Tag: Larry Niven

The SFFaudio Podcast #916 – READALONG: Planet Of Adventure by Jack Vance

Jesse and Alex (Pulpcovers) talk about Planet Of Adventure by Jack Vance

Talked about on today’s show:
4 novels, between 1964, what did you think of this book, scanscope, waggling my fingers, “interesting”, three things that come up endlessly in these 4 books, Adam Reith and his motley crew, experience, one good big novel, a very good book, The Moon Moth, a murder mystery, all the things that are in here, a long short story, other series, the dude wrote a lot, really part of a series that’s one big book, clearly in the middle of a story, a natural final completion, the strength and the weakness of this book, designed to make you read more, a big side quest, almost gets the ship launched, only three, tries to steal a ship, loops right back to where he was, delay tactics, that could be the idea, frustrating, a perverse thought that would be really awesome, goes into the endless, eternity, just livves there forever, turns into a statue, still sits there today, frozen forever, about this book, where it comes from, and other books in this mode, The Green Odyssey by Philip Jose Farmer, a series by Mike Resnick, hero guy says “interesting”, gets out of his problems using his alien mind, thinks differently, hows he gonna get out of it?, a mode of science fiction, appreciate and frustrated with, Ringworld, luck is skill, bred to be lucky, such a fun idea, a little bit Mars, two moons, the cultural stuff, soft science fiction, it has to be handled well, in the tradition of, four alien races, pnumemen, a greek term for knowledge, strange society, throw it away and move on to the next one, the saving grace, it should be read as a whole, a modern novel, get you back up to speed stuff, it flows very well, which do you like the most?, the gold rush town, The Most Dangerous Game, the only way to get them, sentient tiger things, all the sequins that you can carry, biological?, mineral, geodes that grow in the soil, strange mushroom, nodules, geological nodule, like bitcoin mining, claim jumpers, what book is Casino World?, the eel racing, more than one thing going on in it, at least two big things, book 4, a girl in every book, I’m a princess of Mars, some adventurer who saved her, a sack of gold, be on your way, a big change from the expectation of the first book, most radical discontinuity, the love interest is excised from the plot, more freedom of adventure, kidnapped again, Zap210, Karina 429, employing the techniques of the odyssey, today at the typewriter, it was very tawny, old and boring looking, worn out, a direct reference to, that whole genre, from the late 60s, vintage sci-fi, when Burroughs was at his peak, 1912?, going on sixty years, that double gap, does it really well, doing it earnestly, no tongue in cheek here at all, there’s some of everything, a planetary romance, kinda stinky, mystery religions, the mysteries of some female anti-sex cult, the bitter old feminist sex-cult, fairly misogynistic, the main character is a male, he is heterosexual, underdeveloped female, I’m having these strange feelings, that’s how the species gets reproduced, very solid, weird sex cults on earth, cutting their boobs and dicks off, do it just for the art, a science fiction setting, was Jack Vance a seabee?, a photo of him on a boat, the start of the premise, the way a Star Trek episode would start, space navy, competent, we don’t know which one is going to be , nobody wants a bald short guy, Paul Wander, such a good name, Adam Reith, humans taken from earth and made slaves, getting back to Earth, the boat journey, Robert E. Howard style plotting, one damn thing after another, coincidence, what he’s written before, about the map, abandon the map, continents and islands, every time he goes to a new culture, a reskin, this is clearly Venice, Norse barbarians, merchant marine, essentially the same thing, you get off the boat, they have a different culture there, primitive people as you bulldoze their forest to make a landing strip, Thailand and Hong Kong, both Asian, not the same, what makes something taboo, puts a female mask on Zap210, orgy, the emblems, your emblem is you identity, keep with the Austrian accent, why people get tattoos, figure out their identity, what Jack Vance’s science is, how weird people are, the extreme of the underworld, a little bit like Weena and the Time Traveler from The Time Machine, made permanently child like, the whole point, the Eloi are the aristocracy, we don’t know how our car works, we’re definitely gonna eat you, she herself was a teacher of the young ones, decorum, don’t be boisterous, that kind of transformation, the only identity she had, girls inbetween, immediately kills, trying to get off the planet, a really bad villain, the worst villain ever, Wooldiver, avarice, the collection of money, his religion, he wants to be a Dirdirman, heresy, the big egg, sticking baby Chasch in the brain, chemically castrated, its all culture, this is how things are, I’m only level 4, a key to understanding, he becomes king of a city in book 1, I don’t have time for this, have to make reforms, I don’t especially care, he’s got adventure, king of that one small town, that extraction, the narrator is really good at making him evil, alive or dead, put in the glass box, presumably he’s dead, all wrapped up eventually, he and his remaing crew, some kind of a report, where it ends, a sequel, an epilogue, little Adam Reiths running around, pretty tame, not a sex adventure, Gor-curious, better written, a 25 book series, The Demon Princes, The Star-King, one damn thing after another and no resolution, you have to sell the book the way it needs to be sold, a four season show, the themes and the chapter breaks all fit together and hang together as a nice whole, not wrong, motivations, Predators, that human hunting stuff, mad Pnume, nighthounds are the same thing, walking on four legs upside down, as an ecosystem, not as thorough as Dune, worms up and down, one species planet, using that background to enrich the alienness of The War Of The Roses or some such, pilgrim plant, a restaurant, restaurant in Bankok, this is spicy, this is very pickled, grow to enjoy, a different set of taboos, cultural morals, the experience of adventure, Lieutenant Gullivar Jones: His Vacation, visit to Mars by magic carpet, legless children, the bitter feminist cult, an organ made of men, everything moves on, who thinks of that?, Elric of Melniboné, Melbourne, the sword who drinks, a sash, a hat, a way of hiding your hair, the ferry, very Charon on the ferry, the most modern of the books, eyes are free, almost all of them are zombies, cigarettes off the sidewalk, we’re not zombies like these other people, seperate from those zomies, trapped in your own algorithm, you block people, Brave New World, the soma, the only one that’s sweet, clever and so insidious, hunt escapees, really solid, compared to Ringworld, for such a big dumb object, in the first book, hard science fiction, engineering, superstrong string, technology stuff, everyone’s got spaceships, the scanscope, doesn’t know anything about physics, the hulk, it was cool to the touch, because it’s iron, what it can do, those strange markings, do not point at sun, Luke’s binoculars from Star Wars, a fantasy world, wooden sailing ships, D&D on this planet, everyone knows there are spaceships, yep yep, yes it is, hunting for food for a spear, learns a language by kissing a girl, they’re bitcoin mined, rhymes with stuff that happens on Earth, when you read Jack London, lots of horrible cultural shocks, temperature shocks, how assholish people are, telling it from the point of view of a dog, many many such, a liberation there, faithfulness, very frothy, apples are really delicious, the same reason that they float, this book is not a dense stake, that crunch sound, if you hold an orange, juicy, mostly fluff, I would have more of this, three books called the Alastor, three books, cluster of 10,000 stars, loosely under the control of this dictator, the Whelm, the weird Jack Vance culture, the dictator, shows up in disguise, lowly bureaucrat, giant space battleship, pops in and likes to observe his planets, Tales Of Dying, that’s what we read, a French version, it takes longer in French, Lyonesse, To Live Forever, get your level up high enough, trying to solve his own murder, Big Planet looked really good, more out of print stuff, the Vance Integral Edition, a matched set, limited print, 60 books, brown leather, collection vs. reading, makes it unappealing, a nice pulp cover, $1500 in 2003, $14,995, 47 volumes, cheap paperbacks, a successful author, Stephen Leacock, My Financial Career, Stephen Leacock’s house, Mark Twain’s house, a massive beautiful home based on telling lies, so many cases like that, nobody you’ve heard of has a writing castle in Michigan, the premiere medium, movies were just coming in, as a writer you were the source and the sole employee, you could do it, E. Phillips Oppenheim, Howard had a typewriter, a carbon copy, a big market for fiction, so many magazines, then hardback market, paperback market, audiobook ebook market?, audible makes money now, stretch your legs into some E.R. Eddison, The Worm Ouroboros, majestic romance, should rejoiced, the many mountained demon land, a literary event of the first importance, there is a map and illustrations, 15 hours, 520 pages, appendices, somewhere down the road, last weekend of September, Tolkien or C.S. Lewis, A Voyage To Arcturus by David Lindsay, has two heads, a girl, astral projection, same way as John Carter, magic carpet, you don’t need oxygen, the symbology going on, everybody’s retarted, the language has got so much simpler, that literary voice, the dumbing down of pop culture, the producers insist they recap what’s happened, oh that just happened, don’t make them work for it, the themes are shallower, an endless fetch quest, the difference is that is an excuse to get the next culture, to have the next adventure, Metropolis, 2001: A Space Odyssey, static scenes, the exact right mood for it, 2010 is a great science fiction movie, Brave New World, gets you into the mood of what the book is going to be about, a really good painted cover, That Time I Got Drunk and Yeeted a Love Potion at a Werewolf by Kimberley Lemming, World Without Men by Charles Eric Maine, weirdly fascinating, that’s it, contraception, government conspiracy, shoots down the jetliner, its fun, ideas, the last man on earth, all these lesbians who hate him, very 2026, the first male child in 5000 years, look at this we created a male, enforced lesbianism, a supercomputer that runs the world, a fun read, Mr. Adam by Pat Frank, everybody’s sterile, inspecting a lead mine, we need to study this, we must study you, we have a sperm gap, the Chinese have seized him, Canada’s like we will play along, a mockery of American government and bureaucracy, a mocking satire, all these guys coming back from WWII, using science fiction ideas, the fun stuff, if it doesn’t have robots or androids or supercomputers or vampires it better fuckin have a murder, maybe an Agatha Christie, not as a steady diet, conartist in space, Deathworld by Harry Harrison, a good space opera, Deathstalker by Simon R. Green, weird urban fantasy, giant decadent space empire, farm planet, a sexy mistress that he bought from the concubine store, declared an outlaw, start a rebellion and overthrow an empire, plot reasons, swordfights and blasters, corrupt decadent courts, handmaidens with brains burned out, no one can say no, this is what happens when you put women in charge, and the adventure continues, a chonker, two weeks to read four books, other genres, military science fiction, subset of space opera, big dramatic galaxy changing, subverting tropes thing, invading this planet, this unit trapped somewhere, Honor Harrington, Horatio Hornblower in space, the big dumb object, bio-science fiction, Peter Watts, Greg Bear, Project Hail Mary, The Martian and the other Martian (Odyssey) by Stanley G. Weinbaum, Artemis, anything still being talked about 100 years later, Orville Prescott, its not as big as Shogun, old books still being talked about, 100 years later, an introduction by big movie collection, Forrest Ackerman, my Slan friend, skyscraper is a reference to a sail on a ship, the moonraker, Moloch, the heart machine, the human clocks, the mole world, a ruler as ruthless, the Seal of Solomon, supermundane science, Hugo Gernsback, I don’t want to be him and I think I am him, set in Novembro 2026, The Cosmic Courtship by Julian Hawthorne, Cirsova, illustrations, some collector had the issues, to do the OCR, they didn’t release those scans, Mary Faust, a brilliant scientist, an evil sorcerer, Jack Paladin, her love, swashbuckling, 1917, a gutenberg text, so many scans coming in, Black Canaan, how to pronounce Ouroboros, adventury book, it went down easy, a big investment is fine, more people should be readin Jack Vance, born in 1916, Showboat World, modern author biography, wrote a bunch of crappy books, cattlehand, mercenary in South Africa, joined a cult in the Himalayas, admit when a story is good, a story published in Chatelaine in 1983, a good story, called The Metaphor, a really good English teacher, flamboyant, teaching grade 7 for 16 years, my dog is a big fluffy cat, my mom is a cold austere building, do you need to talk to somebody, attracted to boys now, finally spreading her wings, a little older, just as flamboyant, the students all make fun of her, hit by a bus, how important you were to me, it was a murder, that is most of the mainstream literature that teachers push on kids, they went into creative writing, their upbringing, become a dentist, now reconciled with you brother, every single Disney movie, the working class playwright, Monty Python, broad country accent, coal mining is an honorably profession, more to life with gala lunches, nailing a lot, the people in the DSA, in favour of the working class but they don’t know any, LuluLenin, people aspiring to that sort of class, a lot of money for a mug, there’s something there, probably helped their writing, rich kids that did good, Larry Niven, Michael Crichton, a really solid paperback from the 70s, it felt complete, hit it big, moving on, very much a John Lange, bigger projects, The Great Train Robbery, he directed the movie, an excellently funny film, when you’re watching a 70s movie, The Black Hole (1979), the hot Maui sun, Deep Rising (1998), 80s movies, 60s movies, great westerns.

Posted by Jesse Willis

The SFFaudio Podcast #905 – READALONG: Time For The Stars by Robert A. Heinlein

Jesse and J. Daniel Sawyer talk about Time For The Stars by Robert A. Heinlein

Talked about on today’s show:
Time For The Twins by Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman, Raistlin and Caramon, twin boys, one becomes a wizard and the other becomes a muscleman, lawful evil and lawful good, wow, this is really cool, illustrations!, you don’t get that anymore, there’s a checklist, who wrote this book?, he marries his grand niece, Time Enough For Love, The Door Into Summer, the young girl is grooming the older man, her plan works out, Heinlein’s relationship with Ginny, he wrote it on her honeymoon, I’m a cradle robber, the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard, already descending into alcoholic psychosis, Leslyn went so far around the bend, back together, ran away and got married, honeymooned at a hunting cabin in Colorado, he’s looking for the door into summer, wrote the whole book in a week, an older bitter woman, write what you know, Dan Davis, Ricky, Riki-Tiki-Tavi, Heinlein was definitely Kipling pilled, Three Men In A Boat by Jerome K. Jerome, Thomlinson, The Gods Of The Copybook Maxims, M.I., mobile infantry, he’s a book guy, how engineering and invention works, a house robot, Bill Christensen, the robot that doesn’t work properly, MG, the Lucas Electrical Systems, as all the boomers are dying, they don’t make the parts anymore, the prince of darkness, they chose positive for the ground, prior art, six months to a year, much better, Toyota MR2, the literary allusions in this book, A Picture Of Dorian Gray, walks in and sees his twin brother there, the Long Range Foundation, the Howard Families Foundation, The Long Now Foundation, something people don’t actually believe but is very true, the world’s richest man, his inspirations are more Heinleiny, Peter Thiel is all Tolkien, Palmer Lucky, seed round, Grok, massive impacts, the right hands at the right age, Hardy Boys, Nancy Drew, [the Bobbsey Twins], to argue with Heinlein, a statement, all wars are wars of population conflict, Malthus, that hasn’t ever been the case, in a starvation setting, you could argue it into that, make breathing room, living space, super-taboo at the moment, Isaac Asimov, Make Room Make Room, Harry Harrison, Hitler’s not even quoting Hitler, the conventional wisdom, 1860 – 1945, world tour, The Star Beast, a proto-fascist in an H.G. Wells sense, social credit, an evangelical tract, the educated class, material uplift, level cultures, administer world resource, very WASPy, very socialist, down in the trenches, the cultures are so different, anarchist bent, government can solve problems, Friday, a character invent a technology and not patent it, The Number Of The Beast, if it is a novel, 20 year window, a reasonable length of time, who owns the Statermeyer syndicate books now?, estates as liches, Dr Suess’ estate, Agatha Christie’s estate, Tolkien, how crappy the control, there’s competition to be faithful, there’s competition for art, the ones from the official estate, riddled with typos, cost $1500, get another stack, kickstart it, there are other juvenile science fiction novels, written some of them, the imitators, the competitors, the critical mass, year after year for twelve years, Dal Tigmar book, an Alan E. Nourse novel, first space voyage, alien buddy, its good, Heinlein wants you angry at him, how Heinlein doesn’t really have villains, the replacement captain, acting unwisely, shakes his hand, maybe you should go to school too, is this anyone’s favourite, most similar to Starman Jones, Finnish people in space, the breeding program, Citizen Of The Galaxy, Sisu, space gypsies, land monsters, centaurs or hippogriffs, move alongs, all the books are similar, a propaganda of the learning, the love of science, investigation, engineering, culture, overtly propagandistic, the math, reading the classics, Shakespeare, Heinlein’s imitators, autodidactic, the cultural canon, Hadrian’s Flight, The Wolf Of Venus, the broad base, the deep base, Mormon culture, Orson Scott Card, might be even stronger than Heinlein’s following, different eras, hit harder in the 1980s, new books comin out, the depth and the breadth, star rankings, compare books to each other, a competent writer, trying to build a book, squeeze out a really interesting book out of Farmer In The Sky, the conflict between the company and the colonists, can that book be greater than it is, probably the worst juveniles, the smallest idea, the twin paradox, school curricula, Have Spacesuit, very relatable idea, homeschooling parents, which one do I start my kids with?, Treasure Island, trial before the gods, a really interesting relationship with loving but distant parents, abusive parents, orphan, Tom turns into an abusive parent, Patricia, controlling abusive person, the book you give to an abusive home, Red Planet, a gun culture, an abusive school system, Star Beast, Between Planets, get rich quick scheme, controlling land, starving people out, real life stuff, space and on other planets, families, let’s do something about it, while listening to it, he’s the worst, most unpleasant, he’s not a bad boy, he’s weak and manipulative and self pitying, unsympathetic characters, this kid’s diaries, he’s a kid, he grows up by the end, what a little shit he is, he’s being a little self-pitying, the psychology of his brother, raging narcissist and a sociopath, precocious, the action is quite limited, the rescue of people, feels shorter, Rocket Ship Galileo, it’s plot is much butter, a Tom Swift book with Heinlein flavouring, more deft with what he was doing, very slick, I’m gonna stay, pulls the rug out, all your work was for nothing, that sometimes happens, Space Cadet, these huge initiation rites, just qualifying them for adulthood, the first chapter of the next journey, facing the bully, give up his dog, the transition out of juveniles, more of this too, I’m a real girl now, I’m gonna have a baby, space hooker makes good, Mata Hari, more manipulated, more annoyed, The Puppet Master, your sister who’s not you sister, don’t look at her with your penis out, cool book man, let’s have so more arguments sir, it isn’t Mary Sue wish fulfillment thing, he likes to piss his audience off, on multiple levels, the top level argument, an element of satire, when you reread some of those scenes, isn’t that the power of being a smart reader, now can dismiss them, first contact, my ability to fight back, the checkboxes, always in there, transgenderism, he goes to the ship’s psychologist, just thing of me as Doctor Whateverhernameis, with his pets, the subject of the book, the secret of the book, we’re all stuck in our own heads as well, the problem of solipsism, self satire in “All You Zombies”, the only thing that happens is the story, more humorous, a really smart guy, a Philip K. Dick story Foster, You’re Dead, you nailed, by just talking about it, most of his short stories are solid, several of his novels are crap, the rest are interesting, the latest bomb shelter, subscribe to the new bomb shelter, during the COVID thing, maybe I can stay in the school bomb shelter, the fear of a child, nailing something very specific, Tony And The Beetles, the relationship of India to Britain during the time Gandhi, you’re my friend!, reading the newspaper 1944, bonus points, free writing materials, the Japs, victory gardens, The Man In The High Castle, the Japanese could invade at any time, that’s how you get that powerful amazing stuff, judge it based on what it is, a pastiche of Kim, some Conan like scenes in it, Citizen Of The Galaxy, a story about slavery, he discovers he’s a slave at every level, opts for the slavery, why are time travel stories so full of incest, a Robert Silverberg incest time travel novel, there better that way, Chekhov’s Gun, a thematic purpose, your inhabiting your own heritage, connecting with that bodily, good writing, everybody loves Back To The Future (1985), Timerider: The Adventure Of Lyle Swann (1982), the avuncular mad scientist, Marty McFly and Doc Brown, the reader, the viewpoint for this exciting idea, surrogate father, saving his own father, even more necessary than a present father, uncles being there, a series of surrogate uncles, mentors, Tremors (1990), Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins (1985), he’s his own grandpa, Edward Page Mitchell, The New York Sun, time travel, the invisible man, faster than light travel, a cyborg story, a robot with human skin, a Star Trek style transporter, The Balloon Tree, contact with a god, The Soul Spectroscope, Edgar Allan Poe, Washington Irving, The Senator’s Daughter, cryonics, veganism before vegans were invented, they’re gonna take pills, a war with China, all comedy, humorous, The Clock That Went Backwards, cars haven’t been invented yet, knickerbocker roots, a clone of their aunt, the Tardis Doctor from Doctor Who, 1 page of the newspaper, Weird Tales, a good science fiction story doesn’t have to have knowledge of Heinlein, a really good mind behind the linotype, documentary, this is behind almost everything, kitchen sized typewriters, Predestination (2014), The Door Into Summer (2021), an extra step to the loop, I missed you terribly, it brings out the fundamental tension, individualism vs. duty to society, isolated from himself, it’s hard to make novels into good movies, Project Hail Mary (2026), when an author does a good joke, Grace is the only one left, the reason you read poetry, triples the meaning, $45, a dragon on the cover, does it really need to be that big?, the Dune books, book 4 is the best of the series, the first 6, potboilers, The White Plague, Hellstrom’s Hive, The Jesus Incident, poetry, all the stuff that Campbell likes, telepathy shit, The Demolished Man, Alf Bester, the Psi Corp, Highways In Hiding by George O. Smith, Dimension X, X-Minus One, Clifford D. Simak, Shawn Standfast, Shakespeare’s Planet, late Simak novels, Wizard Of Oz style narrative, put them on the road, see where it goes, Ring Around The Sun, free houses and free cars, The Fisherman, three different ways, small town newspaper, he has to write it, what’s really going on in this company, what is the effect of the Vietnam War when a whole bunch of people go away, he doesn’t really do villains, mobs exist, witch-hunts, a part of human nature but we can all live together, the mid-west, Simak’s books get better, he feels more free, all good, all slightly different, a robot, a girl, what it means, a wizard of Oz for adults, men who’ve lost there wives, university professors who’ve had to grade students, crowdfunding, his later books, kinda weird, a crowdfunding goal, studying late period, The Cat Who Walks Through Walls, To Sail Beyond The Sunset, The Number Of The Beast, rewriting The Divine Comedy, the last chapter of each book, facing down the devil (Robert Heinlein), anagrams of Robert Heinlein, a description of heaven, describing Tertius, the Enochian books, a whole bunch of layers open up, Heil aka Successful Operation, Assignment In Eternity, as by Lyle Monroe, Ray Bradbury’s not paying anybody, he wrote short stories, The Man Who Travelled In Elephants, parts of Tenderfoot In Space, Satellite Scout, Nothing Every Happens On The Moon, a diligent renewer, Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle, Draco’s Tavern, Arthur C. Clarke, Isaac Asimov, Lord Dunsany, not actually a good novelist, I’m old now I’ll take the money, medical bills, a financial scramble, apparently Silverberg did really good and nobody knows how, how dare you, he’s indispensable, a few clunkers, doing things nobody else can do, profoundly impactful, Nancy Drew and The Hardy Boys, cleanup when you have a picnic, be charitable, hearth and home, let’s pretend to be the Black Hand, the time of coming into your masculinity, the heroism of the individual, inspired and changed the world, a few of his non-juveniles are profoundly impactful, the wealthiest man in the world, D.D. Harriman, Musk in his rockets, he hasn’t been up in one, the other rocket boys, influencers, he read a book when he was kid, he ain’t faking that part, how genius works, the general aspects of intelligence, cognitive psychology, the higher levels, the flavour, he has hobbies and interests that aren’t just cash, sleeping on a cot for three months, the accumulation of money, making cool shit, sideways imported, Dan Davis, Ted Chiang’s Understand, feted vs fetid, William Gibson, author voice, a very flat dry voice, even more easily parodiable, John Steakly, he likes the sound and the feel of the word in his mouth, Neil Gaiman, a big ponderous book, Douglas Adams, an amazing short story writer, Seeing Ear Theatre, giving people what they want, short story and fairy tale tradition, mostly what he does, he redoes it and does it nicely, Charly (1968), Flowers For Algernon, you keep combing it, how do you write somebody smarter than you, Brainwave by Poul Anderson, they understand words and concepts, a dutch shepherd, they’re real smart, elephants, ponderous, it’s built into them, mountaintop hideaway, naked in shoes with a gun, an appendage to humanity, what we’ve been doing with herds, co-evolved symbiotes, cats, the feed store cat, they know their business, they assign themselves jobs, humans are boss here, local crows work with the local eagles, scares the crows off the property, a whole ecosystem, 200 times in the last two years, he’s always got a pet, a cat guy, a comedy of manners, Oscar Wilde, Pixel, Schrodinger’s Cat, an embodiment of quantum uncertainty, a really good cover, Robert Vaughn, Tom Weiner, McDonald’s is an Irish restaurant that serves German food, what have the google brothers done for us lately?, investing in life extension, space travel companies, spacesuits and life support systems, expose of the early 2000s tech culture, institutions vs. individuals, the wives, philanthropy arms, got snowed, the NGOs, the global censorship complex, feel very betrayed about it, sorry about that, it rhymes with the westcoast, 10am pacific, Skype, they lost so much money on it, a blight on humanity, satellite internet, except Skype, long distance, that company collapsed, a technological or engineering thing, some Russians, some Iranians, total light pollution, monopoly locally, he literally teaches you stuff, this is the book that got me into physics, he did it twice, the hyperspace, necessary for the McGuffin of the book, it’s his gimmie, one big gimmie, what’s the plot of Ringworld?, the theme is sex, sex comedies, a very funny guy, the main character is Niven, J.C., The Day The Earth Stood Still, J. Michael Straczynski, healed by Lorien, Harlan Ellison’s contribution, he had a vision, the 1989 strike line, Walter Koenig, kept him motivated, financial problems, A View From The Gallery, their lower decks episode, Peter David, Londo’s wives, one of the best villains ever on television, a tragic hero, nobody actors given Shakeperean roles, Lady Galadriel, he’s a lizard man, the story was done so well, if you just take the audio from episodes of Babylon 5, you don’t need the special effects, his first sales, Alien Worlds, his politics and his attitudes, the media he’s in, very independently minded, brittle personalities, Jeremiah, a lot of shitty stupid people who get in the way of shit, written by the same guy, interested in the same things, likeable male protagonist alone by himself, the great secret, in love with good stories, Lin Carter is not a good writer except when he’s writing about things that he loves, this Robert E. Howard really knows what he’s doing, David G. Hartwell, resentment is poison you take to kill someone else, call balls and strikes, it winnows away the problems and attracts other stuff, mediocre or worse, a joy when you find good stuff, good stuff that you don’t like, tried to like anime, it’s the writing that sucks not the drawing, how many good comic book writers, no new Garth Ennis, Alan Moore, Charlton horror comics, rip off good stuff, we made it happen.

Posted by Jesse Willis

Reading, Short And Deep #507 – Ultimate Melody by Arthur C. Clarke

Reading, Short And Deep

Reading, Short And Deep #507

Eric S. Rabkin and Jesse Willis discuss Ultimate Melody by Arthur C. Clarke

Here’s a link to the story |PDF|.

Ultimate Melody was first published in IF, February 1957.

Posted by Scott D. Danielson Become a Patron!

The SFFaudio Podcast #848 – AUDIOBOOK/READALONG: The Magic City by E. Nesbit

The SFFaudio Podcast #848 – The Magic City by Edith Nesbit (7 hours 33 minutes) read by Ruth Golding for LibriVox – followed by a discussion of it. Participants in the discussion include Jesse and Jason Thompson.

Talked about on today’s show:
1910, read to me, talking about it on twitter, pretty amazing, working on my Dreamland role playing game, dreamland adjacent, Five Children And It, childhood library, didn’t have good art, really love it, Ruth Golding’s version, the audiobook will be up front, unless they skip to the end, not better known, Wizard Of Oz level, didn’t have 50 other books made after it, we start with the premise, a little boy who’s an orphan, his mother is his sister, he’s 10, one day they meet a man on the road, he offends in many small ways, determined to be mad at his sister-mom, introduced to the family of this widower, everything’s wrecked, very real, Isekai, portal world stories, annoying boys, jerks, he gets out of it, negotiates with the girl, it’s sweet, talking everything, to restate the whole premise, child protagonist, feels lonely and grumpy, honeymoon with her new husband, new step-sister, takes refuge in an elaborate city, toy soldiers, books, the nanny, what a mess, take all this apart, by moonlight, transformed, into the city, his sister pops in too, not just a magic city, the wikipedia synopsis, the magic world, a small part of this greater world, everything that he’s ever dreamed of or played with, other people are drawn into this world, reminded by the premise, The Lego Movie (2014), Lord Business, relationship between you your toy your world, bad relationship, through the course of the experience, avatar, a more positive relationship on the other end, really key, build something and the then play with it, couldn’t become the guy, being inside the buildings, building up a fantasy secondary world, The Sword Of Welleran by Lord Dunsany, another mode, just play, not just the story of a kid who builds a city, a new family being integrated together, emotional change, after they see the beautiful city, she shouldn’t tear this down, a coming together, wild imagination, The Dream-Quest Of Unknown Kadath, earlier modes of human behavior, past-toddler, a 2 year old and a 4 year old, superbaby, peekaboo, imaginative work, names for her toys, Setsee, literal names, the process, a mermaid named Seariel, every language was foreign, stodgy and literal, pretending to be things, a monster here, this is an ice cream shop, the floor is lava, his whole world and everything that he thought of, favourite line, for the second time, Philip the carpenter, a little progressive, idle dreamers, the people who build these toys, Mr Parent, how can you be here and at Amblehurst too, just a dream then, go through the dreams and come out on the otherside, the coolest concept, the most lame explanation, even in 1910, fairly silly, arbitrary, fetch quests, maybe written for serialization, no vegetables or fruits in this kingdom, pineapples are not considered fruits here, very profound, trippy, secondary world material, a cosmic feeling, the mystic sense, mysticism, drilling in the eight hours of day enough, contemporary politics, the laws in the Magic City, good laws and bad laws, Noah is also the judge, they’re convicted, put in prison, would you please escape, they exit the door, would you please escape, a task defeated, what the purpose of everybody’s job is, make beautiful laws, everyone should be nice to everyone else, Nesbit doesn’t delve deeply into this idea, SimCity, Civilization, your own philosophy, a peaceful city, a healthful city, chessboards and old books, will it be a kingdom?, crowned king and queen, this is a republic, please leave, play with the idea of what makes a building of a city beautiful and valuable, H.P. Lovecraft stories, the chalcedony and the thanes, impious leadership, very corrupt, how should they live there, gotta be conscious, the city is multi-ethnic, this person is brown, this person is Chinese, non-ethno state fantasy world, a reflection of the ideal, the boy builds it for escape, a very lonely life, wealthy enough to afford servants, play-friends, sister/mom playfriend, he’d previously done it, a practice of comfort, such a big grudge, so much investment he literally falls into it, Inferno by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle, Larry Niven goes to Hell, reconstructing Dante’s Inferno from a hard science fiction point of view, how does the city work?, work out a history, meals made of cardboard, bowls for dessert, prophecies, make plot happen, while our hero has not been there, The Neverending Story, movie and book, the first half of the book, since you created it it has been here forever, module creation, set your players on a path, not hallucinate exactly, filibuster, once it has been said it is now fact, maybe the people don’t eat at all, fight the lions in the desert, the intent of the person killing them, so many great parts in this book, the hints of the political changes, Somnolentia, formerly Briskford, backtory, why are we changing the name, making the place better, healing exercise, you’ve got some trauma, talk it out, write it down, work it out, Halva?, more complex chess or go or Chinese checkers, before video games, before dungeons and dragons, toy shop, the Sears catalogue, Lando’s speeder, I can imagine it, you use what figures you have, why LEGO is so great, make your own toys, the guts to see though it, branded toys, an IP nightmare, make it generic, playing into the same, sloth vs. industry, something there, a slow person, very slow, sloth is a sin, what makes you suddenly creative, 17 different things going, on the phone, no creativity there, stress and things that gotta get checked off, today’s a slow day, early in the book, just because it’s raining outside that isn’t a day for lessons, punishment, much rather be playing, a day of laze-about, get out the pencil crayons, something starts to appear, the rule by the great sloth is something to be addressed, not working deep mines of anything, isn’t it interesting, impressed by the ending, the grand surprise, Julius Caesar to defeat the barbarians, imaginative stuff, everything is in the city, how they exit is interesting, they build their way out, they build their way in, the pretenderess, carried away with her own excitement, the Noah toy comes to life because of the tears, not a serious story, maybe it didn’t happen, The Fall (2006), artsy, listening to stories told by a stuntman, the story becomes darker, dark thoughts, helplessness and despair, all just a dream, oh please!, fantasy sequences, they don’t give you that wink, literal minded, establish that it’s “real”, pointing to it earlier, you go through dream through to reality, Ex Oblivione, chairs, horses, become one with everything that’s real, through the trauma of that plucking, as you grow and learn and experience, you recognize the things you once knew, dreams tell me about me and what’s going on in my world, if it has no consequence or value, the world is a dream, the Poe gloss on it, The Arabian Nights, literal mindedness, let me tell you another story, what’s the real?, equal weight as words on a page, we’re destablishing the reality of the frame story, get me back to the action!, what is the real reality, something you find in Borges, a story inside the Arabian Nights, what the particular story is called, a prophecy, meets a man and talks to him, something that he wanted, that man has had a dream, it’s a circle, The Circular Ruins, a man who self creates in dream, The Green Meadow, The Crawling Chaos, the landscape is a human body, it’s a skull, a man lying down in hospital, decaying and decrepit body, so interesting, the connection between mind and body, sick the last week, high fever, see many things, experiencing things that are not real, you can be in a waking dream state, the normal activity, faces, swirling, crazy outsider artist, devilish landscape, look up at the ceiling, painted in a pattern or lack of pattern, a cloud that looks like a dragon or a horse, the interpretation and the generation, real connections, a map and perception of the world, something that’s real outside of you, a piece of fiction, narrowing the reality to just the words, no reality other than the words, combined through the ears, the eyes or fingers, as real as a dream but more concrete, it’s cool, magic items, magic coming to our world, time travel, expand this out, headcanon, essentially in the Dreamlands, if the world is bigger than the city, his sister, the people who build the blocks, the collective unconscious, public domain, the dragon that was the key, wind up the dragon, largely lost, a kid’s nursery from 1910, the toy soldiers, Christmas presents, what it is constructed around, propagandistic toy soldiers and sailors, without the Jurassic Park or Star Wars branding, marketing to kids, blocks are handmade by the servant, the factory works, it really is the LEGO movie, it is good, whatever’s on the streaming service, curate everything, the Barbie Movie, addressing right away, doesn’t mention the CIA, Barbie can be any job that she wants, arch and meta and clever, that was for adult women and men and kids, H.G. Wells doing his Floor Games, collecting He-Man figures coming out today, his sister reappears in the world, not conscious of it per se, the husband is Julius Caesar, read it very subversively, childhood sweethearts, he’s got a kid he needs a mom for, an integration not a horror, the sister and not the parent, makes the resentment more, you’ve already been betrayed, you’ve already lost your parents, 17 brothers and sisters, how big a deal is it?, the more tenuous your relationship with your parents, mad at my father when he’s dying of cancer, it’s not fair, child logic just amps it up, he’s left alone, unless you work really hard, she’s whisked off to the honeymoond almost immediately, thank you, every two years or so, get well soon, this really fund story, better known, three other lives, the magic country, the magic land.

The Magic City by E. Nesbit - The Strand, 1910

Posted by Jesse Willis

The SFFaudio Podcast #826 – AUDIOBOOK/READALONG: The Aeneid by Virgil (Books I to IV)

The SFFaudio Podcast #826 – The Aeneid by Virgil [Books I – IV] read by George Allen (for LibriVox) and translated by John Dryden. This is the first third of the epic poem, books I to IV (comprised of XII Books) running 3 hours 52 minutes, followed by a discussion of them. Participants in the discussion include Jesse, Scott Danielson and Alex (Pulpcovers)

Talked about on today’s show:
books 1 to 4, a humanities course, misspoke, The Iliad, a hard downshift to reading the Aeneid vs. living on twitter, opposite end of the spectrum, young people don’t watch a lot of movies anymore, even TV shows are generally for old people, The Only Murders In The Building, boomers or slightly younger, bet money, this didn’t actually happen, invited Virgil over for dinner, it’s 9 hours, bro, people would and could do it, you’re in a different headspace, a different mode, the material is familiar, reading this on paper, easy reading on paper, following along in print, Robert Fagels, John Dryden, the footnotes, sometimes the footnotes contradict Jesse, who is Aeneas’ mom, the goddess Venus, she’s a huntress, dressing up like Diana, sometimes they’re not behaving in the way that is most stereotypical, reflecting, the opening, the retelling, mapping The Odyssey, book 3 especially, one to oney, Homer, Virgil was a real dude, 100% known, a merging of some things, existing myths about Aeneas, crafted an overarching story, popular myths, strikingly different, a work of art by a particular individual, all about prophecy, just Roman history, subsumed by the Roman Empire, a national epic done folk hero style, Robin Hood, national epic propaganda style, saying Shakespeare wrote to get approval of the queen, this doesn’t feel as mythological, reliance on gods for everyday events, Augustus, from town to town, died before he finished it, not in 20 years, a really cool noir ending, its finished, wanted to have it burned, not good enough, his heirs, his literary estate, copyright didn’t exist back then, George R.R. Martin, more drafts, how you write an epic poem, the pentameter wasn’t quite right, a meter problem, forced rhymes, pretending you can rhyme things, funnier, poems should be hilarious, helps tell the story, Beowulf, the translation, failed Latin, Latin 101, greater shames in life, written in Greek or Latin, this translation tries to feel epic poetry, modern post-critical translation, words that will shock you, twist the meaning, the feel, someone just telling a story, structured that way on the page, accept it without a rhyme, prose translation, a phone call, edited an annotated and compiled, Arms and the man I sing, haughty Juno, long labours both by sea and land he bore, Latian realm, built his destined town, long glories of majestic Rome, so brave, so just a man, first part of book 1, very different, an exile driven on by fate, destined to reach Lavinia soil, cruel Juno’s relentless rage, before he could found a city, the same idea, same material, not as pretty, not as poetic, easier to understand, sounds better when you read it, a very busy week, hard to pick up what’s happening, sometimes the backwards is grammar, to make it it, Maissa was going to be here, compared to The Odyssey, a very boy book, not a girl book, marriage, Juno being mad, childbirth and marriage, picks up his father, takes his son by his hand, leaves his wife behind, new wives, a nice lady there, wants to have him in bed, a serious succession of goddesses, widow, ok, destiny, I am very Roman virtue, honoring thy father, Imma kill myself, I curse you, the feel, we notice and know, comes back all by himself, loses some ships, war with the Latins, he’s still got his people, not an individual’s return home, Philip K. Dick, a man experiencing the world, Beyond Lies The Wub, a similarity but a difference, he’s trying to go home, home has been destroyed, found a new place, you need more than one guy, the Greeks are not an empire, a league, teams, allies, games together, each guy is his own king, no matter what town, Ajax the lesser, Ajax the greater, propagandistic, a national epic for an empire, a leader of men who doesn’t kill his men, sex quest across the Mediterranean, supernatural stuff, monster or goddess, variation on the magic, guest host relationship, you invited me into your home, you came into my home without knocking, each island is about the guest host relationship, a bible for how to deal with no empire, they invite you in and turn you into a pig, Dido’s peninsula, Libya, respect and food to the other lost ships, I’ll sleep with you, that’s cool, called by fate, reminded by the gods, we disagree, Juno’s the one manipulating things, do we call that fate if a god is doing it, when Zeus or Jupiter says something’s happening, that’s fate, classical pantheons, the king of the gods has real authority, a lot of talk about how the greeks are very masculinity, same thing is true of the Romans, more obviously intensive, the rape of the Sabines, whole buncha women, a sacking, taken the remnants of an army, one guy eventually showing up on his own island, teams up with his son and kills em, righteous executes justice, boy what a troubled sailor, Aeneas is not fun, moved by the fate, a mirror to Augustus, blows some waves, Poseidon is happy with Aeneas, everything is reversed, all subsumed to the outcome, written backwards, a deliberate myth about his own people, an inversion, every part of it is backwards, an inevitable monopoly piece, watching a chess game from the 1960s, no concept of spoiling things, you know where it is going on purpose, the whole fun of it, almost too perfect, Dido is not a goddess, nymphs, more deliberate, more false, she’s also the queen of Carthage, beaten in recent history, she’s on her pyre, now we’re going to forever be at war for what you did to me, why didn’t he just stat with her, almost like a prequel, to get to Episode 4, doesn’t feel as awesomely spontaneous, not internal, everything he ran into, a goal he was going for, he’s dutiful, less of a character, found the new city and get better lives, you’re all going to live and conquer Italy, not acting like a king, a piece on a chessboard being moved around, his destiny was to found Rome, that is what a king is supposed to act like according to this piece of propaganda, those guys are lost at sea, that guy got eaten by a cyclops, that’s not the job of a kind, that is why we have an empire, good at art and tutoring but they don’t have the discipline that a king is supposed to have, that culminating scene at the end, he’s basically won the war, he’s essentially founded Rome, he could end this and make friends and have it be over, brothers in this new land, my friend, echoes back to the Iliad, of course we have to genocide you, extremely new to having a king again, imperator, supreme executive authority, an agent of the senate, working for the senate, that lie went away over the centuries, this is an emergency, for the rest of his life, is Augustus the first time an emperor comes into existence?, the same trick Napoleon uses, does that trick work again?, the British are very willing to marry into the Bonaparte royal line, the emperor of japan still exists, but the empire is just Japan and Okinawa, before the Shogun, prime minister, but the king has no power, I’m the emperor’s chief warlord, nobody tries to mess with the throne, a separate kind of thing, the managers of empire, they have staff, the buck stops with them, pontifex maximus, the highest religious figure, sometimes you become a literal god as well, the head of the army, extreme power, this book feels different in part because its an inversion, it is not about art and a man wandering the earth and figuring out how to relate to things, a man needs to be with his wife and his son, the journey of a state, curses the two culture to war, 27 BC, 2100 year old book?, they knew about all that Carthage stuff, figuring out what they’re culture is like based on this one thing, a very narrow window, the propaganda of empire, an emperor’s job, carrying the father, to lead the son, faithful to his friends, push on towards destiny, my pride is up, personal rivalry, the inevitable grind of what the plan is, trying to live your life trying to figure out what the gods want, make a sacrifice to Juno, the milk white cow, and a foal, motifs we don’t get, symbols, fire, snake, page 61, the hollow spaces lie, denoting deeth [death], the priestess enters with her hair unbound, a curse, threefold Hecate, hoary, with brazen sickles reaped a noon of night, baleful juices, robbing the mother’s love, two meanings, the mother of the foal, unable to suckle its child, she wanted to have his babies, you could get married again, this ritual is to kill her, a mother’s job is to have children and make new Roman soldiers, everything’s white, twas dead of night, gentle floods, peace with downy wings was brooding on the ground, making eggs, very skillfully done, a cow, pours red juice on its head, cow, cattle?, it exists, if I was a Roman, some of those symbols, circling back, feels like a witch, she’s a priestess, this text is the foundational text in education up into the 1900s, memorizing, those symbols, I bet a lot of it came straight outta this text, the root of a lot of the symbolism and language, this massive poem, 9000 couplets, breaking it up, so much going on, Donald Westlake book set in New York, what a cab is, how the economy works, the prices, racism, how much a sandwich costs, what the alley smelled like, how this was distributed, copied by slaves or copyists, possibly Greeks, making copies to be gifted, presents, enjoy them, everybody likes reading, the major media that’s available, they have theaters and stuff, the actors were slaves, low class, business magnate, a general, something important, who the audience for it is, they’re going to think it is cool, the amount of change you need to get in to get into it, questioning what does that mean exactly, more difficult than the odyssey, a manufactured bible, more book of Mormon, maybe they have an empire, surrounded, in Utah, there’s a Mormon in the house!, the description of the Trojan War, their minds were addled, intervention by gods that made them actually accept this thing, Virgil, why Odysseus is a hero to me is because he’s tricky, his virtue is not the virtue of being a good father or a dutiful leader, not the virtue of an emperor, pride, proud, strong, some invulnerability, sense of honor, honor comes from pride, how he can trick his way out of things, you promised to go off with a thousand ships, pretends to be insane, plowing the beach, puts [Telemachus] on the beach, Achilles, dressed him up as a handmaiden [Achilles on Skyros], thread, a rocket, a sword, these conversations, differences between men and women, the reason he is beloved of Minerva/Athena is he’s tricky, wisdom is being clever/tricky not making good decisions for your community, Aeneas is beloved by Jupiter, the fealty is to the father, a major difference, tusky boars and stags, my animal, the titles for these books, The Passion Of Dido, a biblical meaning, Safe Haven After Storm, The Final Hours Of Troy, Landfalls Ports Of Call, Arms And The Man, The Fall Of Troy, Aeneas’ Wanderings, wow, double meaning, an interesting choice, have something happen to you, Passion Of The Christ vs. a woman who is passionate, to be an actor is to act, to be a patient is to have things done to you, her sister is the human who tries to give her good advice, bad advice, murdered by his brother, his land and his wealth, his gold, the wife is collateral damage, she had promised not to remarry, in such a tough spot, she loved her dead husband, visiting his tomb, not in the know with regard to the chessboard plan, the visits to Sicily, abbreviated and less cool than anything we get in the Odyssey, just following the map, together in one book, who he was writing for, what would a stop in Sicily have meant, pooping on this book, two of the greatest things ever written, pretty good for a dude, given all the limitations, so much foreshadowing, follows the same structure and formula, you can bump into characters, a map of the journeys, time feels very compressed, founded Rome before Odysseus got home, 10 years at war, 10 years at sea, hanging out with Calypso, the storytelling, the first book of The Odyssey, sees some washer princesses, is it Menelaus, I’m not a classics scholar, I’m a pulp art fan, the man of many devices, the sacred citadel of Troy, many the woes he suffered, the return of his comrades, he desired it sore, so sad all my guys died, hey guys you all have to stuff your ears full of wax, but tie me up I gotta hear this shit, so appealing to a teenagers, fools, goddess daughter of Zeus, longing for return, yearning that he should be her husband, everybody wants to marry our boy, turn him into a tame animal, maybe an owl, whatever you are is what you’re turned into, stay in bed don’t go out, stay here, we’ll stay in, a third lady, all these sea-ladies want to keep him, return home to Ithaca, even among his own folk, save Poseidon, sundered in twain, where Hyperion sets and rises, Argives, his men screwed up, they killed the bulls of the sungod, that’s why they were all killed, Mercury shows up and says don’t go in there, take this herb with you, favoured by the gods, one way to read it, being gifted with good ideas, having an app on your phone that can tell you where to go, these Facebook gods are working against us, always meeting cross dressing gods, Mentor, more formal about it, piety was prized among the Romans, forces of nature, make this guy a king, personification of storms, keep your head down and survive, more legalistic, rational?, the city of Rome, household gods, a Roman concept, a guardian angel, you inherited them from your father, little statues of them, a different vibe, the gods have a plan and are working through it, I got reject by Paris and I’m mad about it, you killed my cows, he was brought home because they liked him for some reason, Aeneas is being dragged along his path of fate, a very pious guy, Aeneas before this was written he was a very pious guy, supremely violent, appealed to the Romans, a more Roman virtue, martial prowess, bows to the will of the gods, does what he’s supposed to, feels less mythic than Odysseus, really good, flashed, Hyrcania, Hyrkania, the horselords in Conan, Russia/Ukraine, these walls he entered, forced by my fate, from head to foot, looking at people’s bodies, no longer these outrageous threats, she dissin him, hardened entrails, rough Hyrcanian tigers, looked or lent, all symptoms of a base ungrateful mind, behold in vain, triumphant treason, faithless is earth, faceless are the skies, suicidal you might say, #betrayed, I know that place, you knew that one, a number of cities, Argos, in one of these old books, sometimes it is mapped in Robert E. Howard, The Lost Valley Of Iskander, kinda sorta, 20 cities named after Alexander, weird fantasy novel, the other Alex, weird fantasy author, [Thomas Burnett Swann’s The Weirwoods], shinto like spirits, occassional cyclops, there isn’t magic in every wave, Cloacina the goddess of the drains, the sewers in Rome, chief of the drame, The Not-World, every forest is full of spirits, nymphs, dryads, naidas, land of the lotus eaters, weird creatures, the world is unexplored, at least 500 years earlier, the Mycenaean collapse, a very post-modern, Virgil is very post-modern for a pre-modern, camera, well that just happened, make me die, really horrible, a mural of the Trojan war here, a grotto where there’s a lady who’s immortal, that’s not a thing in this book, its a human woman in a real place, that we really salted the earth for, pretty extraordinary book, the next two installments, split it into thirds, the Iliad part is the war part, more Odyssey part, the journey to the underworld, how Virgil ended up in Dante, referencing previous book, Larry Niven putting himself in hell, Inferno, the sequel, H.P. Lovecraft is always thinking my life as a Roman!, Philip K. Dick leans on the early end, a story set in ancient Greece, [The Tree by H.P. Lovecraft], I know, I know, the whole story is a kinda like Robert Graves gives us about Livia, Augustus’ wife, I, Claudius, poisoning everybody, two artists are commissioned to make a statue of a god, inspiration from nature vs. inspiration from partying in the city, such a good friend to his friend, you don’t need to build me a tomb, put an olive branch at the head of my grave, a mighty tree, collapses in a windstorm, the friend isn’t a friend he was jealous, he poisoned him, art inspired by nature, Lovecraft’s argument, making that argument here, The Odyssey is better because its inspired by some sort of natural thing vs. a propagandistic thing, three great attempts to do epic poetry, Gilgamesh is a thing, a tradition of epic poetry, Dante did it for the Italians, he put Virgil in it, not so much as a history, everyone else writing in Latin, Milton tried to do it in English, none of them, for science fiction fans, Eclogues aka The Bucolics, The Georgics, shorter poems, some sort of theories, one of them is a really interesting thing about bees, bees in here, an Italian miniseries adaptation of The Aeneid, a nest of bees, bees are a big thing in Roman culture, the Romans being bees, they have queens, they thought they had kings, the king bee, industrious, plays and drinking parties and doing philosophies, also farmers, bees produce honey, citizen farmers, we will kick your ass, a recipe for making bees, get a carcass of a bull and cover it so no air can get in, bees within it, wasps?, that doesn’t sound right, a metaphor, what that metaphor is, you can see the working hand of Virgil in the manipulation of the events, Dido and the war, so much content in the millions of similes, Dido’s sister her hair is blonde, are the Carthaginians aryans?, is that a metaphor, the marriage bed, something red poured on its head, virgins everywhere, endless virgins, something the Romans are thinking a lot about, prized virginity, Vestal virgins, what’s the word sacred mean, set aside for the gods, something unblemished, in Exodus, an unblemished lamb, what’s the best animal to sacrifice, nudity, half-cladness, bottomless, kinda fun, not a prudish book, the morality is very different, extremely different, they have the things they believe in, a lot of echoes to it, The Man Who Was Thursday, Father Brown Mysteries – The Sign Of The Broken Sword, guess who the spymaster is, higher up the chain, The Everlasting Man, the pinnacle of pagan civilization, only the Christianization of Roman, the best culture, supposed to rule the world, our empire will have no boundaries, let’s go Rome!, these guys were a little weird tho, invade and murder all these people, before tweets, it sounds like a forerunner to the Riverworld novels, John Kendrick Bangs, Bangsian Fantasy, everyone who has ever died is in Hades, a mysterious houseboat, comedic version of what happens, put Virgil in Hell, he doesn’t belong in the worse circle of hell because he’s a virtuous pagan, retrograde takes, this doesn’t seem right to me, reading Gilgamesh, that guy really loved his friend, science fiction about a future culture where their virtues are really different, prized different things, murdered that guy and raped his wife, Jack Vance, The Moon Moth, a culture where you aren’t allowed to watch people eat, so disgusting, Time Out Of Joint, you do things backwards, gonna have to go to school soon, people regurgitate food into the refrigerator, everything’s reversed, Catholic worries about birth control and abortion, insert me into some woman, attach an umbilical cord, you eat through your ass, learned a ton, meeting again on the first of September, on for The Green Queen and then Treasure Island, Hugh B. Cave, unmute your children.

Aeneas tells Dido of The Trojan War by Guerin

Posted by Jesse Willis

The SFFaudio Podcast #825 – READALONG: Rendezvous With Rama by Arthur C. Clarke

Jesse and Scott Danielson talk about Rendezvous With Rama by Arthur C. Clarke

Talked about on today’s show:
really disappointed, what?, love this book, why?, nostalgia is part of it, subject to that disease, recurring flare ups of nostalgia, 1973, Dolphin Island, never looked back, 3rd grade, a juvenile, a library edition, a nostalgia trip, this kid named Johnny, living with his aunt and uncle, hovercraft, equivalent to a truck, got inside, stowingaway, wakes up over the ocean, adrift in the ocean, dolphins come adopt him, scientists, a keypad, it says it in dolphin, 1964, avoided this book, fist time read, Ringworld, Rama is the same thing, big dumb object in space, doing really cool things but also faking it, they’re all going to have an orgy, everybody is so happy, space orgy, cite sources, an etext, one of the characters has two wives, two sets of families, generic so it will fit both families, he’s not a heterosexual man, a very strange gay man, very clinical with regards to human beings, A Fall Of Moon Dust, the moon bus book, tourists, a sandpatch, a disaster movie like Airport (1970), Airplane! (1980), delve into their characters, it’s a novel, The City In The Stars, Arthur C. Clarke is simulating, not being himself, this should have been a short story, A Meeting With Medusa, what makes it awesome, character through the storytelling, characters, he’s making a novel, the same beef, Gentry Lee, shorter stuff is better for science fiction, people from earth go to investigate it, sequels, Larry Niven’s characters, I’m a sex monster, I’m a coward, I’m a lucky girl, all about sex, the Larry Niven stand-in character, have the privilege of breeding, a lucky husband, the engineering, boring human beings, the bicycle through the space, the worldbuilding is awesome, mystery, 240 pages, 9 hours, nostalgia bits, the Waldentapes edition, nothing but exploration of Rama, councils, United Nations, Mercury launched this missile, having read the book, what if Rama is a threat, launches a nuclear weapon out of fear, blow it up, thank you for your cooperation, another sequence of plot that involved humans, cosmochristers, space Jesus is sending us a space ship to be raptured on, maybe I get a free ride, when Arthur C. Clarke is operating in his spiritual mode he’s excellent, Christ was an extra-terrestial being, space jesuits, space mormons, space accident, Rama II, remember disappointment, stunning 1 star reviews, Gentry Lee, set in the Rama universe, happenings in the solar system, nothing that’s not Rama related, a NASA or JPL guy, very enthusiastic guy about exploration, the big negative things, not Clarkeish at all, all about that, Clarke fans are generally disappointed, thins being a novel, a sense of wonder, finding this object, flying to the object, exploring the object, who sent it?, how do things work?, diluted, so much character action, if our guy Olaf Stapledon had written thins, Sirius, the dog book, triangular relationship, a dog a human and another human, not that particular book, Last And First Men [and Starmaker], trying to cash in where the money is, better than Asimov, a better science fiction writer?, he’s the definition of science fiction, what he writes about, Asimov is a step below, Foundation, the first book, there’s good stuff in there, a fixup, this had to have been conceived as a novel, the Rama point and click adventure, the end credits, remember bluescreen?, these to books are very different, broken in a very strange way, a creepazoid, he’s imitative, the human beings in this, more meeting scenes, all the tech is brilliant, computers, logical, well thought through, what Rama is, the sea, the wall, the cities, doesn’t have a high IQ, actual explanation, a city for making Ramans, of course that’s the answer, they’re not from Earth, they are from Earth but not born of woman, full adult humans, explore the world through one of them, shorter, 1956, Against The Fall Of Night, Childhood’s End, vaguely remember the characters, this book is so good, super quick, did you find the orgy yet, the end of mission orbital orgy will be in full swing, it could be they’re having food, a bunch of sex or whatever, glossing over that, it’s fake, comb through all the Clarke that you’ve read, The Nine Billion Names Of God, The Sentinel, an acceptable social thing now, sexual revolution, presenting a social structure that’s really open, Robert Silverberg, monthwife, what a good story, a novella, the accident stuff, superchimps, set in the same universe, astonishing, he has rules he doesn’t break, idolizing him, one of the rules: stories are sacred, then Gentry Lee shows up in the teardrop underneath India, I could use the money, fairly excited about it, excited to meet a fan, you shouldn’t put your name to that, a co-author, maybe it is amazing, writers want to make a living, a cook, fund their expeditions, a period of time where he’s transitioned out of short stories largely, a big book for Scott, a nice short book, under novels, he never stopped short stories, he’ll experiment with stuff, a novel that expands the idea, The Sentinel, why do you live in Sri Lanka?, what’s up with 2001, yo?, back and forth with Stanley Kubrick, a true collaboration, a great movie, as soon as the light show starts, the germ of that idea, he doesn’t do interstellar space, is there any Clarke story that isn’t set within the solar system?, other planets, The Star, The Nine Billions Names Of God, set in the Himalayas and New York, Planet Stories stories, extra-solar planets, aliens, space queen, hero with a sword, Travel By Wire, so cool, he’s right, 12 minutes long, Edward Page Mitchell’s [The Man Without A Body], travel by wire, in a non-humorous way, looking back, born recently, the Star Trek transporter, magically appear in our stomachs or microwaves, letting us go wow, amazing!, idea idea ideas, some observation of reality, Moon Dog by Arthur C. Clarke, an astronomer on Earth, such love, allowed to move to the moon, FarSide, the perfect telescope in the solar system, he can’t bring his dog, an experience in which the dog wakes him up on the moon, great San Fransisco earthquake, devastates the city, his sensitivity to his dog, foreshocks, a relationship of a man to a dog, a science fiction story about a man’s relationship to a dog, the superstructure of it is about being a telescopist, a big dog man, multiple dogs, a cylopean one eyed mexican hairless named Pepsi, the paranormal, Fortean experiences, massively interested in science, what if it is real, investigates, what about this one?, genuine interest in dogs, what about this phenomenon, a masterpiece, the top no movie related Arthur C. Clarke, the elevator one, Fountains Of Paradise, famous because of the movies, a huge Clarke fan, A Meeting With Medusa was amazing, the way it was revealed, not even human, a robot with a brain inside, a cyborg of some kind, good structural writing, how did Larry Niven get away, making Arthur C. Clarke look like a robot, not a favourite, very different, a birthday party, zipping around the planet, not a lot of identification with the characters, aliens everywhere, tech everywhere, the Beowulf Shaeffer stories are more Clarke like, Crashlander, the hard sf idea is the point, Lucifer’s Hammer, nostalgic mode, how much took place after the comet hit, a rich guy with an observatory, fully stocked, through great danger, people there already, the racist scene, we’ll take the woman, turned away, the burying of a bunch of books in a septic tank, with Julie [Davis], one of her favourite books, very good, the best joint book, Oath Of Fealty, Steven Barnes and Larry Niven, Westercon, Tananarive Due, The Seascape Tattoo, doing a book with Larry Niven right now, involved with television, The Ringworld Engineers, A World Out Of Time, Protector, humans are not actually paks, go with the flow, so hard, so well thought through, why I like science fiction so much, sense of wonder, so rare nowadays, Spin by Robert Charles Wilson, looking at the sky, separating them from the timeline of the universe, The Three Body Problem, wiggy awesome physics with stretches of boring stuff, meetings, Asimov is meetings, largely meetings, Foundation is one giant meeting, two kids in an attic discovering books, a robot in the basement, the 9 hour meeting, a giant city, let’s talk about the future and controlling the empire, Heinlein, the big three, phase 1, I’m writing novels for John W. Campbell, short stories, Gentleman Be Seated, space moon nazis, juveniles, Tom Swift style stories, Double Star, Stranger In A strange Land, and phase 4 is after the stroke, Joes working on the moon, too much characterization compared to Clarke, no fats, he picked up a cigar, lecture lecture lecture, strawman strawman strawman, not really sense of wonder, this is what it would be like to live there, his pa and ma, stepmom, Starman Jones, hyperloop skytrain, knocked down by it, a tech awe vs. sense of wonder, the premise is sense of wonder, I’m a catman and I eat humans, all my females are non-sentient, the tech in Clarke, The Sentinel is that, The Star is that, The Star by H.G. Wells, he knows wherefrom he’s cribbing, stupid nostalgia, Fritz Leiber’s A Pail Of Air, there’s a sense of wonder story, describing daily life, they may takeaway, aliens, if you turned out our star we’d find a way to come and kill you, Los Alamos, we’re gonna colonize space, we got uranium we can do anything, when the black star came and took away, mom went crazy, all the water in the air precipitated out, then nitrogen then oxygen, thirty layers of blankets, fishbowl on his head, canned beans for 15 years, I considered killing us all, what real science fiction can do for you, extended and diluted, so many characters, what if it was too guys, this is what was happening in space, a space merchant fleet, the inner solar system, we’re figuring out what they’re seeing, the curse at the end of the book, he didn’t construct it in order to make sequels, everything about Rama itself is awesome, what’s the sea for?, why is that wall like this?, a spaceborne version of The City And The Stars, why are we on Earth at all, adventure popular books, set it over 3000 years, cleaning the fishtank, they’re like the aliens from Childhood’s End, space guardians, not as annoyed, such a tiny part of the book, even the meetings, none of that, human colonies, somewhat interesting, plausible, short, quick, why is it there?, some interesting stuff, no closed ecology can be 100% efficient, billions of years, the earth is the same, material dropping on us all the time, an attempt to recreate a closed ecology, introduce these various ideas, a thread that was not paid off, being a devout member of the fifth church of Christ, Jesus Christ was a visitor from space, literally true, in heavens above, lift these dudes out of their misery, Chariots Of The Gods, 1968, his collections, this Fortean thing, his thesis, let’s investigate, barely remember before the internet, literally collect the materials, it’d be really nice to have a book, 17 books on it, devoted, young young people, the pre-scarcity days, funko-po[o]ps, why denigrating, taking up space, the mania for collecting, take a photo of it, churning books, jettison mode, scan the cover, read or reread, trophies on the shelf, hand it to somebody, we’re in post scarcity now, very little uranium, almost none, Liverpool football players, Kirk and Spock, designed to make you get more, maybe there’s a Reader’s Digest version, the Waldentapes version, 20 characters?, crew, ambassadors, family members, Footfall, too many characters, the cast of characters at the beginning of the book, Lonesome Dove, too long, very good, The Aeneid, tolerated, The Lord Of The Rings, a big honking book, The Hobbit, the Canadian government changed the laws, forced by Mr Trump, renegotiate NAFTA, the evil Justin Trudeau, the excuse, country comparison website, who is Zendaya?, an actress, is she the one who is crying in Dune, the Chani one, Corruption index: CANADA 24 (good), UNITED STATES 31 (moderate), perceptions is fake news, do you want to invest in Somalia, you can’t invest in Venezuela, Syria, under-sanctions, Yemen, Haiti, the best countries to invest in, a colony of Australia, position 31, open tabs and never close them, Haiti vs. Cuba, worlddata.info, factor other things in, why does Arthur C. Clarke live in Sri Lanka, he took the Sir, the guys who take the Sir, the guys who earn the Sir, Sir Elton John, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, where’s the one for Charles Darwin, Ian McKellan, charitable work and being a good actor, propaganda work in WWI, if Heinlein had been a British citizen, Olaf Stapledon, no sir, anti-war, a pacifist, he likes undersea stuff, the tropical thing, gay and subject to horrific laws in the UK, what they did to Alan Turing, he’s a weird guy, massively interesting and massively good, how non-secular he is for a very secular guy, poking around these edges, feels more legit, The Left Behind books, Stephen King’s The Stand, more menacing, spiritual stuff in it, walking from Colorado Springs to Las Vegas, walking, spiritually ready, Random Walk by Lawrence Block, a racewalker, at one point does a walk turn into a run, a different gait, the way your feet interact with the ground, jogging is not full on, fierce arguments, a particular look, the arms and the placement of the feet, “a tiresome journey”, naive, preachy and dull, psycho-spiritual babble, several vignettes about a serial killer, the text was improved by the serial killer, too elusive to sustain a narrative, “truly dopey” with “mawkishness”, the most extraordinary writing experience he had ever had, 20 pages a day for three weeks and a day, largely about the experience of walking, The Long Walk by Richard Bachman, a crystal on the cover, the importance of walking, sometimes you don’t need to read a book to make it your new heart book, this unfortunate book, a guy who could do no wrong until, novellas, novelettes and short stories, two shows on two different short stories, The World That Couldn’t Be by Clifford Simak, my mind is going, The Worlds Of If by Stanley G. Weinbaum, the entire ecosystem is genderless, two good science fiction writers, jammed together, five hours, how can this be?, more short stories, more happiers, Books 1-4, organize that, 100 pages of epic poetry, the kids’ version, Treasure Island, a sweet story, Robert Louis Stevenson, so you like pirates, an x marks the spot, we’ll write the book, good step-dad, huh?, the audible audio drama, so good, it was really good, six hours long, not every word of the text?, Full Cast Audio, really good hours, a classic, adapted, on The Office, all British actors, not approached, since 2017, three people, public domain, sound effects, excited about Travel By Wire, some books require novel length (some not most), authors got to make a living, independent pensions, the Ted Chiang thing, a Ted Chiang hit, getting worried, won an award, excellence in the short story, nothing since 2019, rich kids are still winning, oof, New York Times.

Rendezvous With Rama

Rendezvous With Rama PC GAME

RAMA - Arthur C. Clarke circa 1996

RAMA - Arthur C. Clarke and Gentry Lee circa 1996

Posted by Jesse Willis