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2-1-1999 SFRA ewN sletter 238 Science Fiction Research Association

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Scholar Commons Citation Science Fiction Research Association, "SFRA eN wsletter 238 " (1999). Digital Collection - Science Fiction & Fantasy Publications. Paper 57. http://scholarcommons.usf.edu/scifistud_pub/57

This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Digital Collection - Science Fiction & Fantasy at Scholar Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Digital Collection - Science Fiction & Fantasy Publications by an authorized administrator of Scholar Commons. For more information, please [email protected]. #1~B FEBRIIARY 1### Co·EdHors: .onfiHion Rnie. EdHor: Haren Hellekson l Crail Jacobsen .eil Barron

• ~ • IrI.": W .. [;] STARTIIIG OUT Alan Elms Not so very long ago at all, I got a phone call from Joan Gordon. The good news, she said, was that I had been elected to become the next vice president of SFRA. The very bad news was that Lynn Williams, the president-elect, had sud­ denly died. The however-I-wanted-to-take-it news was that, according to the SFRA bylaws, I was now the president-elect. Initially I wasn't sure how I wanted to take it. Lynn would have been an energetic and wdl-qualiftd president, and the news of her death was a shock. I had agreed to run for the vice presidency with no further organizational ambitions. Joan said I could decline the presidency if! felt it was more than I had bargained for, but she hoped I'd accept it. As you can see, she persuaded me. In part, my decision was based on Joan's willingness to provide continued support, assistance, and encouragement. (As immediate past president, Joan remains a full participant on the Executive Board.) Our two reelected officers, Carolyn Wendell and Mike Levy, have also been very helpful, as have our new editorial team of Karen, Craig, and Neil, and our ex-ex-president, Joe Sanders. Adam Frisch, the other vice presidential candi­ date in the 1998 election, responded with enthusiasm when the new Executive Committee asked him to ftll the vice presidential vacancy. So with all that help, I think I can do the job. My other reason for decid­ ing to take it on is the importance of SFRA to me. Science ftction research and teaching don't Cut much ice in academic psychology. On the other hand, when I began to study science ftction writers from a psychological perspective, I was quite uncertain as to how such work would be received by the literary scholars and teach­ ers already immersed in the fteld. At my first SFRA conference, in Rolla in 1984, I was quickly made to feel at home by such people as Walt Meyers, Mack and Sue Hassler, Brian Attebery, and Brooks Landon. I was also taken under the gentle wings of Muriel Becker and Betsy Harfst, who continued to look out for me at later conferences. At the half-dozen or so later conferences I've attended, I've found further friendship and intellectual stimulation from such people as Neil Bar­ ron, Dave Mead, Susan Stratton, Jim Gunn, , and Gary Westfahl.

The SFRAReview (ISSN I068-395X) is published six times a year by the Science Fiction Research As­ sociation (SFRA) and distributed to SFRA members. Individual issues are not for sale. For informa­ tion about the SFRA and its benefits. see the description at the back of this issue. For a membership application. contact SFRA Treasurer Michael M. Levy or get one from the SFRA Website: . 2 And then there's the SFRA listserv, through which I've become familiar with the current interests and ideas of many members who can't get to the conferences, as lIonlidion Re,ie. JI well as those who do. Though I'm active in several other professional organiza­ tions, ranging in size from enormous to miniscule, SFRA soon became the one that Disch Dreams felt most like family. It still does-now more than ever. Neil Barron lIonlidion Rnie. J2 • ei.: ~ Invaluable Index ~ FORWARD THE REYIEW Neil Barron and Craig Jacobsen lIonlidion Rnie. J2 This issue marks the beginning of a new year for the Review, and with Difficult Bibliography that comes changes. We've begun our Approaching... feature by focusing on Wil­ Neil Barron liam Gibson's . Through the generosity of our contributors we are lIonlic.ion Rnie. JJ able to bring you a of valuable information for anyone interested in teaching or researching the book that helped define . In fact, there was so much Gorey Galore that we had to edit it down to shoehorn it all into this already beefy issue. Check Neil Barron the call for submission for features (a new one every month), and submit! lIonlidion Rnie. JJ You'll also notice that we've changed the layout a bit, and included our Awards Bargain first letter to the editors and the first installment of an ongoing graphic narrative. Neil Barron We are also lucky enough to be able to print a poem from a Pulitzer Prize winner. lIonlic.ion Rnie. J4 This issue also contains the first President's message from Alan Elms and the regular yearly reports from the rest of the SFRA Board (except VP Adam Goosebumps Frisch, who at deadline was still recovering from having been shanghaied into that Michael Levy position), including everything you ever wanted to know about the SFRA budget. Correspondence J5 We've also got the index for the 1998 issues. Of course we also have the usual slew Letter to the Editors of the insightful fiction and nonfiction reviews that, logically enough, are the heart Graphic lIarra.in J5 of the Review. Croatoan Even with these changes, which we think are pretty nifty, we'd like to see Laura Jacobsen the Review do more. Accordingly, we've put together an SFRA Review web page, accessible through the main SFRA page at or directly at . While the design of the site may not win any awards (except perhaps for minimalism), we'll be using it to post calls for submissions, provide information on upcoming issues, and, with the SUBMISSIONS permission of the authors, offering downloadble versions of select articles from the The SFRAReview editors encourage submis­ Review. Our primary purpose for this is to offer material in a format that members sions. Please send submissions to both editors. can easily manipulate for their own classroom needs, and thus we'll be focusing on If you would like to be put on the list of non­ the Approaching... articles. We also may present the "director's cut" version of arti­ fiction reviewers. please contact Neil Barron directly. The general editorial address for the cles that we've been forced to whittle on for considerations. SFRAReview is: And finally, though we hate to admit it, we've caught Millennium Hype . Fever. We've mastered whatever qualms we once had and accepted that 2000 is going to be the big year no matter what people who can count say. The Review is Karen Hellekson. Coeditor already looking forward to the big December issue with exciting plans for a big 742 N 5th Street finish. Lawrence, KS 66044 i.:~ • i.: i.: •• ; (for attachments) = SECRETARY'S REPORT Carolyn Wendell Craig Jacobsen. Coeditor In November, I mailed out 255 notices for membership renewal. I wrote 208 E Baseline Road #311 Tempe. AZ 85283 the letter of greeting, but the questionnaire sheet to be filled out was taken directly from the Web site, where the information is kept updated. Reminders will be sent out before March. Neil Barron. Nonfiction Reviews Editor I am also now the keeper of what remains of the SFRA flyers (about 200); I 149 Lime Place because some of the information is now dated (costs, Web address), I have printed Vista. CA 92083-7428 up a correction sheet to be put into the flyer. If anyone wants flyers to distribute, please let me know and I will be happy to send them out. ~.:. . ~ ~ -.;' = TREASURER'S REPORT Michael Levy SFRA BOARD ELECTS V.P. Despite fears that a dues increase would cost us membership, and despite Soon after the new SFRA officers took continuing problems with the SFRAReview, I believe that 1998 has ended on an office in early January 1999, they con­ optimistic note. As usual, the SFRA lost some members last year, but we picked up vened to appoint a new vice president others (thanks in part to our new Website). Total membership declined from 310 The death of Lynn Williams (reported in in 1997 to 305 in 1998, but this was apparently the result more of the sparse atten­ dance at our 1998 conference in Scottsdale, Arizona, than of a negative reaction to SFRAReview #23 7), the winning presi­ the increase in dues. dential candidate, meant that the win­ This dues increase (to $80 for a standard membership) was necessary, of ning vice presidential candidate, Alan course, because the lower dues level at which the organization had stayed for some Elms, was now the president Adam ($60 for a standard membership) was simply inadequate to cover costs. In Frisch, who stood for office for vice presi­ fact, it was discovered in 1997 that the SFRA had actually been running in the red dent in the lost election, was asked to be for several years. This situation had not previously been noted because each year's vice president, and he agreed. membership renewal money was covering the previous year's shortfall. Unfortu­ nately, by 1997, that shortfall had grown to more than $4,000, and the problem Welcome to all the members of the had become obvious. SFRA Executive Boord! Since it was not at all clear that even this substantial dues increase would solve SFRA's financial problems, the Executive Board also made the decision to • I I. decrease the cost of the SFRAReview by publishing it in a less expensive format. SFRA 1999: SOUTHERN Based on a 1998 revenue projection 0 f $28,550 and projected expenditures of ACCENTS IN SCIENCE FICTION $25,750, it was believed that we would be once again on solid financial ground, with the projected overage of approximately $2,800 going a long way toward SFRA 1999 will be held June 2-6, eliminating the previous years' shortfalls. 1999, at the Radisson Admiral Semmes Difficulties in the SFRAReview have included the Great Midwestern Hotel, Mobile, Alabama. The topic is , which affected our printer in the summer of 1997, and destroyed the print­ Southern SF. Gregory Benford is the ing schedule for 1997 and some of 1998; editor Amy Sisson relocating, then even­ author guest of honor, and Usa Snellings tually resigning; and coeditor Geoffrey Sperl's inability to produce the Review. I describe these difficulties because they affect our finances. Because the SFRAReview is the artist guest of honor. Kathleen did not come out regularly, our actual expenditures in 1998 were a low Goonan and are the special $21,221.49, far below our projected expenditures of$25,750, and even further guest writers, and I. F. Clarke is the spe­ below our actual 1998 income of $27,670. Only half the normal complement of cial guest speaker. Papers on the guests Reviews appeared in 1998, so we spent only $3,474.44. If all six issues had come of honors' work and on Southern SF are out, our expenditures would have been more in line with projections. However, it particularly encouraged; other SF topics, is important to emphasize that under the editorial guidance of Karen Hellekson however, will not be excluded. and Craig Jacobsen, the SFRA will publish all of the missing 1998 issues of the Hotel reservations con be mode by SFRAReview in 1999 as well as the expected 1999 issues. The money saved in 1998 will therefore be spent in the current year, and our books should come into bal­ colling 8001333-3333; ask for the SFRA ance. 1999 ffat rote for a double, which is $79. A number of other financial matters are discussed in notes below, but I Registration before March 30, 1999, is would like to call special attention to the matter of the Encumbered Income set $75, which includes on awards banquet aside to do a book of Pilgrim Award speeches. This money was given to us a num­ and evening activities. ber of years ago, with the editing of the above-mentioned volume being assigned to To register, send a check or money then-SFRA member and SFRAReview editor Daryl Mallett, along with Hal Hall. order to SFRA 1999 Mobile, Tom Bren­ This book, at long last, seems to be on the verge of becoming a . With interest, the total amount of the encumbered funds would be nan, Deportment of English, University 0 $3,613.64. However, in 1995, $998.45 of that money was disbursed, leaving a bal­ South Alabama, Mobile, AL 36688. Send ance available of $2,615.19. Evidently $747.67 was spent to pay the printer of panel or paper proposals to Andy Imaginative ; $200.00 was spent to pay for a cover illustration of what was Duncan, Box 870244, Deportment 0 expected to be a series of SFRA-sponsored books, and the rest of the money wen t English, University of Alabama, Tus co­ to pay Daryl Mallett's phone bills and other costs. loosa, 35487. Email: . ~.:.. ~ ~ .. ~ ::: TREASURER'S REPORT: FINANCES MLA MEETS SFRA Mike Levy AND VICE VERSA Expenditures PrOjected 99 98 Budget Projected 98 97 Budget Projected 97 This year's Modern Language Associa­ Extrapolation (n. I) +100.00 3476.00 4500.00 3543.00 4500.00 tion (MLA) meeting in SF Swdies 4400.00 4166.50 4500.00 4356.00 4500.00 marked the inaugural of the Science Fiction and Utopian and Fantastic Utera­ Foundation (n. 2) 2500.00 4284.00 2400.00 0.00 1600.00 ture discussion group. Thanks to the tire­ NY Review of SF 2300.00 2229.00 1750.00 1708.00 1900.00 less efforts of such people as Ken Roe­ SFRA Review (n. 3) 8500.00 3474.44 8500.00 5060.94 13,500.94 mer and Tom Moylan, SF is at last rec­ Awards (n. 4) 1100.00 221.98 1000.00 822.07 1100.00 ognized in this bastion of English studies. Directory 1000.00 920.68 1600.00 1178.05 1600.00 The (rrst official session was a conver­ Conferences (n. 5) 500.00 1639.58 750.00 0.00 0.00 sation between Office Expenses 300.00 391.18 300.00 266.95 500.00 and Peter Fitting, this year's discussion Exec. 80ard Mtng. 500.00 418.13 250.00 I 969.n 2000.00 ,roup chair. The session was erudite and Recruiting 100.00 70.00 200.00 213.46 200.00 informal, relaxed and stimulating, and Publications 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 had a large audience of about (rfty peo­ Total Expenditures 25,600.00 21,221.49 25,750.00 20,855.24 31,400.00 ple. The conversation revolved primarily around Stan's work with utopian (rction, Income PrOjected 99 98 Budget Projected 98 97 Budget Projected 97 not surprising since that is Peter's inter­ Memberships 26,000.00 26,378.00 26,500.00 20,573.00 20,500.00 est Interest 500.00 464.19 200.00 171.n 300.00 Peter began by asking how Stan be­ Royalties 100.00 541.76 1500.00 In3.52 1500.00 came interested in utopias. Stan spoke Other Income 100.00 287.00 300.00 3927.00 100.00 of wanting to write a pocket utopia Total Income 26,600.00 27,670.95 28,550.00 26445.60 22,400.00 about a small group in a larger world. They went on to discuss the problems Received 98 Disbursed 98 Balance writing utopian frction-their static na­ Royalties 1354.37 812.61 541.76 ture, the trench ('s term) Scholar Support 363.00 230.00 29.90 Fund between the regular world and the uto­ pia, the decision about how far from the Originally Disbursed in Balance present to place the utopia. Received Previous Yrs.

My notes capture moments of bril­ Encumbered In- 3613.64 998.45 2615.19 liance rather than the general movement come Pilgrim Awd. Grt. n.6 of the discussion, so let me present a few of Stan's insights. Capitalism, he Cash Balance 1/8199 said, is antithetical to environmentalism. (includes 99 renewals) Longevity is a device that expresses metaphorically the many ages through Member Count which we live. Hard SF is often hard pri­ marily on the underprivileged. Science is (n. I) Extrapolation is a (n. 2) Foundation (n. 3) Actual (n. 4) This (n. 5) This (n. 6) After a a utopian politics. Philip K Dick's bit behind in its billing failed to bill us money spent on figure is low represents $500 number of and we still owe them for our 97 the Review is because L advances to the years, progress set up a dialogiC among many viewpoint for a number of 98 subscriptions low because Sprague de 98, 99, and 0 I is apparently narrators. novels illus­ subs. until early 98. several issues Camp didn't organizers, plus being made on trated the principle of sensitive depend­ This figure were delayed. attend the 98 the amount the book of represents both These COSts will meeting, but it needed to Pilgrim Award ence. And last, a question: Is SF that 97 and 98 subs. appear in 99. includes a me- cover a small speeches for which has a historical connection with morial for Lynn loss on the 98 which this Williams. Conf. and some money was the present and fantasy that which does incidentals. intended. not? As you may have gathered from my brief summary, this was a fascinating conversation. Neuromancer Neuromancer Later in the day, we held a small busi­ by by William Gibson ness meeting. determining the topic for List Price: $6.99 List Price: $21.95 next year's discussion session, which I Mass Market - 271 pages Re­ Hardcover - 278 pages Reprint edition will be chairing. As you might expect, issue edition (May 1995) Guly 1994) ; ISBN: 0441569595 Ace Books; ISBN: 0441000681 next year's topic will stress SF. The title of next year's session will be "Going ~ •• ~ • .:..~.: ... &.4 .... :. Postal: Science Fiction and Contempo­ ~ OLDRO"AIICERI NEIIR'IIANtER rary Cultural Transformation," and the Donald Gilzinger call for papers appears here in I first taught Neuromancer in my sophomore-level science fiction class SFRAReview #238. The call has also during the fall 1985 semester. We used the original $2.95 Ace Science Fiction Spe­ gone out on the SFRA listserv and in the cial with an introduction by and an illustration of a crystal and ruby MLA newsletter. head on the cover (shouldn't the head have been "cloisonne over platinum, stud­ In order to show the continuing inter­ ded with seed pearls and lapis" as described on page 74?). Two challenges to the est in and importance of SF as literature, 's accessibility immediately presented themselves to student readers: their own I hope that when you renew your mem­ lack of experience with computers and Gibson's total immersion style. Until 1989, there was no and the nascent Internet was bership in MLA, you will check the Sci­ still known as ARPAnet. Gibson's prescient , and , ence Fiction and Utopian and Fantastic needed careful definition and explanation, as did ICE, simstim, console cowboys, Literature discussion section. zaibatsus, Ono-Sendai Cyberspace 7, and so many other terms. Readers raised on MLA also offered me a personal 0p­ the simple "SF as western" narratives of the and Star Wars universes be­ portunity to touch base with our new came easily frustrated. And Gibson kept piling on the vocabulary: joeboys, arcolo­ preSident, Alan Elms, and with one of gies, Ninsei, yakitori stands, wartime Russian mycotoxin, Kuang Grade Mark the Review's editors, Karen Hellekson. Eleven penetration program. Fortunately, evidence in the text of Gibson's own lack of experience with computers was easy to overlook; some students were ac­ What a pleasure it was to pass the torch q4ainted with mainframes and with programming FORTRAN or COBOL, but in to Alan, although I am no longer She 1985 almost none had a Pc. We were all in the dark concerning computers and Who Must Be Obeyed. As for Karen, not information-driven society. In a sense, our horizons of expectation were then much only was I able to be reassured about different from ours today. In 1985 and the years immediately following, all of us, this very Review, now that she has students and teacher, read and assessed Neuromancer as neophytes. Craig Jacobsen to help her-

• I I • ..... ~ • .:. • ..-: .II: "'~." : • GUIDE TO NEIIRIIIANtER DOOR INTO OCEAN joan Slonczewski would like SFRA Rich &lich members to know thot she is doing a 1. Bibliographic and Generic Information small press edition of A Door Into Gibson, William. Neuromancer. : Ace, 1984. Ocean for sale to students in SF classes. If you are interested, please con­ First book of the Neuromancer trilogy (a.k.a. ""): Neuro­ tact joan at mancer, (1986), (1988). Also related to at least four stories in Gibson's collection (1986). Department of Biology Critics of SF discuss Neuromancer as a central work of "cyberpunk," a useful Kenyon College term, but one which Gibson and others in the movement usually eschew (see Gambier, OH 43022 's Preface to : The Cyberpunk Anthology [reprinting sto- E-mail: [email protected] ries by Gibson, Sterling, , , , Greg Bear, and others in the group]). Cyberpunk (c-p) is often discussed as an important liter­ ary form of , the successor to the modernism of the earlier part of the 20th century. In my citations below, N = Neuromancer, MLO = Mona Lisa Overdrive. AI = "(s)" = fully sentient, highly intelligent, self-aware devices (computers, usually, but in some SF also , space ships, etc.). VR = (a term that became popular only later). T-A = Tessier-Ashpool, SA; Tessier-Ashpools. P-o-v = point of view. NB = Note well. There is a special cyberpunk issue of Mississippi Review: vol. 16, combined issues 2 & 3, running number 47 & 48 (1988), Larry McCaffery, guest editor. Ci­ tations to MR47/48 refer to this issue. Included in MR47/48 is McCaffery's Intro­ duction, "The Desert of the Real: The Cyberpunk Controversy" and "An Inter­ view with William Gibson," and a "Cyberpunk Forum/Symposium"; I'll cite these in class or below as "C-p Controversy," "Interview," and "Forum." MR47/48 has been revised, somewhat expanded, and reissued as Storming the Reality Studio: A Casebook o/Cyberpunk and Postmodern Science Fiction (Durham, N.C.: Duke Uni­ versity Press, 1991).

2. Time o/"Neuromancer D Mona Lisa Overdrive takes place some time after 2040 Common Era, which, we learn, is about seven years after Count Zero, which, in turn, is about seven to eight years after Neuromancer, Mona Lisa Overdrive is set about fifteen years after "It Changed." Hence, Neuromancer is set shortly after 2025 C.E.

3. Characurs 3Jane: Lady 3Jane Marie-France Tessier-Ashpool (N213), currently most active member of Tessier-Ash pool clan. Armitage: Col. Willis Corto, as reconstructed by Wintermute (see esp. N 82-84, 193-94). Ashpool: apparently the original Ashpool of Tessier-Ash pool, opposed to Marie­ France Tessier's plan to get into symbiotic relationship with the clan's AIs-Artificial Intelligences (N 183-86, 205, 228-29, 243-44). Case: Henry Dorsett Case (N 159), main character of Neuromancer. (A real hard­ case when we see him, but he ends trilogy rich, retired, possibly married, and with four kids [MLO 137; chap. 22].) Dixie Flacline: McCoy Pauley; trained Case as a "cowboy," now an interactive construct aiding Case et al. Finn/The Finn: ally of Case and Molly in the BAMA Sprawl (one of Winter­ mute's favorite personas-masks-for communicating with Case). Julie/Deane: Julius Deane: old man (N 12) who has Linda Lee murdered. Linda Lee: woman who loved Case in Chiba and was loved by Case as much as Case was capable oflove (which might not be much during time of N). Lonny Zone: pimp in Chiba City (then, a Wintermute persona in communicating with Case). Maelcum: young Rasta who helps Case et al. on Wintermute run. Marie-France: Marie-France Tessier, founding mother of Tessier-Ash pool clan and originator of plan for Wintermute and Neuromancer (see page refer­ ences for Ashpool). Molly [Millions]: full name in "" (colI. Burning Chrome). "Razorgirl" hired for muscle for the run on (and on behalf of) Wintermute. Neuromancer: an Artificial Intelligence, "right brain" in orientation (N 243, 250- 51, 258-59); when combined with Wintermute, they become a new entity of godlike power (N 269-70)-but, as we learn in the later books, without God's stability; their merging and later break-up changes the matrix and sets the premise for the rest of the trilogy. Peter Riviera: nasty man who tries to manipulate 3Jane and to mess over Molly; ends up dead. SFRAMOBlLE 1999 Ratz: bartender of Chatsubo bar ("the Chat"); tries to give Case straight talk on UPDATE Case's condition, and other good advice (N21, 23). The program for SFRA99 in Mobile Wage: small-time hoodlum to whom Case owes money. is still in the making. You may recall that Wintermute: an AI, "left brain" in orientation; see "Neuromancer," above. the theme of the Conference is 4. Word/Allusion List "Southern Accents" in Science Fiction." Notes: [1] "q.v." = "which see"; [2] sources: Glossary to Wang Funciamen­ Please submit your proposals to Andy tals Guide, Webster's New World Dictionary [1980], Encyclopaedia Britannica Duncan as soon as possible at [1974], Gibson's Sprawl stories: [email protected]. Registration AI: Artificial Intelligence (see above, #1). fees should be sent to Tom Brennan at Babylon: ancient city of corrupt enemies in Scriptures; non-Rastafarian world. Dptof English, Univ. of South Alabama, BAMA: See "Sprawl." Chiba: city on Tokyo Bay, opposite of Tokyo, part of Tokyo-Yokohama metro- Mobile, 36688. politan area. We experienced a brief setback Cray: Real-world line of supercomputers. when Michael Bishop had to withdraw Dali: Surrealist painter. as GoH. As Dame Kinde would have it, Desiderata: Things needed and wanted. his daughter will bless the world with a Dreads: See "Rastas." child in the first week of June. Happily, Eastwood: Clint Eastwood, "Mr. Macho" in a number of action-adventure fIlms Gregory Benford has agreed to assume (apparently not remembered by Case as a film director or politician). EEG: electroencephalogram, a recording of the electrical activity of a brain. the role of GoH. Gregory is originally Garvey, Marcus: Leader of West Indian Blacks in USA (1880-1940). from Fairhope, AL which is directly ICE: Intrusion Countermeasures Electronics (defined N 28). across the Bay from Mobile. Two more Jah: Yahweh (cultic name for God ofIsrael). "southern sf' writers, Kathleen Goonan LED: Light-emitting diode, used for the faces of digital watches and such. and Andy Duncan, have agreed to come L-5: A "libration" (balance) point not far up the gravity well from Earth; things as special guest writers. put at L-5 tend to stay there. Other attending authors are: Barbara : New Testament character raised from the dead by Jesus of Nazareth. Chepaitis, F. Brett Cox, Joan Slonczewski, Lee: Bruce Lee, star of martial arts flicks in the 1970s and after. Lupus: Case's alias on Freeside (N 133): Latin for "wolf'; English for a number of Sydney Sowers, Del Stone, Fred Pohl and diseases. David Hartwell. Barbara Chepaitis will Ninsei: "Heart" of "Night City"-area between port ofChiba and city proper (N moderate a session on profeSSional stcr 6; I can't find it on the map I consulted ["Ninsei" is the pseudonym for a rytelling. I.F. Clarke, retired Foundation famous Japanese potter].) Professor of English Studies at the Uni­ RAM: Random-access memory-the memory one works with in a computer versity of Strathclyde, Glasgow, will give (opposed to ROM, q.v.); can be recorded, moved, stored, changed, copied, a paper on "Albert Robida: First Artist to sold. the Future." And Professor Clarke will Rastas: Rastafarians-religious cult from Jamaica known in mainstream U.S. cul­ ture in our time for politics, cuisine, music, and hair style. also accept the SFRA's Pioneer Award ROM: Read-only memory-information a computer reads and uses but which the for his Science-Fiction Studies arti­ operator can't change and manipulate. cles on 19th-century future-war fiction. Shinjuku: Part of Tokyo-Yokohama metropolitan area. Several people will do papers on south­ Sprawl, the: "BAMA, the Sprawl, the Boston-Atlanta Metropolitan Axis" (N 43). ern aspect of sf. There will be at least Topkapi: Famous museum in . one panel devoted to discussion of Turing: From Alan M. Turing (1912-54), British mathematician who helped de­ "Southern Accents in Science Fiction." velop computer theory and believed in the possibility of machine intelli­ gence (AI); developed the Turing Test for determining whether or not a A grant proposal has been submitted machine is thinking. to the Alabama Humanities Foundation, Verne, Jules: Famous French author (of SF, more or less) of 19th century. and that money, if it becomes available, Yakuza: The Japanese mob. will be used to bring in another speCial * * * guest writer. amphetamine: Generic "speed," a family of uppers known to be dangerous by the Bud Foote has volunteered his Dau- 1960s. burning bush: In the biblical book of Exodus, God speaks to Moses out of a burn­ phin Island beach house for a cookout ing bush. and swim party. Tom Brennan will bushido: Chivalric code of the samurai (aristocratic warriors) of feudal Japan, em­ make his sailboards and two-person, phasizing courage and loyalty-and death before dishonor; the code re­ sea-going kayak available to those who quires absolute loyalty to one's current lord (later, employer). may want to indulge in more strenuous catheter: "Slender tube ... inserted into a body passage, vessel, or cavity for pass­ ing fluids, making examinations, etc., esp. one for draining urine from the activity. bladder." Tom Brennan done(d): Duplicating quite closely an organism by being growing the clone from a • II. single somatic cell (body cell, not fertilized egg and usually grown outside MLA CALL FOR PAPERS of a womb); the duplicate. (By extension, other close copies.) As you know, MLA now has a discus­ derm: Skin patch containing a drug in a medium that will go through the skin. sion section on Science Fiction and Uto­ dex: Dexedrine, trademark for dextroamphetamine, a powerful upper. pian and Fantastic Uterature, thanks to djellaba: Unisex, loose garment warn in some Moslem countries. emps: Electromagnetic pulses (of very high energy). the efforts of Ken Roemer and Tom endorphin: Peptide(s) secreted by the brain, with analgesic effects similar to those Moylan. Next year I will chair the con­ of morphine. vention session. Please consider submit­ event horizon: The sphere of space around a black hole that is the beginning of ting an abstract of 500 words or fewer. the black hole-anything inside the event horizon stays there as long as our The deadline is March 15, 1999, and universe lasts. you should send your abstract as an gaijin: Foreigner, someone not Japanese. email message to gordonjl@earthlink. go-to: Computer command telling the program to "go to" someplace (e.g., go-to line 10, go-to p. 6). net (not as an attachment, please) or head: Among other slang meanings, toilet on a ship (and by extension, elsewhere). snailmail to Joan Gordon, I Tulip Lane, joeboys: Kids on the make, apprentices; thugs (not yet "street samurai," q.v.). Commack, NY 11725-3714. mainline: To inject a drug into a large vein. matrix: Defined for N-in children's terms---on p. 51; note in addition the dic­ Goine Postal: Science Fiction and tionary definitions: "1. orig., the womb; uterus 2. that within which, or Contemporary Cultural Transformation within and from which, something originates, takes form, or develops ... ; Our historical moment has gone 5. Math. a set of numbers or terms arranged in rows and columns ... 7. Zool. a) any nonliving, intercellular substance in which living cells are em­ postal with a vengeance. This moment of bedded ... b) the formative cells from which a nail, tooth, etc., grows." seemingly perpetual political and cultural megabyte: A bit is "The smallest unit of data; a single binary digit," either 0 or 1; a crisis has been represented as: post­ byte is "The amount of space, usually 8 bits, used to store one alphabetic or modern, post-colonial, post-historical, [other] symbolic character; a kilobyte is approximately 1000 bytes; a mega­ post-structuralist, post-narrative, post­ byte is approximately 1 million bytes (more exactly, there are 1024 bytes to literate, post-human, post-feminist, post­ the KB and 1024 KB to the MB; figuring about 2 kilobytes a page; a mega­ utopian, post-gender, post-Einsteinian, byte is about 500 pages of ryped text in a large font [say, 12-point])." meperidine: Methyl piperidine, a sedative and analgesic. and on and on. Science frction, using the microchip: A "chip" is "a semiconductor body in which an integrated circuit is fUture to comment on the present, the formed or is to be formed," and a "microprocessor chip" is a chip in a com­ alien to comment on the familiar, pro­ puter "that executes instructions." In N, probably a very small integrated vides an ideal site from which to explore Circuit. the frontier over which all these post-ings microsoft: Very small software (q.v.); name of a famous 20th-c. computer program hover, residing as it does on the postal company-the "MS" in MS-DOS (Microsoft Disk Operating System). borderland of our current critical posi­ modem: Communication device linking computer to phone lines (etc.). tion. This session will be concerned with moire: "Fabric ... having a watered, or wavy pattern." necromancer: Magician, especially a magician using the dark arts to tell the future the variety of ways in which science frc­ by communicating with the dead. tion has been deployed as a means to ninja: Very highly trained killer. think about contemporary social, cul­ noir: "" is literally "black film," i.e., gritty 1940s b/w "B" movies, with tural, political, and technological trans­ many night shots, set in decaying cities, usually featuring a barely middle­ formations, ruptures, and gaps. class detective Outsider, who often moves among both the underworld and Joan Gordon the decadent rich; by extension, any work with a similar "look and feel," e. g., hard-boiled detective novels, P. K Dick's Do Androids Dream olElectric Sheep and the film made from it, . origami: Japanese paper folding. CALL FOR PROPOSALS: pachinko: "A Japanese gambling device like a pinball machine." SFRA 1999 PANEL pheromone: "Chemical substances secreted externally by certain animals ... which Craig Jacobsen is organizing "Gone convey information to and produce specific responses in other individuals South": Dying, Death and the of the same species"; the information is often "Here-I-Am-and-I'm-Horny," and the response a strong tropism. Dead in Science Fiction, a panel for rude boy: Unmannerly, disobedient youth, lacking respect; hooligan, punk. the 1999 SFRA Conference in Mobile. sanpaku (N 10): Drug? Anyone interested in joining the panel sarariman: "Salary-man," worker for a large corporation. should submit a brief abstract via email speed: Amphetamines. . Deadline is squid: In Gibson's story, "Johnny Mnemonic," squids are "Superconducting March 30. quantum interference detectors," wired into a dolphin to allow the dolphin to read data stored on chips that are highly protected for privacy (Burning • II. Chrome 9-10). REQUEST FOR INFORMATION shuriken: "Steel stars with knife-sharp points" (N 11). ON JAMES TIPTREE, JR. simstim: "Simulated stimulation" received from the sensorium of another per­ Julie Phillips, Rozenstraat 27, 10/6 son-an art form and commercial medium by the early 21st century. NM Amsterdam, The Netherlands, e­ software: Computer programs and the media they're on (cf. and contrast hard­ mail , is working on ware: computers and related machines). street samurai: Modern warriors for hire (that's warrior, not "thug"; samurai a biography of James Tiptree, Jr., for would be under bushido, q.v.). publication by St Martin's Press. She is subliminal: Beneath the threshold (of conscious perception). particularly interested in Tiptree's pre-SF synaesthesia: Mingling of the senses, where sounds are seen as colors, sights are career as Alice Bradley (Dovey) Sheldon, felt, etc. (N 221). who served in the WAC, in USAF intelli­ triptych: "A set of three panels with pictures, designs, or carvings, often hinged so gence (as Copt Alice Davey), 1942-45, that the two side panels may be folded over the central one, commonly used or when she was at George Washington as an altarpiece." trodes: Electrodes used for direct linkage of a human brain/mind to a computer University. All help will be acknowledged. virus/viral programs or subprograms: Programs introduced into a computer sys­ • I I. tem to destroy, damage, or modify all or part of the system. AUSSIECON 3 ACADEMIC yakitori: Lit. "bird on a stick," Japanese fast-food chicken on wooden skewers. TRACK CLOSED zaibatsu: Large corporation(s); in N, inevitably huge multinationals. (Zaibatsu in Japanese is singular or plural; Anglicized, it can be "zaibatsus" for plurals.) has closed the call for papers for Aussiecon 3 Academic Some Comments and Questions on the List: Track and thanks all SFRA members (1) Don't worry if you don't initially understand a word; if it's important, who submitted. He notes, 'We're in the context should make it clear enough-or, ifit's an esoteric word, Gibson will communication with each of you, but if get around to defining it. (You don't need to know precisely what "yakitori" is, so you have any doubt that This Means long as you figure out it's some sort oHood.) If Gibson doesn't make it clear, and You, then drop me a note." He also the word is important, maybe you should look it up and learn it. (Definitely con­ sider looking up words if "esoteric" was a word you had to look up.) notes that the programming committee (2) "Modernists" like T. S. Eliot and James Joyce have been justly accused may put out requests for participants for of elitism for demanding, if one is to understand their works readily, familiarity specific panels they have in mind. Con­ with the classical tongues and fashionable modern languages and literacy in the tact him at culture produced mainly by dead, white, European males. What degree of "cultural for further infonnation. literacy" does Gibson demand for Neuromancer? Do you find that demand elitist? Do you think Gibson demands a kind of cultural literacy that will be useful as we • I I. move into the 21st century? PROJECTS SFRA SHOULD UNDERTAKE 5. lOch Erlich on Plot, Story, World in "Nt!Uromanur" The plot of Neuromancer-the story as it's told to us-is quite complex be­ Richard Erlich suggests that the SFRA cause (a) we come in near the end and (b) it's told from the point of view of Case, develop more on-line resources. a very minor player. To simplify matters, I'll ask you to rearrange the plot into the chronological storyline, starting with Marie-France Tessier's plan to get her clan into symbiotic relationship with their Als-and see things from the p-o-v of the MEMBER UPDATFS Als. (Oh-and you'll need to read Nat least twice.) Pilgrim winner Marleen Barr writes, From the p-o-v of Wintermute and Neuromancer, we have a very simple "If anyone would like to use the millen­ romantic comedy that moves from very high Romance up to Mythic. Wintermute and Neuromancer are kept separate and in metaphorical shackles by the Turing nium as an excuse to bring a SF critic to people. At story's end, the two lovers (so to speak) are united and become more or give a lecture to their campus, I would less a god, or God, for a bit. Long enough, anyway, to join the family of gods (N be happy to come and do it I think that 268-70). A victorious movement from confinement to freedom, from separation the millennium should be used to pro­ to integration, to apotheosis: comedy, all right! mote SF in English departments, and I What gets the critics debating is that we're not told the story from the ma­ am a Pilgrim who has the energy to chines' point(s) of view, and it's hard to read the story as cybernetic Romeo and make my presence known." Juliet. Case is the point-of-view character, and he gets Linda Lee only in the ma­ Philip Hallard notes that he's work­ trix-and he loses Molly in the "meat" world. Gibson seems to want us to care a bit at least about whether or not Case, the "meat" one, becomes capable of love, ing on the relationship between creator but in Neuromancer we learn only that case went home to the Sprawl and "found a and creature in SF. girl who called herself Michael" (N 270). In Mona Lisa Overdrive, a construct of Darren Harris-Fain is completing Finn tells Molly that "Case got out of it. Rolled up a few good scores after you the second and third Dictionary of split, then he kicked it in the head and quit clean. You did the same, maybe your L.iterary Biography volumes on British wouldn't be freezing your buns off in an alley, right? Last I heard, he had four fantasy and science fiction writers. kids ...." (137; ellipsis in MOL). We don't know ifhe had the kids with Michael. SFRAReview coeditor Karen Hellek­ You want a happy ending (and we usually do), then make an effort and identify with the machines. You want to stay humanistic and worry about two-bit humans son now has an e-mail address that like Case, then you'll have to settle for a very bittersweet ending. accepts attachments. Though she hasn't What also interests most critics is the world of Neuromancer. that dense, yet closed down her Juno account, she funky texture in the "meat" world and the beautiful geometries and freedom of the may also be reached at matrix. What downright fascinates Richard D. Erlich and Thomas P. Dunn, edi­ . tors of Clockwork Worlds: Mechanized Environments in SF, is the 180% turn in the Terry Heller is working on a Sarah image of being inside a machine, from terrible imprisonment in modern, Orne Jewett text project, which can be "mechanical" stories to great freedom in postmodern, "electronic" stories. What fascinated Peter C. Hall and me was the video screen as the latest version of a por­ seen at . ing of the Popular Culture Association: Ed Higgins' fall 1999 sabbatical pro­ Jea involves the study of Quakerism in In the "meat" world of their decadent physical bodies and decaying physi­ the SF of Slonczewski, Moffett, and cal cities, the most the majoriry of Gibson's people can do is run the inter­ Gloss. stices of the zaibatsus and the Yakuza ... as punkified stainless steel rats. New member Susannah R. Man­ But in cyberspace, jGoll dang! A computer nerd's wet dream of freedom and power. The final frontier with a vengeance and a twisted technological proof del is working on an undergraduate sen­ that "Thinking is the best way to travel." Inwardness as outwardness. The ior thesis, "Images of Space Travel and denial and affirmation of the desire for an enclosed hive and the loathing of the Romantic Sublime," at Harvard Uni­ space, affirming and denying the "denial of the bright void beyond the versity. hull" (Neuro. 171-72,229). Technospiritualism and macho intellectualism; New member Dominique Martel's Plato's forms as pure data in neoModernist style; the bird-god as cowboyl current work can be seen on the World pirate/jockey/merchant-adventurer. With intimations of immortality. And Wide Web at . That macho world of mind versus the body still interests me, and I invite your New member Javier Martinez is opinions; I'd be especially interested in feminist readings. currently revising his doaoral disserta­ tion, 'The Construction of Race and the 6. Extract From Bruu Sterling's Priface to "'Mirrorshades'" [A pipe, I, indicates a Representation of Ethic Differences in new paragraph; paragraphs are run together here sometimes to conserve space] American and British SF" for publication. Joseph Milicia is regularly reviewing Cyberpunk is a product of the Eighties milieu-in some sense ... a defini­ tive product. But its roots are deeply sunk in the sixty-year tradition of modern popular SF .... [ the have borrowed from, Sterling lists , Samuel Delany, Norman Spinrad, , Brian Ald­ iss, J. G. Ballard; H. G. Wells, , , Roben A. Heinlein; of Science fiction. John Varley, Philip K. Dick, , and .] * * * Many of John Newsinger is writing articles the cyberpunks write a quite accomplished prose; they are in love with sryle, and on the Hellblazer comic book and on are (some say) fashion conscious to a fault. But like the punks of '77, they prize Terry Pratchett. He's also doing a book their garage-band esthetic. They love to grapple with the raw core of SF: its ideas. on the politics of science fiction. (x) Like punk music, cyberpunk is in some sense a return to roots. The cyber­ Jody Nye reports that she's working punks are the first SF generation to grow up not only within the literary tradition on The Grand Tour, book 3 of the of science fiction but in a truly science-fictional world. For them, the techniques of epic Dreamland series of fantasy novels. classical "hard SF "--extrapolation, technological literacy-are not just literary Robin Roberts' new book, Sexual tools but an aid to daily life. (x-xi) Generation: "Star Trek: The Next Mirrored sunglasses have been a [c-p] Movement totem since the early days Generation" and Gender, is forth­ of'82. The reasons for this are not hard to grasp. By hiding the eyes, mirrorshades coming from the University of Illinois prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dan­ Press in 1999. gerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws. Mirrorshades-preferably in chrome and matte Warren G. Rochelle has just had black, the Movement's totem colors-appear in story after story, as a kind of liter­ his book Communities of the Heart: ary badge. (xi) The Rhetoric of Myth in the fic­ ["Cyberpunk" as a term] captures something ctucial to the work of these tion of Ursula K. LeGuin accepted writers, something crucial to the decade [of the 1980s] as a whole: a new kind of by Uverpool University Press. His novel integration. The overlapping of worlds that were formerly separate: the realm of The Wild Boy is being considered by high tech, and the modern pop underground. (xi) Edge Science Fiction, a Canadian pub­ The work of the cyberpunks is paralleled throughout Eighties pop culture: in rock video; in the hacker underground; in the jarring street tech of hip-hop and lisher, and he is currently working on a scratch music; in the synthesizer rock of London and Tokyo. This phenomenon, second novel, Harvest of Change­ this dynamic, has a global range; cyberpunk is its literary incarnation. (xi-xii) lings. Technical culture has gotten out of hand. The advances of the sciences are Patrick Sharp is working on race so deeply radical, so disturbing, upsetting, and revolutionary that they can no issues in the history of nuclear apoca­ longer be contained .... they are everywhere. The traditional power structure, the lypse narrative. traditional institutions have lost control of the pace of change. I And suddenly a Robert Sheckley writes, "I am still new alliance is becoming evident: an integration of technology and Eighties coun­ terculture. An unholy alliance of the technical world and ... the underground actively writing, but have begun teaching world of pop culture, visionary fluidity, and street-level anarchy. I The countercul­ as well. Presently I teach in the Writers ture of the 1960s was rural, romanticized, anti-science, anti-tech. But there was in Classrooms program in Portland, Ore­ always a lurking contradiction at its hean, symbolized by the electric guitar. Rock gon. I am presenting two seminars at technology was the thin edge of the wedge. (xii) the Surrey, B. C, Writer's Conference in As Alvin Toffier pointed out in The Third Wave-a bible to many cyber­ February 1999. In recent years, I have punks-the technical revolution reshaping our society is based not in hierarchy but taught my own one-day seminar in sci­ in decentralization, not in rigidity but in fluidity. (xii) ence (lction writing. I look forward to The hacker and the rocker are this decade's pop-culture idols, and cyber­ punk is very much a pop phenomenon: spontaneous, energetic, close to its roots. doing more of this and actively seek peo­ Cyberpunk comes from the realm where the computer hacker and the rocker over­ ple who might be interested in using me lap. (xiii) to teach writing or present seminars on Science fiction-at least according to its official dogma [e.g., I. Asimov, SF and allied material." "" (RDE)]-has always been about the impact of technol­ Joan S/onczewski is working on a ogy. But times have changed since the comfonable era of , when new novel, The Carrier, about micro­ Science was safely enshrined-and confined-in an ivory tower. The careless tech­ bial aliens. nophilia of those days belongs to a vanished, sluggish era, when authority still had a comfonable degree of control. I For the cyberpunks, by stark contrast, technol­ New member Joshua Stein is work­ ogy is visceral. It is not the bottled genie of remote Big Science boffins; it is perva­ ing on a PhD dissertation entitled sive, utterly intimate.... Under our skin; often inside our minds. I Technology "Interpretations oflfor SF." itself has changed. Not for us the giant steam-snoning wonders of the past: the Robert H. Waugh is putting to­ Hoover Dam, the Empire State Building, the nuclear power plant. Eighties tech gether a collection of essays on H. P. sticks to the skin, responds to the touch: the personal computer, the Sony Walkman, the ponable telephone, the soft contact lens. (xiii) Cenain themes spring up repeatedly in cyberpunk. The theme of body in­ Chris West is working on a disserta­ vasion: prosthetic limbs, implanted circuitry, cosmetic surgery, genetic alteration. tion with the prospective title, "Ump The even more powerful theme of mind invasion: brain-computer interfaces, anifi­ Wrists and Loser Guns: Male Homo­ cial intelligence, neurochemistry-techniques radically redefining the nature of sexuality and Science Fiction." humanity, the nature of the self. I ... [Notes with approval on per­ sonal computers as] "the LSD of the 1980s"-these are both technologies offright­ • I I. eningly radical potential. And, as such, they are constant points of reference for RECENT AND FORTHCOMING cyberpunk. (xiii) BOOKS William Gibson's Neuromancer, surely the quintessential cyberpunk novel is set in Tokyo, Istanbul .... I The tools of global integration-the satellite media General Reference net, the multinational corporation-fascinate the cyberpunks .... Cyberpunk has Trahair, Richard. Utopias and Utopi­ little patience with [international] borders. (xiv) ans: A Historical Dictionary. Cyberpunk work is marked by [its use of "mix,"] its visionary intensity. Its Greenwood, June 1999 writers prize the bizarre, the surreal, the formerly unthinkable .... Like J. G. Bal­ Bell, John. The Far North and Be­ lard-an idolized role model to many cyberpunks-they often use an unblinking, yond: An Index to Canadian almost clinical objectivity. It is a coldly objective analysis, a technique borrowed from science, then put to literary use for classically punk shock value. I With this Science Fiction and Fantasy in intensity comes strong imaginative concentration. Cyberpunk is widely known for English Language Genre Maga­ its telling use of detail, its carefully constructed intricacy, its willingness to carry zines. Dalhousie University School of extrapolation into the fabric of daily life. It favors "crammed" [xiv] prose: rapid, Ubrary and Information Studies, Oc­ dizzying bursts of novel information, sensory overload that submerges the reader in tober 1998 the literary equivalent of the hard-rock "wall of sound." I Cyberpunk is a natural extension of elements already present in science fiction .... Cyberpunk has risen History and Criticism from within the SF genre; it is not an invasion but a modern reform. (xiv-xv) Paradis, Andrea, ed. Canadian Sci­ 7. Cyb"/,unklPostmodemism ence Fiction and Fantasy. The various authors in MR47/48 try to put cyberpunk fiction into a larger Quarry (Ontario, Canada), 1998 cultural context. I list below a number of works, people, and such that these critics Turney, Jon. Frankenstein's Foot- have associated with Neuromancer, c-p, and/or postmodernism (which I'll abbrevi­ steps: Science, Genetics and ate p-m when I need to save space); presumably you know some of these works, Popular Culture. Yale UP, 1998 anists, etc., and can get an idea from the parallels what c-p/p-m might be about Czemeda, Julie E No Limits: Devel­ (abbreviated, it sounds like a rescue technique ...): The films BLADE RUNNER, VIDEODROME, BRAZIL, THE HIDDEN, ROBO­ oping Scientific Literacy Using COP, MAx HEADROOM; Laurie Anderson, Devo (as satire? taken straight?), David Science Fiction. Trifolium Books, Bowie "in his Ziggie Stardust pose," Skinny Puppy, "Mad-Maxish, heavy-metal Canada, November 1998 rockers," MTV, "the industrial performance-an of Mark Pauline and the Survival Jones, Diana Wynne. The Tough Research Laboratories" (8); cyberpunk's Godfather, William Burroughs, Thomas Guide to Fantasyland. Daw, No­ Pynchon, Samuel R. Delany (9); The Clash, Talking Heads; Meat Puppets (12); vember 1998. Reprint of 1996 UK ALIEN; 1940s film noir detective movies with the "Big Heist" theme (14); "super­ edition specificity of opening description in The Maltese Falcon (222); Jimi Hendrix (15). Raymond Chandler's The Big Sleep (novel), with the last line, "All they did Schweitzer, Darrell. Windows of the was make me think of Silver-Wig, and I never saw her again" (20); 's Imagination: Essays on Fantas­ "All My Darling Daughters" (22). S. Beckett, The Lost Ones; K. Vonnegut, tic Literature. Borgo, November "Tralfamadorian fiction" [Sirens of and Slaughterhouse-Five]; J. McElroy, 1998; 29 essays Plus; S. Lem, The Star Diaries; T. Pynchon, Gravity's Rainbour, D. DeLillo, Ratner's Stableford, Brian. Glorious Perversity: Star, A. Burgess, A Clockwork Orange; S. Delany, Dhalgren, R. Hoban, RitMley The Decline and Fall of Literary Walker, W. Burrough's Express, The Soft Machine, The Ticket that Exploded Decadence. Borgo, November (37). (220: cited by Gibson). 1998; some pieces appeared as in­ "Postmodernism" came into general usage as a term from architecture, troductions in Dedalus translations of where it has a clear meaning; architects have a pretty fair idea of what "modernism" European fiction means. Modernism would include an deco, the International Style, and big, Touponce, William F. streamlined buildings from NYC's Empire State Building to Chicago's Sears Tower. Okay, after the Sear's Tower, there's not a hell of a lot more you can do piling boxes one on top of another, so you have to do something different-and a quick look at some of the new, fancy buildings in metropolitan Chicago will show and the Poetics of Reverie: you that architects indeed are doing things that are different. So they went through Gaston Bachelard, Wolfgang modernism and are now beyond/after that: postmodernism. It is less clear what Iser and the Reader's Response "modernism" means in literature. to Fantastic Literature. Borgo, About the time the term "p-m" was getting introduced, Peter Hall and I November 1998; rev. and expo of were asked what was new in the SF film, and we said it had something to do with architecture and tried to get some architects to talk to a meeting of the Society for 1984 edition Utopian Studies about BLADE RUNNER and what we called "The Funkification of Weiner, Adam. By Authors Pos­ the Future" in SF films. This much is clear: Whether presenting that future as sessed: The Demonic Novel in good or bad, older SF films presented a future that was modern: streamlined, un­ Russia. Northwestern UP, Novem­ cluttered, clean, downright aseptic. In recent SF film that many critics call p-m, ber 1998 the setting, is crowded, highly textured, dark, dirty-like, fonky. The conventions Hoeveler, Diane L Gothic Feminism: offilm nair (the dark detective movie) are pushed to their limits: consider BLADE The Professionalization of Gen­ RUNNER as a sequel to Roman Polanski's CHINATOWN. There is a mixture of der from Charlotte Smith to styles, sometimes to a point where we're on what Gibson calls "": the first two BATMAN movies. Whatever c-p and p-m might be, we the Brontes. Penn State UP, De­ see them in the movies mentioned above plus , ALIENS, TERMINATOR, un­ cember 1998 doubtedly THE ABYSS; REpo MAN, BROTHER FROM ANOTHER PLANET, BUCKE­ Martinson, Harry. Aniara. Story Une ROO BONZAI; the Mad Max trilogy; in more "realistic" films of this sort we have Press, c/o Three Oaks Farm, Box plain p-m: e.g., BLUE VELVET. 1240, Ashland, OR 97520-0055, February 1999; new translation of 8. Extract from Kim Stanley Robinson, "Cyberpunk Cake" (MR47148: 51) epic SF poem by Nobel Prize winner, One cup film nair, two tablespoons BLADE RUNNER, one tablespoon James Bond, a dash of Delany, "several thousand micrograms" ... of Dexedrine; mix originally published in Swedish· in thoroughly, cover .... Bake at full heat for three years, then let simmer. Serves 1956 two good writers and several hangers-on. Andriano, Joseph D. Immortal Mon­ ster: The Mythological Evolu­ 9. Some Excerpts from David Porush, "What is Cyberpunk" (MR47/48: 46-50) tion of the Fantastic Beast in It [the coming of various Apocalypses ca. 1999] has meant an End to mean­ Modern Fiction and Film. ing as you understand it. and art has been long preparing Greenwood, March 1999 you for this, rehearsing over and over again the axiological apocalypse ["end to Joshi, S. T. Arlcham House: The First meaning. Destruction of value"]. The meaning of postmodern was the papering over of meaninglessness and the hopelessness of such a project. Don't forget that 60 Years. Arkham House, March Pynchon, Barth, ... Vonnegut, ... [and numerous other authors] all find this es- 1999 sentially amusing ..... Paradoxes and conundrums and irony and the breakdown Blackford, Russell, Van lkin, and Sean of language are humorous. The collapse of logical systems of distinction, the break­ McMullen. Strange Constella­ ing of barriers, the fall of orders of rationality, are all funny. We will laugh our way tions: A History of Australian into the Cyberpunk Apocalypse, just as you know cyberpunks are laughing at us. Science Fiction. Greenwood, July That's why Gibson's cyberpunks in Neuromancer are cosmic jokesters. [Henri] 1999 Bergson said that the essence of comedy is watching people acting like machines. [Charlie] Chaplin, Buster Keaton, Harpo [Marx]. Postmodernism and were the two great intellectual movements Author Studies of the post-war [Worid War II] era. Together they poin ted to a new order .... Jones, Jo Elwyn, and J. Francis Gladstone, We become machines in order to grow less mechanical. eds. The Alice Companion: A So we have been brought, here in 1999, to an ever-growing apocalyptic Guide to Lewis Carroll's Alice movement, [an] Axiological movement, in which the end to old meaning is Books. NYU Press, 1998 brought about and a new sense is achieved. But the stable systems of order that Schultz, Jeffrey D., and John G. West, Jr., create information as we know it have been swept away. And cyberpunks are in the The C. S. Lewis Readers' vanguard of this new revolution, this leap across the ramparts from human to cy­ eds. bernaut, android, , soft machine. We are going over. Tonight. Encyclopedia. Zondervan, Septem­ But know this: cybernetic , like this one you're reading, are inher­ ber 1998 ently paranoid, and paranoia itself may be inherently cybernetic. In fact, Stephensen-Payne, Phil, and Gordon Ben­ [Sigmund] Freud in his best paper on paranoia ... describes Daniel Paul Schreber, son. : The paradigmatic paranoid and prototypical cyberpunk, he believed the world was populated by "cursory contraptions" (read: Automata) and that he was the only Gentleman from Chapel Hill: A flesh and blood man left alive. Worlcing Bibliography. Galactic 10. Extract from Istvan Csicery-Ronay, "Cyb"punk and N~romanti­ Central, September 1998; 3d rev. cism'" (MR47148: 266-78) ed., primary and secondary bibliogra­ What cyberpunk ... has going for it is a rich thesaurus of metaphors link­ ing the organic and the electronic .... The advantages these metaphors have over phy the more deliberate and reflective symbols that usually go into ... cybernetic fic­ Stephensen-Payne, Phil, and Chris tion ... is that they are embedded in the constantly shifting context of a global Drumm. John T. Sladek: Steam­ culture drawn into ever newer, ever stranger webs of communication command Driven Satirist: A Worlcing Bibli­ and control. The metaphors themselves have a life. And in the hands of a master, ography. Galactic Central, Septem­ like Gibson, the fuzzy links can become a subtly constructed, but always merely ber 1998 implied, four-level hierarchy of evolving systems of information-processing, from Wallace, Sean, and Philip Harbottle. the individual human being's biological processes and personality, through the to­ tal life of society, to nonliving artificial intelligences, and ultimately to new entities The Tall Adventurer: The created out of those Als. In Neuromancer, each level of the hierarchy is meaningless Works of E. c. Tubb. Beccon Pu~ to itself, yet it creates the material/informational conditions for the of lications, UK, September 1998 the next higher one, and all participate in a quasi-cosmic "dance of biz." Lupoff, Richard A. Writer at Large. Cyberpunk is fundamentally ambivalent about the breakdown of the dis- Gryphon Books, Oaober 1998; 18 tinctions between human and machine .... [Almost always in c-p] , the break- pieces, 5 not previously published down is initiated from outside, usually by ... multinational capitalism's desire for Beahm, George. Stephen King from A something better than [fallible humans]. The villains come from the human corpo­ to Z: An Encyclopedia of His rate world, who use their great technical resources to create beings that program out the glitches of the human ... [as in ALIEN, ROBOCOP, VIDEODROME]; in Life and Work. Andrews McMeel, Neuromancer, the Tessier-Ashpool dan. November 1998 And yet, out of the anti-human evil that has created conditions intolerable Magistrale, Tony. Discovering Ste­ for human life, comes some new situation. This new situation is then either the phen King's "The Shining. II promise of an apocalyptic entrance into a new evolutionary synthesis of the human Borgo, November 1998; rev. and and the machine, or an all-encompassing hallucination in which true motives, and expo edition of The Shining true affects [= emotions], cannot be known. Neuromancds myth of the evolution Reader, 1991 of a new cosmic entity out of human technology is perhaps the only seriously posi­ tive version of the new situation-but even it offers only limited transcendence, Munster, Bill, ed. Discovering Dean since the world is much the same in ... Count Zero, set some years later. (274-75) KoontL Borgo, November 1998; * * * Rev. of Sudden Fear, 1988. In Gibson's world, human beings have nothing left but thrill. it is all that Nichols, Joan Kane. : power can offer, but it is also-the ambivalence again-the only way to create new Frankensein's Creater: First Sci­ conditions, since old philosophical-moral considerations means nothing in a world ence Fiction Writer. Conari Press, where one can plug in another's feelings or a [whole] personality-memory complex November 1998; young adult biogra­ through "simstim" ... , assimilate a myriad of power-programs through "microsofts" ... [etc.]. phy So cyberpunks ... write as if they are both victims of a life-negating system Spignesi, Stephen Stephen King: A J. and the heroic adventurers of thrill. They can't help themselves, but their hip grace Guide to Unpublished Manu­ gets them through an amoral world, facing a future ... beyond human influ- scripts, Story Fragments, Alter­ ence, ... where the only way to live is in speed, speed to avoid being caught in the native Versions, and Oddities. web, and getting rubbed out by the Yakuza, the Als, the androids, the new corpo­ Overlook Connection Press (limited rate entities bent on their own self-elaboration. Here the speed of thrill substitutes ed.), Oaober 1998; Carol Publishing/ for affection, reflection, and care, which require room and leisure and relaxation; so Birch Lane Press (trade ed.), Novem­ there are no families, no art, no crafting .... (276) All the ambivalent solutions of cyberpunk works are instances/myths of bad ber 1998 faith, since they completely ignore the question of whether some political controls Dick, Philip K. Selected Letters over technology are desirable, if not exactly possible. Cyberpunk is then the 1980-' 982. Underwood Books, apotheosis of bad faith, apotheosis of the postmodern. December 1998 I don't mean that as pejoratively as it sounds. It goes along with the sophis­ Lam. Kathleen Margaret, and Theresa tication and ambivalence of cyberpunk artists that they know that their art is in Thompson, eds. Imagining the bad faith. But in a world of absolute bad faith, where the real and true are super- seded by simulacra and the hyperreal [substitutes, that appear more real than the real thing], perhaps the only hope is in representing that bad faith appropriately. (277) Worst: Stephen King and the This romanticism does not repress "the meat" as the forebears did. This one Representation of Women. has permitted itself enough distance to demand that "the meat" show its unruly Greenwood, December 1998 self, show that it's not only not the enemy, [277] but that it's the victim-it can splatter, burst, writhe, pulsate, secrete, furiously publicize its anguish. It is helpless Aldiss, Brian W. In the Twinkling of and sad against the powers of exteriorized mind-whose modes are the hard, cruel, an Eye. St Martin's, April 1999 gunmetal cold, spiky, and unyielding ways of self-proliferating hard stuff. The flesh Clarke, Arthur C Greetings, Carbon­ is sad, and then some-romance is a case of nerves. (277-78) Based Bipeds: Collected Works, Cyberpunk is the apotheosis of the postmodern, its truest and most consis­ 1944-1998. St Martin's, May tent incarnation, bar none. It could easily have the same role in our world that ro­ 1999 mantic poetry had at the beginning the 19th century. Not that I'm happy about it. Winter, Douglas. : The (MR47/48: 27-28). Dark Fantastic. HarperCollins UK, july 1999 .:. •• ~.... • a: .. ;'14";''' ; .. SECONDARY SOURCES Film/TV Studies Donald Gilzinger £rb, Cynthia. Tracking King Kong: A Baruth, Philip E. "The Excesses of Cyberpunk: Why No One Mentions Race in Hollywood Icon in World Cul­ Cyberspace." In Into Darkness Peering: Race and Color in the Fantastic, edited by ture. Wayne State UP, 1998 Elisabeth Anne Leonard, pp. 105-18. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood, 1997. Fowkes, Katherine A. Giving Up the Blade Runner. Directed by . 1982. Ghost: Spirits, Ghosts, and An­ Brahm, Gabriel, Jr. "The Politics ofImmortality: Cybernetic Science/Fiction and Death." In Prosthetic Territories: Politics and Hypertechnologies, edited by gels in Mainstream Comedy Gabriel Brahm, Jr., and Mark Driscoll, pp. 94-111. Boulder, Colo.: Westview, Films. Wayne State UP, 1998 1995. Smith, Don G. The Poe Cinema: A Brands, David. "The Business of Cyberpunk: Symbolic Economy and Ideology in Critical Filmography of Theatri­ William Gibson." In Virtual and Their Discontents, edited by Robert cal Releases Based on the Markley, pp. 79-106. Baltimore, Md.: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1996. Works of Edgar Allan Poe. Bukatman, Scott. Terminal Identity: The Virtual Subject in Postmodern Science Fic­ McFarland, 1998 tion. Durham, N.C.: , 1993. james, Edward, and Farah Mendlesohn, Cadora, Karen. "Feminist Cyberpunk" Science-Fiction Studies 22, no. 3 (November 1995): 357-72. eds. The Parliament of Dreams: Ceruzzi, Paul. "An Unforeseen Revolution: Computers and Expectations, 1935- Conferring on "." SF 1985." In Imagining Tomorrow: History, Technology, and the American Future, Foundation, UK, September 1998; edited by Joseph J. Corn, pp. 188-201. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1986. papers from a December 1997 con­ Csicsery-Ronay, Istvan, Jr. "Fututistic Flu, or, The Revenge of the Future." In Fic­ ference tion 2000, edited by George Slusser and Tom Shippey, pp. 26-45. Zito, Zach, et 01. Monster Madness: Cyberpunk. Directed by Marianne Trench. With William Gibson, Jason Lanier, King Kong, Godzilla and Other Timothy Leary, and Michael Synergy. Intercon, 1990. Classical Creatures of the Silver Davidson, Cynthia. "Riveria's Golem, Haraway's : Reading Neuromancer as Baudrillard's Simulation of Crisis." Science-Fiction Studies 23, no. 2 Guly Screen. Smithmark, Odober 1998 1996): 188-98. Te/otte, j. P. A Distant Technology: Dery, Mark Escape Velocity: Cyberculture At the End 0/ the Century. New York: The in the Grove, 1996. Machine Age. Wesleyan UP/UP of ---, ed. Flame Wars: The Discourse o/Cyberculture. Durham, N.C.: Duke Uni­ New , December 1998 versity Press, 1994. Bond, jeff. The Music of "Star de Zwaan, Victoria. "Rethinking the Slipstream: Reads Neuro­ Tre/c." Lone Eagle, january 1999; mancer." Science-Fiction Studies 24, no. 3 (November 1997): 459-70. Easterbrook, Neil. "The Arc of Destruction: Reversal and Erasure in Cyberpunk" includes CD with book Science-Fiction Studies 19, no. 3 (November 1992): 378-94. McCarthy, Kevin, and Ed Gorman, eds. Eriksen, Inge. "The Aesthetics of Cyberpunk" Foundation 53 (autumn 1991): 36- "They're Here . ..": "Invasion 46. of the Body Snatchers": A Trib­ Escape From New York. Directed by John Carpenter. 1981. ute. Boulevard, january 1999 Gibson, William. "'The Charisma Leak': A Conversation with William Gibson and Bruce Sterling." Interview with Daniel Fischlin, Veronica Hollinger, and Andrew Taylor. April 5, 1991. Science-Fiction Studies 19, no. 1 (March 1992): Artllliustration 1-16. Barlowe, Wayne. Barlowe's . ---. "High Tech High Life: William Gibson and Timothy Leary in Conversa­ Morpheus International, November tion." (fall 1989): 58-64. 1998 ---. "An Interview with William Gibson." Interview with Larry McCaffery. August 14, 1986. Mississippi Review 47/4816, no. 2/3 (1988): 217-36. Re­ Beksinski, Zdzislaw. The Fantastic Art printed in Storming the Reality Studio, edited by Larry McCaffery, pp. 263-85. of Beksinski. Morpheus Interna­ ---. "The King of Cyberpunk." Interview with Victoria Hamburg. Interview tional, November 1998 Oanuary 1989): 84-87+. ---. "Queen Victoria's Personal Spook, Psychic Legbreakers, Snakes and Cat­ Recent Fiction of Note food: An Interview with William Gibson and Tom Maddox." Interview with Few notices o( fiction will appear Darren Wershler-Henry. Virus 23 (fall 1989): 28-36. here (or several reasons. There isn't Gilmore, Mikal. "The Rise of Cyberpunk." (December 4, 1986): 77- 78+. much room (or them, and trying to Hollinger, Veronica. "Cybernetic Deconstructions: Cyberpunk and Postmodern­ choose in advance better specimens ism." Mosaic 23, no. 2 (spring 1990): 29-44. (rom the almost 300 SF books published Jameson, Fredric. Postmodernism, or, The Cultural Logic ofLate Capitalism. Dur­ annually is a thankless task at best In­ ham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 1991. stead we'll run a list derived (rom the Johnny Mnemonic. Directed by . 1995. New Books o( Interest list in Locus, Kadrey, Richard and Larry McCaffery. "Cyberpunk 101: A Schematic Guide to reviews in Publishers Weekly (many Storming the Reality Studio." In Storming the Reality Studio, edited by Larry by the SFRA's Mike Levy), award winners McCaffery, pp. 17-29. Latham, Rob. "Cyberpunk 3D Gibson 3D Neuromancer." Science-Fiction Studies and nominees and other sources. That 20, no. 2 Ouly 1993): 266-72. last includes you, so i( you read a SF Linton, Patricia. "The 'Person' in Postmodern Fiction: Gibson, Le Guin, and book you recommend strongly, e-mail Vizenor." Studies in American Indian Literatures 5, no. 3 (fall 1993): 3-11. Neil Barron the author, title, publisher McCaffery, Larry. Storming the Reality Studio: A Casebook ofCyberpunk and Post­ and month/year o( publication, and he'll modern Fiction. Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 1991. include it with a credit Umit your McHale, Brian. Constructing Postmodernism. London: Routledge, 1992. choices to books published within the Moylan, Tom. "Global Economy, Local Texts: UtopianlDystopian Tension in William Gibson's Cyberpunk Trilogy." Minnesota Review 43/44 (1995): 182- past six months. 97. Nixon, Nicola. "Cyberpunk: Preparing the Ground for Revolution or Keeping the The November 2, 1998, Publishers Boys Satisfied." Science-Fiction Studies 19, no. 2 Ouly 1992): 219-35. Weekly listed books published in 1998 Porush, David. "Cybernetic Fiction and Postmodern Science." New Literary His­ they judged best The SF books included: tory 20, no. 2 (winter 1989): 373-96. Patricia Anthony, Flanders (Ace); Octa­ Rosenthal, Pam. "Jacked In: Fordism, Cyberpunk, Marxism." Socialist Review via Butler, Parable of the Talents Oanuary/March 1991): 79-102. Siivonen, Timo. " and Generic Oxymorons: The Body and Technology in (Seven Stories) [sequel to Parable of William Gibson's Cyberspace Trilogy." Science-Fiction Studies 23, no. 2 Ouly the Sower]; Paul J. McAuley, Child of 1996): 227-44. the River: The First Book of Con­ Slusser, George, and Tom Shippey, eds. Fiction 2000: Cyberpunk and the Future of fluence (Avon £05); Kim Stanley Robin­ Narrative. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1992. son, Antarctica (Bantam); , Slusser, George. "The Frankenstein Barrier." In Fiction 2000, edited by George Black Butterflies (Ziesing), Harry Tur­ Slusser and Tom Shippey, pp. 46-71. tledove, The Great War: American Sponsler, Claire. "Beyond the Ruins: The Geopolitics of Urban Decay and Cyber­ Front (Ballantine). netic Play." Science-Fiction Studies 20, no. 2 Ouly 1993): 251-65. Sterling, Bruce. "Preface." Mirrorshades: The Cyberpunk Anthology, pp. ix-xvi. 1986. Edited by Bruce Sterling. New York: Ace, 1988. The November 1998 Locus listed the Stevens, Tyler. " 'Sinister Fruitiness': Neuromancer, Internet Sexuality and the Tur­ (ollowing: William Barton and Michael ing Test." Studies in the Novel28, no. 3 (fall 1996): 414-33. Capobianco, White Light (Avon £05); Waters, Malcolm. Globalization. London: Routledge, 1995. Pat Cardigan, Tea from an Empty .;. •• ~ ••• .: ..: "H~": , ~ MORE SECOIIDARY SOURCES Cup (Tor); and Grania Hal Hall Davis, eds., The The following sources were consulted to generate this index ofsecondary sources: Treasury (Tor); Paul Di Filippo, Lost Hall, Hall W. Science Fiction and Fantasy Reference Index 1878-1985. Detroit, Mich.: Gale Research, 1987. Pages (Four Walls Eight Windows); Ni­ ---. Science Fiction and Fantasy Reference Index 1985-1991. Englewood, Colo.: cola Griffith and Stephen Pagel, eds., Libraries Unlimited, 1993. : Science ---. Science Fiction and Fantasy Reference Index 1992-1995. Englewood, Colo.: Fiction; Nancy Kress, Stinger (Forge); Libraries Unlimited, 1997. John Varley, The Golden Globe (Ace); David Weber, Echoes of Honor On Gibson, Neuromancer. (Baen). Blackford, Russell. "Mirrors of the Future City: William Gibson's Neuromancer." Science Fiction: A Review ofSpeculative Literature 7, no. 1 (1985): 18-22. Cherniavsky, Eva. "(En)gendering Cyberspace in Neuromancer. Postmodern Sub­ The December 1998 Locus listed the jectivity and Virtual Motherhood." Genders 18 (winter 1993): 32-46. following: Poul Anderson, Starfarers Csicsery-Ronay, Istvan, Jr. "The Sentimental Futurist: Cybernetics and Art in Wil­ (Tor); , liam Gibson's Neuromancer." Critique 33, no. 3 (spring 1992): 221-40. (HarperPrism); Octavia Butler, Parable Glazer, Miriyam. " 'What Is Within Now Seen Without': Romanticism, Neuro­ of the Talents (Steven Stories); Patrick manticism, and the Death of the Imagination in William Gibson's Fictive Nielsen Hayden, ed., Starlight 2 (Tor); World." Journal ofPopular Culture 23, no. 3 (winter 1990): 125-64. Rachel Pollack, Burning Sky (Cambrian Grant, Glenn. "Transcendence through Detournement in William Gibson's Neu­ Publications); Theodore Sturgeon, The romancer." Science-Fiction Studies 17, no. 1 (March 1990): 41-49. Huntington, John. "Newness, Neuromancer, and the End of Narrative." In Fic­ Perfect Host (Complete Stories, vol. 5; tional Space, edited by Tom Shippey, pp. 59-75. Atlantic Highlands, N.J.: Hu­ North Atlantic); Sara Zettel, Playing manities Press, 1991. [Essays and Studies, vol. 43, 1990.] God (Warner Aspect). ---. "Newness, Neuromancer, and the End of Narrative." In Fiction 2000: Cy­ berpunk and the Future ofNarrative, edited by George E. Slusser and Tom The January 1999 Locus listed the Shippey, pp. 133-41. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1992. following: Octavia Butler, Parable of Mead, David G. "Technological Transfiguration in William Gibson's Sprawl Nov­ the Talents (Steven Stories); Jack els: Neuromancer, Count Zero, and Mona Lisa Overdrive." Extrapolation 32, no. Dann and , eds., 4 (winter 1991): 350-609. Orr, Peter. "William Gibson: Neuromantic." Starlog 145 (August 1989): 41-44. Nanotech (Ace); and Porush, David. "Cybernauts in Cyberspace: William Gibson's Neuromancer." In , eds., Dreaming Down­ Aliens, edited by George E. Slusser, pp. 168-78. Carbondale: Southern Illinois Under (Voyager Australia); Gardner University Press, 1987. Dozois, ed., The Good Old Stuff (St Pringle, David. "Neuromancer by William Gibson (1984)." In Science Fiction: The Martin's); , ed., 1 00 Best Novels, by David Pringle, pp. 219-21. New York: Carroll and Graf, Starlight 2 (Tor); Paul J. McAuley, The 1985. Invisible Country (Avon £os); Ruddick, Nicholas. "Purring the Bits Together: Information Theory, Neuromancer, and Science Fiction." Journal ofthe Fantastic in the Arts 3, no. 4 (1994): 84-92. Maureen F. McHugh, Mission Child Spinrad, Norman. "Neuromantics." 's 10, no. (Avon £os); Elizabeth Moon, Rules of 5 (May 1986): 180-90. Engagement (Baen); Bruce Sterling, Voller, Jack G. "Neuromanticism: Cyberspace and the Sublime." Extrapolation 34, Distraction (Bantam Spectra); David no. 1 (spring 1993): 18-29. Wolverton, ed., L Ron Hubbard Pres­ Wahl, Wendy. "Bodies and Technologies: Dora, Neuromancer, and Strategies of ents , vol. 14 Resistance." Postmodern Culturd, no. 2 Oanuary 1993): [17 pp.]. Electronic (Bridge). journal available from .

On Gibson in general (including the items above): Other publications listed in Publish­ "1995 Prix ." Locus 34, no. 6 Oune 1995): 8. ers Weekly: Bruce Sterling, Distrac­ "$500,000+ Gets Bantam/Spectra New William Gibson Novel." Science Fiction tion (Bantam Spectra); Doris Lessing, Chronicle 12, no. 2 (November 1990): 4. Mara and Donn: An Adventure "$850,000+ for New William Gibson Novel." Science Fiction Chronicle 15, no. 7 (HarperFlamingo). The Washington aune 1994): 4. AIkon, Paul. "Deus Ex Machina in William Gibson's Cyberpunk Trilogy." In Fic­ Post Book World listed Bruce Sterling, tion 2000: Cyberpunk and the Future ofNarrative, edited by George E. Slusser Distraction (Bantam Speara). and Tom Shippey, pp. 75-87. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1992. Angulo, Michael M. Random Access Memories: Mechanism and Metaphor in the Fic­ British Future Fiction, 1700-1914 tion ofWilliam Gibson. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Illinois, Urbana­ This is the title of a forthcoming six­ Champaign, 1993.345 pp. (DAI-A 54/11, p. 4086. May 1994.) Annis, Ethan. The Utility ofInformation in William Gibson Futuristic Science Fic­ volume, 2,1 OO-page set edited by Pilgrim s tion. Master's thesis, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, 1992. 38 pp. Award and Pioneer Awar~inner I. F. "Auction of , by Bruce Sterling and William Gibson." Locus Clarke. Each volume reprints selected 21, no. 3 (March 1998): 5. works, with a general introduction, anno­ "Aurora Awards" Science Fiction Chronicle 16, no. 7 aune/July 1995): 4. tations, and consolidated index by Bell, Celina. "Canada's SF Writers." Quill and Quire 55, no. 1 aanuary 1989): Clarke. The range is from the anony­ 20-21. mous The Reign of George VI, "Bill Gibson and the Cabana Boys." Locus 19, no. 5 (May 1986): I: 4,52. Biddick, Kathleen. "Humanist History and the Haunting of Virtual Worlds: Prob­ 1900-1925 (1763) to James Elroy lems of Memory and Rememoration." Genders 18 (winter 1993): 47-66. Flecker's The Last Generation Blackford, Russell. "Mirrors of the Future City: William Gibson's Neuromancer." (1908). Publication is tentatively March Science Fiction: A Review ofSpeculative Literature 7, no. 1 (1985): 18-22. 2000. British and overseas buyers Bolhafner, J. Stephen. "Guide to Cyberspace." Starlog 200 (March 1994): 72-74, should order from Turpin Distribution, 87. Blackhouse Road, Letchworth, Herts Booker, M. Keith. "Technology, History, and the Postmodern Imagination: The SG6 I HN, England, UK, e-mail Cyberpunk Fiction of William Gibson." Arizona Quarterly 50, no. 4 (winter . North and South 1994): 63-87. Brande, David J. Technologies ofPostmodernity: Ideology and Desire in Literature and American buyers should order from Ash­ Science (Pynchon, Thomas; Gibson, William; Butler, Octavia; Acker, Kathy). Ph. gate Publishing Co., Old Post Road, D. dissertation, University of Washington, 1995.228 pp. (DAI-A 56107, p. Brook~eld, VT 05036-9704, 8001535- 2677. January 1996.) 9544. There was a prepublication price Bredehoft, Thomas A. "The Gibson Continuum: Cyberspace and Gibson's Mer­ of £4951$740 through October 1998, vyn Kihn Stories." 22, no. 2 auly 1995): 252-63. but I suspect the prepublication price Bukatman, Scott R. "Gibson's ." South Atlantic Quarterly 92, no. 4 (fall would still be honored; inquire. Postage is 1993): 627-45. Cherniavsky, Eva. "(En)gendering Cyberspace in Neuromancer. Postmodern Sub­ extra. jectivity and Virtual Motherhood." Genders 18 (winter 1993): 32-46. Christie, John. "Of AIs and Others: William Gibson's Transit." In Fiction 2000: Announced for January 1999 is a Cyberpunk and the Future ofNarrative, edited by George E. Slusser and Tom similar set, Sources of Science Fic­ Shippey, pp. 171-82. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1992. tion: Future War Novels of the Christie, John R. R. "Science Fiction and the Postmodern: The Recent Fiction of I 890s, edited by George Locke, a well­ William Gibson and John Crowley." In Fictional Space, edited by Tom Ship­ known British antiquarian dea/er­ pey, pp. 34-58. Atlantic Highlands, N.J.: Humanities Press, 1991. [Essays and collector, and 1994 Pioneer Award win­ Studies, vol. 43, 1990.] Csicsery-Ronay, Istvan, Jr. "Antimancere: Cybernetics and Art in Gibson's Count ner Takayuki Tatsumi. The eight vol­ Zero." Science-Fiction Studies 22, no. 1 (March 1995): 63-86. umes are fasimile reprints of the origi­ ---. "The Sentimental Futurist: Cybernetics and Art in William Gibson's nals. The dollar price is $980 for the set, Neuromancer." Critique 33, no. 3 (spring 1992: 221-40. $130 for individual volumes (inquire for Currey, L. W. "Work in Progress: William Gibson." New York Review ofScience prices in pounds sterling). Details from Fiction 14 (October 1989): 23. Routledge, , "Cyberpunk Era: Interview with William Gibson." Whole Earth Review 63 , 8001634-7064, 29 W 35th Dargis, Manohla. "Cyber Johnny." Sight and Sound 5, no. 7: 6-7. July 1995. Delany, Samuel R. "ZelaznyNarley/Gibson-and Quality, Part 1." New York Re­ Street, New York, NY 10001-2299. view ofScience Fiction 48 (August 1992): 1, 10-l3. ---. "ZelaznyNarley/Gibson-and Quality, Part 2." New York Review ofSci­ Young Adult Science Fiction ence Fiction 49 (September 1992): 1,3-7. Although SF speci~cally written for Dever, Sean. "Quick Cuts: Cinematic Cyberspace." Cinefex 62 aune 1995): 17- 18. Dolphin, Ric. "Master of the ." Maclean's 105 (December 14, 1992): 44. [Not seen.] younger readers could be argued to date "Electronic Gibsons." Locus 28, no. 6 aune 1972): 7. from the earliest years, as a publisher Farrell, John A. "Cyberpunk: Sub-genre of Science Fiction Postulates Future of marketing category it is much more re­ High-Tech Hedonism, Despair." Bryan-College Station Eagle, June 4, 1989, cent, developing after World War II. The pp. C1, C4-C5. [Knight-Ridder.] Heinlein juveniles from Scribner's are Fischlin, Daniel, Veronica Hollinger, and Andrew Taylor. "The Charisma Leak: A fairly early examples. Children's litera­ Conversation with William Gibson and Bruce Sterling." Science-Fiction Studies 19, no. 1 (March 1992): 1-16. ture speCialists have discussed it episodi­ "Full Steam Ahead: Gibson/Sterling Book Sale." Locus 21, no. 4 (April 1988): 4. cally, but only in the past two decades Garreau, Joel. "Cyberspaceman: Sci-Fi Writer William Gibson, Far Flung and have scholars paid sustained attention to BackAgain." Washington (D.C.) Post, October 18,1993, p. 01. young adult (YA) SF. Hal Hall provides Gehr, Richard. "William Gibson: Cyberspace is the Place." Austin Chronicle 6, no. bibliographic access to much of the ma­ 3 (October 10, 1986): 29. terial, beginning with his Science Fic­ "Gibson and Sterling; On the Virtual Chicken Circuit." Locus 26, no. 5 (May tion and Fantasy Reference Index, 1991): 5,65-66. 1878-1985, under the headings "Gibson Moves to Putnam/Berkley." Locus 32, no. 6 aune 1994); 7. "Gibson Novelization to Pocket Books for $200,000." Science Fiction Chronicle 15, "Children's SF" (most of the entries) and no. 9 (August 1994): 4. "Young Adult SF" (nine entries), and con­ "Gibson, Walter B. (Obituary)." Locus 19, no. 1 aanuary 1986): 49. tinuing in his supplemental indexes. C. "Gibson, Walter B. (Obituary)." Science Fiction Chronicle 7, no. 5 (February W. Sullivan 11/ at East Carolina Univer­ 1986): 6. sity edited Science Fiction for Young Gibson, William. "Notes on a Process: Novel into Film." Wired 3, no. 6 aune Readers (Greenwood, 1993), whose 1995): 157-59. sixteen essays focus on specific authors. "Gibson, William (Ford), 1948- ." In Contemporary Authors, edited by Susan M. Due this spring from Greenwood is his Trotsky, vol. 133. Detroit, Mich.: Gale Research, 1991. Glazer, Miriyam. " 'What Is Within Now Seen Without': Romanticism, Neuro­ Young Adult Science Fiction, several manticism, and the Death of the Imagination in William Gibson's Fictive of whose essays focus on YA SF in se­ World." Journal o/Popular Culture 23, no. 3 (winter 1990); 125-64. lected countries (USA, UK, Canada, Ger­ Grant, Glenn. "Transcendence through Detournement in William Gibson's Neu­ many, Australia), whereas others discuss romancer." Science-Fiction Studies 17, no. 1 (March 1990): 41-49. more general topics (women in Hein­ Greenfield, Adam. "New Romancer: Interview with William Gibson." 4 lein's juveniles, SF in comic books, etc.). (December 1988): 96-99, 119. Mike Levy contributed a comprehensive Greenland, Colin. "Nod to the Apocalypse: An Interview with William Gibson." Foundation 36 (summer 1986): 5-10. secondary bibliography of SF for children Hamburg, Victoria. "The King of Cyberpunk." Interoiew 19 aanuary 1989): 84- and YAs. Last November, Twayne pub­ 86,91-92. lished Presenting Young Adult Sci­ Harmon, Amy. "Crossing Cyberpunk's Threshold: William Gibson." Los Angeles ence Fiction by Suzanne Elizabeth () Times, May 24, 1995, p. 01. Reid, most of whose chapters are cen­ Harper, Leanne C. "The Culture of Cyberspace: An Interview with William Gib­ tered on individual authors. Both the son." Bloomsbury Review 8, no. 5 (September/October 1988): 16-17,30. Reid and Sullivan books will be reviewed Huntington, John. "Newness, Neuromancer, and the End of Narrative." In Fiction in these pages. 2000: Cyberpunk and the Future o/Narrative. Edited by George E. Slusser and Tom Shippey, pp. 133-41. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1992. Neil Barron Huntington, John. "Newness, Neuromancer, and the End of Narrative." In Fic­ • I I. tional Space, edited by Tom Shippey, pp. 59-75. Atlantic Highlands, N.J.: Hu­ manities Press, 1991. [Essays and Studies, vol. 43, 1990.] CONVENTION LOG Johnson, Brian D. "Mind Games with William Gibson." Maclean's 108, no. 23 March 4-7, 1999: World Horror aune 5, 1995): 60-64. Con, Atlanta, Ga.; World Horror Johnson, Kim H. "Memories Can't Wait." Starlog216 auly 1995): 50-53,64. Con '99, Bax 148, Qarkston, GA Killheffer, Robert K. J. "PW Interview: William Gibson." Publishers Weekly 240, 30021-0148; Landon, Brooks. "Cyberpunk Writer William Gibson on Authoring the Script for AHem III" Cinefontastique 18, no. 1 (December 1987): 31. Leonard, Andrew. "Cyberpunks and Techno-hicks: Surfing the Matrix of April 30-May 2, 1999: Nebula Week­ William Gibson." San Francisco (California) Bay Guardian 27, no. 46 (August end, Pittsburgh, Pa.; Lofficier, Randy, and Jean-Marc Lofficier. "Mad Max Movies (1979-1985): Inter­ view with George Miller, Terry Hayes, George Ogilvie and Mel Gibson." In Science Fiction Filmmaking in the 1980s. Edited by Lee Goldberg, et al., pp. June 2-6, 1999: SFRA, Mobile, Ala.; 133-74. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland, 1995. Tom Brennan, English Dept, U of ---. "Road Warrior." In Starlog's Science Fiction Heroes and Heroines, edited South Alabama, Mobile, AL 36688; by David McDonnell, pp. 12-14. New York: Crescent Books, 1995. Maccarillo, Lisa. "Hardwired Hero." Sci-Fi Entertainment 1, no. 5 (February 1995): 46-50, 72. July 9-", 1999: Readereon II, Maddox, Tom. "Cobra, She Said: An Interim Report on the Fiction of William Waltham, Mass.; Readercon, Box Gibson." Fantasy Review 9, no. 4 (April 1986): 46-48. 381246, Cambridge, MA 02238- ---. "Eye to Eye: 1986 Guest of Honor Interview with William Gib­ son." Science Fiction Eye 1, no. 1 (winter 1987): 18-26. 1246; Masters, John. "Hollywood Strains SF Writer's Imagination." Financial Post, August 28, 1993, p. S19. [Cited from lAC Imite online service.] August 20-22, 1999: Conueopial Mayrhofer, Maximilian. "William Gibsons Cyberspace-T rilogie. 1: Handlungsver­ NASFIC '99, Anaheim, Calif.; Conu­ lauf und Charaktere." Quarber Merkur 31, no. 1 Gune 1993}: 41-52. [Whole cupialNASFlC '99, c/o S.C/.F.I. Inc, no. 79.] Box 8442, Van Nuys, CA 91409; ---. "William Gibsons Cyberspace Trilogie. 2. Teil: Abenteuer-Science Fic­ tion-Krimi. Struktur in Gibsons Werk." Quarber Merkur 31, no. 2 (December 1993): 34-54. [Whole no. 80.] ---. "William Gibsons Cyberspace Trilogie. 3. Teil: Thematik und Bausteine September 2-6, 1999: Aussieeon einer fiktiven Welt." Quarber Merkur 32, no. 1 Gune 1994}: 21-39. [Whole 311999 Worldeon, Melbourne, no. 81.] Australia; Aussicon 3, GPO Box ---. "William Gibsons Cyberspace-Trilogie. 4. Tcil und Schludf: Sprache bei 12/21<, Melbourne VIC 300 I or Box Gibson und die Sprache Gibsons." Quarber Merkur 32, no. 2 (December 688, Prospect Heights, IL 60070- 1994): 3-23. [Whole no. 82.] 0688; (1988): 217-36. ---. "An Interview with William Gibson." In Across the Wounded Galaxies, edited by Larry McCaffery, pp. 130-50. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, November 4-7, 1999: World Fantasy 1990. Convention, Providence, R.I.; WFC, ---. "Interview with William Gibson." In Storming the Reality Studio, edited Box 1010, Framingham, MA 0 I 70 I; by Larry McCaffery, pp. 263-85. Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 1991. McHale, Brian. "Difference Engines." ANQ 5, no. 4 (November 1992): 220-23. McQuiddy, A. P. "William Gibson: Hallucinating on the Present: An Interview." May 11-14,2000: World Horror SF Inquirer 22 (October/November 1987): 2-7. McVeigh, Kev P. "Homo-Eroticism, Llamas and (A Little Bit About) the C-Word: Con, Denver, Colo.; WHClOOO Inc., Bruce Sterling and William Gibson Interviewed." Vector (BSFA) 159 Box 32 167, Aurora, CO 80041- (February/March 1991): 6-9. 2/67; Mead, David G. "Technological Transfiguration in William Gibson's Sprawl Nov­ els: Neuromancer, Count Zero, and Mona Lisa Overdrive." Extrapolation 32, no. June ?, 2000: SFRA, Cleveland, Ohio 4 (winter 1991): 35(Wj09. Murray, Will. "Walter B. Gibson: Casting a Giant Shadow." Starlog 105 (April May 24-27,2001: SFRA, Schenectady, 1986): 59-62. Nicholas, Joseph, and Judith Hanna. "William Gibson: Interview." Interzone 13 N. Y.; SFRA 200 I, Box 2085, Albany, (autumn 1985): 17-18. NY 12220-0085; tion 32, no. 3 (fall 1991): 278-89. Neil Borron ---. William Gibson. Starmont Reader's Guide no. 58. Mercer Island, Wash.: Starmont, 1992. "On Technology: Sci-Fi Vision of Things to Come: Authors Brin and Gibson De­ pict Opposing Future Outcomes for the Evolving Internet." San Francisco (California) Chronicle February 20, 1996. [Cited from the Internet edition.] FICTION REVIEW Orr, Peter. "William Gibson: Neuromantic." Starlog 145 (August 1989): 41-44. GUIDELINES Porush, David. "Cybernauts in Cyberspace: William Gibson's Neuromancer." In The SFRAReview's guidelines for Aliens, edited by George E. Slusser, pp. 168-78. Carbondale: Southern Illinois fiction review writers are an extension of University Press, 1987. the SFRA's mission and the Review's Porush, David. "Prigogine, Chaos, and Contemporary SF." Science-Fiction Studies audience. Reviewers should keep in mind 18, no. 3 (November 1991): 367-86. Pringle, David. "Neuromancer by William Gibson (1984)." In Science Fiction: The that the Science Fiction Research Asso­ 100 Best Novels, pp. 219-21. New York: Carroll and Graf, 1985. ciation exists to encourage scholarship Rirdan, Danny. "Works of William Gibson." Foundation 43 (summer 1988): 36- and further excellence in education, and 46. base evaluations upon those concerns. Rosenthal, Pam. "Jacked In: Fordism, Cyberpunk, Marxism." Socialist Review 21, Thus, while aesthetic questions are im­ no. 1 (January/March 1991): 79-103. portant, they are secondary to appraisals Ross, Andrew. "Getting Out of the Gernsback Continuum." Critical Inquiry 17, of the work's scholarly and academic no. 2 (winter 1991): 411-33. Ruddick, Nicholas. "Putting the Bits Together: Information Theory, Neuromancer, promise. and Science Fiction." Journal ofthe Fantastic in the Arts 3, no. 4 (1994): 84-92. Reviews should include the following Saffo, Paul. "Viewpoint: Consensual Realities of Cyberspace." Communications of elements: theACM32, no. 6 (June 1989): 664-65. I. Description of the book. Al­ Schmitt, Ronald E. "Mythology and Technology: The Novels of William Gibson." though the review certainly could include Extrapolation 34, no. 1 (spring 1993): 64-78. a brief synopsis of the plot, it is more Schroeder, Randy. "Determinancy, Indeterminacy, and the Romantic in William important that it provide a description of Gibson." Science-Fiction Studies 21, no. 2 (July 1994): 155-63. what the book is about This means ---. "Neu-Criticizing William Gibson." Extrapolation 35, no. 4 (winter 1994): 330-41. identifying what subgenres the work Sims, Michael. "William Gibson: The Day afrer Tomorrow Meets Film Noir in touches on. Is it a story? Al­ the Imagination of This Writer, Interview." BookPage, August 1993, p. 3. ternate history? ? Military Smith, Wes. "Cyberpunk Master." Chicago Tribune. November 23, 1988. In SF? All of these? Keep in mind that you NewsBank. Literature 4 (1989): F2-3. are trying to help scholars and academ­ ---. "Father of Cyberpunk Fiction Perplexed by Popularity." Bryan-College ics determine whether the book fits Station Eagle, November 27, 1988, p. 4C. [Knight-Ridder.] within a given class or research program. Snead, Elizabeth. "His Future is Closer than You Think." USA Today (September 2. Contextualization of the book. 2, 1993), Sec. 0, p. 1. Speller, Maureen. "Horribly Real: A Conversation with William Gibson." Vector In addition to describing the book, the 179 (June/July 1994): 12-17. review should locate the book within the Spinrad, Norman. "Neuromantics." Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine 10, no. context of the works of the author, 5 (May 1986): 180-90. within any subgenres from which the Sponsler, Claire. "Cyberpunk and the Dilemmas of Post modern Narrative: The work borrows, or the SF tradition. The Example of William Gibson." Contemporary Literature 33, no. 4 (December goal of such contextualization should be 1992): 625-44. to explore the relationships between the ---. "William Gibson and the Death of Cyberpunk." In Modes ofthe Fantastic, text at hand and other works with which edited by Robert A. Latham and Robert A. Collins, pp. 47-55. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood, 1995. it might be compared or contrasted in a Stone, Linda. "A Glimpse of Cyberspace." Sci-Fi Entertainment 1, no. 5 (February scholarly or academic approach. Does it 1995): 51. address gender issues in ways reminis­ Suvin, Darko. "DCber Gibson und die Cyberpunk-SF." Quarber Merkur 27, no. 2 cent of The Left Hand of Darkness? Is it (Dezember 1989): 9-21. [Whole no. 72.] an homage to Wells's War of the ---. "On Gibson and Cyberpunk SF." Foundation 46 (autumn 1989): 40-51. Worlds? Does it explore issues that the ---. "On Gibson and Cyberpunk SF." In Storming the Reality Studio, edited by author has examined in earlier works? Larry McCaffery, pp. 349-65. Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 1991. Tatsumi, Takayuki. "Eye to Eye: An Interview with William Gibson." Science Fic­ 3. Assessment of the book's schol­ tion Eye 1, no. 1 (winter 1987): 6-17. arly and academic potential. The review should provide some ideas about the Teitelbaum, Sheldon. ": William Gibson's 'Neuroaliens'." Cinefontastique 22, no. 6 aune 1992}: 12-13. kinds of scholarly or academic ap­ van Bakel, Rogier. "Remembering Johnny." Wired3, no. 6 aune 1995}: 154-57. proaches that might offer the most fruit­ Voller, Jack G. "Neuromanticism: Cyberspace and the Sublime." Extrapolation 34, ful vantage points from which the work no. 1 (spring 1993): 18-29. Wahl, Wendy. "Bodies and Technologies: and Strategies of can be viewed. Does the book raise in­ Dora, Neuromancer, Resistance." Postmodern Culture 3, no. 2 aanuary 1993}: [17 pp.]. Electronic teresting issues? Offer intriguing insight? journal available from . Assignment Warsh, David. "Cyberspace: What is in It for You?" Boston (Mass.) Globe, May 30, Although I will be requesting review 1993, p. 65. copies of important books from publish­ Westfahl, Gary. " The Gernsback Continuum': William Gibson in the Context of ers and assigning them to those who Science Fiction." In Fiction 2000: Cyberpunk and the Future ofNarrative, edited have expressed interest, I will accept by George E. Slusser and Tom Shippey, pp. 88-108. Athens: University of queries if reviewers have texts that they Georgia Press, 1992. White, Tim. "William Gibson: Exploring the Newest Frontier." Mindsparks 2, no. would like to evaluate. The Review may 1 (1994): 35-36. [Whole no. 4.] print multiple reviews of the same work "William Gibson." In Contemporary Literary Criticism, vol. 39, yearbook 1985, pp. by different reviewers, if doing so pro­ 139-44. Detroit, Mich.: Gale Research, 1986. vides sufficiently divergent viewpoints. If "William Gibson: New Futures, Just on the Horizon." Hailing Frequencies you would like to become a reviewer, (Walden books newsletter) 8 (1993): 1,3-5, 13. please e-mail your name, address, e-mail Yule, Jeffrey. "The Marginalized Short Stories of William Gibson: 'Hinterlands' address, and up to five areas of interest and '." Foundation 58 (1994): 76-84. summer 1993 ---. "William Gibson: A Cyberpunk Examined." The Mage 7 (spring 1987): (authors, periods, subgenres, etc.) to 48-50. . Zuckerman, Edward. "William Gibson." People Weekly 35, no. 22 aune 10, Format 1991): 103-8. All submissions should conform to the Review's overall submission policy and .~ ; ~~ ~~ should be between 500 and 1,000 A FANTASTIC BARGAIN words long. The fiction editor reserves Peter Sands the right to ask for rewrites or to reject Walker, Dale, ed. Fantastic Tales. Foreword by Philip Jose Farmer. Bison reviews, particularly unsolicited reviews. Books, 1998. Reprint of Curious Fragments: Jack London s Tales ofFantasy Craig Jacobsen Fiction, Kennikat Press, 1975. x + 223 pages, $11. • I I. Teaching science fiction or fantasy literature sometimes presents its great­ est challenge in selecting, rather than discussing, texts. We work in a genre of BEAM ME UP ephemera: events that never happened, in times that never were, published in Gene Weingarten suffered from groin books whose presence in the material world is only slightly more tangible. Paper­ pain and was given Urised by his urolo­ backs in particular go out of print quickly enough that even teaching gist, a drug that has a colorful side ef­ "contemporary" authors can pose a problem. fect It turns your urine "Bic pen blue." Teaching canonical or "mainstream" authors as SF or fantasy writers In his book, he says: "Once, as I was poses other problems, though, not least of which is the inconvenience and diffi­ standing at one of those trough urinals in culty of finding editions specifically geared toward teaching genre fiction. Editions that select the of mainstream authors go out of print more read­ a bathroom at a football game, I be­ ily than do "complete works" or "definitive editions." For a prolific author-as came aware that the man next to me Jack London was-the problem at the very least makes selection of teaching mate­ was staring down at me, slack rials cumbersome. So the reissue of Dale Walker's short selection of}ack London's jawed . . . . I Zipped up, pulled a ciga­ fantastic fiction by Bison Books is welcome indeed. rette lighter out of my pocket, and spoke London (1876-1916) was very prolific, both in short fiction and long. into it in a robotic voice: 'Gardak report­ He is best known as the author of The Call ofthe Wild and The Sea- Wolf, two ing. Earth colonization plans complete. mainstays of American literature. But he also regularly wrote stories of science fic­ tion or fantasy published in magazines. This collection reprints fifteen of those, Initiating return to mother ship.' " ranging ftom his first fantasy story, "Who Believes in Ghosts!"-published in his Neil Barron high school literary magazine-to the better-known "The Red One" and "The Scarlet Plague," a novella about a postcatastrophic world lost in illiteracy. This edition's foreword by Philip Jose Farmer is short and to the point, as well as idiosyncratic, presenting Farmer's take on London in language that also INDEX: 1998 VOLUME OF appears in part word for word in Walker's lengthier and meatier introduction. SFRAREVIEW Farmer in particular reveals an affinity for London and alleges a debt to London The 1998 volume year comprises six owed by himself and other writers of the so-called Golden Age of SF (" ... every numbers and fIVe physical issues. Numbers time I write, London, to some effect, is directing my pen" [vii]). Farmer and 235 and 236 are contained in one issue, Walker concur in their introductory pieces in naming The Star Rover and Before printed in January 1999 but dated Augustl Adam as the two most likely full-length works of London's to become "mainstream Oaober 1998. classics" (viii, 9), deliberately overlooking The Iron Heel, which has seen scholarly This index contains citations to spedal attention at twice the rate of The Star Rover and twenty times the rate of Before Adam, to judge by the number of citations in the MLA bibliography over the past features, officers' reports, and reviews. two decades. Walker excludes The Iron Heel because he finds it not fantastic Ephemero such as calls for papers, member enough outside its framing devices. updates, ballots, and listings of forthcoming London's output varied in quality and staying power, as might be ex­ books are not induded. pected from the author of nearly two hundred published stories, but he often en­ Candidate statements for the election of gaged certain core themes. These stories range through his idiosyncratic reading of SFRA officers are listed in 233. The an­ socialist principles-"A Curious Fragment," "Goliah," "The Strength of the nouncement of winning candidates is in 23 7. Strong"-to his engagement with metaphysics-"A Thousand Deaths"-and his The awards speeches ore in 234, except for interest in prehistory and geographic remoteness-"A Relic of the Pliocene" and the Pioneer Award acceptance speech, was is "When the World Was Young." For good measure, there is even a classic example in 2351236. Officers' reports are in 233, of the racialist Othering strategy known as "the yellow peril"-"The Unparalleled except for the secretary's report, which is in Invasion," which tells the story of how the rest of the world defeats the threat 234. posed by China and highlights London's racial views. This book is not a complete replacement for other short editions of Lon­ Index by Writer of Article don's work, such as Jack London Short Stories (I991), which contains fifty stories. That excellent book shares "A Relic of the Pleistocene," "The U nparallclcd Inva­ Barber, Douglas sion," "The Strength of the Strong," "War," and "The Red One," which are argua­ Nonfiction review, Clute, Look at the bly the strongest pieces in the Walker collection. Other publishers are in on the E.vidence (Serconia) ... 232, 9 London act, too: Citadel Twilight publishers put out The Science Fiction Short Sto­ Borron, Neil ries ofJack London in 1993, a 211-page collection of London's SF. But this is an : "Pulps and Painters" [essay review inexpensive, attractively designed book that, if nothing else, reprints what may be of Di Fate, Lesser, and Robinson and the first Viagra short story: "The Rejuvenation of Major Rathbone." Aside from Davidson] ... 237, 3 the phallic pun of its tide, "Rathbone" offers the following observation regarding Nonfiction review, Bleiler and Bleiler, the chemical rejuvenation of the elderly male: "I see, now, that great care must be Science-Fiction: The Gemsback exercised in the administration of our lymph-the greatest of care is we should Years (Kent State) ... 237, 6 wish to avoid all manner of absurdities in the conduct of the patient." Nonfiction review, Mulvey-Roberts, ed., Who says SF isn't prescient? Handbook to Gothic Literature (Macmillan) .. . 237, 8 .~ .~~ ~~ Nonfiction review, Wolff. compiler, ...£... ALTERNATIVE AMERICA NetSci-Fi (Dell) ... 233, 15 Thomas Morrissey Bogstad, Janice M. Sargent, Pamela. Climb the Wind. New York: HarperPrism, 1999,436 pages, Candidate statement for SFRA presi­ cloth, $25.00, ISBN 0-06-105029-6. dent...233,2 Nonfiction review, Leonard, ed., Into Alternative history has never been my favorite genre. One reason is that Darkness Peering (Greenwood) ... authors of such works had really better know what they're talking about. The occa­ 234, 12 sional verifiable slip-up is the kiss of death in an alternative history. Another reason Pilgrim Award presentation speech ... is that until fairly recendy I don't think that I had a sufficiendy evolved under­ 234,2 standing of what history is and is not. My seven-year experience teaching in an in­ Bousfield, Wendy B. terdisciplinary American Studies program for college freshmen has caused me to Candidate statement for SFRA secre­ think of history as the often unlikely convergence of irresistible forces and pure tary ... 233,3 accident. What would have become of European civilization had the Mongols not Nonfiction review: Clute and Grant, eds., halted their unstoppable march across the continent to return to Asia to choose a E.ncyclopedia of Fantasy (St Mar- new khan? Suppose Wayna Qhapaq had not died of smallpox and Pizzaro had had to deal with him rather than Atawallpa? Finally, I've also come to think of almost any history text as an alternative history. The pilgrims and their successors cele­ Oarke, I. F. brated the plagues that nearly drove coastal Indians to extinction as divine interces­ Pioneer Award acceptance speech: sion, but by the mid-nineteenth century, American history texts deleted the mass "Pioneers! 0 Pioneers! ..... 2351236,3 deaths from memory in order to accommodate the myth of the "vanishing Indian" Davidoff. Solomon and the colonial version of social Darwinism-and, no doubt, to pave the way for Nonfraion review: Greenwald, Future historically inaccurate elementary school Thanksgiving pageants. Perfect (Viking Penguin) ... 2351236, Climb the Wind is an intelligent alternative history that displays its 26 author's meticulous knowledge of the post-Civil War campaign against the Plains Davis, Richard Indians as well as her appreciation for the enormity of her task. The novel posits Nonfraion review, Donawerth, Franken­ that one Lakota leader, Touch-the-Clouds, unites his people, forms alliances with stein's Daughters (Syracuse) ... 234, other unconquered tribes as far away as Arizona, and adopts what he needs of nine­ II teenth-century technology to wage a successful defense against the Wasichu ad­ de Camp, Catherine Crook vance. Like Temujin, the future Genghis Khan and hero of Sargent's epic novel Pilgrim Award acceptance speech: Ruler o/the Sky, Touch-the-Clouds realizes that preserving as much of the present "Something Personal" for the Science as possible for his people will necessitate confrontation with the complex societies Fiaion Research Association .. . 234, 2 on their borders and that such confrontation cannot be successful without some de Camp, L Sprague potentially unpopular cultural adaptations. He is also a man of vision, literally. His Pilgrim Award acceptance speech: dream of a Mongol warrior motivates him and prepares the way for his acceptance "Something Personal" for the Science of assistance from Chinese arms makers and a Russian Alaskan seeking freedom for Fiaion Research Association ... 234, 2 the nonhern territory that has recently been purchased by the United States. Donsky, Charlotte P. Sargent's treatment of historical forces and accident are impressive. Oareson Award presentation speech ... Touch-the-Clouds never questions his people's right to self-determination, but one of his allies, Lemuel Rowland, a Seneca raised by whites and who served on U. S. 234,3 Grant's staff in the Civil War, is torn between the white and Indian worlds. Like Elms, Alan C Catherine Lematre, Mohawk heroine of Sarent' s 1982 short stoty "The Broken Candidate statement for SFRA vice presi­ Hoop," Rowland (Poyeshao) and his visionary Lakota lover Katia (Graceful Swan) dent ... 233,2 have internalized the conflicting values of both cultures. Early in the book, Row­ Frisch, Adam land believes that the best the Indians can hope for is to buy time to make the Candidate statement for SFRA vice presi­ transition to reservation life easier. Thus an important task for a would-be North dent ... 233,2 American Genghis Khan is to help purge Indians of the white man's view of them. Gordon, Andrew At the same time, Touch-the-Clouds understands that Candidate statement for SFRA treas­ the prevailing myth of the vanishing Indian and a blind faith in Manifest Destiny urer ... 233,2 and progress make it difficult for whites to have too much sympathy with what Gordon, Joan their culture regards as the doomed savages of the Plains. Couple these problems Fiaion review, Slonczewski, Children with the Wasichus' numerical and technological advantages, and the triumph of Star ... 2351236, 18 Touch-the-Clouds seems pretty unlikely. Nonfraion review, Donawerth, Franken­ On the other hand, post-Civil War America was a nation plagued by sec­ stein's Daughters (Syracuse) ... 234, tional, racial, and economic tensions, many of which have been glossed over in 10 what passes for high school history texts. When Grant assumed the Presidency in President's message ... 232, I; 234, I; 1869, he was faced with Radical Republicans who had impeached his predecessor, 237, I; 2351236, f unreconstructed Southerners ready to take up arms to preserve white supremacy, Gray, Rosemary economic instability, and the unbridled greed of unscrupulous men whose taste for Fiaion review, Wright, Scientific Ro­ wealth had been fed by war profits and who would sacrifice anything-the Union mance (Anchor) ... 2351236, 23 victory, the war veterans, the Indians, and Grant himself-to satisfY their appetites. Gunn, James Although Grant was an ineffectual executive, his devotion to the causes for which Feature essay: "Isaac Asimov and Psycho­ the Union had fought and his national stature kept the lid on for a few years. In history ..... 2351236, 4 Sargent's novel, the often tipsy President is killed by a speeding carriage and is suc­ Harris-Fain, Darren ceeded by one of the nation's most corrupt office holders, Vice President Schuyler Fiction review, Ellison, Slippage Colfax. His ineptitude helps set in motion a series of events that lead to a coup in (Ziesing) ... 237,9 Washington, the repression of civil rights, and a vicious war against the Lakota. Hatfrefd, Len Lakota diplomacy and the excesses of the usurpers in Washington make the Indi­ ans look pretty good to many Americans, and history is rewritten as the Lakota Pioneer Award winner announced ... 234, join outraged whites in an attack on the nation's capital. 5 The vision ofTouch-the-Clouds and the untimely death of President Grant are the linchpins of the historical extrapolation, but Sargent's thinking about history is deeper than this. Climb the Wind is a book about visions. The Indians in Hellekson, Karen the novel are troubled by two conflicting visionary worlds; one is ours, the one in Editors' message ... 232, I; 237, 2; which Custer died at the Little Bighorn and the Lakota were slaughtered at 2351236,2 Wounded Knee. The other is the one in which Touch-the-Clouds destroys Fiction review, Bujold, Komarr (Baen) ... Custer's men without a trace at the Greasy Grass, thus preempting the history that 233,12 we know. These worlds are symbolized, respectively, in Katia's vision as the broken Hill, Mike hoop and in Rowland's dream as Touch-the-Clouds' pronouncement that "the Nonfiction review, Sisk, Transforma­ circle is closed." Like the Mule in Asimov's Foundation books, Touch-the-Clouds, tions of Language In Modern assisted by a careless U. S. Grant, is the wild card, the historic mutation that allows (Greenwood) ... 233, 14 what is for us the alternative vision to prevail. Hull, Elizabeth Anne What, then, are the limits of Sargent's vision? Having read Ruler ofthe C1areson Award acceptance speech ... Sky, I expected Touch-the-Clouds to ride triumphantly into Washington, the 234,4 ghost dance made real. After all, the great khan's grandson became of jacobsen, Craig China. Although Touch-the-Clouds is victorious, the facts of history, among them Editors' message... 237, 2; 2351236,2 the numerical superioriry, devotion to progress, and traditional racism of the Euro­ Kaveny, Philip E Americans, would make the rise of a Lakota emperor a hard-to-believe ending. The Fiction review: "Small press items of balance of power at the end of the novel is not what carne to pass in the 1870s and note" [review essay of Cannon, Mosig, '80s as we know them, but neither is it a total reversal. The nature of the long-term and Verba] ... 2351236, 24 relationship among the peoples of the continent is not certain; much will depend Nonfiction review, joshi, Subtler Magick on how the western tribes balance their traditional values and practices with (Bargo) ... 232, 13 changes that they will need to make in order to forestall or prevent the eventual Levy, Michael M. sweep of whites across the land. In her engrossing new novel, Candidate statement for SFRA treas· bends the course of the mighty river of history, but she channels it on a course that urer... 233,2 is plausible and open-ended. Feature interview: joan Slonczew­ ski ... 2351236, 12 • ...: ~::l' :A: Fiction review, White, Dancing with ~ EXCITIIIG PREQUEL Dragons (Camden) ... 234, 13 Michael Levy Fiction review, joyce, Tooth Fairy Vinge, Vernor. . New York: Tor, 1999.608 pages, (Tor) ... 233, 13 $27.95 ISBN 0-312-85683-0. Fiction review, Slonczewski, Children Star (Tor) ... 234, 12 A Deepness in the Sky is a prequel to Vinge's -winning space Fiction review, Vander Meer and Secrest, opera, (1992). Set several thousand years in our future, but eds., Leviathan 2 (Ministry of some thirty thousand years earlier than the previous novel, Deepness shows us a Whimsy) ... 2351236, 20 time when humanity has developed a sizeable intergalactic civilization within a vol­ In memoriam: Lynn Williams ... 237, 2 ume of space several hundred light years across, but has not yet had any real deal­ Treasurer's report. .. 232, 3; 233,4 ings with the multitude of sentient alien species that were so important to A Fire Lewis, Arthur O. upon the Deep, nor is humanity as yet aware of the peculiar and complex physics Fiction review, Harrison, Signs of Life that structure life within Vinge's galaxy. Still, the human race has made a start at (St Martin's) ... 2351236, 22 . Several interstellar human civilizations are old enough to have Lindow, Sandra risen to prominence and then collapsed more than once. Not the least of these, Fiction review, Harpman, I Who Have Earth, has actually been wiped out and reseeded with human life on at least three Never Known Men (Avon occaslOns. Eos) ... 2351236, 18 The Qeng Ho are the glue that holds humanity together. Traveling at Mathews, Richard sublight speeds, they trade between the worlds, picking up volunteers as they go. Nonfiction review, Schweitzer, ed., Dis­ Spending much of their lives in suspended animation, some of the Qeng Ho trad­ covering Classic Fantasy Fiction ers are hundreds of years old and have seen entire human societies rise and fall. (Borgo) ... 232,14 Now, however, word has corne to them of the discovery of an alien civilization McKnight. Ed and, just on the brink of space flight, the species the Qeng Ho dub Spiders can be Special feature: "The Way We Were­ considered as potential trading partners. The aliens live on a world that circles a n't"... 232,7 peculiar sun. The OnOff star is a variable brown dwarf that spends most of its time too dim to sustain any form oflife on the surface of its lone planet. Every two hun- dred years, however, the star flares up, making life possible for several decades thereafter. The Spiders spend most of their time in hibernation, corning to life Morrissey, Thomas J. only after the OnOff star has flared and packing what for other species might be Fiction review, Kanaly, Virus Clans centuries of development into a few short decades. (Ace) ... 2351236, 23 Unfortunately, when the Qeng Ho arrive at the Spider's system, they find Reid, Robin themselve in close competition with another, much more bloody-minded human Review essay: "Femism, Gender, and culture, the Emergents. This totalitarian society is centered upon a mysterious sci­ Sdence Fiction" [review essay of Bur­ entific procedure called Focus, which gives the slave-owning Emergent masters an well, Roberts, and Wol­ enormous edge over the otherwise technologically superior, but much less rapa­ markJ. .. 2351236, 9 cious, Qeng Ho. Sanders, Joe While the Emergents and Qeng Ho fight it out in space, the Spiders have Fiction review, Mdeod, Great Wheel come out of hibernation and are progressing rapidly. The discovery of nuclear (Harcourt) ... 233, 13 power presents them with the possibility of avoiding the next Darkness, as they call Nonfiction review, de Camp, Rubber their centuries-long periods of inactivity, but it also makes real the danger of nu­ Dinosaurs and Wooden E.lephants clear warfare between various Spider nations. The situation is made worse by the (Borgo) ... 233, 12 Emergents who, having subdued the Qeng Ho, now subtly manipulate the Spiders' Pilgrim Award presentation speech ... 234, primitive computer networks to pave the way for their own enslavement of the 2 planet. Sands, Peter is a talented writer who deserves to be mentioned in the Spedal feature: "Packing It All In: One­ same breath as Gregory Benford, Greg Bear, Joan Slonczewski, and lain M. Banks as being among the leading proponents of what is often labeled hard science fic­ Volume Anthologies and the Teaching tion, but might just as well be called literary space opera. Each of these writers pro­ o( SF" [review essay of Hartwell and duces stories set in outer space and involving alien cultures and heroic adventure Wolf, LeGuin and Attebery, and that are clearly descended from the work of E. E. Smith, A. E. Van Vogt, Arthur MinyardJ ... 233, 8 C. Clarke, Poul Anderson, and Larry Niven. Each of these writers, Vinge not the Slonczewski, Joan least among them, features a wide range of fascinating scientific ideas and exactly Feature interview [with Michael M. the kind of sense of wonder-inducing pyrotechnics that made authors like Van LevyJ ... 2351236, 12 Vogt and Clarke great. Where the new, more literary space upera writers differ Sperl, Geoffrey from their predecessors, however, is in their more substantial interest in such tradi­ Editors' message ... 232, I; 233, I tional mainstream literary values as character development and style. Vinge, for Surova, Sue example, gives us a number of characters, some human, some Spider, who are ex­ Fiction review, Danvers, Circuit of tremely well rounded, convincing, and morally complex. We simply find out more Heaven (Avon) ... 2351236, 21 about and care more about the aging and secretive Qeng Ho trader Pham Nuwen Fiction review, Hegland, Into the For­ and the feisty but eccentric Spider scientist Sherkaner Underhill than we did about est (CaIyx) ... 2351236, 21 the protagonists of earlier space operas. Umland, Sam A Deepness in the Sky looks to be a solid early candidate for the 1999 Nonfiction review, Holte, Dracula in Hugo Award, and I strongly recommend it. The book stands entirely on its own, the Dark (Greenwood) ... 232, 12 but you might want to read A Fire upon the Deep first anyway. Doing so will make Wendell, Carolyn you privy to a number of secrets and mysteries that are merely hinted at in the new Candidate statement (or SFRA secre­ novel, and this all by itself will add a certain delicious irony to your reading of tary ... 233,3 Vinge's latest. Secretary's report SFRA minutes for June 24, 1997; June 26, 1997; January 25, .., ~ ~~~. 1998; May 22, 1998; May 25, A. A HEW CLASSIC 1998 ... 234,6 Steven Silver West, Richard C Verne, Jules. The Chase ofthe Goldm Meteor. Originally published in 1909 as Fiction review, Tolkien, Roverandom Chasse au mit/ore. Bison Books, 1998. ISBN 0-8032-9619-3. 292 pp. (Houghton) ... 233, 14 Westfahl, Gary Many of Jules Verne's fans accredit the French novelist with an amazing Nonfiction review, Collings, Work of ability to predict technological advances and scientific breakthroughs. In 1909, his Stephen King (Borgo) ... 232, II son, Michel Verne, published his posthumous novel, The Chase ofthe Golden Me­ Williams, Lynn teor (Chasse au meteore, a novel about a scientific dispute over the priority of dis­ Candidate statement for SFRA presi­ covery of a strange that was captured by Earth's gravity. Although the dent .. 233,2 novel doesn't detail any futuristic devices, it does portend the idea of an asteroid striking the Earth, a notion that seems to have been the theme of 1998. Bison Books has elected to rerelease The Chase ofthe Golden Meteor to coincide with the release of the rums Deep Impact and Armageddon as well as the In memoriam [by Michael M. novels Moonfoll Newton s Cannon, and Rogue Star, all of which explore the idea of LevyJ ... 237, 2 a large rock striking the Earth. Although the new crop of fiction looks at the im­ Pilgrim Award presentation pact from a disastrous point of view, Verne's novel took a more scientific, social, speech ... 234,2 and financial angle. The story follows the dispute between Sydney Hudelson and Dean For­ Index of Nonfiction Reviews by Author syth, two amateur astronomers whose friendship is threatened by their simultane­ of Book Reviewed ous discovery of the bolide. Making matters worse is the fact that Hudelson's daughter is on the verge of marrying Forsyth's nephew. Their dispute is brought to Bleiler, Everett F, with Richard J. Bleiler. Sci­ a head when the object's orbit is changed and it become clear that the meteor will ence-Fiction: The Gernsback Years land somewhere on the Earth. Each man claims the asteroid, now known to be (Kent State), rev. Neil Barron ... 23 7, 6 made of solid gold, for his own. Unknown to them, Zephyrin Xirdal, a French Burwell, jennifer. Notes on Nowhere genius, also believes he has the right to claim the meteor, since it was his machine (Minnesota), rev. Robin Reid ... 2351236, that caused the bolide's orbit to degenerate. 9 Verne's characters are painted with very broad strokes, with the result that Clute, john, and , eds. Encyclope­ none of them come across as real or as interesting as his best creations, such as dia of Fantasy (St Martin's), rev. Captain Nemo. Instead, Verne focuses on the Forsyth-Hudelson feud, which Wendy B. Bausfield ... 2351236, 25 seems almost to be based on the similar scientific feud between nineteenth-century Clute, john, ed. Look at the Evidence paleontologists Othniel Marsh and Edward Cope. With the discovery that the (Serconia), rev. Douglas Barber... 232, 9 bolide is gold and descending to Earth, the issue of ownership is taken from the Collings, Michael. Work of Stephen f(jng two scientists as an international commission is established to determine owner­ (Borgo), rev. Gary Westfahl ... 232, II ship. Verne's commission does not come up with any easy answers regarding the deCamp, L Sprague. Rubber Dinosaurs meteor. Their wrangling over the issue seems to foretell the type of debate that oc­ and Wooden Elephants (Borgo), rev. curs in the United Nations. joe Sanders ... 233, 12 Verne's strength is his ability to take a single idea and extrapolate its social Di Fate, Vincent. Infinite Worlds (Penguin and technological ramifications. In The Chase ofthe Golden Meteor, he focuses this Studio), rev. Neil Barron ... 237, 3 ability by showing the effects the discovery has on the families of the discoverers Donawerth, jane. Frankenstein's Daugh­ and the society in which they live. Although seemingly simplistic in modern terms, Verne's depiction ofWhaston, Virginia, does true for the times. ters (Syracuse), rev. joan Gordon ... 234, The Chase ofthe Golden Meteor is an early attempt to depict the type of /I meteoric collision with the Earth that saw so much attention in 1998. An enter­ Donawerth, jane. Frankenstein's Daugh­ taining novel in its own right, it provides an interesting baseline when looking at ters (Syracuse), rev. Richard Davis ... 234, the various works now available. 10 Greenwald, jeff. Future Perfect (Viking Penguin), rev. Solomon Davi- .~ ~~ ~:a; doff. .. 2351236, 26 ~ STRAHGE.HDEED Holte, james Craig. Dracula in the Dark Everett F. Bleiler (Greenwood), rev. Sam Umland ... 232, 12 Heron-Allen, Edward. The Collected Strange Papers of Christopher Blayre. joshi, S. T. Subtler Magick (Bargo), rev. Horam, Sussex, England: Tartarus Press, 1998. viii + 257pp. Clothbound. Philip £ Kaveny ... 232, 13 ISBN 1-87262135-X. £25.00/$49.95. Tartarus Press: Ray Russell, Tar­ Leonard, Elizabeth Ann, ed. Into Darkness tarus Press, 5 Birch Terrace, Hangingbirch Lane, Horam, East Sussex Peering (Greenwood), rev. janice M. TN21 OPA, England, UK. Bagstad ... 234, 12 Lesser, Robert Pulp Art (Gramercy), rev. Edward Heron-Allen (1861-1943) was a prominent British marine biolo­ Neil Barron ... 237, 3 gist whose technical works fill several pages in the catalog of the British Library. He Mulvey-Roberts, Marie, ed. Handbook to was president of the British Microscopical Society, a member of many learned so­ Gothic Literature (Macmillan), rev. cieties, translator of Omar Khayyam from Persian, and an authority on the hand­ Neil Barron ... 237, 8 craft making of violins. (His Violin-Making, As It Was and Is [1882] contains a por­ Roberts, Robin. New Species (II/inois), rev. trait, a pasted-in photographic print, for those curious about his appearance.) He Robin Reid ... 2351236, 9 also wrote fiction under the pseudonym Christopher Blayre. Robinson, Frank M., and Lawrence Davidson. His two early collections of short stories, The Purple Sapphire and Other Pulp Culture, rev. Neil Barron. .. 237, 3 Posthumous Papers (London: Philip Allan, 1921) and an enlarged edition, The Strange Papers ofChristopher Blayre (London: Philip Allan, 1939), contain a total of twelve stories, supernatural and science fiction, united by the common narrative Schweitzer, Darrell, ed. Discovering Clas­ tactic of being confidential papers deposited with the Registrar of the University of sic Fantasy Fiction (Borgo), rev. Rich­ Cosmopoli, not to be released until the deaths of their authors. These stories are ard Mathews ... 232, 14 intelligent, reasonably well-written, somewhat quirky, and stiff, in the manner of Sisk, David W. Transformations of Lan­ the late nineteenth century. In 1931, Heron-Allen privately published a third col­ guage in Modern Dystopias lection, Some Women ofthe University, in an edition of one hundred copies, obvi­ (Greenwood), rev. Mike HiII ... 233, 14 ously a very rare book. It contained four stories, two of which, "Zum Wild- White, Donna. Dancing with Dragons bad" (about lesbianism and vampirism) and "The Boots" (about a very strange (Camden), rev. Michael M. Levy ... 234, aunting), are excellent. All sixteen of these stories are reprinted in the present book. 13 The high point of Collected Strange Papers, however, is the inclusion of Wolff. Michael, compiler. NetSci-Fi (Dell), "The Cheetah-GirL" a story of about 18,000 words. According to tradition, which rev. Neil 8orron ... 233, 15 is probably valid, the author planned to include it in The Purple Sapphire, but the Wolmark, Jenny. Aliens and Others publisher refused to print it, as he considered it unsuitable for commercial publica­ (Iowa), rev. Robin Reid ... 2351236, 9 tion because of its sexual content. Heron-Allen then prepared an edition of twenty copies, perhaps bound-up galleys, and gave them to depositary libraries and to a Index of Fiction Reviews by Author of few friends. Needless to say, this only edition of "The Cheetah-Girl" is of legen­ Book Reviewed dary rarity. "The Cheetah-Girl" describes candidly, in social and biological terms, an Bujold, Lois McMaster. Komarr (Boen), rev. experiment in which Menagerie Sal, the nadir of prostitutes and who copulates with animals as a spectacle, is impregnated under laboratory conditions by a chee­ Karen Hellekson ... 233, 12 tah. The experimenting biologist had overcome the barriers to intergeneric fertili­ Cannon, Peter. Chronology Out of Time zation by chemical means. A girl child is born, almost completely human in ap­ (Necronomicon), rev. Philip E. pearance, but with a feline, patterned lanugo. She matures into a beautiful Kaveny ... 235/236, 24 woman-generally speaking, a human-but with a violent estrus and, as it turns Danvers, Dennis. Circuit of Heaven out, feline philoprogenitiveness. The narrative is told from the points of view of (Avon), rev. Sue Surova ... 2351236, 21 the biologist and later of a stufl}r don who cannot resist her sexual appeal, marries Ellison, Harlan. Slippage (Ziesing), rev. Dar­ her despite vague warnings, discovers her history too late, and is torn by the knowl­ ren Harris-Fain ... 237, 9 edge of what he thinks he must do. Greenberg, Martin, ed. The Way it Wasn't The story is not pornography. Although the author frankly discusses pros­ (Citadel), rev. Ed McKnight..232, 6 titution, unconventional sexuality, abortion, and other taboo topics of the day, he Harpman, Jacqueline. , Who Have Never does so in a technical, dispassionate manner. It was apparently considered obscene Known Men (Avon Eos), rev. Sandra in 1921, but today it would not raise many eyebrows. Lindow ... 2351236, 18 Heron-Allen acknowledges his debt to Wells's The Island ofDoctor Harrison, M. John. Signs of Life (St Mar­ Moreau, and a modern reader may perceive possible echoes from Hans Heinz tin's), rev. Arthur O. Lewis ... 235/236, 22 Ewer's Alraune and Arthur Machen's The Great God Pan, but Heron-Allen's story Hartwell, David G., and Milton T. Wolf, eds. is highly original and an almost unknown landmark in science fiction. The devel­ Visions of Wonder (Tor), rev. Peter opment is excellent, and the story is well worth reading. Sands ... 233, 8 The present edition can be recommended for libraries with developed Hegland, Jean. Into the Forest (Calyx), rev. collections of fantastic fiction. Sue Surova ... 2351236, 21 Joyce, Graham. Tooth Fairy (Tor), rev. Mi­ II.;: ell.;: • ..-:~~~.: chael M. Levy... 233, 13 .J "ASTERFUL BIBLIOGRAPHY Kana/y, Michael. Virus Clans (Ace), rev. Neil Barron Thomas J. Morrissey ... 2351236, 23 Hauptmann, Richard A. The Work ofJack Williamson: An Annotated Bibliog­ LeGuin, Ursula K.., and Brian Attebery, eds. raphy and Guide. Framingham, Mass: NESFA Press, Box 809, 01701- Norton Book of Science Fiction 0809, August 1998. xvii + 185 p. $17 (+$2 postage to U.S. addresses, +$4 (Norton), rev. Peter Sands ... 233, 8 elsewhere). ISBN 1-886778-12-4. McLeod, Ian R. Great Wheel (Harcourt), rev. Joe Sanders ... 233, 13 Born in the Arizona Territory in 1908, Williamson is the second-oldest Minyard, Applewhite, ed. Decades of Sci­ active SF writer, barely edged out by last year's Pilgrim winner, L. Sprague de ence Fiction (NTC), rev. Peter Camp, born late the previous year. commented that "It is something to Sands. .. 233, 8 brood upon that the first man to become a professional science fiction writer is still Moore, Ward. Bring the Jubilee alive." "The Metal Man," in the December 1928 Amazing, was his first published story. This April, Tor will publish his novel, The Silicon Dagger. His remarkable record in continually adapting to changing markets over the past seventy years is thoroughly documented by this admirable bibliography, which benefits from the (Ballantine), rev. Ed McKnight .. 232, 6 efforts of fans and scholars over many years, including Robert E. Myers, whose Mosig. Yazan Dirk W. Mosig at Last Jack Williamson: A Primary and Secondary Bibliography (G. K. Hall, 1980) is effec­ (Mosig Necronomicon), rev. Philip E. tively superseded. Kaveny... 2351236, 24 A chronology from 1908 to 1997 includes something I've rarely seen for Slonczewski, Joan. Children Star (Tor), rev. any author: the amount of money earned for his SF writings, at least through Michael M. Levy ... 234, 12 ... *rev. Joan 1973, which gives real meaning to the word "hardscrabble." The eight pages are no Gordon ... 2351236, 18 substitute for his Hugo Award-winning 1984 autobiography, Wonder's Child: My Sobel, Robert For Want of a Nail Life in Science Fiction, a very personal and moving account. (Greenhill), rev. Ed McKnight..232, 6 Hauptmann's work is an excellent author bibliography-thorough, accu­ Tolkien, J. R. R. Roverandum (Houghton), rate, and very well organized. The detailed chronicle of books and stories is supple­ rev. Richard C. West .. 233, 14 mented by a number of useful lists, such as a chronological listing of Williamson's Vander Meer, Jeff, and Rose Secrest, eds. fiction, by magazine source, by decade, languages in which his work has appeared, Leviathan 2 (Ministry of Whimsy), rev. etc. Three terms Williamson invented in 1951 are now standard: genetic engineer­ Michael M. Levy... 2351236, 20 ing and terraform (from novels), and psionics (from a story). He had an asteroid Verba, Joan Marrie. Boldly Writing (FTL), named for him in honor of his 86th birthday, thanks to the efforts of Roger rev. Philip E. Kaveny ... 2351236, 24 Zelazny and David Brin. Wright, Ronald. Some writers boast of 20 years' experience. Sometimes this means essen­ (Anchor), rev. Rosemary Gray ... 2351236, tially one year repeated twenty rimes, with little growth evident. That certainly 23 doesn't apply to Jack Williamson, who may have slowed a bit but gives no indica­ • I tion of having stopped growing. A model bibliography, a model life. I. CORRECTIONS: #235/236

lii:.~ e.:;;~ .. Page 18: The last line of Joan Gordon's .) . DISCH DREAMS review ofJoan Slonczewski's The Chil­ Neil Barron dren Star should read: 'The Children Disch, Thomas M. The Dreams Our StuffIs Made Of How Scimce Fiction Star is highly recommended. Conquered the World. Free Press, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020, May 1998. 256 p. $25. 0-684-82405-1. Page 20: The end of Sandra Un dow's ofJacqudine Harpman's I Disch (b. 1940) is a respected but not popular writer of SF and some hor­ review Who ror fiction, with a semiseparate life as a poet, writer of children's fiction, and critic. Have Never Known Men should read: His heterodoxy was evident in his first novel, 1965's The Genocides, in which aliens "Though the narrator has, like many eliminate humans by fumigation, a decidedly downbeat conclusion rejected by the autistic individuals, never found comfort in dozens of novels and films, before and since, that depict plucky humans defeating touch and never known the joys of human alien invaders. More recently you may recall his "Big Ideas and Dead-End Thrills," sexuality, in the end I conclude that hu­ in the February 1992 Atlantic, in which he argues that SF is primarily a children's manity itself is based on something else, literature. Knowing this, you wouldn't expect, and you don't get, anything resem­ perhaps an awareness, an affirmation of bling a standard, consensus history. He begins by rejecting the tired truism that the golden age of SF is self and others and the ability to strive for twelve, when we begin to read it and develop a sense of wonder. Today, SF's truth through created personal meaning. icons-rocket ships, robots, aliens, etc.-are standard fixtures in the lives of pre­ If this was Harpman's intent., she does, in schoolers. They don't graduate to comics and pulps, as his generation did, but to fact., succeed. Recommended.. " TV, film and computer monitors, for better or worse. Pace , Disch argues for Poe as the father of SF and devotes a Page 22: The last sentence of Arthur O. chapter to what he calls "our embarrassing ancester," whose many stories anticipate Lewis's review of John M. Harrison's themes common in later SF. He places SF in the tradition of tall tales and lying, arguing that SF "has a special claim to be our national literature, as the art form Signs of ute should read: "For me, best adapted to telling the lies we like to hear and to pretend we believe." Signs of Ufe is such a novel, one that He investigates a handful of common themes in chapters on space travel, makes much sense when regarded as a nuclear holocausts, Star Trek (a bland, utopian future in pajamas), drugs, sex, and something actually written in that very feminism (some very sharp jabs here), religion, politics, imperialism in space, and near dystopian future in which its charac­ race relations. His comments on stories by many of the field's best-known figures, ters arrive." past and present, reflect a thorough knowledge of SF, both as an insider and an outsider (he largely ceased writing SF two dec­ ades ago) and the wider world in which it developed. But admirers of many of the writers he discusses with wit may be uncom­ fortable or enraged. Gary Wolfe's review in the May 1998 Locus discusses the survey's principal weaknesses: its scattershot approach and an argument that often indefensibly tries to link SF with pseudoscience and with occultism and cultists generally, part of his gener view of SF as a contemporary form of the tall tale. His account also suggests haste, carelessness or editorial oversight­ Stapledon, Wollheim, and Gernsback are all misspelled. His concluding chapter, an allusion to Freud, is titled "The Future of an Illusion-SF Beyond the Year 2000," and offers a bleak perspective. More than half the top ten grossing films of all time have been SF, but the economics of filmmaking dictates action-adventure and dumb plots. Similarly, the economics of book publishing favor undemanding series "for subteen audiences that were the SF equivalent to the Oz books and to girl-and-horse romances," hard SF adventures, militaristic space operas, and cyberpunk. SF, like film, has become "product" to fill the racks of the chains, and " who do not make such an adaptation will find themselves squeezed to the sidelines of university and small press publications, like poets and nongenre midlist novelists." Don't rely on this as you would, say, Aldiss's Trillion Year Spree (1986) or Edward James's Science Fiction in the Twen­ tieth Century (1996). It's more polemic than history, but if, like me, you like to throw dead cats into churches and believe one horse laugh is worth a dozen syllogisms, don't miss this.

~.~ -a.;:. ~~ .) IIiVALUABLE IIiDEX Neil Barron Hall, Hal W., ed. Scinza Fiction and Fantasy Rifn-nza Index, 1992-1995; An International Subject and Author Index to History and Criticism. Libraries Unlimited, Box 6633, Englewood, CO 80155-6633, July 1997. xxi + 503 p. $75. ISBN 1-56308-527-5.

Remember 3 x 5-inch index cards? They're still around, and this index began in 1967 on such cards, well before Tom Clareson's Science Fiction Criticism: An Annotated Checklist appeared in 1980. This index began as the two-volume set, Science Fiction And Fantasy Reference Index, 1818-1985 (Gale, 1987, $185), which covered more than 19,000 books, articles, essays, news items, and audiovisual items, most issued since 1945 in spite of the title. A 1985-1991 supplement followed in 1993 (Libraries Unlimited, 16,000+ items). This latest supplement adds more than 10,000 citations. About 90 percent of all citations are to English-language material. Hall estimates that these 45,000 items are still "perhaps 50 to 60 percent of the directly appli­ cable material published to date," even though most of the key genre magazines and fanzines were thoroughly indexed (two pages list all magazines indexed). These indexes supplement Hall's book review indexes, three volumes from Gale (only one in print), covering reviews published 1923-1984, and in self-published annuals since, although Hall is some years behind in index­ ing reviews. Hall acknowledges the help of others, but this indexing is still mostly a one-person project that's extended over more than three decades. Any serious scholar should have access to these indexes, and larger university libraries should have acquired them. And SFRA members should realize the debt we all owe to Hall and consider him for a Pilgrim .

.: -iii: -iii: ~ ~~~:.: .) DIFFICULT BIBLIOGRAPHY Neil Barron Stephensen-Payne, Phil. Brian Stabliford: Gnzdic Revolutionary; A Working Bibliography. Galactic Central, April 1997. x + 133 p., continuously paginated in two saddle-stapled booklets {part 1, major items, part 2, minor items}. $7.50 from Chris Drumm, Box 445, Polk City, IA 50226-0445; or £5.00 from Phil Stephensen-Payne, 'Imladris,' 25A Copgrove Road, Leeds, West Yorkshire LS8 2SP, England, UK. ISBN 1-871133-49-1

Born in 1948, Stableford's first story was published in 1965, his first book in 1969. He has an undergraduate degree in biology, a doctorate in , and lectured at the University of Reading for about a dozen years before resuming a career as a freelance writer. Although his varied fiction has been widely praised, it hasn't, so far, garnered the field's major awards. But his critical works, from reviews to full-length books, have brought him the J. Uoyd Eaton Award, the IAFA Distinguished Scholarship Award, and the Pioneer Award in 1996. This is the forty-eighth in the publisher's Bibliographies for the Avid Reader series, begun by the late Gordon Ben­ son, Jr., and one of the lengthiest. The back covers of these booklets list the complete series, which I think is kept in print, with volumes updated at irregular intervals. I've reviewed other booklets in this series, which is a bit more professional than when it started in 1980, before Benson joined with Stephensen-Payne, who's been responsible for the updates and all the more recent bibliographies. The biggest single deficiency of the series is poor organization. Since Stableford has been and is fairly prolific, this weakness is more obvious than it might otherwise be. Dividing up material by and about the author into eighteen categories is cumbersome at best and disperses items that should be kept together. For example, reviews of books should follow listings of the books. Although most categories (e.g., short fiction, fiction books) are sequenced alphabetically by title, there's no master title index. Pagination isn't given for short fiction. Most of the needed information is included, but locating it is a real chore. The author should seriously consider adopting a format like that used in Richard Hauptmann's outstanding bibliography of Jack Williamson, the subject of the tenth bibliography in this series. The series is fairly reasonably priced as bibliographies go, but it isn't a vety good value, even when the bibliographies are the only ones of their subjects. One value that this specific bibliography has is to show the remarkable breadth and depth of Stable ford's writings. I have for some years judged him the best candidate for a Pilgrim by a wide margin. Reading a handful of the critical works listed here may convince you as well.

~.~ .arr;:;;~=l::.: • ..) GOREY GALORE Neil Barron Toledano, Henry. Goreyography: A Diverse Compendium ofand Price Guide to the Works ofEdward Gorey. Word Play Publications, 1 Sutter Street, San Francisco, CA 94104, 1996. 192 p. $45, ISBN 0-9642922-2-X; $24.95, -3-8, trade paper. Add $4 for shipping.

Ogdred Weary and Eduard Blutig are: Nobel Prize winners from the 1930s; 1969 candidates for the Pilgrim; 1988 candidates for the Booker; and co-owners of a Sutter Street kosher deli. If you guessed none of the preceding, congratulations. The first is an anagram of Edward Gorey, the second a pseudonym. Gorey (b. 1925) is a genuine discoverer, a person who sees what everyone else sees and thinks what no one else has thought. He not only thinks it, he draws it, and has been doing so since infancy. His first book, The Unstrung Harp, was published in 1963, one of the 113 small tomes he's solely authored through 1995. Add to that hundreds of other books he's designed or illustrated, plus the work used in dolls, on mugs, calen­ dars, and t-shirts. His sketches served as the basis for the animated titles for the PBS Mystery series. You can learn a lot more from this exemplary guide. I've never systematically collected Gorey (or anyone else), but I was astonished to discover I had a dozen or so of his remarkable books, including an autographed copy of his first one. If the market values for fine copies are fairly accurate, and the guide notes wide variation in asking prices, my collection might sell for $1,700 ifI could find, or wanted to find, fellow Gorey nuts. If you're merely curious-and you should be-why Gorey inspires such deranged devotion, check out The World ofEdward Gorey by Clifford Ross and Karen Wilkin (Abrams, 1996). In the meantime, I'm going to surround myself by urns and fondle my collection.

~.arr;: -arr;:;;~, ..) AWARDS BARGAIII Neil Barron DeVore, Howard. The Hugo, Nebula and World Fantasy Awards. Advent Books, Box A3228, Chicago, IL 60690, June 1998. Author, 4705 Weddel Street, Dearborn, MI 48125. 332 p. $16, delivered, trade paper. ISBN 0-911682-32- 5.

DeVore mimeographed the first version of this listing in 1970, mostly for members of the Fantasy Amateur Press Association (FAPA). Like Topsy, it growed, with the last edition appearing in 1986, which included the ancient International Fantasy Awards (1951-57), the Hugo Awards, and the Nebula Awards. This new edition updates the last edition and adds the World Fantasy awards (begun 1975), all through calendar year 1997 awards. DeVore, retired from the post office, has been and still is a dealer (send wants; he doesn't issue catalogs). Donald Franson, shown as a coauthor on earlier editions, provides a ten-page history of the Hugos. DeVore discusses the Nebula Awards, and Roger Silverstein, a Detroit-area pediatrician, found and corrected many errors in earlier editions and in other reference works; he also wrote a two-page introduction to the fantasy awards. John Gamble keyboarded all the text, and Silver­ stein proofed it very carefully. George Price, who "is" Advent, formatted the text and arranged for printing. Awards are listed chronologically, with the winner in boldface. A fifty-six-page index provides access by authors/ winners and by titles (novels, nonfiction, and shorter fiction). Original sources of fiction are shown but not the multitude of reprints of many works. Why review another awards listing? Because almost all list only winners, often of many awards not shown here (mostly trivial). DeVore lists winners and runners-up. This is important, because in many cases only a few votes separate the winner and the runners-up. Anyone wishing to read earlier works judged best should consider the runners-up as well and may judge them superior, given the capricious nature of awards. If you're willing to settle for winners only and/or want all the other awards, you'll want Reginald's Science Fiction and Fantasy Awards: A Comprehensive Guide to the Awards and Their Win­ ners, compiled by Daryl F. Mallett and Robert Reginald, 3d ed, Borgo Press, 1993. My judgment is that DeVore is preferable, and at the price is a bargain.

~ • .: • 1rII::' ~ a: • .) GOOSEBUMPS Michael Levy Jones, Patrick. What's So Scary about R. L. Stine? Lanham, Md.: Scarecrow Press, 1998.249 pages. ISBN: 0-8108- 3468-5.

Well, the R. L. Stine wave has apparently crested and his Goosebumps books have been replaced by Animorphs and Redwall as the most popular children's fantasy, science fiction, or horror series. Before we begin to feel sorry for Mr. Stine, however, it should be noted that both the Goosebumps and the Fear Street books still continue to outsell virtually all adult this side of Stephen King. Patrick Jones's What's So Scary about R. L. Stine? is the first volume in the new Scare­ crow Studies in Young Adult Literature, which is itself intended as a replacement for the now-defunct Twayne Young Adult Authors series. Many other additions to the series are currently in the planning stages, evidently, including volumes on such young-adult (yA) fantasy and science fiction writers as Robin McKinley and Margaret Mahy. As was the tradition in the Twayne series, this volume offers a solid, straightfotward survey of Stine's life and career. Jones begins by defending his choice of subject matter. Although it's true that Stine is not a writer worthy of comparison with such literary YA novelists as Robert Cormier and Richard Peck, Jones argues quite forcefully that it is worthwhile to analyze why Stine has been so enormously popular. What is it about his rather formulaic plotting and gross-out climaxes that so attract young readers? With more than 250 titles in print, most of them horror, a significant number also qualifying as science fiction, Stine's oeuvre cannot be analyzed on a book-by-book basis, so Jones concentrates on the major themes and techniques that run throughthe author's work. Before the first Goosebumps book was written, Stine had considerable success as an author of joke collections and then of multiple storyline books of the Choose Your Own Adventure sort, most of which were science fiction or fantasy. He later did a stint as head writer for the successful children's show Eureka's Castle. He got started on horror fiction in 1986 when Scholastic was looking for a way to cash in on the enormous success of Christopher Pike's early YA novels. Stine wrote Blind Date in three months, and this led first to the Fear Street series and then Goosebumps. Stine never looked back. Jones concludes his monograph with a detailed look at Stine's generally negative critical reception. Although even­ handed in his evaluation of this criticism, he suggests that much of it is based on either a mistrust of horror fiction in general or a dislike of series fiction, fiction that makes no attempt to be either literary or moral. He points out quite rightly that Stine's work, although occasionally rather gross, is much less terrifying than that of Stephen King and suggests that, after all, "reading is reading is reading." Perhaps it would be better if kids read more literary fiction, but in fact Stine has reached a large, gener­ ally male young adult audience that might otherwise not read anything at all. All in all, What's So Scary about R. L. Stine? strikes me as an excellent study of its type, one that bodes well for the entire Scarecrow Studies in Young Adult Literature series. R. L. Stine's work may not be worthy of consideration as literature per se, but its popularity is a significant indicator of certain important aspects of the contemporary American psyche. I enjoyed this clearly written, perceptive study and recommend it to anyone interested in what teenagers are reading today. e:::: ae~. ~ • LEnER TO THE EDITORS Dear Editors, In a book review in the Aug/Oct 1998 issue, Solomon Davidoff says that he "knows that most if not all" back-cover blurbs "are solicited with an added incentive (read: paycheck)" ... I have written a lot of blurbs. Most of them were solicited-how else would one know an unpublished novel existed? The few unsolicited ones I have written were for books by writers I know who showed me their work in MS, and I wrote the edi­ tor offering to blurb or review. No added incentive was ever offered me, by any publisher, for any blurb. (Read: no paycheck.) Unless you count a copy of the book when it comes out as a big incentive ... and some publishers don't even send one. A big disincentive of blurbing is the fact that authors who have done some blurbing may get three or four 350-page par­ cels a week, each with a cover letter from the editor saying this is the greatest thing since Homer and he knows I'll want to say so on the back cover. I scream when I see these things coming, and am pitifully grateful to editors who send a letter describing a MS and asking if I'll read it and possibly comment. Mostly I say no, sometimes I say yes; at least I get an illusion of choice. But never has there been mention of money. If the common practice really is to offer paychecks for blurbs, I'm a boob for doing it for free. And all the people who've blurbed my books are boobs too. (Hurray for boobs!) At this point I still believe that the common practice among writers is to give praise, and that only people involved in the manufacture of big-name- and other booklike objects would offer or take money for a blurb. But Mr. Davidoff's state­ ment shook me up, because I not only write blurbs, I read them and am influenced by them. And so I want to ask: Does every­ body "know" that blurbs are hired, are commodities for sale? If so, do you realize what your "knowledge" does to those of us who blurb only books we like, and do it because we like them and hope to help them get read? It makes our intentions, our work, and our words meaningless. That's heavy, man. Can anybody weigh into this with some real information?

Very truly yours, Ursula K. Le Guin Old Pilgrim

~.;.a. ~.:. •• .:. ~ CROATOAII ©1999 Laura Jacobsen SCIENCE FIOION RESEARCH ASSOCIA.,ION The SFRA is the oldest professional organization for the SFRA Revi(!W. Six issues per year. This newsletter/journal includes ex­ srudy of science fiction and fantasy literarure and film. Founded in tensive book reviews of both nonfiction and fiction, reviewarti­ 1970, the SFRA was organized to improve classroom teaching; to en­ cles, listings of new and forthcoming books, and letters. The Re­ courage and assist scholarship; and to evaluate and publicize new books vi(!W also prints news about SFRA internal affairs, calls for papers, and magazines dealing with fantastic literature and film, teaching updates on works in progress, and an annual index. methods and materials, and allied media performances. Among the membership are people from many countries---students, teachers, pro­ SFRA Optional Benefits fessors, librarians, futurologists, readers, authors, booksellers, editors, Foundation. Discounted subscription rate for SFRA members. Three publishers, archivists, and scholars in many disciplines. Academic af­ issues per year. British scholarly journal, with critical, historical, filiation is not a requirement for membership. and bibliographical articles, reviews, and letters. Add to dues: $27 Visit the SFRA Website at . An application for membership is available at this site. The N(!W York Revi(!W ofScimce Fiction. Discounted subscription rate for SFRA members. Twelve issues per year. Reviews and features. SFRA Benefits Add to dues: $25 domestic; $34 domestic first class; $27 domes­ Extrapolation. Four issues per year. The oldest scholarly journal in the tic institutional; $28 Canada; $36 overseas. field, with critical, historical, and bibliographical articles, book SFRA Listserv. The SFRA Listserv allows users with e-mail accounts to reviews, letters, occasional special topic issues, and an annual in­ post e-mails to all subscribers ofthelistserv, round-robin style. It dex. is used by SFRA members to discuss topics and news of interest Scimce-Fiction Studies. Three issues per year. This scholarly journal to the SF community. To sign on to the listserv or to obtain fur­ includes critical, historical, and bibliographical articles, review ther information, contact the list manager, Len Hatfield, at articles, reviews, notes, letters, international coverage, and an an­ [email protected]> or [email protected]>. He will nual index. subscribe you. An e-mail sent automatically to new subscribers SFRA Annual Dirt:ctory. One issue per year. Members' names, ad­ gives more information about the list. dresses, phone, e-mail addresses, and special interests.

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