An interview with Tolkien from 1966, originally published in New Worlds magazine, reprinted in 2001 at Fantastic Metropolis. Interesting for his opinions on Science Fiction – although I suspect that the interviewer, Daphne Castell, might perhaps have skewed the presentation of his views to make them more sympathetic, it does seems that Tolkien saw himself as part of the genre, and he contributes his “Hard Science Fiction” bit – talking about the science of linguisitics.
Oh, yeah, it’s also interesting for the bit about the cats of Queen Beruthiel, which reads like Tolkien demonstrating his myth-making process live to his interviewer.
The site also reprints Rani Graf’s interview with Ted Chiang (from Bli Panika!) And they have a two-part “Old Farts’ Fireside Chat” where Barrington J. Bayley and Michael Moorcock ramble and ruminate.
Category: Science Fiction and Fantasy
An interesting discussion of China Mieville, Fantasy Economics and Tolkien which bounces between these two blogs: start here, detour here and here, and end up back where you started for the rebuttal.
Somewhere (perhaps in the referring blog, I lost track) I found a link to an audio interview with China Mieville at The Agony Column, which also has an interview with Peter Watts, who has just come out with a sequel to Starfish and Mealstorm, which is being published in two parts. As he explains in his author’s note (quoted in the interview): …Henceforth, books by midlist authors will not receive wide distribution if they cost too much — that is, if they weigh in at more than about 110,000 words. “Behemoth is over 150,000 words long, and was almost complete by the time this policy came into effect. Hacking away a third of it was not an option (believe me, I tried)…A two-part release was the only alternative.
Categories
Middle Earth 419
Bruce Sterling:Meanwhile, in the stricken Third World of Middle Earth –
Dear Beloved,
I am Vivien Grimhelm Wormtongue, The only daughter of late Counsellor Gríma Wormtongue of the Kingdom of Rohan.
My father was Chief Counsellor [equivalent to Prime Minister] to late lamented king Théoden of Rohan. In his position my father altogether legally and correctly acquired significant assets throughout Rohan in order to protect
the Kingdom from enemy forces within and without.In the course of lamentable events succeeding, my father was illegally deprived of office and expelled from the Kingdom.
Before this he had with foresight already entirely legally deposited gold worth S$42,000,000 with one of the Africa leading Banks in Cote d’ Ivoire of which I will let you know if you identify your interest.
A paleoclimatologist claimed it would take a 100 dollars to get him see the Day After Tomorrow. . Readers of the Usenet group where he made that claim collected money to send him to the theatre.
His review is amusing, summing up that This movie is to climate science as Frankenstein is
. (link via Kottke’s link log).
to heart transplant surgery
Categories
Earthsea Film (TV)
The SCI FI Channel is adapting Ursula K. Le Guin’s Earthsea. This is almost cool, except that it’s a Hallmark production. However, I see that despite what the author says about the book, it appears that they’re casting white people in it. OK, so Ogion is played by Danny Glover, but in the books he and Ged (here played by Shawn Ashmore, the kid that did Iceman in the X-Men movie) are of the same people.
Tenar in the book is actually white (a Karg, sort-of moslem viking barbarians), but she’s probably not as pretty as Kristin (Smallville) Kreuk, who is playing her in this. But then, who is?