.
You know Old Earth Books is reprinting all his stuff, right?
Alexx S Kay
> List courtesy of Andrew Wheeler.
[snip]
> DEEP SPACE edited by Robert Silverberg
> Introduction (Robert Silverberg)
> Blood's a Rover (Chad Oliver)
> Noise (Jack Vance)
> Life Hutch (Harlan Ellison)
> Ticket to Anywhere (Damon Knight)
> The Sixth Palace (Robert Silverberg)
> Lunungomeena (Gordon R. Dickson)
> The Dance of the Changer and the Three (Terry Carr)
> Far Centarus (A.E. Van Vogt)
I could *swear* that I've read a story titled "Blood's a Rover" which
was written by Harlan Ellison (and was a sequel to "A Boy and His Dog").
Is this A) Harlan re-using someone else's title, or B) two Harlan stories
in one anthology, so they gave one a pseudonym? [Or C), my memory has
betrayed me...]
Alexx
Alexx Kay
Opinions expressed are my own and not necessarily those of my employers
al...@world.std.com
http://world.std.com/~alexx
"With the magical experience, what happens is that you suddenly get a whole
mess of stuff in the in-tray that you don't have the first fucking clue
how to classify. This is not a woman with a perambulator, or a well-done
steak. This is something that may be a rose, a century, the Platonic
essence of the colour green, or all of these at once. This thing over
here is Sqmrlpstgyzlt: it eats a by-product of human jealousy and it shits
previously undiscovered prime numbers. The only sane thing to do in the
face of sensory input like this is to go mad."
-- Alan Moore in correspondence with Dave Sim about _From Hell_
Allan Griffith
<jonmeltzer.at.mindspring.com> says...
> >Summer AN ALIEN HEAT by Michael Moorcock
> >
> > And I missed this as well.
>
No, it's the first part of the (brilliant) _Dancers at the End of Time_.
Al
Randy Money
> In article <GaEfa.672$NW6...@newssvr19.news.prodigy.com>,
> Richard Horton <rrho...@prodigy.net> wrote:
>
>>On 24 Mar 2003 07:51:22 -0500, jdni...@panix.com (James Nicoll)
>>wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>> ORBIT 11 edited by Damon Knight
>>>
>>> Contents:
>>>
>>> Alien Stones (Gene Wolfe)
>>> Spectra (Vonda N. McIntyre)
>>> I Remember a Winter (Frederic Pohl)
>>> Doucement, Si'l Vous Plait (James Sallis)
>>> The Summer of the Irish Sea (Charles L. Grant)
>>> Goodbye, Shelley, Shirley, Charlotte, Charlene (Robert Thurston)
>>> Father's in the Basement (Philip Jose Farmer)
>>> Down By the Old Maelstrom (Edward Wellen)
>>> Things Go Better (George Alec Effinger)
>>> Dissolve (Gary K. Wolf)
>>> Dune's Edge (Edward Bryant)
>>> The Drum Lollipop (Jack M. Dann)
>>> Machine of Loving Grace (Gardner R. Dozois)
>>> They Cope (David Skal)
>>> Counterpoint (Joe Haldeman)
>>> Old Soul (Steve Herbst)
>>> New York Times (Charles Platt)
>>> Chrystallization of the Myth (John Barfoot)
>>> To Plant a Seed (Hank Davis)
>>> On the Road to Honeyville (Kate Wilhelm)
>>>
[...]
>
> I should have mentioned Skal as well. I can't say I enjoyed
> reading his books but they were always memorable, the way a molten
> sugar accident is.
FYI: If you're interested and haven't heard, Skal wrote and published,
_The Monster Show_, which is a terrific history of the horror film.
What's especially good about it is that Skal puts the development of the
genre into historical context. His detailing of the effects of WWI on
the development of horror films in the '20s and '30s are particularly
fascinating.
Randy M.
Randy Money
> List courtesy of Andrew Wheeler.
>
> Since the anthology is still important and since the SFBC went
> to multiple releases in the '70s, expect a much slower rate of posting.
One thing these postings are re-establishing is the importance the short
story still had to the genre only 30+ years ago. I think, when I came to
s.f. in the mid-to-late-70s, I knew this, since my formative readings
included _Dangerous Visions_ and _The SF Hall of Fame_, but I may not
have understood the extent of its influence.
Randy M.
David Johnston
> >1973
> >January THUVIA, MAID OF MARS & THE CHESSMEN OF MARS by Edgar Rice Burroughs
> >
> > If I read these, I then forgot them. O merciful Providence!
> >
> >
>
> I KNOW I read ALL the Burroughs Mars books[1], but apparently my brain
> has refused to retain any memory of either of the above.
Thuvia, Maid of Mars has the World Law defying situation of a Martian
Princess who is not noble in her behaviour, and her maid who is. Naturally
it turns out they were switched at birth. All I remember about Chessmen
of Mars is that it contains one of the earliest depictions of a "living"
chess game.
David Johnston
>
> On 24 Mar 2003 07:51:22 -0500, James Nicoll <jdni...@panix.com> wrote:
>
> > April CEMETERY WORLD by Clifford D. Simak
> >
> > Earth as holy land, sort of, except mostly it is used to
> > store dead people. If I recall correctly there's a robot that meets
> > the problem of losing his maintainance base in here.
>
> Are you thinking of the robot who lubes itself with bear grease? That was
> in a different Simak novel (_A heritage of Stars_, I think).
There was also a Ogre-like automated tank in Cemetary World with the problem
of maintence, I think.
Mike Schilling
>
>
> May THE SCIENCE FICTION HALL OF FAME, Volume 2A edited by Ben Bova
>
> Contents:
> Introduction (Ben Bova)
> Call Me Joe (Poul Anderson)
> Who Goes There (John W. Campbell, Jr)
> Nerves (Lester del Rey)
> Universe (Robert A. Heinlein)
> The Marching Morons (C.M. Kornbluth)
> Vintage Season (Henry Kuttner & C.L. Moore)
> ...And Then There Were None (Eric Frank Russell)
> The Ballad of Lost C'Mell (Cordwainer Smith)
> Baby is Three (Theodore Sturgeon)
> The Time Machine (H.G. Wells)
> With Folded Hands...(Jack WIlliamson)
>
>
> Using the 'Did James Read These' test, this scores
> a near 100% rating, except for the Russell. On the other hand,
> I have a rough idea of what the Russell is about, which must
> say something for it.
"ATTWN" is its last, longest, and best part.
> I could quibble over the inclusion of
> the *particular* RAH story Bova chose but not having a RAH
> in there.
As I would with "The Roads Must Roll" in volume 1. Likewise with the
Anderson, which seems formulaic to me
>
> June THE SCIENCE FICTION HALL OF FAME, Volume 2B edited by Ben Bova
>
> Contents:
>
> Introduction (Ben Bova)
> The Martian Way (Isaac Asimov)
> Earthman, Come Home (James Blish)
> Rogue Moon (Algis Budrys)
> The Spectre General (Theodore R. Cogswell)
> The Machine Stops (E.M. Forster)
> The Midas Plague (Frederic Pohl)
> The Witches of Karres (James H. Schmitz)
> E for Effort (T.L. Sherred)
> In Hiding (Walter H. Shiras)
> The Big Front Yard (Clifford D. Simak)
> The Moon Moth (Jack Vance)
>
>
> This scores less well than volume 2a, but it still looks pretty
> gooda. I will note many people feel the short version is the best version
> of Schmitz' WoK story.
>
> The only story I would call actively bad is the Pohl, about
> the perils of abundence badly handled, if I recall correctly.
You do, though I'd call the Forster bad as well.
"The Moon Moth" is the only Vance short piece I can think of as wonderful as
his novels are.
>
> DEEP SPACE edited by Robert Silverberg
>
> Introduction (Robert Silverberg)
> Blood's a Rover (Chad Oliver)
> Noise (Jack Vance)
> Life Hutch (Harlan Ellison)
> Ticket to Anywhere (Damon Knight)
> The Sixth Palace (Robert Silverberg)
> Lunungomeena (Gordon R. Dickson)
> The Dance of the Changer and the Three (Terry Carr)
> Far Centarus (A.E. Van Vogt)
>
The Dickson is narrated by a Dorsai, though it's not really a Dorsai story.
>
> August THE 1973 ANNUAL WORLD'S BEST SF edited by Donald A. Wollheim
>
> Contents:
>
> Introduction (Donald A. Wollheim)
> Goat Song (Poul Anderson)
> The Man Who Walked Home (James Tiptree, Jr.)
> Oh, Valinda! (Michael G. Coney)
> The Gold at the Starbow's End (Frederic Pohl)
> To Walk a City Street (Clifford D. Simak)
> Rorqual Maru (T.J. Bass)
> Changing Woman (Wallace Macfarlane)
> "Willie's Blues" (Robert J. Tilley)
> Long Shot (Vernor Vinge)
> Thus Love Betrays Us (Phyllis MacLennon)
>
>
> Good year for short SF judging by the ones I read. "Goat Song"
> is an SF retelling of Orpheus.
And is far better than _Call Me Joe_, though I'm not sure if it's a novella.
>
> NEW DIMENSIONS 3 edited by Robert Silverberg
>
> Contents:
>
> Introduction (Robert Silverberg)
> The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas (Ursula K. Le Guin)
> Down There (Damon Knight)
> How Shall We Conquer? (Wallace Macfarlane)
> They Live on Levels (Terry Carr)
> The Girl Who Was Plugged In (James Tiptree, Jr.)
> Days of Grass, Days of Straw (R.A. Lafferty)
> Notes Leading Down tot he Conquest (Barry N. Malzberg)
> At the Bran Foundry (George Alec Effinger)
> Tell Me All About Yourself (F.M. Busby)
> Three Comedians (Gordon Eklund)
> The Last Day of July (Gardner R. Dozois)
>
Two Hugo winners here (Le Guin and Tiptree.)
Anthony Nance
James Nicoll <jdni...@panix.com> wrote:
>
>
>October RENDEZVOUS WITH RAMA by Arthur C. Clarke
>
> A very large spaceship is falling through the solar system.
>Only one ship is in a position to intercept it. In the hands of other
>authors horrible things would have happened at this point but this is
>Clarke and most of the crises are human-caused, from fear or ignorance.
>Not a lot happens but it happens so charmingly I can forgive that.
>
> There were no sequels.
Possible SPOILER of the very last line of the only Rama book
ever written:
James: "There were no sequels."
Ah, but then you forget one of the most famous last lines in all of
written SF:
"The authors of Raman sequels do everything in threes."
Or something like that.
Tony
Mike Schilling
news:sh-dnS0wWaK...@news.io.com...
>
> > DEEP SPACE edited by Robert Silverberg
> >
> > Introduction (Robert Silverberg)
> > Blood's a Rover (Chad Oliver)
> > Noise (Jack Vance)
> > Life Hutch (Harlan Ellison)
> > Ticket to Anywhere (Damon Knight)
> > The Sixth Palace (Robert Silverberg)
> > Lunungomeena (Gordon R. Dickson)
> > The Dance of the Changer and the Three (Terry Carr)
> > Far Centarus (A.E. Van Vogt)
>
> Ticket to Anywhere is one of my all-time favorites.
> It is an exceedingly haunting story
> about an alien teleportation network.
> But on a deeper level it talks about the
> price of "secure society", and what does
> it mean to be a man.
You might also enjoy Knight's _Hell's Pavement_. which is also set in the
"analogues" universe. (The short story _The Analogues_ is _HP_'s first
chapter.)
David Tate
I had it backwards. My formative SF readings were all short-story
collections that my father had -- Conklin, H.L. Gold, the annual F&SF
collections, some oddball theme anthologies like "Galaxy of
Ghouls"[*], single-author collections of Bradbury, Sturgeon, Asimov,
Heinlein, Clarke, Fredric Brown. Oh, and a few novels too -- but not
many.
Then, for some reason, I stopped reading recent SF for about 15 years,
from (say) '80 to '95. When I came back and started looking around,
my first reaction was "where the heck are all the stories!?". Reading
discussion on this forum (and others), I was bewildered by the
exclusive focus on novels.
Is there any hope that the short story is coming back? More recent
authors like Ted Chiang and Greg Egan are helping; Ursula Le Guin has
been doing her bit all along; even Baen books has been doing yeoman
work in re-releasing forgotten short works by Laumer, Schmitz,
Leinster, Anvil, and others. Of course, a return to the glory days of
the SF monthly is out of the question, if only because short stories
compete directly with television and video games as entertainment, and
nobody is going to win that war.
David Tate
[*]Also known as "Off the Beaten Orbit"; an obscure but excellent
collection edited by Judith Merrill. Contents a la ISFD:
sf The Ambassadors Anthony Boucher
sf Blood Fredric Brown
sf Child's Play William Tenn
sf The Demon King J. B. Priestley
sf Desertion Clifford D. Simak
sf Fish Story Leslie Charteris
sf Homecoming Ray Bradbury
sf Mop-Up Arthur Porges
sf The Night He Cried Fritz Leiber
sf O Ugly Bird! Manly Wade Wellman
sf Proof of the Pudding Robert Sheckley
sf Share Alike Jerome Bixby and
Joe E. Dean
sf A Way of Thinking Theodore Sturgeon
sf The Wheelbarrow Boy Richard Parker
sf Wolves Don't Cry Bruce Elliott
sf You Triflin' Skunk!
[vt The Triflin' Man] Walter M. Miller,
Jr.
Daphne Brinkerhoff
(snippety snip)
> > NEW DIMENSIONS 3 edited by Robert Silverberg
> >
> > Contents:
> >
> > The Girl Who Was Plugged In (James Tiptree, Jr.)
>
> The Tiptree won either the Nebula or Hugo -- it's a very good story.
Is this the one in which high school seniors get to go forward in time
to their (18+x)-year-old selves? And the snobby beauty queen ends up
in the future with the class geek, instead of the football hero? And
then... some other stuff? I know that's a Tiptree, but can't remember
the title.
--
Daphne
Nancy Lebovitz
>
>
>
>March NEBULA AWARD STORIES SEVEN edited by Lloyd Biggle,Jr.
>
> The Queen of Air and Darkness (Poul Anderson)
Aliens pretend to be elves. A story expressing a preference that
aliens stand and fight like, um, men, even though they'll lose.
>
> DEEP SPACE edited by Robert Silverberg
>
> Introduction (Robert Silverberg)
> Blood's a Rover (Chad Oliver)
> Noise (Jack Vance)
> Life Hutch (Harlan Ellison)
> Ticket to Anywhere (Damon Knight)
> The Sixth Palace (Robert Silverberg)
> Lunungomeena (Gordon R. Dickson)
> The Dance of the Changer and the Three (Terry Carr)
> Far Centarus (A.E. Van Vogt)
>
> I -think- the AEVV is about people travelling to Alpha C
>slower than light, only to discover FTL opened the system long
>before they got arrived.
Yes.
>
> TO DIE IN ITALBAR by Roger Zelazny
>
> I am fairly certain I never read this.
>
It's a sequel to _The Isle of the Dead_, and not as good. Francis
Sandow runs afoul of a man inhabitted by a goddess who heals except
when she's spreading plagues.
>
> NEW DIMENSIONS 3 edited by Robert Silverberg
>
> Contents:
>
> Introduction (Robert Silverberg)
> The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas (Ursula K. Le Guin)
Much discussed here.
> Down There (Damon Knight)
> How Shall We Conquer? (Wallace Macfarlane)
> They Live on Levels (Terry Carr)
In order to solve the population crisis, people live in different
realities/sensoria. The story is about the barriers breaking down.
I can't remember whether overpopulation is still a problem.
> The Girl Who Was Plugged In (James Tiptree, Jr.)
> Days of Grass, Days of Straw (R.A. Lafferty)
Pleasant story about the extra days when everyone gets to be
an Indian.
> Notes Leading Down tot he Conquest (Barry N. Malzberg)
> At the Bran Foundry (George Alec Effinger)
> Tell Me All About Yourself (F.M. Busby)
> Three Comedians (Gordon Eklund)
> The Last Day of July (Gardner R. Dozois)
>
--
Nancy Lebovitz na...@netaxs.com www.nancybuttons.com
Now, with bumper stickers
Using your turn signal is not "giving information to the enemy"
Mike Schilling
news:EuMfa.180$a52.1...@monger.newsread.com...
> > They Live on Levels (Terry Carr)
>
> In order to solve the population crisis, people live in different
> realities/sensoria. The story is about the barriers breaking down.
> I can't remember whether overpopulation is still a problem.
Sounds like Farmer's Dayworld stories.
William December Starr
jdni...@panix.com (James Nicoll) said:
[ In a discussion of "The Midas Plague" (Frederic Pohl) ]
> I think satire works better if the situation isn't entirely
> unbelievable (Taking into account real world events like PM King
> and his Talking Dog of Political Accumen).
Huh wha who?
-- William December Starr <wds...@panix.com>
William December Starr
"Mike Schilling" <mscotts...@hotmail.com> said:
> "The Moon Moth" is the only Vance short piece I can think of as
> wonderful as his novels are.
Having heard that story praised so often in here, I finally read it
about a month ago. And man did it ever put me in a really, _really_
deep Ugly American(tm) mood, i.e., "Fucking stupid foreigners and
their fucking stupid cultures... oughta just conquer the little
sonsofbitches and make 'em all eat at McDonalds, grumble, grumble,
why do they all have to be so fucking weird anyway, grumble."
And I don't particularly _like_ feeling like that.
Andrew Wheeler
>
> Is there any hope that the short story is coming back?
Unless the Internet sparks a huge new revival, I don't see much hope.
The hugely prolonged death spiral of the magazines is now entering its
third decade. Short story outlets (collections, anthologies, magazines)
have sold consistently less well than novels for almost thirty years now.
(Remember, in our way-back machine, it's still 1973, and the spectre of
Elwood is only just looming on the horizon.)
--
Andrew Wheeler
--
"It's a sad day for American capitalism when a man can't fly a midget on
a kite over Central Park." -Jim Moran
William December Starr
jdni...@panix.com (James Nicoll) said:
> Since the anthology is still important and since the SFBC went
> to multiple releases in the '70s, expect a much slower rate of
> posting.
Hmm. On the one hand I'm weeks behind in keeping up with this
newsgroup so any slowing down of the Nicoll juggernaut is a good thing
for me, but on the other hand I can't help but asking why you don't
just suck the anthology tables of contents wholesale out of the ISFDB?
[ *snip* ]
> I sheepishly admit I nicked the factoid from [Arthur C. Clarke's]
> Crusade for the background of a high school short story about a
> honeypot world and why it existed.
What factoid was that?
[ *snip* ]
> DEEP SPACE edited by Robert Silverberg
>
> Introduction (Robert Silverberg)
> Blood's a Rover (Chad Oliver)
> Noise (Jack Vance)
> Life Hutch (Harlan Ellison)
The Ellison is a surprisingly straightforward (considering who the
author is) sf story about a man who, having survived a space battle
and managed to reach refuge of the title object, a survival module
with the treaty-recognized equivalent of a big red cross on the side,
now finds himself fighting for survival against the module's own
malfunctioning automation. (Hmm. That summary makes it sound like
it might be humorous in a sort of Sheckleyan way. It isn't.)
William December Starr
Nyrath the nearly wise <nyr...@projectrho.com.invalid> said:
>> February CITIES IN FLIGHT by James Blish
>> I liked the books as a teen but Blish's NYC seems so bland
>> and tasteless compared to the real NYC.
>
> Most interesting was the appendix written by
> a Blish critic in the back. The critic discusses
> the Spengler theory of history influence in CITIES.
Was the critic "William Atheling, Jr." by any chance?
Mike Schilling
"William December Starr" <wds...@panix.com> wrote in message
news:b5od83$h5m$1...@panix1.panix.com...
>
> > DEEP SPACE edited by Robert Silverberg
> >
> > Introduction (Robert Silverberg)
> > Blood's a Rover (Chad Oliver)
> > Noise (Jack Vance)
> > Life Hutch (Harlan Ellison)
>
> The Ellison is a surprisingly straightforward (considering who the
> author is) sf story about a man who, having survived a space battle
> and managed to reach refuge of the title object, a survival module
> with the treaty-recognized equivalent of a big red cross on the side,
> now finds himself fighting for survival against the module's own
> malfunctioning automation. (Hmm. That summary makes it sound like
> it might be humorous in a sort of Sheckleyan way. It isn't.)
It was one of his very first stories, published in 1956 when he was 22. I
remembered it as the first, but ISFDB thinks otherwise.
Steve Parker
wrote:
> THE MAN WHO FOLDED HIMSELF by David Gerrold
>
> Young man uses time belt to create alternative versions of
>himself with whom to have sex. "Folded" may not be the verb Gerrold
>wanted, here.
I kinda liked it. Sort of "The Girl, The Gold Watch and Everything"
meets "All You Zombies". The bit where he's randomly changing time
just to see what happens and causes Christ not to exist(?) was kinda
creepy.
>Summer AN ALIEN HEAT by Michael Moorcock
>
> And I missed this as well.
Moorckck's best work, part one of three: a near omnipotent, bored
far-future, god-like human decides, as an affectation to reinvent the
old idea of "falling in love". He decides that the object of his
affection will be a Victorian woman time-traveller who's been
kidnapped to the future. The Godlike human soon learns that 1)
Courting isn't as easy as it's supposed to be (She's not flattered
when he shows up in a copy of her dress offering her whisky and raw
beefsteak.) and 2) emotions aren't so easily controlled.
The tag-line from the book is great. It's something like "This is the
last story of the human race. It's about Jherek Carnilian who knew
nothing of Morality and Amelia Underwood, who knew everything about
it." but more pithy.
Steve
Steve Parker
Brinkerhoff) wrote:
No: The Girl Who Was Plugged In, IIRC was about a crippled woman who
was hooked up to a flesh-based android. Once hooked up, her mind was
projected into the new body which was being used to do product
placement in a world where overt advertizing was illegal. It was
turned into a surprisingly good musical by Alan (Little Shop Of
Horrors" Menkin with the bad title "Weird Romance"
Steve
Nancy Lebovitz
No, that one's much more recent.
IIRC, the Tiptree is about a very ugly woman with a talent for VR.
Bill & Sue Miller
> Winter THE WIND FROM THE SUN by Arthur C. Clarke
>
This one's a strange mix of good stories and icky-asimov-type one-joke
stories. But, the good ones are good indeed.
> A Life for the Stars
>
> A Young Adult novel in which pluck and opportunity propel
> a young man to a position of some power in the star faring city of
> New York.
>
And, is killed off practically in a footnote in the sequel.
>
> May THE SCIENCE FICTION HALL OF FAME, Volume 2A edited by Ben Bova
> June THE SCIENCE FICTION HALL OF FAME, Volume 2B edited by Ben Bova
*sigh* teenage memories of reading these Big Thick Avon Paperbacks on long
beach holidays.
>
> TO DIE IN ITALBAR by Roger Zelazny
>
In his Pe'eian universe like _Isle of the Dead_. Worth reading if you liked
that one, but not as good.
Speaking of _Isle of the Dead_, the 2nd page of that book is the only place
I've ever seen low-tech-birth-control-devices referred to as 'condums' vs.
'condoms'. It's consistent, too, so presumably not a typo? However, I like
how he calls them "...testimonies to the instinct to continue the species but
not tonight..."
> October RENDEZVOUS WITH RAMA by Arthur C. Clarke
>
Great last line too. As you say, good thing they left it at that.
Bill
--
Home: wbmi...@houston.rr.com
Work: william....@jsc.nasa.gov
Homepage: http://home.houston.rr.com/wbmiller3
Richard Horton
<spar...@REMOVETHIS.attbi.com> wrote:
>>
>>Is this the one in which high school seniors get to go forward in time
>>to their (18+x)-year-old selves? And the snobby beauty queen ends up
>>in the future with the class geek, instead of the football hero? And
>>then... some other stuff? I know that's a Tiptree, but can't remember
>>the title.
>
>No: The Girl Who Was Plugged In, IIRC was about a crippled woman who
>was hooked up to a flesh-based android. Once hooked up, her mind was
>projected into the new body which was being used to do product
>placement in a world where overt advertizing was illegal. It was
>turned into a surprisingly good musical by Alan (Little Shop Of
>Horrors" Menkin with the bad title "Weird Romance"
The other story is "Backward, Turn Backward", an incredibly creepy and
depressing story.
--
Rich Horton | Stable Email: mailto://richard...@sff.net
Home Page: http://www.sff.net/people/richard.horton
Also visit SF Site (http://www.sfsite.com) and Tangent Online (http://www.tangentonline.com)
James Nicoll
William December Starr <wds...@panix.com> wrote:
>In article <b5ndak$jr$1...@panix3.panix.com>,
>jdni...@panix.com (James Nicoll) said:
>
>[ In a discussion of "The Midas Plague" (Frederic Pohl) ]
>
>> I think satire works better if the situation isn't entirely
>> unbelievable (Taking into account real world events like PM King
>> and his Talking Dog of Political Accumen).
>
>Huh wha who?
>
years on the advice of his dead mother and dog. And that's the
merest tip of his eccentricities. He was a man who could turn
a moment of uncontrolled vomiting into a political statement.
James Nicoll
>jdni...@panix.com (James Nicoll) said:
>
>> Since the anthology is still important and since the SFBC went
>> to multiple releases in the '70s, expect a much slower rate of
>> posting.
>
>Hmm. On the one hand I'm weeks behind in keeping up with this
>newsgroup so any slowing down of the Nicoll juggernaut is a good thing
>for me, but on the other hand I can't help but asking why you don't
>just suck the anthology tables of contents wholesale out of the ISFDB?
I never learned how to do it and typing all that stuff in
is how I keep up my typing speed.
This is embarrassing to admit so I am emailing it.
>[ *snip* ]
>
>> I sheepishly admit I nicked the factoid from [Arthur C. Clarke's]
>> Crusade for the background of a high school short story about a
>> honeypot world and why it existed.
>
>What factoid was that?
An amazing number of novas in the 1930s happened in one small
region of our sky.
James Nicoll
James Nicoll <jdni...@panix.com> wrote:
>In article <b5od83$h5m$1...@panix1.panix.com>,
>William December Starr <wds...@panix.com> wrote:
>>In article <b5mv0a$1r6$1...@panix3.panix.com>,
>>jdni...@panix.com (James Nicoll) said:
>>
>>> Since the anthology is still important and since the SFBC went
>>> to multiple releases in the '70s, expect a much slower rate of
>>> posting.
>>
>>Hmm. On the one hand I'm weeks behind in keeping up with this
>>newsgroup so any slowing down of the Nicoll juggernaut is a good thing
>>for me, but on the other hand I can't help but asking why you don't
>>just suck the anthology tables of contents wholesale out of the ISFDB?
>
> I never learned how to do it and typing all that stuff in
>is how I keep up my typing speed.
>
> This is embarrassing to admit so I am emailing it.
Well, crap. That hasn't happened in a while.
Yes, I have no idea how get info off isfdb into a file
on my shell account.
Joseph Nebus
>In article <sh-dnS0wWaK...@news.io.com>,
>Nyrath the nearly wise <nyr...@projectrho.com.invalid> said:
>>> February CITIES IN FLIGHT by James Blish
>> Most interesting was the appendix written by
>> a Blish critic in the back. The critic discusses
>> the Spengler theory of history influence in CITIES.
>Was the critic "William Atheling, Jr." by any chance?
Nope; one Richard D. Mullen, according to the table of contents
and the essay's footnotes. But then a footnote on the appendix mentions
it started as an essay in "Riverside Quarterly" in 1968 and that version
is copyright Leland Sapiro, who is either the editor of the Quarterly or
the result of Blish playing games on the mention that Mullen's essay
pointed out various inconsistencies, many of which Blish fixed up in the
editing for the big Cities in Flight collection.
(The Cities in Flight stories went through a lot of revising.
Apparently in the original magazine short stories that went into
Earthman, Come Home it's mentioned Amalfi benefited from the mental
health regimens of Dianetics.)
Joseph Nebus
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Joseph Nebus
>James Nicoll wrote:
>> A Life for the Stars
>>
>> A Young Adult novel in which pluck and opportunity propel
>> a young man to a position of some power in the star faring city of
>> New York.
>And, is killed off practically in a footnote in the sequel.
He was doomed anyway -- Crispin's death was part of the detail
in the first "Okie" short story. Somebody or other (Damon Knight?)
collected a bunch of city-themed short stories and I've been upset
since I saw it in the bookstore that I only leafed through it ...
Joseph Nebus
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
William December Starr
jdni...@panix.com (James Nicoll) said:
>> This is embarrassing to admit so I am emailing it.
>> [James Nicoll]
>
> Well, crap. That hasn't happened in a while.
>
> Yes, I have no idea how get info off isfdb into a file on my
> shell account.
The cat being out of the bag, I guess it can't hurt to post this
publicly as well...
Unix shell, right? If you use the lynx browser, do this to save to
a file the web page that you're currently looking at:
(1) Hit the p key.
(2) Use the up/down arrow keys, or the TAB key, to highlight "Save to
a local file" in the "Print options list." (Most likely, that'll be
the one that's highlighted by default, allowing you to skip this step).
(3) Hit ENTER, and down at the bottom of the screen you'll be
prompted to "Enter a filename."
(4) Hit control-U to clear the suggested filename, which will
probably be ugly as sin, and type in one of your own choosing.
(Or, if you like the suggested filename, just skip this step.)
(5) Hit ENTER again and Robert is the sibling of at least one of your
parents.
(Note: If after you've hit p and gone to the print-stuff screen you
change your mind, just do step #4 and then immediately hit ENTER.
Lynx is smart enough understand that "Hey, the user's left me without
any filename to use" means "Oh, forget the whole thing.)
William December Starr
jdni...@panix.com (James Nicoll) said:
>>> I sheepishly admit I nicked the factoid from [Arthur C. Clarke's]
>>> Crusade for the background of a high school short story about a
>>> honeypot world and why it existed.
>>
>> What factoid was that?
>
> An amazing number of novas in the 1930s happened in one small
> region of our sky.
Oh, right, *that* kind of Crusade. Now I remember the story.
Theresa Ann Wymer
: Is this the one in which high school seniors get to go forward in time
: to their (18+x)-year-old selves? And the snobby beauty queen ends up
: in the future with the class geek, instead of the football hero? And
: then... some other stuff? I know that's a Tiptree, but can't remember
: the title.
IIRC, the story you're thinking of is "Backward, Turn Backward". I assume
as in "Backward, turn backward, time in thy flight/Make me a child again
just for tonight." I was rather spooked by the ending, especially given
what happened in Tiptree's own life. (I hope that's vague enough; my
sincere apologies if it isn't.)
--
Theresa Ann Wymer twy...@efn.org
Margaret Young
>In article <b5obo3$5r8$1...@panix1.panix.com>,
>William December Starr <wds...@panix.com> wrote:
>>In article <b5ndak$jr$1...@panix3.panix.com>,
>>jdni...@panix.com (James Nicoll) said:
>>
>>[ In a discussion of "The Midas Plague" (Frederic Pohl) ]
>>
>>> I think satire works better if the situation isn't entirely
>>> unbelievable (Taking into account real world events like PM King
>>> and his Talking Dog of Political Accumen).
>>
>>Huh wha who?
>>
> Prime Minister King, who ran Canada for more than twenty
>years on the advice of his dead mother and dog. And that's the
>merest tip of his eccentricities. He was a man who could turn
>a moment of uncontrolled vomiting into a political statement.
The Prime Minister and vomiting story I remember was John A Macdonald,
who threw on while sitting on a podium listening to an opponent. After
which John A. announced "Every time I hear that man speak, he turns my
stomach."
Canada's First Prime Minister was not a Washingtonian character.
--
Margaret Young
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Come the apocalypse there will be cockroaches, Keith Richards and the
faint smell of cat pee.
Allan Griffith
<jonmeltzer.at.mindspring.com> says...
> >> >Summer AN ALIEN HEAT by Michael Moorcock
> >> >
> >> > And I missed this as well.
> >>
> >
> >No, it's the first part of the (brilliant) _Dancers at the End of Time_.
>
> Thanks for the correction.
>
> Moorcock's best series, IMNSHO.
I'm inclined to agree, it was certainly pretty damned good. I think his
best book was _Gloriana_, though.
Al
Niall McAuley
> James Nicoll wrote:
> > A Life for the Stars
> > A Young Adult novel in which pluck and opportunity propel
> > a young man to a position of some power in the star faring city of
> > New York.
> And, is killed off practically in a footnote in the sequel.
Other way around: he was killed off first, then this prequel
was written getting him into the sights.
--
Niall [real address ends in se, not es.invalid]
David Goldfarb
Alexx S Kay <al...@TheWorld.com> wrote:
>
>was written by Harlan Ellison (and was a sequel to "A Boy and His Dog").
>Is this A) Harlan re-using someone else's title, or B) two Harlan stories
>in one anthology, so they gave one a pseudonym? [Or C), my memory has
>betrayed me...]
Both Oliver and Ellison were using a line from A. E. Housman.
>"With the magical experience, what happens is that you suddenly get a whole
> mess of stuff in the in-tray that you don't have the first fucking clue
> how to classify. This is not a woman with a perambulator, or a well-done
> steak. This is something that may be a rose, a century, the Platonic
> essence of the colour green, or all of these at once. This thing over
> here is Sqmrlpstgyzlt: it eats a by-product of human jealousy and it shits
> previously undiscovered prime numbers. The only sane thing to do in the
> face of sensory input like this is to go mad."
> -- Alan Moore in correspondence with Dave Sim about _From Hell_
I've seen a number of these Alan Moore quotes in your sigs: where was
this correspondence published?
--
David Goldfarb <*>|"I'm reconsidering my desire to go to college, as
gold...@ocf.berkeley.edu | from what I've seen on this group it drives one
| immediately and incurably insane."
gold...@csua.berkeley.edu | -- Aili Contini-Morava, on rec.arts.comics.xbooks
Nancy Lebovitz
Andrew Wheeler <acwh...@optonline.com> wrote:
>David Tate wrote:
>>
>> Is there any hope that the short story is coming back?
>
>Unless the Internet sparks a huge new revival, I don't see much hope.
It might. I was just told that there are 64,000 Harry Potter fan fictions
available online, and at that, the number may only refer to one site.
>The hugely prolonged death spiral of the magazines is now entering its
>third decade. Short story outlets (collections, anthologies, magazines)
>have sold consistently less well than novels for almost thirty years now.
I still like to believe that all we need is an inspired editor, but
it may be that tv and movies have taken over the short fiction niche.
>
>(Remember, in our way-back machine, it's still 1973, and the spectre of
>Elwood is only just looming on the horizon.)
--
Nancy Lebovitz
to me that Vance might count as orientalist (look at how weird those
people's cultures are). I think a lot of the effect comes from the
viewpoint character living more simply and sensibly than the people
he's[1] observing.
[1] Did Vance ever have a female viewpoint character?
Karl M Syring
>
> Yes, I have no idea how get info off isfdb into a file
> on my shell account.
The most elegant way is to use the lynx browser that should be
available on a shell account, e.g.
$lynx --dump http://isfdb.tamu.edu/cgi-bin/ea.cgi?Roger_Elwood >out.txt
where "Roger_Elwood" is the query string. This will put the
result of the query into the file out.txt.
Karl M. Syring
Abigail Ann Young
James Nicoll wrote:
>
> List courtesy of Andrew Wheeler.
>
> Since the anthology is still important and since the SFBC went
> to multiple releases in the '70s, expect a much slower rate of posting.
>
> and not make the top five most prolific posters in this group.
> [...]
I just want to thanks James for reminding me, almost single-handedly,
why I stopped reading SF for a while in the early to mid 70s, or at
least stopped reading new stuff. And I had been a constant reader of
Analog and F&SF during the late 60s. I will be interested to see when
the shift back comes, as he gets into the 80s.... Thanks, James!
Abigail
--
Abigail Ann Young (Dr), Associate Editor/ Records of Early English
Drama/
Victoria College/ 150 Charles Street W/ Toronto Ontario Canada
Phone (416) 585-4504/ FAX (416) 813-4093/ abigai...@utoronto.ca
List-owner of REED-L <http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~reed/reed-l.html>
http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~reed/reed.html => REED's home page
http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~reed/stage.html => our theatre resource
page
http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~young => my home page
Nyrath the nearly wise
> All I remember about Chessmen
> of Mars is that it contains one of the earliest depictions of a "living"
> chess game.
It also has an appendix with the rules for "Jetan" or
Martian Chess. I actually made a set out of paper
when I was a teenager.
Nyrath the nearly wise
> In article <sh-dnS0wWaK...@news.io.com>,
> Nyrath the nearly wise <nyr...@projectrho.com.invalid> wrote:
>> Most interesting was the appendix written by
>> a Blish critic in the back. The critic discusses
>> the Spengler theory of history influence in CITIES.
>> all cultures go through.
>
>> I'm sure more than one SF author used that chart,
>> and I know for a fact it was used in a computer
>> game and an RPG game.
>
> ? I think you told me before but what RPG?
Arrgh. My brain is seizing up.
I want to say Space Opera by FGU,
but I'm not sure.
Of course there is a chance that I'm having
a senior moment and there is no such RPG.
The computer game was called "Universe",
for the Atari 800. The chart was almost
word for word the same as the CITIES chart.
As an interstellar trader, each planet you
visited was at a preset Spenglerian cultural
stage. It influenced what sort of cargo
was legal to sell, and related matters.
wth...@godzilla2.acpub.duke.edu
> On 24 Mar 2003 23:33:01 -0500, jdni...@panix.com (James Nicoll) wrote:
>
> The Prime Minister and vomiting story I remember was John A Macdonald,
> who threw on while sitting on a podium listening to an opponent. After
> which John A. announced "Every time I hear that man speak, he turns my
> stomach."
>
> Canada's First Prime Minister was not a Washingtonian character.
>
I heard a different version. After the chunks were
blown he said:
"So much for my opponent's position".
Given his drinking habits, he probably had several
chances to perfect the comment.
William Hyde
EOS Department
Duke University
Alexx S Kay
>Both Oliver and Ellison were using a line from A. E. Housman.
Thanks for the info.
>>"With the magical experience, what happens is that you suddenly get a whole
>> mess of stuff in the in-tray that you don't have the first fucking clue
>> how to classify. This is not a woman with a perambulator, or a well-done
>> steak. This is something that may be a rose, a century, the Platonic
>> essence of the colour green, or all of these at once. This thing over
>> here is Sqmrlpstgyzlt: it eats a by-product of human jealousy and it shits
>> previously undiscovered prime numbers. The only sane thing to do in the
>> face of sensory input like this is to go mad."
>> -- Alan Moore in correspondence with Dave Sim about _From Hell_
>I've seen a number of these Alan Moore quotes in your sigs: where was
>this correspondence published?
In the back pages of several (4?) successive issues of Dave Sim's Cerebus
comic book. I don't have issue # refs handy, but it was around the
end of _Guys_ and the beginning of _Rick's Story_.
There's a very good interview with Alan Moore in the second issue of Eddie
Campbell's Egomania magazine, which might be more locatable, and covers some
of the same ground.
Alexx
Alexx Kay
Opinions expressed are my own and not necessarily those of my employers
al...@world.std.com
http://world.std.com/~alexx
In Heaven, the police are British, the cooks are French, the mechanics
are German, the diplomats are Swiss, and the lovers are Italian.
In Hell, the police are German, the cooks are British, the mechanics
are Italian, the diplomats are French, and the lovers are Swiss.
Leif Magnar Kj|nn|y
Nancy Lebovitz <na...@unix1.netaxs.com> wrote:
>
>[1] Did Vance ever have a female viewpoint character?
At least one or two in the Lyonesse trilogy, IMS.
--
Leif Kjønnøy, Geek of a Few Trades. http://www.pvv.org/~leifmk
Disclaimer: Do not try this at home.
Void where prohibited by law.
Batteries not included.
James Nicoll
>jdni...@panix.com (James Nicoll) said:
>
>>> This is embarrassing to admit so I am emailing it.
>>> [James Nicoll]
>>
>> Well, crap. That hasn't happened in a while.
>>
>> Yes, I have no idea how get info off isfdb into a file on my
>> shell account.
>
>The cat being out of the bag, I guess it can't hurt to post this
>publicly as well...
Thanks. Boy that will save time. I'll still keep my posting
rate to one or two a day, though.
The thing with software is, I learn by playing* and with a lot
of computer things, they just break when you do that. So I am well behind
the curve when it comes to getting the best out of them.
For soem reason, I find just reading instructions without
using them as I read doesn't work. This makes assembling furniture
interesting...
James Nicoll
* My entire knowledge of vi, for example, comes from keeping an eye
on what typos do. No decent vi man pages when I got my first account.
James Nicoll
Holy mother of god, does this make extremely long articles
trivial to compose. I will use this power only for good on-topic
posts.
raymond larsson
says...
[...]
> Somebody or other (Damon Knight?)
> collected a bunch of city-themed short stories and I've been upset
> since I saw it in the bookstore that I only leafed through it ...
_Cities of Wonder_ ed. Damon Knight ?
(from ISFDB)
sf Billenium J. G. Ballard
sf By the Waters of Babylon Stephen Vincent Benét
sf * Dumb Waiter Walter M. Miller, Jr.
sf * Forgetfulness John W. Campbell, Jr.
(as Don A. Stuart)
es Introduction (Cities of Wonder) Damon Knight
sf It's Great to Be Back! Robert A. Heinlein
sf * Jesting Pilot (Henry Kuttner and
C. L. Moore) (as
Lewis Padgett)
sf The Luckiest Man in Denv C. M. Kornbluth
(as Simon Eisner)
sf The Machine Stops E. M. Forster
sf Okie James Blish
sf Single Combat Robert Abernathy
sf The Underprivileged Brian W. Aldiss
*s I remembered as being in the book, but I thought the title of
'Dumbwaiter' (abandoned automated city) was 'Single Combat' (city tries
to kill protagonist).
Robert Whelan
On Tue, 25 Mar 2003, Leif Magnar Kj|nn|y wrote:
> In article <MoYfa.204$a52.1...@monger.newsread.com>,
> Nancy Lebovitz <na...@unix1.netaxs.com> wrote:
> >
> >[1] Did Vance ever have a female viewpoint character?
>
> At least one or two in the Lyonesse trilogy, IMS.
And Wayness in "Ecce and Old Earth". But that one isn't
worth it. Wayness spends much of her time complacently
fending off lecherous fiends.
One of my favorite Vance peripheral female characters is
the secretary of the fourth demon prince, in THE FACE.
She's a healthy, life-loving, energetic personality,
who is interested in the protagonist, who ignores her
for an effete, insubstantial, upper-class snob. Her
overheard comments about both him and his preference
are very funny. Vance generally tends to warn his
readers away from the wrong kind of woman, but in
this story he also gives them a taste of what the
right woman might be like. It's rather sad that
Gersen misses his chance.
Robert Whelan
On Tue, 25 Mar 2003, Nancy Lebovitz wrote:
> In article <b5ocd4$apg$1...@panix1.panix.com>,
> William December Starr <wds...@panix.com> wrote:
> >In article <GAIfa.3280$la5.12...@newssvr14.news.prodigy.com>,
> >"Mike Schilling" <mscotts...@hotmail.com> said:
> >
> >> "The Moon Moth" is the only Vance short piece I can think of as
> >> wonderful as his novels are.
> >
> >Having heard that story praised so often in here, I finally read it
> >about a month ago. And man did it ever put me in a really, _really_
> >deep Ugly American(tm) mood, i.e., "Fucking stupid foreigners and
> >their fucking stupid cultures... oughta just conquer the little
> >sonsofbitches and make 'em all eat at McDonalds, grumble, grumble,
> >why do they all have to be so fucking weird anyway, grumble."
> >
> >And I don't particularly _like_ feeling like that.
> >
> I only nibble around the edges of literary theory, but it's occured
> to me that Vance might count as orientalist (look at how weird those
> people's cultures are). I think a lot of the effect comes from the
> viewpoint character living more simply and sensibly than the people
> he's[1] observing.
>
> [1] Did Vance ever have a female viewpoint character?
Actually, Vance's general attitude seems to be "other cultures are
beautiful, mysterious, and annoying" and he seems to present the
same mixture of emotions regarding the female sex.
Robert Whelan
On Mon, 24 Mar 2003, William December Starr wrote:
> In article <GAIfa.3280$la5.12...@newssvr14.news.prodigy.com>,
> "Mike Schilling" <mscotts...@hotmail.com> said:
>
> > "The Moon Moth" is the only Vance short piece I can think of as
> > wonderful as his novels are.
>
> Having heard that story praised so often in here, I finally read it
> about a month ago. And man did it ever put me in a really, _really_
> deep Ugly American(tm) mood, i.e., "Fucking stupid foreigners and
> their fucking stupid cultures... oughta just conquer the little
> sonsofbitches and make 'em all eat at McDonalds, grumble, grumble,
> why do they all have to be so fucking weird anyway, grumble."
>
> And I don't particularly _like_ feeling like that.
I wasn't sure whether I was supposed to like that feeling either,
but then I got the idea that Vance wasn't trying to make me
hate annoying cultures, but to simply give up and laugh at the
impossibility of utterly bridging the gap. One thing Vance
doesn't do is make you FEAR them, not if you can laugh. The
wierdness of alien culture, and being able to appreciate it
with emotions other than fear, is a good thing, I think.
Randy Money
Yes, from what I remember of Vance, but like Nancy "The Moon Moth" in
particular struck me as coming from an orientalist point of view.
Randy M.
John M. Gamble
Jon Meltzer <jmeltzer.at.pobox.com> wrote:
>On 25 Mar 2003 00:15:26 -0500, neb...@rpi.edu (Joseph Nebus) wrote:
>
>> (The Cities in Flight stories went through a lot of revising.
>>Apparently in the original magazine short stories that went into
>>Earthman, Come Home it's mentioned Amalfi benefited from the mental
>>health regimens of Dianetics.)
>
Um. I can.
>edit the stories without Blish's consent?
>
--
-john
February 28 1997: Last day libraries could order catalogue cards
from the Library of Congress.
John M. Gamble
Steve Parker <spar...@REMOVETHIS.attbi.com> wrote:
>On 24 Mar 2003 07:51:22 -0500, jdni...@panix.com (James Nicoll)
>wrote:
>
>> THE MAN WHO FOLDED HIMSELF by David Gerrold
>>
>> Young man uses time belt to create alternative versions of
>>himself with whom to have sex. "Folded" may not be the verb Gerrold
>>wanted, here.
>
>I kinda liked it. Sort of "The Girl, The Gold Watch and Everything"
>meets "All You Zombies". The bit where he's randomly changing time
>just to see what happens and causes Christ not to exist(?) was kinda
>creepy.
Of course, the only consequence of the non-existence was that the
cars were a little boxier. I think he was trying to say something...
John Andrew Fairhurst
spar...@REMOVETHIS.attbi.com says...
> The tag-line from the book is great. It's something like "This is the
> last story of the human race. It's about Jherek Carnilian who knew
> nothing of Morality and Amelia Underwood, who knew everything about
> it." but more pithy.
>
That's it close enough anyway in my 70s paperback which makes it one of
my earliest books along with those Pern books...
Incidentally, the three Dancers at the End of Time novels are being
reissued in an omnibus edition in the SF Masterworks series.
--
John Fairhurst
In Association with Amazon worldwide:
http://www.johnsbooks.co.uk/
Your One-Stop Site for Classic SF!
Updated for 2003 Publications
Joseph Nebus
>On 25 Mar 2003 00:15:26 -0500, neb...@rpi.edu (Joseph Nebus) wrote:
>> (The Cities in Flight stories went through a lot of revising.
>>Apparently in the original magazine short stories that went into
>>Earthman, Come Home it's mentioned Amalfi benefited from the mental
>>health regimens of Dianetics.)
>Oh, good lord. I can't see Blish falling for that crap. Did Campbell
>edit the stories without Blish's consent?
As I understand it -- and this is from reading one biography of
Blish just about a decade ago -- he went through a brief Dianetics phase
when the book first came out, and it crept into a couple of his stories
before he outgrew it. I think you had to be in 1950 and be a sceince
fiction nerd to really get it.
Joseph Nebus
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Del Cotter
James Nicoll <jdni...@panix.com> said:
>Holy mother of god, does this make extremely long articles
>trivial to compose. I will use this power only for good on-topic
>posts.
The original post in this thread tripped my "no more than 500 lines"
filter as it is :-)
--
. . . . Del Cotter d...@branta.demon.co.uk . . . .
JustRead::NeilGaimanAmericanGods:GwynethJonesBoldAsLove:KenMacLeodDarkLi
ght:DamonKnightWhyDoBirds:JRRTolkienTheTwoTowers:RobertCharlesWilsonBios
ToRead:GuyGavrielKaySailingToSarantium:ChinaMievilleTheScar:ChristopherP
Brandon Ray
"John M. Gamble" wrote:
> In article <vkjv7vs293oeufqb2...@4ax.com>,
> Steve Parker <spar...@REMOVETHIS.attbi.com> wrote:
> >On 24 Mar 2003 07:51:22 -0500, jdni...@panix.com (James Nicoll)
> >wrote:
> >
> >> THE MAN WHO FOLDED HIMSELF by David Gerrold
> >>
> >> Young man uses time belt to create alternative versions of
> >>himself with whom to have sex. "Folded" may not be the verb Gerrold
> >>wanted, here.
> >
> >I kinda liked it. Sort of "The Girl, The Gold Watch and Everything"
> >meets "All You Zombies". The bit where he's randomly changing time
> >just to see what happens and causes Christ not to exist(?) was kinda
> >creepy.
>
> Of course, the only consequence of the non-existence was that the
> cars were a little boxier. I think he was trying to say something...
That's not how I remember it. I think he said that the resulting world
was completely alien and unrecognizable, and he therefore had to put
things back the way they were.
--
When we're victorious everyone's going to want to get into the action.
Nepal will send two Sherpas and a bomb-sniffing yak. -- seen on the
Internet, 3/23/03
James Nicoll
Del Cotter <d...@branta.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>On Tue, 25 Mar 2003, in rec.arts.sf.written,
>James Nicoll <jdni...@panix.com> said:
>
>>Holy mother of god, does this make extremely long articles
>>trivial to compose. I will use this power only for good on-topic
>>posts.
>
>The original post in this thread tripped my "no more than 500 lines"
>filter as it is :-)
>
300 lines or so.
Martin Wisse
>
> THE MAN WHO FOLDED HIMSELF by David Gerrold
>
> Young man uses time belt to create alternative versions of
>himself with whom to have sex. "Folded" may not be the verb Gerrold
>wanted, here.
I always will think of this as _The Man who Fondled Himself_, even to
the point of accidentally putting it that way in my sf database...
Liked it quite a lot as a teenager. I should reread it, but am scared
to.
Martin Wisse
--
Thunderbird Two, green with a yellow stripe, just has to
have been build by John Deere.
-David G. Bell, rasseff
Daphne Brinkerhoff
> Daphne Brinkerhoff (cen...@hotmail.com) wrote:
>
> : Is this the one in which high school seniors get to go forward in time
> : to their (18+x)-year-old selves? And the snobby beauty queen ends up
> : in the future with the class geek, instead of the football hero? And
> : then... some other stuff? I know that's a Tiptree, but can't remember
> : the title.
>
> IIRC, the story you're thinking of is "Backward, Turn Backward". I assume
> as in "Backward, turn backward, time in thy flight/Make me a child again
> just for tonight." I was rather spooked by the ending, especially given
> what happened in Tiptree's own life. (I hope that's vague enough; my
> sincere apologies if it isn't.)
(a quick trip to Yahoo later)
Now that I know what you're referring to, I have to say you're right
about the connection. Especially given that the ISFDB lists the
publication date as 1988.
Thanks everyone for the inadvertent YASID.
--
Daphne
Paul Vader
>Summer AN ALIEN HEAT by Michael Moorcock
I'm not sure it's possible to summarize that book, other than to say 'time
travel', and 'weird'. Book 1 of a trilogy. *
--
* PV something like badgers--something like lizards--and something
like corkscrews.
Andrew Wheeler
>
> In article <4vD4sfHp...@branta.demon.co.uk>,
> Del Cotter <d...@branta.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> >On Tue, 25 Mar 2003, in rec.arts.sf.written,
> >James Nicoll <jdni...@panix.com> said:
> >
> >>Holy mother of god, does this make extremely long articles
> >>trivial to compose. I will use this power only for good on-topic
> >>posts.
> >
> >The original post in this thread tripped my "no more than 500 lines"
> >filter as it is :-)
> >
> It's the anthologies. I bet by the 1990s these will drop to
> 300 lines or so.
By the early '90s, there will also be at least twice as many books as
the mid '70s (and a few of those are still anthologies -- and the
anthologies got even bigger, reaching true bug-crushing status).
So this might be an odd sort of arms race here.
--
Andrew Wheeler
--
"It's a sad day for American capitalism when a man can't fly a midget on
a kite over Central Park." -Jim Moran
James Nicoll
Andrew Wheeler <acwh...@optonline.com> wrote:
>James Nicoll wrote:
>>
>> In article <4vD4sfHp...@branta.demon.co.uk>,
>> Del Cotter <d...@branta.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>> >On Tue, 25 Mar 2003, in rec.arts.sf.written,
>> >James Nicoll <jdni...@panix.com> said:
>> >
>> >>Holy mother of god, does this make extremely long articles
>> >>trivial to compose. I will use this power only for good on-topic
>> >>posts.
>> >
>> >The original post in this thread tripped my "no more than 500 lines"
>> >filter as it is :-)
>> >
>> It's the anthologies. I bet by the 1990s these will drop to
>> 300 lines or so.
>
>By the early '90s, there will also be at least twice as many books as
>the mid '70s (and a few of those are still anthologies -- and the
>anthologies got even bigger, reaching true bug-crushing status).
>
>So this might be an odd sort of arms race here.
Thank god I am not using my old 600 baud modem to do this.
Doom & Gloom Dave
"Andrew Wheeler" <acwh...@optonline.com> wrote in message
news:3E825EC7...@optonline.com...
> James Nicoll wrote:
> >
> > In article <4vD4sfHp...@branta.demon.co.uk>,
> > Del Cotter <d...@branta.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> > >On Tue, 25 Mar 2003, in rec.arts.sf.written,
> > >James Nicoll <jdni...@panix.com> said:
> > >
> > >>Holy mother of god, does this make extremely long articles
> > >>trivial to compose. I will use this power only for good on-topic
> > >>posts.
> > >
> > >The original post in this thread tripped my "no more than 500 lines"
> > >filter as it is :-)
> > >
> > It's the anthologies. I bet by the 1990s these will drop to
> > 300 lines or so.
>
> By the early '90s, there will also be at least twice as many books as
> the mid '70s (and a few of those are still anthologies -- and the
> anthologies got even bigger, reaching true bug-crushing status).
>
> So this might be an odd sort of arms race here.
>
significantly as we are reaching his teen years so we'll get more reviews
and fewer "never heard of's" making these postings truly gargantuan. If a
book brings up the memory of a disaster of some sort, even bigger posts.
Brian Palmer
> Daphne Brinkerhoff (cen...@hotmail.com) wrote:
>
> : Is this the one in which high school seniors get to go forward in time
> : to their (18+x)-year-old selves? And the snobby beauty queen ends up
> : in the future with the class geek, instead of the football hero? And
> : then... some other stuff? I know that's a Tiptree, but can't remember
> : the title.
>
> IIRC, the story you're thinking of is "Backward, Turn Backward". I assume
> as in "Backward, turn backward, time in thy flight/Make me a child again
> just for tonight." I was rather spooked by the ending, especially given
> what happened in Tiptree's own life. (I hope that's vague enough; my
> sincere apologies if it isn't.)
And as usual, I'm going to be one of those scratching my head and
saying, "What? I don't get it." (No, I haven't read the story, and I
doubt I'll be reading any tiptree for a while, so feel free to spoil
me).
Although when I was looking around for information, I found this page
http://www.mbay.net/~cgd/naturism/nudesf.htm
on nudity in science fiction, where Tiptree gets discussed. Very
interesting stuff
--
If you want divine justice, die.
-- Nick Seldon
Nancy Lebovitz
Brian Palmer <bpa...@rescomp.Stanford.EDU> wrote:
>
>And as usual, I'm going to be one of those scratching my head and
>saying, "What? I don't get it." (No, I haven't read the story, and I
>doubt I'll be reading any tiptree for a while, so feel free to spoil
>me).
>
>Although when I was looking around for information, I found this page
> http://www.mbay.net/~cgd/naturism/nudesf.htm
>on nudity in science fiction, where Tiptree gets discussed. Very
>interesting stuff
Thanks for the pointer--I'll have to get around to _The Merman's Children_.
--
Nancy Lebovitz na...@netaxs.com www.nancybuttons.com
Now, with bumper stickers
Using your turn signal is not "giving information to the enemy"
Brian Palmer
> In article <3E7FB55F...@optonline.com>,
> Andrew Wheeler <acwh...@optonline.com> wrote:
> >David Tate wrote:
> >>
> >> Is there any hope that the short story is coming back?
> >
> >Unless the Internet sparks a huge new revival, I don't see much hope.
>
> It might. I was just told that there are 64,000 Harry Potter fan fictions
> available online, and at that, the number may only refer to one
> site.
Honestly, fan fiction is quite a bit different category than short
stories. First, some fan fiction is quite definitely novel length
(although admittedly most is very short). For example, _The Saotome
Gambit_ is a long fusion between Ranma 1/2 and Battletech; at 32 parts
and 2 epilogues, using part 1 as an estimate of chapter length, it's
over 500k words. Using part 32, it's about 750k words. Either way,
clearly way past short story length. (it's quite a good read, too;
and I think it'd be readable even if you're not familiar with the
universes it's fusing)
The short fan fiction I've read typically takes advantage of the fact
that the settings and characters are already familiar to most readers
(even if there are divergences, a delta can be much shorter than
setting it all up from scratch), and to a lesser extent that people
reading one bit of fanfiction are likely to have read
others.
It wouldn't surprise me horribly if some form of short-story market
were to grow, where authors write shorts in established
universes. That seems to be what's going on in Weber's Honorverse, for
example, although I don't know how successful the collections are.
But that's a far cry from the old short stories.
>
> >The hugely prolonged death spiral of the magazines is now entering its
> >third decade. Short story outlets (collections, anthologies, magazines)
> >have sold consistently less well than novels for almost thirty years now.
>
> I still like to believe that all we need is an inspired editor, but
> it may be that tv and movies have taken over the short fiction
> niche.
Even in tv, I think the trend is towards longer story arcs (either a
story is completed over the entire season, or a story goes across
seasons).