Steampunk Recommendations?
GlupiNickname
William Gibson (the world is nice, novel is okay). I'm also planing to read
Keith Robertson's "Pavane".
Could anyone reccomend me any other steampunk novel? It doesn't have to be a
mind-blasting experience but I would like it to be a nice page-turner
without writer treating his readers like idiots.
P.S. Pardon my horrible English.
--
Danijel
glupin...@net.hr
CABBAGE, n. - A familiar kitchen-garden vegetable about as large
and wise as a man's head.
Ambroce Bierce: "Devil's
dictionary"
Nancy Lebovitz
GlupiNickname <glupin...@net.hr> wrote:
>I'm just finishing "the Difference Engine" written by Bruce Sterling &
>William Gibson (the world is nice, novel is okay). I'm also planing to read
>Keith Robertson's "Pavane".
>Could anyone reccomend me any other steampunk novel? It doesn't have to be a
>mind-blasting experience but I would like it to be a nice page-turner
>without writer treating his readers like idiots.
_Perdido Street Station_ might be fun if your concept of steampunk includes
fantasy as well as science fiction.
And if you're interested in novellas (novellettes?) as well, try Ted
Chiang's "Seventy-Two Letters". It's brilliant.
--
Nancy Lebovitz na...@netaxs.com www.nancybuttons.com
Michael Schilling
news:9rbbrr$5pb6$1...@as201.hinet.hr...
> I'm just finishing "the Difference Engine" written by Bruce Sterling &
> William Gibson (the world is nice, novel is okay). I'm also planing to
read
> Keith Robertson's "Pavane".
> Could anyone reccomend me any other steampunk novel? It doesn't have to be
a
> mind-blasting experience but I would like it to be a nice page-turner
> without writer treating his readers like idiots.
>
> P.S. Pardon my horrible English.
>
Tim Powers's _The Anubis Gates_ is arguably steampunk, and one of the best
SF/fantasy books I've ever read.
todd sanders
Sean McMullen - Souls in the Great Machine, and his 2 followup books.
sort of pre-steampunk
In article <9rbbrr$5pb6$1...@as201.hinet.hr>, "GlupiNickname"
<glupin...@net.hr> wrote:
Ted Nolan
>GlupiNickname <glupin...@net.hr> wrote:
>I'm just finishing "the Difference Engine" written by Bruce Sterling &
>William Gibson (the world is nice, novel is okay). I'm also planing to read
>Keith Robertson's "Pavane".
>Could anyone reccomend me any other steampunk novel? It doesn't have to be a
>mind-blasting experience but I would like it to be a nice page-turner
>without writer treating his readers like idiots.
If you're willing to go a bit further afield, try Phil Fologio's
_Girl Genius_. Read the whole first issue (legally!) here:
http://www.studiofoglio.com/girlgenius/issue1/cover.html
Ted
Sea Wasp
>
> Could someone please define "steampunk" for me. How does it differ from
> cyberpunk? Does Neal Stephenson write steampunk?
Take Jules Verne's world and let Babbage get his Analytical Engine
built, cook at high heat for 50 - 100 years.
IOW, far less electronics, lots of funky things done with steam
engines, mechanical linkages that would blow your mind, etc. "The
Difference Engine" is often cited as an example. Anime and manga have
several examples -- Nadia: Secret of Blue Water is one. Vision of
Escaflowne has some definite Steampunk influence, although it's still
more on the fantasy side. Giant Robo is a Steampunk world with some
extra added features.
--
Sea Wasp http://www.wizvax.net/seawasp/index.htm
/^\
;;; _Morgantown: The Jason Wood Chronicles_, at
http://www.hyperbooks.com/catalog/20040.html
Lawrence Person
> I'm just finishing "the Difference Engine" written by Bruce Sterling &
> William Gibson (the world is nice, novel is okay). I'm also planing to read
> Keith Robertson's "Pavane".
> Could anyone reccomend me any other steampunk novel? It doesn't have to be a
> mind-blasting experience but I would like it to be a nice page-turner
> without writer treating his readers like idiots.
>
Stephen Baxter - The Time Ships (sort of)
James P. Blaylock - Homunculus, Lord Kelvin's Machine, and (argueably) The
Digging Leviathan
Ted Chaing - "Seventy-Two Letters"
Mary Gentle - Rats & Gargoyles (an exceptionally complex and brilliant fantasy
which has a few steampunk elements)
K. W. Jeter - Moorlock Night, Infernal Devices
Kim Newman - Anno Dracula
Tim Powers - The Anubis Gates, The Stress of Her Regard
Brian Stableford - The Werewolves of London
You could also make the case for some Howard Waldrop short stories, such as
(with Steve Utley) "Black as the Pit, From Pole to Pole," "Heart of Whitenesse"
and the eternally forthcoming The Moon World.
Blaylock, Jeter and Baxter are considered the "cannonical" steampunks. There was
also a Steampunk issue of Nova Express but it is, alas, long out of print.
--
Lawrence Person
lawrenc...@jump.net
New 2001 Lame Excuse Books Catalog now available! Ask for one!
Current Lame Excuse Books Stock Online at: http://www.abebooks.com
Jordan S. Bassior
>Anime and manga have
>several examples -- Nadia: Secret of Blue Water is one. Vision of
>Escaflowne has some definite Steampunk influence, although it's still
>more on the fantasy side. Giant Robo is a Steampunk world with some
>extra added features.
The "Tale of Two Robots" segment from _Robot Carnival_ is a good example of
anime steampunk being played totally for laughs.
--
Sincerely Yours,
Jordan
--
Charles Frederick Goodin
I think you'd have to argue pretty hard to get it accepted as steampunk.
Where's the steam? It's more like fantasy.
--
chuk
Leif Magnar Kj|nn|y
Lawrence Person <lawrenc...@jump.net> wrote:
>In article <9rbbrr$5pb6$1...@as201.hinet.hr>,
> "GlupiNickname" <glupin...@net.hr> wrote:
>
>> I'm just finishing "the Difference Engine" written by Bruce Sterling &
>> William Gibson (the world is nice, novel is okay). I'm also planing to read
>> Keith Robertson's "Pavane".
>> Could anyone reccomend me any other steampunk novel? It doesn't have to be a
>> mind-blasting experience but I would like it to be a nice page-turner
>> without writer treating his readers like idiots.
>>
>Stephen Baxter - The Time Ships (sort of)
His _Anti-Ice_ fits the bill better (involves the 19th-century discovery
of Arctic antimatter deposits in a kind of superconductor trap which can
be kept stable in refrigeration, and its technological utilization).
>Tim Powers - The Anubis Gates, The Stress of Her Regard
If you're going to count something this fantasy-ish as steampunk
(and not just because Tim Powers is great) you might as well include
Phillip Pullman's "His Dark Materials" trilogy.
Other than that, a lot of the early SF from a hundred or so years
ago (Verne and Wells, etc) should fit the bill. Or is it considered
cheating to include stuff that was written when the future still
*looked* like steampunk?
--
Leif Kj{\o}nn{\o}y | "Its habit of getting up late you'll agree
www.pvv.org/~leifmk| That it carries too far, when I say
Math geek and gamer| That it frequently breakfasts at five-o'clock tea,
GURPS, Harn, CORPS | And dines on the following day." (Carroll)
Lee DeRaud
wrote:
>how...@brazee.net wrote:
>>
>> Could someone please define "steampunk" for me. How does it differ from
>> cyberpunk? Does Neal Stephenson write steampunk?
>
> Take Jules Verne's world and let Babbage get his Analytical Engine
>built, cook at high heat for 50 - 100 years.
>
> IOW, far less electronics, lots of funky things done with steam
>engines, mechanical linkages that would blow your mind, etc. "The
>Difference Engine" is often cited as an example. Anime and manga have
>several examples -- Nadia: Secret of Blue Water is one. Vision of
>Escaflowne has some definite Steampunk influence, although it's still
>more on the fantasy side. Giant Robo is a Steampunk world with some
>extra added features.
Would "Souls in the Great Machine" count?
Lee
Charles Frederick Goodin
This is a really good book, but it's not steampunk. More like alternate
history or something.
>Tim Powers - The Anubis Gates, The Stress of Her Regard
These two are set in the same time period as steampunk, but they're
fantasy.
You could check the bibliography for GURPS Steampunk, an award-winning RPG
book that came out last year. I haven't got it though, so I don't know
what's in that bibliography.
--
chuk
lal_truckee
> how...@brazee.net wrote:
>
>>Could someone please define "steampunk" for me.
CLIP
IOW, far less electronics, lots of funky things done with steam
> engines, mechanical linkages that would blow your mind, etc.
Before there was Steampunk, there was RubeGoldbergpunk.
We musn't forget Rube - a credit to my Alma Mater ...
aRJay
writes
>how...@brazee.net wrote:
>>
>> Could someone please define "steampunk" for me. How does it differ
>from
>> cyberpunk? Does Neal Stephenson write steampunk?
>
> Take Jules Verne's world and let Babbage get his Analytical Engine
>built, cook at high heat for 50 - 100 years.
>
> IOW, far less electronics, lots of funky things done with steam
>engines, mechanical linkages that would blow your mind, etc. "The
>Difference Engine" is often cited as an example. Anime and manga have
>several examples -- Nadia: Secret of Blue Water is one. Vision of
>Escaflowne has some definite Steampunk influence, although it's still
>more on the fantasy side. Giant Robo is a Steampunk world with some
>extra added features.
>
punk?
And if it does is it the earliest example?
--
aRJay
"In this great and creatorless universe, where so much beautiful has
come to be out of the chance interactions of the basic properties of
matter, it seems so important that we love one another,"
- Lucy Kemnitzer
aRJay
Lawrence Person <lawrenc...@jump.net> writes
>James P. Blaylock - Homunculus, Lord Kelvin's Machine, and (argueably) The
>Digging Leviathan
Blaylock gets mentioned favourably here quite often, is The Digging
Leviathan considered to be a good example of his output.
I found the book to be unengaging, tedious and far from being the funny
book about a trip to a subterranean world (ala Pellucidar) that I was
led to believe I was getting from the blurb, fortunately it was a
library book and so had cost me nothing.
Eric Walker
>Could anyone reccomend me any other steampunk novel?
Blaylock, James:
_Lord Kelvin's Machine_ & _Homunculus_
(light-hearted takes in the style of Stevenson's Jekyll/Hyde)
Jeter, K.W.:
Infernal Devices
(madcap adventures, nominally serious, somewhat like Blaylock)
Powers, Tim:
The Anubis Gates
(possibly a fit to the definition)
Davidson, Avram:
The Enquiries of Doctor Eszterhazy
(a faux Austro-Hungarian Empire setting; some science fiction,
some fantasy, some serious tales, some light-hearted)
Some fantasy (& horror/fantasy) with a pronounced period feel:
Hodgson, William Hope:
Carnacki the Ghost-Finder
Machen, Arthur:
almost anything (horror/fantasy)
There's lots more, but that's what I've read of the kind that
seems good; as much in that sub-genre is relatively new, I will
be behind on my reading.
--
Cordially,
Eric Walker, webmaster
Great Science-Fiction & Fantasy Works
http://owlcroft.com/sfandf
Eric Walker
>Could someone please define "steampunk" for me. How does it
>differ from cyberpunk? Does Neal Stephenson write steampunk?
http://www.steampunk.com/
http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/Phil_Masters/
steampnk.htm
[that, obviously, needs to be on one line]
http://www.plastic.com/altculture/01/04/11/1734244.shtml
http://www.kyamk.fi/~lha7saki/rpg/steampunk/
Eric Walker
[...]
>Blaylock gets mentioned favourably here quite often, is The
>Digging Leviathan considered to be a good example of his
>output.
>
>I found the book to be unengaging, tedious and far from being
>the funny book about a trip to a subterranean world (ala
>Pellucidar) that I was led to believe I was getting from the
>blurb, fortunately it was a library book and so had cost me
>nothing.
No, it's a terrible introduction to Blaylock. It's actually a
pretty good book, but you need substantial reading in Blaylock,
in all the sub-genres he uses, before much of what is going on,
and how it is going on, will make much sense or show his
talents. It is, however, about the only work of his of which
that can be said, so really do try the others.
<TOUT>
You can read up a bit on Blaylock here:
http://owlcroft.com/sfandf/AUTHORS/JamesBlaylock.html
</TOUT>
He's one of our modern best.
Mike Schilling
try as well, but none of the books of his I've looked through seemed all
that enticing. Does anyone have a suggestion where to start? Something
along the lines of "If you don't like XXX, you won't like anything of
his." would be ideal.
Paul Fraser
Pavane isn't steampunk by any stretch of the imagination. It has steam
engines in it, sure, but the setting is a technologically repressed
(by a militant Catholic church) alternate world.
Still well worth reading though.
Paul Fraser
William T. Hyde
Until he started writing the polished horror novels
he produces today, Blaylock's output was sometimes
hard to get into. He's written nothing as compelling
as Powers' "Anubis Gates", which was my gateway
drug to Powers' writings.
The most approachable Blaylock, in my view, is
"The Last Coin". I would have been better off
if I had begun with that book rather than with
"The Stone Giant" which is a fine book but one
that didn't at first absorb my attention.
That said, Blaylock is one of the few authors
I have in my "buy on sight" list. Even his
new stuff, unambitious though I think it is
compared to his earlier work, is well worth reading.
I would say that the Powers books that are most
like Blaylock would be "On Stranger Tides" and
"The Stress of Her Regard". More the first than
the second, though.
William Hyde
EOS Department
Duke University
Lawrence Person
Mike Schilling <mike.sc...@ebay.sun.com> wrote:
The Paper Grail is probably his best, as the protagonist isn't the complete
eccentric loon so many Blaylock protagonists are.
The Magic Spectacles, being one of those "children's books for adults" sort of
things, is probably the single easiest to read. (And why on earth hasn't someone
reprinted this book in the wake of Harry Potter?)
Lawrence Person
cgo...@sfu.ca (Charles Frederick Goodin) wrote:
> In article <lawrenceperson-95C...@news.jump.net>,
> Lawrence Person <lawrenc...@jump.net> wrote:
> >Kim Newman - Anno Dracula
>
> This is a really good book, but it's not steampunk.
Under what definition?
>More like alternate history or something.
>
> >Tim Powers - The Anubis Gates, The Stress of Her Regard
>
> These two are set in the same time period as steampunk, but they're
> fantasy.
>
Again, under what definition? When K. W. Jeter first coined the phrase, Anubis
Gates was one of the books specifically included. It's rather like arguing Bruce
Sterling isn't a cyberpunk due to some post-facto definition that excludes him...
Chris Camfield
<lawrenc...@jump.net> wrote:
>In article <9rc7pr$54v$1...@morgoth.sfu.ca>,
> cgo...@sfu.ca (Charles Frederick Goodin) wrote:
>
>> In article <lawrenceperson-95C...@news.jump.net>,
>> Lawrence Person <lawrenc...@jump.net> wrote:
>> >Kim Newman - Anno Dracula
>>
>> This is a really good book, but it's not steampunk.
>
>Under what definition?
Well, I personally would have called it an alternate-history vampire
novel. What elements of the book (I did read it once, but it was a
year or two ago now) dealt with technology more advanced than existed
in the Victorian era?
I wouldn't have called The Anubis Gates steampunk either, but then
again, I didn't coin the term. :-)
Chris
GSV Three Minds in a Can
GlupiNickname <glupin...@net.hr> said
>I'm just finishing "the Difference Engine" written by Bruce Sterling &
>William Gibson (the world is nice, novel is okay). I'm also planing to read
>Keith Robertson's "Pavane".
>Could anyone reccomend me any other steampunk novel? It doesn't have to be a
>mind-blasting experience but I would like it to be a nice page-turner
>without writer treating his readers like idiots.
_Anti Ice_ by Stephen Baxter might fit the bill?
--
GSV Three Minds in a Can
eskridge
_The Wild Wild West_ movie from a year or so back qualifies. Steam powered giant
robot and the rocket powered high wheeler bicycle certainly are steam punk. It was
an uneven film but the steam punk elements made it worthwhile for me.
On TV _The Secret Adventures of Jules Verne_ is an example. It is very well done
visually although the stories are a bit clunky here and there. The steam powered
robot cowboy and the victorian version of the six million dollar man stand out in
my memory.
Curt
Eric Walker
Blaylock is hard to do that with because he has written in four
fairly distinct modes or styles. I think I've already mentioned
this recently, and am sorry if I'm repeating a tout, but--
<TOUT>
You could look at--
http://owlcroft.com/sfandf/AUTHORS/JamesBlaylock.html
for more discussion of those types and the books exhibiting
each.
</TOUT>
Eric Walker
---=== S P O I L E R S P A C E ===---
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
---=== S P O I L E R S P A C E ===---
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
---=== S P O I L E R S P A C E ===---
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
But of course it isn't an alternate world.
But it wouldn't be staempunk anyway--as best I understand that
term--because (if I'm recalling aright after lo these many
years) it covers a fairly broad slice of history, not just a
Victorian or Victorian-equivalent period.
And, as the man says, _very_ well worth reading.
Martin Wisse
Magnar Kj|nn|y) wrote:
>
>Other than that, a lot of the early SF from a hundred or so years
>ago (Verne and Wells, etc) should fit the bill. Or is it considered
>cheating to include stuff that was written when the future still
>*looked* like steampunk?
For me, it misses that undertone of nostalgia and irony you get in
steampunk.
Martin Wisse
--
English is grammatically promiscuous.
I would have said perversely polymorphous.
Teresa Nielsen Hayden & Lucy Kemnitzer, rasfc
Vlatko Juric-Kokic
<lawrenc...@jump.net> wrote:
>Mary Gentle - Rats & Gargoyles (an exceptionally complex and brilliant fantasy
>which has a few steampunk elements)
Seconded.
But _Ash_ then, too. Not "steam" but there are some interesting
mechanical devices. Anyway, if it's not exactly "de rigeure", it's
fun. :-)
(Danijel, I don't remember whether you're in Zagreb, but they have it
in the British Council library here.)
Paul J. McAuley's _Pasquale's Angel_ is quite good and more
"steampunk" in the strict sense.
Philip Pullman trilogy that starts with _The Golden Compass_/_The
Northern Light_ can also be considered "steampunk" and is very much
worth reading. (It was published in translation. The first book is
titled _Sjeverno svjetlo_. Or something like that.)
vlatko
--
_Neither Fish Nor Fowl_
http://www.webart.hr/nrnm/eng/
http://www.michaelswanwick.com/
vlatko.ju...@zg.hinet.hr
Michael Grosberg
> William Gibson (the world is nice, novel is okay). I'm also planing to read
> Keith Robertson's "Pavane".
> Could anyone reccomend me any other steampunk novel? It doesn't have to be a
> mind-blasting experience but I would like it to be a nice page-turner
> without writer treating his readers like idiots.
>
_Pasquale's Angel_ by Paul J. McAuley, An alternate history novel in
which the steam engine was invented by Leonardo Da Vinci. It's not
great but it's OK.
Kate Nepveu
Hmm. This is sort of an anti-recommendation; I tried _The Paper Grail_
and was too distrated by realizing that I liked how Powers did this
sort of thing better. But that and _The Last Coin_ seem to be the
main ones people talk about when comparing Blaylock to powers.
Here, this might explain the difference a bit better than I can
right now:
http://groups.google.com/groups?as_umsgid=72tkjn%24...@rac4.wam.umd.edu
Kate
--
http://www.steelypips.org/elsewhere.html -- kate....@yale.edu
Paired Reading Page; Book Reviews; Outside of a Dog: A Book Log
"I awoke this morning with devout thanksgiving for my friends."
--Ralph Waldo Emerson
sugarman
>Could someone please define "steampunk" for me. How does it differ from
>cyberpunk? Does Neal Stephenson write steampunk?
Well, just having finished _The Diamond Age_, I'd argue that that
easily fits within the milieu. It has enough of the trappings,
despite being a slightly future setting, to count. Any objections?
--sugarman--
Nancy Lebovitz
effects with pre-electronic tech, but Diamond Age merely has people
trying to revive Victorian mores in a society of considerably advanced
tech.
Has anyone mentioned Flynn's _In the Country of the Blind_ yet? Does
it qualify?
--
Nancy Lebovitz na...@netaxs.com www.nancybuttons.com
John Andrew Fairhurst
aR...@escore.demon.co.uk says...
> Would Harry Harrison's _A Transatlantic Tunnel Hurrah_ count as steam
> punk?
>
Not quite, though there is certainly a case to be made for it. There are
Babbage Engines (well, to be precise, Brabbage engines, but we know what
Harry meant :-)) and Stanley Steamers rather than petroleum driven cars
but heavy plant seems heavily into nuclear power. It's also an Alternate
Now where a steam punk novel is also set in the past, usually Victorian.
--
John Fairhurst
In Association with Amazon worldwide:
http://www.johnsbooks.co.uk/Books/Masterworks/
Classic Science Fiction & Fantasy Releases to Dec 01
aRJay
Fairhurst <Jo...@johnsbooks.co.uk> writes
>In article <A2TO8qAW...@escore.demon.co.uk>,
>aR...@escore.demon.co.uk says...
>> Would Harry Harrison's _A Transatlantic Tunnel Hurrah_ count as steam
>> punk?
>>
>
>Not quite, though there is certainly a case to be made for it. There are
>Babbage Engines (well, to be precise, Brabbage engines, but we know what
>Harry meant :-)) and Stanley Steamers rather than petroleum driven cars
>but heavy plant seems heavily into nuclear power. It's also an Alternate
>Now where a steam punk novel is also set in the past, usually Victorian.
I figured that would be the case, still apart from _Anti-Ice_ it's the
closest I've got and a damn good read to. I almost wish he'd written
some more stories in that world.
Jordan S. Bassior
>but heavy plant seems heavily into nuclear power.
Well, actually atomic power first came in during Edwardian science fiction,
particularly the works of H. G. Wells. Even before Einstein formulated his
famous theory, also, the Victorians liked to give their ancient super-races
various sources of "ultimate energy," etc.
--
Sincerely Yours,
Jordan
--
sugarman
wrote:
>In article <3bdaffd2.84763371@news>, sugarman <suga...@canada.com> wrote:
>>On Fri, 26 Oct 2001 14:26:07 GMT, how...@brazee.net wrote:
>>
>>>Could someone please define "steampunk" for me. How does it differ from
>>>cyberpunk? Does Neal Stephenson write steampunk?
>>
>>
>>Well, just having finished _The Diamond Age_, I'd argue that that
>>easily fits within the milieu. It has enough of the trappings,
>>despite being a slightly future setting, to count. Any objections?
>>
>Yes. Imho, the fun of steampunk consists of getting somewhat modern
>effects with pre-electronic tech, but Diamond Age merely has people
>trying to revive Victorian mores in a society of considerably advanced
>tech.
I Found the approach in the Diamond age consisted of more than just
the return to Victorian mores. The treatment of all the nanite
computers as 'Rod Logic', ie, mechanical systems, albeit on a small
scale, also contributed heavily to this feeling.
I realize it is not a cludge of low-tech devices, but overall, it maps
well enough onto the sub-genre.
--sugarman--
Konrad Gaertner
> Imho, the fun of steampunk consists of getting somewhat modern
> effects with pre-electronic tech,
Then would Discworld count? Pratchett is on record saying he wants to
see how advanced he can get without electronics. So far he's got a
computer (_Soul Music_, _Interesting Times_, _Hogfather_),
continentwide communications (_Fifth Elephant_), and now spaceflight
(_Last Hero_).
BTW, could someone summarize this thread? It seems that everything
nominated has at least one person arguing against it.
--KG
Martin Wisse
<kgae...@worldnet.att.net> wrote:
>Nancy Lebovitz wrote:
>
>> Imho, the fun of steampunk consists of getting somewhat modern
>> effects with pre-electronic tech,
>
>Then would Discworld count? Pratchett is on record saying he wants to
>see how advanced he can get without electronics. So far he's got a
>computer (_Soul Music_, _Interesting Times_, _Hogfather_),
>continentwide communications (_Fifth Elephant_), and now spaceflight
>(_Last Hero_).
Certainly parts of _The Fifth Elephant_ and especially _the Truth_ felt
like it.
>BTW, could someone summarize this thread? It seems that everything
>nominated has at least one person arguing against it.
Awkward buggers, sf readers.
Me, I define steampunk as science fiction set in a world in which
technology is basically Victorian in design, extrapolated unto infinity.
Coupled with this is that the mores of Victorian society also still
hold. Common in steampunk are huge, steam driven trains & boats,
gigantic airships, the use off Babbage engines instead of electronic
computers and in general an use of clockwork on an absurd scale.
In tone it's both nostalgic for the simpler world of the British Empire
and ironic and (dare i say it?) postmodern in how it presents the
created world.
Examples of steampunk are:
_The Warlord of the Air_ and sequels by Michael Moorcock.
_A Transatlantic Tunnel Hurray_, by Harry Harrison
_The Anubis Gates_, Tim Powers[*]
_The Difference Engine_, William Gibson and Bruce Sterling
[*] awkward, cause it does miss certain elements of steampunk I
mentioned above...
Martin Wisse
--
"So, you're the Unix guru." At the time Randy was still
stupid enough to be flattered by this attention when
he should have recognized them as bone-chilling words.
-From Cryptonomicon
Ian Galbraith
--
Ian Galbraith
Email: igalb...@ozonline.com.au ICQ#: 7849631
"I am enough of an artist to draw freely upon my imagination. Imagination
is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited. Imagination
encircles the world." - Albert Einstein
Vlatko Juric-Kokic
Wisse) wrote:
>>Then would Discworld count? Pratchett is on record saying he wants to
>>see how advanced he can get without electronics. So far he's got a
>>computer (_Soul Music_, _Interesting Times_, _Hogfather_),
>>continentwide communications (_Fifth Elephant_), and now spaceflight
>>(_Last Hero_).
>
>Certainly parts of _The Fifth Elephant_ and especially _the Truth_ felt
>like it.
Well, the Century of the Fruitbat is 19th century here, isn't it?
MILD SPOILERS FOR _FIFTH ELEPHANT_ AND OTHERS
The continent-wide communications, I think they had their real-word
counterpart in something called semaphors. Or I'm mixing _Pavane_into
it?
And the Shades is certainly what the Victorians called a rookery.
OTOH, the Dis-Organiser in _Jingo_ is definitely 20th century.
James Nicoll
Martin Wisse <mwi...@ad-astra.demon.nl> wrote:
>
>Me, I define steampunk as science fiction set in a world in which
>technology is basically Victorian in design, extrapolated unto infinity.
>Coupled with this is that the mores of Victorian society also still
>hold. Common in steampunk are huge, steam driven trains & boats,
>gigantic airships, the use off Babbage engines instead of electronic
>computers and in general an use of clockwork on an absurd scale.
>
>In tone it's both nostalgic for the simpler world of the British Empire
>and ironic and (dare i say it?) postmodern in how it presents the
>created world.
>
It's not steampunk for sure but it too uses a setting with a more
primitive tech elvel than ours (It's about the space program of a
nation with roughly 1950-ish level tech: prop and jet fighters
co-exist on the battlefield).
Samuel Kleiner
> What would you call something like _Honneamise no Tsubasa_?
> It's not steampunk for sure but it too uses a setting with a more
> primitive tech elvel than ours (It's about the space program of a
> nation with roughly 1950-ish level tech: prop and jet fighters
> co-exist on the battlefield).
Atompunk?
--
"...there is only one way this can end: with the kind of defeat that makes
a people feel that their preachers have lied to them, their leaders have
deserted them, that the world is against them and that God is dead."
--Ken MacLeod on the WTC Disaster, on rassef.
John Andrew Fairhurst
jsba...@aol.com says...
> Well, actually atomic power first came in during Edwardian science fiction,
> particularly the works of H. G. Wells
>
Not sure about that. The ones I'm most familiar with, _The Time Machine_,
_The War of the Worlds_, _The First Men in the Moon_ and _The Invisible
Man_, don't really have power sources as such.
In as much as Dr Cavor's ship is powered by anything, it's gravity - his
cavorite blocks out sources of gravity acting on the ship iirc, so it
gets attracted to other gravitational bodies.
Whatever powers the time machine is completely ignored, and I got a
distinct whiff of steam from the Martians' travel machines :-).
The Invisible Man's doom was the traditional potion wasn't it? I've not
actually read this one, though it's part of Gollancz/Millennium's SF
Masterworks series.
Martin Wisse
Your use of the original name threw me at first, but I think _Wings of
Honneamise_ does share somwhat of the same impulse as steampunk. The
same sense of nostalgia for what might have been, for the cool,
beautiful technology of a bygone era.
It's not entirely the same as steampunk; call it retro.
(a somwhat more sinister variant on this is the (US) manga series
"Luftwaffe 1946" series, which lets WW II continue one year longer so
all those beautiful but unpractiical nazi jet and rocket fighters can be
played with. It has a bit of a sinister side to it since I have the
uncomfrotable feeling the author has slightly too much sympathy for the
German side, let alone Japan.)
Martin Wisse
--
Standing barefoot in a river of clues, most people would not get their toes wet.
-Brian Kantor, (you know where)
Charlie Stross
as <glupin...@net.hr> declared:
> I'm just finishing "the Difference Engine" written by Bruce Sterling &
> William Gibson (the world is nice, novel is okay). I'm also planing to read
> Keith Robertson's "Pavane".
> Could anyone reccomend me any other steampunk novel?
Has anyone mentioned "Infernal Devices" by K. W. Jeter yet? Or "The Anubis
Gates" by Tim Powers (sufficiently related, I think, to qualify on tone
if not content).
In the cinematic context, I was rather startled to watch "Wild Wild West"
the other day and discover that this movie -- which AFAIK bombed, with bad
reviews -- is probably best described as a light-hearted steampunk comedy.
-- Charlie
Simon Bradshaw
> Awkward buggers, sf readers.
>
> Me, I define steampunk as science fiction set in a world in which
> technology is basically Victorian in design, extrapolated unto infinity.
> Coupled with this is that the mores of Victorian society also still
> hold. Common in steampunk are huge, steam driven trains & boats,
> gigantic airships, the use off Babbage engines instead of electronic
> computers and in general an use of clockwork on an absurd scale.
>
> In tone it's both nostalgic for the simpler world of the British Empire
> and ironic and (dare i say it?) postmodern in how it presents the
> created world.
>
> Examples of steampunk are:
>
> _The Warlord of the Air_ and sequels by Michael Moorcock.
> _A Transatlantic Tunnel Hurray_, by Harry Harrison
> _The Anubis Gates_, Tim Powers[*]
> _The Difference Engine_, William Gibson and Bruce Sterling
>
> [*] awkward, cause it does miss certain elements of steampunk I
> mentioned above...
_The Anubis Gates_ certainly *feels* like steampunk, probably because it
features a lot of the subsidiary themes that often go along with the
'deranged Victoriana' (e.g. conspiracies, secret societies, C-19th urban
legends). Indeed, given that _TAG_ is set in 1810, rather earlier than
typical steampunk, Victoriana would be rather anachronistic.
[I don't know if there is a core timeframe for steampunk, but to my mind
it starts around about the Great Exhibition and tails off during the
exploits of Sherlock Holmes.]
--
Simon Bradshaw sjbra...@cix.co.uk
http://www.cix.co.uk/~sjbradshaw
*** The Science Fiction Foundation ***
http://www.sf-foundation.org
Simon Bradshaw
Nicoll) wrote:
> What would you call something like _Honneamise no Tsubasa_?
> It's not steampunk for sure but it too uses a setting with a more
> primitive tech elvel than ours (It's about the space program of a
> nation with roughly 1950-ish level tech: prop and jet fighters
> co-exist on the battlefield).
But not really more primitive than our tech-level at the time of the first
spaceflight. After all, prop-driven AD-1s were in combat alongside F-4s
over Vietnam during *Apollo*.
Simon Bradshaw
Kleiner) wrote:
> James Nicoll wrote:
>
> > What would you call something like _Honneamise no Tsubasa_?
> > It's not steampunk for sure but it too uses a setting with a more
> > primitive tech elvel than ours (It's about the space program of a
> > nation with roughly 1950-ish level tech: prop and jet fighters
> > co-exist on the battlefield).
>
> Atompunk?
Ah, now *that* will be the genre that does for the mid-20th century what
steampunk does for the mid-19th. The 1960s, but with the secret history
hinted at by the Bond movies, and the technological wet dreams of the
1950s built, flown, and spectactularly crashed.
In fact, there was a fair amount of stuff around in the 60s and 70s that
can only be explained as cross-dimensional leakage from an Atompunk
universe. The USSR was responsible for rather a lot of it (the Caspian Sea
Monster was the most spectacular, but by no means only, example) but with
projects like the XB-70 Valkyrie the West wasn't far behind.
I would say that there's not really been any true Atompunk yet, as we're
too close to the era in question to get the best effect (steampunk works
partly because of our distance from, and perspective of, Victorian
times). But some sf has definite Atompunky overtones; off the top of my
head, I would nominate:
_Steam Bird_, Hilbert Schenck
_The Tranquillity Alternative_, Allan Steele
_The Stone Dogs_, S M Stirling
'A Colder War', Charles Stross (Cthulhu meets Atompunk! Yeayyy!)
aRJay
<cha...@nospam.antipope.org> writes
and was very pleasantly surprised at how good it was, allowing for the
fact that opinion here seems to be is set in the Victorian era and the
film is in 1914 I would say it had a very steampunk flavour.
John Schilling
>In article <9rkev6$knc$1...@panix2.panix.com>, jdni...@panix.com (James
>Nicoll) wrote:
>> What would you call something like _Honneamise no Tsubasa_?
>> It's not steampunk for sure but it too uses a setting with a more
>> primitive tech elvel than ours (It's about the space program of a
>> nation with roughly 1950-ish level tech: prop and jet fighters
>> co-exist on the battlefield).
>But not really more primitive than our tech-level at the time of the first
>spaceflight. After all, prop-driven AD-1s were in combat alongside F-4s
>over Vietnam during *Apollo*.
Yes, but the Skyraider never was a fighter, as specified. In Honneamise,
high-performance propellor-driven aircraft were still used as front-line
fighters. Possibly turboprops, and certainly somewhat different from the
best piston fighters ever fielded in this timeline. But used as fighters,
and as astronaut trainers, with only the barest hint of second-class status.
HnT/WoH certainly qualifies as early atompunk, and a superb example. Very
well researched; the 1950ish rocketry is dead on, and the aforementioned
fighter planes have to have come out of the notebooks that were abandoned
in 1945 when our timeline went over to jets.
--
*John Schilling * "Anything worth doing, *
*Member:AIAA,NRA,ACLU,SAS,LP * is worth doing for money" *
*Chief Scientist & General Partner * -13th Rule of Acquisition *
*White Elephant Research, LLC * "There is no substitute *
*schi...@spock.usc.edu * for success" *
*661-951-9107 or 661-275-6795 * -58th Rule of Acquisition *
Phil Fraering
It was based on an old 70's TV show, which is usually described as
being better than the movie. I've never seen it.
Phil
Mark Atwood
> >
> > In the cinematic context, I was rather startled to watch "Wild Wild West"
> > the other day and discover that this movie -- which AFAIK bombed, with bad
> > reviews -- is probably best described as a light-hearted steampunk comedy.
>
> It was based on an old 70's TV show, which is usually described as
> being better than the movie. I've never seen it.
The TV show is also "steampunk", even tho the word did not exist
then. It was probably pitched at the network execs as the sort of
shows that "Get Smart" was a parody of, meets the "wild west".
It worked *amazingly* well.
--
Mark Atwood | I'm wearing black only until I find something darker.
m...@pobox.com | http://www.pobox.com/~mra
Jordan S. Bassior
>The TV show is also "steampunk", even tho the word did not exist
>then.
Very much so. The heroes had and used all sorts of nifty gadgets, based vaguely
on some (real) odd Victorian inventions; the villains frequently had classic
"mad scientist" devices, many of which the plots hinged upon.
Eric Walker
[...]
>The TV show ["Wild Wild West"] is also "steampunk", even tho
>the word did not exist then. It was probably pitched at the
>network execs as the sort of shows that "Get Smart" was a
>parody of, meets the "wild west".
Just so. That was the era when the small screen overflowed with
spy stuff, a byproduct being a number of spoofs (Get Smart, The
Man from UNCLE, I Spy, and the subject curiosity, which was
indeed richly amusing.
--
Cordially,
Eric Walker, webmaster
Great Science-Fiction & Fantasy Works
http://owlcroft.com/sfandf
Mark Atwood
> On 01 Nov 2001 11:29:43 -0800, Mark Atwood wrote:
>
> >The TV show ["Wild Wild West"] is also "steampunk", even tho
> >the word did not exist then. It was probably pitched at the
> >network execs as the sort of shows that "Get Smart" was a
> >parody of, meets the "wild west".
>
> Just so. That was the era when the small screen overflowed with
> spy stuff, a byproduct being a number of spoofs (Get Smart, The
> Man from UNCLE, I Spy, and the subject curiosity, which was
> indeed richly amusing.
The reason for my somewhat baroque phrasing was, I *cannot* remember
the titles of any of the "straight" special agent shows of the era. I
wasn't around to watch TV then, and they seem not to have been
syndicated into reruns as much as their parodies have.
I suppose that "The Avengers" and "The Saint" count. What others?
Paul David John Andinach
> > > Then would Discworld count? Pratchett is on record saying he
> > > wants to see how advanced he can get without electronics. So
> > > far he's got a computer (_Soul Music_, _Interesting Times_,
> > > _Hogfather_), continentwide communications (_Fifth Elephant_),
> > > and now spaceflight (_Last Hero_).
> >
> > Certainly parts of _The Fifth Elephant_ and especially
> > _the Truth_ felt like it.
>
> Well, the Century of the Fruitbat is 19th century here, isn't it?
I don't think it's really helpful to say that any particular Discworld
century is the same as any particular Earth century. Differential
rates of development, and so on. (More on this below.)
That said, I've always thought of Fruitbat as being the twentieth
century.
> The continent-wide communications, I think they had their
> real-word counterpart in something called semaphors.
Yes and no.
The basic mechanism of the clacks is much the same as the semaphore
system, but some of the things that are happening with it are
ahistorical.
One of the characters in _Thief of Time_ has the clacks equivalent of
an email address, for instance.
And the clacks technology has been adapted so that the City Watch now
has the (somewhat less efficient) equivalent of walkie-talkies, and
yuppies have the equivalent of the mobile phone (and annoy their
fellow patrons in restaurants by signalling wildly to people on the
other side of the room).
> And the Shades is certainly what the Victorians called a rookery.
This is true. But perhaps unhelpful.
Ankh-Morpork has *been* Victorian. It's been many things: it began as
a standard fantasy-medieval city, but has piled on centuries of social
and technological progress since then; somewhere in the middle, it
probably passed through a Victorian phase, although I can't think
offhand which book that would have been in.
Paul
--
The Pink Pedanther
Eric Walker
[...]
>The reason for my somewhat baroque phrasing was, I *cannot*
>remember the titles of any of the "straight" special agent
>shows of the era. I wasn't around to watch TV then, and they
>seem not to have been syndicated into reruns as much as their
>parodies have.
>
>I suppose that "The Avengers" and "The Saint" count. What
>others?
Curiously, those two count as one of one and one of t'other:
"The Avengers" (by the time it hit the U.S. market) was droll
comedy par excellence, while The Saint, despite touches of
swagger (and the opening motif with the halo), was--I *think*--
intended to be "straight."
But yes, the spoofs have as a class well out-endured their
models.
(Not sure about dates: "Mission Impossible"?)
Double aside (that's like a P.P.S.): does anyone at all in the
world besides me recall the short-lived show "21 Beacon Street"
that was obviously the prototype for "Mission Impossible"?)
Lawrence Person
wrote:
> "Eric Walker" <ra...@owlcroft.com> writes:
> > On 01 Nov 2001 11:29:43 -0800, Mark Atwood wrote:
> >
> > >The TV show ["Wild Wild West"] is also "steampunk", even tho
> > >the word did not exist then. It was probably pitched at the
> > >network execs as the sort of shows that "Get Smart" was a
> > >parody of, meets the "wild west".
> >
> > Just so. That was the era when the small screen overflowed with
> > spy stuff, a byproduct being a number of spoofs (Get Smart, The
> > Man from UNCLE, I Spy, and the subject curiosity, which was
> > indeed richly amusing.
>
> The reason for my somewhat baroque phrasing was, I *cannot* remember
> the titles of any of the "straight" special agent shows of the era. I
> wasn't around to watch TV then, and they seem not to have been
> syndicated into reruns as much as their parodies have.
>
How about "Secret Agent Man" and "The Prisoner"? The latter may not be
"straight," but it's not a "spoof" either...
--
Lawrence Person
lawrenc...@jump.net
New 2001 Lame Excuse Books Catalog now available! Ask for one!
Current Lame Excuse Books Stock Online at: http://www.abebooks.com
Lee DeRaud
<ra...@owlcroft.com> wrote:
>On 01 Nov 2001 11:29:43 -0800, Mark Atwood wrote:
>
>[...]
>
>>The TV show ["Wild Wild West"] is also "steampunk", even tho
>>the word did not exist then. It was probably pitched at the
>>network execs as the sort of shows that "Get Smart" was a
>>parody of, meets the "wild west".
>
>Just so. That was the era when the small screen overflowed with
>spy stuff, a byproduct being a number of spoofs (Get Smart, The
>Man from UNCLE, I Spy, and the subject curiosity, which was
>indeed richly amusing.
Hmmm...just because 'I Spy' nor 'UNCLE' contained occasional humorous
elements doesn't mean they were intended as spoofs: they were somewhat
lighter and more, um, whimsical than the early Bond movies, but if
*they* qualify as spoofs, what do you call the later (Roger Moore)
Bond movies?
'Wild Wild West' was simply 'I Spy' pushed back 100 years, attempting
to corral the remaining Western fans.
OTOH, "Get Smart" *was* a deliberate spoof...of 'The Man from UNCLE'.
Lee
Lee DeRaud
>"Eric Walker" <ra...@owlcroft.com> writes:
>> On 01 Nov 2001 11:29:43 -0800, Mark Atwood wrote:
>>
>> >The TV show ["Wild Wild West"] is also "steampunk", even tho
>> >the word did not exist then. It was probably pitched at the
>> >network execs as the sort of shows that "Get Smart" was a
>> >parody of, meets the "wild west".
>>
>> Just so. That was the era when the small screen overflowed with
>> spy stuff, a byproduct being a number of spoofs (Get Smart, The
>> Man from UNCLE, I Spy, and the subject curiosity, which was
>> indeed richly amusing.
>
>The reason for my somewhat baroque phrasing was, I *cannot* remember
>the titles of any of the "straight" special agent shows of the era. I
>wasn't around to watch TV then, and they seem not to have been
>syndicated into reruns as much as their parodies have.
>
>I suppose that "The Avengers" and "The Saint" count. What others?
'Avengers' actually would have to qualify as a semi-spoof by your
definition (see my other post in this thread). The most "serious" of
that era's spy shows would have to be "Secret Agent", at least once
you got past the theme song. 'I Spy' was usually played straight...
IIRC, most of the critics of the time were surprised by Cosby's
dramatic acting skills.
Lee
Lee DeRaud
<ra...@owlcroft.com> wrote:
>On 01 Nov 2001 23:01:19 -0800, Mark Atwood wrote:
>
>[...]
>
>>The reason for my somewhat baroque phrasing was, I *cannot*
>>remember the titles of any of the "straight" special agent
>>shows of the era. I wasn't around to watch TV then, and they
>>seem not to have been syndicated into reruns as much as their
>>parodies have.
>>
>>I suppose that "The Avengers" and "The Saint" count. What
>>others?
>
>Curiously, those two count as one of one and one of t'other:
>"The Avengers" (by the time it hit the U.S. market) was droll
>comedy par excellence, while The Saint, despite touches of
>swagger (and the opening motif with the halo), was--I *think*--
>intended to be "straight."
Yup. Which made Moore's later Bond movies all the more disappointing.
>But yes, the spoofs have as a class well out-endured their
>models.
>
>(Not sure about dates: "Mission Impossible"?)
Also played pretty straight, at least in the early seasons.
>Double aside (that's like a P.P.S.): does anyone at all in the
>world besides me recall the short-lived show "21 Beacon Street"
>that was obviously the prototype for "Mission Impossible"?)
Missed that altogether - IMDB shows it as 1959 season only.
Interestingly enough, IMDB also lists a second (or first, depending on
how you think of it) TV series 'I Spy' starring Raymond Massey, in
*1956*. No details given.
Lee
Lee DeRaud
<lawrenc...@jump.net> wrote:
>In article <m3g07xk...@khem.blackfedora.com>, Mark Atwood <m...@pobox.com>
>wrote:
>
>> "Eric Walker" <ra...@owlcroft.com> writes:
>> > On 01 Nov 2001 11:29:43 -0800, Mark Atwood wrote:
>> >
>> > >The TV show ["Wild Wild West"] is also "steampunk", even tho
>> > >the word did not exist then. It was probably pitched at the
>> > >network execs as the sort of shows that "Get Smart" was a
>> > >parody of, meets the "wild west".
>> >
>> > Just so. That was the era when the small screen overflowed with
>> > spy stuff, a byproduct being a number of spoofs (Get Smart, The
>> > Man from UNCLE, I Spy, and the subject curiosity, which was
>> > indeed richly amusing.
>>
>> The reason for my somewhat baroque phrasing was, I *cannot* remember
>> the titles of any of the "straight" special agent shows of the era. I
>> wasn't around to watch TV then, and they seem not to have been
>> syndicated into reruns as much as their parodies have.
>>
>How about "Secret Agent Man" and "The Prisoner"? The latter may not be
>"straight," but it's not a "spoof" either...
Both starring Patrick McGoohan. In retrospect, "Secret Agent" had much
of the feel of Adam Hall's 'Quiller' novels (at least the early ones).
(Note: it was just "Secret Agent" - the "Man" I think you're
remembering from the godawful theme song or from the UK title "Danger
Man". There *was* a show titled "Secret Agent Man" last year...don't
go there. :-))
Lee
William T. Hyde
> "Eric Walker" <ra...@owlcroft.com> writes:
> > On 01 Nov 2001 11:29:43 -0800, Mark Atwood wrote:
> >
> > Just so. That was the era when the small screen overflowed with
> > spy stuff, a byproduct being a number of spoofs (Get Smart, The
> > Man from UNCLE, I Spy, and the subject curiosity, which was
> > indeed richly amusing.
>
> The reason for my somewhat baroque phrasing was, I *cannot* remember
> the titles of any of the "straight" special agent shows of the era. I
> wasn't around to watch TV then, and they seem not to have been
> syndicated into reruns as much as their parodies have.
>
> I suppose that "The Avengers" and "The Saint" count. What others?
The last couple of years of "The Avengers" were
definitely spoofish (ahh, Tuesday nights at age
13, an hour of the original Star Trek followed
by The Avengers. I was just old enough to appreciate
Diana Rigg's acting abilities, and sundry other things).
"The Saint" was played fairly straight but with
some humor. But I haven't seen it since I was
eleven, so take that with a grain of salt.
I Spy was less of a spoof than UNCLE, which was
vastly less of a spoof than Get Smart. In its
first couple of years UNCLE was intended to be
taken fairly straight, I think, and only later
became a spoof. At the time someone said that
it was finally killed by "The Girl from UNCLE"
which singlehandedly eliminated everybody's wsod
for the whole genre.
"Danger Man" (called "Secret Agent Man" in this
country?) was definitely played straight. "The
Prisoner" got rather surreal at times, but for a
serious purpose. I saw reruns of both of these
on pbs about a decade ago and they stood up
fairly well.
William Hyde
EOS Department
Duke University
Lee DeRaud
Do the 'Wallace & Grommit' animated shorts count as "steam-punk"?
They're *definitely* SFnal. :-)
Lee
Margaret Young
wrote:
The very very early "The Avengers" was definitely played very
straight. Hard to get copies but worth seeing the episodes _before_
Cathy Gale (Honor Blackman).
The series definitely became more "spoofish" over the years, but in
the early days the tech and people were no more outlandish than you
would find in any other straight detective/mystery story of the time.
Margaret
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Come the apocalypse there will be cockroaches, Keith Richards and the
faint smell of cat pee.
-----= Posted via Newsfeeds.Com, Uncensored Usenet News =-----
http://www.newsfeeds.com - The #1 Newsgroup Service in the World!
Check out our new Unlimited Server. No Download or Time Limits!
-----== Over 80,000 Newsgroups - 19 Different Servers! ==-----
Vlatko Juric-Kokic
On Fri, 2 Nov 2001 15:05:08 +0800, Paul David John Andinach
<pand...@ucc.gu.uwa.edu.au> wrote:
>On Mon, 29 Oct 2001, Vlatko Juric-Kokic wrote:
>
>> > > Then would Discworld count? Pratchett is on record saying he
>> > > wants to see how advanced he can get without electronics. So
>> > > far he's got a computer (_Soul Music_, _Interesting Times_,
>> > > _Hogfather_), continentwide communications (_Fifth Elephant_),
>> > > and now spaceflight (_Last Hero_).
>> >
>> > Certainly parts of _The Fifth Elephant_ and especially
>> > _the Truth_ felt like it.
>>
>> Well, the Century of the Fruitbat is 19th century here, isn't it?
>
>I don't think it's really helpful to say that any particular Discworld
>century is the same as any particular Earth century. Differential
>rates of development, and so on. (More on this below.)
>
>That said, I've always thought of Fruitbat as being the twentieth
>century.
Certainly the phrase "Drag kicking and screaming into the CoF" has
that connotations. But, given the overall rate of progress in the
Discworld, it feels, at least to me, much more like the 19th. The late
Victorian era, or *possibly* the 20th just before WWI.
And there's a new century mentioned somewhere in the later books.
>> The continent-wide communications, I think they had their
>> real-word counterpart in something called semaphors.
>
>Yes and no.
>
>The basic mechanism of the clacks is much the same as the semaphore
>system, but some of the things that are happening with it are
>ahistorical.
>
>One of the characters in _Thief of Time_ has the clacks equivalent of
>an email address, for instance.
Of course they are ahistorical. I didn't mean that everything follows
the course of history closely. You certainly remember that in the
earliest books there were 66-megalith stone circles. Just about time
we had 66MHz 486's here. And later the Hex appeared, which is either a
throwback or evolution, depending on your point of view. Pratchett has
never been the writer to let such details get in the way of a good
story and good jokes. He's also perfectly right. the mixture of
historical and contemporary is one of the things that makes his books
enjoyable.
>And the clacks technology has been adapted so that the City Watch now
>has the (somewhat less efficient) equivalent of walkie-talkies, and
>yuppies have the equivalent of the mobile phone (and annoy their
>fellow patrons in restaurants by signalling wildly to people on the
>other side of the room).
See above for the details.
>> And the Shades is certainly what the Victorians called a rookery.
>
>This is true. But perhaps unhelpful.
>
>Ankh-Morpork has *been* Victorian. It's been many things: it began as
>a standard fantasy-medieval city, but has piled on centuries of social
>and technological progress since then; somewhere in the middle, it
>probably passed through a Victorian phase, although I can't think
>offhand which book that would have been in.
Possibly _Men at Arms_. I admit it had much more modern features
before that, though. :-) But the overall organisation and look and
feel and everything still look Victorian to me.
vlatko
--
_Neither Fish Nor Fowl_
http://www.webart.hr/nrnm/eng/
http://www.michaelswanwick.com/
vlatko.ju...@zg.hinet.hr
Eric Walker
==============================================================
On Fri, 2 Nov 2001 15:20:57 GMT, Lee DeRaud wrote:
>Hmmm...just because 'I Spy' nor 'UNCLE' contained occasional
>humorous elements doesn't mean they were intended as spoofs:
>they were somewhat lighter and more, um, whimsical than the
>early Bond movies, but if *they* qualify as spoofs, what do
>you call the later (Roger Moore) Bond movies?
That last I don't know, but The Man From UNCLE (for the
nit-pickers, U.N.C.L.E.), after a couple or so of shaky seasons
in deadpan mode went completely bananas. Perhaps my favorite
memory is an opening pan of the square in a sleepy Latin
American village, adobe huts and all: backgrounded, as in
standard movie or TV opening pans of that sort, is the standard
sort of flamenco guitar music (itself inappropriate), and
eventually the view closes in on a peasant with huge sombrero
sitting on the ground in the shade, leaning up against an adobe
wall, strumming the guitar in question. He then stands up,
while continuing to play, and we see that this Latin peasant is
blond, blue-eyed David McAllum, whose guitar work shifts
seamlessly into Hava Nagila, with accompanying sung lyrics.
What a Bond movie is by comparison I couldn't say.
"I Spy" I guess had a lot of serious episodes--I recall a
couple--but then again:
Robert Culp: We're looking for a Mr. Cohen.
Cab Driver (with manifest accent): Well, there's a lotta Cohens
in this village. You mean maybe Cohen the tailor?
Culp: No, I don't think he's a tailor. Any others?
Cab Driver: Maybe Cohen the barber?
Culp: No. Uh, well, uh . . . .
Cab Driver: Oh, of course (slaps forehead)--you want Cohen the
spy.
[...]
==============================================================
On Fri, 2 Nov 2001 15:36:34 GMT, Lee DeRaud wrote:
>On Thu, 01 Nov 2001 23:36:47 -0800 (PST), "Eric Walker"
><ra...@owlcroft.com> wrote:
>
>>[...]
>>
>>Double aside (that's like a P.P.S.): does anyone at all in
>>the world besides me recall the short-lived show "21 Beacon
>>Street" that was obviously the prototype for "Mission
>>Impossible"?)
>
>Missed that altogether - IMDB shows it as 1959 season only.
[...]
21 Beacon Street was the address of the headquarters (which, as
I recall, looked like an expensive suburban pseudo-colonial
house) of a crack team of experts, each of whom was a
specialist in something--the sexy babe, the gadgetmeister, the
competent master planner (I think there were only three, maybe
four though). They took on, well, "impossible missions,"
though usually to trap criminals rather than do spy stuff.
The gadgetmeister was an old guy who looked like Fred Mertz.
They did stuff like dope people's unopened bottles of booze
with microholes drilled in the bottom, had lost of phony IDs
and masquerades, and in general did the whole shtick just like
the later show.
It was what Cue Magazine used to say of some movies, "good of
kind."
==============================================================
On Fri, 2 Nov 2001 15:44:40 GMT, Lee DeRaud wrote:
>>How about "Secret Agent Man" and "The Prisoner"? The latter
>>may not be "straight," but it's not a "spoof" either...
>
>Both starring Patrick McGoohan. In retrospect, "Secret Agent"
>had much of the feel of Adam Hall's 'Quiller' novels (at
>least the early ones).
>
>(Note: it was just "Secret Agent" - the "Man" I think you're
>remembering from the godawful theme song or from the UK title
>"Danger Man". . . .
McGoohan conceived "The Prisoner," and conceived it as a closed
vehicle--that is, with a set length and a definite end, just as
it had. It was, as I guess everyone knows, deeply allegorical
(too deeply, some argue).
A good case could be made out that the Prisoner himself was the
lead character from "Secret Agent."
==============================================================
The End.
blubarsky
Big brick house?
Starred Dennis Morgan I think.
Bill Lubarsky
Eric Walker
>On 2-Nov-2001, Margaret Young <mmy...@umich.edu> wrote:
>
>> The very very early "The Avengers" was definitely played very
>> straight. Hard to get copies but worth seeing the episodes
>> _before_ Cathy Gale (Honor Blackman).
>
>But not written that way.
Apparently the original idea of "The Avengers" grew out of
something called "Police Surgeon," which then starred the
then-newcomer Ian Hendry. It had been decided to take the basic
idea of a physician but to add in a secret-agent sort to make
more of an action-adventure program, which was right from the
start to be called "The Avengers"; Patrick McNee fortunately
fell into the secret-agent role of John Steed.
At that stage, the thing was definitely straight, and--though it
caught on quickly--definitely pretty awful (as all those
associated with it agreed). The laughs came later. (Not, I
think, until the Diana Rigg era.)
For the interested, Patrick McNee's book _The Avengers and Me_
is an entertaining, if superficial, look at the whole show and
its history, including that awful revival shot in Canada.
Margaret Young
>
>On 2-Nov-2001, Margaret Young <mmy...@umich.edu> wrote:
>
>> The very very early "The Avengers" was definitely played very
>> straight. Hard to get copies but worth seeing the episodes _before_
>> Cathy Gale (Honor Blackman).
>
>But not written that way.
I would say very definitely written straight. Have you had a chance to
see any? They were just straight murder/espionage shows. Two guys, no
woman. Wry sense of humour but not more than lots of other shows I
have seen.
Lee DeRaud
>On 2-Nov-2001, Lee DeRaud <lee.d...@boeing.com> wrote:
>
>> >Curiously, those two count as one of one and one of t'other:
>> >"The Avengers" (by the time it hit the U.S. market) was droll
>> >comedy par excellence, while The Saint, despite touches of
>> >swagger (and the opening motif with the halo), was--I *think*--
>> >intended to be "straight."
>>
>> Yup. Which made Moore's later Bond movies all the more disappointing.
>
Agreed. Excellent non sequitur, by the way :-)
Lee
Lee DeRaud
<ra...@owlcroft.com> wrote:
>On Fri, 2 Nov 2001 15:20:57 GMT, Lee DeRaud wrote:
>
>>Hmmm...just because 'I Spy' nor 'UNCLE' contained occasional
>>humorous elements doesn't mean they were intended as spoofs:
>>they were somewhat lighter and more, um, whimsical than the
>>early Bond movies, but if *they* qualify as spoofs, what do
>>you call the later (Roger Moore) Bond movies?
>
>That last I don't know, but The Man From UNCLE (for the
>nit-pickers, U.N.C.L.E.), after a couple or so of shaky seasons
>in deadpan mode went completely bananas.
>What a Bond movie is by comparison I couldn't say.
Two words: "redneck sheriff". Or, for that matter, "Moonraker", in its
entirety. I swear to God, toward the end of Moore's run as Bond, I
thought they were trying to make a spoof of "Our Man Flint".
>"I Spy" I guess had a lot of serious episodes--I recall a
>couple--but then again:
>
>Robert Culp: We're looking for a Mr. Cohen.
[snip]
>Cab Driver: Oh, of course (slaps forehead)--you want Cohen the
>spy.
Was that the one where the whole show was a set-up/explanation for the
"Glass pants" pun? As with X-Files, an occasional episode was done
with a more, um, "comedic" style. :-)
Lee
Lee DeRaud
>On 2-Nov-2001, Lee DeRaud <lee.d...@boeing.com> wrote:
>
>> 'Wild Wild West' was simply 'I Spy' pushed back 100 years, attempting
>> to corral the remaining Western fans.
>
>>> Wild, Wild, West << had much more technology than >> I Spy << had.
I was referring more to the basic "dashing agent plus brainy support
guy" premise, plus the rather conspicuous hide-in-plain-sight "covers"
that both used. (Although James West admittedly never really made much
of a *secret* out of the fact that he was a "secret agent" :-).)
Lee
@hotmail.com.invalid Eric D. Berge
<ra...@owlcroft.com> wrote:
>On 01 Nov 2001 23:01:19 -0800, Mark Atwood wrote:
>
>[...]
>
>>The reason for my somewhat baroque phrasing was, I *cannot*
>>remember the titles of any of the "straight" special agent
>>shows of the era. I wasn't around to watch TV then, and they
>>seem not to have been syndicated into reruns as much as their
>>parodies have.
>>
>>I suppose that "The Avengers" and "The Saint" count. What
>>others?
>
>Curiously, those two count as one of one and one of t'other:
>"The Avengers" (by the time it hit the U.S. market) was droll
>comedy par excellence
It wasn't always. The very early episodes with Honor Blackman as
Cathy Gale were pretty much straight Cold War spy dramas.
The non-parodic shows you are missing are "Secret Agent" and its quasi
sequel, "The Prisoner", both starring Patrick McGoohan in increasingly
dark and cynical stories.
--
------------------------------------------------------------------
Eric D. Berge
(remove spaces for valid address)
Clay lies still, but blood's a rover
Breath's a ware that will not keep
Up, lad! When the journey's over
There'll be time enough to sleep.
- A.E.Housman, "Reveille"
------------------------------------------------------------------
William December Starr
gae...@aol.com said:
> BTW, could someone summarize this thread? It seems that everything
> nominated has at least one person arguing against it.
Don't look now, but I think you just summarized this thread...
-- William December Starr <wds...@panix.com>
William December Starr
"Eric Walker" <ra...@owlcroft.com> said:
>> Pavane isn't steampunk by any stretch of the imagination. It has
>> steam engines in it, sure, but the setting is a technologically
>> repressed (by a militant Catholic church) alternate world.
>>
>> Still well worth reading though. [Paul Fraser]
>
> ---=== S P O I L E R S P A C E ===---
> |
> |
> |
> |
> |
> |
> |
> ---=== S P O I L E R S P A C E ===---
> |
> |
> |
> |
> |
> |
> |
> ---=== S P O I L E R S P A C E ===---
> |
> |
> |
> |
> |
> |
> |
>
> But of course it isn't an alternate world.
Oh yes it is too. (Yes, yes, I know about the codicil at the end
of the book. I just can't make myself come within a dozen light
years of believing in it.)
William December Starr
> ...The Man From UNCLE (for the nit-pickers, U.N.C.L.E.), after a
> couple or so of shaky seasons in deadpan mode went completely
> bananas. Perhaps my favorite memory is an opening pan of the square
> in a sleepy Latin American village, adobe huts and all: backgrounded,
> as in standard movie or TV opening pans of that sort, is the standard
> sort of flamenco guitar music (itself inappropriate), and eventually
> the view closes in on a peasant with huge sombrero sitting on the
> ground in the shade, leaning up against an adobe wall, strumming the
> guitar in question. He then stands up, while continuing to play, and
> we see that this Latin peasant is blond, blue-eyed David McAllum,
> whose guitar work shifts seamlessly into Hava Nagila, with
> accompanying sung lyrics. What a Bond movie is by comparison I
> couldn't say.
There was one incredible episode -- a bit of IMDb research reveals that
it was "The Bat Cave Affair," the second-to-last episode of the second
season -- which guest-starred Martin Landau as "Count Zark." He was a
villain, a THRUSH-associated bad guy with a Secret Plan to, well, to
do something or other, but what was completely amazing about him was
that while he was a normal (evil) human being, you could just _see_
that what really drove him was that he wanted to be Count Dracula so
badly that he could taste it. It was one of the most wonderful things
I've ever seen on television. How any of them got through any of
their scenes with straight faces, I'll never know.
Man, that was an amazingly off-kilter series...
Eric Walker
[...]
>There was one incredible episode -- a bit of IMDb research
>reveals that it was "The Bat Cave Affair," the second-to-last
>episode of the second season -- which guest-starred Martin
>Landau as "Count Zark."
"Goot eeevening. I am . . . Zark!"
Who could forget it?
Eric Walker
[... re _Pavane_]
>> ---=== S P O I L E R S P A C E ===---
>> |
>> |
>> |
>> |
>> |
>> |
>> |
>> ---=== S P O I L E R S P A C E ===---
>> |
>> |
>> |
>> |
>> |
>> |
>> |
>> ---=== S P O I L E R S P A C E ===---
>> |
>> |
>> |
>> |
>> |
>> |
>> |
>>
>> But of course it isn't an alternate world.
>
>Oh yes it is too. (Yes, yes, I know about the codicil at the
>end of the book. I just can't make myself come within a dozen
>light years of believing in it.)
I rather think of that as the key that turns the whole lock of
the book. (Hey, it's late, I slur my metaphors.)
eskridge
Eric Walker wrote:
>
> "I Spy" I guess had a lot of serious episodes--I recall a
> couple--but then again:
>
> Robert Culp: We're looking for a Mr. Cohen.
>
> Cab Driver (with manifest accent): Well, there's a lotta Cohens
> in this village. You mean maybe Cohen the tailor?
>
> Culp: No, I don't think he's a tailor. Any others?
>
> Cab Driver: Maybe Cohen the barber?
>
> Culp: No. Uh, well, uh . . . .
>
> Cab Driver: Oh, of course (slaps forehead)--you want Cohen the
> spy.
>
> [...]
Two I Spy points-
One of the PBS stations in the Washington DC area (We have three or
four depending how you count) was running I Spy last year. I never
quite fiqured out why but then again the PBS station in
Philadelphia ran Secret Agent after they ran the Prisoner one too
many times.
I Spy Returns the reunion from 1994 is on HBO-F next week. It is
the rare network TV movie that jumps to pay channels.
Curt
eskridge
Eric Walker wrote:
> Apparently the original idea of "The Avengers" grew out of
> something called "Police Surgeon," which then starred the
> then-newcomer Ian Hendry. It had been decided to take the basic
> idea of a physician but to add in a secret-agent sort to make
> more of an action-adventure program, which was right from the
> start to be called "The Avengers"; Patrick McNee fortunately
> fell into the secret-agent role of John Steed.
Something very similar happened to Gene Barry on _Burke's Law_. It
went from _Burke's Law_ in 1963, a detective show, to _Amos Burke -
Secret Agent_in 1965, a spy show and was revived as _Burke's Law_ in
1994, a detective show crossed with the _Love Boat_. That Bond guy
created a lot of spies. :-)
Curt