I dunno; and I’m sure that this quiz isn’t going to cast any light on the subject. But here are my answers anyone. (Via Brandywine Books.)

1. Tell, within a dozen, how many books P. G. Wodehouse wrote. Shoot, make it within thirty…



Nearly a hundred, if I recall correctly.

2. Name the song playing on the radio when Duke’s Samoan attorney threw the grapefruit into the bathtub.



I don’t remember this particular incident, but it’s clearly a reference to Uncle’s stint as the U.S. Ambassador to American Samoa, back in the early days of Doonesbury.

3. Fill in the blank, “I love the smell of _____________ in the morning.”



“napalm.” Apocalypse Now, a move I watched but didn’t particularly enjoy.

4. Tell what machine Toad fell in love with after being thrown from his caravan.



A motor car; though I know this from Walt Disney rather than Kenneth Grahame.

5. Name the Who’s original drummer.



Keith Moon, of course.

6. Describe the procedure for trapping a heffalump.



Dig a pit and put a pot of honey at the bottom.

7. Name the Black Panther Party member who went from exile in Cuba to preaching at Wheaton Bible Church before designing and selling codpiece-equipped pants.



Nope, I’m not quite that old.

8. Name the artist who played harmonica on Keith Green’s 1980 “So You Wanna Go Back to Egypt” LP.



I’m going to guess that it was Bob Dylan. It’s the right era, and who else plays harmonica?

9. Tell who said, “The policeman isn’t there to create disorder. The policeman is there to preserve disorder.”



I dunno.

10. Name the movie: “Gentlemen, you can’t fight in here! This is the War Room.”



Dr. Strangelove. I’m not old enough to know this answer either.

11. Name the Beatle with the bare feet.



The walrus is Paul.

12. Name the now-dead newspaper columnist who often quoted his friend Slats Grobnik.



Slats Grobnik?

13. Tell what color and model car O.J. Simpson was being driven down the Santa Monica freeway in.



A white Bronco.

14. Name the Chicago Bears defensive tackle who scored a touchdown in Super Bowl XX.



The Super Bowl…is that something to do with football?

15. Finish the sentence from “Cool Hand Luke”: “What we have here is a failure to _____________ .”



“Communicate”. Not that I’ve ever seen the movie.

16. Name the movie this line comes from: “It’s just a flesh wound! Come back and I’ll bite your kneecaps off!”



Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Have you seen the Lego version of the “Camelot” song?

17. Name the song that ends with the drummer shouting, “I’ve got blisters on my fingers!”



It’s a Beatles song, but I don’t remember which one. And are you sure it was the drummer? It doesn’t sound like him.

18. Name the lead guitarist on the Beatles’ “While My Guitar Gently Weeps.”



George Harrison. Paul played bass, and John Lennon usually played rhythm guitar in any case.

19. Name the Tom Wolfe book originally serialized in Rolling Stone magazine.



Bonfire of the Vanities. I think.

20. Name the television series modeled on the work of a New Yorker cartoonist.



The Addams Family, of course. I loved the show, and I’ve got a book of the cartoons.

I make that 14/20, if my guesses were correct.

Suppose England had had a glorious history of magic and magicians;
suppose indeed that the North of England was ruled for 300
years by the mysterious Raven King, the first and greatest magician of
England’s golden age of magic. Suppose that paths to the land of Faerie
had once been commonplace throughout the English countryside.

Suppose that magic is now sadly faded, and though studied by a few,
is in actuality practiced by no one; that Napoleon is ravaging the
Continent and that only England stands against him; that the glories of
English Magic are suddenly, miraculously, about to be reborn…

…and that Jane Austen wrote a book about it all.

That, in a nutshell, is Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell.

The book was published to great acclaim; indeed, it won the 2005 Hugo
award, which is no small potatoes. It was an interesting read, and was,
indeed, novel in its subject matter and presentation; Clarke has done
the remarkable job of creating an alternate history for England that
feels plausible. I enjoyed the book, more or less.

But I fear I didn’t love it. The narration maintains an air of
detachment; and one loves none of the characters, and rather
cordially dislikes several of them. Momentous events occur (at one point
an entire city–Brussels, if I recall correctly–is transplanted to the
Great Plains of North America for a short while), but they are described
matter-of-factly, and with no fanfare.

I’m not sorry I read it; and I’m curious to see what Clarke might come up
with next. But I’m not entirely sure why it got the Hugo.

A reader asks,

I’m writing out of desperation and hope that your extensive reading will
benefit my research for an upcoming speech. I am looking for the letter,
forward or script that read like an admonition of the 60s youth. It went on
to say things like: “the next generation will never rise to the challenges
we just faced in Europe. They’re consumed wholly by their own endeavors,
music and dancing. They are lazy, slovenly and uninterested in world
politics…” Then, only at the end do you realize it is written by a WW I
veteran lamenting the weak moral fiber of the (soon to be) greatest
generation. Do you where I could find the above (albeit loosely para-phrased) text?
Thanks for any and all help you can provide.

I recall reading such a piece, more than once, but I’ve no idea where; probably
on-line somewhere. It quite possibly wandered through my e-mail box in some
bygone era. Does anybody out there remember more about this than I do?

I’m going to be off on a business trip all this week; I’m writing this as I wait for the shuttle to come pick me up and take me to the airport. Posting, therefore, might be non-existent. If, on the other hand, I have ‘net access in my hotel room (which seems likely) and if I find myself sitting in my hotel room in the evenings both bored and rested enough to write coherently (which seems less likely given the schedule of events: day-long meetings which have a tendency to continue well into the dinner hour) and if I can find something non-work-related to write about, then maybe there will be posts.

I first posted this on September 11th, 2002, the first day of this blog’s existence:

It’s not unreasonable to ask why they hate us. But it is unreasonable to assume that it must be our fault.

This is a trio of fantasy novels; the first two were written in the
mid-’90’s, and the third was published a month or so ago. All concern an
unlikely hero named Bahzell Bahnakson–unlikely because…but hold that
thought.

A thousand years ago, the continent of Kontovar was the home of a vast
and sophisticated civilization. Humans, elves, dwarves, and hradani
lived together, and mostly in peace. Then came a war in which the black
wizards tried to take over Kontovar. Wizards aren’t much good as foot
soldiers, even assuming they feel moved to try, and so the black wizards
magically enslaved the wise, peaceful (but immensely strong) hradani and
turned them into fierce berserkers.

The black wizards lost in the end, but the war ruined Kontovar. The
survivors fled to another continent–including a small contingent of
hradani, no longer enslaved but still subject to fits of berserk Rage.
Hated and hunted for their role in the war (though it was no choice of
theirs) and with hair-trigger tempers (and you really don’t want
to see them when they are angry), the hradani have since scraped out
a barbarian living in lands no one else wants.

A thousand years later, the hradani are still hated and feared by the
other four races of men. Bahzell Bahnakson is a hradani.

He’s also the son of the most progressive of the Hradani lords, and in
addition to being large even for a hradani (who are the tallest of the
races of men) he’s somehow acquired a strong sense of justice. As a
political hostage to another clan, he surprises the eldest son of the
clan lord on the verge of ravishing a serving girl. Rape is practically
unheard of among the hradani–their women are not subject to the Rage, and
hence are highly valued–and rapists are dealt with harshly. Bahnak
cannot turn aside, and so he thrashes the evildoer, ties him up, and then
to save his own life (and that of the girl) takes it on the lam.

After securing the girl’s safety, Bahnak must go forth into exile; having
been a hostage, he cannot go home without forcing his father to renounce
the treaty under which he was held and starting yet another war. And as
he travels he starts having dreams. It develops that the War God wants
Bahnak to be one of his Champions, to sally forth righting wrongs and so
forth. Bahnak wants no part of it–the gods have never done anything for
the hradani, and so the hradani want nothing to do with the gods. But
the War God is persistent, and the result is a foregone conclusion.

Oath of Swords contains the part of the story I’ve described
so far, up until Bahnak’s eventual capitulation; it’s a delightful
picaresque and goofy fantasy, and it made my laugh frequently.
The War God’s Own continues the story as Bahnak learns what
it means to be one of the War God’s Champions; there are Dark Deeds
Afoot, and the War God has Champions to thwart them. The goofiness
continues, and indeed it’s rather surprising how much fun you can have
following an extremely competent, dedicated paladin around and about.
In fiction these days, paladins are supposed to be stuffy pantywaists who
can’t get the job done because they insist on following the rules.
Bahnak follows the rules and gets the job done too.

Windrider’s Oath, on the other hand, was something of a
disappointment. The book suffers from
the same bloat as the latest Honor Harrington novels. The plot is adequate, but
the pacing is lousy; too little happens, and it’s related in so much
detail for so many points of view that the
suspense cannot be maintained. (I’m beginning to think of this as
Weber’s Disease.) The book would have been much better at half the
length. Worse, the goofiness that made the first two so endearing is
largely gone.

If Weber writes another book in this series, I’ll read it; I like the
characters, and I’m curious about what happens next. But I begin to fear
that Weber has jumped the shark.

Here’s an interview with fantasist Tim Powers. You should try reading his stuff; start with The Anubis Gates.

(Via Amy Welborn)

This appears to be a remarkably good look at warfare and how it has changed through
the ages. I say “appears to be” because I’m no authority on the subject;
Keegan’s version of history could have massive holes in it, for all I
know. But it tallied with what I’ve read in the past, though there were
some surprises. It’s a complex subject and difficult to summarize, but
I’ll give it a go: chariots, horses, bows and arrows, walls, cannon,
small arms, bayonets, trenches, tanks, airplanes, atom bombs.

The book is not without its faults. The first section is an extended
reflection on Clausewitz’ blind spots, the moral being that Clausewitzian
total war is necessarily self-destructive. The author hopes
that perhaps we’ve progressed beyond all that (the book was written in the
peaceful years after the first Gulf War), and expresses a touching faith
in the saving power of the United Nations, a power that in recent years
has become rather tarnished by the oil-for-food scams, the presence of
nations like Syria on the UN Human Rights committee, and such like.
And his discussion of warfare in primitive societies seems more
authoritative than is warranted by the scarce data.

On the whole, though, I found this to be a fascinating book, and
well-worth the time I spent with it.

This book is set in the same world as Modesitt’s earlier book
Archform: Beauty (not that you’d know it from anything on
the cover), and pleasantly enough it has a more intelligible plot than its
its predecessor. It’s set in a near future Earth in which genetic
experimentation and high-tech are starting to divide the human race into
distinct classes (indeed, there are intriguing hints that Modesitt’s
Adiamante might be set in the far future of this same world,
in which case we’re seeing the birth of the “cybs”). Beyond that, it’s
basically a competent thriller.

Although they didn’t hinder my enjoyment, there are two things about the
book that annoyed me. The first is the maguffin–the Evil Multinational
Corporations Are Trying To Take Over The World. It reminded me too much
of some of the overheated rhetoric I’ve seen on the ‘Net over the last
few years.

The second–and considerably more annoying–is Modesitt’s handling of
place names. Our hero, for example, lives in the major metropolitan
center of “Denv”–the city we know as “Denver”. Similarly we have
“Minpolis” for “Minneapolis”, and “Epaso” for “El Paso”.

Now, it’s a long-time game of SF authors to have fun with mutating place
names over long periods of time. The thing is, there’s usually some kind
of return to barbarism involved. The names were transmitted orally, and
the language and pronunciation shifted over time, and when civilization
and writing returned the names were written down as they had come to be
spoken. There’s no such reversion and regrowth in this case, so far as I
can tell–which means that the name changes were a conscious choice on
somebody’s part, and I just can’t see it. In fact, I can’t see it either
way–I can’t see “Denver” mutating into “Denv” through oral tradition,
and I can’t imagine anyone thinking that “Denv” is a nicer name than
“Denver”. And why on earth would you choose to go from “El Paso” to
“Epaso”? It’s not even easier to say, and it looks funny too. Ugh.

…you’ll like the Cthulhu Babies.

(Via Byzantium’s Shores.)