Pulp Heroes EXPLAINED!...John Carter, you're not so naughty now

The pulp magazines discussed previously (click here) were responsible for the sci-fi genre. Horror sci-fi, like H. P. Lovecraft, and planetary travel sci-fi, like Edgar Rice Burroughs, drew fans out of the serie noire (French crime) and the western pulps.  For novices, Edgar Rice Burroughs not only wrote something other than Tarzan,  he wrote something BETTER than Tarzan!

And now Disney is going to kiddify it! Horrified yet? You should be.

Pulp magazines were written to appeal to a more adult crowd than the comics of the same time period.  They were exploitative, bloody, scary, and full of steam! They depicted hard men, damsels in distress, and twisted criminals. Ever wonder what that family in The Thin Man was hiding behind their big fancy house and secret closet doors? Read the book! Same goes for A Princess of Mars. You'll be even more confused after watching Disney's John Carter, I'd wager.

Why?

I'll tell you!

John Carter is mysteriously immortal.  He has no idea how old he is.  One night after a strange ordeal in a cave, he finds himself pulled to the planet Mars where clothes are considered ugly and unnecessary.  Good thing he arrived there naked as the day he was born! The hulking, 15 feet tall green Martians that Burroughs describes? Disney has made into skinny, Avatar-esque creatures that wouldn't frighten the flea off a Thark's behind! And what of the beautiful Dejah Thoris, the red Martian princess that John Carter falls immediately in love with? Burroughs? Naked as a jay bird.  Disney? Wearing some silly costume only Earth girls would find appealing.

(Not to mention the description of one of the green Martian leaders could be describing Jabba the Hut, and the titles of some of the ranking Martians are suspiciously a predecessor to Jedi.)

The John Carter of Mars books, beginning with A Princess of Mars, are chock full of nakedness, gory battles, more distress than a damsel can shake a stick at, and epic adventure that could not possibly translate to Disney PG-13 (assuming it isn't going to be PG, I've been too scared to check).

When John Carter was first seen around 1918, I'm sure the nakedness of not only the bizarre green Martians, but more particularly of the hero and heroine and everyone in between, was rather shocking to a puritan America.  It is also one of the most strikingly different aspects of life on Mars.  Of course, they weren't depicted as such on the covers of the pulp magazines, but once you crack open the cover, there they were, displayed in all Edgar Rice Burroughs' beauteous descriptives.

There you are.  How can you tell that John Carter is a pulp hero? Exploitation. Damsel. Epic battles. Exotic locales. Heroic adventures. Check, check, check, check, and check.

We can expect none of the exploitation from the movie, I am certain. So, hop onto your Kindle and download A Princess of Mars for FREE, and see what all this pulp heroism is about!

Keep your eyes peeled for more PULP HEROES...EXPLAINED!

Filk U! The wonderful world of geek music!

"Hey, Glork! Haven't seen you since ComiCon 1998! Love the new ears.  You make them yourself?"

"Gee, Doff, thanks for noticing! HISlah, I did make them myself. Heghlu'meH QaQ jajvam!"  

"JIjah....I mean..." Glork begins to back away slowly.

"I'm just teasing you!" Doff claps Glork on the back jovially.  "Where are you off to next? Maybe I'll grab the wife and meet you there!"

Quizzically:  "Nugjatlh?"

"The...wife...spouse..."

"Oh...Well, I am going to see the folk music in Room 222."

"Folk music?" A rather rumpled program is retrieved from the waistband of rather snug uniform pants.  "I wondered if this was a typo.  It says 'Filk music...'"

Superior, snorting laughter.  "Indeed it does.  And yes, it is a typographical error.  But it sounds rather catchy, don't you think?"

***
Yes, those were actual words in the language of Klingon. No, I did not make them up.  Yes, you may now kiss my toes.

And that was a dramatized rendition of how the word "filk" came to mean sci-fi/fantasy-based folk music.  A typo in a convention program that was to define a genre and give meaning to many a wandering folk artist with an affinity for the weird.  Filk songs can be about anything near to the hearts of sci-fi fans: vampires, kitty cats, computer, dragons, Star Trek, Lovecraft, comics, etc.  If you happen to be a seasoned filker (someone who is a filk singer/songwriter) you may win a Pegasus Award at the Ohio Valley Filk Fest!

I invite you to plumb the depths of my favorite filk tunes.  So, grab your snake and your plumb bob and enjoy!

Oh, and Hab SoSlI' Quch! (But don't tell her I said so...)

1.  My ultimate favorite filk song does not have a Youtube entry, but you sometimes can find a version to listen to here.  Scroll to the bottom of the page for the lyrics. And all you New-Who fans can bask in the glory of the original Doctor! Cecilia Eng's Grandfather Clock.
It is a Dr. Who-based song using the tune of the old folk song My Grandfather's Clock.  This song defines filk in my humble opinion (see there, that's a good geek phrasing, eh?).

2.  As I am told by my own filk-sensei, Michael of the great frozen north, this next one is the most well-known filk song ever in the history of filkology.  The song won Leslie Fish (hmmm, suspiciously Lovecraftian name..) one of those much coveted Pegasus Awards in 2003. She, however, has stated that she wrote the song as a filler for an album and has regretted it ever since.  That's gratitude for ya! Here are her lyrics, and mind you, there are around a bizillion different versions, but I bring you the original! And for you visual types, the Star Trek version of the video!


3. You may skip the video on this one and just listen.  It is only a picture of Elrond superimposed against the Matrix code, and if you need that explained to you, you've come to the wrong place. Heather  Alexander: Freaking the Mundanes.  That tune is, of course, Waltzing Mathilda.


4.  And my personal favorite.  Also because no horror, filk, or ocean themed blog should be without it, The HP Lovecraft Historical Society's heartwarming, seasonal favorite, "It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Fishmen."  *Sniffle* May the joy of Dagon be with you this, and every season.



Now that you are armed with the Dr. Scott Refresher Course version of sci-fi music, I bid you to go forth upon the earth and filk!
****
Lyrics: Cecilia Eng-The Grandfather Clock
 Oh, a grandfather clock just appeared in the hall
and it seems very strange to be sure
And a man has come out of the clock in the hall
and is stating some things quite obscure
He seems mildly deranged and a little bit insane
we can make out his words if we try
He says he's the master and we'll obey,
or we all shall die.
So we did as he said after one of us was dead
shrunken down to a tiny toy doll
And we wake up in fright to hear laughter at night
from the man in the clock in the hall
Oh we don't understand all the orders and commands
why he wants to be king in the sky
But he is the master and we'll obey,
or we all shall die
Now a wooden blue box has appeared in the hall
just across from the grandfather clock
And a man has come out of the box in the hall
and his clothes are a bit of a shock
He seems mildly deranged and a little bit insane
and he holds out a featherless hand
He says he's The Doctor and how are we
as he shakes my hand
Now the man in the clock has stepped into the hall
and is holding The Doctor by force
And they talk as we work, like old friends now estranged
as the project continues on course
They seem mildly deranged and a little bit insane
as they talk of strange worlds in the sky
but the master orders and we obey
or we all shall die
Now a darkness and cold has come into our hall
it seems things have gone terribly sour
for the man from the box and the man from the clock
are both trying to cut off the power
as the darkness creeps out they work hard to shut it out
all their differences now laid aside
how we wish they and their darkness would go away
as we try to hide
At the end of the fight day has won over night
and the master has run to his clock
and the man from the box gives a curse as it fades
and his hand passes right through the lock
He seems mildly deranged and a little bit insane
as he screams at the star studded sky
but he is The Doctor and we'll obey
or we all shall die
But he says we are free and returns to his box
and it fades from our now empty hall
And we sigh with relief and a bit of disbelief
as the last weeks events we recall
And we've put the word out sent our messengers about
no more grandfather clock chimes will ring
they've been chopped up never to run again
o'er a time Lord bring

Top 5 Dystopian Books/Stories and Movies

Continuing the discussion on dystopian fiction began by author Rosalie Lario, I was curious about what other people's favorite dystopian stories were.  I think the first time I heard the word dystopian was when I was around eight or nine, the first time I watched the movie 1984.  It was a favorite book of my mother's and we watched the movie together on TV late one night.  Of course, I didn't know what the term meant then and wasn't fond of asking my parents questions so I pondered over it until I began hearing it applied to other things.  Mind you, this was in the late 70s to mid-80s when you couldn't find a wiki on anything your heart desired.

For years I had a rather narrow view of what dystopian was.  I think I considered only the very bleakest of sci-fi to be dystopian. I also applied that to movies. 

It was hard for me to narrow my list of favorites down to just five, considering that some of my favorite and most enjoyable dystopian books and movies are not what I would consider the BEST in dystopian fiction.  That being said, I made a list of my ever-changing five favorite dystopian books/stories and five favorite dystopian movies.  Enjoy, comment, and post your favorites.

BOOKS/STORIES

1.  Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep
2. 1984
3. The Hunger Games
4. Brave New World
5. The Road (Which I didn't finish because I'm a wuss)
MOVIES

1.  Dark City
2.  The Matrix
3.  The Lathe of Heaven (original)
4.  Clockwork Orange
5.  Blue Gender (anime series)

What are your favorites?

Lovecraft and Dick

I was reading science fiction when I was too young to know it was science fiction.  Recently, however, something has rekindled my love of the genre and I've been going back through stuff I should have read years ago and somehow missed.  Two works of short science fiction I devoured recently are reviewed here, by two of my favorite genre authors, Lovecraft and Dick.  I chose these two particular works because I feel they are some of the most poignant, most imaginative, and the most accessible of each authors' works to people who are not familiar with science fiction or who have not read these authors before.  Even non-genre fans will enjoy.

Title:  A Colour Out of Space
Author:  H.P. Lovecraft
Pages: approx. 35
Publication Date:  1927

One sentence synopsis:  An unwitting surveyor preparing to turn an old settlement into a reservoir stumbles across a mystery from half a century previous involving a strange and brilliant rock that fell from the heavens.

The Colour Out of Space is a perfect blend of horror and science fiction.  It also tells of the most alien creature ever to appear in literature or film.  Many alien stories and movies depict aliens that are either humanoid in some form, have thoughts and motives that we can relate to on some level, and behave in ways that, while we may not be able to sympathize, we can at least logically understand.  The creature in The Colour Out of Space has no form that can be described using human adjectives.  Its motivations are as foriegn as its appearance.  Its powers we can see the effects of, but we cannot fathom exactly what it is doing.  How, you ask, can a writer craft a story if his creation cannot be captured in words? Read this story.  NOW!

The Colour Out of Space lays to paper some of the most beautiful phrases and emotions I've ever read.  That's coming from an obsessive logophile. What should have taken me an hour to read took probably three hours because I had to keep going back to savor the heartbreaking loveliness of a particular passage, to consume a line of dialogue.  This story does for science fiction what Hamlet did for drama.

The story:  Told through first and second hand accounts of a past event, the tale unfolds to a man who starts out as a skeptic.  A meteroite crashes on a farm and is taken to a lab for examination with bizarre results.  Finally, it fades away, leaving something behind that begins to slowly taint the entire landscape, causing devastation to the farm and the family living on what is called by locals "the blasted heath."  Read it for that description alone:  "the blasted heath." 

News:  While waiting impatiently for del Toro's At the Mountains of Madness, Lovecraft fans can try to get their hands on a copy of the DVD or Bluray of Germany's Die Farbe, an indie release of an adaptation of A Colour Out of Space that has been getting better reviews than most Lovecraft adaptations.

3.99 for all Lovecraft in one bundle on kindle.  That is the best way to go if you're just wanting to dabble in his material.  Some of it can be quite daunting, however Colour Out of Space is the perfect starting point.

Title:  Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
Author:  Philip K. Dick
Pages:  approx. 135
Publication Date:  1968

One Sentence Synopsis:  In a partially deserted earth-future of fallout dust and aptitude tests, renegade androids who have killed their masters and fled to earth to try to make a life for themselves are hunted by bounty hunters for 1,000 dollars a piece, money that can buy the much-coveted living animal pet.

The movie blade runner, while based on this book, has flip-all to do with it beyond some surface scrapings.  I was a fan of Blade Runner as a teenager, but I hadn't read a lot of Dick at the time. 

Pervading themes throughout the book are loneliness, empathy, identity, and destiny.  All of these are things that slap us into reality as we move from birth to death.  But in a world where only the genetically unaltered from fallout dust can immigrate to other planets and procreate, where android slaves are used as incintive to do so, and where animals from spiders to elephants are all but extinct and coveted as signs of wealth and humanity, loneliness and destiny begin to define life.

The Story:  Bounty hunter  Rick Deckard, in the middle of a stressful time in his marriage, dons his fallout-proof codpiece and hits the hovercar-highway to hunt down renegade android murderers so he can buy a real animal to replace the electric sheep he has grazing on his rooftop garden.  The importance of the animals invades all aspect of life on earth.  Without public displays of affection toward helpless creatures, one can be suspected of being an android.  Affection toward raising and keeping animals has become a measure to define humanity.  Androids do not feel empathy or care to have animals.  At least that is the general consensus.

Rick's been looking for a big break and he might have found it when a group of android hellions murdered their slavemasters on the Mars colony and fled to earth to rape and pillage.  But what Rick finds on his 24 hour journey to bring them to justice (i.e. retire them, i.e. kill them) will challenge the very fabric of his humanity.  Through encounters in his day-long task, Rick finds questions about what makes someone human, worthy of life and respect, and what weight should be put upon intelligence, organs, and acts of despiration.  Questions to which there are no answers.

Another important theme:  Religion is as central to human life on this future-earth as pet ownership.  Mercerism is the religion of the day.  Only humans are allowed to participate in Mercerism because it centers on empathy for all actual living things and a desire for human companionship.  Because the earth is so sparsely populated after the last World War, from death and immigration, many people live their lives without much human contact.  Mercerism connects them to other human beings.  Through Mercerism, Dick explores what makes people human, what draws people to each other, and what a person (or Android) becomes when left out of the circle of humanity.

In so few pages, Dick tells a story so vast and important that it should be required reading.

Book Review: More Than Human

Title:  More Than Human
Author:  Theodore Sturgeon
Publishing date:  1953
Number of pages:  188
Recommended for:  Ages 12 and up

Gestalt:  A physical, biological, psychological, or symbolic configuration of elements so unified that its properties cannot be derived from a simple summation of its parts.

The style of Theodore Sturgeon, like the style of Ray Bradbury, is more poetic than prose.  Being the logophile that I am, it took an extraordinarily long amount of time to read this because I kept going back and rereading several paragraphs just for the pleasure of consuming them again.

More Than Human tells the story of a human gestalt, five beings with unique talents who, upon finding each other, become irreducible to their collective parts.  They become something more, something powerful. 

The Head:  Lone, a 25 year old innocent homeless man who "lived in a black and gray world, punctuated by the white lightning of hunger and the flicker of fear." Called The Idiot, Lone must pull the parts together to make the whole and muddle through his childlike thoughts to help it function.

The Brain:  Baby, an infant with Down Syndrome, rescued by Lone, who never grows, never speaks aloud, but functions as a human computer.

The Feet:  A set of twins who can teleport and reach things that the gestalt needs but cannot get to.  They also speak to Baby telepathically.

The Hands:  A young girl, kicked out of her home at the age of 8, gifted with telekinesis

More Than Human was originally a novella entitled Baby is Three.  Sturgeon added a beginning section and an ending section and published it as a novel, which was later made into a graphic novel illustrated by Alex Nino, called Heavy Metal Presents: More Than Human.

In the first section, The Fabulous Idiot, the reader is introduced the separate portions of the gestalt, how they lived, and how they met and became a whole.  The most poetic portion of the book, The Fabulous Idiot paints the picture of the tragic lives and events that shaped the outcasts. 

In the second segment, Baby is Three, the reader is introduced to another important character who will reshape the path of the gestalt.  Several years have passed since The Fabulous Idiot and the gestalt is changing.  The whole moves closer to a more evolved consciousness while trying to find a place for itself in the world.

In the final section, Morality, several more years have passed and the gestalt has become something altogether different from what The Idiot intended.  Slowly, in a reversed telling, the events of the past few years are revealed and what is lacking in the gestalt begins to come clear.

The book is a wondrous build-up of events that are never what the reader expects to see.  Characters grow and change and leave in times and ways that are wholly unpredictable.  However, the final segment is on the confusing side and, though the new character is endearing and beautiful, seems as though the author simply grasped at some way to add an ending.  It felt as though the story would have benefited in another segment between Baby  is Three and Morality, showing some of the events that are mostly hinted at in the final section.  I had to consider what the author was meaning and fill in some blanks myself in order to believe the ending.  Even so, the book was phenomal from the standpoint of the craft of writing and characterization. It was also a great one for National Down Syndrome Month (October)!

This was a book that was beloved my father and one he had wanted me to read for years.  I am glad that I took the time to read it. While flawed, especially with the forced ending, it was still very endearing.  Now I am off to track down that graphic novel!


Recommended for fans of Marvel comics, fantasy, and beautiful writing.  Appropriate for all ages, but probably most effective for ages 12 and up.

My Reading Challenge

On the right hand sidebar of my blog I've listed about 60 or 70 books that I've never read.  The school I attended until my last few high school years did not have a focus on literature for whatever reason, so the books that are often required reading for high schoolers, I never read. Of course, I was never seen without a book in my face. Cheerleading practice, I was sitting with a book until everyone got there (usually a horror novel to gross out the other girls).  In the dressing room at ballet school I was reading (usually a novel or biography of famous prima ballerinas or primier danseurs).  And in bed at night or in my treehouse I was usually reading some spanning epic like Count of Monte Cristo or Anna Karenina or Gone With the Wind.

History in novels was always an attraction for me.  The Alienist, Sherlock Holmes, the French Revolution, Jack the Ripper, the Spanish Inquisition.  I read Count of Monte Crist, of over 1000 pages, when I was 14! But I didn't read Anne Frank's diary. I read Hamlet when I was 12, but I didn't have the required (for other schools) Julius Caesar.

So what I've done here is look over twenty or so greatest books lists, and seek suggestions from others which did not go over well (forcing me to assume that the majority of people I know do not read), and compile a list of what I think are great novels that I have never read, or read so long ago that I do not remember enough about them.  I tried to pick works from across the board: German, Netherlands, Asia, Europe, Britain, America, men, women, classics, modern, horror, science fiction, fantasy, tear-jerkers, young adult, exploitative, political, etc.

I've toyed with the notion of creating a 2nd list of the greatest short stories or poems that I've not read because these are often over looked and have contributed to the advancement of the culture as much as novels.  We'll see. I have an ambitious list already!

I would like anyone who happens upon this blog to post a comment with any book, short story, poem, etc. that should be on my list but isn't.  Just put whether it is a novel, short story, etc. out to the side and the author if known.  I don't anticipate finishing this in any short time span, and I'm sure that I will close a few of them after 100 pages and never pick them up again.  The point isn't to torture myself; the point is to enrich my knowledge of what is out there to be consumed.

Book Review: The Giver by Lois Lowry

 

The Giver by Lois Lowry (1993)

Pages:  179

My age recommendation: 5th grade through adult

Awards: Newbury Medal

Other novels by the author: Number the Stars, The Messenger

I believe that too often, young adult literature is discounted as being for "kids" or without enough substance to keep adults engaged.  Having actually grown out of caring what Stephen King bangs out on a keyboard, and very hesitant to spend exorbitant amounts on authors I've never heard of, I decided to take my 12 year old daughter's advice and read a book that she read for a book report in 6th grade last year.  I made the same assumptions, it was going to be too childish to keep my attention though her description of it was intriguing.  The essential elements of life were not going to be touched on at all because those things are not "for children" in the minds of most adults.  And besides, it was on the approved reading list for the Accelerated Reader program!

I could not have been more wrong.  What followed over the two days I took to read this bleak and heart-wrenching tale of a future so far away that it almost seems a part of the past was a tear-filled, anxious journey through what could be an all too real destiny for the human race.

Confined to remain in one of the Communities, young Jonas is preparing for the Ceremony of the Twelves, when he will be given his adult job and no longer be considered a child.  He is a good student, obedient, rarely in need of Chastisement.  He cares for his younger sister, a Six named Lily.  But his orderly life is about to be tossed into mortal turmoil when he finds that he has not been selected for a job, but Chosen to be the Receiver of all the memories that have been painstakingly erased from the human consciousness over centuries: memories of war, broken bones, sunburns, death, the loss of loved ones, hunger, poverty, and fear.  But other memories are there, too, waiting to change his life forever:  memories of colors, sexuality, love, exhilaration, and celebrated differences between human beings.

In the world where Jonas lives, Climate Control and Sameness became important issues hundreds of years before his birth.  Colors were erased from human perception so that everyone and everything took on shades of gray.  The landscape became even, flat, without rises and hills and mountains and valleys.  Food is distributed in equal amounts to every Citizen.  Children are called Males and Females.  Pills are subscribed daily to suppress Stirrings of desire and sexuality.  The job of Birthmother to produce newchildren for the Family Units is one without honor.  Rain, snow, storms, and temperature change do not exist in the memories of anyone except the Receiver of the memories who is destined to live in sadness and pain and loneliness, bearing the memories so no one else has to.

The Giver has many elements of George Orwell's 1984 and George Lucas' THX 1138.  It paints the picture of a future that on the surface seems ideal, without describing exactly what life is like for the Citizens of the Community.  As life begins to unfold and the eyes of Jonas are opened, we become aware that with all of the pain in our world, we could not erase it without erasing the joy as well.  Racial differences are obscured, but gone is the realization of beauty in every human being, in sparkling eyes, in varying shades of hair and skin.  In those conditions, we do become just Citizens, Male and Female, not men and women and human beings.

The book is short but is full of substance.  There are also two companion books, not sequels, but stories of other Citizens that I want to track down and read soon.  The author's use of language is captivating and her ability to make the reader feel shock, anger, and amazement is uncanny.  Fans of futuristic fantasy, sci-fi, and social commentary would love this novel.

This book was captivating.  I recommend it wholeheartedly to adults and young people 11 and over.  It was one of the best books I've read in a while.  Lois Lowry brings new ideas to concepts that have worried humanity for generations.  Be prepared to look at life differently.