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SF-LOVERS Digest V6 #7 [message #5220] Sat, 28 July 2012 00:10
Anonymous
Karma:
Originally posted by: utzoo!decvax!ucbvax!sf-lovers
Article-I.D.: ucbvax.7949
Posted: Thu Jul  8 09:22:35 1982
Received: Fri Jul  9 03:26:23 1982

>From JPM@Mit-Ai Thu Jul  8 09:21:10 1982

SF-LOVERS Digest        Wednesday, 7 Jul 1982       Volume 6 : Issue 7

Today's Topics:
                 Administrivia - MisNumbered Digest,
     SF Books - Ellison Query & Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever &
          Colony & Voyage from Yesteryear & Crystal Singer,
                        SF Movies - The Thing,
             SF Topics - SF Ghetto & Hard SF & Brain Use,
                 Random Topics - Violence in Movies,
                   Humor - Genderless Video Games,
                Spoiler - Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan
----------------------------------------------------------------------

Date: Wednesday, July 7, 1982 1:50AM
From: Jim McGrath (The Moderator) 
Reply-to: SF-LOVERS-REQUEST at MIT-AI
Subject: MisNumbered Digest

No, we did not skip an issue.  Issue 5 should have been issue 6, so
this issue (numbered 7) is just to get us on the right track again.

Jim

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

Date: 30 Jun 1982 1142-PDT
From: Francine Perillo 
Subject: Query

Does anyone know whether The Glass Teat and The Glass Teat II by
Harlin Ellison are currently in print? A friend of mine cannot locate
copies in the Bay Area. Any suggestions as to where to look?

-Francine

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

Date: 5 Jul 1982 0214-EDT
From: Steven J. Zeve 
Subject: for all you Thomas Covenant fans out there

I don't think I sent this to SF-L yet so here goes.

Several weeks ago, a lecture on fantasy and science fiction was given 
in a town near where I live.  One of the three speakers was Darrell 
Sweet, who does cover art for Del Rey line of SF from Ballantine 
Books.  Mr Sweet, who did the cover art for each of the first five 
Thomas Covenant books by Stephen Donaldson, mentioned that he had just
gotten the manuscript for the sixth book.  After the lecture, I asked 
him when he thought that this sixth book would be available; he said 
he thought it would probably be out sometime in June 1983.

Sweet also confirmed the rumor that Donaldson had had a big fight with
his editor about the fifth book in the series (The One Tree).  This 
rumor was mentioned here quite some time back, I don't remember when 
and I don't have access to the archives (perhaps our kindly, but 
overworked, moderator could fill in the reference here?).  According
to Darrell Sweet, Donaldson had something go terribly wrong in his 
personal life and (as far as I understand this) it had a fairly 
serious effect on "The One Tree" and on his attitude towards the book.
As a result Donaldson had a big fight with Lester del Rey, who was his
editor at the time.  Del Rey refused to continue working with 
Donaldson, and "The One Tree" was stalled until a new editor could be 
found.  As far as I can tell, Sweet seems to feel that del Rey was in 
the right and Donaldson in the wrong. (Sweet mentioned that he wanted 
to get to the new manuscript soon so he could find out if Donaldson 
had gotten himself pulled together and Thomas Covenant out the fix 
that he got left in in "The One Tree".)

        Steve Z.

p.s. No I didn't ask Sweet about this rumor.  As a matter of fact, I'm
not even sure how the subject came up.  I think it was because someone
asked him how he picked the scene that he painted for the cover of 
"The One Tree".

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

Date: 2 Jul 1982 04:15:28-PDT
From: pur-ee!pur-phy!retief at Berkeley
Subject: Laumer and Hogan (slight spoiler)

  Recently Keith Laumer wrote a book with a title like "Colony", but I
seen other titles, similar yet different to it.  Is there one book or
more?

  I've just finished reading James Hogan's new book "Voyage from
Yesteryear" and found it to be very good.  Not as talky as many of his
earlier works (although he tends to cook up strange  physics
theories.)
  The plot is basically of a stellar colony (naive to old Earth's 
biases) coming into comflict with its barbaric ancestors.
  The stellar society that Hogan creates is similar to many "utopian" 
societies (but different too), but the isolation of interstellar space
makes the whole story a bit more real.
  "Voyage from Yesteryear" is an interesting book to read.  Try it.
                        -- Dwight Bartholomew --

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

Date: 2 Jul 1982 12:36:42-EDT
From: csin!cjh at CCA-UNIX
Subject: Re: radio advertising of sf

   LORD VALENTINE'S CASTLE was supposed to be advertised, according to
the contract; the commercials were only heard (so far as I know) in
parts of California (Ellison has flamed about this). I heard an ad in
Boston a few years back for THE MAGIC GOES AWAY.

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

Date: 3 July 1982 13:09-EDT
From: James M. Turner 
Subject: Re: Movies as the only discussion topic.

Hey man, I don't actually read the stuff, movies are where its at...

Seriously, I got the Crystal Singer compression (more on that term
later) the other day, and found it interesting. One of those things I
read once, and put away for 3 months because I don't feel like reading
it again right away (as opposed to Friday, which definitely deserves
an immediate rescan/reparse.)

The bitch I have with it is the same one I had with Juxtaposition, I 
saw too many elements of another series by the same author in it. Just
as Anthony used the magic/non-magic and sentient/humanoid themes in 
both the Split Infinity and Xanth series, McCaffrey uses the 
"achieving in one's profession" (Ship that Sang/Harper series) and 
"paying back one's dues quickly" (Ship that Sang) themes in Crystal 
Singer.

I don't mind an author using the same idea more than once (if
approached from a new angle), but I find it somewhat lazy to use the
same themes in two or more series. I will give McCaffrey one thing,
the protagonist of Crystal Singer is about as far from the
self-conscious Menolly of Dragonsong as can be. I just wish authors
would stop playing safe with "pretested" plotlines.

A note on Crystal Singer: This is a collection of shorts novelized 
into a coherent narration. They were written before Weyr Search (I 
think), so the theme recycling may have propagated in the other 
direction.

Note2: This is part of a larger flame on the subject of "Why are so
many series being hatched as such instead of evolving into series
based on merit? Answer: Greed".

Note3: I have been told by friends that they can't see any parallels 
between Crystal Singer and other McCaffrey works. Am I going gaga.

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

Date: 4 Jul 1982 14:43:56 EDT (Sunday)
From: David Mankins 
Subject: The Thing

Well, John Carpenter has finally made a worthy sequel to his ``Dark
Star''.  This one's not a comedy, though.

``The Thing'' is a horror movie, all right.  From the openning shots 
when the helicopter filled with crazy Norwegians chases a sled-dog 
across Antarctic snows, to the ambiguous ending (how many Things are 
left, anyway?) you're rivetted to your seat.  The Thing is an evil 
(but, unlike ``Alien''s alien, believable) nightmare creature.  The 
people at this Antarctic research station don't do anything stupid 
(again in contrast to ``Alien'', and most other horror movies), but 
they're victims all the same.

Boy, see this movie with someone you won't be embarrassed clutching at
when things get tense.  Avoid this movie if you're subject to 
hypertension...

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

Date: 5 Jul 1982 0147-EDT
From: Steven J. Zeve 
Subject: Violence in movies

The wonderful thing about Glenn Collins' article is that it shows the 
power of quoting out of context and of juxtaposing unrelated comments.

        Steve Z.

p.s. While gore and violence aren't really nice things, the tendency 
of viewing them as the pentultimate evil (second only to sex) in 
movies is absurd.  The world is full of violence.  If we wish to keep 
people from seeing or hearing about violence we had best kill everyone
now and be done with it, there is no other way to keep people from 
seeing the violence inherent in the world.  All things must be taken
in context, including the violence in movies.

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

Date: Sat Jul  3 05:15:46 1982
From: decvax!utzoo!laura at Berkeley
Subject: Real SF writers dont...

        Hmm.  What about another division in science fiction.  There
was a time when my grade six teacher was perfectly correct in saying
that the central theme of science ficiton was a scientific idea or a
technological device, and that though the character development in
science fiction was often weak, it was a harder medium to write than
is genrally believed because it demanded a scientific excellance to be
successful.

        Now the vast majority of science fiction is based on the inner
stuggles of human beings (or alien beings).  We have moral, personal, 
humanistic, soft sf.  Good sf, yes, -- but the problem is that there
are many times when I am only too aware that there are 'people
problems' and what I want to do is bask in the appreciation of some
idea or technology.

        I am perfectly willing to read science ficiton which has less 
'characterization' and less 'this is the work of an author to rival 
Hemmingway' and more 'Holy smoke arent Beanstalks really neat things!'
I do demand that the science is *accurate* (or *accurate for the time*
or *accurate with future predicitons/extrapolations*).

        So I read all of Clarke, Asimov, Sheffield, Clement, Hogan and
Dragon's Egg (the only thing I have seen by Forward).  I then read
Niven and Hoyle and ... now where do I go??  With the exception of
Sheffield, Forward and Hogan are all the 'gosh neat idea/technology'
people all in semi-retirement?? I know that fantasy sells -- I know
that sf has had to overcome the 'sf has no relevance to humanity
because it is not human oriented stigmata' ... but where do I get the
hard sf I want ... who *else* is writing it *now* ???

going through withdrawl waiting for the Hogan release (July 15??)

Laura Creighton 
decvax!utzoo!laura

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

Date: 29 June 1982 06:40-EDT
From: Allan C. Wechsler 
Subject: 6% of brain.


Mijjil said something in a recent digest about the average person
using only six per cent of their brain.  I have been hearing this or
similar gibberish for a long time.  What is the origin of this
folklore?

Danny Hillis (I think) once got a phone call from a reporter.  "I've
heard that the average person only uses about 20% of their brain."

"Well, uh," replied Danny, not knowing how to respond to this kind of
gubbish.

"I was wondering," continued the reporter, "what the exact figure is?"

   ---Allan

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

Date: 3 Jul 1982 1834-PDT
From: Henry W. Miller 
Subject: Another PacPun...

        What do you call a rodent PACMAN?

A PAC-RAT.

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

Date: Wednesday, July 7, 1982 1:50AM
From: Jim McGrath (The Moderator) 
Subject: SPOILER WARNING!  SPOILER WARNING!

The last messages in this digest discuss some plot details in the
movie Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan.  Some readers may not wish to
read on.

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

Date: Tue Jun 29 20:17:23 1982
From: decvax!idis!mi-cec!dvk at Berkeley
Subject: SPOILER WARNING - comment on ST-II TWOK


Seem's to me that the whole show could have been avoided if Chekhov,
in his wisdom of the Botany Bay affair, had simply yelled into his
mike "Beam us up Enterprise - NOW!", instead of turning tail and
running into Ricardo Egobahn.

And WHY is Kirk such an asshole when it comes to Starfleet regs and 
shields.  What a JERK! And in reply to the earlier question, why DID 
the critter leave the warmth of Chekhov's obviously tasty mind?

Ah, well. To be fair, ST-II was a far-far better movie than ST-I. It 
mercifully lacked the seemingly endless moments of studying the 
"concerned" faces of the crew (that we all know by heart now ANYWAY).

                                -Dan Klein

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

Date: 2 Jul 1982 01:30:08-PDT
From: pur-ee!pur-phy!hal at Berkeley
Subject: STII:TWOK

    Has anyone other than me found it strange that Chekov, who was 
assigned to the crew of the Reliant at the beginning of the movie, 
just waltzes onto the bridge of the Enterprise ready to assume "his" 
duties?  Does anyone have a plausible explanation?  I know that it 
wasn't explicitly stated that he was part of the Reliant's crew but it
sure appeared that way to me.
                                Hal Chambers
                                pur-ee!pur-phy!hal

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

Date: 1 Jul 1982 1901-EDT
From: Larry Seiler 
Subject: Why the critter crawled out of Chekov's ear

Just before it crawled out, McCoy was running his tricorder on Chekov.
I assumed that that miraculous device is what caused it to leave.

Larry

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

End of SF-LOVERS Digest
***********************


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