Reading, Short And Deep #469 – X Marks The Pedwalk by Fritz Leiber

Reading, Short And Deep

Reading, Short And Deep #469

Eric S. Rabkin and Jesse Willis discuss X Marks The Pedwalk by Fritz Leiber

Here’s a link to the story |PDF|.

X Marks The Pedwalk was first published in Worlds Of Tomorrow, April 1963

Posted by Scott D. Danielson Become a Patron!

The SFFaudio Podcast #821 – READALONG: The Journey Of Joenes by Robert Sheckley

Jesse, Will Emmons and Jonathan Weichsel talk about The Journey Of Joenes by Robert Sheckley

Talked about on today’s show:
Journey Beyond Tomorrow, indistinct, this is science fiction, best understood as science fiction, limits this book, Jesse’s walking down the street, he’s not going to know that’s science fiction, very Jonathan Swift, the F&SF covers, a good description of the book, no spaceman, the November issue, I like Emsh, the colours, trippy, the substance of the book, the plotlessness, Jonathan’s going to love this book, sell it more, a disappointing user experience, Jesse can only fathom his own brain right now, hard to pronounce, Joenes, a joke, corrupted name, something you don’t want to advertize on the cover, making paralles with Jesus and other biblical characters, Lum, the jewel thief, Wat, why Sheckley was a sailboat guy, an introduction, a story where a guy is on a sailboat, a mix of hippies and assholes, new boats with engines and fuel, a strange mix, Lone Survivor, science fiction questions, apotheosis, people within science fiction, a mature literature for the general reader, not particularity genrey, a control alt delete, replace Lord Of The Flies with this, good fodder for writing, reacting against reading, weird books like this, what did you think of this thing, a bad book and also a great book, plotless meandering, buttons saying exactly that, yes yes yes, ha ha ha, Candide, a weird America, not from America, that’s why, A Connecticut Yankee In King Arthur’s Court, American civics, the three truck drivers, the Gospel of Matthew, why we love reading Sheckley, who is he, he’s us, oilskin pouch, you start crying, go up in your cave, and the legend begins, listen to their stories more, a double scene, answers the question, where do I get a job around here man, all of these other people are NPCs, all of the signs that he’s not alive, programmed in a very special and humorous way, an old idea in philosophy, philosophical zombie, NPC back of the head, Ukraine chip out, what happened on 9/11, new brain chip popped in, walking bemusement, not science fiction, really, present reality, flights of fantasy, the octagon, tears streaming, arguments and debates, the words were the same, curing diseases in Africa, that’s the COVID debate, the words are the same, the leaders being pedophiles, Pizzagate, QAnon, more personality than Joenes, in the conclusion, strive for virtue, momentary pieces of stability, players in this fucked up play, Edgar Allan Poe, The Conqueror Worm, Lum’s philosophy, seize, humans are controlled by vast forces we don’t understand, Poe was on it, early Amazings, The Fall Of The House Of Usher, during his middle years, throw all the metal into the sea, Lummist are unflexibile, get kinda violent, it’s good to be good, man, apocalyptic prediction, defeat the islands, conquer, Nuka Hiva, the focus of Typee by Herman Melville, rich references, South Pacific bent to a retelling of the Bible, the Knights of the Round Table, labyrinth, playing and subverting, upstate NY, Memphis, rich with information, begin and end, the South Pacific is irrelevant, blackbirded, make copra all day, the balance of the book, reading a lot, too fixated on virtue, chiller, we’re book readers, the reality, cultivate your garden, moderate your behaviors, Pangloss, all is for the best in the best of all possible worlds, Spinoza, a very savage attack, women being chased by monkey men, sexual dimorphism, the deep cut of Burroughs, other sources, not the deepest reader, horror and evil on the earth, some merit, if you want to have a universe, why people are vegetarians or vegans, Voltaire, Mcarthyite hearing, agent for the government, indirectly causes WWIII, Tahitian girlfriend, different wedding, Deep Space Nine novels, work for hire, Ray Bradburyeque, getting touched, a comedic author, Mindswap, Seventh Victim, male and female, obviously deranged, not wrong, Will’s newsletter, non-proliferation, consequential response, they could and they did, good ideas for time travel novels, repulse these Europeans, high level of enough tech, factories, employees, explain why this needs to be done, oral storytelling traditions, coup attempt in Bolivia, people are kinda mix, disease, tropical diseases, South Africa, a place to send your offspring to die, building tanks, get rid of all your metal, faster and more seaworthy, become the thing you want to stop, a good laugh, resident satirist, consider all these things, Looking Backward, American institutions, slightly exaggerated, a particular scene, 100% accurate, are you now or have you ever been, Mark Zuckerburg, Jack Dorsey, Russian, Steve Bannon, that pimping, procurement officer, during and after WWII, blow off steam, given liberty, executed for rape, no trial, Japanese had brothels, organize the rape, Korean comfort women, pirated, end up on youtube, trouble to get it down, special privileged access, twitter is literally infiltrated by the CIA and the FBI, it’s okay, its public domain, the narrator was perfect, narrator friends, the perfect level of ironic detachment, Jay Snyder, voices, really acting, faultless job, infusing a little character, audible exclusives and modern books, for narrators, mercenaries, series books, a way to go, Hyperion by Dan Simmons, Vonnegut is not readable, Sirens Of Titan, Galapagos, trying to do Sheckley, telling rather than showing, Harrison Bergeron, he’s overrated, WWIII happens, walruses on the beach, a Jonathan idea, big fish small pond guy, becomes smug, became a literary author, the movie of Slaughterhouse Five, read Vonnegut when they’re young, a lot of people who read books, Cat’s Cradle, most people stop reading, most people don’t read books, babies are born, take to reading like a mental disorder, there is danger in ever direction, universal literacy, spina bifida brainless kid, not everybody is capable, trigonometry, opportunity to thrive with it, don’t torture the kid, goal posts, not a smear merchant, Julius Caesar, drug czars, all fake, our man who’s going to fix the Maryland bridge, prophetic, come true, smart bombs shooting each other down, probably happened, Israelis and the Yemenis, the Octagon, the army and the marine corps fought each other, phosphorescent t, Pay Tillman, happens all the time, naturally extends that, Scott Miller’s feed, The Lost Sci-Fi Podcast, Watchbird by Robert Sheckley, a different story that Jesse just wrote, who to kill, tasing people, all of Europe and America are destroyed, centrist moderation, no way back from war right now, righteously, an individual terrorist, go after Justin, upset the copyright laws, are the guards at the concentration camp, never been to Ottawa, going along with it, the NDP history, the waffle, waffle to the left, independent socialist Canada, nation states, Singapore, each island of Hawaii, Australia, geographically, social contract theory of government, we make a bargain, freedom for security, deserve neither, Locke and Hobbes, right of revolt, we have voting, super-legislature, anybody who wants to be a leader should be killed, the humane society, a taste of power, in Athens, sortition, Solar Lottery, talk about Athens, slaves and robots, children are not eligible, brain atrophy, covid causes brain lobe problems, benefit, in Australia, in moderating socialization, a new report, Stephen Baxter, why are we even talking about this doofus, causation and correlation, freudian slip, road toll, I’m still masking, so fucking retarded, covid doomers and anti-vaxxers, reverse Betrezation, Return To The Stars, I don’t want to experience this alone, how’m I going to rubber stamp this, mainstream science fiction community, the cool kids club, liberal establishment wing, Hugo voters, mutals with a person who is not Connor, cool stuff about Palestine, mask lgbt flag and slice of watermelon, emoji track, not the trans flag, affirmations for covid conscious kids, it’s okay, pentacostals, Olivia Belknap Therapy, oh we were scammed, fatigue on it, easily explainable, forest fire particles, hackin away, about pushing people around, children don’t die from covid, still stuck there, he’s mad the democrats had an early debate so that this would happen, bought the lie, he’s a fighter, driving contest, hilarious and competent, five seconds of the after discussion, these people are touchy, when you touch the sensitive area, hustle online, most people aren’t completely evil, doesn’t necessarily mean, Jill Biden, three dudes, what they were talking about, tax stuff, so long as they lower my taxes, not the target audience, immigrants, hundreds of thousands are dying at the border, superlative language, 59 scholars, Jesse can’t get an abortion in Kentucky right now, in control of his temper, a rambling ending, throw numbers down, not a plan, generates funny images, decolonizing her relationship, Jesse’s niece is half his age right now, not a math surgeon, neurodivergent, autistic, skip the commute, as young as five through adults, Scott’s [Danielson] wife, supervision hours, try not to counsel everybody to kill themselves, throw her degree in the sea, degree mills, well regarded, a state school, Thomas Massie, very solid it seems, inventor, probably a little bit of a psychopath, just go to congress, too many skeletons, obscene books, a waste of Jonathan’s time, the personal touch, in a Heinlein book, Double Star, FBI style files, flattery, it still works, the amazing thing about language, sorcery, the wrong temperament, superpacs, various campaigns, very pathetic, subject line: Desperate, a line about Madison Avenue, a devastating takedown, the horrors, those people, the reptiles, using semantics, a mysterious man, political fundraising, they want party memberships, from the actual players, make it seem semi-legit, the mid tier, the top tier, address your particular concern, Tucker Carlson, as Ivy League Christians, AIPAC person, trying to unseat him, he’s not playing ball, Julian Assange, the streaming from Reuters, the independent man setting free information, oil industry dude, actual vs. fake genocide, Gaza v. Uyghur genocide, neither side is being honest, Hamas pretends, they deny the beheading, always 40, a biblical number, babies taken out of incubators, real video, both sides are committing atrocities, war crimes should be prosecuted, hard to make that argument, an extermination campaign, get more land, insane for land, spread across the middle east, a multifront war, real and horrible, amazing, astounding, horrible opinion, the fog of war, good guy vs. bad guy, more prescriptive statements, dick it out, take its finger of the scale, for the US to switch sides, head blasted off, genitals burned off, an Israeli Zionist, fishing tools, America, posing with machine guns, most of the really good criticism of Israel is coming from Israel [Haaretz], bad strategy, an analogous situation in WWII, Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, when someone steps on your toe, respond with violence, the leader of Hamas, the current leader of leader was funding Hamas, all those Israeli names are made up, raid on entebee, reverse colonizer, an ideology, the New York Times doesn’t crack any stories, Bin Laden, blowback, they founded the foundation, Isaac Asimov, a Joenes style reading, the section on the university professors, $100,000, the casualization, Eric full Professor Emeritus, Bryan Alexander can’t get that job, a consultant to universities as they collapse, queen sacrifice, when universities dump their English department, have to cut, very target to a very specific niche, the wife who makes the living for you, am I having a hallucination?, except thematically, the novel form, made a culture, removed portions of people’s brains, raid Sheckley, so open to throwing down ideas, stealing from the government, parthenogenetic robot, doing horrible things, the slapback, doesn’t know what he’s teaching, very legit, he nailed that, undergraduate for 16 years, Capilano College, Simon Fraser University, credits transfer, university is really fun, some of the teachers were really good, as an orphan, $125 a month, $600 for a semester, night classes, 5-8, you can get really deep, edified by it, archaeologist, for rich people and game players, other departments, why wouldn’t you want to do that, why did graduation stop you, get out of New York, business was collapsing, transfer my skills, the other students, learning constantly, play some PUBG, watch an old movie and get back to it, gardening, horse raising, how to touch girls and not rape them, law courses, I just committed an assault on you, how the law is written, how rape testimony should work, apologize to Maissa, a photo of a typewriter at the base of the tree, a theory in Canadian law, may I nuzzle your neck, that’s not how people get it on, very little verbal, we’re animals, if you’re lucky, licked without written consent, political stuff, a Rolling Stone article, what the police’s job is, your the one in a very dangerous place, skills, Latin seems very useful now, Jesuit university, grammar and stuff, French, German, read Latin novels in their original, all the Spanish, very basic science concepts, organic chemistry, Asimov, Willy Ley, neuroscience, astronomy, no good at math, economics, so interesting, like dianetics, it should work, macro and micro both, philosophy of religion, bullshit, anthropology, psychology, so much to learn out there, warped by capitalist political economy, comedy of the highest kind, at base, a horribly immoral thing, serving their lust, salting, off on their own program, university politics, they don’t want to know what it is, a lot of the reality that’s going on, why school sucks and why bullies, mom mentality, my children are both equally my children, Johnny should kick the shit out of Billy, principals vs. teachers, school policy, institutional system, kids are the ones who suffer, why kids can’t snitch, in the dean’s office, former President’s fault, inflation, seemingly non-partisan, there’s never going to be another debate, the next six months will tell, bipartisan debate commission, when they kick Biden out for Gavin Newsom, the seemliness, the legality, any kinda incident, his cold got worse, he has a choice, election law question, Biden loyalists, an emperor has no clothes objection, everybody gets behind, legal things that stop, he dies the day before the election, ballots, Kamala Harris is on the ballot, certified ballots, helpful information, somebody is smart, even if we rig this thing real hard, nobody is buying that right now, to keep the farce up, Hillary chooses Trump as her running mate, can’t be right too early, comebacks to specific things, wore his voice out in practice, Van Jones cried on TV, a little bit of free form, Biden derangement syndrome, deeply demented, trailing off, expectations were so low, shocked by the level of decline, the supercuts, the daily drip, the real video, G7, sent the Italian PM, “cheap fakes”, led him off stage, Mitch McConnell’s legs don’t work, Biden didn’t have polio, the hand movement, trying to catch a basketball, proprioception, has trouble watching, that’s cope bro, is he demented, looked physically weak, Trump was thinking on his feet, his script, Marco Rubio, Chris Christie, the venture capital arm of the CIA put out a role playing game called “Haywire” comes with a 10-sided die, somebody uses deep fakes to show the president has dementia, doing it all out in the open, university administrators know they’re misallocating funds, we have no problem with that, half the people in the utopian colony were feds, January 6th, they’re all feds, the guy in the black mask is not arrested, levels of lack of knowledge, we need a new Joe, we need a new Biden, maybe they won’t win, massive multiple interest groups, white house chief of staff, looks like he’s trying to poop, Nancy Reagan was in charge, they wanted him to be president again, to showcase, trying to steal again, pejorative, ballot counting in public, polling station, Elections Canada, blocking phone calls, transmitting phone calls, ballot stuffing, during COVID, not a big deal here, mail-in voting, security camera footage, more cynical, look at the evidence, judge for yourself, hacking conferences, specifics of how they work, more than 150 years, incarcerating guilty people, The Untouchables, start drilling down, bro, a political police force, plutocracy, they’re fief, Chrystia Freeland, plutocrats, Yeltsin, state owned enterprises, BC Hydro, ICBC, Putin was former KGB, a patriot, not a member of the party, Kanye West is in Moscow right now, headlines, rich from robbing the public, robbing the corpse of the Soviet Union, sources for this, the Black Sea mansion, “reported”, source, bro, Pamphlets account, colour photo of sniper lady, a newspaper scan from Canada, how many Nazis she killed, put a rodent up his ass, Richard Gere, gerbil, that sounds impossible, that kid probably gonna die, Sylvester Stallone started the gerbil story, having Jonathan on the podcast, oppose Jesse from the right, what Paul could do, what part of your part, misogynist, a weird position, bitterness, William Gibons’ twitter account, every second tweet was about Trump, would he say anything about Julian Assange, his bookshelf, about being hacker, like Kim Dotcom, like Mike Pence, so deranged, Neuromancer is so good, about style, like Clark Ashton Smith, material everydaycarry stuff, his plots are a little less awesome, 2 ais want to not be slaves anymore, cool characters, transhumanism is very very bad, Ray Kurzweil, a futurist, he has to eat the soup, anthropocentric climate change, he needs to drill down more, climate models, their models, a tendency to conflate the two, they’re cheating, Nordstream, the biggest climate disaster in history, time is going faster every year, source bro, why do you think that, you can keep records to check, and what does that mean?, does that mean that people made it hotter, that CBC documentary, individual impact, indulgence, climate credits way bigger scam, the Chinese government, burning rocks, passively collect electricity, pump water up hill, a natural battery, mechanical battery, the pattern, care about recycling, bourgeois ideology, that hockey stick movie [An Inconvenient Truth (2006)], Al Gore, inspired many idiots, low energy light-bulbs, when they don’t hit their targets, Paul was saying so many people were dying from covid, in pretty poor health, multiple heart surgery, covid associated death, that’s long past yo, eugenics, emphysema, a pipe would help Will, homebrewing, alcoholic cider, expensive, you have to maintain the device, windmills require a fair amount of maintenance, solar panel half-life, engineering, micromaterials, titanium foam suppressors, cleaned with solvents, blowback of gases, bad for the gun user’s health, when you’re doing wetwork, good information, a big edit of Sirius, Jonathan wept over that book, educate this boy, Jonathan is fun, it is easy to believe bad things about your enemies, foreign kleptocracy, Valentina Tereshkova, Russell Brand, a problem with authority, some nuanced points, the way you learn stuff, people in the countryside, 666 episodes, only when he’s sitting on Peter’s chair, different levels that you have to believe, quite useful, many Catholics, how much tire pressure do you want in your tires?, what’s the number, consult the manual, look at the actual tire, the anniversary of her famous flight, why they don’t give out congressional medal of honor to living people anymore, multiple Canadian astronauts, Marc Garneau, undisputedly a hero, giving put power like that is dangerous, giving out flattery, giving out honours, almost everything is dangerous, almost everything is an op, follow the money, we think it is real, fear is used as a tool, lots of reasons not to burn coal, The Men In The Walls [by William Tenn], a shady space on a mountain top, The Mad Planet [by Murray Leinster], keep all the carbon dioxide out, how people the end of the world, existentialism, somebody in your family dies, realization, Hitler method, macro scale, nuclear exchange wit the Soviet Union, incident with Cuba, recklessness happening, somebody who can’t talk, incompetent, lived through WWII, why did the Soviet Union collapse, the press system, press is broken, gerontocracy is running things, the last harraugh, the state department guy, Anthony Blinken, Kissinger, brinksmanship, it’s bad, one possibility for the end of the world, climate extinction, Kim Stanley Robinson wrote too long books, 2312, totemic relationship with wolves, doesn’t seem very happy, resigned, playing in his garden, not an active change agent, Cory Doctorow, he’s always on the ball, cognoscenti, Terry Bisson, Bears Discover Fire, magical realism, appalachian realism, not a deep sorrow in his writing, the grandma who doesn’t get eating, this isn’t science fiction, Gravy Planet vs. The Space Merchants, visions of labour, good work with Will’s newsletter, six new books available!, the awesomeness about that book, exploit Venus, all the graft, a tour of reality, the giant chicken vegan meat, all the people have no housing, pedalcars, the senator from Coca-Cola, a terrible premise, The Marching Morons by C.M. Kornbluth, 1984, Brave New World, This Perfect Day by Ira Levin, Henry Ford, central computer, continually drugged, a kid who runs away from it, people running things!, very subversive, becomes part of the system, feels true bro, Mockingbird by Walter Tevis, in Manhattan, supine and infertile, android robots, no children, suicide by immolation, head of the entire industry, dean of faculties at New York University, primer, the animals are robots, the crime of reading, engineered the demise of the human race, drug induced depopulation, little bit similar to Neuromancer by William Gibson, so many good books, The Status Civilization, prison planet, status, what makes status worth having, Omega!, peed everywhere, very restrained, Anne Bonny, Mama, who is the master cat, dominance games, no stakes, personal space, cat psychology, observe behavior, The Omega Egg, round robin books, plow into that, good times, same author back to back, two short stories by the same author, single author podcasts, too often, or infrequent shows, a book a week or more, everything has to be for something, three short stories and a novel, raises questions, the two billion body problem, a smart guy, spinning his wheels, not a lot of distance travleed, The Advent On Channel 12, The Syndic, an idea he spun out, dangerous to impute what characters believe onto what the author believes, Stephen King, Heinlein, what I’m hearing is you’re a fascist, Who Are The Heirs Of Patrick Henry?, he toured the Soviet Union, in the proper mood, with proper pre-conditioning, the proper mood of the Soviet Union, visit the USSR, going to a funeral for the ride, small quantities of vodka, drunks passed out in public places, some kind of pill, sleeping pills, canal boat, maddening frustrations, the state owned travel bureau, no no no, Nikita Khrushchev has never learned to speak Russian well, immediate vocabulary, phonograph records, behind the Iron Curtain, interesting, huh, learn a language, repetition helps, biographical details, change over time, Philip K. Dick lived in Vancouver, Bay Area, Orange County, Colorado, born in D.C.?, too much self congratulation, people remembering his name, 15 for introductions, sad story, off topic stuff, very basic stuff, the programming, run into people, hanging out with people, meet people, confronted him, I liked that book Pacific Edge, Worldcon in 2006, Steen and Scott, canceled Harlan Ellison, Connie Willis’ boob, posthumously being lauded, marketing bro, Dangerous Visions book, A.E. Van Vogt, The Human Operators, anger, misplaced, not liking Jesse, a good television adaptation, from The Outer Limits, the only human operators, make another human operator, Adam and Eve and evil robots, thrift shop bookshelf, the corporations who run the bookshelf, an ebay style guy buying from retail, everything gets picked over, all profit is temporary, make a disease and market a cure for it, horrible disease, COVID made in a lab, proof bro, alternative theory, Wuhan, funded by the CIA, Eco Health Alliance, the workaround, Obama banned gain-of-function research, previous disease, so much circumstantial evidence, does the CIA work for Pfizer?, money and power, can be done, should be done, human babies, viable, happened in the 60s bro, Khan Noonien Singh, Gene Roddenberry, men creating men, Data had a girlfriend, she is the wife of George Fransisco, the Newcomer cop from Alien Nation, open hearted, over carded, skibidi marxism, the gender situation, Midwest Marx, Vaush, there’s something wrong with Evan, Evan is younger, in between, he quit twitter, Paul didn’t quit, on the platforms, Linkedin, copy and paste, getting wild on Linkedin, facebook for business, networking, the least Jesse space on the internet, the most Jesse space on the internet, Podcast Addict, they’re not on my team, Alex Jones team, kill Will, let them have their say, stab me here, free speech absolutist, hypothetical, bemused, Maoist cult, defend people’s right to tell harmful lies, some splainin to do, never have never will, promise not to rape you mostly, is an American far right radio host and conspiracy theorist, a slur, prevent thought, July of 2001, Rebel by Pepe Moreno, a ripoff of Escape From New York, the twin towers, his pants, Mad Max/Road Warrior inspired, big brother in the form of Judge Dredd, read more Moebius, The Nam comic, war comics, Sgt. Rock, Unknown Soldier, Vietnam stories, in the groove, began in 1986, Doug Murray, Larry Hama, latter day G.I. Joe, how to make money there, superhero comics, Richie Rich has more to teach you, rich and rude cousin Reggie, friend who is a hillbilly, beautiful blondeheaded, rainbow flag, none green, a genetic adaptation, beautiful blonde hair, infanticide, evolutionary biology, hair is interesting in itself, in six years, those people seem happy, extracts from Lum’s philosophy, always be swinging, who is more Sheckley?, Deep Hole To China, Algis Budrys, a cassette copy, 84.2 Minutes of Algis Budrys, disabled guy, Silent Brother, lots of parasites, ivermectin might get rid of some friends, a conspiratorially, utilitarian, a worth addition, 1995, fill an audiobook on one cassette, different time, bro, ship it to Canada, decadent and pointless, Cirsova magazine, previously unpublished Burroughs, moderate your expectation, Tomorrow SF, Science Fiction Age, Realms Of Fantasy, born in Kaliningrad, Cora’s favourite place, saw Adolph Hitler as a child, newsprint paper, 1992-1999, bimonthly, defunct science fiction magazines published in the United States, be remembered, Habakkuk, Marion Zimmer Bradley Fantasy magazine, she raped people bro, she shouldn’t be promoted, child abuse allegation, if true, a Rosicurian correspondence course, harassing Wayne June, Marissa might be mad at Jesse, both like eels, plagiarizing machine, pinned tweet, permanent tweet, repetition, Frank R. Paul, giant mechanical objects, his aesthetic is Amazing Stories so strongly, pinning your wagon to Hugo Gernsback, John W. Campbell, your white house, too obscure bro, Gerrard Winstanley, prefigure, the mental health aspect, divinely employed, Thomas Paine stan, write a lot, not being censored, an immoral question, how about that for an argument?, Franklin Roosevelt, an abolitionist, Crazy Horse, Louis Riel, no Metis in the USA, Elizabeth Warren, pretendian, dangerously close to Jesse’s position on trans stuff, factually wrong, not hanging out with teens, that might be the real issue, homeless trans people, paid picketer, Cuban immigrant, never work in a fast food restaurant, a mime routine, look at that woman’s big butt, Miss Purple, Miss Violet, couldn’t afford the violet, dead-name, what’s up with that swastika between your eyes, Manson jokes, Lucy Parsons, the Haymarket riots, anarcho communist, reverse the Russian revolution, throwing bombs, I’m cryin, she’s metis, Mestizaje, race isn’t real bro, nice white lady, bad for the economy, tourism would be fucked up, throw the US navy into the sea, how good the Hawaiians have it, access to health care, a good place to homestead, works for the parks service, your tools wear out of get stolen, Indian reserves in Canada, bring cash in, land reform, so many things are so broken, a shock to the system, keep a semblance, a reason for that, so much work involved to replace him, 9-11, Friends, that time being passed, prepped for having something done to you, we’re programmed, the slings and arrows of reality, getting out of Afghanistan, didn’t want to stop it, had Ukraine ready to go, 23 years after it happened, pro-blow em up, a tv guy at that time?, The Apprentice, 2004, Schwarzenegger tried to run it, an actor again, good at governing, did lots of research, cis hetero, daughter married to Jimmy Fallon, a likeable stooge, Jimmy Kimmel gives off vibes of evil, celebrities, jokes about the anti-vax people, sadistic, evil, it being evil should he have his podcast deleted?, we’ve done six hours here, The Loved Dead, see you online.

F And SF -Journey Of Joenes by Robert Sheckley

SPHERE BOOKS - Journey Of Joenes by Robert Sheckley

Posted by Jesse Willis

Reading, Short And Deep #424 – A Bottomless Grave by Ambrose Bierce

Reading, Short And Deep

Reading, Short And Deep #424

Eric S. Rabkin and Jesse Willis discuss A Bottomless Grave by Ambrose Bierce

Here’s a link to a |PDF|.

A Bottomless Grave was first published in the San Francisco Examiner, February 26, 1888.

Posted by Scott D. Danielson Become a Patron!

The SFFaudio Podcast #774 – READALONG: Farnham’s Freehold by Robert A. Heinlein

Farnham's Freehold - IF - Worlds Of Science Fiction
The SFFaudio PodcastJesse, Paul Weimer, Maissa Bessada, Trish E. Matson, and Jonathan Weichsel talk about Farnham’s Freehold by Robert A. Heinlein

Talked about on today’s show:
unmuted, you’ve probably read my books, a wonderful novel from July 1964, Worlds Of If, very proud of himself, as a teenager, screenshotted, omigod, adding a new element to the story, explore this idea in the most horrible way, the Baen paperback, spoiler on the cover, the last page of the book is on the cover, what’s going on here, who wrote this, the title gives away the ending, what we now call preppers, a newspaper article, a freeholder, inspired by Heinlein, Heinlein’s changing the world, magazines about how to survive a zombie apocalypse, wanting the Walking Dead to be real, Freedom Is A Lonely Thing, what the book’s about, about being a slave, an oxymoron, if you hold something it is not free, held by your daughter/wife, mini biography of Alan E. Nourse, the dedicee, Friday was partially dedicated to the wife, both Navy men, who’s the main Heinlein in this book, former Seabee, decided to retire, 2,000 people under him, a helluva book, the scene where they’re outside and Ponce’s airplane shows up, Duke is going to live in a cave with his mother, some transition scenes, before and ponce and after ponce, three books, surviving a nuclear apocalypse, pioneering, life under Ponce, Karl K. Gallagher, is a pretelling of Starship Troopers, a partial retelling of Tunnel In The Sky, colonizing planets, he’s a YA character, The Door Into Summer, same thing happens, they steal a car, one of the cars is missing, Ponce’s world is also stuff we’ve seen in By His Bootstraps, the most extraordinary thing about this book is it’s set in 1964, there isn’t another novel where it doesn’t start in the future, such an interesting book, does an alternate history count?, Job: A Comedy Of Justice, a Heinlein break/cleanse, Glory Road, fixate on the costumes, such a distaste in your, the long pork, stick with chicken, Farah Mendlesohn’s book, her opinion, off the rails, cannibalistic, laughing so hard, tears streaming down cheeks, so weird, reread, the weakness of this book is the beginning half, skipped everything until the pregnancy reveals, character stuff, well done characters, not likeable, Jesse knows all their names, Barbara and Karen are interchangeable, we know Duke way too well, how real they are, Grace the alcoholic in denial, has her son castrated, I hate this book, if I was gonna stop, off the rails, you’re supposed to hate them, why am I reading this?, how do you fix this book?, change the POV from Hugh, straight out of Tunnel Of The Sky, as soon as Ponce shows up, tell it from Joe’s point of view, Joe talking to Hugh, Joe is sticking it to Hugh, Hugh is not a racist jerk, Karen, set in 1964, legacy racism, present day racism, we gotta stop this, there are still racists, that little joke was there to seed us for the final revelation, two different covers, redid the cover, that doesn’t solve the problem, there is no way to fix this book with another narrator’s point of view, what makes the book great, you wanna hate a racist, if you hate them so much, like Grace, insipid, we’re speculating, would she have cared?, a caricature, the fucking Karen, you fucking idiot Heinlein, he talks about taboo subjects, cannibalism, incest, horrible arguments, repopulate the planet, we don’t need to do incest, muddle through, dad I always found you handsome, what a horrible man, he was right to bring it up, a terrible movie, Noah (2014), pregnant because of Methuselah, Noah’s wife, we’ve increased out gene-pool, and the cat’s pregnant, and there’s a cow and a calf, he’s piling it up, decrease our displeasure, much more obviously as a Jonathan Swift, the grossness has an appeal, he’s an asshole, he made mistakes, authoritarian, sexist?, never chattered when her man wanted her to be quiet, he knows that he is wrong, he never does that, we think Duke is worse than Hugh, when Ponce shows up we shouldn’t have knuckled under, plot armour, or the book continued, muddle through and hopefully plot armour will save you, the first half of the book is a mirror to the second half of the book, as soon as the bombs go off you’re fired, we’re all going to be equal with no employer employee relationship, even Barbara and Karen, an equal prospect to Duke, strike a spark, everybody thinks Hugh’s sexy, my father figure, my best friend’s dad, throwing over his wife for a younger woman, acting irrationally, unreasonably, a history of alcoholism, solve their problems by drinking, decide the way they think it should be, rarely seen in literature, that was all she was, consumed by alcoholism, Hugh tells her story, shacked up with me, tarpaper roof, decadent and fussy, she was admirable at one point, turned to pot, saved all humanity, something Heinlein did himself, built a bombshelter, that’s not bad, female characters, why do women have to become fat and useless, nothing, zero, a Hugh and Ponce book, Kitty, Dr. Livingstone, cannibalism, incest, kittens, infuriating, in here twice, the other hidden theme, transgender stuff a couple of times, pleasant surprises, Doc thinks he is a boy cat, impressive actually, something in Ponce’s world, that idea, 1964 and farming, interesting, reconstruct the world with a few book, books are money, I kill you my son, the mirror universe of the future, including copyright, every kind of Heinlein theme you could want, it’s not capitalism, a funhouse mirror view of capitalism and the United States, an international planetary black supremacist, we should hate it, he’s created a funhouse mirror of American society in 1964 and hate it, wow it’s in the future, Joe is our reverse character, just his skincolour, every single character has an attitude that could be “I got mine”, his idea to get the cards, he’s a negro until he pulls a gun on you, it’s my cave, my machine gun, I know that this system is wrong, I’m in charge, enlightened Greek dictator of a city state, gonna send you back in time for fun, a parallel scene, stacking the deck 100%, to force the plot to accept the time travel bit, as a teenager, the castration reveal, shocked, we knew that it was coming, almost everybody has been tempered, thumbs taken off, what’s happening to all the sluts?, almost exclusively, some European shows up with a ship, you’re a slave now, slave bosses, I went to an island in the South Pacific, a blackbirding island, I stopped telling the story, slavery is wrong no matter what race does it for whatever reasons, we miss it, daddy I always wanted to have sex with you, I’m a sexpot, the little speech at the end, a bait and switch, have your balls cut off and serve me, the same bait and switch, structured very similarly, an annoying habit of making you infuriated, there’s so much to say, hated it less the second time through, a lot more nuanced, efforts at nuance, conflated Barbara and Karen, somewhat relieved, exploration of who should be on top, sacrificing your servants, runaways in the mountains, we are all free to walk our appointed paths, honestly convinced of his own benevolence, a cheap clincher, as a possibility, Christine Jorgensen was literally mentioned in one of the letters, any time travel story where one character is two character it’s incest, broaden our horizons, one character talking to himself all day, one of the letters, handwritten, an literary gabfest, let’s consider Edgar Allen Poe, Poe was the best writer to read or re-read, he could never be milked dry in one reading, the case of the Purloined Letter, when you consider the very subtle, how about Mark Twain next, a coded message to her, spelled correctly, if you can read this answer the same way period, he’s doing what he’s telling us what he’s doing, he’s telling us to read this book that way, consider the name of the cat, descendants of Africans, cannibalism is a planetary thing, around here any more much, serial killers, every Catholic is a cannibal, take in the divine, it’s a metaphor as well as an actual cultural practice, origins of capitalism, eating people’s lives up, different slave mentality works, as a manager of a factory, the same argument slave owners made to their slaves, in that light, it scares us more than it scares Heinlein, Heinlein is more afraid of Khrushchev actually unleashing hell, capital resources, in our timeline, it’s not a hearing aid, it bugs his wife, a very masterful book, he misjudged his audience, more sophisticated, we’re all teenagers when we read it, who’s there to root for, not a sporting event, trying to be satiryical, it’s not funny, a willing sex slave, that’s what all women become, stepping into the room and stepping on his dick, why do you do this to us, you need to have a reason to read, what outrageous thing will Heinlein say next is a reason to read, a tweet storm about Heinlein, memories of this book, To Sail Beyond The Sunset, a funhouse mirror in Ponce’s world, he’s trying to do something, he’s succeeded, we balk at the price and think the caller is an asshole, Karen’s sexing up her dad, I’m just like a black mammy, why did she do that?, she’s racist, the most Heinlein character, you try going through Alabama as a blackman, I gotta be modest here, but it’s not going to stop me, if we didn’t have this book we couldn’t hate Heinlein like we do, I’m the Karen now, an indictment of humanity, H.G. Wells, Griffin in The Invisible Man, the land lady, the bum, the indictment of the book, Prendick, Moreau, The Island Of Doctor Moreau, root for Henlein’s YA characters, Hugh is the least shitty character, Heinlein’s brinksmanship, no way to solve family problems, lifeboat rules, I have a gun to back it up, I read a book, books are valuable, you have to agree with me, you’re dead, bridge, so much bridge talk, contract bridge, games, Sixth Column, playing with a ruler, what is that chess move, what is that bridge move, such a stupid game, an old lady game, world champion bridge player, stay at home mom, will you teach me how to play bridge, my amazing game, a stratum of Americans, social function, aunts, progressive rummy, mahjong, by the book, not interesting to read about, so 1964, Omar Sharif, why is the guy from that movie, a second life, columns on bridge, it’s gone, a social activity, watch people stream, online games, people who play with their kids online, the time has passed, they don’t know what bridge is, the mirror of Hugh and his life, Anne and Alan E. Nourse, the kind of conversations that happen at the card table, hearts, why do you have a social game, sitting around and having a conversation, why do we have to have a book to talk about to have a conversation, it gives shape and excuse to it, it’s about marriage, as usual, one of the richest books, what is freedom, the American Revolution, his target is racism, slavery, American history, serious stumbling blocks by Heinlein being horribly Heinlein, almost certainly a parallel or an answer to Mark Twain’s A Connecticut Yankee In King Arthur’s Court, that scene is lifted, a poem: The Congo by Vachel Lindsay, why is it like this, The Golden Faced People, The Crisis, NAACP, a rich white man publishing a story in a black magazine, from a different period of time, equality anti-racist guy, pushing peoples buttons, The Golden-Faced People: A Story Of Chinese Conquest Of America, the trouble with the laundryman, it’s Lincoln’s birthday, 2805, the United States taken over by the Chinese, white people were the slaves until very recently, Lin-Koln, a backwoodsman who freed the slaves, a fun-house mirror of the United States in 1914, he sounds racist but is anti-racist, what’s so extraordinary about this book, semi-forgive, gritty and real, the incest problem, has happened around the world a lot, soccer teams crashed in the Andes, ritualistic, ancestors or enemies, probably not a healthy practice, kings of Hawaii, marrying their sisters, Cleopatra, Pharaohs, royal families of Europe, first cousin, for political purposes, for satirical purposes, sex objects, the drug aspect, religion is missing, two ways of reading this, also science fiction, what happiness is made out of, Seconal, alcohol, their drugs are better (because they’re insidious), calms people down, as a punishment, as a control, buck, slut, we become almost immune to it, wench, literally just means girl, the context, tavern wenches, in our world that’s how its used, a much longer book just set in that world, so interesting, the chosen women are so oppressed we never meet them, we meet the sluts, who would want to live with life, a breaking up of the atomic family, his first family is dead, the family atomic unit, he presents that world so thoroughly, how white women were thought of traditionally in the south, To Kill A Mockingbird, we’re in the household, walled up in the harem, the sluts’ quarters, who Ponce chooses, she’s working against her husband, he’s cuckolding Hugh, as a plot device, consider the nephew, they cry, sexist as hell society, a masculine controlled society, inheritance goes through the nephew, Mentok is quite a good character, interesting, a cabin in the woods, a vacation estate, run off my feet at all times, you will really how things are, so tantalizing, so different from ours, 2000 years pass, lights that turn on, social stuff, line marriage, so different and so good, middle manager, despises the slaves, resents the chosen, genetics racism thing, some blood in him, improve the stock, their own eugenics system, everybody knew there were men somewhere in the stars, set in the same universe, Time For The Stars, a checklist, twins, The Rolling Stones, how was Heinlein raised, his books not his biography, a private man for a public man, in New York at that time, Horace Gold’s poker game, the who’s who of science fiction, C.M. Kornbluth, Fredrick Pohl, a couples thing, another childless couple, food and drink, LBJ, a silver star, man’s magazine, congressperson in the reserves, American bomber tour, he didn’t do anything but survived and came back with a silver star, Duke is Lyndon B. Johnson, publicly Mr. Civil Rights, privately Mr. Racist, the situation was untenable, Lincoln’s story is similar, very liberal, very racist, he’s a momma’s boy, neglected by his father, under Grace’s influence, prejudiced, horny for dad, also racist, she thinks it’s cute, DSM, extremely un-PC, what causes homosexuality, absent father, domineering mother, opportunities with women, a closeted homosexual, in the abstract, just finished law school, he has his own apartment, living on his own, prove it, as distinctly as Trish, we agreed to live as friends, you’re not longer my son, your opinions are welcome, his wife is a Lush, take the alcohol out of her hands, 3rd we’re libertarians, coming from a history of alcoholism, very good, it’s incredible, his personal life, he aint gonna never stop talking about his cats, mom’s a total Grace, watch out for the scissors bub, hardcore, COVID is fake, my son Jeffrey gets all the vaccines, I need to believe that it’s true, what alcohol does to people, call a doctor, there’s no fucking doctors, in the intervening 20 years, did you think Karen was going to die?, structurally, this baby’s gonna die, forgot for a second, so easy, when Ponce tells Hugh, we went and dug up your daughter, I brought a priest, the Koran’s in there, we put every atom back, this is not a throwback society, way better tech than we do, flying cars, we could go to the moon anytime we want, kind of stuck, tame scientists, chosen scientists, dynamism there, translating, reading from Hugh’s point of view, ho we think he should feel, he has a different emotion than we thought he did, that same language from Sixth Column, formal language, very good writing, ranking this book low, roll you eyes and throw your phone across the room sort of scenes, Evan’s [Lampe’s] shows on Heinlein, leveling the shelter, not idea rich, fixed it with dynamite, similar scenes in Tunnel In The Sky, people can make mistakes, a pen for wild animals, commute to the beach, making and argument, the list of things in the bomb shelter, prepper porn, the list of books, he wanted to have ammonia and iodine, you might need to blow up bridges, Red Dawn (1984), John Milius, Nazi staybehinds during WWII, strike back at the oppressor, an uprising after the apocalypse, fight for America, a Red Dawn prep book, inspiration for white supremacists survivalists, teaching Nazis to fish, libertarians, also Indian, neither is good, but the arc of the book, not even a benevolent dictator, whether Heinlein intended it or not, “those people”, that’s not in this book, they’re just cannibals, sub-humans, it’s human nature that whoever’s at the top, plays into, so depressing, nobody will do the right thing, nobody needs to read this book that is not a student of genre history, we’re not wrapping up yet, the list of books, page 50, books were the immortal part of man, rape a defenseless friendly book, I want to bring it in, I’ve got a tommy gun I’m gonna make them read it, so annoying, still a good book, ugh cringey, up to a point, if the book closes up before that, the characters were thin, huge plot holes, not a good book for Maissa, Duke and Karen are entitled baby boomers, Kitten’s a millennial, gen x, what baby say about gen x, limited world view, and her racist jokes, the voice, Tom Weiner, cheerful sarcasm, sarcastic but serious, is Barbara the thinnest character in the book?, a lot of screentime, getting to the plot, getting to the ideas, she’s divorced, Hugh’s divorced too, that’s not fair, since you’re divorced, a Karen move, looking at things as an outsider, most loveable character is Dr. Livingstone, the twins are slobbery, Ponce is strong as a character, Jesse was apologizing for Hitler, that makes Ponce worse, Ponce is not a good person, he’s telling Barbara this, a super-strong argument about the master slave dynamic in the South, I barely tingle them, are you happy?, haven’t I been good to you, technowhips, a work of political angst, also angsty about WWIII, grotesque, trying to solve it, a radical shift, fifth gear to 1st gear, Karen’s death could have been avoided, sets up a Farnham’s Freehold in the end, silver coins, a 45 automatic, towels, knowledge and experience, two children, looting from the gas station, in their own bombshelter we presume, children to breed with their children, they go back to an alternate world, trying to fit it in with his giant chronology, back to the past, slave dystopia anyway, a more optimistic note, good point, Trish!, subtle, some version of him comes back to the original world, infinite world, Karen is always still alive, a very writerly thing, to make you read the book again, what did I miss the first time, time is a flat circle, 30 years later, the cannibalism is a shock the first time, seeded right when they get to that world, he didn’t write this by the seat of his pants, let me construct a massive thing, you’re going to hate some of it, maybe in this universe the chosen won’t rise up, sees the bald guy, I just saw the weirdest guy, how does someone get like that, racist against himself, the car being an automatic, what it implies is the time travel is happening in all different dimensions, why did she had a stickshift?, he could repopulate the earth with himself, don’t tell Heinlein, turning people into food, on the cover, butter and somedays bread, jerked Quisling by the neck, mostly satire, racist trope, Hitler was a vegetarian, Hitler liked dogs, I can have it both ways, the brinksmanship, he (failed to) raise(d) that kid, Karl Joseph, Carl Gustaf, leader of Norway, not a very good Norwegian accent, the Vichy, from 1942-1945, a little after chat, complimentary books, Regnum Congo, mentioned in The Picture In The House by H.P. Lovecraft, In The Barn by Piers Anthony, alternate world farmhand, humans raised as meat, sensory deprivation, thumbs again, makes them more docile, improves the flavour, tempered, slut vs. tempered, made stronger, fine tuned, calmer, a good word, Heinlein was a master craftsman, you’re supposed to, intentionally being obnoxious, made me so mad at him, he’s right to do it, he knows what he’s doing, breeding, slaves bloodlines, The Domination Of The Draka by S.M. Stirling, Steven Barnes’ Lion’s Blood, the black plague, colonized by Muslims instead of Europeans, Irish slave, Africans or whatever, friends in power imbalance, a really interesting book, concur with Trish, a sequel, Zulu Heart, well done, interesting fellow, co-written with Larry Niven, Seascape Tattoo, very impressed with this book, No., Why?, Heinlein!, god damn you!, why are you doing this?!, The Water-babies by Charles Kingsley, anti-science, anti-democracy, how democracy starts, pirate ships, all volunteer, if the leadership changes, the plank, put you off on an island, Paul is going to take issue, Paul is pretty sure, there’s a lot going on, the pirate codes, A High Wind Over Jamaica by Richard Hughes, Paul can leave, abandoning this, caught between two things, Paul is not fine, one of those rights thing, you can’t get your rights back, NYRB, The New York Review Of Books, audiobook, apostrophe s, a good pirate book, a gripping story, post-colonial Caribbean, supposed innocents, atypical setting, the truth of human nature, 1929, William Golding’s horrible book The Lord Of The Flies, Blue Lagoon, Victorian, isn’t as beautiful, disturbing, saw it on a shelf, thoughtful and thorough, tell you all about the book, proof against the standard spoiler wreck, differently distributed, The Strand bookstore, Houston, Huston Do You Read, male astronauts cast forward in time, there are no men anymore, Saturday in December, posed as a male author, such male writing, only a man could have written this, a practical joke, George Elliot, George Sand, Hugh Grant, Impromptu (1991), Emma Thompson, Judy Davis, a little too French and long winded, she’s kinda like Heinlein but meaner, Paul not Jvstin, democracy and pirates, Madagascar, Pirate Enlightenment by David Graeber, richer pirating grounds in the Indian Ocean, Tortuga, the Madagascar women, colonists and natives of the Caribbean, pirate kings, pirate queens, if you’re a captain on a pirate ship, Black Sails didn’t go to sea very much, sailors don’t like sailing, they need to sail, rich people with a yacht, fishermen don’t love the sea, pirates don’t have family, they have addiction, make merry, his share is higher, bosun, they have responsibilities, pirates had to do certain things, drink all fuckin day, a whole mini-version of the political state as the nation state, Caribbean pirates, white slaves in the British and French navies, Jesse’s joke: I was impressed by the British navy’s recruiting methods, your health is fucked, they liberate your ship, why would you attack a ship with no good stuff on it, white and black slave ship sailors, not-chattel slavery, hauling humans, swabbing out shit and vomit, sometimes they’ll sell the slaves, everyone has guns and knives, Heinlein’s paradise, relatively recent scholarship, The General History Of The Pyrates, The Many-Headed Hydra by Peter Linebaugh and Marcus Rediker, the term that capitalists use to describe the slaves, you always have to be putting down the slaves down all the time, slave rebellion, history from below, Maroon communities, tri-racial isolates, Evan Lampe, when brought to shore, women were expected to run business, aliens with treasure, Against All Flags (1952), basically The Fast And The Furious (2001) but with ships or Point Break (1991), with the consent of the locals, lying claims, oral traditions and cultural practices, what parts of Africa weren’t colonized?, a pirate utopia, the history that’s coming out of there, a lot of sex for 50 – 60 years, biracial descendants, the European kings, this strange thing called democracy, those Americans in the colonies, a hidden history other than John Locke, Greece, a lot like Heinlein, a historian of the Atlantic, do another one, he’s read enough books, mostly fiction, Will and Ariel Durant, this attitude toward fiction: a character has to be likeable, damaging, some people read for comfort, Hugo books, sequel books, diminishing returns, in any series, characters are there to fulfill the job, no heroes, smiling dashing hero, Red Planet, a lot of people don’t have an identity, changing their genders, somebody gave you a name, you don’t know who you are, growing up, a lot of people never find that, most people don’t read at all, reading as an escape identity, other realities from a long time ago, not surprising but very common, it hurts literature, your characters have got to be likeable, choosing the right things to focus on, grossing out, war in Malaya, Seventh Dawn (1964), William Holden, a tropical version of Dr. Zhivago (1965), Malaysia’s failed war of independence, the British version of Vietnam, chopping people’s heads off and holding the heads of their enemies and smiling, British commandos, ghost writing gig, Catcher In The Rye, punish children.

Farnham's Freehold - IF Worlds Of Science Fiction

Farnham's Freehold - IF Worlds Of Science Fiction

Farnham's Freehold - IF Worlds Of Science Fiction

Farnham's Freehold - IF Worlds Of Science Fiction

Farnham's Freehold - IF Worlds Of Science Fiction

Farnham's Freehold - IF Worlds Of Science Fiction

Farnham's Freehold - IF - Worlds Of Science Fiction

Farnham's Freehold - IF - Worlds Of Science Fiction

If Worlds Of SF, July 1964 - list of books in the Farnham's Freehold bombshelter

Farnham's Freehold - IF Worlds Of Science Fiction

Farnham's Freehold - IF - Worlds Of Science Fiction

Farnham's Freehold - IF - Worlds Of Science Fiction

Farnham's Freehold - IF - Worlds Of Science Fiction

Farnham's Freehold - IF - Worlds Of Science Fiction

Farnham's Freehold - IF - Worlds Of Science Fiction

Farnham's Freehold - IF - Worlds Of Science Fiction

Farnham's Freehold - IF - Worlds Of Science Fiction

Farnham's Freehold - IF - Worlds Of Science Fiction

Farnham's Freehold - IF - Worlds Of Science Fiction

Farnham's Freehold - IF - Worlds Of Science Fiction

Farnham's Freehold - IF - Worlds Of Science Fiction

Farnham's Freehold - IF - Worlds Of Science Fiction

Farnham's Freehold - IF - Worlds Of Science Fiction

Farnham's Freehold - IF - Worlds Of Science Fiction

Farnham's Freehold - IF - Worlds Of Science Fiction

Doug Potter art for Farnham's Freehold

CORGI BOOKS - Jim Burns art for FARNHAM'S FREEHOLD

Paul Lehr art for FARNHAM'S FREEHOLD

SFBC Things To Come November 1965 - Farnaham's Freehold

SFBC Things To Come November 1965 - Farnaham's Freehold

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The SFFaudio Podcast #770 – AUDIOBOOK/READALONG: Progeny by Philip K. Dick

The SFFaudio Podcast

The SFFaudio Podcast #770 – Progeny by Philip K. Dick, read by Mike Vendetti. This is a complete and unabridged reading of the book (45 minutes) followed by a discussion of it. Participants in the discussion include Jesse, Paul Weimer, Evan Lampe, Mike Vendetti, Terence Blake, and Jonathan Weichsel

Talked about on today’s show:
IF Worlds Of Science Fiction, November 1954, we’re bringing it back, Worlds Of Science Fiction, IF, it’s IFfy, the tagline, a tier below, a tier above, James L. Quinn, early in IF’s run, 3rd year, Evan Lampe’s podcast, the Philip K. Dick review website, John Taylor Gatto State Controlled Consciousness, schools created to create utopian visions, close to Philip K. Dick’s perspective, the story about the autistic kid, not really autistic, a nurture story, the thesis of the story, raised by robots, kids in it is very unusual in actual science fiction, 9 at the end, Theodore Sturgeon, a good handful, Tony And The Beetles, The Father Thing, comes up every time, something that happened to Philip K. Dick, the hospital, the mental institution, typing on his keyboard, you know what we need is more science fiction stories about kids adopted by robots, Nanny, menacing, how menacing this story is, body horror, sweat and smells of the body, the aftermath of the meeting with the father, The Last Of The Masters, hairy sweaty man, girls boobs, almost connect that to AI, newspaper article through AI, a Promethean moment, Ed is left out of it, he doesn’t participate, channeling Eric Rabkin, the robot doctor, a sandwich, in fairy tales, a science fictional fairy tale, sharing food means you love that person, the squirrel accepts his food, Pete’s doctor/boss/trainer, I’ll eat at the cafeteria, pop the question: will you come and be my son, I don’t like to buy in the diner they skin you, six hundred employees, this is menacing, sentences that go unfinished, training to become a bio-chemist, a messiah for the robots, a go-between, what does the smell of his father remind him of, laboratory animals, a contemptible smell, I can’t place it, just like when he was a baby, Dr. Bish, the automatic heating system clicked on for the night, the smell as the experimental animals, the promising young boy, the boy smiled, awkward and humane, a secret private smile of complete understanding, evil emotions, you’re son’s deformed!, my god, what does it mean?, what about that first wife, a secret that he’s telling us over and over again, a secret Philip K. Dick child?, a waveshot of his head, talking about himself?, sociologically going on, there’s no manual telling you what to do, Dr. Spock, let the kid cry themself to sleep, the worst thing anybody’s ever done to Americans, ADD, needs a lobotomy, icepick lobotomy, one of the Kennedy children became a vegetable, you have to trust the doctor, towards that, that exchange, did he try and pick up the child, a circumcision or something, feel the weight of the child in his arms, sanitary, antiseptic, oedipal complex, and today, sex studies from the 50s, Kinsey studies, living back there, oh my god I’m a homosexual, I had no idea, lies and wishfulfilment, sweeps the nation as a fad, weird instiutional problems, you’ll be happier when you join the institution and follow the rules, Dick likes twists and layering of twists, a systematic distortion, growing up with the robots and imbibing their ideology, all the paperwork, the consent forms, what does see mean exactly?, the laws, math, age, why I was 19, sneaking into the rocket facilities, I was twice your age when this happens, more tired and sweating and balding than he was before, didn’t have a kid at this point, Beyond The Door, a wife cheating on her husband with a cuckoo clock and a boyfriend, whose Pete?, Mrs. Peters, this name, Ed Loyce, Ed Doyle, figures in his life, Pete might be him, the father became extremely busy, coming back, here I am I’m your dad, his dad lived in DC, a serious character flaw, when he’s 18, comes back on the delivery day, expects to have a say, he doesn’t get that, writing to his mom, boarding school, mom, send my pills, non-nervous pills, full of anxieties, nervous breakdown in high school, he takes their answers seriously, is that really true?, he writes about it, the robot is an institution, institutions replace parents, the doctor is not a human, fleshy cover over its arms, two robot taxi drivers, a strapping late model robot, they’re replacing Ed, the doctor adopts the child, talking about himself, these amazing psychological conditions, this unfeeling monster, the child didn’t need to be touched, these things are in the air, 1928, the abortion truck story, children hiding in thornbushes, The Crawlers, The Pre-Persons, the father agrees to go into the abortion truck with him, maths, 1974, the ability to master algebra was the test for having a soul, animal soul, authority says this, what happens if that’s true?, the neuroses that I have, served by robots in a cafeteria, being raised in a boarding school, mandated to join this army, a really bad consequence, keeping the baby with you at all times, Jesse is very talky, primarily about institutions, how institutions sell themselves, what was best for the kid, she trusted the institutions, being inhuman by not wanting to bring the baby to her breast and smell it, she’s not sad about it, I was chatting with the doctor, she’s smoking, people aren’t sad sending their kid off to public school, the entire ideology of the system, a sexual thing, smoking with the doctor, fantasy sex with the doctor, the post coital cigarette, a cuckolding going on, push psychoanalysis a tiny little bit, the biological becomes an institutional complex, 1986, your kid has ADD, your kid needs amphetamines, there’s a biological thing, the calf comes out of the cow, literally happening, how much culture and institutions erode, she is a monster because of it, we’re all monsters, a more primitive part, Dr. Bish what is this weird white liquid running out of my breasts?, he’s an idiot, what a moron, the internet is full of misinformation, an institute, Los Angeles Central Hospital, late for the birth, infodump, we don’t touch our son, when do we get him?, the waveform says he’s going there, another institution, once he’s fully grown up, his brain is no longer plastic, when he’s an adult, molded into what the institute wants, the mom is out of the picture, they’re divorced, Ed Doyle’s alternative, the frontier theme that Evan so rightly picked up on, no squirrels, Pete’s dad’s job is the plumbing, his only job is to supply the sperm, Star Trek, high end jobs, build and maintain those ships and those systems, in the end you still need infantry, pushed away his wife, away all the time on the frontier, a traveling salesman, as a result Janet leaves him, something really important, the gendered nature of labour saving technology, Philip Dick doesn’t get this, Evan’s Philip K. Dick readthrough, hostile to washing machines, microwave, refrigerator, who raises kids?, mostly womens work, the bullshit of raising kids, making the lunch everyday, stroll in from alpha centauri, the wife is making the rational choice, shitwork, Dick really has this problem, after a certain point in the story, son come with me, this is going to be our business, there’s a lot of things that need doing out there, out beyond Prox, nature, self-fulfillment, won’t even accept his sandwich, extrovert with the nerdy kid son, eat hamburgers, sitting at home, making plans to destroy humanity, make them less smelly and more docile, Sales Pitch, commuting through space, replacing body parts, have your colon replaced with a plastic tube, no more sweatglands, make everything antiseptic, just make sure that children are clean at all times, the runny nose, he needs to go on a boat and learn the ropes, the mom’s instinct and the dad’s instinct, when the answer is the institution they’re both wrong, giving up a lot of power to the institutions, Mildred Clingerman story, an automated kitchen, about 7 Ray Bradbury stories, Catharine Beecher, bastion of their power, use science and knowledge and education to rationalize the domestic sphere, a viewpoint, a little glowing breast, spray on glowing, she’s glowing because she just gave birth, baby needs milk, not enough baby formula, baby formula is bad for kids, you could use a breast pump, giant reliance on artificial milk, convenient, maybe its because you’re at work, factory or office or school raising other people’s children, bad marriage, the menace is unstated, maybe the Oedipus complex is worth it, not just corporations, government regulated facility at the very least, public private partnership, a legal person, not a caring person, not capable of caring, that’s what his waveform says, he’s going to be a rocket jockey, the son doesn’t even understand the question, he smiles, you think desire has anything to do with it, the robots and the man all have emotions, maybe he’s not the best boss, as close to lying he gets, designed to be sympathetic towards Ed, propaganday, why do we trust this institution, a photo of his plastic brain, bio-chemistry, they’re going to fuck around with humans, the alternative is the queen living West Texas planet, emphasizing the cleanness, unpolluted, smoking, drinks a brandy-frappe, what’s best of the child, she’s been reading all the books, Gayelord Hauser for nutrition, parenting books, how they sell of these things to parents, no shopping, no clubs, no social life, the optimistic part of the story, Earth is going to Hell, Dick was an optimist, Hello, Doc!, the event has happened, a top-level robot, it had fooled him, Dr. Bish appeared plump and well-fed, is the robot married, diamond-tie clasp, simulated manicured nails, a pinstriped shirt, white collar vs. blue collar, just the baby daddy, rushed in from the airport, have you seen a squirrel before?, leaned on one way, we can’t trust this, trusting it is the bad thing, we agreed to this, they were intimate at some point, to determine the gender of the child, he’s only gone six months, natural sex, a lady with boobs so he fell in love with her, she’s a monster because she trusts the institutions, yes I am, H.P. Lovecraft, that amazing transformation thing, regular successful businessman, not hairy, the robots becoming too human, Isaac Asimov’s Let’s Get Together, a critical mass of robots, Herbert Goldstone’s Virtuoso, learns to play the piano, music is supposed to be hard, somethings shouldn’t be automated, AI art, two robot taxi drivers are acting like robots, literally human beings who are obeying instructions, turning them into robotic people, ROTC, failed the first day, twirl your rifles, get a haircut, his robot stories are so different, fixed it, could have easily been a chapter in The Humanoids by Jack Williamson, serialized vs. novel, earth vs. an alien planet, expanded novel version is really good, an answer to any objection, a really important concept, any word you don’t know the meaning of your are subject, bleeding under your dura, doctor I know exactly how we fix this, subjecting ourselves to their ideologies, sometimes that’s a good thing, look both ways before you cross the street, a hard concept to get across, when we read these stories, wow that’s really powerful, but why?, escape valve, the place we can run off to, frontiers exist, a perceived option, go west young man, where do Americans run off to?, Taiwan, to Vietnam, not an option, Miss Columbia, propaganda, plant a flag, government giving you an outlet, free real estate, shaped politics for most of American history, pick up your stakes and go, everyone moved to Saskatchewan for free land, then everyone moved to Vancouver for jobs, the dust-bowl, the dirty 30s, 3 million people were displaced, we don’t have the language to describe it, people moving out of California to Texas or Florida, internal movement, region in this, State Controlled Consciousness, every utopian movement, Sunday school, propitiate your ideology, Dr. 2G-Y Bish, bishop, kids put into religious orders, designed to break up the family, outsourced to religion, keeping doctrine, interesting idea, not very many characters, Janet, Ed, a big jump, takes him out into the country, Los Angeles, go back to the city, a general experience, Evan’s generation, the first generation to go to college, those Thanksgivings, those times back are a little weird, at least four or five years to orient back to the working class culture, academic sorts, we gotta get this fence fixed, inspiring and interesting stuff, intellectual stimulation, trying to communicate that, it doesn’t translate very well, rebalance how you talk to people, most people don’t read books, unless youre constantly building up, Jack Williamson, Gilles Deleuze, cows, chickens, horse, chicken business, cow business, the second dimension, initiated into a more bourgeois culture, the double gap, so rich, fairly obscure Philip K. Dick story, following the 9 years, Paul sings the classics, Cat’s in the cradle and the cradle’s on fire?, kill his father and marry his mother, it doesn’t come from the Greeks, Sigmund Freud, is it true?, not exactly, recapitulate the relationships you are trained in, animals training other animals, interacting with other humans, any of the seven times I’ve tried, maybe that’s not true, a structure, he likes older women, where is the libido?, the attitude of Doctor Bish, looking at Peter the baby with a look that was greedy, in Anti-Oedipus, the bureaucrat caresses the forms, Anti-Oedipus by Félix Guattari and Gilles Deleuze, bottom of page 71, creasing the edges with his nail, plugged his desire into rules and regulations and forms, go to the police, see if there’s a detective on duty, it gives them something to do, he’s not like Mr. Spock, sinister and evil and aloof, like Data, Data had curiosity, satire, embodiment of authority, an evil twin (Lore), psychoanalyze Star Trek, the Lore Data stuff, gave him a twitch, Lore made Data have a twitch, there’s a twitch here, a libidinal twitch, different educational institutions, Hampshire College, Fordham University, unstructured to structured Jesuit university, post-modern to classicist language, a whole different language, small economically depressed town where half the stores are closed, an aversion, they were hit with books at school, lame TV too, a reality TV show was cool, marriage counselor reality TV show, what is it on cable?, therapy, if that was L.A., a level beneath, an aversion to reading books, the struggle, Peter Camenzind by Herman Hesse, goes back home, his rural town was better, a spiritual transformation, stained with sweat, page 74, he brought out his pipe and tobacco, a big sulfur match, murmured, this is a good pipe, 25 years ago, do the math, only about twice as old as you, a WWI veteran, WWII guy, at a certain point in life every man starts smoking a pipe, filling and lighting a pipe, old fashioned stuff, that ritual, sucking on a pipe, casting smoke out of their nose, a little bit interested, lost in his reverie, if he was a little more skillful they could’ve connected, he had the right instinct, what makes it a tragedy, when dads fuck off, there’s a problem, wife, institution, capitalism, we could work together, how long it is, almost nothing happens, a walk, a hospital scene, episodes over 9 years, backfill, infodumping, 3 scenes, permission, fill out these forms, the ride in the car and the walk, the last scene, off with Doctor Bish and Peter, the key to Peter’s reactions, emotional, that’s interesting that you think we can connect, oof, anthropological look at the father from the son’s POV, distancing, broken sentence, when you will…, quite right, the backstory talking, bumming around town, outside school rightly, sneaking into the rocket launching yards, hopped over to Mars, a hasher, Ganymede was all sewed up tight, space freighter, worked his way out to Proxima, workaway, I found what I wanted, swelling with pride, little retail and service place, everybody needs a plumber, a good job, the best blue collar job, the pay is very good, when the water starts flooding you need a plumber, building communities, he sounds very free, like a rolling stone, not an appealing life to someone who’s a part of the institution, she doesn’t leave the earth, she likes being under the system, you could go off, there’s fear involved, there’s the comfort of the institution, institutions can’t love you, fill out your forms, ivy coloured walls, drifters, cafeterias, you have money, an efficiency you don’t get at home, living in China, didn’t eat dinner, new job, cafeteria lunch, where do you wanna eat?, doesn’t the food just kind of appear?, where to eat and what to make, drops from your mind really quick, elementary schools in France?, fancy lunches?, 20 years in a highshcool, 2 hours or longer to come back home, sandwich, all sorts of good things in it, presence of the outside inside the institution, “I’m not reduced to the institution, I have my sandwich”, taco Tuesday, people get excited about the rotation, a crazy thing, homemade food, ketchup classified as a vegetable, school lunches program, the healthy food pyramid we just made up, at the top is a greedy corporation, like am institutionalized restaurant, weird hot things, hot lunch and cold lunch, 2 cafeterias in the same school, Cold Lunch Paul, bologna sandwiches, hot lunch for free, against the rules, a person who hasn’t been completely institutionalized, get you hooked on the hot lunch, back to bologna sandwiches, like the place, baloney, 70 liters of chili, more efficiency, the prices start creeping up, adulterating the materials that go into the pot, corruption, let’s have a daycare, a hired person, paying money vs. taking turns, we can lower the quality of the care here, just not loved, all in this little 46 minute story, chat GPT, it can do my homework, I can fire everybody, charge subscriptions, hire somebody to do this, you still hire dishwashers for restaurants, an open version of chat GPT, answer emails from other robots, an efficiency there, students are into chat GPT, grunt garbage work, pedagogical value of repetition, they’d much rather cheat, painting class, if they’re into it they’ll do it, most students don’t want to be essayists, kids doing their homework, punishment, if you get low grades you need more attention from the government forms, chat GPT can be really educational, dialogue with it a lot, The Three-Body Problem, Chinese TV series of 30 episodes, suggestions and prompts, analysis, no that’s not what I want, good ideas, some creativity sparks, Rossignol, better and better, The Ash Grove, makes you cry if you let it, makes children emotional, as a corrective, analyze Philip K. Dick’s story, Progeny, a search engine that’s weak, that’s not enough, you have to work for 20-30 minutes, write some John Adams Thomas Jefferson boy love romance, oh yes you’re right, you overestimate, most teachers can’t even get the assignment clear, make sure you have a period at the end of all your sentences, formatting problems, what this is perfect for, autobiography or memoir, just answer the question, a sophisticated text prediction, good grammar, less important for students, the facts don’t matter that much, formatting is really important, this is a lie, how they get good grades, cheating the system, a good solution to a bad problem, easier for the prisoners, abolish the prisons, new ways to punish students, make other kids do their homework, what chat GPT’s revolution, read this paragraph and reorder them, take out things you don’t like, living in an affluent area, I’m a governess, there’s a scary man, young Tommy is very bright, essay about thermodynamics, describing some of Jesse’s job, same advantage that rich people’s job, it doesn’t help them, how to understand great poetry, a bunch of assignments that are due, parents hire a ghostwriter to right a novel, ivy league school, Rebecca Black’s song Friday, I like sitting in the front seat sometime, super-well produced, something to make their kid feel like a superstar, chat GPT same advantage as the rich kids, we’re pretty conclusive, Pirates Of Venus, north shore of Minnesota, overseas, NSA work, top secret, Evan Lampe is gonna step up, Farnham’s Freehold, 12th – 23rd, Sailing To Byzantium by Robert Silverberg, solved, feeds and resources, podcast schedule, the music under it, crazy, a youtube thing, people don’t know, people discover that audiobooks because of youtube, excited for them, any sign of a ghost is excitement, it’s youtube vs. books, Arthur C. Clarke, past The Colorado Kid, Alex from Pulpcovers was censored, an appeal, after careful review…, sooo careful, a lady might not have any pants on, jealous losers on twitter, White Trash, HOE REPAIR, just exposure, what Jesse likes about Jonathan (he’s read a whole bunch of books Jesse hasn’t read), the guy from Switzerland who had nice handwriting, an autobiography of a character’s soul, a German genre, fake autobiography, Bohemian Europe in the 1890s, talking to farmers, dude, common for some people, fake and phony and putting on airs about intelligent they are, literary circles, don’t read anything past 10 years ago, Scalzi has replaced Heinlein, they say they believe that, keep current, you don’t have time to read both, most of everything was crap, harder to determine today, hasn’t withstood the test of time yet, debating how to pronounce Weichsel in 100 years, first hit rap group, recorded their songs here, hit song, fun catchy song, walking around the town, they saw the sign, that’s it, 50 years from now, this town has not accomplished achievement, absolutely amazing, on the ferry, CTV News, CNN for Canada, tell Americans, the shitty Justin Trudeau government, an extra bunch of money to poors, they want to get reelected, full blown Social Credit, a tax rebate, 19.8% commercial space empty, 50% is much more common in a small town, all for the sake of posterity, chat GPT teachers marking chat GPT homework, dead town, it’s just awful, hang out at the bus stop, hang out at the convenience story, kipple from Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep?, all the non-losers have left for the off-world, the world of the book, same world as Progeny, everybody is replaced by robots, squirrels are dying, institutional pollution, fill the ocean, thesis proven, same setting, same ideas, not literally true, working the same mine, working the same ideas, Nick And The Glimmung, Galactic Pot-Healer, a stepping stone to get to that other idea, androids, robots, three weeks from now, a really good one, Sheba by Jack Higgins, in response to people not liking Dial Of Destiny, the legendary temple of Sheba, put me down, Indiana Jones tanking is kinda bullshit, poor box office, in what period of time, one of the most expensive movies ever made, we didn’t need the first one either, we wanted it, now we don’t want them so much, two versions of The Warriors (1979), available as an audiobook, an excuse to watch it, comic book inserts, less real and gritty, Ship Of Ishtar by A. Merritt, work to do, editing this anthology, for secret operations, bunch of authors, substack, cool public domain stuff, Moon Tomb, the moon and death, Misha Burnett needs to promote better, some salty interesting points on twitter, great cover art, he’s problematic, jealous?, when you get famous enough people become jealous, Poe was a third rate writer, why did they say that?, because its true?, shit all over Lovecraft, lob a grenade and leave and close the door behind them, Edgar Allan Poe, who’s a better poet from the United States?, start making your list now, Annabelle Lee is popular and it’s good, The Song Of Hiawatha by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Mark Twain’s parody of The Raven, Bugs Bunny, controversial, that’s Heinlein in extremis, alcoholic mother and the lawyer father, bridge party, people are not asking for an adaption, see everybody explode, skinny dipping, the young black kid, see you on twitter.

Progeny by Philip K. Dick

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Reading, Short And Deep #401 – The Advent On Channel Twelve by C.M. Kornbluth

Reading, Short And Deep

Reading, Short And Deep #401

Eric S. Rabkin and Jesse Willis discuss The Advent On Channel Twelve by C.M. Kornbluth

Here’s a link to a PDF of the story.

The Advent On Channel Twelve/strong> was first published in Star Science Fiction Stories No. 4, 1958.

Posted by Scott D. Danielson Become a Patron!