The SFFaudio Podcast #132 – AUDIOBOOK/READALONG – Home Is The Hunter by Henry Kuttner and C.L. Moore

Podcast

The SFFaudio PodcastThe SFFaudio Podcast #132 – a complete and unabridged reading of Home Is The Hunter by Henry Kuttner and C.L. Moore, read by Pat Bottino. The audiobook is followed by a discussion of the story. Participants include Scott, Jesse, and Tamahome.

Talked about on today’s show:
The July 1953 issue of Galaxy Science Fiction, Henry Kuttner, C.L. Moore, the questionable authorship, Worlds Of Wonder: Exploring The Craft Of Science Fiction edited by Robert Silverberg (aka Science Fiction 101), this is a really really really Science Fiction story (soft SF), sociology, psychology, politics, Scott didn’t like it (at first), Robert Silverberg’s essay Home Is The Hunter: The Triumph Of Honest Roger Bellamy, Central Park in New York, an alien mindset, philosophy, “why do you want things?”, the accumulation of things, “the ultimate gathering of stuff”, glass vs. plastic, immortality, “the Bellamy within”, caring about posterity, “victory over self”, rejecting the premise, Hunters are trained from the age of six, television, “the most powerful man in New York”, boxing’s ranking system, being Honest Roger Bellamy is akin to being Brad Pitt, “incentives change constantly”, “not in this age of science”, populi, “a post scarcity society”, sometimes he wears a hare shirt, “women weaken knees”, fratricide, A.E. Housman’s Home Is The Sailor, Robert Louis Stevenson’s Requiem, home is death, compare it to Philip K. Dick, “plenty deep”, the loss of love (in favour of discipline and obedience), girls were turned out into the populi, ancient history, Ancient Rome, Sparta (had a Spartan lifestyle), the Agogae system, Crypteia (secret society/secret police), Helots, Frank Miller’s 300, is Roger Bellamy crazy?, why did the Spartan’s live as they did? the Peloponnese, the Persian Empire, their culture, the Protestant work ethic, “idle hands”, his self esteem is tied to the number of heads he holds, if you could have anything…, “I want a machine that can make me money”, after you collect everything you want what is left to want?, a “status” society, a trustworthy criminal in a world without material want, is Roger Bellamy happy? Has he triumphed?, happiness is “the exercise of vital powers, through lines of excellence, in a life affording them scope.”, workaholics, Steve Jobs, satisfaction vs. happiness, why the death of a young person is a tragedy, “I did not really want to kill”, brainwashing vs. culture, what makes you rich is the number of heads you hold, “I have more points than you”, “most kills badge”, turning the infinitely reproducible into scarcity (grinding), “there’s no deeper explanation”, gold farming, Cory Doctorow’s For The Win, Occupy Earth, hunting for friends on facebook, the ultimate in keeping up with the Joneses, the shrinking (but still comfortable) middle class, the great depression, the great machine is society, “we have all the high fructose corn syrup we need.”
Home Is The Hunter- illustration by Ashman from Galaxy July 1953

Posted by Jesse Willis

BBC Radio 4 Extra: The Eagle Of The Ninth RADIO DRAMA

SFFaudio Online Audio

Last weekend saw the re-broadcast of first episode (of four parts) of the 1996 BBC’s radio dramatisation of The Eagle Of The Ninth, that’s Rosemary Sutcliffe’s excellent YA novel. It was recently turned into a pretty good film (The Eagle). If you’re a fan of Henry Treece, as I am, you’ll probably also like Sutcliffe. The next three parts will air on subsequent weekends. I hope to collect them all over on RadioArchive.cc when it completes. Based on the first episode, listenable HERE, you may want to do the same. Sadly no unabridged version of the audiobook currently exists.

BBC Radio 4 ExtraThe Eagle Of The Ninth
Based on the novel by Rosemary Sutcliffe; Dramatised by Sean Damer; Performed by a full cast
4 (half-hour) Broadcasts – Approx. 2 Hours [RADIO DRAMA]
Broadcaster: BBC Radio 4 Extra
Broadcast: Sunday October 23, 2011 (and the subsequent three Sundays)
Can Marcus recover his father’s reputation and the lost Eagle from his legion in Rosemary Sutcliffe’s children’s adventure set during the Roman occupation of Britain?

Cast:
Tom Smith
Mark Coleman

Produced by Hamish Wilson

Here’s the trailer for the recent movie version:

Posted by Jesse Willis

Ancient Rome Refocused: Interview with Eric Shanower artist/author of the Age Of Bronze comics

SFFaudio Online Audio

Ancient Rome RefocusedI’m a big fan of Roman history, but over the last twenty-five years or so I’ve pretty much exhausted every source and story. I could probably tell you more about the Imperial family tree than my own. And that’s probably why I hadn’t subscribed to any new Roman history podcast recently. But, a recent visit to Age-Of-Bronze.com informed me that Eric Shanower, the artist/author of Age Of Bronze (an amazing comic book series detailing from beginning to end the entire epic story of The Trojan War), was a recent guest interviewee on a podcast called Ancient Rome Refocused.

Here’s the interview: |MP3|

There’s also a transcript of the interview HERE.

Podcast feed: http://rob33.hipcast.com/rss/ancient_rome_refocused.xml

And, if you’re looking for a massively longer interview, check out SFFaudio Podcast #080, which is my own two hour talk with Shanower from last fall.

Posted by Jesse Willis

BBCR4X + RA.cc: Topkapi by Eric Ambler

Aural Noir: Online Audio

BBC Radio 4 ExtraRadioArchives.ccAccording to the Wikipedia entry, BBC Radio 7 was renamed BBC Radio 4 Extra back in April. I’m not much for re-branding – it’s a grubby little idea that makes me think of scientific management, focus groups and meetings … endless … unproductive … meetings. The more I think about meetings the less I want to think.

Hopefully the new name will last a few years, and then perhaps BBC management can go ahead and arrange to have a meeting about considering the update of their antiquated delivery methods – perhaps they’ve already started as I hear they’ve finally dropped RealAudio (the web’s first big audio technology).

Speaking of delivery methods, I discovered my first interesting BBC Radio 4 Extra offering over on RadioArchive.cc. RA.cc is my favourite site for public radio, its chock full of great taxpayer funded programming. The site is extremely well organized and make even people who are wary of the word “torrent” comfortable with the technology. Files are, naturally, in the MP3 format, and when well seeded, a program the size of Topkapi will take only about TEN minutes to download. That’s service folks!

Topkapi, aka The Light Of Day, is a 1962 novel Eric Ambler. I’d heard about it – but until it showed up on RadioArchive.cc I never even thought to investigate it. Well, after investigating it turns out that The Light Of Day was an Edgar Award winning novel, 1964, and has a fair cachet in espionage and crime fiction circles. The name change, for this reading, was likely done to remind BBC listeners of the movie – Topkapi is pretty famous, the Ottoman Sultans used it as their personal residence as well as an “impregnable fortress” that housed its famous seraglio/harem.

the Topkapi Palace by night

The Wikipedia entry for Ambler has this gem:

“A recurring theme in Ambler’s books is the amateur who finds himself unwillingly in the company of hardened criminals or spies. Typically, the protagonist is out of his depth and often seems for much of the book a bumbling anti-hero, yet eventually manages to surprise himself as well as the professionals by a decisive action that outwits his far more experienced opponents.”

That certainly fits Topkapi.

I can’t say how much of the novel was excised for this abridgement, but I can say the novel definitely works as a quick listen. There are some unnecessary sound effects added, but when they show up they don’t overwhelm the text. The story is told in first person, by the clever, but unlucky anti-hero. David Westhead, the reader, is truly excellent in performing the lead character. He’s got a wonderfully subdued humor, and the voice and accent work he provides for the man supporting characters adds a lot of color.

Topkapi by Eric AmblerTopkapi (aka The Light Of Day)
By Eric Ambler; Read by David Westhead
Six 30 minute episodes – Approx. 3 Hours [ABRIDGED]
Broadcaster: BBC Radio 4 Extra
Broadcast: May 2011
Source: RadioArchive.cc
Small time operator Arthur Abdel Simpson is an illegitimate stateless half British half Egyptian pimp and pornographer. He makes his living fleecing tourists in Athens, Greece. When he picks up a likely looking pigeon at the airport he soon discovers that he’s the one in trouble. He’s then blackmailed into driving a car to Istanbul.

1/6. Minor crook Arthur Abdel Simpson spots a likely mark at Athens airport
2/6. Arthur Simpson is interrogated by Turkish security for unintentional arms smuggling.
3/6. Arthur is now seconded to Turkish security. He also has to work at the suspect’s villa.
4/6. Unwilling agent Simpson watches a group of ‘tourists’, while he works as their driver.
5/6. Arthur Simpson witnesses a vicious knife fight and waits for news of Fischer.
6/6. Arthur Simpson is still on the roof. He has just reluctantly robbed the Treasury.

Here’s the trailer for the film version:

I’ll try to find a copy of the film itself, and maybe see if its anything like the audiobook.

Posted by Jesse Willis

BBCR4 + RA.cc: Keep Your Pantheon by David Mamet

SFFaudio Online Audio

BBC Radio 4RadioArchives.ccI use an RSS feed aggregator to check most websites these days but RadioArchive.cc is one I still have to check manually. One recent visit turned up a torrent that figuratively screamed for a download. Keep Your Pantheon was broadcast in 2007 on BBC Radio 4 and was written by David Mamet.

Yes, that David Mamet!

The production, as performed by a cast of veteran BBC voices, is of course a comedy (hopefully you could tell by the title), and follows in the fine tradition of A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Forum and Blackadder the ThirdSense and Senility. To get the MP3 head on over to RadioArchive.cc and do a search. You will, of course, also need a torrent client (thats the software for getting torrents). I use µTorrent.

BBC Radio 4 - Keep Your Pantheon by David MametKeep Your Pantheon (or On The Whole I’d Rather Be In Mesopotamia)
By David Mamet; Performed by a full cast
1 Broadcast – Approx. 45 Minutes [RADIO DRAMA]
Broadcaster: BBC Radio 4 / Afternoon Play
Broadcast: May 28, 2007
Provider: RadioArchive.cc
An impoverished acting company on the edge of eviction is offered a lucrative engagement. But through a series of riotous mishaps, the troupe finds its problems have actually multiplied, and that they are about to learn a new meaning for the term “dying on stage.”

Cast:
Strabo … Martin Jarvis
Lupus Albus … Lloyd Owen
Philius … Darren Richardson
Pelargon … Simon Templeman
Ramus … Morgan Sheppard
Quintus Magnus … Christopher Neame
Titus … Kenneth Danziger
Servant / 1st Centurion / Armourer / Priest … Alan Shearman
Messenger / 2nd Centurion / Guard … Matthew Wolf

Director Rosalind Ayres

A snippet from the script:

A snippet from ACT I of David Mamet's KEEP YOUR PANTHEON

Comparative videos for research, private study, criticism, or whathaveyou:

Posted by Jesse Willis

LibriVox: Greek And Roman Ghost Stories by Lacy Collison-Morley [non-fiction]

SFFaudio Online Audio

LibriVoxLooking for a bit of background on ancient ghost stories? Here’s the introduction to a 1912 scholarly work (full of footnotes) that was recently turned into an audiobook:

“This collection was originally begun at the suggestion of Mr. Marion Crawford, whose wide and continual reading of the classics supplied more than one of the stories. They were put together during a number of years of casual browsing among the classics, and will perhaps interest others who indulge in similar amusements.”

LibriVox - Greek And Roman Ghost Stories by Lacy Collinson-MorleyGreek And Roman Ghost Stories
By Lacy Collison-Morley; Read by Timothy Ferguson
7 Zipped MP3 Files or Podcast – Approx. 1 Hour 56 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: LibriVox.org
Published: October 4, 2009
Source: Gutenberg.org
A non-fiction work, comparing and collecting ghost stories by Classical Greek and Republican or Imperial Roman authors.

1 – The Power of the Dead to Return to Earth – Approx. 16 Minutes |MP3|
2 – The Belief in Ghosts in Greece and Rome – Approx. 9 Minutes |MP3|
3 – Stories of Haunting – Approx. 20 Minutes |MP3|
4 – Necromancy – Approx. 18 Minutes |MP3|
5 – Visions of the Dead in Sleep – Approx. 14 Minutes |MP3|
6 – Apparitions of the Dead – Approx. 27 Minutes |MP3|
7 – Warning Apparitions – Approx. 12 Minutes |MP3|

Podcast feed:

http://librivox.org/bookfeeds/greek-and-roman-ghost-stories-by-lacy-collison-morley.xml

iTunes 1-Click |SUBSCRIBE|

[Thanks also to “isolation” and “Hokuspokus”]

Posted by Jesse Willis