Budrys was right in a way, in that Disch's early stuff could be pretty smart-alecky and cynical -- that was enough to probably enough back then to get you called a nihilist. But Camp Concentration and 334 aren't even remotely smart-alecky or cynical -- 334 in a lot of ways is the most serious and substantial piece of literary sf ever published. (Budrys did admit that Disch had turned out to be a real artist, though that doesn't seem to have made any difference to Disch's view of him in the end.)
I wonder if it would have gone better for Disch if Clara Reeve hadn't been published under a silly pseudonym. It did get great reviews, but nobody knew he wrote it. And he was also working on another serious sf novel after 334, The Pressure of Time -- he published some pieces of it in the 1970s, and they were terrific, but he apparently never finished it. He did a lot of good stuff after that, but none of it was as ambitious as 334 (or the published sections of Pressure)... I certainly felt with his later books that he just wasn't trying that hard. Maybe he'd decided, given the non-response, that it wasn't worth it.
One of the first pieces I ever published, more than twenty years ago, was a long article about Disch -- I called him up to ask him a couple of questions about his books and he talked to me for most of an afternoon. He told me funny stories about how he'd come to write the novelization of "The Prisoner," and about the Gothic novels he'd written with John Sladek. I mentioned that I'd just finished "Lucifer's Hammer," which he hadn't read, and he questioned me closely about it -- and I was gratified to see years later that he wrote a nasty putdown of it. He was charming and good-humored, and afterwards he was extremely complimentary about the (awful, amateurish) piece I published. It was horribly dismaying to come upon his blog in the last several months and find him so despondent, so unreasonable, and so unconsolable.
The best thing to do now is to read his books. 334 and Camp Concentration, of course -- and I think The M.D. is underrated. But I wish, really wish, somebody would reprint Clara Reeve, which is a wonderful mock-Victorian melodrama. It has a surprise ending that seemed spectacular when it was first published -- I wonder if readers now would see it coming right away?
CHip #105: Oh, "disputed" is an understatement. There are a lot of early Greek manuscripts of the gospels, and there are hundreds and hundreds of differences among them. Most are trivial, but some of them are pretty big. Studying them can be kind of an upsetting experience for people who need to believe the text is absolutely fixed and inerrant.
To Chip in #86:
The Greek manuscripts differ, and the text is ambiguous anyway. The KJV used a ms. that reads, "en anthropois eudokia." There've got to be better scholars of koine than me out there, but I'll suck up my courage and suggest that it literally translates as something like "towards men, good will" -- but it could also mean just "in men, good will." ("Good will" isn't really right, either, but Ancient Greek words for mental states just don't translate neatly). Modern editors prefer a ms. that reads "en anthropois eudokias," which means something more like "well-pleasing men." So the phrase could mean "good will towards men," or "men who have good will," or "men that God is pleased by."
Oops -- forgot to say, my post #73 is from "The New Testament in Scots," translated by William Laughton Lorimer, an astonishing work that should be seen by all lovers of the NT and all lovers of language.
About this time the Emperor Augustus pat furth an edick ordeinin at aa the fowk i the haill warld suid be registrate. This wis whan Quirinius wis Governor o Syria, an it wis the first time at siccan a thing hed been dune. Sae aabodie gaed tae be registrate, ilkane til his ain toun, Joseph amang the lave.
He belanged til the stock an faimlie o Dauvit, an sae it was wis tae Dauvit's Toun, Bethlehem in Judaea, at he gaed doun frae Nazareth in Galilee for tae gie in his name, takkin Mary, at wis haundfastit til him, wi him. She wis boukin gin this; an whan they war in Bethlehem, she cam til her time an brocht hame her first-born son. She swealed the bairn in a barrie an beddit him in a heck, sin there wis nae room for them intil the inn.
Nou, i that same pairt the war a wheen herds bidin thereout on the hill an keepin gaird owre their hrisel at nicht. Suddent an angel o the Lord cam an stuid afore them, an the glorie o the Lord shined about them, an they war uncolie frichtit. But the angel said tae them: Binna nane afeard, I bring ye guid news o gryte blytheness for the haill fowk -- this day in Dauvit's Town a saviour hes born til ye, Christ the Lord! This gate ye s'ken it is een as I say: ye will finnd a new-born bairn swealed in a barrie an liggin intil a heck.
Syne in a gliff an unco thrang o the airmies o hieven kythed aside the angel, glein laud tae God an liltin:
Glore tae God i the heicht o heiven,
an peace on the yird tae men he delytes in!
#77 -- Jeremy's fuller description of the situation here in Illinois is exactly on target. Lenny Bruce said, fifty years ago, "Chicago is so corrupt, it's thrilling." Absolutely nothing has changed since then. Today I had to vote Republican (in the election for county board) for the first time in my life, and I'm not at all happy about it. But I don't care how desperate the political situation is, we're doing absolutely no good for our side, or for the country, when we vote for people we know are dishonest.
(And I hope that Barack Obama's contemptible endorsement of Todd Stroger was just a momentary lapse rather than a sign that he's really a typical Illinois politician after all.)
I can only repeat what they say in "The Untouchables:" You're not from Chicago. No matter how bad the Republicans are as a national party -- and I'll be dancing in the streets if they lose Congress -- it's morally impossible to vote a straight Democratic ticket here. A few highlights -- but by no means all: one Democratic candidate for state office has been plausibly accused (by the leadership of his own party) of being connected with the Chicago mob. And you've heard of dead people in Chicago voting? The local Democratic organization fielded a *candidate* for president of Chicago's county board who has not been seen in public since last March and might actually be dead. (If you don't believe me, search news archives, or Wikipedia, for "John Stroger.")
I understand the impulse to "take the country back" from the current administration, but will somebody please explain what the point of that would be, if all it means is turning it over to a crew like this?
| Year | Number of comments posted |
|---|---|
| 2008 | 3 |
| 2006 | 6 |
Total: 9 comments. View all these comments on a single page.
The most recent 20 comments posted to Making Light by Lee Sandlin:
Show all comments by Lee Sandlin.