Michael Shea: Nifft the Lean, Pt. 2

See previous post for introduction and discussion of the First Adventure.

Warning: I will discuss significant events and endings.


Second Adventure:

"The Pearls of the Vampire Queen"

In his usual pedantic and fussy manner, Shag Margold tells us that this tale came to him from Ellen Errin (also known as Greymalkin Mary), Nifft's long time friend and lover. At the end of the introduction, Margold poses an ethical question that has long bothered him: is the rule of the Vulvula, the Vampire Queen worse than that of the Hipparch, the cruel ruler of Gelidor, whose main export is weapons of war, and who is also suspected of fomenting conflicts. Or, to put it Margold's words: "Who drinks more blood--the Hipparch or Queen Vulvula?"

Briefly, Nifft and Barnar are broke. They decide to improve their financial status by favoring the country of Fregor Ingens with a visit. Fregor Ingens is the only known source of the rare black pearls, much favored by the rich and powerful, and they decide to do a little free-lance pearl diving of their own. The pearl trade, of course, is strictly controlled by the government, so their first concern is to avoid being spotted. Diving for the pearls is usually handled by a team of three people. Two are needed to grab the tentacles of the plant (it's a flesh-eater, naturally), and third to grab pearls. However, two can do it if one is extremely strong (Barnar) and one extremely fast and nimble (Nifft). The thought of hiring on as legitimate pearl divers never occurs to Nifft and Barnar.

The work is hard and dangerous, and their hoard grows slowly. On learning of the festival that's being held in the capital city, Nifft decides that there's an easier way of becoming rich, although it's even more dangerous. The festival is the annual festival of renewal for the Queen. For one year, a young male is given all that he desired. Whatever he wanted, he was given. At the end of his year's "reign," the Queen would drain him of all of his blood. This will restore her strength and her youth and allow her to live another year, slowly aging, until the next festival.

This is reminiscent of certain spring festivals held many centuries ago here on Earth in which certain individuals were treated "royally" for a specified length of time, frequently a year, and then sacrificed to the gods to ensure a good harvest. It's also a reminder of the old tradition that the ruler was identified with the land and the land with the ruler. A healthy ruler insured a healthy land. In the Arthurian Quest for the Holy Grail, Percival encounters a wounded king whose affliction mirrors his kingdom, which has been described in some accounts as the Wasteland.

There was a condition though: she needed to drain every last drop of his blood, or the restoration would not be complete. At the next festival, therefore, she would again be restored, but she would have aged a bit that corresponded to the amount of his blood that she didn't consume. Nifft's plan was simple: steal a cup of blood and hold it for ransom.

It all works out as planned, except for one minor detail. They decide to make their escape on the back of a basilicus, a flying beast that is too stupid to be considered a true demon, but it is controllable. It was commonly thought to be the fastest flying critter on the planet, but Nifft and Barnar soon discovered "that there is something faster than a basilicus." They never learned its name, but its description sounded like a gigantic praying mantis to me. While it cost them part of the ransom, this turned out to be a highly successful trip.


Third Adventure:

"The Fishing of the Demon-Sea"

According to Shag Morgold, this tale is told by Nifft himself, in his own hand. Margold provides the reader with a brief history of Kairnheim, the location of this adventure.

Nifft and Barnar have arrived in Kine Gather, a city in Karnheim, with thoughts of improving their financial status. Before they get a chance to do much more than look over the town, they are arrested and found guilty of thievery when "evidence" is found that proves they have committed at least one theft. Seconds before they are to be executed, a herald bursts onto the scene ordering them to halt the execution. Nifft immediately recognizes the situation. They were set up in order to persuade them to undertake a perilous task, one so dangerous that only those facing imminent death would agree to it.

The son of one of the most powerful men in Kine Gather has been kidnapped by a demon. Actually it's his fault. He's a perfect example of the oft-quoted line--"a little learning is a dangerous thing"--especially when accompanied by stupidity and an irrational belief in one's superior powers and in one's immortality. Such is Wimfort, the son of Rod-Master Kamin. Unfortunately, he managed to correctly perform a summoning spell for demons, but, even more unfortunately, he didn't do as well with the spell of protection. Wimfort summoned the demon, who promptly grabbed him and returned home, to the Demon-Sea.

Nifft and Barnar's task is easy: go down to the Demon-Sea and rescue the Rod-Master's son. To prevent them from just taking off for parts unknown when given the chance, a magic spell is placed on them that causes pain even when only thinking of doing anything but rescuing the Rod-Master's pride and joy.

After numerous painful and bloody encounters they finally manage to rescue Kamin's P and J. Wimfort's gratitude is overwhelming:

" 'My father sent you . . .' echoed the boy. I [Nifft] was getting alarmed--his stare was so wide. 'Three months here!' he groaned. 'Three months. And my father sent you. He waited two months, and then sent a pair of baboons on foot who took another two months to get here!' His voice was rising to a howl as uncontrolled as his arithmetic was getting. "A good wizard could have had me out in a day! That dung-heap! That greedy, stingy dung-heap! THREE MONTHS!'"

The trip back was worse than the trip there. In addition to the other dangers, they now had to protect Wimfort who seemed determined to kill himself and his rescuers. It wasn't long before I decided that he should have been left there as he provides strong evidence in support of Robert A. Heinlein's theory of child raising. According to RAH, the child, after birth, should be placed in a barrel and fed through the bunghole. Once it reaches puberty, close the bunghole.




Fourth and Final Adventure:

"The Goddess in Glass"

This tale is quite different from the first three. Nifft appears to be a bystander, although he has worked himself into becoming a member of the priestess's inner circle of advisers. What he does behind the scenes, if anything, can only be guessed at.

Shag Margold had asked Nifft if he would stop at Anvil Pastures, a city whose main export is weaponry, to get some information about its chief religious cult. The divinity appears to be dead, but it is known to somehow transmit information to its priestess or oracle. Margold is doing a treatise on this cult and lacks certain information.

Nifft agrees and travels to Anvil Pastures, which he finds in turmoil. Months ago, the goddess/ alien? who may be dead or hibernating, asked, through the priestess/oracle, Dame Lybis, that the town gather up a herd of certain animals which had recently emerged from underground and bring them to the vicinity of the town. As Nifft soon learns, the town generally responds to such requests only if there's a profit to be made. As this would be expensive and unprofitable, the town's leaders ignored the request.

Shortly afterwards, the goddess provided information about a source of ore for weapons that was unknown to the town at this time. This time the leaders listened, and the ore was found to be a superior material for weapons. Prosperity was at hand. Months later, however, mining of the nearby mountain range had caused a shifting of large quantities of rock, much of which was now poised to come crashing down on the town. An appeal to the goddess produced a solution: bring the herd of animals from its present location to the town, as it had requested months ago.

The townspeople did and then went to the goddess. The oracle brought the following message: the goddess was pleased, but now a new problem had occurred, for which the goddess had a solution. The townspeople had no choice but to comply. This pattern repeats--as each problem is solved, a new one appears. At one point, the herd of animals that the goddess wanted brought to the vicinity became a threat to the town. They were lithovores--rock eaters--and were working their way towards town. The goddess suggested that all the gold in town be melted down into sheets and placed against a ridge that was between the lithovores and the town. Lithovores didn't eat gold. Hmmmm...

Frankly this sounds a lot like a scam to me, especially since Nifft is now one of Dame Lybis' advisors, or perhaps there's a closer, more intimate relationship?

The resolution soon becomes obvious: the townspeople are going to be punished for their sins. Of course, it isn't clear as to which sins in particular they are being punished for, but their punishment is inevitable.

I had read this book many years ago, so long ago I can't remember why, for I normally don't read this type. However, it stayed with me, and I decided to read it again. It was only during the second reading that I began to see just what Shea has worked into his stories. And, I suspect I've picked up only a few of the echoes of literature and ancient traditions that are present.


Overall Rating: Highly recommended.


I forgot to mention that Michael Shea went on to write two novels featuring Nifft the Lean.

The second book in the series is The Mines of Behemoth, again with Barnar Hammer-Hand. The third is A'rak. Barnar isn't in this one.

I haven't read either of them, but I do have both in my long queue. I think I'll move them up a bit.

Michael Shea: Nifft the Lean

Michael Shea's Nifft the Lean is the type of work that I seldom read. It's fantasy with a strong tinge of the horror tale about it. Actually, I should say tales since it's not a novel, but four separate stories with a linking device. Each of the stories is told by Shag Margold, a historian, about the exploits of his friend Nifft, known as the Lean. Margold tends to be on the fussy side, a bit pedantic, but don't let Margold's "Eulogy" and prefaces discourage you. Once he gets beyond the academic blather, he turns into a very good story teller. He did not witness the events of the stories for as he tells us, most of the information comes from Nifft himself and from Nifft's friends.

The four stories are really separate tales, linked only by the presence of Nifft and his friend Barnar. The work probably could be described as a "picaresque novel," even though not considered a novel in the traditional sense. According to the Wikipedia entry, picaresque comes from the Spanish picaro which translates into English as rogue or rascal. The novel is a series of stories, therefore, about a "hero of low social class who lives by his wits in a corrupt society." The article also points out that "[s]ome science fiction and fantasy books also show a clear picaresque influence, transported to a variety of invented worlds—for example, 'The Dying Earth" series of Jack Vance [and] Fritz Leiber's 'Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser.' " I think a number of role-playing games have adopted this format.


Warning: I will discuss some significant plot elements and events, and in some cases, the ending.


First Adventure: "Come then Mortal, We Will Seek Her Soul"

This tale has a more complicated frame structure than the other three. Presumably Shag Margold is presenting us with a tale that is "Nifft's own composition" but is obviously written by a professional scribe, implying that Nifft had someone else take dictation. Once into the tale, we find that the tale is actually a frame for another story.

Nifft and Barnar are on the road and make camp. That night, Nifft tells Barnar of an adventure that began years ago on this same campsite. It is about the time that Nifft and Haldar Dirkness, Nifft's companion before he met up with Barnar, went down to Hell. In fact, it is the tale of his last adventure with Haldar.

Nifft becomes part of a long and illustrious fellowship when he makes his journey into the underworld: Gilgamesh, Odin, Orpheus, Odysseus, Aeneas, and, of course, Dante, among others. Once there, his experiences do not differ greatly from the others. All have to cross water by boat, and all get the chance to talk to some of the inhabitants, and no doubt, come away wiser than before, probably. And, as always, there is a price to be paid.

Nifft, though, has a slightly different reason for his trip. The others go down to hell either to bring back someone or at least to get information which would help them on their quest. Nifft has a different task: he is to bring a living person down to the underworld as the bequest of another already there.

The person making the request is Dalissem. She has come back to beg Nifft and Haldar to bring her lover Defalk down to join her where she resides, in the Place of the Raging Dead. She was destined to be a priestess and therefore had to remain a virgin. However, she and Defalk fell in love and, eventually, were caught. They swore a suicide pact. When she got the opportunity, she killed herself, but Defalk reneged when he got off with only a warning. That was seven years ago (the magic number seven pops up everywhere), and she was tired of waiting for him. She promises them the Wizard's Key, a device of great power, if they would capture Defalk and bring him down to Hell.

As is typical of other trips to the underworld, there is a toll to be paid. Nifft gives up his left ear (with all the blood spurting about, the demons don't notice that they didn't get the entire ear, just the lobe--that's why Nifft volunteered to do the cutting himself). Haldar sacrifices his index finger, while Defalk loses an eye. That Defalk gains some wisdom on this trip reminded me of Odin in Norse mythology who goes down to the underworld to gain wisdom and must lose an eye as payment.

There are strong resemblances to Dante's Inferno in this tale. They, like Dante, had a guide. And, on their journey through the underworld, the three see numerous examples of souls being tortured by demons. In Dante's underworld, these are sinners and we are told why these souls are being punished. In Shea's story, it's not clear why many of these are here or why they are punished. At times I wondered if this is the fate of all, not just the evil ones. But, this is not true for all. Some earn a special place in Hell. Dalissem, for one, is condemned to the Place of the Raging Dead.

The Place of the Raging Dead is "a dim cauldron of gales" where "the winds wrestled and surged and blew in constant contradictions." It is a place where those with strong emotions are condemned to be blown about by winds that surge first one way and then another, as these people are by their emotions.

In Dante's Inferno, the first circle of Hell itself is for the carnal sinners "who are blown about forever on stormy winds. . . "

from Canto V

I came into a place of all light dumb
That bellows like a storm in the sea-deep
When the thwart winds that strike it roar and hum.

The abysmal tempest that can never sleep
Snatches the spirits and headlong hurries them,
Beats and besets them with its whirling sweep.

. . .

I learnt that in such restless violence blown
This punishment the carnal sinners share
Whose reason by desire was overthrown."



In both works, the sinners, or those doomed to reside here for eternity, are those whose emotions are strong and contrary, sufficient to overthrow reason. Their fate is to be blown about forever, never to rest, a symbol of their life on earth which also found them uncontrollably tossed about by their emotions.

The fates of the three--Nifft, Haldar, and Defalk--differ, as befits their differing souls. Haldar, whose strong passions and high-minded principles, echo those of Dalissem, gains his chosen fate. Defalk learns too late what he has lost when he abandoned his Dalissem and the suicide pact and loses all therefore, but he accepts his fate with a courage and valor that were not evident when we first meet him. And Nifft, ever the pragmatic one--his only concern is getting out of hell, alive, as quickly as possible, and he, also, gets his wish.

To be continued in my next post.

Nikos Kazantzakis: Feb. 18, 1883--Oct. 26, 1957

I first discovered Nikos Kazantzakis, not through his writings but through a film. I was so fascinated by the film Zorba the Greek that I went out and found the novel. After that, I searched for everything I could find by him. I now have around ten novels and several prose works--travel writings and some of his philosophical and autobiographical works. My favorite is, though, Zorba the Greek.




Zorba: on freedom

The Englishman, who in a way has been adopted by Zorba, is getting ready to leave. The Englishman says:

" 'Perhaps I'll stay here with you . . . I'm free.'

Zorba shook his head.

'No, you're not free,' he said. 'The string you're tied to is perhaps no longer than other people's. That's all. You're on a long piece of string, boss; you come and go, and think you're free, but you never cut the string in two. And when people don't cut that string . . .'

'I'll cut it some day!' I said defiantly, because Zorba's words had touched an open wound in me and hurt.

'It's difficult, boss, very difficult. You need a touch of folly to do that; folly, d'you see? You have to risk everything! But you've got such a strong head, it'll always get the better of you. A man's head is like a grocer; it keeps accounts: I've paid so much and earned so much and that means a profit of this much or a loss of that much! The head's a careful little shopkeeper; it never risks all it has, always keeps something in reserve. It never breaks the string. Ah no! It hangs on tight to it, the bastard! If the string slips out of its grasp, the head, poor devil, is lost, finished! But if a man doesn't break the string, tell me, what flavor is left in life? The flavor of camomile, weak camomile tea! Nothing like rum--makes you see life inside and out.' "


Zorba's santuri (a stringed instrument)

"He placed the santuri on his lap, bent over it, lightly touched the strings--as if he were consulting it to see what tune they should sing, as if he were begging it to wake, as if he were trying to coax it into keeping company with his wandering spirit which was tired of solitude. He tried a song. It somehow would not come out right; he abandoned it and began another; the strings grated as if in pain, as if they did not want to sing. Zorba leaned against the wall, mopped his brow, which had suddenly started to perspire.

'It doesn't want to. . . .,' he muttered, looking with awe at the santuri, 'it doesn't want to!'

He wrapped it up again with care, as if it were a wild animal and he was afraid it might bite. He rose slowly and hung it on the wall.

'It doesn't want to. . . .' he muttered again, 'it doesn't' want to . . . we mustn't force it!'

He sat down once more on the ground, poked some chestnuts amongst the embers and filled the glasses with wine. He drank, drank again, shelled a chestnut and gave it to me.

'Can you make it out, Boss?' he asked me. 'It's beyond me. Everything seems to have a soul--wood, stones, the wine we drink and the earth we tread on. Everything, boss, absolutely everything!' '



Zorba on dance:

" 'Why don't you laugh? Why d'you look at me like that? That's how I am. There is a devil in me who shouts, and I do what he says. Whenever I feel I'm choking with some emotion, he says: 'Dance!' and I dance. And I feel better! Once, when my little Dimitraki died, in Chalcidice, I got up as I did a moment ago and I danced. The relations and friends who saw me dancing in front of the body rushed up to stop me. 'Zorba has gone mad!' But if at that moment I had not danced, I should really have gone mad--from grief. Because it was my first son and he was three years old and I could not bear to lose him. You understand what I'm saying, boss, don't you--or am I talking to myself?' "


Zorba on getting old:

" 'I'm white on top already, boss, and my teeth are getting loose. I've no time to lose. You're young, you can still afford to be patient. I can't. But I do declare, the older I get the wilder I become! Don't let anyone tell me old age steadies a man! Not that when he sees death coming he stretches out his neck and says: Cut off my head, please, so that I can go to heaven! The longer I live, the more I rebel. I'm not going to give in; I want to conquer the world!' "


Zorba: the past, present, and future--

" 'I've stopped thinking all the time of what happened yesterday. And stopped asking myself what's going to happen tomorrow. What's happening today, this minute, that's what I care about. I say: 'What are you doing at this moment, Zorba? 'I'm sleeping.' 'Well, sleep well.' 'What are you doing at this moment, Zorba?' 'I'm working.' 'Well, work well.' 'What are you doing at this moment, Zorba?' 'I'm kissing a woman.' 'Well, kiss her well, Zorba! And forget all the rest while you're doing it: there's nothing else on earth, only you and her! Get on with it!' "


If you haven't read anything by Nikos Kazantzakis, then I would strongly recommend doing so, and Zorba the Greek is a good place to start. Perhaps you might want to try the film first; it's what ensnared me.


A link to the Cretan Museum Web page on Nikos Kazantzakis.

http://tinyurl.com/ycj8y9j

The Rubaiyat: Quatrain XXII

This is the second quatrain in what I see as a linked series of three quatrains.


First Edition: Quatrain XXII

And we, that now make merry in the Room
They left, and Summer dresses in new Bloom,
Ourselves must we beneath the Couch of Earth
Descend, ourselves to make a Couch--for whom?


Second Edition: Quatrain XXIII

And we, that now make merry in the Room
They left, and Summer dresses in new bloom,
Ourselves must we beneath the Couch of Earth
Descend--ourselves to make a Couch--for whom?


Fifth Edition: Quatrain XXIII

And we, that now make merry in the Room
They left, and Summer dresses in new bloom,
Ourselves must we beneath the Couch of Earth
Descend--ourselves to make a Couch--for whom?


The changes over the five versions are minor: "Bloom" which has a upper case "B" now has a lower case "b" for the second and the fifth editions. The comma in the first edition following "Descend" in the fourth line is changed to a dash for succeeding editions. In fact, the second and fifth versions are identical.

I think the linkage to the previous quatrain is quite clear. In the second line, the "They" who left refers back to Quatrain XXI: the "some we loved, the loveliest and the best . . . [who] crept silently to Rest." We have taken their place , but eventually we also must "Descend, ourselves to make a Couch . . ."

As we read in "Ecclesiastes"

"One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh:
but the earth abideth for ever."

One more point should be made, I think. Previous quatrains had referred to Spring, but this quatrain mentions Summer, which provides a subtle hint that time is passing. If it is now Summer, Autumn and Winter are rapidly approaching.

Quatrains XXI and XXII point out that even as the "loveliest and the best" must go on, so shall we ourselves one day make room for another, and that other will be unknown to us. But, this doesn't seem quite adequate, for something is missing from these two observations, perhaps some conclusion to be drawn here. This is why I think Quatrain XXIII is linked to XXI and XXII.

Tobias Smollett: Humphry Clinker

Actually, the full title of the novel is The Expedition of Humphry Clinker, and it was published in 1771, the same year Smollett died. It is considered his best novel, quite different and far superior to his earlier works. Unfortunately, Smollett died before he had a chance to write another, so he was unable to increase his standing among 18th century writers.

Just why Smollett named the novel as he did is still not clear to me. This is an epistolary novel which consists of letters written by five characters on a journey to Scotland. Humphry Clinker is not one of the five letter-writers, and he doesn't even appear until the reader is at least 1/4 to 1/3 into the novel. Most copies of the work simply call it Humphry Clinker and forget the expeditionary part. A more apt title, I think, would be The Expedition of Squire Bramble.

Most of the novel takes place on a journey to Scotland undertaken by Squire Matthew Bramble and members of his family. First and foremost is, of course, the Squire, who is the moving force behind the journey. He suffers from gout and various digestive ailments and refers to himself as a valetudinarian. He usually is wise and kind and generous, except when bothered by his various ailments or by bad weather or by obnoxious people, or at least those he considers obnoxious.

A significant member of the traveling party is Tabitha Bramble, the Squire's spinster sister, whose main goal in life is getting a husband, and much of the fun of the novel is watching her set her traps for anything in pants who appears on the horizon and seems to be lacking a spouse. Also occupying a seat in the coach is Jery Melford, Squire Bramble's nephew and heir apparent, who is somewhat distant from his uncle as they are not in agreement on many issues. Lydia Melford, Jery's sister, is also present, as is a maid, Winifred Jenkins. The story is told by these five people in letters to their friends and confidants. Humphry Clinker joins them on their journey as a servant, mainly because of the Squire's generosity. When they first meet, Clinker is impoverished and barely covered by his rags.

Warning: From this point on, I will discuss significant plot elements as well as the ending to the novel.


Smollett has gone to some pains to include every possible cliche normally found in the 18th century novel. First are the young lovers. Lydia has fallen in love with a young man who doesn't appear to be at her social and economic level and is therefore forbidden to have any contact with him. He then tells her that he will leave temporarily and return with proof of his high social standing, the equal of her family, at least. She, of course, spends much of the trip pining away for her young man. Jery, her brother, is so incensed at the young man's suit to his sister that he challenges him to a duel when he sees him during the journey. At the site of the duel, Jery discovers that a mistake has been made and apologizes to the man, who coincidentally has the same name as Lydia's suitor.

As already mentioned above, we have Tabitha, a constant source of amusement as she goes charging madly off after every single male who appears. There is Winifred, the attractive young maid, who, according to her letters, wouldn't be better than she should, given the opportunity. There is an attack by highwaymen who have designs upon the Bramble finery and currency, as well as what appears to be a reformed highwayman, looking for an opportunity to get out of the business. Can he be trusted?

And, what's lacking so far is an unjust imprisonment, in which one of the characters is falsely accused of a crime, one whose penalty is hanging. It's Clinker's turn now, as he ends up in jail, accused of being part of a robber gang.

A common problem in 18th century novels is that of identity. The novels are filled with people traveling under false names, either deliberately or unknowingly. A number of the characters in this novel are not using either their right names or a name they have used in the past, which adds to the confusion. And, as should be expected, a natural (illegitimate) child appears who is joyfully reunited with his father at the end.

And, predictably, numerous coincidences occur. Near the end of the novel, the coach overturns while fording a rain-swollen stream, and Clinker rescues the Squire. They find they are near the home of the Dennison family who graciously takes them in, for Squire Bramble is in no shape to travel. In addition, the coach itself needs repairs. The Dennisons introduce themselves and tell them that they have a son, who happens to be visiting a friend and should be home the next day. I'll bet that nobody could ever guess just who their absent son is.

As befits the formal definition of a comedy, the work ends happily with three marriages. Jery and his uncle now are in harmony once again. Clinker is reunited with his father. Squire Bramble's gout and various digestive problems have disappeared, and the Squire decides that perhaps a little regular exercise and some care taken about his diet could be beneficial.

Along with the above, the reader is blessed with various rants and raves about parliament, the jury system, medical quackery, and religious preachers, primarily the Methodists. Smollett even throws in, at no extra cost, a sentimental happening that has nothing whatsoever to do with the story, except that it gives the characters and the readers an opportunity to demonstrate their sensitivity and sensibility by shedding tears of joy at a family reunion.

Overall Rating: I enjoyed the novel. It, however, is quite different from the modern novel, and those who believe that novels must be in the modern mode will not appreciate The Expedition of Humphry Clinker.

District 9: a film

One of the most unusual, and perhaps unforgettable, SF films I've seen recently is District 9. I hadn't heard much about the film, but it was recommended to me as one I would enjoy. I checked with the public library and was surprised to discover that it had purchased 62 copies (that suggests someone thought it was going to be popular) and what was more surprising was that, in spite of the relatively large number of copies, the waiting list was over 100 when I signed on. I just checked a few minutes ago, and there are now 180 people on the waiting list. Apparently a large number of people had heard about the film.

I am surprised that it is so popular, for it doesn't strike me as being a film that would attract many people. It is a dark, gritty film; it is not pretty. It is shot, in part, in documentary style. Many of the scenes are shot as though it was a real-time documentary film. This gives it a sense of immediacy and suggests that this is really happening, right now--unbelievable as it may seem--you are seeing it as it happens.

The Plot: an alien space ship suddenly appears over Johannesburg, South Africa. After waiting for something to happen, the humans go up, cut their way into the ship, and find several thousand aliens in very bad shape: most are starving, and many are ill. The aliens are brought down to an area on the outskirts of Johannesburg and eventually allowed to stay. This area is designated District 9, and it becomes a restricted area--For Aliens Only--a ghetto actually. The aliens--later nicknamed Prawns--could leave the district but had to return. They could live nowhere else. This happens several decades before the events of the film.

Or, to put it in today's headlines, these are interstellar "boat people" who have been confined to a refugee camp for several decades now. Generally, "boat people" leave their homes in order to find a better place to live. If so, what has happened to induce these to leave their home planet.

Now, the powers-that-be decide that it is too dangerous and inflammatory to have many thousands of aliens living in such close proximity to a large human area, so they decide to set up another reservation several hundred miles away. Wikus Van De Merwe is appointed to head the relocation of the aliens. The film begins at this point.


Warning: I will discuss significant plot elements and the resolution of the film.


Van De Merwe, played superbly by Sharlto Copley, comes across as an eager, innocent executive who appears to have been handed a task beyond his capabilities. In fact, I wondered if he hadn't been selected because a scapegoat would be needed if and when the relocation of tens of thousands of aliens turned into a disaster.

Van De Merwe clearly shared the prejudices of the majority of people. He saw his job as moving the aliens, regardless of what they thought or wanted. Part of his job was to get the aliens to sign a form in which they agreed to the relocation. That would make it "legal" and satisfy various civil rights groups. At one point, he is seen explaining to those whose job it is to get the signatures that, even if an alien disagrees and pushes the form away, just touching the form constituted an agreement and any smudge left on the form was to be interpreted as a signature.

His attitude begins to change when he comes into contact with alien biotechnology that reacts with his genetic structure, and he begins to change into an alien. The aliens have a number of very powerful weapons that humans can't use because the weapons are tuned to the aliens' DNA. At the hospital, those studying Van De Merwe discover that his DNA has been affected and that he can now fire the alien weapons. He now is wanted by his corporate employers, various governments, and certain criminal elements who have large numbers of the alien weapons but can't use them.

He eventually escapes from the hospital and heads for District 9, with various interested parties in pursuit. At this point, he begins to interact with the aliens and eventually helps one of them recover a container of fuel for the ship which they had been laboriously manufacturing for decades. However, he only agrees to help when the alien says that it could restore Van De Merwe to his human form. At this point, the pace of the film has moved into high gear with lots of action, culminating in the final sequence when Van De Merwe climbs into a personal combat device and battles the groups interested in capturing him. The alien and its son escape and promise to return in three years for Van De Merwe.

As I watched the film, I was reminded of other SF films and books by some scenes or incidents. It isn't that they copied them, but there were echoes. For example, the sudden appearance of the ship over Johannesburg, followed by no further activity by the aliens, reminded me of Arthur C. Clarke's novel Childhood's End in which numerous alien ships appeared, one over each of the major cities on Earth. For six days, everybody watched and waited and wondered until finally the aliens made contact.

And, Van De Merwe's slow transformation into an alien certainly brings to mind a number of SF films from the 50s in which someone turns into an alien, usually beginning with a hand, just as in this film. We watch as his arm gradually alters into an alien limb while the "victim" desperately seeks a cure.

The vehicles used by Van De Merwe's employers are constructed of a white plastic material which looks exactly like the white armor worn by the Empire's troopers in Star Wars.

In the final scene of the movie, a completely transformed and monstrous Van De Merwe gazes at what appears to be a small flower, and I'm reminded of a similar scene (at least I think I remember this) from at least one film version of Frankenstein in which the monster, at one point, does something very similar--an echo of Beauty and the Beast.

I can only wonder about the choice of Johannesburg, South Africa, for the setting of this film, considering its past history of apartheid. Is Johannesburg's past significant here?

Overall Rating: probably one of the best SF films of the decade, if not one of the best films, regardless of genre, of the decade.

Langston Hughes: February 1, 1902--May 22, 1967

The following quotes are from the Wikipedia entry on Langston Hughes.


"James Mercer Langston Hughes, (February 1, 1902 – May 22, 1967) was an American poet, novelist, playwright, short story writer, and columnist. He was one of the earliest innovators of the new literary art form jazz poetry. Hughes is best-known for his work during the Harlem Renaissance.

. . .

On May 22, 1967, Langston Hughes died from complications after abdominal surgery, related to prostate cancer, at the age of 65. His ashes are interred beneath a floor medallion in the middle of the foyer leading to the auditorium named for him within the Arthur Schomburg Center for Reasearch in Black Culture in Harlem. The design on the floor covering his cremated remains is an African cosmogram titled Rivers. The title is taken from the poem The Negro Speaks of Rivers by Hughes. Within the center of the cosmogram and precisely above the ashes of Hughes are the words My soul has grown deep like the rivers."


Since this poem has been singled out at his monument, I thought I would post it here.



The Negro Speaks of Rivers

I've known rivers:
I've known rivers ancient as the world and older than the
flow of human blood in human veins.

My soul has grown deep like the rivers.

I bathed in the Euphrates when dawns were young.
I built my hut near the Congo and it lulled me to sleep.
I looked upon the Nile and raised the pyramids above it.
I heard the singing of the Mississippi when Abe Lincoln
went down to New Orleans, and I've seen its muddy
bosom turn all golden in the sunset.

I've known rivers:
ancient, dusky rivers.

My soul has grown deep like the rivers.

-- Langston Hughes --







Below is a link to the Wikipedia entry about Langston Hughes.

http://tinyurl.com/6kkyb6

The Rubaiyat: Quatrain XXI

This quatrain seems to be the first in a series of three linked quatrains: XXI, XXII, and XXIII. They, to me anyway, make more sense if read together than if read separately.


First Edition: Quatrain XXI

Lo! some we loved, the loveliest and the best
That Time and Fate of all their Vintage prest,
Have drunk their Cup a Round or two before,
And one by one crept silently to Rest.



Second Edition: Quatrain XXII

For some we loved, the loveliest and the best
That from his Vintage rolling Time has prest,
Have drunk their Cup a Round or two before,
And one by one crept silently to rest.



Fifth Edition: Quatrain XXII

For some we loved, the loveliest and the best
That from his Vintage rolling Time has prest,
Have drunk their Cup a Round or two before,
And one by one crept silently to rest.


What changes were made were limited to the first two lines and the last word in the second edition. The fifth edition is identical to the second. In the first edition, the quatrain begins with the exclamation "Lo" whereas in the second and fifth editions, FitzGerald substitutes the more prosaic "For" for "Lo." In the second edition, "Fate" no longer plays a role with "Time" in producing "the loveliest and the best." The last change is using a lower case "r" in the second and subsequent editions, in place of the upper case "R" found in the first edition.

The first change seems to follow the pattern FitzGerald established earlier of changing the poetic expressions and terms to more prosaic formulations.

Why did he drop the reference to "Fate" after the first edition? One possibility may be that "Fate" might have negative connotations. Would readers see "Fate" as suggesting something good or would the implication be something bad or unpleasant? On the other hand, "Fate" could also bring in ideas of determinism or a fixed future which he may have felt inappropriate here, even though there's a clear reference to this in a later quatrain. The use of "rolling" now imparts movement to Time. It is not just Time but "rolling Time," which indirectly brings in a reference to Fate. "Rolling" can suggest wheels, possibly the Wheel of Fate.

The last change also is an example of another pattern of changes: FitzGerald had changed the first letter of many nouns from the upper case in the first edition to the lower in subsequent editions. The change in meaning is subtle, from a static place or condition "to Rest" to the more active verb, "to rest." Of course, it could simply have been a typographical error in the first edition which he was simply correcting for the later editions.

I like the first line of the first edition better than the second through the fifth editions. "Lo" gets my attention better and suggests more strongly that a point is being made. "For" is weaker and moreover suggests that an explanation is to follow--but what is being explained?

However, this quatrain is a observation, one that has been made before. All must die eventually, even those of a superior vintage. Again, we see the theme of wine and wine-making brought up. The "loveliest and the best" are a vintage of time and fate, although only time is given the credit in the later editions. And this vintage, superior though they may be, now have "crept silently to rest"--the Fate of all.

Greg Benford: Furious Gulf--Galactic Center Book 5

Furious Gulf is the fifth book in Greg Benford's Galactic Center series. In this novel, Killeen Bishop and Bishop family reach the center of our galaxy, at which is the black hole they call the Eater. (Current theory supports the existence of a black hole at the center of our galaxy and at the center of many other galaxies also.) In the first two volumes, In The Ocean of Night and Across the Sea of Stars, we followed the exploits of Nigel Walmsley, a Brit who somehow wrangled his way to becoming an astronaut for NASA. Those two novels covered the period from the 1990s to around 2060 or so and depicted humanity's first tenuous contacts with the hostile mech culture.

Book three in the series, Great Sky River, takes us some 30,000 years into the future and far from Earth. During that period humans have spread throughout the galaxy but had seemingly reached their peak and dwindled down into isolated remnants scattered throughout the galaxy. The planet Snowglade contained some of these remnants, a few bands of tech-nomads desperately trying to survive the mechs. Discovering a ancient human built spacecraft, which they name the Argo, and with the aid of a renegade mech (perhaps) known as the Mantis, the humans escape the planet.

In Tides of Light, Killeen Bishop, who has become the leader of the Bishop family and remnants of other families, leads his people to another planet which they had hoped to settle, free once again from the mechs. Instead, they find more bands of humans who are engaged in a struggle for survival, first against the mechs and then against the mulitpedia, who are an organic intelligent species far in advance of the humans and who are also apparently on the way to becoming an organic/mech hybrid. After a struggle, Killeen once again leads his people off-planet and heads for the Galactic Center, this time accompanied by Quath, one of the multipedia who comes along as a representative of and a contact with the multipedia, .

Furious Gulf opens with the Argo nearing the Eater, the massive black hole at the Galactic center. Killeen faces a mutiny aboard ship for his crew has been on reduced rations for some time, and he has ignored their requests to stop and replenish supplies. Killeen, at this point, resembles Melville's Captain Ahab much more than Captain Kirk of Star Trek fame. Killeen is obsessed with reaching the Center, for legends, myths, and his instincts tell him that the secret of survival in the war with the mechs lies at the Center, and he seems willing to sacrifice his ship and crew in pursuit of that secret.


Warning: I am going to discuss significant plot elements and the ending of the novel.

With the aid of the mysterious electromagnetic entity who has appeared previously, the Argo is able to avoid the mechs and find a temporary haven at a space station? on the edge of the black hole. At this point, the disagreement between Killeen and his son Toby emerges, and this appears to be the result of one of the strangest Oedipal conflicts I have ever read.

The humans who run the station are not doing this out of any warm feelings for humanity but out of a profit motive. The Bishops and the Argo can stay, but there are various fees, one of which is access to the so far untranslatable tiles found on the ship.

Benford has allowed us to listen in while the mechminds debate their course of action with regards to the humans, and we have discovered that they also are intrigued by these same tiles. They just might be a threat to the mech civilization. The mechs are also concerned because they know that mysterious intelligences superior to them exist. Are these intelligences more highly evolved mechminds or could they impossibly be organic?

In the first two novels, the POV character was Nigel Walmsley, whose struggles with his superiors in NASA was a significant part of the work. The third and fourth novels featured Killeen Bishop and his struggles, not surprisingly, with various authority figures and to some extent with his crew, which could replace him if they became too disenchanted with him. In this novel, the POV now shifts a third time, to Killeen's son Toby. We experience events from Toby's perspective, including his view of his father, who is struggling to keep the crew under control.

Toby, about two-thirds of the way into the novel, finally breaks with his father and escapes into the strangest environment yet presented. To a considerable extent the landscape consists partially of more or less "solid" time. No, I'm not going to attempt to explain this.

While Toby is on the run, the mechs make a concerted attack on the human stronghold. They, like Killeen, believe there is a threat to mech survival, and it seems to have something to do with getting three generations of a family together. Somehow, Abraham (interesting name for a patriarch), Killeen's father, has managed to escape the final attack on the Bishop stronghold on Snowglade and get to the Galactic Center. The mechs want capture them, if possible, and discover just what the nature of the threat might be, or at least eliminate them to remove the threat.

Toby eventually manages to reach a sanctuary and is greeted by Nigel Walmsley, who has managed to survive for 30,000 years through judicious use of cold sleep and the time-dilation effects of existence on the edge of a black hole (these effects are a generally accepted and respectable part of the theory regarding black holes). Time is the strangest thing, especially around black holes. We are now ready for the climactic struggle between the mechs and humanity.

Thus ends Furious Gulf.

The star of the show is the Eater, the black hole at the center of our galaxy. I've read other accounts and have even seen at least one film of the environment of a black hole, but Benford is the first to really focus on and bring out its strangeness, and that includes several life forms. That he is able to do this is, no doubt, the result of his education and training as an astrophysicist. In the "Afterward" to Furious Gulf, Benford writes--

"It has been an unusual experience to conjure up imaginary events about a place that I was also doing hard calculations about. Freed of the bonds of The Astrophysical Journal, I have felt at liberty to speculate on what processes might have transpired, over the galaxy's ten billion years of furious cooking, to create forms of life and intelligence beyond our ken."

Overall Rating: again a superb effort on Benford's part.

Now, on to Book 6, the final book in the series, Sailing Bright Eternity.

Something to think about

Eric Hoffer
Reflections on the Human Condition


The following is a brief quote from Eric Hoffer's Reflections on the Human Condition.


"The savior who wants to turn men into angels is as much a hater of human nature as the totalitarian despot who wants to turn them into puppets.

There are similarities between absolute power and absolute faith: a demand for absolute obedience; a readiness to attempt the impossible; a bias for simple solutions--to cut the knot rather than unravel it; the viewing of compromise as surrender; the tendency to manipulate people and 'experiment with blood.' Both absolute power and absolute faith are instruments of dehumanisation. Hence absolute faith corrupts as absolutely as absolute power."

Reflections on the Human Condition was first published in 1973, over 35 years ago. This quote suggests that it could have been published last week.

What do you think? Is he overstating his case?



Eric Hoffer is the author of The True Believer, a work which should be read by anyone who wants to gain some understanding of the true believer, one who is ready to die for a belief and, unfortunately, equally ready to kill others in the name of that same belief. The true believer is one who knows the only way to paradise and is determined to lead you there, even if it kills you. This person exists on both sides of the political fence.

THREE BY THEODORE STURGEON

Those who don't read SF and Fantasy probably have never had the chance to become acquainted with two of the finest short story writers in the English language: Ray Bradbury and Theodore Sturgeon. Their tales range from the outright fantastic to horror to everyday life. I've discussed some of Bradbury's tales already, mostly in conjunction with film versions, and there are many others which I want to bring up. Today, though, I want to discuss briefly three of Sturgeon's stories that are favorites of mine. One, not only is a favorite, but it forced me to think about some of my attitudes and eventually changed my way of thinking.


Warning: I will bring up significant plot elements and even the endings for some of the stories.



"Bianca's Hands"

This is a horror story, I think. It might even be a love story. Perhaps it's both. I'm not sure what to call it for it's one of the strangest stories I've ever read, and it has stayed with me ever since I first read it decades ago. See for yourself. I will quote the opening paragraphs and let it speak for itself.


"Bianca's mother was leading her when Ran saw her first. Bianca was squat and small, with dank hair and rotten teeth. Her mouth was crooked and it drooled. Either she was blind or she just didn't care about bumping into things. It didn't really matter because Bianca was an imbecile. Her hands . . ."


This is a strange way to begin a love story, the story of an overwhelming passion that eventually leads to a tragedy. At least, I think it's a tragedy. But it gets stranger when one reads the last words of the paragraph which leads into the second paragraph--"Her hands . . ."


"They were lovely hands, graceful hands, hands as soft and smooth and white as snowflakes, hands whose color was lightly tinged with pink like the glow of Mars on Snow. They lay on the counter side by side, looking at Ran. They lay there half closed and crouching, each pulsing with a movement like the the panting of a field creature, and they looked. Not watched. Later, they watched him. Now they looked. They did, because Ran felt their united gaze , and his heart beat strongly."


Ran rents a room and moves in with Bianca's mother and Bianca, or rather, to be realistic, Bianca's hands. He then begins to court, not Bianca, but her hands. Or, perhaps it was the reverse: they began to court? seduce? him.


"Bianca was alone in the room, and Ran went to her and sat beside her. She did not move, nor did her hands. They rested on a small table before her, preening themselves. This, then, was when they really began watching him. He felt it, right down to the depths of his enchanted heart. The hands kept stroking each other, and yet they knew he was there, they knew of his desire. They stretched themselves before him, archly, languorously, and his blood pounded hot. Before he could stay himself he reached and tried to grasp them. He was strong, and his move was sudden and clumsy. One of the hands seemed to disappear, so swiftly did it drop into Bianca's lap. But the other--"


As I read the story, I gradually realized that this tale could not, would not have a "happy ending"--or, at least an ending that I would call "happy." Ran couldn't see that something here was wrong. The horror increases as Ran becomes more and more infatuated with her hands. Finally, he seals his fate when he asks Bianca's mother for permission to marry Bianca (no, I will not give in and say he asks for her hand.)

Is there a moral here? Perhaps. It does point out the danger of focusing on only one aspect of the beloved and not the whole person.

What makes this story so memorable is Sturgeon's language. He manages to make those hands the real focus of the story. They are alive and independent; Bianca's body is simply the means of transporting those hands. He imbues them with a consciousness that is both real and grotesque at the same time.

Overall Rating: a quiet little horror tale that deserves far more attention than it gets.

---------------------------------------------


"The Silken-Swift"

I guess one could call this one a fantasy, mostly anyway. The title refers to a unicorn, a mythical beast, except that in this story it isn't mythical. This story looks at an obsession, sexual naturally, but one that seems more natural than in the previous tale. It's also the story of the eternal triangle: two women and one man. One woman uses him and abuses him, while the second woman is abused by him. It takes a unicorn to resolve the confusion. However, I'm not too sure about the ending. I have some problems with it, and it would be interesting to hear what others think about it.

Briefly, Rita is the daughter of the richest man in the village. She is beautiful and selfish and skilled in the use of potions that manipulate people's feelings. In this way, she has made fools of many men without ever giving them what they think she promises.

One night, she torments a new man, Del, in this way, and left him temporarily blinded by one of her drugs. Barbara, another woman from the village, one who has been quietly in love with him, finds him and attempts to help him. Del, still blind, thinks it's Rita and takes his revenge on her now that he has her within reach. Barbara never tells him of his mistake.

Rita, learning of the presence of the unicorn, has a golden bridle made and gets Barbara to lead them to the pond where the unicorn--the Silken-Swift-- comes to drink. Rita will prove that she is still a virgin for only virgins are able to catch a unicorn.

The pond, even though in the midst of a swamp, was special: "It was a place without hardness or hate, where the aspens trembled only for wonder, and where all contentment was rewarded. Every single rabbit there was the champion nose-twinkler, and every waterbird could stand on one leg the longest, and proud of it. Shelf-fungi hung to the willow-trunks, making that certain, single purple of which the sunset is incapable , and a tanager and a cardinal gravely granted one another his definition of 'red.'"

However, the unicorn ignores the myth and rejects Rita in front of a large crowd of villagers and comes to Barbara. But, there is a price to be paid as the unicorn flips Rita's golden bridle into the pond.

"And the instant it touched the water, the pond was a bog and the birds rose mourning from the trees.

. . .

Barbara said, 'For us, he lost his pool, his beautiful pool.'

And Del said 'He will get another. He must.' With difficulty he added, 'He couldn't be . . . punished . . . for being so gloriously Fair.'"


Strange ending: Rita wrongly is believed to not be a virgin. Del gets the girl whom he raped and the Unicorn loses its beautiful pond. Should Del be rewarded? Why did the Silken-Swift lose its pond? Was it really "for being so gloriously Fair."?

Overall Rating: well-written, as is typical of a Sturgeon tale, but it leaves some disquieting questions unanswered, for Sturgeon has taken a few liberties with the myth.

-------------------------------------------


"Thunder and Roses"

This is the story that caused me to reconsider some of my beliefs many years ago. It didn't change them immediately, but it stayed with me and influenced me so that I no longer think the way I did then. The story was published in 1947, at the beginning of the Cold War, when many people feared that a nuclear war was imminent. The two most strident reactions were generally all one heard: "Better Red than Dead" shouted one side, while the other side screamed "Better Dead than Red." Sturgeon's story suggested there were other options and other, better ways to think. One way was to see all of us as part of humanity.

In "Thunder and Roses," the horror has happened. A surprise nuclear attack has virtually destroyed the US, wiping out the government and military so quickly that no retaliation could be made. The story is set on a small obscure military post that escaped being wiped out. However, those there know their time is short, days for some, a week or two or maybe even a month for most. The North American continent is uninhabitable.

However, the enemy will not escape either, for the amount of radiation released by the attack is so great that within a year or two, it will blanket the northern hemisphere, and as one of he characters says, "They have killed us, and they have ruined themselves."

One of the survivors discovers that the post has a secret backup control system for launching a retaliatory strike, if the first line system has been knocked out. His immediate reaction is that he now has a chance to destroy those who have destroyed the US.

The issue is not that simple. In the story, there is a level of radiation that would eventually destroy all of humanity and almost all of the other species we share this planet with. It's the scenario set up in Nevil Shute's On the Beach. So far, that limit hasn't been reached, yet. It will be, though, if the US retaliates. This is the conflict: revenge vs a concern for all life.

Sturgeon has one of his characters tell us:

"A disease made other humans our enemies for a time, but as the generations march past, enemies become friends and friends enemies. The enmity of those who have killed us is such a tiny, temporary thing in the long sweep of history!'

. . .

'And even if this is the end of humankind, we dare not take away the chances some other life-form might have to succeed where we failed. If we retaliate, there will not be a dog, a deer, an ape, a bird or fish or lizard to carry the evolutionary torch. In the name of justice, if we must condemn and destroy ourselves, let us not condemn all other life along with us. Mankind is heavy enough with sins. If we must destroy, let us stop with destroying ourselves!'"


This was a philosophy that I hadn't heard before. It argues that we look beyond our family, our clan, our city, our nation, even beyond our own species. Of course, today, while this is not accepted by even a sizable minority, it is prevalent, even if only to be derided by the "wise" and the practical. In 1947, at least in my immediate universe, it was a radical thought, and one I had to struggle with. What's unfortunate is that I can't tell Theodore Sturgeon that he succeeded in convincing me and, possibly, many others also.

Who knows? Maybe in a century or two, someone will read this story and wonder why it was necessary to argue such an obvious way of thinking about our place here.

Any thoughts?

Carl Sandburg: January 6, 1878--July 22, 1967

I'm prejudiced here. I was born and raised (mostly) in Chicago, so Sandburg naturally was one I looked into when I first began reading poetry. He didn't get all of Chicago into his poetry, but he got more than anybody else I've read.


One of my favorite poems by Carl Sandburg.


Fog

The fog comes
on little cat feet.

It sits looking
over harbor and city
on silent haunches
and then moves on.


I have a cat and it's mostly grey. It frequently reminds me of Sandburg's poem.

I haven't read anything by Sandburg in many years now. Perhaps it's time to renew an old acquaintance.

Do you want to mention a favorite poem by Sandburg?

Francois Villon: Jan. 5, 1463?

I have found Francois Villon to be a fascinating character, and even more fascinating, or perhaps mysterious would be a better word, his fate. No one knows what happened to him. (For the full article which I've quoted from, see the link at the end of the post). He was sentenced to be hanged in late 1462, but this was commuted to banishment on January 5, 1463. He was never heard of again.


"Francois Villon (1431-after 1463) was a French poet, thief, and general vagabond. He is perhaps best known for his Testaments and his Ballade des Pendus, written while in prison. He is one of the most influential secular poets of fifteenth-century European literature. Villon freely integrated his experiences from his life of crime into his poetry, and the result was some of the first poetry to present, in unflinching terms, the lives of the peasant classes. He became something of a "patron saint" for those who would use their art to criticize power. Whether his roguish life was an extension of his critique, or the other way around, Villon's attitude is the embodiment of an anti-social perspective that would become popular with artists in the modern and post-modern era.

In 1461, at the age of only thirty years old, Villon wrote the Grand testament, the work which has immortalized him. Despite having composed a literary masterpiece, Villon couldn't keep himself away from a life of crime. In the autumn of 1462 he had fled to the cloisters of Saint-Benoit to escape the authorities, and in November he was in prison once again for theft. The old charge of stealing from the College of Navarre was revived, and even a royal pardon did not bar the demand for restitution. Bail was accepted, however, Villon fell promptly into a street quarrel, was arrested, tortured and condemned to be hanged, but the sentence was commuted to banishment. What happened to Villon after this event is unknown—from this point on there exists no further record of Villon's biography. "


This is my favorite poem of his, and it contains what is probably one of the most famous lines in poetry: "But where are the snows of yester-year?" This poem could easily be placed in an themed anthology with Edward Fitzgerald's The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. It has that same feel of past glories that are gone forever.




The Ballad of Dead Ladies

Tell me now in what hidden way is
Lady Flora the lovely Roman?
Where's Hipparchia, and where is Thais,
Neither of them the fairer woman?
Where is Echo, beheld of no man,
Only heard on river and mere,—
She whose beauty was more than human? . . .
But where are the snows of yester-year?

Where's Héloise, the learned nun,
For whose sake Abeillard, I ween,
Lost manhood and put priesthood on?
(From Love he won such dule and teen!)
And where, I pray you, is the Queen
Who willed that Buridan should steer
Sewed in a sack's mouth down the Seine? . . .
But where are the snows of yester-year?

White Queen Blanche, like a queen of lilies,
With a voice like any mermaiden,—
Bertha Broadfoot, Beatrice, Alice,
And Ermengarde the lady of Maine,—
And that good Joan whom Englishmen
At Rouen doomed and burned her there,—
Mother of God, where are they then? . . .
But where are the snows of yester-year?

Nay, never ask this week, fair lord,
Where they are gone, nor yet this year,
Except with this for an overword,—
But where are the snows of yester-year?

(trans. by Dante Gabriel Rossetti)



http://tinyurl.com/ya745uy

J. R. R. Tolkien: Jan. 3, 1892--Sept. 2, 1973

I have heard many readers express disappointment with Tolkien's The Silmarillion (TS). It isn't as good as The Lord of the Rings (LotR) or so many have said. Some claim it's boring. I think this reaction has two different causes. The first is that Tolkien died before he finished the work. His son Christopher Tolkien took on the task of completing it. Unfortunately Christopher Tolkien is not the writer his father was. However, I do not find the work to be poorly written; it may plod sometimes but the content is well worth the effort.

The second problem and the more serious one is that many readers misunderstand Tolkien's view of The Silmarillion. It was not, as far as I can see, to be a grand epic of a quest as was The Lord of the Rings, or even to a lesser extent, as was The Hobbit (TH). I think Tolkien had history in mind when he wrote The Silmarillion. It was to be a history of Middle Earth, prior to the events of the two novels. Tolkien was creating a universe. Consequently we don't have the same focus that we find in LotR or TH.

The one work I find that most closely approaches Tolkien's intentions is The Old Testament, the first book of which is Genesis, and it begins--


1. In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.

2. And the earth was without form, and void: and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.

3. And God said: Let there be light: and there was light.

This is, of course, the Creation story, as recounted in the King James Version. It is the creation of the world--the very beginning of time, of history, of the relationship between God and its creatures.

Now, the first book of The Silmarillion is "Ainulindale: The Music of the Ainur," and it begins as follows:

"There was Eru, the One, who in Arda is called Iluvatar; and he made first the Ainur, the Holy Ones, that were the offspring of his thought, and they were with him before aught else was made. And he spoke to them, propounding to them themes of music; and they sang before him, and he was glad. But for a long while they sang only each alone, or but few together, while the rest hearkened; for each comprehended only that part of the mind of Iluvatar from which he came, and in the understanding of their brethren they grew but slowly. Yet ever as they listened they came to deeper understanding, and increased in unison and harmony."


This clearly is a Creation story, the very beginning of the world of Middle Earth. However, in Tolkien's universe, God works with his first creation, the Ainur, to create the universe. And, instead of light, Eru, in a sense, says "Let there be music." He gives the Ainur "a mighty theme, unfolding to them things greater and more wonderful than he had yet revealed."

He then gives them their task: "ye shall show forth your powers in adorning this theme..."

"Then the voices of the Ainur, like unto harps and lutes, and pipes and trumpets, and viols and organs, and like unto countless choirs singing with words, began to fashion the theme of Iluvatar to a great music; and a sound arose of endless interchanging melodies woven in harmony that passed beyond hearing into the depths and into the heights . . . and the music and the echo of the music went out into the Void, and it was not void."

And later--

"But when they were come into the Void, Iluvatar said to them: 'Behold your music!' And he showed to them a vision, giving to them sight where before was only hearing; and they saw a new World made visible before them, and it was globed amid the Void, and it was sustained therein, but was not of it."

And . . .

"And they saw with amazement the coming of the Children of Iluvatar, and the habitation that was prepared for them; and they perceived that they themselves in the labour of their music had been busy with preparation of this dwelling, and yet knew not that it had any purpose beyond its own beauty. For the Children of Iluvatar are conceived by him alone. . . Now the Children of Iluvatar are Elves and Men, the Firstborn and the Followers."

While "Genesis" and "Ainulindale" differ, they do parallel each other in many respects, and I think that we should not force The Silmarillion into being something that it is not meant to be. It is a unique work, separate in design and intent from The Lord of the Rings, and it should be read with this in mind.

Overall Rating: highly recommended for those interested in Tolkien's universe.

Isaac Asimov: January 2, 1920--April 6, 1992

Isaac Asimov's short story "Nightfall" is one of the best in SF. It's also been his curse for he has said on a number of occasions that it is discouraging to find that one's best was written shortly after one began writing and never was able to match it or surpass it in 5 decades. Asimov published his first short story "Marooned off Vesta" in 1939 and "Nightfall" in 1941. In 1964, the Science Fiction Writers of America (SFWA) voted it the "best short science fiction story of all time."

While I had known vaguely that the germ of the short story had come from an essay by Emerson, it still was a surprise, if not a shock, to encounter it as I did, as a course reading assignment. Emerson's essay "Nature," which was published in 1836, opens with this paragraph that follows Emerson' s "Introduction."

"To go into solitude a man needs to retire as much from his chamber as from society. I am not solitary whilst I read and write, though nobody is with me. But if a man would be alone, let him look at the stars. The rays that come from those heavenly worlds will separate between him and what he touches. One might think the atmosphere was made transparent with this design, to give man, in the heavenly bodies, the perpetual presence of the sublime. Seen in the streets of cities, how great they are! If the stars should appear one night in a thousand years, how would men believe and adore; and preserve for many generations the remembrance of the city of 'God which had been shown! But every night come out these envoys of beauty, and light the universe with their admonishing smile."

Asimov, of course, turns it around. Instead of inspiring people to "believe and adore; and preserve for many generations," the sight of the stars and darkness for the first time in a thousand years creates panic and mass destruction, which brings down civilization and reduces the people for savagery. By the time, some semblance of order is destroyed, all records have been lost, and all future generations know is that something catastrophic happened, several times, if the sketchy reports and legends are to be believed.

It's not Emerson's "envoys of beauty," that the people of Lagash see for the first time in a thousand years, and "Not Earth's feeble thirty-six hundred Stars visible to the eye-- [for] Lagash was in the center of a giant cluster. Thirty thousand mighty suns shone down in a soul-searing splendor that was more frighteningly cold in its awful indifference than the bitter wind that shivered across the cold, horribly bleak world."

It may be that Asimov had in mind a quote from Blaise Pascal, French mathematician, philosopher, and essayist, when he wrote "Nightfall." Pascal in Pensees had written that "The eternal silence of these infinite spaces [in the universe] terrifies me." This seems to be much closer to the story's tone than Emerson's "envoys of beauty."

While one could argue about the SFWA's recognition of "Nightfall" as the best short SF story of all time, it still is one of the best. Novels, of course, get the most recognition, but to ignore the science fiction and fantasy short stories and novellas is to lose out on many short but brilliant gems.

Overall rating: highly recommended.

The Rubaiyat: Quatrain XX

Quatrain XX seems rather apt for this time of the year--the beginning of the New Year.


First Edition: Quatrain XX

Ah, my Beloved, fill the Cup that clears
To-day of past Regrets and future Fears--
To-morrow?--Why, To-morrow I may be
Myself with Yesterday's Sev'n Thousand Years.




Second Edition: Quatrain XXI

Ah, my Beloved, fill the Cup that clears
To-day of past Regret and Future Fears:
To-morrow?--Why, To-morrow I may be
Myself with Yesterday's Sev'n Thousand Years.



Fifth Edition: Quatrain XXI

Ah, my Beloved, fill the Cup that clears
To-day of Past Regrets and Future Fears:
To-morrow?--Why, To-morrow I may be
Myself with Yesterday's Sev'n Thousand Years.



As you can see, FitzGerald made very few changes to this quatrain, and none that I would consider significant. In the Second Edition, he drops the "s" from "Regrets," changes the dash at the end of the line to a colon, and capitalizes the "F" in "future." I wonder if the lost "s" is really an error that happened with the setting of the type for the Second Edition. The colon could suggest that the third and fourth lines explain the second line--that there's no need for regrets and fears for tomorrow he may be dead himself, and therefore beyond regret and fear.

The only differences I can see between the Second and Fifth Editions are the restoration of the "s" after "Regret" so that it is now the same as the First version and the capitalization of the "p" in Past. In the first version, it was "past Regrets and future Fears." This became "past Regret and Future Fears" in the second and, finally, "Past Regrets and Future Fears" in the fifth. This may be more for the appearance of the phrase than for any significant change in meaning.

The quatrain seems to be a celebration of wine, that which gladdens the heart by helping us to forget the past and to become indifferent about the future. In fact, when asked about the future, he exclaims that he himself might be dead tomorrow, another variation on the theme of enjoying oneself today for tomorrow we may die and, therefore, become part of the past.

Combination Plate 11

Pamela Dean
The Dubious Hills
A fantasy novel

This is a fantasy novel, one that really is based on fantasy and one that has an original idea, something that doesn't happen too often. It is not just another medieval romance with men in tin suits hewing away at each other in the name of the Emperor, King, Duke, Prince, Baron, or whatever, defending the realm against the invading armies of another Emperor, King, Duke, or whatever. Nor is it another Tolkien ripoff with various simple folk setting off on yet another quest for the magic sword, chalice, shield, or cummerbund in order to forestall the Necromancer or Dark Lord's attempt to rule or destroy the universe.

In fact, the country where this story takes place has been at peace for many centuries. Long ago, wizards, tiring of the constant warfare, cast a spell on the country which effectively makes the inhabitants completely dependent upon each other for survival. The people cannot learn from mundane experience the way we do. However, each has one type of inborn knowledge that few, if any others, possess. For example, one person was given the ability to know whether something is beautiful or ugly. Those who wish to know whether an object is beautiful or ugly, must bring it to this person. Another possesses geographical knowledge. Those who wish to know where someplace is located must visit this person. One unsettling aspect of conversation among these people is their practice of attributing statements that do not fit in with their particular knowledge to the one whom they heard it from.

All skills which we take for granted are parcelled out among the people. One person knows how to fix things, including people who have something wrong with them. However, his abilities are natural, not magical. He fixes a broken bone with a splint or a rude cast, along with, perhaps, some healing herbs. Only a few people know how to grow food, and they are limited as what they can grow. For example, to prepare a meal, one must go to the person who grows vegetables, to another who bakes bread, to a sheepherder for meat, to a dairy farmer for milk, or to a brewer or vintner for beer or wine.

One of the most unusual skills belongs to Arry, who is a Physici. She alone can sense pain, not only in herself but in others also. No one else in the village can feel pain. If they cut themselves, they will notice that they are bleeding, but they feel nothing. They will come to Arry to ask if this is a problem. Arry then will send for the fixer, to take care of the wound. Curiously, Arry has problems at times with distinguishing between physical pain and psychological pain in others. They seem to same to her.

In this way, each is dependent upon the others for survival. If one doesn't share one's own expertise, then others are unlike to share theirs, which would include food, various forms of knowledge, and even a diagnosis and cure for physical ailments. They have paid a price for peace, and this price is the focus of the novel.

Halver is the teacher and in some sense the villain of the work. On a trip outside the country he was bitten by a werewolf, which of course means that he too is a werewolf. What is more important is that the spell cast many centuries ago no longer affects him now. He can learn from daily experience and other sources just as we do. He has decided that the spell was an obstacle to becoming a complete human being and is determined to spread his new-found abilities to others, whether they wish it or not.

This, then, is the conflict. Do people have the right to force others to follow their ways--even if in good faith--for their own good? Is what Halver is doing, or attempting to do, any different from what the wizards did centuries ago? Both Halver and the wizards are acting for the people's "own good." Does that justify their actions?

Arry and her brother and sister take it upon themselves to fight Halver. In their battle, they learn the same lesson that Tolkien brought out in his tales: in every battle against evil, something is lost, regardless of who wins the battle. Even those completely innocent are changed in some way by this conflict. Part of the cost of evil is the loss of innocence. And, one can't go back.

Overall rating: very good. Recommended for those looking for something different in fantasy.

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Ivy Compton-Burnett
A House and Its Head
A novel

I had heard her name mentioned occasionally in grad school, but she was never on the reading lists of any of the courses I had taken. Consequently, I didn't get around to reading anything by her until this past year. So far, I've read two of her novels: Pastors and Masters and A House and Its Head. They are unlike any other novel I've ever read, and what little I've read about her suggests that all her novels are very similar in style. There are nineteen of them, beginning in 1925 with Pastors and Masters.


Some comments from an entry about her on Wikipedia:

"Of Pastors and Masters, the New Statesman wrote: "It is astonishing, amazing. It is like nothing else in the world. It is a work of genius."

In her essay collection L'Ère du soupçon (1956), an early manifesto for the French nouveau roman, Nathalie Sarraute hails Compton-Burnett as an "one of the greatest novelists England has ever had".

And today, as far as I can tell, she has been largely forgotten, at least among those I'm familiar with.

Two characteristics of her works are probably responsible for her early acceptance, and perhaps the later disregard of her works. First, her novels are at least 95% dialogue, with minimal description of either the characters or the setting. Second, the tone of the dialogue is invariably acerbic, biting, sarcastic, and nasty, and always with an air of supercilious politeness.

She uses dialogue to allow the characters to reveal themselves. Here is a sample of a relatively benign (for her anyway) conversation that begins A House and Its Head. The dialogue is between Duncan and Ellen Edgeworth, the head of the house and his wife. It is Christmas morning.


"So the children are not down yet?' said Ellen Edgeworth.
Her husband gave her a glance, and turned his eyes towards the window.
'So the children are not down yet?' she said on a note of question.
Mr Edgeworth put his finger down his collar, and settled his neck.
'So you are down first, Duncan?' said his wife, as though putting her observation in a more acceptable form.
Duncan returned his hand to his collar with a frown."

(what follows is a brief description--two short paragraphs--of Duncan and Ellen and the setting.)

'So you are down first of all, Duncan,' said Ellen, employing a note of propitiation, as if it would serve its purpose.
Her husband implied by lifting his shoulders that he could hardly deny it.
'The children are late, are they not?' said Ellen, to whom speech clearly ranked above silence.
Duncan indicated by the same movement that his attitude was the same.
'I think there are more presents than usual. Oh, I wish they would all come down.'
'Why do you wish it?'
'Well, it is not a day when we want them to be late, is it?'
'Do we want them to be late on any day? Oh, of course, it is Christmas Day. I saw the things on the table."


Conversation in Compton-Burnett's works is actually open warfare, with characters attempting to dominate others, to retaliate for real or imagined insults, or to establish their freedom from a verbal tyrant. Many of her novels begin as this one does--at the breakfast table where the struggle for survival begins at the earliest possible moment. It is quite appropriate that Duncan, still at breakfast, takes a book from his nephew and throws it in the fire. It is "a scientific work, inimical to the faith of the day." While the title is never revealed, it could be Darwin's Origin of Species, which ironically would be most useful in describing the behavior of the characters in Compton-Burnett's novels.

In the sample conversation above, Duncan barely acknowledges his wife's existence at first. She is forced to revise her question several times and is almost reduced to begging for a response before he condescends to answer. He clearly dominates her, barely deigning to notice her until he is ready. Duncan doesn't have it completely his way though, for when Nance and Sibyl, his daughters, and Grant, his nephew and heir apparent, finally appear, we see several differing ways of dealing with Duncan--submission, defiance, and a subtle challenge to his dominance.

A House and Its Head is not just filled with talk though, for embedded within its pages are adultery, abuse, extortion, and murder. As the English novelist Angus Wilson remarks: "No writer did more to illuminate the springs of human cruelty, suffering, and bravery."

I will read more by her, but I must admit I will wait until later in 2010. It's strong stuff.

Overall rating: Read at least one of her novels. It's a experience.

========================================

Jo Nesbo
The Devil's Star
Mystery: police procedural
A Detective Harry Hole mystery
Oslo, Norway

This is the second novel I've read in Nesbo's series featuring Detective Harry Hole of the Oslo Police Department. My first encounter was his highly acclaimed Redbreast (see August 2007, Combination Plate 7). This novel also follows the pattern I noticed in Redbreast: Nesbo uses the first part of the novel to leisurely provide background for the second part, which then becomes a tension-filled and taut race to identify and capture the killer before there are more deaths.

In Redbreast, Nesbo spends considerable time depicting the Norwegian soldiers who fought with Germany against the Russians, and this provides the backdrop for the deaths which occurred decades later.

In The Devil's Star, the focus of the first part is on Detective Harry Hole himself. He is on a downward spiral, headed for termination from the police department because of alcoholism, absenteeism, and general insubordination. All this takes place during a series of murders which suggests a serial killer is loose in Oslo. Moreover, he is assigned to work with his old enemy, Tom Waaler, whom he considers responsible for the murder of his partner (see Redbreast) but has been unable so far to prove it.

Hole's superior is on vacation but will return in three weeks, at which time he will, no doubt, sign Hole's termination notice, which is now sitting on his desk. At this point, Hole decides to go out in a blaze of glory and solve the case. He sobers up and goes to work. Once the alcoholic fumes diminish, he takes another look at the series of killings. They follow the classic serial killer pattern: murders in which the victims are presumably unrelated to each other, similar MO in all cases, lack of usual motivating factors of revenge, hate, greed, sex. However, something is wrong, and Hole alone senses it, but he's unable to figure it out, yet. This, then, is the story of the second half of the novel.

Overall Rating: recommended--Nesbo can write action-oriented stuff with the best of them, once he gets the backdrop out of the way.

========================================

Yrsa Sigurdardottir
Last Rituals
Mystery: talented amateur
A Thora Gudmundsdottir mystery
Reykjavik, Iceland

This is the first in a series of novels featuring Thora Gudmundsdottir, an attorney in private practice. A young German student at the university has been murdered, his body mutilated, and strange symbols carved on his chest. The police quickly make an arrest, but the victim's family isn't satisfied that the police have the right man. They hire Thora to investigate and also include a partner for her, Matthew Reich, who is in charge of security for the family-owned bank. Thora's not happy with the situation, but she, a single mother of two, does need the work.

The symbols soon are identified as being associated with witchcraft, and the victim's intense interest in Iceland's own history of witchcraft, torture, execution, and witch hunts provides the setting for this tale. Also adding to the fun are ancient books, missing? or stolen? letters, and perhaps a revival of Satanic worship.

Overall Rating: recommended. This is the first mystery I've read that is set in Iceland. Yrsa is a skilled writer: she is the award-winning author of a number of children's novels. She is on my list of authors for further reading.

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Plan 9 from Outer Space
An SF film


To refer to Plan 9 from Outer Space simply as an SF film really doesn't do justice to this work. Perhaps I should add that this is one of the most famous SF films ever produced. Some consider it the No. 1 cult film of all time. Others have called it the worst film ever made, regardless of genre. One critic said that it is so bad that it is sublime. It is the "two-time winner of the Golden Turkey Award for Worst Film and Worst Director of all time." Surely, these are accolades not to be despised.

I hadn't seen it in a number of years, but I did remember its laughable dialogue ("Idiot Earthmen. . .Stupid, stupid, stupid. . .") , its unbelievably incomprehensible plot, and its disjointed continuity for there were scenes that just seemed to be dropped in from nowhere with characters wandering around aimlessly.

This version, however, is restored and remastered and provides some surprises. First, the continuity is much tighter and consistent than I remember, leading me to wonder if the problems were really caused by poor and incomplete copies of the film. Unfortunately, the remastering did not improve the dialogue and the acting skills of a considerable part of the cast.

The director is Ed Wood, whose directing career is so unique that a film was made of his life. The most famous member of the cast is Bela Lugosi. Others are Vampira, sometimes hostess of late night horror shows or creature features, and Tor Johnson, frequently cast as a monster, a torturer, a brutal guard, and any number of unpleasant characters. And, of course, one can't forget the inexplicably wobbly flying saucers.

The Special Features section corrects several myths that have grown up around the film. In one case the truth is stranger than the myth. One myth is that Bela Lugosi died during the making of the film. This is not true. One day Ed Wood and Bela Lugosi went out with a camera. Wood then had Lugosi act out several scenes. Wood had nothing in mind at that time. Shortly afterwards, Lugosi died. Wood then decided to make a film which would incorporate those scenes, thus Plan 9 from Outer Space. In the film, the scenes that supposedly show Lugosi with his face covered by his cloak were shot after Lugosi's death, and his part is played by Wood's chiropractor, not Wood's dentist as is frequently claimed.

Another myth is that Ed Wood was a cross-dresser and directed his films in women's garb. This is not true and probably stems from another of Wood's films--Glen or Glenda? Wood was a cross-dresser and played that role in that film. Therefore, there were times when Wood was dressed as a woman while directing a scene. This apparently was the only time Wood directed in women's clothing and it was required by the situation, not Wood's preference.

The plot? Oh yes, I forgot. Well, aliens in flying saucers have been unsuccessfully trying to contact governments on Earth. They fear humans will develop the ultimate weapon and destroy the entire universe. The aliens then decide to resurrect the dead in countries all over the world and march them to the various capitols in order to get the governments' attention. This is Plan 9 we are told. Unfortunately we never find out what the first eight plans were.

Overall Rating: highly recommended for those who enjoy watching extremely bad films and best viewed in the company of other like-minded individuals.