Womack and Gibson the Truth Is in Here
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POKÉ HARAM! LONG IN THE TOOTH AND CLAW THE WORLD'S OLDEST ANIMALS WHY RELIGIOUS EXTREMISTS STREWTH, IT'S PELTING PERCH! FISH FALLS IN THE OZ OUTBACK WANT POKÉMON TO GO! RHEAS ON THE RUN OUTSIZED AVIAN ESCAPE ARTISTS THE WOR THE WORLD OF STRANGE PHENOMENA LD’S LADY GHOSTBUSTERS • ROSWELL WRECK • WELSH HOLY GRAIL • MACHNOWWWW.FORTEANTIMES.COM THE GIANT WEIRDES FORTEAN TIMES 345 NEWS T THE WORLD OF STRANGE PHENOMENA WWW.FORTEANTIMES.COM FT345 OCTOBER 2016 £4.25 GIBSON AND WOMACK TALK UFOS • MANUSCRIPTS OF MYSTERY • THE TRUTH IS IN HERE WILLIAM FA GIBSON SHION VICTIMS • MACHNOW THE GIANT • WORLD'S OLDEST ANIMALS • LADY GHOSTBUSTERS AND JACK WOMACK TALK UFOS MANUSCRIPTS MESSAGES FATALFROCKS& OCTOBER 2016 OFMYSTERY FROMTHEMOON KILLERCORSETS VOYNICH AND OTHER READING THE NASA HISTORY'S WEIRDEST BAFFLING BOOKS APOLLO TRANSCRIPTS FASHION VICTIMS LISTEN IT JUST MIGHT CHANGE YOUR LIFE LIVE | CATCH UP | ON DEMAND Fortean Times 345 strange days Pokémon versus religion, world’s oldest creatures, fate of Flight MH370, rheas on the run, Bedfordshire big cat, female ghostbusters, Australian fi sh fall, Apollo transcripts, avian CONTENTS drones, pornographer’s papyrus – and much more. 05 THE CONSPIRASPHERE 23 MYTHCONCEPTIONS 14 ARCHAEOLOGY 25 ALIEN ZOO the world of strange phenomena 15 CLASSICAL CORNER 28 NECROLOG 16 SCIENCE 29 FAIRIES & FORTEANA 18 GHOSTWATCH 30 THE UFO FILES features COVER STORY 32 FROM OUTER SPACE TO YOU JACK WOMACK has been assembling his collection of UFO-related books for half a century, gradually building up a visual and cultural history of the saucer age. Fellow writer and fortean WILLIAM GIBSON joined him to celebrate a shared obsession with pulp ufology, printed forteana and the search for an all too human truth... 38 MANUSCRIPTS OF MYSTERY 32 FROM OUTER SPACE TO YOU From all the coverage it has received, you might be Jack Womack shares his incredible UFO collection with William Gibson forgiven for thinking that the Voynich Manuscript is the only mysterious and undeciphered volume in existence. True, it is probably the strangest, with its unique text and hermetic illustrations, but it is certainly not alone. IAN SIMMONS enters the Library of Babel in search of other unreadable oddities… 44 FASHION VICTIMS This month’s Fashion Weeks in London, Paris, New York and Milan will no doubt witness some strange creations, but this is nothing new. Throughout history, people have tried to stand out from the herd by turning to fashion, even when the results could be bizarre, harmful and even fatal. MARIA J PÉREZ CUERVO reports from the runway. forum 53 A new home for the Nanteos Cup by Ted Harrison 54 Poked by a Pokémon! by SD Tucker AFP / GETTY IMAGES 4POKÉ HARAM 44 FASHION VICTIMS reports Religious extremists want Pokémon to go! Fatal frocks and killer cosmetics 50 BUILDING A FORTEAN LIBRARY No 13. Greed, God, beards – and duels 74 STORIES FROM THE ILLUSTRATED POLICE NEWS No 50. Machnow the Giant regulars SCHER / AFP / GETTY IMAGES FI 02 EDITORIAL 73 IT HAPPENED TO ME GREGOR 25 TELLING PORKIES? 38 MANUSCRIPTS OF MYSTERY 57 REVIEWS 79 PHENOMENOMIX In search of the Hungarian Fisher Pig The world’s weirdest books 69 LETTERS 80 STRANGE DEATHS COVER: IMAGE FROM FLYING SAUCERS ARE REAL! PUBLISHED BY ANTHOLOGY EDITIONS. FT343 1 www.forteantimes.com fortean times editor dAVid SUttoN ([email protected]) foUNdiNg editorS bob rickArd ([email protected]) pAUl SieVekiNg ([email protected]) Art director etieNNe gilfillAN ([email protected]) editorial book reViewS editor VAl SteVeNSoN ([email protected]) reSideNt cArtooNiSt HUNt emerSoN The coming of the saucers SUbScriptioN eNqUirieS ANd bAck iSSUeS www.subsinfo.co.uk [email protected] librAriES of bAbEl work of Carl Pabst, who had laboured heroically FORTEAN TIMES is produced for Dennis Publishing by Wild Talents Ltd. Postal address: Fortean Times, This issue has emerged with a somewhat in deciphering the tiny squares of paper filled PO BOX 71602, London E17 0QD. bookish theme. News that a Spanish publisher with Fort’s crabbed shorthand, a small portion You can manage your existing subscription through was planning to print a facsimile of the of which was then published in the journal http://www.subsinfo.co.uk/ – this should be your first port famously enigmaticVoynich Manuscript – an Pursuit between 1978 and 1989. Dr Reed then of call if you have any queries about your subscription. ‘unreadable’ text of curious provenance that began scanning Pabst’s card indexes, which Change your address, renew your subscription or report problems has baffled scholars and cryptographers for a pass to Mr X to transcribe as digital text. In an UK subscriptions: 0844 844 0049 century – prompted Ian Simmons to examine email to us on 6 August – Fort’s birthday – Mr X USA & Canada subscriptions: (+1) 800-428-3003 (toll free) it, and other ‘manuscripts of mystery’ (p38); says that their work began in December 2014 Fax (+1) 757-428-6253 email [email protected] Other overseas subscriptions: +44 (0)1795 592 909 elsewhere (p50), the Hierophant’s Apprentice and, to date, they have transcribed more of the Fax: +44 (0)1795 414 555 continues to advise you on how to assemble notes than Pabst, and before him Thayer (in your own Library of Babel, Doubt between 1937 and 1951) licEnSinG & SYnDicAtion Fortean times IS AvAILABLE FOR tackling that classic managed to publish.This work, INTERNATIONAL LICENSINg AND SYNDICATION – CONTACT: study of human folly in thus far, can be accessed at Mr Syndication Senior Manager ANj DOSAj-HALAI TEL: +44- (0) 20 7907 6132 its many forms, Mackay’s X’s website – www.resologist. [email protected] Extraordinary Popular net/notes/ – marshalled in Licensing Manager CARLOTTA SERANTONI TEL: +44- (0) 20 7907 6550 Delusions and the Madness groups of five or 10 years [email protected] of Crowds. between 1800 and 1860.Those Licensing & Syndication Assistant NICOLE ADAMS TEL: +44- (0) 20 7907 6134 We’re also thrilled to familiar with Fort’s originals [email protected] welcome two titans of will be interested to learn YoU cAn rEAcH ft on tHE intErnEt speculative fiction to our that Mr X has created a single www.forteantimes.com pages this month. Jack chronological sequence, where Womack – whose highly Thayer and Pabst followed © Copyright Dennis Publishing Limited fortean work was the Fort’s eccentric system of subject of an article a few several sequences which often pUbliSHed bY prodUctioN execUtiVe years back (see Robert split between several different lAwreNce brookeS deNNiS pUbliSHiNg, 020 7907 6062 Guffey’s “A Truly Fortean boxes. Mr X details both Fort’s 30 cleveland Street lawrence_brookes@ SF Writer”, FT236:53) – has and his working abbreviations london w1t 4Jd, Uk dennis.co.uk spent 50 years assembling and simplifies the references tel: 020 7907 6000 AdVertiSiNg director SteVe NicolAoU an astonishing collection of to the eight great catalogues of groUp pUbliSHer 020 7907 6633 printed sauceriana: bizarre quakes, meteorites, eruptions iAN weStwood steve_nicolaou@ books, pulp paperbacks and tornadoes used by Fort. 020 7907 6000 dennis.co.uk and strange pamphlets Dr Reed writes: “Mr X circUlAtioN mANAger SAleS execUtiVe testifying to the UFO is making an enormous JAmeS mANgAN brAdleY beAVer james.mangan@ 020 7907 6701 mania that gripped the contribution to the fortean seymour.co.uk bradley_beaver@ West through the Cold War, the Space Age and community by making the Fort notes available export circUlAtioN dennis.co.uk beyond. Luckily for the rest of us, some of the to the world. But he is doing an even greater mANAger SAleS execUtiVe gerAldiNe grobler imogeN williAmS gems from this cache of ufological ephemera service by identifying the original, full geraldine.grobler@ 020 7907 6247 have been handsomely collected in a new book bibliographic citation for each of Fort’s notes, seymour.co.uk imogen_williams@ entitled UFOs Are Real. Defining the nature which Fort never did in either his four books or dennis.co.uk of that reality has provided grist to many a in the notes at the New York Public Library. Fort PrintED BY WYNDEHAM BICESTER mill over the years, and in this issue it’s the would usually just note an abbreviated form of DiStribUtion subject of a fascinating personal discussion the source, so that one has to usually do some Distributed in UK, ireland and worldwide between Jack and SF legend (and fellow FT real digging to find the actual source.” by Seymour Distribution Ltd. 2 East Poultry Avenue, London EC1A 9PT reader) William Gibson (p32). Not everyone As a motherlode of raw data gathered from Tel: 020 7429 4000 / Fax: 020 7429 4001 will agree with their views on where the ‘truth’ the newspapers and scientific publications of Queries on overseas availability should be emailed to [email protected] of the UFO experience lies, but I suspect most the time, these notes will be of inestimable Speciality store distribution by Worldwide Magazine readers will recognise the way most of us first value to researchers into all kinds of anomalies. Distribution Ltd, Tel: 0121 788 3112 Fax: 0121 788 1272 encountered it and other fortean subjects: This is a long-term project done for the love of it StAnDArD SUbScriPtion rAtES 12 issues: UK £39.98; EU £47.50 turning a spinner rack of yellowing paperbacks and the benefit of posterity; for which, on behalf in some long-vanished shop. That the modern of forteans everywhere, we extend our sincere fortean times (USPS 023-226) is published every four weeks by Dennis Publishing Ltd, 30 Cleveland Street, London, W1P 4JD, United Kingdom. UFO mythos has been mediated in no small appreciation to Mr X and Dr Reed. The US annual subscription price is $89.99.