June Reading

 In addition to getting through books by my ten remaining Avon/Equinox Rediscovery authors, I managed two non-related books as well.  Reading continues to be a major pastime for me, with no end in sight yet for my project, now in its sixth year.  As usual, the month began with a novel by Robert Silverberg.  Tower of Glass is from 1970, and Silverberg already had captured the essence of a multi-billionaire's ego.  Krug is the richest man alive, with ambitions to match his wealth.  When a signal from space arrives indicating intelligent alien life, he sets out to build a communication tower.  This tower will be able to return a signal faster than light.  Krug wants to meet aliens before he dies, or at least talk with them.  The tower is being built west of Hudson's Bay, and it's a big one, all right.  However, the main theme of the novel appears to be the relationship between the fully human and the somewhat human AIs who do all the actual work.  Both themes intertwine to make a fascinating tale of the near future.  As we watch today's billionaires compete to be the first in space, and AI intelligence continues to be refined, this is not such a far fetched story 51 years after it was written.

Next I read Kiai! by Piers Anthony, a very early work by him focusing on a judo expert entering a mixed martial arts contest.  This work is quite terrible, and no doubt contributed to the disdain and disbelief most people have today regarding martial arts.  It is the first of a series, so I might try one more later on.  At this point I am trying the first book of each series Anthony wrote before deciding to continue of with them.

Winter In Eden is Harry Harrison's 1986 sequel to West of Eden, his major "what if" series about what might have transpired if the big meteor had not struck Earth.  In general I am bored by books about prehistoric humans.  But Farmer wrote a great one, and Harrison, a much better writer, has written a wonderful history novel.  The characters and races become a bit more complex, and new people are added to the epic tale.  All in all a good read, with one more novel in the set to go.

Roller Coaster World is from 1972, and is Bulmer's last single novel.  Now I only have his series to attack.  Bulmer sort of lost his way lately with exposition, but if readers stick to it, another good, solid SF novel emerges from the initial chaos.  At heart it's a hopeless love story, and would make a great film or series.  Several of  Bulmer's latest books go to a lot of trouble to set up an entire world and culture, only to end it permanently after the first book.  He seemed to have a mind for series later on, but managed to keep things to only the first book.  This story is about a human colony that thrives on the life-giving radiation a planet gives off.  Only the radiation has been dying out, leaving people feeling very poorly, indeed.

E.C. Tubb's Pandora's Box was written in 1954, but not published until the mid 1990s.  The story is really constructed well, and involves the smuggling of dangerous spores to Earth from Venus, sent by a mad professor to end all life on the planet.  But before we get near that aspect of the story, it begins on the Moon, at a customs station.  We meet John Weston, an honest customs agent who has a unique knack for finding smugglers.  He is saddled with Marge, a wife who likes to spend big.  John was once a space pilot, but lost his commission, along with his big salary.  Marge continues to spend regardless.  And so we come to the set up.  If John will allow one smuggler through, he will be well paid.  Once the smuggler has clear access to deliver his package (which he thinks are seeds for illegal drugs), then the story shifts to Venus.  A really good tale, by one of the best pulp writers to have ever taken up a typewriter.

Wall Around A Star, from 1983, concludes the Saga of Cuckoo, by Jack Williamson and Frederik Pohl.  The series consists of two books, both confusing due to the number of major characters involved, and the number of alien races.  It seems unusually cluttered, with enough characters to have lasted for five or six books, if they had been slowly introduced to us over time.  But concepts, ideas, plots, characters, and races are all thrown at us quite breathlessly.  The central story is excellent, about an incoming solar system size entity about to invade our galaxy.  In book one, everything was still pretty much a mystery regarding this object (called Cuckoo by the investigators).  Book two provides full explanations for everything, which is a relief.  However, some of these explanations are a bit far fetched and difficult to swallow.  This second book isn't as fun as the first book, and the series itself is certainly not required reading for diehard SF fans.  Still, there is a lot to ponder in here, if you can keep the characters straight in your mind.

Michael Moorcock's conclusion to his 2nd Corum trilogy is called The Sword and the Stallion.  It marks a strong finish to a really decent sword and sorcery series featuring a troubled and put upon hero (Corum), helping for the sixth and final time to put down evil and restore decency to the world.  The only problem with Moorcock's final solution (as per usual for him), is that the evil has rendered such destruction, mayhem, and murder that there really isn't much of a world remaining.  I will continue with his eternal champion theme next month, as I begin a new series with a (mostly) new hero.

Next up was Volume 2 of Ballard's shorter fiction, another 750 pages of mostly very good short stories.  I have once again chopped it into three segments, meaning that I still have two months of Ballard reading remaining.  Last month I read 14 stories from 1964 to 1968.  Despite a few clunkers.  The best of them, the ones that should seriously be sought out, include The Lost Leonardo, The Terminal Beach, The Illuminated Man (the first, much shorter version of The Crystal World), The Recognition, and, perhaps the finest story ever written (I know I've said this before with Ballard's works--I can't help it), The Cloud-Sculptors of Coral D.

The Sodom and Gomorrah Business by Barry Malzberg is from 1974, and continues his long winning streak in writing some of the most provocative fiction ever penned.  And there is always great storytelling going on, too.  This could be considered one of the weirdest road movie plots every created, as two cadets sneak out of their safe training haven in a 1964 Cadillac, and encounter the real world, head on.  Inspired by Anthony Burgess and Kubrick, the beginning owes a lot to Clockwork Orange.  The rest reminds me a bit of Budrys' writing, with a good solid chunk of Malzberg thrown in the mix, too.  A truly awesome writer.

Galactic Cluster contains 8 stories by master SF writer James Blish, all from the 1950s.  Six of the eight are truly fantastic tales, still resonating after almost 70 years!  Common Time, A Work of Art (Iain Banks??), Nor Iron Bars (in which a space ship ends up orbiting inside an atom!), Beep, and This Earth of Hours would all go on to influence SF writing for decades to come.  It's easy to see how and why.

Now we turn to the two books read not relating to my overall reading project.  These are books that have been on my reading shelf for years.  I am trying to clear off that shelf (about 20 books remaining on it), and it is slowly happening.  The hard part is trying not to add anything new to it!  Most new books are going on my Kindle, once the hard copies are read.  Even though I hope to read the complete Jules Verne (Kindle, $1.00), I had a hard copy of Carpathian Castle, a science based Gothic horror novel set in and near a small Carpathian village.  The story is told with humour, especially regarding the superstitious beliefs of the locals, but all the usual Gothic nonsense is also included.  The book is hard to put down once begun.  Despite all of the weird things that (seem) to go, they all have a scientific basis, explained at the end.  But the book's main flaw, which isn't explained, is why the (bad) Baron had to blow up his castle at the end.  He actually had done nothing wrong!  I am going to use parts of this story in my upcoming third Valeria the Vegetarian Vampire story, as her family goes to Eastern Europe on holiday.

Lastly comes a truly amazing and wonderful book by Kenneth Grahame, illustrated by Maxfield Parrish, called The Golden Age.  When we were studying for our education degree back in 1979-80, we learned all of the major theories of learning, and how children's minds work at different stages of their lives.  Piaget comes to mind here, especially as to his theory about concrete versus abstract thought processes.  This Grahame novel consists of many very short tales of childhood adventures and doings, wonderfully told (for adults) from a child's perspective, and illustrating better than anywhere I have ever seen exactly how children think concretely.  There are continuous laughs on every page, as well as some of the tenderest moments one could ever hope to live through.  This book is a real treasure, published by Dover.  I bought it new years ago from a store in Detroit, and wish I'd read it when I was still teaching.  It should be required reading for beginning teachers.

That (almost) takes care of this month's reading.  But I am going to add a new feature starting this month, for those of you not willing to tackle by Avon/Equinox webpage (see left margin for a link).  I will choose the best cover of books read over the past month, and post it here for your viewing pleasure.

Best cover of the month award goes to Charles Moll. 

Mapman Mike

Tropics Come To Amherstburg

 It's usually hot and humid here in the good old summertime, but things have certainly been taken up a notch or two this week.  Detroit was flooded badly on Friday night and Saturday, though we escaped the worst.  We ended up with just over 3" of rain for the week (so far).  Some parts of Detroit got more than twice that at one go.  Google traffic maps showed almost the entire freeway system over there flooded, and filled with stranded cars. The forecast for the rest of the week reads like the monsoon season somewhere near the equator-hot, humid, with frequent storms each day and night.  During a welcome break from rain yesterday I managed to cut the two lawns that border the house, so I am caught up for now.  But the weeds in the garden are growing a foot each week, and there are too many mosquitoes to even think about going in there.  On top of this, it is fish fly season, and while cutting the front lawn I was surrounded by about 7 billion of them.  They don't bite, but they fly into ears, eyes, nose, and mouth.  Parts of my tractor ride could have been filmed for a horror movie, only I would never have been paid enough to do it.

A flooded freeway in Detroit.  Note the kayak!

 

Another flooded freeway in Detroit yesterday.  Several main arteries are still closed.

In movie news, I combined my two choices last week into one big one, a four hour version of the 1991 Taiwanese film A Brighter Summer Day, directed by Edward Yang.  Using a lot of adolescent non-actors, the first half of the film talks about the situation in Taipei in 1961.  Street gangs roamed at night, fighting for territory as the adults around them are mostly unaware and/or unconcerned about their behaviour.  The second half of the film narrows it down more to one family.  The 2nd half seemed to be smoother and more story-centered than the first half, which quickly (for me) became quite tiresome.  This is one of the international films restored by Scorcese's film preservation society, the full version being shown in a pristine print since 2015, once thought lost.  It was unseen in any version for over 20 years.  Definitely worth watching, especially for the camera work and composition, and the way the director uses his space with his actors.  The central incident in the film, a young boy killing his girlfriend, is based on an actual event in Taiwan.  The movie came with hours of features, but so far we watched only three, including a wonderful interview with the adult version of the boy who plays the lead role.

Now showing on Criterion Channel. 

Deb's first film choice for this weekend was The Revolt of Mamie Stover, from 1956 and directed by Raoul Walsh.  It stars Jane Russell and Richard Egan, who meet as the only passengers on a freight steamer from San Francisco to Hawaii.  She has just been escorted out of town by the police, and is looking for a fresh start.  They fall in love on the boat, and even more once in Hawaii.  She works at a dance hall, on commission for how many drinks she can sell.  He is a rich man living in a mansion on a hilltop.  The time is 1941, and one fine Sunday the Japanese decide to bomb Pearl Harbor.  He enlists, and she promises to quit the racket.  They will be married after the war. However, she doesn't quit, making even more money.  When he finds out, he returns to break off the engagement.  With fine acting, a beautiful colour print filmed in Hawaii, and a strange ending, the film is not at all what people might expect from a Jane Russell film.  Definitely worth catching.

Now showing on Criterion. 

 

A few moments ago I was talking about how our house and yard are being overgrown in a serious way.  Though this happens every summer, it is much worse this year.  A warm, wet spring got things going early, and though we had control until about mid-May, we have firmly lost control again until the autumn.  We have a tree service coming Monday to see about removing some fast, pesky growing trees.  But overall, things are much like a jungle around here.  Somehow Ruisdael seems to capture the mood nicely in today's work of art from the DIA, another fine landscape print by the master.  Not everyone in his day could afford to purchase an original oil painting, but most modestly-incomed people could afford to buy a print or two. Today, not many can even afford to buy one of his prints.  There is some slight irony here, I'm sure.  And now you have an idea of what our yard looks like.

 

Cottage On The Summit Of The Hill, 17th C. Jacob van Ruisdael, Dutch, 1628 or 29-1682.  Etching and drypoint printed in black ink on laid paper, 8" x 11".  Collection Detroit Institute of Arts.

 

Detail of left side.

 

Detail of right side.

Detail of the cottage. 

 

I will hopefully return at the end of the month with the monthly reading report.  Please come back often. 

Mapman Mike

 

 
 

 

 

In The Good Old Summertime

 If only summer could be like today.  Sun, clouds, and a high around 19C.  Glorious!  But rare.  We've already had more than a month of summer heat, and July is still far off.  Not to mention the rain.  Monday night's storms dumped 2.1" of rain in the rain gauge.  Even so, I managed to cut the far back lawn today.  No damage here, but more lightning than one would normally see in an entire year.

For Solstice we didn't do much this year.  No day trip, nothing too special.  Lots of great music inside, and a wonderful Leffe Brown Ale.  We were able to sit out back for an hour, admiring the wall of green that encloses us there, and we saw a gorgeous sunset, literally covering 180 degrees of the sky. Aside from that, it was pretty quiet.  Until the storms began, at 9 pm.

 

View from our back deck.  We are surrounded by a wall of green.

 

Summer Solstice sunset, from our front window.  This sunset went through several phases, including having the entire sky lit up at one point. 

 

In movie news, here are Deb's two picks from last weekend.  First up was a Czech film from 1970, called Valerie and Her Week of Wonders.  A short but unforgettable film, it seems to be a cross between Alice and Nosferatu.  An innocent thirteen year girl encounters vampires in her village, and a whole lot else.  Some wonderful weirdness is on display.  Deb finds it captures some of the flavour of Eastern European folk tales quite well.  It reminds me of what a psychotronic drug trip might be like.  Enjoyable, but very strange.

Now showing on Criterion.

Her going away choice was Horse Feathers, from 1932, featuring the Marx Brothers.  While not one of their classic films, there are enough great jokes to easy keep things lively during this short film.  Lines such as "You should drill a hole in yourself and let the sap run out," and "Was that you talking just now, or the duck?"  And then there is the football game, and a few funny Groucho sung songs.  The brothers are in good form here.

Showing on Criterion until June 30th. 

 

In art news, in summer I often feature a different print by Hiroshige on our desktop everyday.  he is one of my favourite artists, and the DIA has a few choice prints by him.  Here is a beauty!  If this doesn't signify a lovely summer moment, than I have nothing else for you today.

 

View of Toto, ca 1842, Utagawa Hiroshige 1, Japanese, 1797-1858.  Woodcut printed in colour.  8" x 13.5".  Collection of the Detroit Institute of Arts.

 

Detail, left side.

Detail, right side.

Further detail, right side.
 

Mapman Mike

 

 

The Longest Day

Today, Sunday, was the final day of Spring.  However, we have already had more than a month of summer and summer temps.  There is no shortage of rain here, but hot temps have been persistent.  A week of cool weather is forecast, however, and we are looking forward to it.  The weeds are taller than we are, and all gardens need attention badly.  In a 15 minute blitz yesterday we filled two huge lawn waste bags.  We need a few hours of that to get the yard back to where we can say we are in control.

We are celebrating Solstice on Monday, the first full day of summer.  Not much planned in the way of special activities.  We might take a drive, but probably won't.  The garage needs a bit of paint, and a door salesman is coming tomorrow morning at 10 am.

Last Thursday I went to Kingsville, dropping Deb off at her mom's LTC home, and then going to Lakeside Park again to read for a few hours.  It was a beautiful day, with a cool breeze off Lake Erie.  That has been my only non-essential outing of late.

 

Lake Erie, on a very pleasant late spring afternoon.  The baby geese were all gone.

Looking south across Lake Erie from Lakeside Park, Kingsville.

 In movie news, I am behind again in my exclusive reporting.  Deb's going away pick from last weekend was Shaft's Big Score, from 1972.  Richard Roundtree is back, but the Isaac Hayes score and song are not, nor is the white police lieutenant.  Nowhere near as engaging as the first Shaft film, this one does have a pretty exciting finale, with a helicopter kamikaze pilot chasing Shaft through some docklands scenery that is rather death-defying.  However, it isn't really worth the time to watch it.

Showing on Criterion until June 30th.    

Next came my choices from last week.  From the main list I chose Zatoichi Meets Yojimbo, from 1970.  With a title like that, and Toshiro Mifune reprising his role, what could go wrong?  A masterpiece, right?  The first thing to go wrong was the very lame script, one of the worst of any samurai film ever seen.  It plodded along as if it had all the time in the world, and as if it didn't matter what was in the script, because with the two lead actors, what could go wrong?  Well, those two great actors had absolutely no chemistry in this movie.  Their scenes together are among the least memorable of the film.  A huge disappointment!

Now showing on Criterion.

 My going away film was Bertrand Tavernier's A Sunday In The Country, from 1984.  A sweet film, it can be added to the list of decent films that have virtually nothing earth-shattering that happens in them.  These almost Zen-like films are among my favourite kind.  In this one, an elderly painter in turn-of-the-century France welcomes his son and his wife and their three children for their weekly Sunday visit.  The younger daughter also arrives, but unexpectedly.  She visits her father less often, but she is his favourite.  A lovely film.

Leaving Criterion June 30th. 

Last Friday Jenn G. visited.  We got caught up during her nice long outdoor visit, and we shared 5 different ales.  There was food all day, too!  She is off to B.C. for six weeks at the end of June, returning mid-August.  That was our first social event since last autumn!  We are in constant touch on Messenger, and she watches Criterion!  I'm hoping to get her subscribed to the upcoming DSO season, too, where we could meet several times next year for ale, food, and music.  However, it was just announced that the border with the US will remained closed at least through July 22nd.  I'd say it's just about time to reopen.

Mapman Mike

 

The Roses of June

As I have mentioned in earlier posts, this has been a banner year for flowering shrubs.  In fact, it is the most wondrous flowering event in our 30+ years living at the Homestead.  The rose bushes are nearly falling over with blossoms, and it has been the same with all of our many flowering shrubs.  Something really clicked this spring to set off such a display of lilacs, roses, .. and .., to our benefit.  Right now the roses are peaking, and smell heavenly.

We usually get five or six blooms at a time on our bushes.  Not this year. 

The weather continues to be more like July and August, and many teachers and students can be thankful that schools are shut until September.  It would have been a brutal finish in the classroom this year.  To date I've had four fine nights this lunar cycle for observing.  Tonight is a fifth possibility, but evening storms are predicted.  We shall see.  At this time of year I have to stay up very late to get much done, as it isn't very dark until at least 10:30 pm.  The mosquitoes are out in force now, too.  And the fireflies.  Our backyard is lit up like a Christmas display after dark these past evenings.

In movie news, my two films from last week need to be mentioned.  The fun began with the next film by Fassbinder, as I make my way through every available film, all of them restored and in pristine condition.  Fear of Fear is from 1975, and deals with the mental unraveling of a young housewife just after her 2nd baby is born.  Starring Margit Carstensen, she gives a great performance of incipient madness.  after watching the film, a sad realization is that the stigma of mental illness remains at about the same level as it was in 1975.  Definitely worth catching on Criterion.

Now showing on Criterion. 

Leaving June 30th is Shaft, from 1971, starring Richard Roundtree as the hip black private detective sent to find a mobster's kidnapped daughter.  Filmed in Harlem, the street scenes are wonderful, capturing the period perfectly.  Directed by still photographer Gordon Parks, this is a very fun movie, with the "wooka-chucka" score and award winning song by Isaac Hayes.  Shaft's relationship with a white police lieutenant is priceless.

Showing on Criterion until June 30th.

Turning briefly to landscape art (to complete your day), here is a wonderful print, tiny, by one of the great masters of the genre.  Here he chooses a little fixer-upper of a place, well situated near woods and water.  The appetite for landscape art knew no limits in the 17th C., and if unable to afford a painting, then prints such as these could be had for much less money.  It's probably something I would have added coloured myself to back in the day.

 

Little Bridge, 17th C.  Etching and drypoint in black ink on laid paper.  8" x 11". Jacob van Ruisdael, Dutch (1628 or 29-1682).  Detroit Institute of Arts.

 

 

Detail of left side.

Detail of right side. 

 

Someday I may even get to see art for real again.  Until then....

 

Mapman Mike

 
 

 

 

The End Is Near

 The end of Covid restrictions, that is.  Things slowly begin to reopen again on Friday, a Phase 1 of 3.  Out door patios will reopen, for one thing.  I'm still not sure about getting a haircut, but I hope that comes up soon.  As of today I am considered fully vaccinated, it being 14 days since my 2nd shot.  Deb's turn comes up on Friday.

In Homestead Nature news, we have had some interesting avian visitors lately, besides the usual hordes of free loaders.  A great blue heron came by to dine.  He caught a tiny vole that was snitching bird seed and gobbled him down.  That was a new one for us!  And yesterday we were visited by a vocal Baltimore Oriole, demanding that I refill the sunflower seed holder.

This heron came onto our lawn to hunt for voles.  It caught one, too, and devoured it.

 A Baltimore oriole sits on our window ledge.  

Our two small rose bushes are now bursting with red roses.  We have more roses on them right now that we have had altogether over the past 20 years.  It's been that kind of Spring around here; everything seems to have contributed to a perfect growing season.  Photos of those later.

 

 In movie news, here's the latest.  Les Saignantes was my choice for leaving Criterion June 30th.  From 2005, this experimental film from Cameroon defies description.  It stars two very beautiful and talented actresses who attempt to use an ancient traditional power to gain advantage over the men who rule everyone's lives.  As much a statement on the corrupt political scene in Cameroon at the time as it is a wild adventure into the unknown and bizarre, this is definitely a film that will capture the viewer's attention.  Filmed in beautiful colour, and featuring camera techniques that visually enhance the action, be prepared for some laugh out loud moments, as well as several MTV ones.  The way the lead women move they are obviously good dancers, and possibly fashion models.  Definitely worth a look.

 

 

Scene from Les Saignantes.

Showing on Criterion until June 30th. 

 

And now, on to Deb's two choices from last weekend.  Her first film, chosen from the main list, was Topsy Turvy, from 1995 and directed by Mike Leigh.  Gilbert and Sullivan are at the height of their fame, but are beginning to repeat themselves in their musical offerings.  Along comes a Japanese exhibition to London, and Gilbert is dragged along to see it by his wife.  And then along comes The Mikado, one of their biggest hits.  The newest hit musical is so over the top that even today it can be enjoyed on a certain level.  Cultural appropriation?  Racism?  What's that?  No doubt a younger audience would shrink at watching the film, or run out of the theatre screaming.  But a few of us old timers can still get a chuckle or two out of the outrageousness of it all.  Great acting and singing, and the costumes are simply stunning.  The scene with Andy Serkis and the three actual Japanese ladies is totally hilarious.  And the scene with Sullivan rehearsing his orchestra is also too funny.  Recommended.

 

Scene from The Mikado, from Topsy-Turvy.

Now showing on Criterion. 

 

Her going away June 30th film choice was a Blake Edwards noir from 1962 called Experiment in Terror.  Using audience manipulation at every turn, this predictable but enjoyable film stars Lee Remick as a bank teller who is forced to do the bidding of a murderous, psychopathic bank robber.  She happens to live in Twin Peaks, San Francisco.  Working with her is Glenn Ford, as FBI agent Ripley.  Ross Martin plays the heavy breathing (asthmatic) criminal.  Lee's kid sister is played by Stephanie Powers.  Emulating Hitchcock whenever possible, the film is great viewing for single females alone in their apartment (just kidding).

 

Now showing on Criterion.

Turning to art, one of the finest art books we ever had was called The Grand Eccentrics, a hardcover book that featured works by some wonderful and bizarre artists.  Several of the paintings represented in the book were from Detroit, including the following painting by Dewing.  Detroit has six incredible works by this American artist.  One of them used to be in a bank downtown, now in the museum collection.  The Recitation is one of my favourite works in the museum.  With its hazy, filtered appearance, greenish/gray colour scheme, three oddly placed chairs and two characters, it seems to inhabit a fantasy world somewhere beyond time, and beyond strife.  Zimiamvia, perhaps. It is a gentle and very personal world I love to visit when in the American wing of the DIA.

The Recitation, 1891, by Thomas Dewing, American (1851-1938).  Oil on canvas, unframed 30" x 55".  On view at the Detroit Institute of Arts.

 

Central area detail.  

 

Mapman Mike

 

 

Heatwave, Part 2

 Though it only made it up to a very humid 30 C today, there is much worse to come over the next several days.  Two of three lawns were cut yesterday, with one more to go tomorrow.  At least it's Friday.  M*A*S*H Friday, with cold, dry gin martinis coming up soon!  And episode 12, Season 10.

Every two weeks I need to replenish my bird seed supplies.  The only place that I like right now is not far from Kingsville, so every two weeks I accompany Deb, dropping her at the home to visit her mom, and running some errands.  I also spend time at the lovely Lakeside park, usually just parking above the lake, reading.  Yesterday was our last cool day for awhile, so it was very pleasant at the park.  My brief walk and stretch was accompanied by a plethora of new geese and their watchful chaperones.

 

There were baby geese galore at Kingsville's Lakeside park.  Foreground: a gang of pre-teens was out looking for trouble.

 

Lakeside Park action.  Two ducks in background.

 

A large flock of something swims on Lake Erie, likely following a school of fish. 

 

My right finger is still painful when I play piano.  I managed an hour today, but no more.  So here I am, blogging.  Typing doesn't seem to bother it, oddly enough.  We finished up the Japanese Noir film festival Monday with a second viewing of Zero Focus, directed by Yoshitaro Namura (again), a b & w film from 1961.  A Tokyo woman, married for only one week, goes north in search of her new husband when he doesn't return from a business trip.  A lot can happen on those business trips, let me tell you.  For instance, the guy already had a common law wife, and tried to fake his suicide to get rid of her. The story is from a novel, and is actually pretty complicated.  It takes about 20 minutes at the end just to explain everything, which kind of slows everything down just a bit too much.  Still, it's quite a good movie, and there are lots of trains again.

 

Zero Focus, 1961, now showing on Criterion.
 

 My choice came from 10 years later, Rossellini's TV version of Socrates  Needless to say, there is a lot of talking and disputing going on.  Not a single car chase!  The story focuses on the final days of Athen's greatest man, and how he came to die by poisoning, and the way that he accepted his fate, along with his reasons.  Compared to what one finds on TV much of today, this is pretty decent stuff.  The dialogue seems to have been taken directly from Socrate's teachings.  Definitely a one of a kind sort of guy, and a pretty tough opponent with which to argue.

Now showing on Criterion. 

 

We are currently watching my leaving June 30th choice.  More on that weird and semi-wonderful film next time.  Turning to art, time for some more fun and adventure from the collection of the Detroit Institute of Arts.  Since it's almost Sunday, let's talk about pancakes.  On Sunday mornings around here, it's special breakfast time.  We take turns: one week I make french toast, a baked vegan kind I adapted from a dairy recipe.  The following week Deb makes either waffles, pancakes, or cinnamon rolls (her repertoire is vastly larger than mine).  At breakfast eating time we listen to a different Bach Cantata each week.  Perhaps the woman seen buying pancakes here is trying to save herself some work on Sunday morning.

 

I tend to prefer smaller pictures over larger ones, and night scenes over daytime.  But good night pictures are so rare.  This one is small, and lit by moonlight and lantern, a wonderful little genre masterpiece of painting.  It's usually on display in the 3rd floor Dutch galleries.

 

The Pancake Maker, E. L. van der Poel, Dutch (1621-1664).  Oil on oak panel, 11" x 10".

 

Central detail of the painting, in the collection of the DIA.
 

Until next time, likely a very hot day...

Mapman Mike

 

 

 

Books, Art, Music: Keys to Sanity

 I think that those first three title words sum up my Covid-19 experience so far.  Throw in a full year of good basic fitness, and I am probably happier and more fulfilled now than I was before the pandemic.  I guess I am largely a hermit, or least I can easily become one if needed.  I still look forward to my next trip to the desert, which will likely be our first big journey once all the Covid dust has settled (if it actually ever does).

In book news, I have just completed my 5th year of attempting to read all the available work by the 24 authors represented in the Avon/Equinox SF Rediscovery series.  I have completed 14 of them, and continue on with the remaining ten, several of whom are extremely prolific.  Last year I read 116 books related to those authors, and 18 other books by unrelated authors.  My Avon/Equinox total is now a staggering 582 books!

Here is a summary of what I read in May.  I read my usual ten books related to the Avon/Equinox project, and three by other writers.  Silverberg's Hawksbill Station started off the month, another short story expansion into a full novel.  Sometimes these expansions work, and sometimes they don't.  In this case, despite adding background to the story and more depth of character, I still prefer the original short story, which I thought was very well done.  Political prisoners are sent back in time to languish until they die.  The story focuses on the men's prison, before any mammals or even good soil covered the Earth.  The prisoners eat mostly trilobytes, though things are sent back to them occasionally, like vitamins.  The concept is well handled, but the longer novel really doesn't add to the flavour at all.

Next came a book by Piers Anthony, an author whom I haven't quite given up on, but mostly have.  His early work in SF is a definite must read, but his later material seems to be turning into formulaic crap.  Through The Ice from 1989 is a stand alone story, a basic fantasy quest adventure at heart, but with many unique touches.  It seems influenced by the Narnia books, though it goes well beyond those in character depth.  Not a bad read, it has a very unique origin.  He was given the unfinished story of a 16 year old boy who died in a car accident.  His friends sent Anthony the manuscript, hoping he could get it published.  The book contains a long essay as to how everything happened.  His co-author is Robert Kornwise, and Anthony didn't do a bad job of editing and finishing it.

Another Harry Harrison novel starring the Stainless Steel Rat was up next, this time following the adventures of the young Rat as he learns his tricks.  This is one of the most hilarious SF series ever penned, and though A Stainless Steel Rat Is Born is not nearly as funny as some of the others, it's still worth a read.  The main reason the book is not as good as previous ones is that he has not met Angelina yet, the love of his life, in this story.  There are still many laugh out loud moments.

Winner of best title for the month (or possible ever) is Bulmer's novel called On the Symb-Socket Circuit.  With a title like that I had no idea what to expect, but it soon begins to make sense.  This is a very cynical SF novel of destruction due to human indifference and stubborn, ingrained beliefs, taking place an an alien planet with intelligent life that humans use for their own ends.  A shocking revelation and ending, unless you really understand human behaviour, in which a case nothing can be truly shocking anymore.

Tubb's Starslave features the single most violent male hero I have ever come across in this reading project.  Captain Varl is likeable and gets things done, but certainly has a unique way of dealing with things.  He is sent to investigate aliens slaughtering human colonies in space, and quickly gets himself and his crew captured by blonde amazons, with a fuzzy link to Sweden.  The story is surprisingly far reaching and quite good, and is a blockbuster movie waiting to be made.

Next, I began a two book series called The Saga of Cuckoo, by Jack Williamson and Frederick Pohl.  The first book is called Farthest Star, and concerns a huge object approaching our galaxy at very high velocity.  A ship is sent to discover what it is, and this concerns the first part of this tense, very readable SF story.  The second part deals with the expedition, years later, that travels outside the galaxy to observe this object, which is the size of two of our solar systems!  Puzzling and fun to read, it does seem to be heading towards the usual "bad aliens" story, I am hoping for more than this from book two, later in June.

Book Two of Moorcock's Chronicles of Corum, a 2nd trilogy about the hero called Corum, was next.  The Oak and the Ram is pretty routine stuff in the sword and sorcery department, though Moorcock's normal often goes pretty far beyond the realm of most people's imagination.  I'd rather read Moorcock's sword and sorcery books over many others except, of course, for Fritz Leiber's work.

I completed Ballard's short stories volume 1, reading 10 stories from 1963 and one from 1964.  Standing out in a very high level pack were The Sudden Game, a tale of Orpheus and Eurydice;  A Question For Re-entry, about a UN worker far up the Amazon River searching for a fallen space capsule; and The Subliminal Man, who tries to convince his doctor that new and enormous highway signs are a severe threat to the world.

On A Planet Alien continues Barry Malzberg's series of home runs, as we get his totally original and off the wall version of a small human crew making first contact with aliens on another planet.  Malzberg's writing is at such a high level, yet he still manages to always tell a coherent tale, despite the increasing incoherence of his main protagonist.  Watch the expedition's captain lose his marbles, one by one, as all hell breaks loose around him.  Yet another in his fine series of "Do Humans Really Belong On Other Planets?"

James Blish's The Triumph of Time completes his 4-volume Cities In Flight Novels.  This is simply the best SF series ever penned, and this last volume is in the top five best SF novels ever written.  An absolutely stunning conclusion to the Okie drama, and a series that I will read again someday (4x so far).

In other books read, I managed to complete Volume Two of Burton's Arabian Nights.  I am reading all ten volumes on Kindle, a bit at a time.  So far several of the stories in these first two volumes were dramatized by Pasolini in his film.  Next came the first novel (and the first I've read) by Joan Vinge, called The Snow Queen.  I had read a a novella by her awhile back, and had high hopes for her novel.  What I got was an almost classic case of what someone thinks should go into a SF fantasy novel.  There are few surprises, and though Vinge can draw characters quite deeply, they really aren't that interesting to read about.  That goes double for the main heroine, who is pretty much your basic loaf of white bread.  Nearly 550 pages still isn't enough for all the characters she tries to cram into the novel. Sometimes we are left at the end of a chapter in a cliffhanger ending, and have to wait several chapters before she returns to that particular story.  And while she can write well and develop characters, she really has no sense of space, as in how to describe a city, a room, a castle, etc.  It's like attending a play or opera with hardly any background scenery.  Her novella that I liked so much was entirely set in a bar.  I have a later book by her on the shelf, which I may or may not get around to someday, but she is no longer a priority.

I finished up with The New Tomorrows, edited by Norman Spinrad.  This has been on my shelf a very long time.  I thought it was just a collection of SF stories.  But it isn't.  It's a group of speculative fiction stories from the late 60s and very early 70s.  Experiemental stories are by Moorcock, Delany, Silverberg, Ellison, Knight, Sladek, Disch, Aldiss, and Farmer.  Only a story by Ballard seems to be missing in this extremely fine collection.  A great way to end the month!

In movie news, we watched Brother From Another Planet, Deb's choice for leaving May 31st.  Directed by (and starring) John Sayles, this was our (at least) 4th viewing of this incredible and fun movie.  Joe Morton, an escaped alien slave, ends up in Harlem running from his two white pursuers.  A classic SF movie, with much of it set in a small bar.

No longer showing on Criterion. 

Getting back to the Japanese Noir festival, we watched Stakeout, from 1958 and directed by Yoshitaro Nomura.  This is one of the best police dramas I have seen, as far as realism goes.  For much of the movie nothing happens, as two Tokyo detectives stake out a house in a distant small city, where a killer might try to contact his old girlfriend.  The long pre-credit sequence takes place on a crowded and very hot train, on a 24 hour journey with no seats available.  We don't yet know these are two policemen.  The entire series of shots is totally brilliant.  Next we move to a small Inn run by three women, overlooking the stakeout house.  It's hard to describe what happens, which is essentially nothing, for most of this time, but the details and handling of it are amazing and wonderful.  Even the eventual take down of the criminal is almost a non event, handled so professionally by the two officers.  At nearly two hours in length, this is a really good film, which seems to prove that violent American films aren't the only (or the best way) to treat a subject such as this.  In fact, an American remake would be quite hilarious, if not impossible.

Stakeout, from 1958, now showing on Criterion.

Turning briefly to art, here is one of the stranger pictures from the DIA.  Many years ago I wrote a manuscript about the museum's collection of 17 C Flemish painting.  I was even allowed a visit to storage to see the paintings not on display, of which this was one.  However, Water, by Jan van Kessel the Elder is now on display, a tiny oil on copper.  I am a fan of his art, and have encountered it in the Prado and the Kunsthistoriches, among other galleries.  He often does small nature paintings for large chests and cabinets.  It was fun to write about this painting, and it's always fun to view it, too.

Detail of back right, showing a penguin quadrille.

 

Detail of left side.

 

Full image of Water, by van Kessel the Elder, Flemish 1926-1679.  Oil on copper, 10" x 13.5", unframed. Between 1660 and 1670.  Collection DIA.

Signing off for now.

Mapman Mike