R. Graeme Cameron has conquered some computer problems by moving The Canadian Fancyclopedia to a new host where things are “simple and free”: http://canadianfancyclopedia.shawwebspace.ca
[Thanks to Andrew Porter for the link.]
Monthly Archives: January 2009
Ackerman Memorial Premiere
of Boneyard Collection
Irena Belle Films will hold its “Forrest J Ackerman Memorial World Premiere” of The Boneyard Collection on March 10.
Ackerman plays the film’s host, Dr Acula. In the words of LJ Dopp, “His last line, sitting in his throne in the marble crypt (in Lugosi’s cape, white collar and bowtie), is delivered elegantly. He says, ‘Auf Weidersehen!’ and waves goodbye to the camera.”
Here is a link to the The Boneyard Collection trailer, and to the movie poster.
The full announcement is after the jump.
[Thanks to John King Tarpinian for the story.]
Update 1/23/2009: Corrected misspellings. I hope.
John Hertz: Fred Patten Ends
44-Year Streak in APA-L
An Iron Man Steps Down
by John Hertz
reprinted from Vanamonde 817
Marty Cantor phoned at nine or ten o’clock at night. He never does that; he rises by dawn; this is a terrible hour for him. It must have been important. It was. As Official Collator of APA-L he had just heard from Fred Patten that Patten was no longer able to continue a weekly Lzine. “The world,” said Cantor, “has come to an end.”
The Amateur Publishing Association of Los Angeles began in October 1964. Since then L has been collated and distributed every week (except one break of a few months in the 1960s). Before the rise of E-mail and the Internet that was almost unheard of; it is still breathtaking. It remains unparalleled. Patten has been in every distribution. APA-L 2279 contains No. 2279 of his fanzine ¡Rábanos Radiactivos!
The science fiction community has since earliest days been enlivened by the amateur publications by fans, for fans, which we call fanzines. Fanzines are our joy, fanzines are our delight, fanzines are our heart of gold. But notoriously they come and go. They last a few years, or a few issues. Into long runs gaps creep. Fanziners drop one title and take up another. “A frequent fanzine” is a rallying cry.
An apa collects and circulates its contributors’ zines. Apazines at best sparkle with the interplay of wit and reflection, the interchange of comments and of comments on comments. Like other sapient beings we in apas do not always rise to our ideals. We find it hard enough in most apas, quarterly or monthly.
Over almost forty-five years Patten’s Lzine was faithful and sound. He noted, reviewed, commented. He was outstanding — and he was mild. His wit and reflection thus interplayed. Of him “prosaic” was praise. He was a founder of the Down Under Fan Fund (visits between Australia – New Zealand and North America), he chaired Westercon XXVII (1974; s-f convention in the North American west) and Loscon XIV (1987; Los Angeles — incidentally, his had the highest attendance to date), he was a worthy fanhistorian, he became an international expert on animé, all with a place in his zine, as is the fannish way. We could read him for his view of what we were not ourselves interested in. That’s writing.
In 2005 Patten suffered a stroke. He was not a lumberjack, or a pianist; his enterprise did not rely mainly on his bodily health. He had already retired as a librarian. He had to give up his s-f collection, and his apartment. But he continued fan activity by other means. He was indomitable — but not, it has at last and bravely appeared, indefatigable. He has done more than dozens, or hundreds. Long may he wave.
Update 1/23/2009: Corrected to 1974 Westercon. (The Roman numeral was right — I know for sure 1978 was 31 and could count back, after all…)
1000 Novels Everyone Must Read: SF
On the installment plan, The Guardian is running its choices for the list of 1000 novels everyone must read. It’s just posted the science fiction titles from the list and the introduction, mentioning some of the right names, makes it all sound very promising:
From the margins of an almost invisible literature has sprung the intact reality of the 20th century.” Ballard’s visions of “inner space”, Orwell, Huxley and Atwood’s totalitarian nightmares, Kafka’s uneasy bureaucracies, Gibson’s cutting-edge cool – all are examples of a literature at the forefront of the collective imagination.
The three parts of the list and some sidebar articles add up to 149 books, according to SF Signal, which encourages people to copy and annotate the books on the list they’ve read.
Here are the links to The Guardian:
Science Fiction/Fantasy Part I
Science Fiction/Fantasy Part II
Science Fiction/Fantasy Part III
I wish I liked the results more because they’ve made some idiocyncratic choices I entirely approve. Mark Twain’s A Connecticut Yankee at King Arthur’s Court would certainly be on my list, but I don’t know how many other fans would call it must-read sf. They also named Walter M. Miller Jr.’s A Canticle for Leibowitz, an overlooked classic that’s well-known to actifans but not by so many others. And it never would have occurred to me to tag Antoine de Sainte-Exupéry’s The Little Prince but I like the choice.
Unfortunately, too many of the selections ring false for me. The right authors represented by their lesser works. No Bradbury at all. And a bunch of books that came out in the past 30 years which didn’t seem very significant then or now.
[Thanks to Andrew Porter for the link.]
Tom Deitz Suffers Heart Attack
Georgia fantasy author Tom Deitz had a heart attack last weekend. At last report he was hospitalized in Gainesville, GA.
The 56-year-old Deitz has authored over a dozen novels. He was recognized with the Phoenix Award at DeepSouthCon in 2007.
[Thanks to Andrew Porter for the story.]
Cordwainer’s Fan Crotchety
The Crotchety Old Fan Steve Davidson says be on the lookout for his weekly piece in the Cordwainer Smith website blog starting January 21.
Rosana – Cordwainer’s daughter – graciously accepted my proposal, so now I’ll be writing a weekly piece for that website. It looks like it’s scheduled for Wednesdays…
I just did a little something on collecting his works and a bit of background on his first story – “Scanners Live in Vain.” We’ll all get to see where it goes from there.
Rumpole’s Creator Rests in Peace (1923-2009)
Literary fountainhead John Mortimer, who passed away January 19, received a fascinating tribute in The Guardian. Barrister, playwright and novelist, Mortimer’s best known fiction chronicles the law practice of Horace Rumpole. (Leo McKern, the most memorable Number 2 in The Prisoner, took that role in the television series.)
Mortimer wanted a career in theater, but his father steered him into law. He ended up thriving in both fields:
Soon he discovered a real talent for divorcing people (in those barbaric, fault-finding days before divorce reform), and for the arcane Chancery world in which time and talent is expended in deciding the validity of a will written on a duck egg, or the charitable status of a legacy to Trappist nuns.
The Guardian argues that Rumpole was the attorney that Mortimer was too timid to become. That’s quite a curious thing to read following a description of Mortimer’s dramatic real-life battles to extend freedom of speech protections in Britain.
[Thanks to John Mansfield for the link.]
Ray Bradbury, Mister First Nighter
Ray Bradbury attended the Saturday night opening of his play The Wonderful Ice Cream Suit at the Fremont Center Theater.
John King Tarpinian sent in these photos of (1) John himself displaying the venerable autographed suit from the 1964 production (F. Murray Abraham’s first paying part as an actor); (2) the lid of the commemorative ice cream carton (at least, I think that’s what it is); and (3) Bradbury celebrating with a serving of ice cream.
The play runs weekends until mid-February at the South Pasadena (CA) theater — Thursday through Saturday at
Update 1/21/2009: Corrected the information for the first photo.
Fred Pohl Arrives in the Future
The remarkable Fred Pohl is still looking for new challenges at age 89. His latest project is writing The Way the Future Blogs.
One of Pohl’s first posts explains how he started collaborating with Arthur C. Clarke on The Last Theorem:
Then, in one of his letters in the early part of 2006, Arthur rather off-handedly mentioned that, a couple of years earlier, in a fit of exuberance, he had signed publishing contracts for several books that, he was now convinced, he would never be able to write himself. Most of them he had arranged for some other writer to finish, but there was one, called The Last Theorem, for which he needed a collaborator.
That sounded like a hint, and I took it. I wrote back, “If you really need a collaborator for that unfinished novel, Barkis is probably willin’. I like collaborating and sadly seem to be running out of collaborators.”
[Via Andrew Porter and Steven Silver.]
Ed Count
A project Ed Green has worked on, Looking for Grace, has a new trailer.
Ed looked back over his show biz career and realized, “A quick count shows I’ve played the bad guy 16 times and the good guy 3 times. Of that count, 5 bad cops, 1 good cop. I sense a trend.”
(Quoted by permission.)