John D. Rateliff's Blog, page 95

Twenty Years

So, hard to believe it's been twenty years ago as of the start of September that I moved from Wisconsin to the Seattle area to start my new job at Wizards of the Coast. I'd been hired on to edit the new DOMINARIA roleplaying game, the D&D campaign setting for the world of MAGIC: THE GATHERING, becoming part of a team that consisted of Lisa Stevens, later co-founder of Paizo;  Jonathan Tweet, who went on to gain fame as the chief architect of Third Edition; Jesper Myrfors, the original art designer of MAGIC THE GATHERING; and later Chris Pramas, brought in as a second writer, who eventually left WotC to found Green Ronin.


And yet the project never saw the light of day, having been doomed from the start. I'd known WotC had worked on one MtG rpg before (designed by Mike Selinker and Wolfgang Baur) that something had gone wrong with. What I hadn't known was that the game I was hired to edit was WotC's FOURTH (and final) attempt to put together a MtG rpg, nor that it was just as doomed as all the rest.  Someone over in Card R&D, where the real Powers That Be in R&D were, didn't want an rpg version of Magic to happen, and accordingly it got shot down every time the rest of the department proposed it -- not when it was mooted, mind you, but well-on into the project.*


All water under the bridge (and living in Renton and Kent teaches you a lot about water and bridges). But what stays in my mind, after all these year, is just how much talent was in the room. That, and how it was great fun to be the keeper of the Dominaria globe for a few months. I wonder who has it now.

--John R.
current reading: AN ASTOUNDING ATLAS OF ALTERED STATES by Michael J. Trinklein (just started)

*a similar silent veto applied to our doing any kind of Tolkien game.

"Tolkien In Love"

So, thanks to Andrew F. for the link to this radio drama based on young Ronald Tolkien's courtship of Edith Bratt. Have to confess I haven't made it all the way through it myself; it's well-done but for some reason off-putting.

Here's the link:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b091s20g

Apparently it'll still be available on the radio BBC's site to listen to for about another week.

--John R
current reading: "The Highwayman" (1908) and THE CASTLE OF CROSSED DESTINIES by Italo Calvino (1969+197; tr 1976-77)

The Sky is White today

So, the night before last I was quite startled when I went to check on the moon (which I do most nights, when I can manage it) and saw that it was an orangey-red in color, more the tone you get with a partial lunar eclipse than the rising of a harvest moon.

Then yesterday morning the sun was odd too: distinctly red, and casting red sunbeams early in the day. By mid-morning we were getting yellow sunbeams out of a white sky. Over in Des Moines (the Seattle suburb, not the city in Iow[image error]a) the sun looked more like the design on the New Mexico flag, except a-symetrical.

Last night came a dim red moon, not visible at all early in the evening, but I think even redder in color.

All this is side-effect of the out-of-control wildfires burning elsewhere in the state, one of which actually jumped the Columbia River Gorge (quite a feat in itself). Every level surface has tiny flakes of ash scattered here and there; the amount of smoke particles in the air was enough to cool down the temperature a little yesterday, which was supposed to have hit the record for hottest day of the year, had the smoke in the air not mitigated it. Reminded me of the definite temperature drop at the time of the eclipse two weeks ago.

It's at times like this that I really begin to understand how the major meteor strike that set off the dinosaur extinction or the effects of a really major Krakatoa-level volcano eruption can produce effects so far away from the actual site of the event.

Here are two pictures, curtesy of Janice: first Monday night's moon and then Tuesday's sun.

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--John R.
current reading: "Where the Tides Ebb and Flow" (1910)

Callooh, Callay

So, all the files for A WILDERNESS OF DRAGONS are now in the publisher's hands. Between now and the book's release date I'll make posts here from time to time to keep folks updated on how things are going.

Meanwhile, here's a slightly earlier version of the Table of Contents, from the flyer distributed at Kalamazoo and Mythcon this summer: all the contents are the same as the final one that'll be appearing in the book but their ordering has been slightly rearranged and some of the essay titles have altered slightly.

Here's the link:

http://gabbrohead.com/a-wilderness-of-dragons

--John R.
current reading: "The Hoard of the Gibbelins" (1912)

Oh, Frabjous Day

So, today I made my first turnover on A WILDERNESS OF DRAGONS. The first quarter of the book is now in the publisher's hands. Further developments to be posted as they occur.

--John R.
--not yet doing The Dance of Doneness but starting to warm up.

current reading: THE FIRST EMPEROR (coffeetable-size catalogue from the exhibition of Terracotta Warriors I saw in the British Museum in 2007 and then again here at the Seattle Center two weeks ago tomorrow. Interesting but unwieldy.
also, BREAKING CAT NEWS: THE BOOK by Georgia Dunn

Dunsany on taking down statues

So, the current fervor rising out of the events in Charlottesville remind me of a passage in one of Lord Dunsany's plays, IF (1922) -- a sort of MAN WHO WOULD BE KING story about the wild adventures that wd have befallen one man had a small event in his life played out differently.* To cut a long story short, instead of a respectable London businessman he winds up ruler of a small central-asian land, where he tries to impose British values on its v. non-British people, who much preferred their old ways.

In the scene I'm thinking of, our hero is busy doing  paperwork, interrupted from time to time as his most trusted servant brings in idols a few at a time. The Englishman examines each, proclaiming some good gods who can be restored to their temples and condemning the others as bad gods who must be destroyed.  When someone asks him his criteria for why some gods are permitted to remain while others are thrown into the river, he explains that the ones with rusty stains around their mouths are the ones fed human blood in ceremonial sacrifice: hence he purges all of these. At one point, however, he notices that his loyal servant seems uneasy about what they're doing. The servant explains in a quick little exchange that's stayed in my memory all these years:


Daoud: I am sad . . . when the old gods go

John: But they are bad gods, Daoud

Daoud: I am sad when the bad gods go


--John R.



 *(whether he did or didn't take a particular train on the Underground one specific day)

I'm on Deadline

So, posts have been on the sparse side here the past few weeks, not because I didn't have anything to say but because I'm on deadline. Things shd clear up for me around the end of the month. Till then, I'll post when I can, because there's only so many hours a day I can work on one thing without overload.

And while I'm at it, apologies to those who sent in comments and didn't see them posted. Looks like they're once again going to a side mailbox I check  on an irregular basis, when they shd be going direct to my email. I've just put up the comments that had stacked up, belatedly. For the future I'll just work it into my daily routine to check that Comments mailbox so Comments can go up right away. Sorry about that.

--John R.
current reading: THE BLACK GONDOLIER by Fritz Leiber (half of a two-volume set of his collected horror stories) and a coffee-table book on the Easter 1916 Irish Uprising (picked up at the Marquette bookstore last year but not read till now because it's so unwieldy.

Wednesday Cat Walking (8/16-17)

After missing three weeks, I was able to get back in today and walk four out of five cats.

I started out with newcomer PUTT-PUTT, since it sounds from all accounts as if the other cats have been giving him a hard time. He took to it amazingly well, and was brave and curious, exploring all round. Anytime he saw people, he made his way directly over to them and rubbed their legs and asked for some petting. He made a lot of friends out there. His favorite bits, I’d say, were the cricket (who I’m glad to say got away), the catnip toys (which he found on the shelf and wanted to take home with him), and all the attention. He watches dogs carefully but isn’t particularly afraid of them. What a great cat.
AVRY was next, since she loves walking but sometime refuses to come out of her cage if the other cats go out first (I think it’s a pecking order thing). Even though she wasn’t quite first in line, I’m not sure she noticed, being up high on a top ledge the whole time Putt-Putt was out of his cage. As usual she poked about, rubbing her chin on everything (to mark it as her territory, I assume). She did her usual dance in and out among the little stools over in the training room. 
TRIS I didn’t walk but instead put atop the bins, where she happily sprawled, perfectly willing to play any string game or game with the laser pointer I cd offer. She also thought a whiff of catnip was quite nice.
CHESTER came next, since it was clear from reports that he’s been going a bit stir-crazy since his un-adoption and return. To my surprise, he had less confidence than the last time (four weeks ago, but still). He wanted to hang out near the cat-room, lying down and welcoming attention but not wanting to move about much. A lot of people did come up and pet him.
Our other new cat (new to me anyway), OBI, may have been asking to go out on previous shifts, but he had second thoughts once actually out there. He got spooked by store racket (bad luck there) and climbed up to perch on my shoulders. Each time I got him down, he went right back up again, so I wound up cutting his walk short. While we were waiting for an employee to bring a key he lay down in front of the room, where he welcomed petting from three little girls (the oldest of whom was seven). 
What Obi really liked best was the box with catnip in the bottom, which he and Chester circled round and round towards the end of my shift. They wd willingly have spent more time with it, but after staying an extra half-hour I had to wrap things up. I’ll try to remember to bring it back in next week, with some fresh catnip.

No health issues, but Putt-Putt did discover the fake grass over near the aquariums and had to be disuaded from nibbling them; he (and some of the others as well) might enjoy some real cat-grass.

—JDR. 
UPDATE 8/17: Got the great news that OBI was adopted on THursday and is now in his new home. Chester will miss his little buddy but it'll be great for Obi to have a family of his own.

Clark Ashton Smith's CHRONICLES OF AVEROIGNE

So, I've now finished the new Clark Ashton Smith collection from Centipede Press, CHRONICLES OF AVEROIGNE, assembled and edited by Ron Hilger. I'd gotten this about a month ago but hadn't plunged in right away, having been somewhat put off by the art, which didn't do much for me, and editorial comments that made this seem a Lin Carter love-fest.

Now that I've read this all the way through, I found that the excellence of the stories drew me in. And while expensive I have to say it is a real pleasure to hold in the hand a well-bound book, with good quality paper and a cover ("boards"), esp when I took off the dust jacket and only put it back on when I was finished.

I'm glad to finally get all the Averoigne stories together in one volume (which will partially replace the photocopy assemblage I made for myself years ago that's had to serve till now).  Not only are these particular favorites of mine but, as I've said elsewhere, I think this the best story-cycle by Smith, the most brilliant of the WEIRD TALES school; the man who cd out-Lovecraft Lovecraft.*

That said, there were things I found off-putting about this collection.

First off, the first story in the book isn't an Averoigne tale at all but a Poe pastiche different in setting, period, and tone. For me it really set the wrong note.

Second, each story is preceded and followed by a Smith poem.** I'm still undecided about the merits of Smith's poems (let's say the jury is out on that one for now). In this case, while I see the effect they were aiming for, I think these interlinear pieces fail to achieve it. I'd have preferred that they instead inserted in their appropriate places the outlines Smith left behind for three more ultimately unwritten stories in the cycle, as 'legends of Averoigne' or some similar framework. For one thing, this wd have given them a better volume-opener ("The Oracle of Sadoqua",  a tale involving Smith's own Great Old One, Tsthuggua), set in Roman times, than "The Maker of Gargoyles" (chronologically the earliest story in the series).

I'm also puzzled why the editorial material, particularly the Afterword, make so much of Lin Carter, whom they honor as the person who thought of this collection years ago. That's true enough, though to my mind he's the person who had the chance to published this collection back in the early seventies and blew it. The Afterword also devotes much space to arguing that this collection is the closest thing we'll ever get to a Clark Ashton Smith novel (to which I say: not very).

Still: it's good to have this collection at last. I'm still grateful to Tom Moldvay's work for first introducing me to Smith's Averoigne stories. And I'm still v. much looking forward to the book of Smith's art (drawings, paintings, sculpture) that shd be out sooner rather than later, also from Centipede Press



--John R.

current reading: a pair of slim (Osprey) books on the Irish revolution and subsequent Irish Civil War (for background to better understand Dunsany's unfortunate experiences therein).***

current music: Glen Campbell's "Wm Tell Overture" (the man sure cd play guitar). R.I.P. to a fellow Arkansan.


*I've given my own opinion of Smith's Averoigne tales elsewhere (in my CLASSICS OF FANTASY piece on said stories),  so here'll I'll just note a few things about this specific collection.


**except the last poem, which is by Lovecraft and about CAS and Averoigne.

***which included having been shot in the head. 1916 was a really bad year for Lord D.

Feanor is gone

FEANOR
December 2002 - August 2017