John D. Rateliff's Blog, page 30

TSR Alumni Event

 So, last weekend thanks to the kindness of the offer of a ride there and back from friend Jim Lowder I got to go down to Lake Geneva to join in the TSR Alumni Event at Garycon.  I had a great time and saw a lot of people I hadn't seen since 1997 or thereabouts, as well as some I do keep in touch with.  I even got some new Tom Wham Snits art. A bit overwhelmed right now; I'll try posting some about it when things settle down some*

--John R.

*this being the final week  of my current trip researching in the Archives, things are busy and getting busier.

Bob Foster and Dick Plotz

So thanks to Carl H for this one: a link to a Tolkien Day event featuring two key figures in early Tolkiendom: Robert Foster and Richard Plotz.

Foster is author of A GUIDE TO MIDDLE-EARTH and then later of THE COMPLETE GUIDE TO MIDDLE-EARTH, expanded to include THE SILMARILLION. This was a book so massively useful that Christopher Tolkien himself acknowledged and praised it (in his introduction to the first volume of HME). 

Plotz founded The Tolkien Sociey of America (TSA*), and launched the most successful of all the early Tolkien fanzines: THE TOLKIEN JOURNAL.

It's amazing to get a chance to see fellow Tolkien fans and Tolkien scholars who dropped out of Tolkien studies before I even got into it emerge and tell their stories. Kudos to those who pulled this off for Tolkien Collector's Guide: **

Here's the link

https://youtu.be/CE9sUPMzs6c?t=11371

--JDR

*not to be confused with The Tolkien Society, based in England.

**not to be confused with The Tolkien Collector.

Oldfangled Fantasy: a much shorter list

  So, in contrast to Esquire's brief to catch the latest trends, here's a selection of the classics of the genre. It's what I consider the best of the best, the books I devoted a monthly installment of my old web-column Classics of Fantasy to. It's obviously incomplete; I'm currently working on a Recommended Reading list to cover books I wd have included if the column had run longer  (e.g., The Lord of the Rings). Obviously I don't expected anyone else to agree with every item --it's not that kind of list. But I hope these writers and works can be taken as books I'd recommend to anyone interested in modern fantasy, while also drawing attention to some lesser-read masters.

Enjoy.

--John R.

 

 I. The Well at the World's End (1896)  by William Morris  

 

 II. The Forgotten Beasts of Eld (1974)  by Patricia A. McKillip      

 

 III. Ghost Stories of an Antiquarian (1904ff)   by M. R. James

 

 IV. Swords Against Death (1970)   by Fritz Leiber  

 

 V. Silverlock (1949)   by John Myers Myers

 

 VI. A Voyage to Arcturus (1920)   by David Lindsay

 

 VII. The Bridge of Birds (1984)   by Barry Hughart

 

 VIII. The Worm Ouroboros (1922)   by E. R. Eddison

 

 IX. The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath (1926)  by H. P. Lovecraft

 

 X. A Wizard of Earthsea (1968)   by Ursula K. Le Guin

 

 XI. The Face in the Frost (1969)   by John Bellairs

 

 XII. The Night Land (1912)   by William Hope Hodgson

 

 XIII. Watership Down (1972)   by Richard Adams  

 

 XIV. The Book of Three Dragons (1930)   by Kenneth Morris

 

 XV. Tales of Averoigne (1929–1938) by Clark Ashton Smith

 

 XVI. The Books of Wonder (1910, 1912, 1916)  by Lord Dunsany

 

 XVII. The Hobbit (1937)   by J. R. R. Tolkien

 

 XVIII. Hobberty Dick (1955)   by Katharine Briggs            

 

 XIX.  Hour of the Dragon (1936)   by Robert E. Howard

 

 XX.  The Dying Earth (1950)   by Jack Vance

 

 XXI  Jurgen (1917)   by James Branch Cabell

When Is Greenland Not a Greenland?

So, following on from the previous post, in the second of two odd points arising from the hastily jotted thoughts that appear in the HME series as Plot Notes F, Frodo and Sam return home to find the Shire 'spoilt'.  So they do not stay there. Instead

They  go west and set sail to Greenland.

Christopher Tolkien points out the oddity of this but makes clear that the form isn't a misreading. That is, Tolkien didn't actually write green land or Green Land but ran it together as one word, beginning with a capital. 

Despite which it seems clear that here he was not talking about the island between Iceland and Newfoundland, the real world's Greenland, but the 'fair green land' Frodo (and, presumably, later Sam) catches a glimpse of a fair green land as he sails off into the West.

 

This example is tricky because it seems to be one of those rare times when we can tell what Tolkien meant but it does not seem to agree with what he actually wrote.

--John R.

Sandyman's Biscuit Fastory

So, here  at the end of my first week (of two) at the Archives, I once again marvel at the LotR manuscript collection.  Even after so much time, reading closely through variant versions reveal how differently things cd have turned out at so many points, making the familiar text become strange and new again.

For example, consider two extremely minor details from the end of Plot Note F.

On a penciled scrap of paper placed at the end of PN F we are told that Frodo and Sam in the end come back to find the Shire ruined and the Sandyman house a biscuit factory.

So, why a biscuit factory?  Remember that for English English 'biscuit' usually means what in American English we call a cookie. So decades before the Keebler elfs we find here a passing glimpse of little people going into the cookie industry. If this had been written down two decades later I'd suspect it was linked to the little elf-queen on Noakes's Cake in SMITH OF WOOTON MAJOR, but the long gap of years between makes that seem a stretch.

Is biscuit chosen here for some specific reason, so drive home a particular point? Or is this a random point that briefly popped into Tolkien's head as he was jotting down some notes re. possibilities in the parts of the story he hadn't gotten to yet?

Have to say I haven't got a clue.

--John R.

--current reading:  O'Malley's THE ROOK

Newfangled Fantasy: A Fifty-Book List

So, thanks to D.A.A., who knows I'm interested in this sort of thing, for having brought this to my attention.  Here's the link.

https://www.esquire.com/entertainment...

I've taken the piece on the other end and re-arranged it out of click-bait format to just author, title, and date (when the date was included, which was usually but not reliably present). I've also reversed the polarity of the neutron flow and reversed the sequence so it starts with the #1 book, the one they think the best fantasy novel of all time, and counts down from there. 

I find that I've read eleven of these books. Most of the rest don't particularly interest me, from the descriptions here, any more than any other such listing, book recommended for me by someone who doesn't know me beyond  'likes Tolkien'. Well, they've got me there. 

And having this list may draw me out to read more of these books (I have to admit I've actually never heard of twenty-three of these fifty authors).

With any list of this type, the immediate (and expected) response is to say 'well, what about [X]?', naming a book or two the reader wd have liked to see included. 

But I'm dismayed at how few books from more than twenty years made it through. If what I've been reading all these years isn't fantasy, what is? And if this truly were a fair representation of the fantasy genre as it stands today, then perhaps I've been left behind and it's something else I'm really interested in. "Classic Fantasy" perhaps?  Dunsany and Adams and Hughart, McKillip and Briggs, and a host of others absent here.

Here's Esquire's list

1.  N. K. Jemisin. The Fifth Season (2015)

*2.  J. R. R. Tolkien. The Fellowship of the Rings (1954)

*3.  Ursula K. Le Guin.  A Wizard of Earthsea (1968)

4.  Ken Liu. The Grace of Kings

5.  Nnedi Okorafor. Who Fears Death (2010)

6.  Jin Yong, A Hero Born (1950s, translated more recently)

*7.  Susanna Clarke. Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell (2004)

8.  Sofia Samatar.  A Stranger in Olondria (2013)

9.  Madeline Miller. Circe

10.  Rand Miller, Robyn Miller, & David Wingrove. Myst: The Book of Atrus (1995)

11.  Tomi Adeyemi. Children of Blood and Bone. (2018)

12.  Octavia E. Butler (1979)

*13.  Angela Carter. The Bloody Chamber (1979)

14.  Gene Wolfe. Latro in the Mist (1986 & 1989)

15.  Amos Tutuola. The Palm-wine Drinkard (1952)

*16.  C. S. Lewis. The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (1952)

17.  Kenji Miyazawa. Once and Forever (?1930s or before)

*18.  L. Frank Baum. Ozma of Oz (1907)

19.  Robert Jordan. The Shadow Rising (1992) [fourth book in Wheel of Time]

20.  Brandon Sanderson. The Way of Kings 

21.  Victor Lavalle. The Changeling 

22.  G. Willow Wilson. The Bird King 

23.  Naomi Novik. Uprooted

24.  Jeffrey Ford.  The Drowned Life (2008)

25.  Marlon James.  Moon Witch, Spider King

26.  Robert Jackson Bennett.  Foundryside

27.  Keren Lord.  Redemption in Indigo (2010)

28.  Kelly Link.  Get in Trouble (2015)

*29.  Grace Lin.  Where the Mountain Meets the Moon (2010)

30.  Sjón.  The Blue Fox

*31.  Stardust. Neil Gaiman (1999)

32.  Kalpa Imperial. Angélica Gorodischer (2003) [tr. Le Guin]

33.  Kacen Callender.  Queen of the Conquered (2020)

*34.  Philip Pullman.  The Subtle Knife [middle volume from His Dark Materials]

35.  George R. R. Martin.  A Game of Thrones (1996)

36.  Neon Yang.  The Black Tides of Heaven (2018)

*37.  Guy Gavriel Kay.  Tigana (1990)

38.  Brian Catling.  The Vorrh

39.   V. E. Schwab.  A Darker Shade of Magic

40.  Julia Fine.  What Should Be Wild

41.  Ben Loory.  Tales of Falling and Flying

42.  C. L. Polk. Witchmark (2019)

43.  Amber Sparks.  The Unfinished World

44.  Kai Ashante Wilson.  The Sorcerer of the Wildeeps (2015)

45.  Michal Ajvaz.  The Other City  (tr 2009)

46.  P. DjèlÍ Clark.  Ring Shout 

47.  Scott Hawkins.  The Library at Mount Char

*48.  Kazuo Ishiguro.  The Buried Giant

49.  Erin Morgenstern.  The Night Circus

50.  S. A. Chakraborty.  The City of Brass

 

—JDR

—current reading: THE ROOK (excellent. recommended).

Sunday in Milkwaukee

So, Sunday being my first full day on my own  in Mikwaukee this visit, I got together with Dale Donavan, who I used to work with at TSR back in Lake Geneva days (and after), and Ben Riggs, who has written a book (out soon) sharing stories about what it was like to work at TSR.

https://us.macmillan.com/books/978125...

We went to a Food Truck Park down on the south side of town --a part of town I don't know v. well (despite having lived a year on Walker) and the sort of place I rarely go to (what with not eating sandwiches and all). But I enjoyed it, both the camaraderie and the food (I got ramen). The mini-greenhouses helped on a grey, chilly days.

https://www.zocalomke.com

After Ben had to head off, Dale and I ventured further south to visit a bookstore he'd recommended,  

Voyageur Books out Kinnikinnick. There I not only got to pet a book shop cat but, searching around in their lower level, came across THE SILENT MIAOW, a book I've been looking for in a desulatory way for years. It had been a favorite of my mother's and mine ever since we came across it in the Magnolia Library.  Having forgotten the author's name (ironic, since I've read and enjoy several of his other books) and misremembering how to spell the title probably accounted for my difficulty in finding it.  

I had intended to find it, buy it, re-read it for the first time in many years, and then pass it on to Mama, who I knew had enjoyed it then and would enjoy it now.  But it took me a little too long.  So rest in piece to a lifelong lover of cats, from one to another.

--John R.

Connectivity Issues

 Hi all

The Internet was out at the hotel last night from mid-evening onward.

I hope for better luck tonight, but if you don't see me post tonight, or comment on a comment, you'll know the problem has not yet seen resolution.

--John R., from Marquette's Memorial Library, which has a nice strong signal.

--current reading: THE ROOK (holding up well on a third reading & highly recommended

Marlon James

So, yesterday I was in the Barnes & Noble in Brookfield west of Milwaukee when the following front cover blurb caught my attention:

"A fantasy world as well-realized as anything Tolkien made"  -- Neil Gaiman

 This cover blurb on the book MOON WITCH, SPIDER KING by Marlon James turns out to be an excerpt from Gaiman's longer blurb for M.J.'s previous book, BLACK LEOPARD, RED WOLF :

“Black Leopard, Red Wolf is the kind of novel I never realized I was missing until I read it. A dangerous, hallucinatory, ancient Africa, which becomes a fantasy world as well-realized as anything Tolkien made, with language as powerful as Angela Carter's. It's as deep and crafty as Gene Wolfe, bloodier than Robert E. Howard, and all Marlon James. It's something very new that feels old, in the best way. I cannot wait for the next installment.” —Neil Gaiman 

I haven't read any of James' work, though this has put him on my radar and will have me on the look-out to find a good entry point.

I do have to make two observations,  though:

--this kind of flailing around by critics to find something to compare a book to can indicate that you've struck gold (cf. the odd lot cited for early blurbs of LotR). But it's more likely to indicate a desperate casting about to try to find something to say.  The idea of a book that sounds like Carter, Wolfe, and Howard sounds like a book I'd stay away from. 

--it's fascinating to see that still, after all these years, publishers are using the tag-line 'this is like Tolkien' to sell books.

--John R

The Norman Spinrad Option

So, during the recent M. A. R. Barker dust-up I've been surprised that only one or two people have tried to evoke the Norman Spinrad option --that is, that it's all some kind of hoax Barker pulled off. Have to say, I'm not buying it.

Spinrad's book, for those without access to a fifty-year-old paperback,* is an alternate history in which Adolf Hitler gives up politics to follow a career as an artist. He immigrates to America in the 1920s where he becomes a fan favorite for his work on pulp magazines. When he dies in 1953 he leaves behind a science fiction novel that embraces the white supremacy tropes endemic in American science fiction at the time. Spinrad's book provides the frame, with the bulk of the book being Hitler's novel.

The point of Spinrad's book is to make the case that there wasn't much distance between the racism acceptable in the pulps and that accepted in the real world at the time.  It's a valid point but an uncomfortable read, and I'm not sure Spinrad cd have gotten away with it today.

--John R.

*caveat: it's been a long time since I read this one, and some of the details given above may be slightly off.