“The purely supernatural has its place in O’Brien’s stories as well. The Pot of Tulips effectively retells a story, as old as antiquity, of a miser who in death reveals through signs and symbols the location of his hidden fortune.
…
O’Brien writes most of the stories in the persona, apparently well know to him, of the comfortable bachelor, ensconced in his cozy lodgings, be it a haunted boarding house or a decaying Dutch mansion in upper Manhattan. Late evenings with cigar or opium, discussing supernatural possibilities with companions set a cozy tone, which will be upended by a shift of reality as objects of speculation become all too real. It would be wrong to judge O’Brien’s themes as hoary simply because we have encountered them in more well known authors who followed him down these speculative paths. Taken as exemplars of early nineteenth-century speculative fiction, these stories are still worth a read on a chill winter’s night.”
The Pot Of Tulips
By Fitz James O’Brien; Read by Maureen O’Brien
1 |MP3| – Approx. 48 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Podcaster: Maria Lectrix
Podcast: October 30, 2005
Source: Archive.org A lost treasure, a lady in distress, and a message from beyond the grave! This 1855 story is an earlier appearance of Harry Escott from “What Was It? — A Mystery“, and features the same entertaining mixture of science fiction, fantasy, and horror. First published in Harper’s, Nov. 1855.
Tom Elliot’s excellent The Twilight Zone Podcast features the original short story What You Need written by Henry Kuttner and C.L. Moore under their joint pseudonym of Lewis Padgett. If you’re a fan of words and the subtleties of their many meanings you’ll enjoy this tale of a store that will only sell you only what you need.
The Twilight Zone Podcast – What You Need
By Lewis Padgett (Henry Kuttner and C.L. Moore); Read by Tom Elliot
1 |MP3| – Approx. 37 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Podcaster: The Twilight Zone Podcast
Podcast: February 27, 2011
First published in the October 1945 issue of Astounding Science Fiction.
Illustrations by Williams from the original publication in Astounding:
What You Need has been adapted for television twice (first for Tales Of Tomorrow and later for The Twilight Zone).
While you’ll have to find The Twilight Zone episode yourself Tales From Tomorrow is PUBLIC DOMAIN and here’s the |MP4| video download. This episode originally aired live on February 8, 1952 (Season 1, Episode 19).
I have discovered another PUBLIC DOMAIN Philip K. Dick story.
Progeny, which was originally published in the November 1954 issue of If: Worlds Of Science Fiction (volume 4, number 3), was falsely renewed. The false renewal was states that Progeny was published in the October 1955 issue of If: Worlds Of Science Fiction (volume 5, number 6). This is false. The story was not in that issue.
In order for a copyright to be renewed United States law at the time required that a copyrighted work be renewed within the 28th year following the original publication. This did not happen. The renewal form, RE190631, was dated November 22, 1983. This puts the true first publication of Progeny in If: Worlds Of Science Fiction 29 years prior to renewal’s application. Therefore the copyright protection on Progeny was not properly renewed and the story is PUBLIC DOMAIN.
Here’s the proof:
1. The copyright and table of contents page for Worlds Of If, November 1954 (volume 4, number 3) is HERE, and it clearly shows Progeny as beginning on page 64.
2. The copyright and table of contents page for Worlds Of If, October 1955 (volume 5, number 6) is HERE, notice the complete absence of any Philip K. Dick story in that issue.
3. HERE is a scan of the copyright renewal form, with the falsified entry for Progeny.
4. Neither magazine title, If or If: Worlds Of Science Fiction for (volume 4, number 3), were ever renewed so any blanket copyright protection for that issue as a whole is also out.
Here’s the evidence:
RE190631 Page 1 (front):
RE190631 Page 1 (back):
RE190631 Page 2 (front):
RE190631 Page 2 (back) this is the page with Progeny:
The Adjustment Bureau movie trailer: Powerful, handsome bachelor boy meets cute girl -> handsome boy loses beautiful girl -> handsome boy is chased by powerfully fedoraed men -> handsome gets beautiful back again.
Now, after having seen the film I can say it is exactly like a longer version of the trailer.
The Adjustment Bureau is a competently written romance. But as such it is neither toned nor focused like any Dick story you’ve read.
In their recently filed lawsuit the lawyers for the Philip K. Dick Testamentary Trust got one thing right. They said this:
“[the filmmakers] took every opportunity to exploit the valuable imprimatur of … the Dick name … they did everything they could to capitalize on the fame, the cachet, the brand of being BASED UPON A STORY BY PHILIP K. DICK.
The estate seemed happy to have the Dick name on there, however diluted its “brand” should become, but only so long as they get to “hoard any and all monies” they think they’re owed. But this post isn’t about that, not directly. This post is about stories, and why ideas matter in stories.
Nearly every element of Adjustment Team‘s plot has been dispensed with in the film. Gone are the talking dog and the “friend with a car.” In are a MAGICAL NEGRO in the form of a dozing black man (replacing the dozing dog), a MEET CUTE ballerina girlfriend and an off the cuff why-can’t-they-do-that-in-real-life political speech that’s also an old trope (called THROWING OUT THE SCRIPT). Also gone are the questions such a world as Ed Fletcher has discovered he lives in would mean to you an me. I came away from Adjustment Team thinking metaphyscial, seeing the idea that Dick was working through, seeing how I’d thought similar ideas, and why my ideas were wrong. I came away from The Adjustment Bureau needing to pee and no wiser than I went in.
The Adjustment Bureau is a fine Hollywood date movie, and it bares almost no resemblance to any Philip K. Dick story you’ll ever read.
I’ll give it this, the film is very competently put together – it’s a by the numbers Hollywood romance with a snappy chase sequence sandwiched between some quasi-fantasy/religious elements. And several fine actors got paid to show up and Carthage must be destroyed.
But the story, Adjustment Team, while only a minor work (just 18 pages). is a paranoid think piece in a suburban setting.
So what are you to do if you’re looking for a more genuine adaptation?
I recommend you check out The Twilight Zone (2002), which has a better, cheaper adaptation of the same story. They’ve called it Gabe’s Story.
The script for Gabe’s Story is credited to Dusty Kay (not PKD) but many of the Dick story elements are in there. Plus the episode is just the right length (22 minutes) to get in with the idea, pose some interesting questions, and let you move on. and in case you’re curious, it’s also got the poor married shlub (with a wife who thinks he’s crazy) a black man in the back yard (not dozing this time) and a trip downtown to an unusual office building. By dispensing with all the romance it gives you the chance to think about what Dick was aiming at, namely what it would all mean if the world was really run from the top down and not the bottom up.
I’ve posted about this story before. But I was provoked to point to it again after discovering Alex Schomburg‘s wonderful interior art illustration, above, and the editorial about it, probably written by Samuel Mines, below.
MASTER PAINTER:
SOME few decades ago an artist was only a man or woman who painted pictures. The word was not applied to sculptors, to poets, to composers, to actors or to authors. You painted pictures or you weren’t an artist and that was that.
Fortunately the term was expanded to include anyone in any sort of work who dies his job an artistic fashion – whether that work is juggling cigar boxes like the late W.C. Fields or stealing based like Tyrus Raymond Cobb. And authors, since fiction-writing is today rated as an art, are generally awarded the term.
Most of the time they don’t rate it – for the artist must convey feeling through the creation of an illusion that casts a tight web around the beholder and impels him into the mood the artist desires. It is a very special magic and only a very few authors have acquired its mastery.
Leigh Brackett is certainly one of them. She can cast a mood-net more unerringly than the most expert fisherman, can paint word-pictures that strike correspondingly vivid images in the mind and the imagination of the reader. Using the same keyboards employed by less gifted authors she can evoke high tragedy, ecstasy, the sense and vision of unbearable beauty or decay or horror.
We have a hunch that this story finds her at her very best. There may be some who will say that it is not properly science fiction. To which, as in the case of Ray Bradbury, we can only counter, “Who cares?” – THE EDITOR
The Last Days Of Shandakor By Leigh Brackett; Read by Nathan Osgood
2 MP3 Files via TORRENT* – Approx. 56 Minutes [ABRIDGED]
Broadcaster: BBC 7 / 7th Dimension
Broadcast: March 2007 An epic space adventure written in which Mars is portrayed as a dying planet where desperate Earthmen compete with the last Martians and other alien races for lost knowledge and hidden power. First published in April 1952 issue of Startling Stories.
*Available through the number one source for publicly funded radio drama on the internet, RadioArchive.cc.
The Pot Of Tulips
