Article-I.D.: ucbvax.8499
Posted: Wed Sep 15 05:28:48 1982
Received: Wed Sep 22 07:48:07 1982

>From SFL@SRI-CSL Wed Sep 15 05:09:49 1982

SF-LOVERS Digest         Thursday, 2 Sep 1982      Volume 6 : Issue 49

Today's Topics:
                Administrivia - Opinions from SU-LOTS,
                  SF Topics - Opinions from SU-LOTS
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Date: Wednesday, September 1, 1982 10:07AM
From: Jim McGrath (The Moderator) 
Reply-to: SF-LOVERS-REQUEST at SRI-CSL
Subject: Opinions from SU-LOTS

Some of the following material is from the BBoard at SU-LOTS, and was
submitted by Stuart M. Cracraft (mclure at SRI-UNIX).  It was thought
to be of interest to the readership.  Since LOTS is not on the net,
responses cannot be made to the original submitters - however, people
should feel free to discuss the topics and issues raised.

Jim

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Date: 18 Aug 1982 0852-PDT
From: Mike Peeler 
Subject: 1-dim ratings


              One-dimensional ratings do not at all indicate
          one-dimensionality of the field. It shows only
          that the opinions expressed are one-dimensional.

              You can feel your heart while reading and come
          up with an assessment of the intensity of your
          response. That technique seems to reduce the
          problem to a simple magnitude without any preten-
          sion of capturing the full richness of the field
          in one little number.


Regards,
     Mike

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Date: Tuesday, 17 August 1982  05:42-EDT
From: RG.JMTURN at MIT-MC
Subject: Correction to LOTS comment

Anne McCaffrey's secondary Dragonrider series (A.K.A the Harper Hall 
series) runs Dragonsong, Dragonsinger, Dragondrums.

                                        James

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Date: 26 Aug 1982 2030-EDT
From: Larry Seiler 
Subject: Correction to a correction on opinions from su-lots

A person called "csin!cjh@CCA-UNIX" made the following statement:

    DUNE does not pander to any mystic cult; it came out before
    almost all of the popular expressions of drugs (e.g. songs
    ranging from "Mr. Tambourine Man" to "Puff, the Magic Dragon" ...

Lets set the record straight:  "Puff, the Magic Dragon" was not
written as a drug song.  DUNE is copyright 1965; "Puff..." was written
around 1960.  So if DUNE predates popular drug usage, so does the
song.  And if you prefer a more straigtforward proof, Paul Stookey
stated in an interview that it wasn't written as a drug song.  So why
does it use drug terminology?  Most likely, the terminology was copied
from the song.  'Nuff said.

Larry

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Date: 15 Jul 1982 1432-PDT
From: M.McLure at SU-LOTS (Stuart M. Cracraft)
Subject: Dune and Farmer

M.MELKAR wondered how Herbert could produce such a winner as Dune and
such losers as its sequels. Simple! It is fairly well known that
Herbert was getting a lot of advice from John W. Campbell during the
period when he was writing Dune. I believe that Campbell could almost
be listed as a second author of Dune. He probably injected an enormous
number of suggestions into its creation. Herbert has not admitted
this, but many critics believe it to be true nonetheless. Campbell was
also responsible for much of the idea behind the Foundation trilogy.
Asimov has been truthful enough to admit his debt to Campbell for this
help.  Campbell is probably partially responsible for numerous other
classics and was the main shaper of SF as we know it.

Back to Farmer again. One of my favorite quotes about Farmer's writing
is in an essay by Rottensteiner in one of the Science Fiction Studies
criticism collections:

        (In reference to TO YOUR SCATTERED BODIES GO)
   "What little value the novel has lies wholly in the fact that it
    presents in an almost pure form the particular method of
    mass-market SF -- that is, playing around with a limited set of
    elements that are combined and recombined to infinity. A
    kaleidoscope of oddities that is simultaneously derivative,
    self-perpetuating and incestuous; a mixtum compositum of almost
    unlimited assimilative powers, ahistorical and devaluating;
    readily accepting what is intellectually bankrupt, and bankrupting
    what initially had some value, before it was drawn into the
    gigantic junk-yard of SF, where everything is but a pretext for
    another cops-and-robbers story -- regardless how the figures are
    called, and whether the background is the earth, some other
    planet, the galaxy, past present or future, some other dimension,
    or indeed the afterlife.

    What does this all suggest? Farmer presents hellish worlds, before
    birth and after it, into which a vague hope is introduced only as
    an additional torture. They depict various degrees of degradation
    of man, and reject the autonomy of human values and human beings.
    These stories proclaim the Fortean doctrine that man is only
    property, utterly at the mercy of beings with remarkable powers,
    "gods" or "ethicals," who appear to be childlike, prankish,
    sadistic dimwits, taking delight only in causing pain and
    suffering. Even death offers no escape from the torturers since it
    has lost its uniqueness and become a playful act that can be
    reversed or repeated at will.

    The author of such "gods" does in fiction what they are supposed
    to do in reality: he plays around with shocking situations and
    possibilities, without justifying them or giving them a larger
    meaning.  Sometimes these creations are, in their vividness of
    description, remarkable as fruits of grotesque imagination; but I
    think they are never of any importance as speculative thought, as
    intellectual effort."

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Date: 17 Jul 1982 1211-PDT
From: T.TIME at SU-LOTS
Subject: S.F. Authors

        One author that I didn't see on M.Melkars list of novels and authors 
was Andre Norton. I have only read one of her novels "Breed To Come" but I was
very impressed by it. It is an Earth in the futur type story after all humans
have left the planet and the animals have evolved. It's quite interesting.
                                                        T.Parker

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Date: 19 Jul 1982 1135-PDT
From: M.MELKAR at SU-LOTS
Subject: Science Fiction Rating list

I think I'm not alone in appreciating A.AVERY's SF list even though
his tastes are different from mine, thanks Avery.  The following will
be my last SF list, from here on I'll stick to specific reviews and
kibbutzing other peoples lists.  I attach all the usual caveats to
this list: my tastes are jaded, etc.


Poul Anderson
    Trader to the Stars                B
    Mirekheim (sp?)                    B
James Blish
    A Case of Conscience               C+ [boring]
S. Delany [an overrated
        author in my opinion]
    Triton                             C+
Charles V. DeVet, Katherine MacLean 
    Second Game                        A+ 
H. Ellison
    I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream  A+ [short stories]
Frank Herbert
    Destination: Void                  C+
    The God Makers                     C
Aldous Huxley
    Brave New World                    A  [a classic]
Fritz Leiber [important author
        and a very nice man, too]
    -Leiber has written some excellent short stories-
    The Big Time                       B
Stanislaw Lem [people tend to overrate this author though he is good]
    Solaris                            A
Larry Niven [One of my favorites]
    The Mote in God's Eye              B
    A Gift from Earth                  B
    The Flight of the Horse            C  [Niven's biggest turkey]
    A World out of Time                B+
    Long ARM of Gil Hamlin             B
Andre Norton
    Galactic Derelict                  B
    Moon of Three Rings                C+
    Star Gate                          B+ [My favorite by Norton]
George Orwell
    1984                               A  [a classic]
Frederick Pohl
    Beyond the Blue Event Horizon      A  [Gateway sequel]
J.R.R. Tolkien [the first and last
        in self consistant fantasy]
    Silmarillion                       A- [Melkar rules!]
    Hobbitt                            A+
    Lord of the Rings                  A
    Farmer Giles of Ham                B+
    Smith of Wooton Major              A  [Avery is right on this one]
    The Adventures of Tom Bombadil     B  [never understood this one]
    Leaf by Niggle (sp?)               A  [Avery would love this]
Evgeni Zamiatin [the Russian Orwell,
        though not as good]
    We                                 A-


This concludes my final list.  I'd like to comment that too many times
people sight the major authors such as Niven, LeGuin, Farmer for
people to read without mentioning the less well known people who are
just as good but so recent that their reputations are not yet
established.  Stephen Goldin is an execellent author and he has one
claim to fame that to my knowledge no other SF author has:  all his
books are great (he's yet to write a turkey).  No doubt in time that
will change.  "Second Game" by DeVet is among my favortites but I seem
to be the fourth person who has read this novel, (classic case of the
starving genius).  Alexi Panshin is among the top five SF authors in
my opinion, and hardly anyone has read him except for "Rite of
Passage" which is an excellent book.  His best work however, is the
"Anthony Villiers series" which I intend to write a review on for
BBOARD as soon as I've completed the David Lindsay review.  Would
anyone be willing to proof read my Alexi Panshin review, (preferably
someone who has read the Villiers series)?  I would still like to see
other reviews, particularly by people with tastes different from Avery
and myself.

                                 G. Allen
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Date: 19 Jul 1982 1204-PDT
From: P.PHIGMENT at SU-LOTS
Subject: sf authors...

Why didn't you give Jerry Pournelle any credit for The Mote in God's
Eye, G. Allen?  And if Larry Niven is one of your favorites, then why
didn't you remember that Gil the ARM's last name is Hamilton?

                                 Just wondering, don't take me wrong.
                                         -pH

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Date: 19 Jul 1982 1229-PDT
From: M.McLure at SU-LOTS (Stuart M. Cracraft)
Subject: Ellison's stories

There's only so much of Harlan that I can take, but some of it is
amazingly good, intense, vivid. For example, his story collection
DEATHBIRD STORIES is one of my all-time favorite books. It's sort of
an assemblage of his best work up until the time it was compiled.

SHATTERDAY, his most recent collection, is also good, but rather
different, more introspective, less frenetic.

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Date: 17 Jul 1982 1628-PDT
From: P.PARDNER at SU-LOTS
Subject: Wiz. of Zao??

Has anyone read a sf novel, "the Wizard of Zao".  That may not be the
correct title, and I CAN'T remember who wrote it.

If the name rings a bell, please let me know who authored it. It was a
VERY cute sf/fantasy-type about a little green wizard (like Yoda, with
a sense of humour) who has a knack for great jokes, screwing up
spells, and general mischief.

The reason I'm interested is that the author was supposedly making
this book the first in a series of N (5? 6?), with one book devoted to
each planet in his own little solar system.  I'm very interested in
finding out if any more have been forthcoming.

As I recall, the book was one of the most DELIGHTFUL I'd ever read --
full of humour, fantasy, and a cute surprise ending when we find out
who the wizard REALLY is.

-- can anyone help?

                -- pardner

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End of SF-LOVERS Digest
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