John D. Rateliff's Blog, page 93

Tolkien TV Series?

So, I may have been wrong about predicting that the next Tolkien-on-film we see wd be a biopic. VARIETY at any rate is reporting that a LotR miniseries is in the works, possibly to be made by Amazon Studio. Details are lacking, but Jeff Bezos himself is said to be pushing the deal. THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER and ROLLING STONE also each have a piece on the project; the former is pretty good  but I take the latter's account less seriously since they seem unable to tell the difference between the movie people (Tolkien Enterprises, an American firm formerly run by Saul Zaentz) and the Tolkien estate (Tolkien's family, often backed up by his publishers).

Here's the VARIETY piece

http://variety.com/2017/tv/news/lord-of-the-rings-amazon-1202606519/

Here's HOLLYWOOD REPORTER's

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/live-feed/lord-rings-tv-series-works-1054978

And here's the ROLLING STONE version.

http://www.rollingstone.com/tv/news/lord-of-the-rings-tv-series-in-the-works-w511077


One thing I was glad to learn, whatever comes out of this, is that the studios have finally settled their lawsuit with the Estate, who objected to Tolkien slot machines, online LotR/H-themed gambling, and other excessive forms of movie merchandising -- following what has now become the established pattern that the studios have only paid up money they owed on the previous project when they've decided to go ahead on a related project.

--John R.

The White Car

THE WIFE SAYS
In May 1992 (2 months before we got married) we bought a white Nissan Sentra. This morning we donated it to Purrfect Pals. More than just the garage is a little empty tonight.

Evil Prayers

So, I was appalled to read in a recent essay on the GUARDIAN site that there are church officials in the Roman Catholic hierarchy praying for the death of Pope Francis.

That some of the same faction are trying to bring an official charge of heresy against Francis seems quixotic by contrast, given the pope's ex-cathedra powers.* But praying for his death because they disagree with the direction in which he's taking the church? That crosses any number of lines.

If I had to come up with a rule of thumb to cover this, it'd be something along these lines:

    Unless your boss is Charles Manson, praying for his or her death is an evil act. 

Here's the piece -- disturbing, but interesting.

https://www.theguardian.com/news/2017/oct/27/the-war-against-pope-francis

--John R.
current reading: memoirs of Clark Ashton Smith (the final section in the new CAS artbook)



* I have to say, though, that I'm bemused by the discovery that the teaching in question appears in a footnote -- footnote number 351 to chapter 8, to be specific.

unknown territory

So, my doctor is retiring.
Does this mean I won't get sick anymore?
Hmm.

--John R.

The Art of the E-quel

So, this week I learned a new term I hadn't come across before: the E-quel. A follow-up work that is neither a sequel (written after and published after) nor a 'prequel' (a work written after but taking place before) but a side-story.

It's a useful concept, but I have doubts about its sticking, if only because it sounds too much like 'equal'. Plus we already have side-story, which pretty much does the job.

Here's the link.

https://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2017/feb/15/philip-pullman-the-book-of-dust-jk-rowling-magic

Having enjoyed the GOLDEN COMPASS movie and been disappointed that naysayers helped stop the second and third films in the series from being made, I was glad to hear that a tv miniseries is currently in the works from the BBC. Let's hope it's a similar quality and fares better.

--John R.
current reading: IN THE REALMS OF MYSTERY AND WONDER (Clark Ashton Smith artbook).

Something I Didn't Know about C. S. Lewis

So, for purposes of a piece I'm working on I decided I needed a copy of C. S. Lewis's COLLECTED POEMS.* I already had the two Hooper volumes (POEMS, 1964, and NARRATIVE POEMS, 1969, as well as SPIRITS IN BONDAGE, 1919) but wanted this newer edition edited by Don King for its notes and more inclusive collection.

Looking over the volume now that I have it, it's striking how few poems Lewis wrote towards the end of his life. Here's a quick breakdown, starting in 1950.

1950: 3 poems
1951: 2 poems
   January 1951: Janie Moore dies
   February 1951: Lewis fails to become Professor of Poetry
1952: 4 or 5 poems**
1953: 2 poems
1954: 8 or 9 poems
   1954: Lewis switches from Oxford to Cambridge
1955: 1 or 2 poems
1956: 5 poems
   April 1956: Lewis marries Joy Gresham
1957: 1 poem
   March 1957: Lewis marries Joy Davidman
1958: 1 poem
1959: 1 poem
1960: 1 or 4 poems
   July 1960: Joy Lewis dies
1961: none
1962: none
1963: 1 or 2 poems


--John R
--current reading: OUR LADY OF DARKNESS by Fritz Leiber

*its full title being THE COLLECTED POEMS OF C. S. LEWIS: A CRITICAL EDITION, ed. Don W. King (2015), 485 pages.

**the second number in each of these 'or' entries includes one or more doubtfully dated poem(s).

Philip Pullman is a Raven

So, over the weekend I saw an interview of sorts given by Philip Pullman in conjunction with the release of his new book, volume one of THE BOOK OF DUST (a prequel/sequel to HIS DARK MATERIALS). Instead of the give-and-take of a traditional interview, this one consisted of questions submitted by an array of people with Pullman's responses --an arrangement that tends to lead to less spontaneity but also more thoughtful responses.

For me the best takeaways from all this were (1) his answer to the question of what his own daemon would be:

I think she’s a raven. She belongs to that family of birds that steal things – the jackdaws, the rooks, crows and magpies – and I admire those birds. I applaud their enterprising way of dealing with the world and their intelligence. I love the way ravens fly: they are the most acrobatic and daring birds. So I would be very pleased if my daemon were a raven.
and (2) looking at his photo accompanying the article and thinking that he looks like a hobbit.

Here's the whole piece:

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2017/oct/22/philip-pullman-my-daemon-is-a-raven-la-belle-sauvage-interview-questions

--John R.
current reading: a mediocre CALL OF CTHULHU module.
my next purchase: LA BELLE SAUVAGE.


P.S. Apropos of the recent discussion here re. Milne, another recent interview w. Pullman reveals the unsurprising fact that Pullman doesn't like Milne. He also has harsh words for Nesbit, and, surprisingly, Grahame. I'm sorry to here he can't appreciate the latter, who laid the ground for Pullman's own work, but so it goes.

The New Arrivals (CAS & HPL)

So, this week brought two more books in the mail, one I was expecting and one I'd ordered a few months back and forgotten was on its way (though I'm v. glad to have it).

The former is the latest from Nodens Books, THE LAUGHING ELF by Ronald MacDonald. No, not that Ronald MacDonald, but one of the sons of old George MacDonald, author of PHANTASTES and THE LIGHT PRINCESS and the Curdie books. It seems that in addition to Geo. MacDonald's eldest son Greville writing a biography of his parents, Greville's brother Ronald was also an author, of more than a dozen books (two co-written with Ronald's son, mystery writer Philip MacDonald). I'm currently struggling through REMAINS OF THE DAY* and Christopher Milne's autobiography, so haven't had a chance to read this one yet.

The other book, from Hippocampus Press, is a massive (666-page, not counting the appendices) tome containing all the surviving correspondence between H. P. Lovecraft and Clark Ashton Smith: some 330 letters exchanged over a period of fifteen years.

In the old days, scholars looking to find a passage in Lovecraft's selected letters had to wrestle their way through the hundreds of pages of the non-indexed five-volume set of Lovecraft's letters from Arkham House. But in recent years we've seen a new approach: individual volumes, each reprinting Lovecraft's complete exchange with a specific correspondent -- say, all his letters to and from R. H. Barlow (2007) or Donald Wandrei (2002). Or, now, Clark Ashton Smith.

Even though I don't expect to work my way through this for some time to come, the timing is good, since I've just received word that the big book of Smith's artwork is just now shipping: IN THE REALMS OF MYSTERY AND WONDER, from Centipede Press.

So, a good week for the books, if not for the bookshelves. Oh for a tardis of a library. Though I have now reached the point at which there are more books going out than coming in.

--John R.


*a good book for those who think Henry James is too action-packed and plot-driven.**


**THE WIFE SAYS (and I paraphrase): Ain't that the truth

Liverpool is Birmingham!

So, more signs that make it look as if the in-the-works Tolkien biopic may actually happen: they're scouting out sites where they might do location filming. At least that's what I gathered from the following little piece posted yesterday:

https://www.prolificnorth.co.uk/2017/10/new-tolkien-film-to-start-shooting-in-liverpool/

So, many things can and no doubt will go wrong with this project, but it's still live at this point, which is further than any previous such effort got.

And now to find out more about, so as to decide whether or not to watch, the latest 'based-on-a-true-story' film about a twentieth century British author, GOODBYE CHRISTOPHER ROBIN.

Which, based on Christopher Milne's own account of his childhood in his excellent autobiography, sounds like it's the 'good parts' version, not particularly close to the facts. We'll see.

--John R.
--last day at Archives

Another Lydney Dog?

So, my forthcoming piece on The Great God Nodens*  includes a section about one among the many mysteries associated with the site of his Temple: lots of dogs, including what's been called the best Roman bronze found in Britain.** Stone dogs, bronze dogs, ceramic dogs, even at least one depiction of a dog on pottery.

It's not surprising then that my attention was drawn to recent news from Gloucestershire, the county in which Noden's temple was found, about the discovery of a bronze dog, one already being associated w. the healing god Aesculapius.***


https://www.theguardian.com/science/2017/sep/27/metal-detectorists-unearth-unique-hoard-of-roman-artefacts


What's striking about this report is the secrecy involved. The actual site of the discovery is being kept secret --which suggests that they may think there's more there to be found. The artifacts themselves are not on display but are also being kept at a secret location. We may find out that the discovery was near the site of Noden's Temple, or elsewhere in the Forest of Dean, or somewhere near Gloucester. Time, and follow-up reports, will no doubt tell.


--John R.
current reading: ON EAGLES' WINGS by Anna Thayer


*(or, to be more precise, on the background to Tolkien's piece on Nodens)

**so dubbed by Mortimer Wheeler, who was given to grandiosity

***the idea being that the dog has his tongue out because it's been trained to lick people's wounds in order to promote healing