Author: publius

Fools! I will destroy you all!!

ASFO 2021–06–05

In which I take a long digression on the significance of energy to women in particular, and then a further one to address the fraught topic of “Nazi rocket scientists”. Some folks find it difficult to accept that the USA employed Wernher von Braun, and I don’t say they’re wrong to feel this way ― but there is some context which desperately begs to be discussed.

ASFO 2021–05–29

This is the first ASFO show to have been archived, and was done by dialing in to the conference bridge (x1088) on the SDF VoIP system, also used for aNONradio OpenVoIP. I spent much of the time discussing the growth in energy use since 1700, why the movement toward a high–energy society is a good thing, and why it has relied up to the present on fossil fuels despite their obvious problems. I end with a cliffhanger, so tune in next time!

Supplementary Show

“A Step Farther Out”

If you recall the Eames Office film “Powers of Ten” ― we humans are at the midpoint between the galaxies and the atomic nucleus. It’s a great place to be!

Saturdays, 19h UTC

Why would I start a new show, when I have trouble keeping up with the one I already have?

This is a completely different concept, and will be a completely different format (whatever the format ends up being), from Hear Now the Words. About all they have in common is my speaking voice. HNtW is the show in which I read stories written by other people. ASFO is the show in which I talk about what I think are interesting and worthwhile things to know and think about. That is going to involve atomic energy and space travel a great deal. As I see it, those are two defining features of human existence in the present age, which is the age of transition from planetary to cosmic existence. If we fail to think about them, and get them in the correct perspective, we may not make that transition successfully. And that is a thought too hideous, too sorrowful, to bear examination.

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Pickwickians Abroad

Dier Treblig Nhoj

This book, published in 1913 (but also dated 1989, in accord with the story) to benefit the International Institute of Shanghai, was the generous gift of well-known leading SDF member smj. The author, alias John Gilbert Reid, was only 14 at the time of publication, & one supposes much of the work was written at least a year or two before that.

My plan is to present one chapter per show of this intriguing work, with something closer to our usual theme rounding out the show.

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The Warlord of Mars

Edgar Rice Burroughs

This further sequel to A Princess of Mars and The Gods of Mars has no preface to explain how the author came into possession of Captain Carter’s story. Rather, it picks up directly where the previous book left off.

Recordings

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By Air Express to Venus

or, Captives of a Strange People

Roy Rockwood

Everett Bleiler, in his monumental Science Fiction : The Early Years suggests that the “Great Marvels Series” of juvenile scientific-adventure novels, in which this was the eighth and next–to–last volume, was the first cloth–bound SF series in any language. The first instalment, Through the Air to the North Pole, or, The Wonderful Cruise of the Electric Monarch, appeared in 1906, and this one dates from 1929.

According to Bleiler, publishing magnate Edward Stratemeyer provided the plots to be fleshed out by writers under the Rockwood pseudonym, and for the first six books, the writer can be identified as Howard R Garis, but for this one it is unknown. Several of the other books in the series are available on Project Gutenberg, but not this one. Copyright is Cupples & Leon Co.

Recordings

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The Gods of Mars

Edgar Rice Burroughs

This is the immediate sequel to A Princess of Mars, relating the further adventures of John Carter after his death on Earth.

Recordings

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When the World Shook

Being an Account of the Great Adventure of Bastin, Bickley, and Arbuthnot

H. Rider Haggard

This work is pretty much contemporary in publication with The Moon Pool, and has some similarities, involving South Seas islands and lost races. It is, however, quite different in both tone and theme. The dedication to Lord Curzon is noteworthy (see below).

Recordings

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Auf Zwei Planeten

Kurd Lasswitz

First half read 2019-02-03 ; about half of what remained, 2019-02-17, and finished 2019-03-03. (Video livestream recordings are available for two weeks.) This is a long one, for all that it represents an abridged edition. No unabridged version exists in English.

Recordings

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Across the Zodiac : The Story of a Wrecked Record

Willy Ley encountered this Mars story in a German translation, and, failing to find the English original (possibly hampered by looking for it under the title Beyond the Zodiac, but Percy Greg was apparently a well-known English author), considered that it might be actually German.  The confusion was not helped by the fact that author Greg presents himself as translating a found manuscript.  Sam Moskowitz considers it the genesis of the Mars romance so characteristic of the early period of modern science fiction.

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