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It's not the principles that kill you in the end, it's the books. - Michael Swanwick, The Iron Dragon's Daughter
What we cannot speak about we must pass over in silence. - Wittgenstein
Never express yourself more clearly than you think. - Niels Bohr
A labyrinthian man never looks for the truth, but only for his Ariadne. - Nietzsche
What else do you do with dark and sinister forces but play with them? - Deadlock, Khronicles of Khaos
There are three things that are real: God, human folly, and laughter. Since the first two pass our comprehension, we must do what we can with the third. - Valmiki, the Ramayana
If you want to tell the untold stories, if you want to give voice to the voiceless, you've got to find a language. Which goes for film as well as prose, for documentary as well as autobiography. Use the wrong language and you're dumb and blind. - Salman Rushdie
Even the oldest stories are new to somebody. - Neil Gaiman, The Kindly Ones
Perhaps Kafka laughed when he told stories... because one isn't always equal to oneself. - Primo Levi
When you set out for Ithaca, ask that your way be long. - Constantine Cavafy
"You can't do that", she said. "You can't have 'fairy tales' without 'fair'! And stuff you find out by determining what words are inside other words is never wrong. Now drink more tea." - Hitherby Dragons |
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 rionaleonhart |
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The Giedroyc-O'Leary-Dawson-Widdicombe episode of Would I Lie to You? just aired! It's a great episode; do watch it if you haven't yet ( here, for people in the UK, is the iPlayer link). I attended the recording of this, and I now have a little more to say about it. ( On a claim that was curiously absent from my original recording recap.Collapse )I have no idea how to end this entry. Erm. Have a cool animated fight scene? It's a trailer for something called RWBY, animated by Monty Oum, the guy who made the Dead Fantasy series of Final Fantasy/Dead or Alive crossover videos. 'Cool animated fight scenes' seem to be very much his thing. I don't usually much care for fight scenes, but I've watched the entirety of Dead Fantasy to date, and that's over half an hour of fighting. (The RWBY trailer is a much more manageable three-and-a-half minutes.) Tags: british comedians, dead or alive, final fantasy, recording recaps, rwby, watch this
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yrieithydd |
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Just said on Twitter that probably half of the Eucharists I've received at have been celebrated by female priests. ( Maths re the Eucharists I've attendedCollapse )This lunchtime I went to the New Room for their Communion for Wesley day and felt slight alienated by the fact the celebrant, both readers (which didn't include a gospel), the preacher, the two stewards and the organist were all male. Women had no role other than congregation member on the day. Of the 6 hymsn, 3 were by Chalres (fair enough given the day), 1 by Newton, 1 by Patrick Appleford and one was translated and versified by two women, from an Old Irish original, Ironically, their "I thy true Son" had been changed to "Thy child let me be" which felt tokenistic at best. IN fact, given the ancient privieges available to Sons not daughters, I'm perfectly happy to sing 'Son' there... Tags: female minsitry, mass
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jimhines |
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I’ve never been one for big cities. In some ways, I think of it as an extension of my introversion. Big cities = too many people, too much going on, and I get twitchy just thinking about it.
But I’ve watched my fellow authors do the occasional New York trip to visit with editors and agents, and it’s been strongly advised by a number of folks that I do the same, especially with the relative success of Libriomancer.
So when I received an invitation to moderate the Adult Book Bloggers Panel at Book Expo of America in New York, I was happy to say yes. I’m even happier now that I’ve been chatting with my panelists, including Sarah from Smart Bitches, Trashy Books — the woman responsible for making me do this — along with Mandi from Smexy Books and Rebecca from The Book Lady’s Blog.
My BEA schedule, excluding meetings and such, looks like so:
- 5/29, 11:15 a.m. – 12:05 p.m. — Book Blogging Panel.
- 5/31, 3:30 p.m. – 4 p.m. — Signing at the SFWA table.
- 6/1, 12 p.m. – 12:30 p.m. — “Meet the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America,” with myself, Jeri Smith-Ready, and Leanna Renee Hieber.
I am both excited and a bit intimidated. I’ve been to NYC once in my life, helping a friend move, and that was more than a decade ago. On the other hand, I’ll be spending time with a lot of great people, and attending an event devoted to the awesomeness of books. How can you not love that?
So blogging will be light to nonexistent next week. This will be my first time at BEA, and my second time in NYC (the first was more than a decade ago, helping a friend move, and I didn’t see that much of the city). My plan is to try to have fun, hopefully collect some books, and shamelessly gawk at everything.
Wish me luck, and if you’re going to be at BEA, then I hope to see you there!
Mirrored from Jim C. Hines.
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tithenai |
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No time to tidy things or do anything and also super awesomely I am sick now. So great. So helpful. My Wiscon schedule! More later!
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As |
Schedule |
Location |
| British Women SF Writers (scheduled) |
moderator |
Fri, 4:00–5:15 pm |
Conference 4 |
| Moderator: Amal El-Mohtar. |
| Ever since Mary Shelley, there have been British women writing science fiction, as well as a long history of women writing in gothic and fantastical modes. Can we talk about any actual tradition, or are there factors militating against this? Writing in speculative mode has been perhaps more accepted as part of high literary tradition in the UK, which has perhaps tended to discourage intragenre dialogue or indeed, the development of a specific sense of genre. (Can we contrast the crime novel and the significance of women writers in the development of the British mystery?) Who are the writers who might be included? What are their influences? |
| Women's Speculative Poetry Now (scheduled) |
participant |
Fri, 9:00–10:15 pm |
Conference 4 |
| Moderator: Lesley Wheeler. |
| Ursula K. Le Guin publishes Finding My Elegy: New and Selected Poems; Tracy K. Smith's science fiction-y collection Life on Mars wins a Pulitzer; Aqueduct issues The Moment of Change, an anthology of feminist speculative verse. If you were standing at the intersection of poetry and speculative fiction, 2012 was an interesting year. In this roundtable, poets, critics, and editors take turns briefly addressing several interlocking questions: What are the most interesting developments in 21st century speculative poetry by women? Where's the action—what magazines, presses, and virtual / physical communities are fostering those trends? What are the audiences—how are these poets reaching readers and listeners? We'll devote much of the allotted time to an exploratory conversation involving the roundtable audience. |
| Queers Dig Time Lords (scheduled) |
participant |
Sat, 10:00–11:15 am |
Senate B |
| Moderator: Sigrid Ellis. |
| We do! Dig Time Lords! Join some of the contributors to Mad Norwegian Press's anthology, Queers Dig Time Lords, as they discuss their love of, joy in, and frustrations with the complicated world of Doctor Who. |
| Queers Dig Time Lords (scheduled) |
participant |
Sat, 1:00–2:15 pm |
Michelangelos |
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| Contributors to Mad Norwegian Press's Queers Dig Time Lords read from their work. |
| Open Secrets: a Speculative Poetry Reading (scheduled) |
participant |
Sat, 2:30–3:45 pm |
Senate B |
|
| Members of the Secret Poetry Cabal (a speculative poetry group) will read their work. |
| Playing with the Shiny Muse (scheduled) |
participant |
Sat, 4:00–5:15 pm |
Room 634 |
| Moderator: Elise Matthesen. |
| Elise Matthesen was nominated for a World Fantasy Award in 2009 "for setting out to inspire and for serving as inspiration for works of poetry, fantasy, and SF over the last decade through her jewelry-making and her 'artist's challenges.'" Jo Walton has gotten necklaces for several of her novels and written poetry inspired by new work posted online by Elise. Others have written short stories, poetry, and songs. Every WisCon, ten to twenty percent of the membership writes haiku for earrings. What's useful and interesting about playing with the shiny muse? How does that work? |
| Contemporary Fantasy and Science Fiction from the Muslim World (scheduled) |
moderator |
Sun, 2:30–3:45 pm |
Capitol A |
| Moderator: Amal El-Mohtar. |
| A lot has happened since One Thousand and One Nights. Come and hear panelists discuss contemporary fantasy and science fiction from the Muslim world! We'll talk about works by Muslim authors from different countries, both those available in English and those still awaiting translation. We welcome audience participation, so come with questions; we'll bring our reading experience and boundless enthusiasm. A dystopian Cairo, a water planet and a magic library await you! |
Tags: fandom, travel, wiscon
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lizw |
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... now up on Flickr. Also, Spotify is being sentient ;-) As I went to post this, it started playing Heather Alexander's Sword and Staff, which starts "Circlet of the Holy Thorn..." (and mentions a Sacred Spring, too, but that's less place-specific.) This entry was cross-posted from Dreamwidth, where there are currently  comment(s). View DW comment(s).Tags: druidry, flickr, glastonbury, paganism, photos, spotify, technopagan
Current Mood:  amused
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treaseproject |
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Our perceptions of the latter part of the twentieth century however have been distorted by Robert Leeson’s comments in“The Spirit of What Age,?’The interpretation of History from a Radical Standpoint”, in Children’s Literature in Education (1976) he writes that he sampled around two dozen books (check). I find that fourteen lean towards the Royalist side, some horizontally; five are in the increasingly familiar area of ‘conflict of loyalties’, and the other four we may be said to do justice to the Parliamentary side. (176) Because Leeson does not give his breakdown I cannot accuse him of an outright distortion but I suspect him of including earlier texts such as Children of the New Forest, which was adapted for television in 1955, 1964, and 1977 and later in a rather distorted version in 1998, but by my figures the post war result is as follows: (I have not included the 40s but honours are even to Trease and Lane). 1950s K7 P4 N0 1960s K6 P3 N1 1970 (inc Leeson) K0 P3 N3 Totals: K13 P10 N1 One of the “neutral” titles is Ronald Welch’s For the King (1969) which, if not read carefully, for all its ambivalences and disdain of the Royalists, might be classified otherwise, but it is clear that by the 1970s the trend has swung solidly towards Parliament or to neutral, and if we discount Sally Gardiner’s I, Coriander (date?) which is a fantasy and not particularly interested in historical veracity, it has stayed that way. This entry was originally posted at http://treaseproject.dreamwidth.org/4823.html. Please comment there using OpenID.
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rionaleonhart |
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I've finally played Chrono Trigger! When I was a teenager, Chrono Trigger was a source of immense frustration to me because everyone on the Internet seemed to rave about it, but it had never been released in Europe. In 2009, fourteen years after its original release, it finally reached these shores as a DS remake. And now I've played it! To be honest, it wasn't quite as amazing and sparkly and magnificent as I was led to believe by years and years of hype, but it was still a lot of fun. The battle system is excellent, as is the soundtrack, and I like pretty much all the characters. There are a lot of lovely tiny touches in this game; I was rather charmed to realise that, when Marle misses an enemy, she gives an embarrassed laugh. Ayla is the best. I thought her caveman speech patterns would become tiresome before long, but they actually turned out to be incredibly endearing. And I love that all the other characters have to do a million sidequests and give the world's greatest weaponsmiths the world's strongest materials and power up legendary swords if they want to get anywhere near the damage Ayla can deal just by using her fists. I found renaming Magus a bit strange. All the other characters give you the 'rename' screen before their name is mentioned in-game. When the 'rename' screen popped up for Magus, everyone had been calling him 'Magus' for a long time. I assumed the screen represented a chance for him to cast off his old name and adopt a new identity, so I renamed him 'Esthar'; the colour of his hair reminded me of the futuristic city in Final Fantasy VIII. But then everyone who'd called him Magus before was suddenly calling him Esthar, even if they had no reason to know he'd changed his name! It made no sense! Presumably Magus liked my new name for him so much that he went through a Time Gate when I wasn't looking and wrote it into his history. Towards the end, during the fight with Lavos, I found myself thinking, 'If we don't at some point go inside Lavos and walk around, I know nothing about Squaresoft.' I'm glad that my faith in Square's love of stupid final battle locations did not let me down. I'm starting to wonder whether I should replay Final Fantasy VII. Playing Chrono Trigger at last has put me in a mood for Square RPGs, and I really want to like Final Fantasy VII. I'm sure I'm capable of liking it. I slightly resent VII for three main reasons: - the translation is lacking (I don't have a problem with 'Aeris' and I can cope with the typos, but sometimes the dialogue just feels awkward to me), - my memory card broke just before the final boss fight on my first playthrough, meaning I've never actually finished it, and - the comments of every Final Fantasy-related thing on the Internet are filled with irritating VII fans baying for a remake and using VII to put down later games in the series, particularly VIII and XIII, both of which I adore. But two of those reasons don't have anything to do with VII itself, so I shouldn't really hold those against it, should I? I think it might be time to give VII another chance. Maybe I'll actually be able to follow the plot this time. Tags: chrono trigger, final fantasy, final fantasy vii, first impressions
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elettaria |
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In the wake of the Woolwich murder, I've been reading a few people who are horrified and alarmed at the strongly racist response that's occurring, both in the media and amongst the general public. This IS my home, you racist swine is an article by a woman talking about her experiences of "'my difference' or to put it in correct terms 'other peoples' racism'". She's Asian British, and I've also been reading responses from people who are black British, or immigrants who are white British. All this has made me think about racism, ethnicity and identity politics, and how they affect me. ( Read more...Collapse )To return to the Woolwich situation, I also want to say that I too am absolutely horrified at the amount of racism coming out in response, and concerned about the safety of people of colour and Muslims. I'm thinking of you, and I hope you stay safe. Tags: ethnicity, identity, judaism, racism
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