Tag: history

The SFFaudio Podcast #831 – AUDIOBOOK/READALONG: The Aeneid by Virgil (Books V to VIII)

The SFFaudio Podcast #831 – The Aeneid by Virgil [Books V – VIII] read by George Allen (for LibriVox) and translated by John Dryden. This is the first third of the epic poem, books V to VIII (comprised of XII Books) running 4 hours 18 minutes, followed by a discussion of them. Participants in the discussion include Jesse and Scott Danielson

Talked about on today’s show:
books 5-8, three, the entire Aeneid, zip up all the things into one show, one long show?, the first half and the second half, how did we devide these?, at the end of book six the whole things changes, The Odyssey, having trouble getting into this, washing over, what happened?, find things, Great Courses series, Elizabeth Vandiver, 1-6 seems to be the interesting bit, 7-12 was the interesting bit, gung-ho Rome, an Avengers movie, power armour, couple of decades ago, the very ending, finding out about that, verym memorable, a good chunk, one of the books of this book, the shield of Aeneas, exemplifies what’s weird about this book, The Iliad is weird compared with The Odyssey, operating on its own, a cast of characters, a bunch of heroes, Achilles, Patrochlus, the other team, the gods, trying to get the stories about being men, the older dudes are there, know who they are, the story of individual heroes from individual towns, two Ajaxes, an everyman’s story, an individual’s story, every dude has a superpower, a massive seperation, Aeneas is not much of a man as a human being, he is piety personified, dutiful to the gods and destiny, a product of a bunch of things, checkboxes, running a race, certain checkpoints, these all things happened in Roman history, telling a story people already know, all the future visions that we see are contemporary, a propaganda piece, more like a bible, moral stories, how Greeks behave, Romans are already behaving, we are seeing some contemporary for Augustus, some ancient stuff, also shorter, both are in one, if we go into any individual passage and break it down a bit, the Dryden translation, the Fagles translation, end of book 8, page breaks from the bottom, a greenwood shade for long religion known, about a grove, a forest, such vistas, stands by the streams that wash the Tuscan town a holy horror to the grove, a holy forest, beautiful poetic, almost Lovecraftian, the first inhabitants, to Sylvanus vowed, the guardian of the flocks and fields, annual day, the particular setting, the Romans have a set of gods like the Greeks, a million percent legit, they are pantheists, everything is full of gods, the god of the sewers, if you work for the city as a sewer man, your duty is holy, a car or a badge, a holy priest of this goddess, that is not capitalism, everything is infused with religion, keep things great, intense secure, the allies that they’re getting ready for the coming war with the Latians, now from a rising ground, his wondering eyes around, from left to right, thither, weary horses fed, now it gets fun, where the shield description starts, the fated arms, within a winding vale she finds her son, presented with weapons by his mom, but the goddess Venus, off in a glade’s recess by a frigid stream, fighting swaggering Latin ranks, savage Turnus to a duel, a little more touching, she shews her heavenly form without disguise, desiring eyes, same information, in the form of someone else, in The Odyssey, as Mentor, Telemachus, who could it have been but the goddess Athena, this is literally her son, the god who made the armor is not his father (but her husband), he wants to see his mom, behold she says, having her first son embrace, his greedy sight, being made personal, he can’t hug her, she embraces him, radiant arms, she sets the weapons and armour, with that Venus reached to embrace her son, exactly the same information, his greedy sight, like Christmas, takes delight in the goddess’ gifts, what we really have to do is slow it down and think about what’s exactly happening, the crested helm that vomits radiant fires, the terrible crested helmet, solid bronze, like a dark blue cloud, given the perfect gift, good quality, his hands the fatal sword and corslet hold, manly thigh, mysterious mould, roman triumphs, burnished grieves of electrum, no words can tell its power…, the incredible description on what’s going on on the shield, the wars, Julian line, there is the story of Italy, seers and schooled in times to come, all the wars they waged, stock, Julius Caesar and his progeny, right up to the contemporary, this is poetry and not story, poetic devices built into the imagery, how exciting this would be to the Romans, walking around looking at sights familiar to them, an ancient world that’s already ancient, not a new land, an old land full of people already, should be a new land, prime of the world, the caves of Mars, the marshal twins, Romulus and Remus, the green grotto, dugs, lithe neck, licked her wolf pack into shape, intrepid of the swelling, licked at their tender limbs, she’s shaping them into men, pretty great, happening upstairs right now, they look like dogs, they might shape up, the foster dam, sucked secure, new Rome appears, the rape of the Sabine dames, accelerated quickly, a war succeeds, unexampled deeds, pray defend, this is the description of the land on the shield, an image being described, not far from there, he forged this shield, very good, the way to appreciate it, what happens in book, the part where Venus gives him the armour, Book 5 is all about Olympian style games, a funeral, funeral games, get gladiators, a ritual, go yell, form those pups, we see that hear in a moment, sorry, through this whole shield, brutally dragged, circus games were played, an anticipation of what’s about to happen, a projection into the future of this book, a war succeeds, breach of public faith, arms they pray defend, the Romans don’t exist yet, plight the peace, each other’s charger, they’re friends, early in this book, a fatted sow, imprecations on the purgered head, firey steeds, vulture’s fud, battling old king, same chiefs, stood in full armour, lifting cups, a charger here is not a horse, a cup, two four horse chariots, man of Alba you shouldn’t have kept your words, from brakes of thorns, punishment, viscera here and there, ready for that good Roman soil, restore the banished kings, the Roman you asserts their native rights, mounted a massive siege to choke the city, in freedom’s name, Roman history, to win by famine or fraud surprising, the flud, his likeness meancing, burst her chains, scap’d from their chain, for their guide, heroic Manleus, gud, held the capital’s heights, then Rome was poor, straw, gold, on the left before, on the right after, the silver goose before the shining gate, by her cackles saved the state, Paul Revere, not a major character in the American revolution, the new thatch bristled thick, the gold arcade, Gauls attack the gates, Gauls! Gauls!, ascend and seize the walls, Romans pretended like they never started wars, modern empires use today, Gulf of Tonkin, the Maine, we were attacked!, you can probably inflate any sort of incident you want, the gold dissembled well their golden hair, long alpine spears, striped shirts, long shields, a lot of gold, that’s also on the shield itself, gilding, a bas relief on this shield, little cartoons, the gold lied, hardby, nearby, naked throw their shields, targets dropped from heaven, dancing priests of Mars, here modest matrons in their soft litters, odorous gums, and chaste matrons riding in pillowed, far hence removed, the Stygian seats are seen, the furies hissing from the nether ground, the torments of the doomed, cringing before the furies, you?, the narrator stepping in, and Cato’s holy ghost is dispensing laws, a contemporary of Augustus, a reflection back of going to Hell, set apart the virtuous souls, finish this giant shield, new stanza, the dancing dolphins, cut the precious tide, the heaving sea, the blue deep foamed, swam the dolphins, cut the waves in two, amid the main, water, ocean, sea, their brazen beaks, watery plain, Battle of Actium, seething, molten gold, I, Claudius, the Battle of Kursk, D-Day, the Battle of Stalingrad, a definitive battle, whathisname and the lady, in pride of place, the propaganda end of this particular poem, young Caesar, his beamy temples, the Julian star, the senate and people too, high astern he stands, lustrous brows, Agrippa seconds him, his manly brows, forshows, performed in part for Augustus, have Virgil in, Virgil performs this part, we’re not forgetting about you Agrippa, how to win this battle, impelled by favouring winds, proud ensign, Agrippa marries a Julian, barbarian aides, the Bactrians from a far, the Egyptian wife, troops of every stripe, in his retinue, the end of the Earth, Cleopatra, camels, Arabians near, of tounges discordant, his ill-fate follows him, forky prows, the water glows, all launch in as one, cleaving triple beaks, a description of the battle, it seems as if the Cyclades again, afloat on the swells, showering flaming toe, fireballs are thrown, the fields of Neptune take a purple dye, her cruel fate, the snakes behind, clacking her native rattles, her destiny coming, the dog Anubis barks but barks in vein, the clash of the two cultures, the Romans were contemptuous of the Egyptians, so much food, massive pyramids and ancient culture, how they treated Caesarean, monster gods, great Minerva, Athena, Discord, Bellona is the wife of Mars, there in the heart of battle, with grim furies, Strife and Triumph rushing in, bloody lash in hot pursuit, the land of Dis, pours down his arrows, quit the watery fields, and scanning the melee, Apollo bent his bow, see her calling, tinting the winds, let her sheets run free, invokes the gales, heaves her breast for breath, sails, panting and pale with future of death, driven along by winds and waves and scudding through the throng, SCUD missiles from the first Gulf War, just opposite sad, hides the flying host, the Nile immersed in morning, all his rippling robes, all his conquered people, Nilus is the river god of the Nile, the sow with 30 white piglets, everything is alive, I’m gonna kill you, the god throws down fear, the retreat, his thanks expressed, 300 temples in the town he placed, in triple triumph, eternal vows, August is great because he’s dutiful to the gods, diverting us, three shining nights, the streets with praise, the theaters with plays, drenched in his gore, upon his throne, hangs the monumental crowns on high, the roads resounded, strewn with slaughtered steers, mounts them high on the lofty temple doors, the vanquished, and in tongue, the ungirt Numedian race, they got no pants, the tamed Euphrates, the Rhine, the Danes unconquered, a map, as motley, the nomad race, archers bearing quivers, bridling at his bridge, divinely wrought, unknown the names, he admires the race, a detail, out of the sky, oh, mom they’re the best, I don’t know who these guys are, more into it, we’re so distanced from it, the poetry, the rhyme, when the rhyme don’t work, blood and good, forced rhymes make you engage with the material more, point to two, the visit to the underworld, the games, part of their tradition, when the Romans want to turn the people to their side, hold a games, it has to be tied to something, an anniversary, a Roman religious festival, funerals and funeral memorials, we’re having a games, you pay for the games, before they were Romans, wrong by the Greeks with no honour, everything is calm now, the civil wars are over, I’m just like Aeneas, people who lose, over in Sicily, one guy slips in blood, everybody gets prizes, nobody on team Trojan, he brings everybody along, political propaganda, I can help every American, no child left behind, such a good boy, respectful of his troops and the gods, our Republic was at war, the most striking thing in the underworld, how Christian it was, not Heaven, nicer parts of the underworld, a little bit of an explanation, resembles the Catholic viewpoint of Purgatory, getting out of Purgatory, punishment for people who are bad, you did bad stuff in life, this is different from the Greek underworld, you don’t really want to be there, everybody goes there, from Book 6, line 850, taints, plagues, so long energized in the flesh, drilled in punishments, later Dante-esque, they must pay, Elysium’s broad expanse, headed to Heaven, striking, doesn’t fit, August isn’t Christian, compatible, Milton and the great Larry Niven, conversation with Julie, A Houseboat On The Styx by John Kendrick Bangs, enlightened pagans, prepping the way for Jesus, up or out vs. down or under, burying people, doing right by people’s bodies, isn’t buried, in real life, outsourcing these things, you don’t wash your own father’s body, you hire a service for that, disconnecting from the reality, dig up the corpse, this was my grandfather, say that to your son, uh huh, a part of him, Romans are deeply connected to the people they kill, duty for your country, my gods tell me we are destined for this land, remembering the end, the anticipation for that end, a genocide, they’re going to kill all these people, future allies, fate is such that, I made the land peacable, we were a house divided, Abraham Lincoln, started a war, unofficially punished, who’s monument is the biggest, the Lincoln memorial, not a figure of Washington, imposing, a giant statue of Lincoln sitting in a chair, a throne, U.S. Capitol, strip of land, quite symbolic, really something, become politicians, done the tour, has no impact, this stuff can wash over you, that lady was the mom of that dude, about this whole thing, multiple purposes, checkpoints it has to go through, this is not a fiction story, alternate history, filling in the gaps, Rommel is one of the characters, you can’t kill Patton, city state propaganda, a lot more like this whole book, more distancing, an individual on his way home, struggling with another people, an amalgam of those two, a duty to perform in the present, as Beowulf does, a Dane or a Jute, connected with that, a Celt and an Irish and a viking and a Swedish, viking is a verb, relationship with the gods, with Dido, got to run because of fate, sees her in the underworld, she’s with her husband, I’m sorry, not having the dead speak, he talks to his dad, pretty amazing, a paper copy, near the beginning, a huge throng of the dead, the Golden Bough, a huge hit in the early 20th century, assume it is connected to this, The Twelve Dancing Princesses by Bros. Grimm, wearing out their shoes, I will allow any man who can solve this mystery to marry one of my daughters, the punishment is death, fuck around find out if you don’t find out, a young soldier and a witch gives him advice, the witch says to him, don’t drink what they offer you, they will drug whoever is locked up with them, underneath their beds is a secret doorway into an underworld, a cloak of invisibility, steps on one the girl’s heel’s once, three trees, silver, gold and diamond, breaks off a branch from each, twelve boats in the lake, scooches down, that’s weird, twelve princess, they dance all night, ascending the stairs, that’s weird happens a third time, that smells like bullshit, three branches, Eric pointed out some interesting things, the dream world, an inversion, like Bilbo Baggins, sneaks in finds out, profits from it, behind it all, no sex before marriage, related to this story somehow, the visit to the underworld, filled the time, wandering them among them, Phoenician Dido, endless woods, through the shadows, see or seem to see, wept and approached the ghost with tender words with love, the final measure with the sword, the powers on high, the depths of earth, the will of the gods, these mouldering places so forlorn, stay a moment, running away from whom, the last word, with welling tears tried to soothe her rage, her features no more moved, set in stony flint, in a new light, I did this because its the gods’ will, I didn’t want to do it, the wills were aligned, so I’m out, he didn’t know what she was going to do, turning it into a Catholic podcast again, it’s getting close, now see through a glass darkly, what gods’ plan is, but you have to get your toenails clipped, defer, the gods are capricious, the development from Greek gods, Clash Of The Titans (1981), Venus loves Aeneas, the apple of Discord, beauty contest, very well said, Upon The Dull Earth by Philip K. Dick, Rick, practicing witchcraft, Dick conflates it with angels, she gets to close to these fairies/angels/ghosts, ritual of bloodletting, after she’s dead, recreates a scene from The Odyssey, talk to Sylvia again, talk to the dead, dead people in dream, turns the world into a nightmare, taking the form of someone else, leaps from that body to another, tries to escape, every passing car, rigid, waiting numbly, the cop has become her, sure he answered dully, familiar fingers, red nails, the hand he knew so well, sure, hurtled ahead, she hurried everywhere, she was omnipresent, please tell me, Rick, I’m back, it was a mistake, that’s all in the past, a wretched unhappy heap, huge cleated boots, sparkled white in the sun, a difficult place to find, filled up the bowl, briefly he glanced up, a face tear stained and frantic, waver and slide, trembling red mouth, the girl at the bowl bent to dry herself, threw herself on the chair, Rick she murmured, she shook her head bewildered, superpowerful, lost love, a girlfriend that haunts you, when we want to connect with ghosts they go everywhere with us, we see them everywhere, we as modern 21st century weirdos don’t connect with, what makes these powerful stories so powerful, in essence very very real, with the last three books, wade through the washes of words we flow over us, a white animal?, the sacrificial animal being white, a pigeon, white horses, in order to win this race, a companion piece to The Lord Of The Rings, the adventures of Fredigar Bulger, the hobbit that doesn’t leave, a smaller scale story, an Atlas of Middle Earth, when we fit all that chronology in, all this backstory that you have to fit in, the original folktale versions of The Iliad and The Odyssey, those are the definitive sources for those events, stories shaped, not an individual guy, it wasn’t a dude, a bunch of people telling a story, get really good at singing songs, Barbara Allen, similar to Robin Hood, useful for telling stories, not based on a true phenomenon, based on wishes, people who get slighted at parties, roses grow in graveyards, there was this great battle long ago, you have a famous hero, a particular dude, these two stories intertwine, reading Detective Comics, Legion Of Superheroes, The Brave And The Bold, the history of the Roman empire, ruling actual Gotham City, the funeral games in Book 5, games in The Odyssey, Odysseus participates in games, the axes, washes up on the beach, a princess, who is this stranger, his great prowess at all these sports, keeping the community together, sex with lots of goddesses, get this empire governed, definitely weird, Bewoulf has a dragon, in an epilogue almost, fairy tales and folk tales, commercial success, we’re having fun with this, what we did her, scheduled that Block, What Mad Universe, meta-science fiction, if there’s thirty white puppies…

Posted by Jesse Willis

Reading, Short And Deep #464 – Make A Prison by Lawrence Block

Reading, Short And Deep

Reading, Short And Deep #464

Eric S. Rabkin and Jesse Willis discuss Make A Prison by Lawrence Block

Here’s a link to the story |PDF|.

Make A Prison was first published in Science Fiction Stories, January 1959

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The SFFaudio Podcast #748 – READALONG: Passport To Peril by Lawrence Block

The SFFaudio Podcast
Jesse, Maissa Bessada, and Will Emmons talk about Passport To Peril by Lawrence Block

Talked about on today’s show:
Anne Campbell Clark, 1967, internal stuff, guess what year this photo was taken, asking about JFK like he was still alive, Teddy Kennedy, the Irish connection, proud of him being president, very few people have read this, a book worthy of reading, noped out, pretty horrific, too sunk into it, a cocoon of singing and countryside, a lovely little book, not going anywhere and not upset about it, almost plotless, not all books need to have plots, spending time with Hobbits in Hobbiton, an old lady who likes to bicycle, red herrings, Will’s first Lawrence Block, the trip to the countryside, all of the lovely singing, I never shall marry as long as I live, really liked this book, who is the audience, Helen MacInnes readers, neither had Lawrence Block, spies with a little romance, romance with a little bit of spies, how smooth did this go down, easy drinking all the way through, it was a formula, the bad guy came around, there he is, why does that priest want her passport, maybe I’ve misjudged him, he’s back, women protagonists, usually a male, page by page, line by line, a little bit much, intoxicated, a 24 year old in 1967, the height of the sexual revolution, chaste for a folk-singer, they get snug and snuggle, she hides her nudity, not so folksy as one might imagine in real life, the scene with the IRA, pastiche-ish, that part never happened when Lawrence Block went to Ireland, a massive amount of violence, let’s go have a party, one of them gets shot and they keep having a party, movie-like, none of the dialogue felt clunky, what kind of folk-singing, Airplane!, lady with a guitar, inspirational songs vs. historical events, WWII essay, WWI, WWI’s influence on Ireland, the Irish Rising, home-rule in 1922, according to Star Trek [The Next Generation] and Mr. Data they’re going to reunite next year, all of us under the British rule, the overlords in Egypt, real bastards, it doesn’t translate across generations as well, gearing up, the ultimate McGuffin, because of the title, back to the passport, easy listening, P.J. Morgan, a lot of singing, male voices too, accents, a really good job, if I was P.J. Morgan and I had finished this book I would be superhappy with myself, a recipe, 191 pages, 5 hours 38 minutes, a short novel, a young lady who goes on a trip, chased across the countryside, a monster, a hero, delivering what women want, nice and smooth, the historical research, enthusiastic about Irish history, great fun, a double checkmark, creepy and scary quite late, when’s it gonna turn, grusome, burned to death, legs blown off, shoots somebody’s brains out, starts with a horrible murder, really violent, a nice guy from Philadelphia to leg cling to, a nice old lady who gets strangled off screen, the German guy with a family, what happened to the kids?, the casting room, spy training school, the woman with the red hair, in the ring?, a nice Londoner, leaving cards together, he’s playing a great great game, I need to tip my hand, when Ellen gets into the car with the priest, you’re just ahead of her, ahead of Jesse, I wish I knew my Irish history better, a really good promoter of stuff on his blog, the afterword, the blog post about Passport To Peril

In 1966 I was living at 16 Stratford Place, in New Brunswick, New Jersey. I’d spent a year in Wisconsin as an editor in the coin supply division of Western Printing, and just when it looked as though I might have a future in the corporate world, I realized it was the last thing I wanted. I’d been writing books all along, and I moved east and resumed writing full-time.

My agent, Henry Morrison, came to me with an assignment. Lancer Books, for whom I’d written a few books during Larry T. Shaw’s editorship, wanted to publish a romantic-espionage thriller in the tradition of Helen MacInnes. I hadn’t read anything by Ms. MacInnes, though I knew the byline; her books were published in hardcover, and frequently wound up on bestseller lists. Mine would be published as a paperback original, and bestseller status would be not even a fleeting dream.

I don’t know if I actually read any of the books which were to be my model. I probably skimmed a couple. I knew what was required—a clean sweet likable American girl as the heroine, a reasonably exotic foreign locale, and a couple of people who were not what they appeared to be, including an evident villain who turned out to be the unlikely hero and love interest, and a dashingly attractive good guy who turned out to be an absolute rotter.

I could do that.

And I knew just where to set it. Ireland. Where else?

I’d actually been to Ireland, which gave it a leg up on the rest of the world. In the fall of 1964, a few months after the move to Racine, my wife and I flew to Limerick and spent the better part of two weeks driving around Ireland. We had a day in Edinburgh and a few days in England, but Ireland got the bulk of our business.

Aside from brief forays into Canada and Mexico, this was my first time out of the States, and if it felt like an adventure, it felt even more like a homecoming. It’s clear to me that I spent at least one past life in Ireland. Among my earliest memories are ones of listening to Irish songs on the radio. (There was a girl who sang “Toora-loora-loora” on a local amateur show, and I’m pleased to report that she was the winner three weeks running.) I had a set of the Book of Knowledge, and from it I learned all the lyrics to Wearin’ o’ the Green.

When I had begun selling short fiction and was casting about for a book to write, I decided a novel of the Irish rebellion and civil war might be a good choice. But what did I know about it? I amassed an extensive library of English and Irish history, and read a surprising amount of it. And, around the time that my interest in numismatics was steering me toward the job in Wisconsin, I began collecting Irish coins and tokens and medals.
No question, then. I’d set the book in Ireland.

Ever since the trip, I’d been picking up records of Irish folk music. The Clancy Brothers, of course, but also a slew of Folkways albums on which various singers, some more gifted than others, collected songs of the 1798 Rising and other blighted periods in the land’s sad history. As G.K. Chesterton wrote:

For the great Gaels of Ireland
Are the men that God made mad,
For all their wars are merry,
And all their songs are sad.

Well, why not make my heroine a folksinger? Why not send her to Ireland to collect songs? There, of course, she could meet the wolf in sheep’s clothing, and the sheep in wolf’s clothing, and things would look decidedly dark for a while, but eventually the sun would burst through. I mean, it would have to, sooner or later. As far as we could make out, it was always either raining or about to rain in Ireland, but maybe I could cheat and have a little sunshine toward the end.

I went to New York to write the book. Don Westlake had sublet a studio apartment on West 24th Street in Chelsea; he’d lived there briefly, during a marital rough spot, and kept it as a sometimes office until the lease was up. I moved in, and brought home Passport to Peril ten days later. I don’t know if the title was mine, though I rather think it was. I know the pen name was mine, and I know that forty-five years later nobody else on earth knew it.

Henry knew back then, but I’m sure he’s long since forgotten. My first wife would have known, but I don’t think she ever read the book, and would be surprised if she recalls anything about it. Irwin Stein at Lancer would have known, but would have had no reason to remember. Among the book-collecting fraternity, no one had a clue. This book, and Fidel Castro Assassinated!, are the two works of mine that somehow escaped detection. The latter, written under the name Lee Duncan, was recently reprinted as Killing Castro by Hard Case Crime, and has since become available as an OpenRoad eBook. Passport to Peril now makes its first post-Lancer appearance as an e-book, and I can only hope you’ve enjoyed it.

I read it myself recently to ready it for publication, and I was surprised to find that I liked it. Remember what Yeats wrote?

Romantic Ireland’s dead and gone,
It’s with O’Leary in the grave. . .

True too of the Ireland of the 1960s. It was a curious pleasure to revisit the time and place, if in my own work.

the exact same thing, good at remembering how things happened in the 60s, very Lawrence Blocky, passionate about foreign revolutions, a CIA plot to kill Castro, a cheque to the farmer with the dead sheep, what ever revolution is happning in that country, the Evan Tanner series, comedic and silly, almost perfect for what its doing, broader, like James Bond, cartoonish, fun but silly, a Korean war veteran, shrapnel in his head gives him a superpower, The Thief Who Couldn’t Sleep, why readers would like a book like this, I become a supergenius, whatever republic that wants freedom from colonialism, participating in their revolutions, joke book, The Canceled Czech, light and fluffy, Tanner On Ice, literally frozen, a participant in the ideas the book he is producing, numismatics, a book on racewalking, walk faster than other people, the Hit Man/Hit List series, cozy, there’s a guy in Mexico who needs to be shot, I like Mexico, observations in a restaurant, really into stamp collecting, an action scene, whatever subject he turns his attention to becomes a very very readable book, can you write a book about assassinating Castro?, technically required to do this, Will material?, not-enough enthusiasm, emphasis and underlining and exclamation marks, Classic Crime Library number 15, how quiet it has been resting, Lawrence Block took control of his publishing, he’s the one, making you buy his stuff, around an participating in his estate, incredible, he’s so good, Westlake through Block, turns out its a real book, Westlake’s highs are higher but Block’s more consistent, a lady on vacation, why that guy slipped, an excuse to have her in peril, an excuse to have a lady chased by spies, maybe she will marry, he was trying to be caught, no one knew, there’s a tip off, out of genre for most of the people who read Lawrence Block, she goes to a movie, something drums, “A Sound Of Distant Drums”, a calling card, or a signature, somebody coming out of a movie theater, that’s cool, his Burglar series, The Burglar Who Thought He Was Bogart, The Burglar Who Painted Like Mondrian, topic books, exploring some little niche, standup comedians bits they connect together, researching and polishing ideas, Burglars Can’t Be Choosers, the girlfriend is the murderer, settles into a formula, really really fun, passes the time, go have a sandwich, oh yeah one of these, that paperback book industry is where he really lives, take a paperback and enjoy the weekend, a song saved her life, why I like folksinging now, Kumbaya, historical information, how to be, in America 2, here 12, makes you want to drink stout, listen to folk music, the festival circuit, the premise of this book, the state department in real life is evil, spread American culture, money spent on evil not on good, cultural activities, Eastern block, throw money at a problem, Lawrence Block needed to have an excuse, her family’s all killed off, one and done, they’re happy and their Irish now, both green, 2 cigarettes, more cigarettes, they stopped to buy more cigarettes, the new taste, so much smoking, they don’t need food they’re thin and young, dates the book, you could write this book, their sten guns would be something else, Berlin, Ukraine or something, delightful little book, make you say “I’d like some stout.”, Guinness, a wish fulfillment fantasy romance, read the back cover, little tipsy here and there, poignant moments, the songs, the stories, a Brothers Grimm thing, went out to all the pubs, music and stories are the same, all personal histories, probably wrong, music that’s close to the people, in the process of collecting these folk songs there’s some exploitation, selling a record, who’s going to see the proceeds of that record, what is the purpose of this?, to commoditization it?, spread it?, share it?, Stan Rogers, Barrett’s Privateers, east coast Nova Scotia Irish kitchen, a fun song, it has swearing a letter of marque, Sherbrooke, god damn them all, Halifax, the staggers and jags, such a good singer, sea shanty folk song, Montego Bay, sailing terms, incapable of catching a slow moving ship, smashed like a bowl of eggs, both me legs, in my 23rd year, six whole years, War of 1812, while you’re paying attention, similar to The Rime Of The Ancient Mariner, a homeless beggar on a pier, the big Coleridge poem, the same story as Annabelle Lee, grateful and thankful, what has Will been doing?, back into politics, a tenant union, a communist caucus in the DSA, COVID last months, 2 and a half weeks, testing positive, not very sick, flu-like symptoms, paxlovid, our medicines don’t protect us or help us, that’s crazy, a lot of cat action happening, a core group of nine cats, stranger cats, a high number of a cats, all feral, the boys that aren’t fixed are both named Brandon, one darker than the other, let’s go Brandon, telling the Brandons apart, laser eyes, that’s the dark Brandon, smaller feet, chipmunk feet, Brooklyn Dad Defiant, a very 90s name that’s a 2020s name, Owen with Gs, beg to come inside, Tobias, to bite toes, a bias towards toes, a negotiation, mother and grandmother of them all, a mean old cat, a sour disposition, the dog will let her, irritable, you can just come and rub up on my dog, mean old girls, on the roof some, Maissa’s fascinating life, editing Ace Galaksi, social media stuff, blogs and newsletters, let’s do an internal podcast, a link on the dl, what is Maissa’s job?, lots of divisions, pr, edit videos, write and produce pr things, listen to the podcast, if I need to know, 15 minutes at most, once a month, reediting a novel for 20 years, middle school, rewrite a billion time, I got out my library card…, regarding that game [chronophoto], everybody’s wearing fucking masks, anytime after 1950, AOC, 2018, an I voted sticker, eerily obvious what year it is, figure out what year that was, talking about Kennedy being president but not talking about Kennedy being assassinated, in county Cork, is the book dated?, no, it’s a period piece, au courant, everybody’s playing with their iPhone 6, bullying each other, only play with a group, a couple repeats, playing PUBG, a faster version of the game, early January, online vs. in person, got rid of some old computers, that to lean on, Scott does the editing for Reading, Short And Deep, 4-6 hours per day, 8 hour days are horrible, and the show’s over, 10 hours per day, send me a secret signal, Burn Notice, a comiccon, Battlestar Galactica, Archer, a throwback, Pulpcovers/Alex, the last of an earlier era of television, problem of the week, and a weak overriding plot every season, he used to be spy, just a premise for the show, exotic locale, it has a car, 80s, A-Team van, Kitt from Knight Rider, Dukes Of Hazzard, the car is the star of the show, an actor based show, Gabrielle Anwar, an IRA terrorist, Jeffrey Donovan, Bruce Campbell is the sidekick, the Evil Dead series, Sharon Gless, Cagney & Lacey, flip phones, 2005-2011 show, a fine show, a comic book, a sidekick on Xena, western shows, The Adventures Of Brisco County Jr., short lived Fox shows, Zorro style, Jack Of All Trades, what you can do while you’re at work, a half hour syndicated action comedy, 1801, East Indies, a swordfighting, masks, Napoleon Bonaparte is character, Mr. Charismatic on screen, bicker in fun ways, a good fun show, Spider-Man villains, Bubba Ho-Tep (2002), Elvis and JFK, it should be an amazing movie, a little long in the tooth, the cylon lady, Lucy Lawless, you see those people together, the Spartacus tv series, Blood And Sand, 300 (2006), the acting and the dynamics, a slave morality show, diaries?, slave folk heroes, Kirk Douglas, what would it mean to be a slave, having sex with the slaves, a great villainess, New Zealanders, Evan agrees, a slave rebellion, the servile war, amazing history, super-compelling on-screen performances, green screen, practical sets, thinking of it as a play, a tool to get stuff done, laidoff, Vikings was a better show, blood eagle, why you don’t want piss the vikings off, doesn’t overstay its welcome, a maori gladiator, sticking to the facts is fascinating, what is it like to be a celebrity slave, I am Spartacus, a consciousness raising movie, also very sexy, they’re sexy too, regretful but should be done, killing the masters, killed in the end, sexy jumping naked slaves, emotional resonance, very underrated show, 39 episodes, 2013, All In The Family, Happy Days, about as substantial, a monologue about Riverdale, too soap opera, just soap opera enough, Twin Peaks, the original, Deep Space Nine, a very resonant show, better is substantial ways, Miles got trapped in the mine for 20 years, extreme amounts of trauma, poor Miles O’Brien, his wife doesn’t love him, his kid doesn’t care about him, the writers were picking on him, Canadian?, Irish movies, the Canadian film industry, Black Summer, a Netflix show, Calgary, that explains it, the old zombie trope, you are the camera, you don’t know why, you follow that person for a while, this is our main character, nope, they’re killed, weird compared to regular television, Z Nation, an art film, the Asylum, notorious for making cheapo rip off movies, a company designed to make money, the coattails of Hollwood, Sharknado, very surprising, going back all the way, April 2019, not a show like Star Trek Discovery, storytelling techniques that have lain follow, basically praise, the endless sprawling suburbs of Calgary, Alberta, The Crazies (1973), worthy of attention, only one trick: surprise!, the trick works a lot, Stephen King’s The Shining, The Picture In The House by H.P. Lovecraft and Pigeons From Hell by Robert E. Howard, White House-style, axed by ghosts of slavery, based on a black person’s story told to him, a traditional slave folktale, pretty scary, a TV adaptation, anti-mystery box show, sparse in dialogue, what the fuck is going on and why am I so scared, The Extraordinary Attorney Woo, sweet and innocent, childlike, well packaged, young and more than middle aged, a broad range of interests, I think you want it to be great, sweet and fun, Korean film and television industry, clips of this autistic lady, The Admiral: Roaring Currents (2013), Yi Sun-Shin, Korean George Washington, defeated Japan, 12 Korean ships vs. 333 Japanese ships, a slog, historical epics, great horror movies, The Host (2006), the Americans pollute the Han river, evil tank juice, a Godzilla movie, lighter than Train To Busan (2016), kaiju, the worst Korean accent ever, A Man Called Ove (2015), enforcing block association rules, boisterous new neighbors, spends half the movie trying to kill himself, when a movie is not so good, theatering?, Avatar 2, beautiful and too long and mostly a setup for the next one, every crew has a crazyass white boy, very satisfying to see giant arrows go through people, a very clunky writer, repeated himself, Titanic (1997) has gravitas, a big weighty movie, Avatar 3 The Way Of The Rocks, the four elements, exhausted its idea, the na’vi won, Dances With Wolves in space, free of his bad body, a trans story, the transgender kid episode of The Orville, too Star Warsy, special effects heavy, the other way around, show the gender surgery working, trying to sell it on an alien, Ezri vs. Jadzia Dax, a funny situation, Macklin?, they’re both boys, hilarious, like Star Trek but funny, less funny, less good, very wrong of them, Obi-Won was horrible, Andor is not shit, Stalin robbing a bank, a heist show, Diego Luna, Star Wars: Rogue One, many boffins died for this thumbdrive, slow paced, beautifully framed, casting is pretty good, Star Wars writing has been shit, hang out with some labourers, smart but evil, political aspect, Blesson Yates, Imani Pullum [playing Topa], IMDB is getting shitty, a fill-in show, The Venom Business by Michael Crichton, Nazis on the Moon, Evan Lampe started a podcast series reading through everything Heinlein wrote, talked him into it, and maybe Mark Twain, Pirate Enlightenment, Or The Real Libertalia by David Graber, he’s been posthumous for a while, I’m posthumousing right now, autistic style take, all the same, his third posthumous book, “enlightenment, liberty, socialism all the same thing”, hey that’s us!, a radical social experiment, The Hopkins Manuscript by R.C. Sherriff, The Crawlers by Philip K. Dick, crawling abortions being run over by trucks, pretty great story, The Pre-Persons, a weird guy, an interview with Ray Faraday Nelson’s kid, David Agranoff, Philip K. Dick: babysitter, Philip K. Dick shows a 7-year old his derringer, why you have a derringer?, what are you thinking?, this is America, man, too American, we just got problem, do something different in this country, Four-Day Planet by H. Beam Piper, Poul Anderson sword and sandal, Francis Stevens is always interesting, dystopia in Philadelphia, The Heads Of Cerberus, a weird lady, what the fancy people do, Unseen-Unfeared, a few things missing, first published in 1904, Jean Veil, People’s Favorite Magazine, a low rent Italian restaurant, he sells love charms, not tempting, a review by E.F. Bleiler, guy breaks into a house, fights with best friend, a knock at the door, the safe was open, very convoluted, a phial with a stopper with the heads of Cerberus, Dante’s gate, no diamonds in here, what did you do with my cousin, alternate 2018, weird dystopia, no names, just numbers, Mr. Handsome gets a municipal job, a fascist state?, goes in the pit, head of the music department, it’s like the Hugo awards, also stirred up the ashes, seat of her pants, spinning up ideas, opposite of well put together, ideas like rockets going off, Science Fiction The Early Years, Guide To Supernatural Fiction, emdash, 729 pages, a special photographic filter, the soul of a recent suicide, only like an hour, how hard is it to do 47 minutes, we had a good chat, Evan’s been sick, isn’t Paul always at a convention?, socialize, Paul is lonely Libra, Jesse’s just a cancer on society, someplace, pulpcon, money, hassle at the borders, no excuses, lining up for celebrities, Pavel Chekov’s signature, the conversations at the panels are surficial, Pulpfest, 2016, intervening years, a long drive, pulps were more expensive, pandemic prices, Planet Stories for $20, hold it in your hand, oooh look at that ooh!, stay up all night talking to people, if Cirsova were in local stores, Jesse doesn’t want to support Amazon, good used bookstores, lesbian couples are in it for the long haul, a trope almost, they’re bookish, Little Sisters, super-prudes, super-evil, a place of prominence, rent is low somewhere, small town Alberta, a town full of Mormons, an amazing town, Cardston, Alberta, Justice League building, Fortress of Solitude, something out of Ayn Rand, it looks like a bank, cost of living, inflation, $850 for a 3 bedroom and big yard, what does that get you?, giant assessments, working online, the fever has not yet broken on covid, an excuse to fuck everybody and line pockets, definitively its a wash, almost none of the positives are with spreading the disease around, wrecked the industry for in-person tutoring, in person classrooms, kids don’t learn very well online, Paul’s masked up at his convention, the vaccines don’t work for almost any of the people getting them, let’s go back to business as usual, tele-judge, on trial with the judge not in the room, fixed camera, ai shit, a program that you run, that changes where your eyes are focused to make it look at the camera, creepy and interesting, simulated real-life but also fake, no modesty at all, Hawaiian Mormon templeing, nice people, just in this life, Brandon Sanderson, Orson Scott Card is a black name, church homophobia, he’s following his church beliefs, this is the doctrine of my church, and I contribute money to prevent people from getting married, religious objections vs. non-religious objections to abortion, Scott is quite nuanced, say things in a polite way, the same claim about the papists, pushing babies into wombs, bio-ethicists say it is okay to use brain dead women’s bodies, clickbait shit, frustrating fun game, coffee, I can still have coffee, too shaky, three cups max, a catfood shortage, egg pricing, incompetence of a cat named Brandon, personally responsible for inflation, not solving problems, price controls, stick it to the egg industry, milk control board, 59% increase in egg prices, realer food, no-corn in Canadian pop, some breads without soy, Italy has basically real food, pink slime, slight advantages to higher food prices, wrangle some cats, try to find cat food, inexpensive kibble, possums, raccoons.

Passport To Peril by Lawrence Block

Passport To Peril by Lawrence Block (back)

Passport To Peril by Lawrence Block - AUDIOBOOK

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The SFFaudio Podcast #747 – AUDIOBOOK/READALONG: Space Viking by H. Beam Piper


The SFFaudio Podcast #747 – Space Viking by H. Beam Piper – read by Mark Nelson for LibriVox. This is a complete and unabridged reading of the novel (6 hours 17 minutes) followed by a discussion of it. Participants include Jesse, Paul Weimer, Cora Buhlert, and Jim Kitchen

Talked about on today’s show:
serialized in Analog, November 1962 and February 1963, paperback in 1963, Ace Books, Little Fuzzy, the Scalzi treatment, gently disagree, Michael Whalen covers, homerun painting, a children’s book of Fuzzies, The Cosmic Computer, Lord Kalvan Of Otherwhen, cross dimensional novel, Roger Zelazny, rat hole, popular, used bookstores almost don’t exist, expensive used bookstores, why are those books harder to find?, how much was published, more printings of Space Viking, redoing it, a great inspiration for the Ewoks of Star Wars, Ewok-ish, translated into German, normal Ace printruns, fell into public domain, Jerry Pournelle, The Other Human Race, Uller Uprising, Junkyard Planet, Graveyard Of Dreams, Graveyard Planet is by Clifford D. Simak, a tier down, grabs your lapels, Dr. McCoy, still alive and on twitter with a pipe and gun emoji, it doesn’t work as an idea, obvious three things, two of them, three rules of H. Beam Piper, 1. throwback to historical incident or occasion, Sepoy Mutiny, fated to repeat our mistakes, hey that Hitler guy had some pretty good ideas, the big lie works for me, anti-cancer vaccine, 2. chainsmoking is still a thing, break out the cigarettes, hardboiled science fiction, drinking, gun oil and cleaning rod, firearms, everybody has cap guns in the future, after the crackup, the final war on Earth, only the southern hemispheres are around, race goes out the window, character’s looks don’t match the character’s names, Four Day Planet, Japanese name but looks like a viking, western colonization, whiteman-centric science fiction, go forward from there, the bleeding edge, he’s with Heinlein, a bigger name, Scalzi commented on his blog about it, his estate is in shambles, how amazing his writing is, his reputation has gone up since his death, all the people we don’t remember from the early 20th century, why everyone hates H.P. Lovecraft, standard beliefs, still read today, worse than Lovecraft, not that apparent in the fiction, Henry S. Whitehead, weirdos like us, 60 years since it came out, rotted in great fiction, Three Musketeers, Four Musketeers, character, romance, begins with a gutpunch, qualms with the society is a part of, the darkest motive of all: revenge, find and end him, a little worldbuilding, playing by the same rules, playing fair by those rules, an axe to grind, pschoanalyzing, a self-educated man, doing their hobbies on 500 journeys, history, he has his characters doing that, when not polishing his gun he’s smoking and reading history, a self-made man, somebody who champions the self-made man, a hardscrabble version of Heinlein, pocket money, by his bootstrapping himself, he was a working man, a nightwatchman, his interests, the way he focuses his characters on engaging in intellectual ideas, some massive blindspots but mostly right, a moral horror book, post-apocalyptic and protect my family, 17 books in this series, intellectual heft he’s working through, we’re utter monsters, I know what I’m doing is utterly monstrous, I’ll have a scene where I explain with a little girl and a dog, Beowulf raid, rape and other things, swordworld core values, Gallic law, innocent people, a quote, the Duke of Wellington, Siege of Cádiz, the 30 Years War, ya ya I know, rifles and pistols, they keep on fighting, what would you do in their place, terro-humans are all stupid like that, a massacre, a man made hell, a compulsion to share their guilt, it doesn’t stop him from writing the book, realistic, WWII, WWI, Ukraine war, The Bridge (1959), betrayed by the German Green party, all of the kids die, grew up to be famous actors (and a singer), whenever they swear, swearing by Satan, writing for magazines, “foul unprintability”, Katherine Tarrant, the system states cede, the collapse, the decline, interstellar ability, sick of what’s coming, raid the bones of the Federation, the atrophy that brought down the Federation, the Empire that comes after, Retrun Of The Jedi, Hoth is one of the planets, Dagon, Nergal, named after famous swords, Durandal, Excalibur, cookies, Gram, The Song of the Nibelungs, the Traveler RPG universe, Game Designer’s Workshop, good thing it is public domain, right?, the worst cover art ever, how did a game with such a crappy cover get any traction, Paranoia had great art, Battletech, Mechwarrior, a pox on you, 1976, Logan’s Run, the juggernaut that is Star Wars, Marc Miller, the great blurb on the cover, where D&D was just a box, the storyhook, Space Opera, Fantasy Games Unlimited, Battledroids, FASA, peoplw ere so excited about the blurb on the cover, a literary game, a board games, tabletops games, playing the game smiling, mmm interesting, explore the entire galaxy, ruled mostly by the French, WWIII, the superpower of the stars, Heinlein smoked, Heinlein could quit, Starship Troopers, horror and guns, a massively different book, different foundations, ideological, hobbyistic, a thing to look at, the names, an explanation, Morglay, Omfray, Nikkolay, Andray, this comes up a lot, pig-latin, in Shakespeare, dog become goday, God become Ogday, Google becomes Ooglegay, a game kids play, you have to learn, Ol’Nick, From, Morgue, Rand, a being from the same culture, Rathmore (wrath), playing fun games, giving the game away, a fun game, smart guy, self-made, he wants to be an architect and couldn’t afford to, a couple of different kinds of arches, what a cathedral you’ve built here sir, he only has marble, he can’t build with girders, a powerful intellect without enough time, he’s got to know he’s brilliant, we can all make it, all noble and good and smart, a very American view of history, very Heinleinian, adventurers who wanted adventure, Germans in the 1850s/60s, the 1848 revolution, gold in California, the apprentice who would never be the master, women who couldn’t find husbands, risky, he’s saying the crazy vicious people leave to go viking, slightly supported by a glance at reality, Scandinavia, barbarism and civilization, what would Robert E. Howard would have liked H. Beam Piper and arguing at the bar all night, very nice socialist emotionally cold, hygge, being cozy at home, exported their vicious people, anger makes him go off, dissatisfaction, describing the reality, starvation, new government policies, cleaning the lands, the enclosures, thieving bread, shipped off, exporting his best genes, not fully decided, viciousness and tenderness, from a ground pounder’s point of view, an infantryman, all the best officers start off as regular soliders, a grounding in what reality is, only people who’ve seen war, imagining a future, settled and collapse, barbarian is back baby, neo-barbarians are not the same as the space vikings, Heinlein started off as a socialist, went to seed later, where he’s at is not the mid Heinlein phases, a very sparky engine, rich or even overrich with ideas, Junkyard Planet, A Planet For Texans was a co-production, courtroom stuff, served on a jury?, people who think for themselves, do you have any set ideas?, let me make a list, strong opinions or closeminded, persuadable by argument, spark up, he wants to be a lawyer, he’s making arguments, ideas against monarchy, from the top down, he leans into it, sits down and smokes, what Conan does, similar guys, he was in a working class society, resident working class vs. transient working class, he had to have a trade, dreams are fleeting, solved their problems the same way in the end, amazing but unsupported is crushing, not all business with Howard or Piper, they both think that they’re geniuses, breathing room for characters, the little girl with her dog, arranging all the family dynasties, he likes the romance, having so much fun in this book, the murder of the new bride, the massacre at the wedding, Game Of Thrones’ Red Wedding, On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, Ian Fleming, different classes, an older trope, people will be doing Heinlein like deep studies on Piper’s books, war with Russia, we are lead by sad idiot clowns, incompetent on purpose, ex-Nazis, semi-competent, what would happen if H. Beam Piper had become a politician?, feeling based ideas, he would want to be a king, not a lot of room for diplomats, Keith Laumer, his standing has much receded over the years, every year that goes by, most writers decline towards the end of their life, later period Asimov, the smart ones stop writing, rising and developing and getting better, if Philip K. Dick was writing today…, you shoulda stopped around 80s man, a better short story writer than a novelist, he works pretty well at the novelette and novel length, ascended, people who want to record his stuff, ebooks with decent covers, people love making the art for his books, Wildside Press, the spinner rack, a whole month of pocket money, the ending, the hallucinations, shot to death, Elaine was with him, be good to her, then she was gone, such a romantic, the chivalry stuff, Howard likes girls and thinking about girls and describing them, Piper is a romantic, his writing style, his grammar is a little bit off sometimes, who says goodbye, Elaine?, its the author, suffering loss, a short brief awful bought with cancer, two ways you go, on off switch or lingering fade, goodbye dad, who is writing this book?, third person, her head against his cheek, one way of reading it, now it finally be said, I can let it all go, I got my revenge and there’s no heaven, it’s not by Trask, it’s by Piper, he’s so crazy, who else would do that?, sometimes it can hurt, a presence throughout the book, appears to him multiple times, in order for the plot to happen, fridging, he breaks the rule of the narration, reframing the whole book, that’s something on the page, lain in ruins, forays to loot the corpse, wealth of detail, how it has all fallen apart, if you wanna understand piper, set during the Federation, seams and threads, natural disintegration, key peices of the Piper library, a lot of himself into it, Jerry Pournelle: Piper was a craftsman, Uller Uprising, set in a common universe, let three authors loose, Twayne Triplet [The Petrified Planet], how these chartered companies work, an analog to the East India Company, sequential order, Space Viking‘s sense of romance, Piper in his prime, he’s put himself into the protagonist’s shoes, agree and disagree, Jesse’s thesis, Fletcher Pratt, Judith Merrill, humour stories, public domain but we didn’t know, it helps your career, hidden behind a paywall of an estate that renewed, Condé Nast, good and bad, still Junkyard, very different, a different girl, Adept’s Gambit, Night’s Black Agents, trans people and gay people in the mid-1930s, Gideon Marcus, Galactic Journey, comparable to Foundation [by Isaac Asimov], good at short stories and bad at novels, Asimov’s characters, big honking series novels, late period novels, horrendously bad, James Lovelock, Arthur C. Clarke, genetically engineered weapon, great ideas, three stages, the setup, the last third, the left turn to Albuquerque, courtroom drama, he’s right most of the time, reinforced from Terra, a hunt through pornographic romantic fiction, sketching on notes, meanwhile his mind is percolating along, interesting to read and not typical novels, the most straight up book he’s got, sell Jesse on Four Day Planet, the closest to juvenile fiction, let’s book it, sea-monsters and unions, one of Piper’s greatest jokes in it, a dad joke, fun, twitter is weird right now, Games Workshop, the worlds largest toy soldier company, Microsoft, stat at home dad, Illinois, tired of moving, all that wonderful stuff, a mover’s worst nightmare, Rivian, surrounded by where the car industry is leaning, why some materials are so important, Amazon delivery vehicle has a panic button, a very science fictional thing, something you’d find in a Heinlein novel, third parties to deliver packages, majority minority employing, the drivers love them, gigantic windshield, mid 50s, make friends with young people, a really good plan, pained but smiling, if you didn’t like her…, German post, electric vehicles, more and more, a facility in Vancouver, Calgary, The Sentry Box, sleep in a teepee, Coquitlam, outside Minneapolis, The Source, Tower Games, great game stores, 1300 game stores, the ones that survive, Staten Island, The Complete Strategist, comic book stores were hit hard by COVID, [Hourglass Comics] leaned into gaming, Diamond Distribution, 18-24 months, Comic World, Huntington, West Virginia, burns everything to ash, Pokemon trades, the black and white bust of the late 80s, a bookstore, they’ve got the space, literally 1 block away from light rail, Evan Lampe doesn’t understand toys, Cora’s got all the He-Mans, Funkopops, scarred by Diddl Mice, Beanie Babies killed an industry, Edmonton, Eternita playset, you deserve it, Rotterdam, they didn’t want to take the hint, you were always watching something, every single Ninja Turtle ever made, you have to keep doing, you can’t overcoming the inertia, Battle Cat, a slippery slope, now they need a Skeletor, Target and Walmart exclusives, I shall make you a queen amongst all the others, new Masters Of The Universe figures, want list, Lego minifigs, little H.P. Lovecraft stories scenes, Playmobil, some amazing stuff, Nativity Scene, general appeal, people are Christians, an A-Team Playmobil, there are no children who have ever seen The A-Team, this is a product that is marketed to adults, adult toys, not the kind you get at the sex shop, Star Trek, nobody sits down with their kid and says let’s watch some A-Team, German only jokes, George Peppard, Perry Rhodan, a series, audio dramas, not huge in North America, its not New Wave, Dan Dare, the morass of Doc Savage, small magazines, dime novels, lucky to have a newsstand, John Sinclair, the biggest science fiction series in the world, almost no impact in North America, an institution, issue 2254, a very robust industry in central Europe, a fan in Italy, Urania, similar in style, great art, pretending to be American, so wonderful, found some long lost friends, we’ve all lost some books you’ve read, Worlds Without Number, Jack Vance’s Tschai, remix everything, Jack Vance integral edition, nobody has the money to buy it, hear about Urania, all the Italian Giallo movies, Italian crime magazines, other European countries, romance and westerns, for the old men, back issues of various pulp magazines, Cora’s main comic store, elderly ladies coming in, romance novels, a lesbian elderly couple, lesbian bookstores are very common, that same collector trait that men more often have, lesbian couples, comics and games don’t pay the rent, the sextoy shopped, they’re in it for the books but the sex-toys sell, 90% of the profits, there’s a joke to be made hand over fist, Playmobil Perry Rhodan, he’s still in very good condition, one of the first ones, Jesse’s theory: Hummels are to the 1950s as Playmobil is to the 2020s, collectible doll,
Rocket Ship Galileo, some cookies, caught COVID in the hospital for the second time, wearing masks, negative tests, she never caught COVID at home, we’re being lied to.

John Schoenherr - Analog, February 1963 - Space Viking

John Schoenherr - Analog, February 1963 - Space Viking

ACE - Space Viking by H. Beam Piper

Space Viking by H. Beam Piper ART

Way Of The Sword Worlds ART

GDW - Traveller RPG, 1977

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Reading, Short And Deep #388 – Chronicle Of The Year 1850 by Anonymous

Reading, Short And Deep

Reading, Short And Deep #388

Eric S. Rabkin and Jesse Willis discuss Chronicle Of The Year 1850 by Anonymous

Here’s a link to a PDF of the story.

This story was first published in The Columbia Magazine, September 1786.

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The SFFaudio Podcast #742 – READALONG: The Many-Headed Hydra by Peter Linebaugh and Marcus Rediker

The SFFaudio Podcast

Jesse and Evan Lampe talk about The Many-Headed Hydra: Sailors, Slaves, Commoners, And The Hidden History Of The Revolutionary Atlantic by Peter Linebaugh and Marcus Rediker

Talked about on today’s show:
2012, 2000, influential for Evan, written up, dirtied edges, moldy, learned to appreciate, first big look into history from below, political history, conventional narrative history, the power of the approach of history from below, understanding Lovecraft, vernacular networks, those ideas are rooted in here, turned you into a radical, social history and labour history (vs. theory), daily life, new wave labour history, E.P. Thompson, Herbert Gutman, religious traditions, English working class radicalism, Baptists and Methodists, pirates, maroon communities, opting out, Typee by Herman Melville, William Blake, William Morris, social pariah, they haven’t read this book, pen is mightier than the sword, undermines a lot of go along get along takes, the heroes vs. the villains, Francis Bacon, this is not science, team evil, Colonel Despard, paraded through every street, 2nd hand, that scene on Jefferson’s estate, the words are compromised, turning that metaphor on its head, surprising insights, actually used as metaphors, upper crust living off the pain of the poors, poors and riches, those with weapons and those obeying until they don’t, very insightful, Villains Of All Nations, which chapter was written by Rediker?, 1741, the Slave Conspiracy, Outcast Nations Of The World, the Hydrarchy, a conspiracy!, rule over water, everything is flipped, the royal navy, left swipes, bottom up order, how wikipedia works, a bunch of CIA guys, recreationally, they’re not personally making money from locking Wikipedia accounts, life purpose, no actual work, competing ideas, some people’s pov, opressed all over the planet, Africa, North and South America and Europe, an other and later story, Bligh and the breadfruit, blackbirding, where capitalism was made, 16th and 17th century, why we have the world we have today, capitalism is fueled by sugar and slavery, the capital is being accumulated, the movement of people to serve the needs of capital, Gandhi, there’s a story there, heroes amongst the horror, repressed and excised and not promoted, Jesse’s twitter profile, all jokes, ruritarian romantic, drawer of roof bears, huer of colour, Canadian history, a youngest, Diaries Of Susana Moodie, its really hard living in the forest, chop down trees and wear high heels, interbreed with the locals, the Hudson’s Bay Company, that little building used to own this entire northern part of the continent, people in Europe wanting hats, Fort St. James, Fort St. John, Moose Factory, cut-off from this history, discovery and settlement and fast forward, Belize, from a previous period in time, independence, iron rule, most people don’t know Belize exists, they have no idea, it doesn’t serve the interests, the chamber of commerce, this book is very subversive, Mestizo, Metis, Creole, culture mixing, our mosaic, radicalized by the hydra, became radical by them, the Putney debates, Smedley Butler, the Businessman’s plot, he wasn’t executed, too much like Daniel Ellsberg, he gets a pass, Julian Assange, 1741 conspiracy, the official line, we created racism to divide the poors, now racism is used only by the bad people, keep the institutions, slave labour in us prisons, post-racial, white washing, a substantial point, slaves who were not black, indentured servants, morally reprobates, what are Australians taught about that in their schools, avarice, keeping the population of the central prairies, this labour thing, in the 17th century, you could own their contract, that could be traded, treated similarly, death rate, legally there was a distinction, the 1741 uprising in New York, the slave port of last resort, the triangular trade, the defective product, Virginia, the rebels, those who could not be seasoned, breaking them through threats of violence and death, sold them cheap, really radical slaves, we need a line between whites and blacks, after Bacon’s rebellion, give whites land, racism is a product of conscious decisions to suppress the working class, blacks used as strikebreakers, scabs, a deliberate technique that develops, am I racist, I don’t think I’m racist, homosexuality, am I gay, I don’t think I’m gay, it doesn’t seem to be the case, individual racists, primarily a system, Critical Race Theory is based, is that what based means?, the problem is institutional, its the institution that’s sending you to it, the class teaches you the history, is that what those classes are?, flagellation, root out the sin within you, not the intention, in favour of this book, progress online, online classes are terrible, Brer Rabbit, Uncle Remus, an old black man, probably an ex-slave telling stories to a little white boy, interrupted stories, background information, what the boy would know, stories of how to behave so as to survive in a system of slavery, Brer Fox, reverse psychology, using the of stuckupedness, double meaning, good morning or get beaten, the writing down of the vernacular tradition, the horror that is being a slaves, the awesome style of writing, phonetic, what was good and what was bad, salty language, fuck and shit are really good words, they are valuable, your only adjective should not be fuck, make your arguments better, people at the top say don’t listen to those sailors, big surprise, swearing and cursing, if you keep hitting me, we’re not allowed to do either, always do what the authority above us tells us, school is abuse, keep the factor workers from organizing, I just don’t want to work all the time, the Barbados thing, you learn about Virginia, The Tempest by William Shakespeare, a strong limb of this many headed hydra of a book, this book needs subsequent books, we need a whole Despard book, Peter Linebaugh, The Magna Carta Manifesto: Liberties and Commons For All, Stop, Thief!: The Commons, Enclosures, And Resistance, The London Hanged: Crime And Civil Society In The Eighteenth Century, something on E.P. Thompson, unfortunate, The Slave Ship, Red Round World Burning Hot, Kate and Ned Despard, emphasizes women in his writing, they need to make the babies, plead the belly, women criminals, plenty of time to get pregnant, Mexican jails, you can’t execute them, the depository for slave nobody else wanted to buy, Moby-Dick, repressed?, we don’t want this book to be popular, gatekept!, various institutions, The Fearless Benjamin Lay, the black dwarf, Between The Devil And The Deep Blue Sea: Merchant Seamen, Pirates And The Anglo-American Maritime World, 1700-1750, the movie?, Amistad movie, the Adams’ are good guys, propaganda, an Adams descendant was president of Raytheon, ambassador to London, Charles Francis Adams, Jr., Abigail Adams, the Adams, a group of people on the right side of history, sacrificed his presidency to stop a war, Jimmy Carter didn’t start any wars, people fall in line, very interesting history books, a horror show, the book is good, looking at resistance to the slave ship by white sailors, tricking sailors, disease, miserable experiences, prison guards, euphemisms are a horrible, to not know they are going to Africa, mutinies on slave ships by sailors, bold women, interracialiness, alternatives, teleology, makes the current world inevitable, the Indian Ocean trade system, the spread of Islam to East Africa, Arabic is the lingua franca, Arabic innovation in the middle ages, capitalism, corporations that are global in scope, connections, trade, that’s indoctrination, it doesn’t create wealth, there’s no wealth created, someone is being screwed from trade, production, turning that tree into that table, mahogany trade, Belize, the plantation, the ship being a site of production, the origins of capitalism, blackbirding in the 19th century, just after the time of Melville, the copra trade, massive effects, Jack London, like Star Trek, a strange federation of Romulans and Klingons, getting tricked, be slaves and die, Maoris in Vancouver, The White Pacific, Nazis moving to the states doing Nazi stuff in the states, the unknown story of this books, we found something!, labour history remains suppressed, the labour historians labour in obscurity, the world history turn, the East India Company, this history of the world in 10 drinks, Tom Standage is the author of all those books, simple, peppy, and they don’t threaten power, The World Is Flat kinda stuff, a refutation of that, the hydra is global, separation into races and nations, white supremacy is the counter revolution, a specific lady, Kimberlé Crenshaw, you’re this you’re that, she really knows what she is, she knows what she wants, very simple, you want to have boys like you, you want to be chaste and chased, this gives you both, critical marriage theory, evidence of it in literature, very modern traditional religion, alcohol, smoking, per-marital sex, a vampire/werewolf book to express the ideas of a teenage girl, land rovers, Robin Hood is a cleaned up version, how to live within your very narrow, cottagecore, keep a nice little house in the forest and you’re a hobbit, setting up your perfect, trad pre-wives, nostalgia for the medieval, collapsing the commons, when the working class was most radical, agrarian settings, the jungle meatpacking plant, this is not what we signed up for, the Stono Rebellion, the New York Uprising Conspiracy, Africans, worth it because we have iphones, nice slave phone AOC, breakage along the way was a shame, Stephen Pinker, the meme the bomber dropping bombs with different paint jobs, CIA ads, I’m an agender black disabled lady, anybody can drop bombs for the CIA, kind of a progress, getting fat, there food has additives, their babies are getting poisoned, the problems are changing, a dearth of labour, you need to coerce people into work, all that land, people would have come and took land, German immigrants, given land, we need to produce sugar/tobacco, homesteader, now we can have a UBI, the obesity epidemic, the back end of production, promoting physical fitness, relaxing immigration, a more easily exploitable working class, some black man got a piece of real estate, why did he tear it down?, instead of becoming a factor, what are you going to use this for, unused land is a sin, jubilee and letting things lay fallow, stores were closed on Sundays, 7-11 was open 7 days a week!, the Diggers, New York’s commercial space is all lying fallow, all the malls are empty now, there’s no land reform, apartments, housing is not affordable, developers never choose affordable housing, the plot of Mr. Robot, F-Society, delete debt, delete the records of who owns what, that would F the system, wild spaces, mountain people in Southeast Asia, a religious revival, geographical solution, a homesteader is a petty bourgeois selling your jam, no geographical solution for capitalist, what happens in games, the streamers and all the people who want to be them, a new phenomenon, sharecropping for Jeff Bezos, he sets the rules, it infects peoples brains, that desire is significant, people want to opt out of traditional, play video games all day, streams are not that interesting, it doesn’t work, it can’t, a colonization of a virtual, what Meta was supposed to be, new spiritual geographies, the internet, this shows people want out, their daily life might be better, coal miner pay, pathetic little podcast, we’re not covering the right things, the homesteading thing, a horrible homesteader, larp, import some immigrants have them work the land for you, why does Indiana Jones have a bullwhip?, a sinister meaning, cattle rustlers, an 80 year old man being de-aged, for swinging, The Dial Of Destiny, WWII action again, the girl from Temple Of Doom, married, Shanghai, Short Round is a teenager, anti-Japanese resistance, Chinese gangsters, he’s old, a history lesson of the early 20th century, insight into those weirdos doing those weird things, artists and humanitarians, the least interesting characters, the Russian Revolution, great documentaries, artist movements, The Outcast Nations Of The Earth, a counterexample to everybody sells out, I’ve been radicalized, you didn’t know that, he did it his way, he’s a hero, and his wife too, from the aristocratic class, siding with the workers against the capitalist class, JFK, murdered by the Dulles brothers, what about Caesar, his power comes from the loyalty of his soldiers, threatens the establishment order, his college buddies stabbed him, in the play, talk to Paul, Evan regrets Paul not being here, open his eyes?, many-headedness being democracy vs. a guy talking about “democracy” but who can cut cheques, how young do you have to be to be radicalized?, liberty university, trump university, reading history did it, away from theory, Marx and anarchist theory, coming back to philosophy, social history, rationalism vs. empiricism, that doesn’t seem to line up with the theory, never joining a political party, focusing on religion after becoming an atheist, now Evan is sympathetic to religion, what’s going on in the text through music, the British experience, counter cultural, anti-monarchy, dissenting churches, right wing churches, being religious outside of a religion, internally puritan, a space of resistance, one of the heads of the hydra, in the same paragraph as the witches, pirates, Matt Christman, Chapo Trap House, we need community again, sympathetic to religion, a space for radical transformation and alternatives, we need something else, we want something real, human experiences, long, but useful, never a dull moment, maybe the best we can hope for, the foundation, sit down and talk with people, come over our collective social anxiety, the progressive era, lived community, moving to cities, creating new instituions, Lions Club, Elks Club, Boy Scouts, used as a cudgel, Murray Bookchin, if freedom is a tree, the best you can do is become a streamer, fuck this shit we’re going to burn down New York, website problems, being very helpful, making community or whatever, problems not caused by big tech, creating “content”, generally buried and forgotten, 1000 podcasts, old posts, anything from about 10 years ago on YouTube approx 75% is gone, sad/boring comments, turning performance art into, give tips to the actors while they’re playing the play, they’re all terrible, extraordinary weirdos who are good at clicking, the worst sort of outcome imaginable, larping your jam, sitting all day, sitting too much, a new dystopia, Elon Musk buying twitter vs. making it open source, new free public engagement, he has the right enemies, a lol cow, read some more Rediker and Linebaugh, The Magna Carta Manifesto gets pretty wild, he’s braver, commentary on these themes, a very good revolitonary book, very insightful, insights into Lovecraft, when we look at something old, things we don’t know they knew, so happy teachers don’t know the contents of these stories, this is a sex metaphor, asses being stared at, these are all fart jokes, so rich, made richer, Shakespeare bad man (but also good man), holding stock, Stephen King knows the problem but can’t take that last step, Blaze, having sex with some lady, that farmer doing his best to help you, the way it should be rather than the way it is, a hotline in some boiler room, weird streamers like Stephen King, everybody can be like me, try to buy a lot less shit, games are full of virtual goods that are artificially scarce, all new games are free (pretty much), battlepasses, get skins for your character or car or gun, there are places for capitalism to go, a horrible place, consuming the public sector, Amazon still rests on producing things, ebooks are essentially skins, audiobooks are essentially skins, sometimes derived from labour, wealth generated by investments, other people’s labour, William Gibson is a shitlib, The Peripheral, disabled people in drone bodies, a place to expand to, go knock on doors and ask do you answer the phone?, a great book, 16.5 hours, the narration, too much of a boomer, Evan has come to terms with his boomerness, Evan is out of touch, YA for adults, that Rite Gud show, a retelling of a Jane Austen but late 19th century Cinderella, so not interested in class consciousness at all, so old fashioned, just Jane Austen + Cinderella as a YA, written for adults who never graduated to something that challenged them, technically well done, cinematographers, reading the subtitles, that’s the actual dialogue, if this is about my soul take it I don’t want it without you, maybe I’m crazy now, voice over narration, is it possible that there isn’t anything sane and normal at all?, Italy for some reason, Virgin airlines, Marry me Bella, GASP!, the credits roll, so cute, so spot on, we’re getting poisoned, which vampire or werewolf to choose, so funny, mass phenomenon, watching the world cup, people going back and forth, Slack is Evan’s twitter, when Qatar got the world cup, using slaves, not allowing beer, my team is my nation, the crimes are done, reparations schmeperations, soccer is not fun, basketball, volleyball, baseball is much more dynamic, cricket, nobody knows how it works, football has strategy, people like running, very simple, games are fun to play not fun to watch, your kid is involved, in solidarity with you kids, car racing, gladiators, MMA, it doesn’t have the clock, moments of great tension, makes better movies, good baseball movies, Major League, The Natural, The Sandlot, For The Love Of The Game, Field Of Dreams, more charm, pastime, a game of leisure, hockey, learning to skate, why soccer is popular on poverty stricken planets around the universe, running around, some sort of vague interest in that game they used to play, the elites care about the prestige, a bottom up thing, I am this powerful, I can pull this off, a poor kids sport, crazy for soccer, running around and kicking, Evan is not the only annoying person on Slack, the help desk blew up, complaining about things, urgent student issues, to do your ranting, friendly and non-work related, shitposting on slack, Tolkien universities, friendly and relaxed calm and peaceable, no J.R.R. Tolkien hate, orcs!, a Tolkien creation, spelled the same: orc, a more subversive reading than calling them black people, Rings Of Power, the creation of Mordor, an orc nationalist subplot, Galadriel is just a fuckin racist, no apologies, a horrible racist, we lost the war, we just need our place, no, you all have to die, a beloved character from the book, trolling on purpose, that longstanding criticism of Tolkien, all the good guys are white people, Richard K. Morgan, Altered Carbon, an essay about two orcs talking to each other, a fox takes note of something, attacking Tolkien in a very narrow way, a fantasy series with a gay protagonist doing gay sex, noir, dark, The Steel Remains, Market Forces, combines Mad Max and Wall Street, conflict investment, on the drive home from work they do car wars, satire sort of thing, an ESL tutor in Turkey, had some kid and fucked off, solid books, Black Man aka Thirteen, a bottom up approach, the ideas tend to be pretty good, Svudu is now Wealthy Genius, seeing it from the orc’s pov, Sam overhears, kidnapping Pippin and Merry, underorcs, discipline, our lot is misery, why William Blake is so weird, he has strong feelings, Jerusalem, undeniably powerful art, they made it a hymn, some Phil Ochs song, nice looking ladies holding hands, The Tyger is almost impenetrable, the final lines of this book, hard to understand then?, some whimsy if not power in his art, the Pacific, the ancient sign of navigators, the wanderers of the planets, some Typee for you, Thomas and Lydia Hardy, tried for his life, the globalizing powers, the planetary wanderers, Seattle, 2000, during the Battle of Seattle, 1999, the rhetoric of the 1990s, peace and trade and progress, a significant chunk of a lifetime ago, worse off now, the hope of a radical, 1997 APEC protests, authoritarian countries, I put pepper on my steak, why is everybody upset, they’re coordinating their laws to fuck us, reading the student newspaper, 2nd World is the Soviet Union, euphemism treadmill, 3rd world is more radical, it means poor, a third path, so much propaganda, poo on Jesse’s head from Evan pooing on him, lazy thinking, the truth can be exposed, you need to not be soaking in propaganda, on the ferry to Vancouver Island, Adbusters magazine, an anti-propaganda magazine, Biden on one side and Zelensky on the other, two critical takes, yessir yessir how high sir?, Megan Markle and her husband are getting a Netflix show, the number one show on Spotify, celebrities that are kings and queens, Obama and a musician had a podcast, content-less, too many books to read, 75 episodes for Mark Twain and 100 episodes for Heinlein, people who should know better, angry at the queen or the other kid for being, mostly not propaganda, a fine place to dwell, analyzing, exposing it, out from under, Jesse’s thinking of Paul, let them be in their blanket, its not Evan’s job to save everyone, do Poe eventual, the Poe wish, stay healthy, losing weight, one pack a week, anti-smoking, a week long group project planned out, deliver content, dynamism, ESL students, read these pages, answer these questions, work in groups, a private school that’s trying to make money, lecture, present this, without Slides (PPT) you might as well be speaking in a foreign language, when the bosses walk by reading at your desk, teaching taking place, devestated by lockdowns, this is going to perk you up, you’re not engaging with this amazing Lovecraft poem the way you should be, why are the kids fucking off?, some structure, a more traditional idea of academic achievement, girls do better, hard on the boys, they’re Evan’s clan/tribe/race, don’t let them embarrass us, their acculturated to do better in those class, boys in person, wooden swords and hack at each other for 45 minutes, then talk philosophy, run around for a long time, able to absorb things, pumped up with lack of sword fighting, it could be javelin throwing, less upset, less restrained, PE is not the solution, nobody cares about the grades, bad grades in gym class, kids love dodgeball, gladiator stuff, you want to do this?, of course!, Philip K. Dick Volume 1 letters, letters to his mom, Mom send my pills!, Mom I need a doctor’s note, doing bad at math, poor Philip K. Dick, terrible spelling, 1940s and early 1950s, letter to Anthony Boucher, Susan Cooper, The Skull, The Moon Maid is about communism on the Moon, centaur, a lady riding a male centaur, foreign teachers could have Christmas off, Life On The Mississippi, Lifeline, Misfit, it pisses off the insurance companies, The Man Who Traveled In Elephants, Tenderfoot In Space, Rocket Ship Galileo, the podcasts are broken, a thousand episodes, boring lame necessary (unpaid) work, Patreon stuff, she loves business shit, hey, this book’s cool!, literally gonna run out of juveniles, a theory of Philip Dick, a theory of Lovecraft, Heinlein’s thesis is he’s American (but not the way the government means), For Us, The Living, Shadows In Zamboula, roaming cannibals, a fearsome strangler, marred by including racial stereotypes, specific blacks from Darfar, profiting from cannibalism, it sounds good, near southern Egypt?, kushites, a love letter to Paul, The Golden Slave by Poul Anderson, The Venom Business by Michael Crichton, Evan can out American Jesse, people mad at him for global warming denier, ended his career sort of, he can never be a good boy like Stephen King, what about his blank book that has a blank in it, no, you’re ruining it!, a strong theory about westerns: ketchup and mustard, #KetchupAndMustardGetup, it means something but probably not anything important, pulp style covers, blues and whites, yellow and red for clothes, snowing.

The Many-Headed Hydra

Europe Supported By Africa And America by William Blake

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