Recent not-quite-reads
Dark Sleeper, by Jeffrey E. Barlough. Barlough does a wonderful job of capturing the atmosphere of Dickensian England -- its homey joys, its warmly-glowing hospitality, its delightfully eccentric intellectuals, its coldly vicious misers and desperate criminals. I won't give away any secrets of the plot, but the cover painting of the paperback edition, depicting a Victorian coach being drawn through a mountainous, misty moonlit landscape by a pair of wooly mammoths, should suggest to the careful reader that the quaint village of Salthead may lie far, far beyond the boundaries of Queen Victoria's realm, no matter how many British mannerisms its inhabitants continue to cultivate.
Sadly, I did not read the entire book. Have I mentioned that I find Dickens atmospheric in small quantities but deadly dull in large ones? Someone with more patience might enjoy this book more than I did.
Wednesday, February 28, 2007
Monday, February 26, 2007
Roadtrip in Retrospect
Off to Toronto Friday. Fight with traffic. Fight fight fight. Grrr. Arrive with minutes to spare. Rush to theater with Fiend. Rush rush rush.
The Threepenny Opera! A fast-paced, lively production with Mack the Knife played by an actor who -- cleanshaven, with his hair slicked back, and from a distance -- kept reminding me of a certain brother o' mine. The production took full advantage of Kurt Weill's tunes by incorporating dance routines that complemented them. A few were self-consciously stagey, but some were quite effective, most notably the sensuously, struttingly cynical "Tango-Ballad" between MacHeath and Jenny Diver. The latter can be played as either a pathetic victim or a smoldering she-devil of vengeance. Soulpepper opts for the she-demon, a slinky, Goth-eyed Jenny who plainly despises her former lover and his past treatment of her all the while she dances with him. Polly Peachum's costume and attitude seem to be derived from the image of an English society lady, which of course just augments the contrast between her and MacHeath's usual associates. The idea of portraying the play's dramaturge as a leering butcher with a mocking Anglo-Jamaican accent makes sense, but the cleaver and the hunks of meat and literal bucket of blood that he (or she) disports with are, maybe, just a bit too overtly symbolic.
Saturday: Eugene Onegin, as performed by the Metropolitan Opera. This is an interesting development: live broadcasts of operatic performances, presented in movie theaters around the globe at prices considerably less than one would pay to see the show in person. There were some technical glitches with the first act. A faint, high-pitched buzzing noise overlaid the music, and the movie theater's retractible screen did not rise fully, leaving the top few feet of the screen dark. At one point this had the unfortunate effect of making it look as though the camera were focused on the leading lady's towering, twenty-foot-tall torso while she sang her heart out with her head chopped off and out of frame. Fortunately both flaws were corrected for the second and subsequent acts.
The closeup shots also served to point out one of the conventional fictions of the opera, the fact that the people playing the roles are frequently significantly older than their characters are supposed to be. This is inevitable, of course. Those gloriously powerful voices are not developed or trained overnight, and it would be unusual indeed for any real 16 year old to actually be able to creditably sing the role of purportedly 16 year old Tatiana.
The story in Eugene Onegin moves in a leisurely fashion, with long musical diversions serving to illustrate the characters' internal thoughts. Essentially, it's the story of a doomed flirtation between a naive but intelligent country girl and a callow and self-absorbed young man, the title character. She, living on an isolated country farm, is smitten at first sight. But since he has attained the worldly age of 22 (22!), he rejects her love, claiming that he's too old for her, he's beyond all that, scarred by the world, etc. etc. Clearly, he's read Byron at far too impressionable an age. The first part of the opera concentrates on her viewpoint; the second focuses on him. In what can only be called Opera Logic, he decides to flirt with his best friend's girlfriend at a ball, in order to get revenge on the friend for his boredom at the party. This escalates into deadly duel and disaster as no one, neither protagonist nor freind, seems capable of exerting common sense. I suppose that Opera Logic of this kind is common in the genre -- otherwise there would be a lack of Byronically dramatic moments to immortalize in song.
At any rate, it all ends badly for one of our callow protagonists, but not so badly for the other. The music is beautiful, although unlike more informal operettas such as Threepenny, it has no catchy, self-contained songs that one is likely to hum or whistle while leaving the theater.
Later Saturday night:
Gasoline to drive to Toronto: $2-$3 per gallon
New operating system software: Price undisclosed.
Girlfriend who knows more about updating your laptop computer's operating system than you do: Priceless.
Sunday evening: Oscar time! Huzzah for Pan's Labyrinth, about which more later.
Off to Toronto Friday. Fight with traffic. Fight fight fight. Grrr. Arrive with minutes to spare. Rush to theater with Fiend. Rush rush rush.
The Threepenny Opera! A fast-paced, lively production with Mack the Knife played by an actor who -- cleanshaven, with his hair slicked back, and from a distance -- kept reminding me of a certain brother o' mine. The production took full advantage of Kurt Weill's tunes by incorporating dance routines that complemented them. A few were self-consciously stagey, but some were quite effective, most notably the sensuously, struttingly cynical "Tango-Ballad" between MacHeath and Jenny Diver. The latter can be played as either a pathetic victim or a smoldering she-devil of vengeance. Soulpepper opts for the she-demon, a slinky, Goth-eyed Jenny who plainly despises her former lover and his past treatment of her all the while she dances with him. Polly Peachum's costume and attitude seem to be derived from the image of an English society lady, which of course just augments the contrast between her and MacHeath's usual associates. The idea of portraying the play's dramaturge as a leering butcher with a mocking Anglo-Jamaican accent makes sense, but the cleaver and the hunks of meat and literal bucket of blood that he (or she) disports with are, maybe, just a bit too overtly symbolic.
Saturday: Eugene Onegin, as performed by the Metropolitan Opera. This is an interesting development: live broadcasts of operatic performances, presented in movie theaters around the globe at prices considerably less than one would pay to see the show in person. There were some technical glitches with the first act. A faint, high-pitched buzzing noise overlaid the music, and the movie theater's retractible screen did not rise fully, leaving the top few feet of the screen dark. At one point this had the unfortunate effect of making it look as though the camera were focused on the leading lady's towering, twenty-foot-tall torso while she sang her heart out with her head chopped off and out of frame. Fortunately both flaws were corrected for the second and subsequent acts.
The closeup shots also served to point out one of the conventional fictions of the opera, the fact that the people playing the roles are frequently significantly older than their characters are supposed to be. This is inevitable, of course. Those gloriously powerful voices are not developed or trained overnight, and it would be unusual indeed for any real 16 year old to actually be able to creditably sing the role of purportedly 16 year old Tatiana.
The story in Eugene Onegin moves in a leisurely fashion, with long musical diversions serving to illustrate the characters' internal thoughts. Essentially, it's the story of a doomed flirtation between a naive but intelligent country girl and a callow and self-absorbed young man, the title character. She, living on an isolated country farm, is smitten at first sight. But since he has attained the worldly age of 22 (22!), he rejects her love, claiming that he's too old for her, he's beyond all that, scarred by the world, etc. etc. Clearly, he's read Byron at far too impressionable an age. The first part of the opera concentrates on her viewpoint; the second focuses on him. In what can only be called Opera Logic, he decides to flirt with his best friend's girlfriend at a ball, in order to get revenge on the friend for his boredom at the party. This escalates into deadly duel and disaster as no one, neither protagonist nor freind, seems capable of exerting common sense. I suppose that Opera Logic of this kind is common in the genre -- otherwise there would be a lack of Byronically dramatic moments to immortalize in song.
At any rate, it all ends badly for one of our callow protagonists, but not so badly for the other. The music is beautiful, although unlike more informal operettas such as Threepenny, it has no catchy, self-contained songs that one is likely to hum or whistle while leaving the theater.
Later Saturday night:
Gasoline to drive to Toronto: $2-$3 per gallon
New operating system software: Price undisclosed.
Girlfriend who knows more about updating your laptop computer's operating system than you do: Priceless.
Sunday evening: Oscar time! Huzzah for Pan's Labyrinth, about which more later.
Sunday, February 25, 2007
Recent Reads :
The Victorian Album, by Evelyn Berckman.
I picked this up for a negligible amount in a library sale. I was intrigued by the first few paragraphs of the first chapter, in which the narrator describes her interest in Victorian photographs and their subjects. Like her, I've noticed the way that those posed, stiff, high-contrast photographs look entirely different than the glossy, toothily-grinning portraits of today.
Of course, unlike the narrator, I have never had to find lodgings for myself and a grown daughter in an overheated urban housing market. And although I have lived in my fair share of dilapidated buildings, and explored my fair share of dusty attics full of previous tenants' discarded possessions, I have never come across quite the kind of situation that she encounters. No ornately embossed black binders filled with Victorian family photographs, no cranky and socially-ambitious landladies on the premises, no mysterious packages of correspondence to spin a tale of a century ago.
I enjoyed the atmosphere of the tale, and the way the author developed the central linchpin of her tale subtly enough that I, like the narrator, didn't see what was happening until almost too late.
The Victorian Album, by Evelyn Berckman.
I picked this up for a negligible amount in a library sale. I was intrigued by the first few paragraphs of the first chapter, in which the narrator describes her interest in Victorian photographs and their subjects. Like her, I've noticed the way that those posed, stiff, high-contrast photographs look entirely different than the glossy, toothily-grinning portraits of today.
Of course, unlike the narrator, I have never had to find lodgings for myself and a grown daughter in an overheated urban housing market. And although I have lived in my fair share of dilapidated buildings, and explored my fair share of dusty attics full of previous tenants' discarded possessions, I have never come across quite the kind of situation that she encounters. No ornately embossed black binders filled with Victorian family photographs, no cranky and socially-ambitious landladies on the premises, no mysterious packages of correspondence to spin a tale of a century ago.
I enjoyed the atmosphere of the tale, and the way the author developed the central linchpin of her tale subtly enough that I, like the narrator, didn't see what was happening until almost too late.
In other news....
News stories that have caught my attention lately, but about which I can't add much more than other sources:
The Bush administration's politically-motivated firing of highly-regarded US attorneys in order to replace them with its own partisan hacks. This was, naturally, done through yet another sneaky provision packed into the so-called "Patriot" Act, which, it's increasingly obvious, was never intended to have anything to do with preventing terrorism at all. One of the fired attorneys, Carol Lam, is receiving Bush-style payback for investigating a corrupt Republican congressman. Several are in districts that are home to prominent Democrats (Arkansas, Nevada, New Mexico....). Hence the push to dump the well-regarded attorneys in those jobs and replace them with Republican cronies who can be depended upon to gin up "investigations" of Hillary Clinton, Harold Reid, Bill Richardson, et al, just in time for the 2008 election.
Elsewhere on the frontlines of the war against fascism, the forces of freedom were defeated when a US Circuit Court of Appeals renounced the doctrine of habeas corpus, disregarding the plain language of the Constitution. ("The privilege of the writ of habeas corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in cases of rebellion or invasion the public safety may require it." -- Article One, Section Nine). The government's case amounts to the assertion that the right protected by this portion of the Constitution doesn't exist, and that it may unilaterally sieze anyone, at any time, and imprison and torture them indefinitely without ever filing charges or showing cause. The case now goes to the Supreme Court -- if that body, dominated by Bush appointees, deigns to hear it.
Meanwhile, the Supreme Court of Canada struck down a somewhat milder law that prescribed indefinite detention without cause. (The Canadians, unlike the US, have let torture remain the domain of third world hellholes.)
And, hey, does everybody know that Britney shaved her head? Yes? Yes? Okay, just checking. Gotta keep up with the important stuff.
News stories that have caught my attention lately, but about which I can't add much more than other sources:
The Bush administration's politically-motivated firing of highly-regarded US attorneys in order to replace them with its own partisan hacks. This was, naturally, done through yet another sneaky provision packed into the so-called "Patriot" Act, which, it's increasingly obvious, was never intended to have anything to do with preventing terrorism at all. One of the fired attorneys, Carol Lam, is receiving Bush-style payback for investigating a corrupt Republican congressman. Several are in districts that are home to prominent Democrats (Arkansas, Nevada, New Mexico....). Hence the push to dump the well-regarded attorneys in those jobs and replace them with Republican cronies who can be depended upon to gin up "investigations" of Hillary Clinton, Harold Reid, Bill Richardson, et al, just in time for the 2008 election.
Elsewhere on the frontlines of the war against fascism, the forces of freedom were defeated when a US Circuit Court of Appeals renounced the doctrine of habeas corpus, disregarding the plain language of the Constitution. ("The privilege of the writ of habeas corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in cases of rebellion or invasion the public safety may require it." -- Article One, Section Nine). The government's case amounts to the assertion that the right protected by this portion of the Constitution doesn't exist, and that it may unilaterally sieze anyone, at any time, and imprison and torture them indefinitely without ever filing charges or showing cause. The case now goes to the Supreme Court -- if that body, dominated by Bush appointees, deigns to hear it.
Meanwhile, the Supreme Court of Canada struck down a somewhat milder law that prescribed indefinite detention without cause. (The Canadians, unlike the US, have let torture remain the domain of third world hellholes.)
And, hey, does everybody know that Britney shaved her head? Yes? Yes? Okay, just checking. Gotta keep up with the important stuff.
A sisterhood of bigots
The national leadership of Delta Zeta sorority has made it known (NYT) that only skinny Caucasian airheads with a "dedication to recruitment" are welcome as members.
To their credit, half the remaining members at the DePauw campus quit in disgust. The rest... well, I guess they'll fit right in.
DePauw's response here. Delta Zeta's response here.
Fortunately for Delta Zeta's preferred class of members, those strict membership standards don't seem to extend to tiresome matters like not being a criminal, or passing a drug/alcohol screening. After all, it's not as if they'll ever have to apply for a job.
Online Athens, of Athens Ga., reports that 1 of 3 students arrested in 2006 were Greeks, with Delta Zeta the second-leading sisterhood of collegiate crime. In Ohio, the sorority has been suspended from campuses due to abusive alcohol-soaked hazing practices ("Activities of Sororities Stir Concerns...". Chronicle of Higher Education, Oct. 10, 1990). And in Texas, Delta Zeta seems to be very successful at recruiting cokeheads. Of course, this sort of thing doesn't matter to Delta Zeta sisters, as long as your daddy can pony up the bail money and "fix the charges" whenever those tiresome police bother you about stuff like that. Silly police! Don't they know that they're only supposed to arrest fat people, and brown people? Like, OMG, y'all !!!
I guess if you want your skinny white daughter to be a drunken, coke-snorting airhead with a criminal record, by all means have her rush Delta Zeta. At least you'll know that she won't become friends with anyone who isn't just like her.
The national leadership of Delta Zeta sorority has made it known (NYT) that only skinny Caucasian airheads with a "dedication to recruitment" are welcome as members.
Worried that a negative stereotype of the sorority was contributing to a decline in membership that had left its Greek-columned house here half empty, Delta Zeta’s national officers interviewed 35 DePauw members in November, quizzing them about their dedication to recruitment. They judged 23 of the women insufficiently committed and later told them to vacate the sorority house.
The 23 members included every woman who was overweight. They also included the only black, Korean and Vietnamese members. The dozen students allowed to stay were slender and popular with fraternity men — conventionally pretty women the sorority hoped could attract new recruits.
To their credit, half the remaining members at the DePauw campus quit in disgust. The rest... well, I guess they'll fit right in.
DePauw's response here. Delta Zeta's response here.
Fortunately for Delta Zeta's preferred class of members, those strict membership standards don't seem to extend to tiresome matters like not being a criminal, or passing a drug/alcohol screening. After all, it's not as if they'll ever have to apply for a job.
Online Athens, of Athens Ga., reports that 1 of 3 students arrested in 2006 were Greeks, with Delta Zeta the second-leading sisterhood of collegiate crime. In Ohio, the sorority has been suspended from campuses due to abusive alcohol-soaked hazing practices ("Activities of Sororities Stir Concerns...". Chronicle of Higher Education, Oct. 10, 1990). And in Texas, Delta Zeta seems to be very successful at recruiting cokeheads. Of course, this sort of thing doesn't matter to Delta Zeta sisters, as long as your daddy can pony up the bail money and "fix the charges" whenever those tiresome police bother you about stuff like that. Silly police! Don't they know that they're only supposed to arrest fat people, and brown people? Like, OMG, y'all !!!
I guess if you want your skinny white daughter to be a drunken, coke-snorting airhead with a criminal record, by all means have her rush Delta Zeta. At least you'll know that she won't become friends with anyone who isn't just like her.
Amusing Youtube videos
Several people have sent me links to amusing videos on Youtube lately. Some of the best:
Beer a la Rube Goldberg
March of the Librarians
Medieval Helpdesk (aka Introducing the Book)
Several people have sent me links to amusing videos on Youtube lately. Some of the best:
Beer a la Rube Goldberg
March of the Librarians
Medieval Helpdesk (aka Introducing the Book)
Thursday, February 22, 2007
Poetry Thursday
On Turning Forty
by Walter Kaufman
The years of hope and promise passed --
a spreading smile on water, then
a fleeting grin that turns
into reflection trembling with
the mockery of change.
No refuge in the future left,
no certainty of promise kept
though many broke and drowned,
and no clear image of a past
that grins and grows.
On Turning Forty
by Walter Kaufman
The years of hope and promise passed --
a spreading smile on water, then
a fleeting grin that turns
into reflection trembling with
the mockery of change.
No refuge in the future left,
no certainty of promise kept
though many broke and drowned,
and no clear image of a past
that grins and grows.
Recent reads
Allies of the Earth : railroads and soul of preservation, by Alfred Runte. Runte presents a well-written and impassioned argument in favor of long-distance passenger rail travel. His recollections of the past glories of trains such as the Phoebe Snow, his praise of the way that railroads can harmoniously interact with the landscape, his criticisms of the aesthetic atrocities of the highway and airline industries, and his cynical dissection of the political and accounting practices that have governed Amtrak are all worth reading, but I doubt that he will make many converts from among those who are not already enamored of rail passenger travel.
Allies of the Earth : railroads and soul of preservation, by Alfred Runte. Runte presents a well-written and impassioned argument in favor of long-distance passenger rail travel. His recollections of the past glories of trains such as the Phoebe Snow, his praise of the way that railroads can harmoniously interact with the landscape, his criticisms of the aesthetic atrocities of the highway and airline industries, and his cynical dissection of the political and accounting practices that have governed Amtrak are all worth reading, but I doubt that he will make many converts from among those who are not already enamored of rail passenger travel.
Added to sidebar:
SF Weekly
Locus Magazine
William Contento's Index to Science Fiction Anthologies and Collections
The FictionMags Index
SF Weekly
Locus Magazine
William Contento's Index to Science Fiction Anthologies and Collections
The FictionMags Index
John C. Wright on, well, just about everything
Sci Fi Weekly has a long and intriguing interview with SF author John C. Wright, in which he discusses everything from his own books to classic pulp SF cliches to religious conversion to philosophy, theology, Occam's Razor, Karl Popper, and the tendency of recent YA fiction to focus on topics such as "rapist elfs sodomizing boys with thorn bushes." I have so far avoided reading his books, but perhaps that will change after reading this interview. Excerpts:
Sci Fi Weekly has a long and intriguing interview with SF author John C. Wright, in which he discusses everything from his own books to classic pulp SF cliches to religious conversion to philosophy, theology, Occam's Razor, Karl Popper, and the tendency of recent YA fiction to focus on topics such as "rapist elfs sodomizing boys with thorn bushes." I have so far avoided reading his books, but perhaps that will change after reading this interview. Excerpts:
At some point after your first three epics were completed, you converted to Christianity, having been a resolute humanist before. How did this come about?Religious dogmatism and "Christian Fiction" seem to get the satirical treatment, however:
Wright: Now, this is a difficult question to answer, because to talk of these deep matters automatically provokes half the audience, and bores the other half. I will try to be as brief and delicate as I can.
Humanist is too weak a word. I was an atheist, zealous and absolute, one who held that the nonexistence of God was a fact as easily proved as the inequality of five and twice two.
However, my disbelief began to erode as fatherhood and war pressed upon me the realities of the world. I was a Stoic, a disciple of Epictetus and Marcus Aurelius, Cicero and Seneca, who say the ground of morality is duty; but I was also a liberal of the classical Enlightenment, which says toleration is the ground of morals. Both these strands in my philosophy were naïve: Humans cannot live by the strictness of the Stoics; humans ought not live by the laxness of the liberals, libertarians or libertines. The two strands did not match. Modern philosophy, which is based on self-interest or utilitarianism, is unsuited both for war and for fatherhood. Growing aware of the defects in my system, I sought something with more experience and wisdom....
Has your writing altered fundamentally in spirit since your conversion?
Wright: Well, my next book is titled Crusaders of Aslan Slay the Vile Heretics of Mars, which is an uplifting children's fantasy story about a magic lion ripping to shreds Semi-Arians, Gnostics and Albigensians. On Mars. The sequel will be called A Handmaid's Tale of Mars, in which a benevolent all-powerful theocracy, by strictly enforcing the biblical notions of sacred matrimony and sacred virginity, uplifts the dignity of women. On Mars. And then Matrix of Mars, where a Chosen One from Zion will die and return from the dead, fulfilling the Prophecy and overthrowing the Diabolical Architect of Deception. On Mars. Oh, and Left Behind on Mars, where Michael Valentine Spith, the schismatic founder of a heretical antichurch, turns out to be the Beast from Revelations. But aside from that, no, no obvious Christian influences on my writing. None.
Relax, just kidding! These books take place on Venus, not Mars....
Wednesday, February 21, 2007
On books and libraries and copyright
The last of the batch of short news and commentary links I plan to post today.
From DegreeTutor, a discussion of the continuing usefulness of libraries.
From Tim O'Reilly, the useful factlet that only 4% of books published are being monetized, i.e., are under copyright and commercially available from the rightsholder. He estimates that 20% are in the public domain, leaving approximately 75% of all published books in the "twilight zone" of being out of print but still "protected" by copyright law.
This illustrates a couple of key points that I've harped on before. The doctrine of "first sale", which permits secondhand sellers and libraries to distribute physical copies of published materials that have been properly purchased from the intellectual rightsholder, is critically important because it is currently the only means of access to 75% of all published material. And our current regime of perpetually extensible copyright is simply insane, allowing the interests of those who control access to 4% of published material to dictate that another 75% of the world's published material be suppressed indefinitely for their sake.
The last of the batch of short news and commentary links I plan to post today.
From DegreeTutor, a discussion of the continuing usefulness of libraries.
From Tim O'Reilly, the useful factlet that only 4% of books published are being monetized, i.e., are under copyright and commercially available from the rightsholder. He estimates that 20% are in the public domain, leaving approximately 75% of all published books in the "twilight zone" of being out of print but still "protected" by copyright law.
This illustrates a couple of key points that I've harped on before. The doctrine of "first sale", which permits secondhand sellers and libraries to distribute physical copies of published materials that have been properly purchased from the intellectual rightsholder, is critically important because it is currently the only means of access to 75% of all published material. And our current regime of perpetually extensible copyright is simply insane, allowing the interests of those who control access to 4% of published material to dictate that another 75% of the world's published material be suppressed indefinitely for their sake.
How to make money as a book reviewer
"Over the last seven years, Donald Mitchell, a 60-year-old strategy consultant in Boston, has made $20,000 writing book reviews on Amazon.com...." (From Forbes)
"Over the last seven years, Donald Mitchell, a 60-year-old strategy consultant in Boston, has made $20,000 writing book reviews on Amazon.com...." (From Forbes)
I am not alone
... and I'm not the only one who hates stupid, badly designed mandatory online application software.
... and I'm not the only one who hates stupid, badly designed mandatory online application software.
Dangerous movie alert
Ed Abbey's book The Monkey Wrench Gang, famous for inspiring Earth First!, is reportedly in production as a movie. No word yet on whether Homeland Security agents will be videotaping and profiling everyone who goes to see it.
Ed Abbey's book The Monkey Wrench Gang, famous for inspiring Earth First!, is reportedly in production as a movie. No word yet on whether Homeland Security agents will be videotaping and profiling everyone who goes to see it.
Minnesota legislators have a sense of humor
... as evidenced by this bill before their House of Representatives.
(Lifted from Off Center by way of Neil Gaiman's blog)
... as evidenced by this bill before their House of Representatives.
(Lifted from Off Center by way of Neil Gaiman's blog)
Silly me.
I find this news story quite entertaining. No one in their right mind favors drunk driving, of course. But it seems rather unsporting to convince people they're too drunk to drive by rigging a bathroom urinal to talk to them.
I find this news story quite entertaining. No one in their right mind favors drunk driving, of course. But it seems rather unsporting to convince people they're too drunk to drive by rigging a bathroom urinal to talk to them.
Calling all geeks
Looks like this year's lineup of guests at Penguicon (April 20-22, 2007, in Novi, Michigan) includes Charles Stross, author of The Atrocity Archives and other ghoulishly geeky literary delights, and John Kovalic, creator of Dork Tower and illustrator of Munchkin. Also, Steve Jackson, Elizabeth Bear, John Scalzi, and other interesting folks. If anyone's contemplating being in Michigan this spring, this would be an entertaining weekend to aim for. Where else can you commune with open-source programming geeks, gaming geeks, SF geeks, and Geeks With Guns all at the same time?
Looks like this year's lineup of guests at Penguicon (April 20-22, 2007, in Novi, Michigan) includes Charles Stross, author of The Atrocity Archives and other ghoulishly geeky literary delights, and John Kovalic, creator of Dork Tower and illustrator of Munchkin. Also, Steve Jackson, Elizabeth Bear, John Scalzi, and other interesting folks. If anyone's contemplating being in Michigan this spring, this would be an entertaining weekend to aim for. Where else can you commune with open-source programming geeks, gaming geeks, SF geeks, and Geeks With Guns all at the same time?
Sunday, February 18, 2007
Recent Viewings
Flash Gordon: The Lure of Light and The Subworld Revenge
(1954 television series, with Steve Holland, Irene Champlin, and Joseph Nash)
That's right, kids, once more it's time for Flash Gordon, Dale Arden, and Dr. Zarkov! Time for rockets and rayguns, wobbly sets, weird science, and a warbly soundtrack full of frantically tootling trumpets!
In The Lure of Light, an Earth scientist discovers a way to "fly faster than light" [sic]. It seems to have something to do with turning on a Jacob's Ladder. No one knows what will happen to anyone who "breaks the light barrier". Maybe they'll be turned inside out! Or maybe time will go in reverse!
Unfortunately, Flash Gordon and Commissioner Herrig, a military officer with disturbingly bushy eyebrows, happen to be blabbing to each other about the top secret faster-than-light thingie when a megalomaniac evil space-queen happens to wander into their office. Oops! Our Hero comments that she's especially dangerous because she has the brain of a man. I think that's supposed to be a metaphor, but you never can tell.
Shortly thereafter, some goons kidnap Dale Arden. (Earth Central Command, or whatever it's called, apparently has pretty lax security.) They take her to the evil queen's planet, which seems to consist of a boudoir furnished in Late Victorian Chintz, one citizen (a housemaid), and an Elaborate Deathtrap. The evil queen wants The Secret of faster than light travel. Oh no! If she can reverse time, she can go back in time and conquer the galaxy! Unfortunately, she tries to force the information out of Our Heroine by having the Elaborate Deathtrap suck all the oxygen out of her air, which seems rather counterproductive if speech is desired. But then again, I don't know much about being an evil megalomaniac space-queen, so who am I to comment? After wavering a bit, Our Heroine bravely refuses to yield the information, and the evil queen drains the last bit of oxygen out of her air and kills her. Again, this seems rather counterproductive, but who am I, etc.
Meanwhile, Our Hero and Dr. Zarkov have been flying [sic] to the evil queen's planet. Fortunately her planet has pretty lousy security, too, since immediately after the planet appears in front of them, they burst into the Elaborate Deathtrap where the evil queen and her one subject have just offed Dale Arden.
Alas! If only there were some way to reverse time.... (Hint, hint.)
Actually, come to think of it, it's no sillier than Superman.
But in The Subworld Revenge, things get even goofier. The king of the "subworld" is back up to his old tricks, trying to find a way to burst out into the surface world and CONQUER THE WORLD! by releasing flows of lava. The actor playing the king of the subworld seems to enjoy hamming it up, and the result is something like Richard III as played by one of the Three Stooges. Apparently it doesn't take much to rule the Subworld, whose other inhabitants seem to be chubby morons in diapers, who grunt incoherently when not flailing around ineffectually with bullwhips that they clearly have no idea how to use.
Fortunately, Dr. Zarkov has just figured out a way to look through the mass of the Earth and watch what the Subworlders are up to. Also fortunately, Our Heroes still have the Earth-burrowing vessel called The Earthworm with which they defeated the Subworld in a previous episode. Now it's up to them to save the world again. They don't seem to be disturbed by the fact that the corrugated-metal walls of their ship visibly flap up and down whenever it's in motion.
The scientific terminology in this episode is a joy. Dr. Zarkov, before heading off the to subworld, packs a trip bag with useful things like Anti-Heat Serum, Atomic Demagnetizers and concentrated oxygen tubes. When Our Heroes head downward in The Earthworm, we find out that they cannot receive messages from the surface because the earth-burrowing vessel creates a strong electrostatic field that destroys all sound waves.
Which turns out to be important because... oh no! It's a trap!
The fun of Flash Gordon isn't in things like plausible plots. Nor the acting, which is somewhat stiffer than the framing for the sets. But there are other delights to be had. Consider, for example, the ease with which Flash Gordon's shiny blond pompadour defies gravity under all conditions! Or the sense of style displayed in his uniform! Has a white T-shirt with a cartoon lightning bolt sewn onto it ever looked better?
There are mysteries to contemplate as well. For example, why does one of Commissioner Herrig's disturbingly bushy eyebrows have a very visible hole in it, through which gleaming skin can be seen?
The visual effects, of course, are crude at best. It's tempting to laugh at them too, but on second thought I have to have a certain degree of grudging respect for anyone who even attempted to depict spaceships in motion given the primitive equipment available at the time. Some of them even have a certain naive retro charm. I mean, who can resist a space-speedometer with an analog dial?
Even so, the MST3K-style charm wears off after a couple of episodes, and I'm going to let my sense of humor recover a bit before delving into the two episodes of Rocky Jones, Space Ranger, that share the DVD.
PS. Noted in closing credits: "Filmed in West Berlin." Anybody have any idea why?
Flash Gordon: The Lure of Light and The Subworld Revenge
(1954 television series, with Steve Holland, Irene Champlin, and Joseph Nash)
That's right, kids, once more it's time for Flash Gordon, Dale Arden, and Dr. Zarkov! Time for rockets and rayguns, wobbly sets, weird science, and a warbly soundtrack full of frantically tootling trumpets!
In The Lure of Light, an Earth scientist discovers a way to "fly faster than light" [sic]. It seems to have something to do with turning on a Jacob's Ladder. No one knows what will happen to anyone who "breaks the light barrier". Maybe they'll be turned inside out! Or maybe time will go in reverse!
Unfortunately, Flash Gordon and Commissioner Herrig, a military officer with disturbingly bushy eyebrows, happen to be blabbing to each other about the top secret faster-than-light thingie when a megalomaniac evil space-queen happens to wander into their office. Oops! Our Hero comments that she's especially dangerous because she has the brain of a man. I think that's supposed to be a metaphor, but you never can tell.
Shortly thereafter, some goons kidnap Dale Arden. (Earth Central Command, or whatever it's called, apparently has pretty lax security.) They take her to the evil queen's planet, which seems to consist of a boudoir furnished in Late Victorian Chintz, one citizen (a housemaid), and an Elaborate Deathtrap. The evil queen wants The Secret of faster than light travel. Oh no! If she can reverse time, she can go back in time and conquer the galaxy! Unfortunately, she tries to force the information out of Our Heroine by having the Elaborate Deathtrap suck all the oxygen out of her air, which seems rather counterproductive if speech is desired. But then again, I don't know much about being an evil megalomaniac space-queen, so who am I to comment? After wavering a bit, Our Heroine bravely refuses to yield the information, and the evil queen drains the last bit of oxygen out of her air and kills her. Again, this seems rather counterproductive, but who am I, etc.
Meanwhile, Our Hero and Dr. Zarkov have been flying [sic] to the evil queen's planet. Fortunately her planet has pretty lousy security, too, since immediately after the planet appears in front of them, they burst into the Elaborate Deathtrap where the evil queen and her one subject have just offed Dale Arden.
Alas! If only there were some way to reverse time.... (Hint, hint.)
Actually, come to think of it, it's no sillier than Superman.
But in The Subworld Revenge, things get even goofier. The king of the "subworld" is back up to his old tricks, trying to find a way to burst out into the surface world and CONQUER THE WORLD! by releasing flows of lava. The actor playing the king of the subworld seems to enjoy hamming it up, and the result is something like Richard III as played by one of the Three Stooges. Apparently it doesn't take much to rule the Subworld, whose other inhabitants seem to be chubby morons in diapers, who grunt incoherently when not flailing around ineffectually with bullwhips that they clearly have no idea how to use.
Fortunately, Dr. Zarkov has just figured out a way to look through the mass of the Earth and watch what the Subworlders are up to. Also fortunately, Our Heroes still have the Earth-burrowing vessel called The Earthworm with which they defeated the Subworld in a previous episode. Now it's up to them to save the world again. They don't seem to be disturbed by the fact that the corrugated-metal walls of their ship visibly flap up and down whenever it's in motion.
The scientific terminology in this episode is a joy. Dr. Zarkov, before heading off the to subworld, packs a trip bag with useful things like Anti-Heat Serum, Atomic Demagnetizers and concentrated oxygen tubes. When Our Heroes head downward in The Earthworm, we find out that they cannot receive messages from the surface because the earth-burrowing vessel creates a strong electrostatic field that destroys all sound waves.
Which turns out to be important because... oh no! It's a trap!
The fun of Flash Gordon isn't in things like plausible plots. Nor the acting, which is somewhat stiffer than the framing for the sets. But there are other delights to be had. Consider, for example, the ease with which Flash Gordon's shiny blond pompadour defies gravity under all conditions! Or the sense of style displayed in his uniform! Has a white T-shirt with a cartoon lightning bolt sewn onto it ever looked better?
There are mysteries to contemplate as well. For example, why does one of Commissioner Herrig's disturbingly bushy eyebrows have a very visible hole in it, through which gleaming skin can be seen?
The visual effects, of course, are crude at best. It's tempting to laugh at them too, but on second thought I have to have a certain degree of grudging respect for anyone who even attempted to depict spaceships in motion given the primitive equipment available at the time. Some of them even have a certain naive retro charm. I mean, who can resist a space-speedometer with an analog dial?
Even so, the MST3K-style charm wears off after a couple of episodes, and I'm going to let my sense of humor recover a bit before delving into the two episodes of Rocky Jones, Space Ranger, that share the DVD.
PS. Noted in closing credits: "Filmed in West Berlin." Anybody have any idea why?
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