Pixel Scroll 2/10/18 There Must Be Fifty Ways To Scroll Your Pixel

(1) STUDYING TOLKIEN. “The Past, Present, and Future of Tolkien Scholarship” conference will be held November 1-4, 2018 at Valparaiso University in Indiana.

This unique conference will examine the totality and comprehensiveness of Tolkien scholarship in three large groups:  the past (from the 1950s to the 2010s), the present (from the 2010s to the present), and the future (from the present to the next 20 years).  There will be four days of paper presentations, plenary speakers, discussions, film screenings, exhibits, book-signings, and music.…

The Call for Papers is out. Full details at the link.

The conference will be divided into three major days of conference papers:

  • Friday, November 2: The past of Tolkien scholarship

Plenary speaker:  Douglas A. Anderson

  • Saturday, November 3: The present of Tolkien scholarship

Plenary speaker:  Verlyn Flieger

  • Sunday, November 4: The future of Tolkien scholarship

A plenary panel discussion with Dr. Robin Reid, Dr. Dimitra Fimi, Dr. Andrew Higgins, and Dr. Brad Eden

Paper proposals on any topic or theme related to Tolkien scholarship are welcome.

(2) CTEIN AND CHTORR. David Gerrold, who has been foreshadowing good news for awhile, finally uncloaked some of the details:

I have contracts on three books. A novella section of one of those books (co-written with Ctein) will be appearing in the May/June issue of Asimov’s. I believe it is one of the better things I’ve been involved with.

The other two books are Chtorran novels and the final draft of one of them will be turned in by summer.

I have sold an option for a TV series based on one of my projects, and the option on another book was just (enthusiastically) renewed. I have also been approached to direct a film based on a favorite fantasy novel, I just finished my first rewrite of the script. (The first writer did a marvelous job of getting all the pieces on the board, my job was to energize them.)

(3) SUMMER OF ’42. Metafilter has a resource post for Retro-Hugo voters: “Some notable SF/F from 1942”.

Most of these texts are shown in the announcement video or have been discussed as possibilities in the F&SF forum or were previously selected as great SF stories of 1942 or have a record of anthologization at ISFDB. Their categorization by length derives from ISFDB also.

(4) SPECULATIVE MASCULINITIES. Galli Books has put out a call for submissions for its anthology Speculative Masculinities. Window closes April 15. Full details at the link.

Masculinity has, almost since the category of speculative fiction emerged in the early 20th century, been a concern of fiction written in the genre. A culturally dominant, Western, toxic form of masculinity has dominated storytelling in speculative fiction. In worlds as varied and diverse as the distant past of magical worlds and the far future of this one, models of maleness and masculinity tend to be the same toxic form of masculinity that dominates modern Western culture. We want to interrogate that model of masculinity, to problematise it, and to question it; we want to see other possible models of masculinity, models not centred on dominance and violence and repression of feelings; other role models for men. We are looking for fiction, essays and poetry which do this.

We are particularly looking for submissions from authors from marginalised identities and backgrounds, especially where those identities complicate the author’s relationship with masculinity, including but by no means limited to disabled writers, trans writers, and writers of colour.

(5) THIS WAY TO THE EGRESS. Bus stop 9-3/4?

(6) COMPOSER OBIT. Jóhann Jóhannsson (1969-2018): Icelandic composer, died 9 February, aged 48. Scores include Arrival (2016).

(7) GONE BUT NOT FORGOTTEN. Prozines of the past. Art by Tim Kirk.

(8) TODAY IN HISTORY

  • February 10, 1927 — Fritz Lang’s Metropolis premiered theatrically in his native Germany.

(9) TODAY’S BIRTHDAY BOY

  • Born February 10, 1906 — Creighton Tull Chaney, known by his stage name Lon Chaney Jr.

(10) COMICS SECTION.

  • John King Tarpinian saw Gort showing his rhythm at Bliss.
  • Chip Hitchcock says “He has a point” about this installment of Rhymes with Orange.

(11) WHAT WERE THEY THINKING? Yesterday’s Scroll included the class photo featuring 79 actors and filmmakers from across the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Now Unrolled thread from @UberKryptonian has done a humorous deconstruction that tells us the participants’ secret thoughts.

Has anyone really looked at the Marvel 10 year anniversary class photo? Because there is so much going on!

For example –

Chris Evans looks like he’s mad that he has to sit next to the man that tried to murder the love of his life!

(12) A SFF MOVIE LEADS THE PACK. The New York Times asks “How Did ‘The Shape of Water’ Become the Film to Beat at the Oscars?”.

This awards season has been all about hitting the zeitgeist, or at least that’s what the media, present company included, has been telling itself and you. Best picture nominees ought to tap into the #MeToo moment or, failing that, anxieties born in the age of Trump.

But is that narrative really true? And does it fully explain how a fairy tale about a janitor who hooks up with a fishman became the movie to beat?

The film, “The Shape of Water,” stars Sally Hawkins as a cleaning lady who falls for a merman held captive in a government lab, and leads the race with 13 Oscar nominations, more than any other movie. It has also scooped up key precursor awards that often culminate in Oscar gold — last weekend, the Directors Guild of America gave the filmmaker Guillermo del Toro its top prize, two weeks after the Producers Guild of America did the same.

(13) ANOTHER RED TESLA MEME. Randy’s Random has more to say about “Setting the Record”.

A 2010 Tesla Roadster achieves the highest speed and longest range of any electric car ever — and still going strong.

Plus, it can charge from solar.

The most amazing thing to me: it’s a real photo. It’s about time someone did something to capture the imagination of kids who are deciding what to be when they grow up. Engineering, science, technology, astrophysics — they have amazing opportunities.

If nothing else, the stereotype is proven true: red cars are the fastest!

(14) DEALING WITH THE BLUES. “Welcome to the Monkey House”? — “Blue Dye Kills Malaria Parasites — But There Is One Catch”.

It’s hard to imagine that a blue dye sold in pet food stores in the U.S. to fight fungal infections in tropical fish could be a potent weapon against malaria.

…Actually, the use of the dye to fight malaria is not quite as odd as it sounds. The blue dye in question, called methylene blue, is the oldest synthetic anti-malarial drug. A paper published in 1891 tells how two scientists successfully used it to treat a malaria patient.

But there was a catch.

“The treatment being followed by an intense blue coloring of the urine, and the faeces becoming blue on exposure to light, it is not very likely that methylene blue will be much used outside of hospitals,” reads an 1892 publication of the Proceedings of the American Pharmaceutical Association.

(15) HE LIKES IT. Black Panther reviewed by Mark Kermode on BBC Radio 5. Spoiler free review (as usual) from Mark, who seems to have really liked it.

Also Kermode on the attempt to game the Rotten Tomatoes audience score for Black Panther.

(16) SEATTLE FILM FEST. The 2018 “Science Fiction + Fantasy Short Film Festival” presented by MoPOP and SIFF will feature twenty short films from all over the world at Seattle’s historic Cinerama Theater on March 24. Tickets are now on sale.

The lineup is presented in two sessions of films with a 30-minute intermission and concludes with an awards ceremony.

SFFSFF brings together industry professionals in filmmaking and the genres of science fiction and fantasy to encourage and support new, creative additions to genre cinema arts. Admitted films are judged by a nationally recognized jury comprised of luminaries in the fields of science fiction and fantasy.

Session 1: Noon-2:00pm

  • FTL (dir. Adam Stern, Canada)
  • The Sea is Blue (dir. Vincent Peone, USA)
  • Everything & Everything &… (dir. Alberto Roldan, USA)
  • Cautionary Tales (dir. Christopher Barrett and Luke Taylor, UK)
  • After We Have Left Our Homes (dir. Marc Adamson, UK)
  • GEAR (dir. Kevin Adams and Joe Ksander, USA)
  • Niggun (dir. Yoni Salmon, Israel) – US Premiere
  • Fulfilament (dir. Rhiannon Evans, UK)
  • Voyage of the Galactic… (dir. Evan Mann, USA)
  • Dead Hearts (Stephen Martin, USA)

Session 2: 2:30pm–5:00pm

  • Time Chicken (dir. Nick Black, USA)
  • The Replacement (dir. Sean Miller, USA)
  • M.A.M.O.N. (dir. Alejandro Damiani, Uruguay/Mexico)
  • Die Lizenz (dir. Nora Fingscheidt, Germany/France) – US Premiere
  • Ghost Squad (dir. Kieran Sugrue, Australia)
  • Fizzy and Frank (dir. Randall McNair, USA)
  • Haskell (dir. James Allen Smith, USA)
  • Strange Beasts (dir. Magali Barbe, UK)
  • Jiminy (dir. Arthur Molard, France)
  • The Privates (dir. Dylan Allen, USA)

For more information including film synopses and director bios, visit MoPOP.org/SFFSFF.

(17) RETURN OF THE KESH. Wire Magazine says the record label Freedom to Spend will be reissuing Ursula K. Le Guin and Todd Barton’s 1985 recording Music And Poetry Of The Kesh in physical and digital formats on March 23 — “Music And Poetry Of The Kesh reissued on LP”.

Todd Barton and Ursula K Le Guin’s recording Music And Poetry Of The Kesh, originally released as a cassette accompanying Le Guin’s 1985 book Always Coming Home, will receive a long awaited reissue next month via Freedom To Spend. Part novel, part lengthy textbook, the publication tells the story of an invented Pacific Coast people called The Kesh and a woman called Stone Telling, weaving an anthropological narrative of folklore and fantasy. For its soundtrack, words and lyrics were put together by the late novelist while the sound was composed by Barton, an Oregon based musician and Buchla synthesist with whom Le Guin had worked on public radio projects….

Both Barton and Le Guin has started work on the reissue before the novelist’s death on 22 January of this year. Moe Bowstern, a writer and friend of Le Guin, wrote the sleevenotes for this new edition in which she explains that Barton had built and then taught himself to play several instruments of Le Guin’s design, among them ‘the seven-foot horn known to the Kesh as the Houmbúta and the Wéosai Medoud Teyahi bone flute.’”

Information on streaming and purchasing the recording is available at: http://smarturl.it/fts009

[Thanks to JJ, John King Tarpinian, Lise Andreasen, Steve Green, Lenore Jean Jones, Chip Hitchcock, Cat Eldridge, IanP, Mark Hepworth, Martin Morse Wooster, Rob Thornton, Carl Slaughter, Wobbu Palooza, and Andrew Porter for some of these stories, Title credit goes to File 770 contributing editor of the day Kip W.]

60 thoughts on “Pixel Scroll 2/10/18 There Must Be Fifty Ways To Scroll Your Pixel

  1. I have to put Norman Spinrad’s “A World Between” on the table; a screwball comedy about toxic masculinity AND toxic femininity. If memory serves; it’s a good thirty years since & read it…. (I vaguely remember dueling with giant fake phalli…. )

    <edit because I don’t think there’s an author named “Sprinrad”…>

  2. If I recall correctly, Phillip Jose Farmer’s “Riders of the Purple Wage” also explores toxic gender roles (and predicts the universal basic income too).

  3. @Chip Hitchcock

    I’m also wondering whether the editor(s) realize that toxic masculinity has been questioned for some time

    This is so patronising it made me physically cringe, and the fact you, and other filers, can think of individual examples of stories where toxic masculinity is questioned does not disprove the argument that most SFF does not do so. I think it’s extraordinarily ungenerous to speculate that this anthology comes from people with no knowledge of previous “gender in genre” works addressing masculinity on the basis of the call for submissions alone. Based on what I’ve read from a couple of the editors here and elsewhere, I’m also confident in believing it’s completely wrong.

    (Any reason you didn’t acknowledge that one of the editors, D Franklin, has literally commented upthread, btw? Is it because, as your “editor(s)” language also suggests, you couldn’t be bothered to click through and learn exactly who you’re being rude to?)

    In general, folks, I’m all for a “recommend existing works that do interesting things with masculinity” conversation, but can we detach it from thinly-veiled sneering at people who are trying to reinforce and promote that trend?

  4. @Soon Lee: Thanks, I did already remove some older ones again, but now I’ve removed a bunch more AND this thread. I’m going to check the box again here, now that I’ve unsubscribed from it; ‘cuz right now, I’m not getting notices from this thread. (I wonder if I’m missing stuff on other threads, or other threads are just quieter; I don’t subscribe to all threads, unlike before, so it’s tough to tell.)

    Clicking and godstalking and crossing my fingers!

  5. @Arifel, My apologies; I wasn’t meaning to sneer at all. Someone started talking about the (rare) books that addressed the subject of toxic masculinity, and I threw out another example, as one does. I didn’t realize how it might sound. I’m all for this anthology; it sounds interesting.

  6. @ Arifel

    Like Cassy B, I apologize. I was also just adding another book to the mix and didn’t know about the debate that accompanied the topic.

  7. Yes. If there was an anthology exploring Music in SF, would you be all about “I wonder if the editors know that people have questioned the role of music in the future before?”

    Of course there have been questions about it. Of course you can list works about it. SF tends to be *in conversation with itself* on these subjects. It’s not impossible a story submitted to this anthology will even be in direct and conscious dialogue with one of those prior works.

    Wanting to add to the conversation, or shine a spotlight on the conversation, doesn’t preclude being aware the conversation is happening.

    In fact, quite the opposite.

  8. @Rev. Bob: Thanks, and darn. This thread is jinxed for me. I have notices in my inbox (TBR!) from the 2/11 scroll, but none form this one.

  9. Pingback: Ctein Plunges Ahead | File 770

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