Scifi and fantasy – Scripturient

Musings on Collecting and Reading ERB

As some readers here know, I’ve been a lifelong aficionado of Edgar Rice Burroughs (ERB, born 1875), particularly of his Barsoom (Mars) series, but also his Pellucidar and Caspak series. Well, I’ve enjoyed pretty much all of them, including, of course, the iconic Tarzan novels for which he is best known. Okay, maybe not so much his westerns (but then, I was never a fan of that genre). Burroughs wrote about 100 titles (and more information on them is here) between 1912 and his death in 1950. And I have most of them in my collection (and continue to look … click below for more ↓

Why Science Fiction Matters

2020-08-02 2020-08-02 Books & Reviews / Daily life / Musings / Personal Reminiscences / Pop Culture / Reading & Literacy / Scifi and fantasyLeave a comment

In the past two years, we’ve watched all the Star Trek series (on Netflix) from start to finish, and all the ST movies (on DVD). We just started watching the Battlestar Galactica series on Blu-Ray this past week (which we had seen some years back, but with long gaps between seasons). Both of us love scifi. Although the first ST series was often more space opera than scifi (as the Star Wars series has been), it matured quickly into some complex, adult-oriented storytelling in the subsequent series (a sad failing of the first several Star Wars films was their failure … click below for more ↓

The House on the Borderland

2018-01-04 2018-01-04 Books & Reviews / Daily life / Family history / Musings / Personal Reminiscences / Scifi and fantasyLeave a comment

“But for a few touches of commonplace sentimentality [it] would be a classic of the first water.” So said H. P. Lovecraft of the 1908 novel, The House on the Borderland, by William Hope Hodgson. But, Lovecraft admitted, the book was also a major influence on his own, later work. And for good reason: it created the ‘unknown horror’ effect that Lovecraft (and later writers) exploited so well. House on the Borderland is a seminal work in its genre and, despite its age, deserves not to be forgotten by modern readers. Here’s a passage from the book: And then, as … click below for more ↓

The dystopian present

2017-02-23 2017-02-24 Books & Reviews / Council / Scifi and fantasy / Social Order & Disorder / US Politics / What I'm Reading NowLeave a comment

If there is one good thing to come out of the election of Donald Trump, it has been the renewed interest in a certain genre of literature. Sales of dystopian novels have skyrocketed on Amazon, in particular what might be called “The Big Three” of dystopian tales: George Orwell’s 1984, Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World, and Margaret Atwood’s Handmaid’s Tale. From each of these novels, allegorical threads can be woven into some narrative aspect as a metaphor for the Trump administration: 1984’s newspeak, media manipulation and paranoid Big Brother; Brave New World’s elites-vs-savages mentality, exiled intellectuals and its psychological manipulation; … click below for more ↓

The Postmortal

2016-06-26 2016-06-26 Books & Reviews / Culture / Manners & Civility / Scifi and fantasy / Social Order & Disorder / What I'm Reading NowLeave a comment

Mortality. We all get it. It’s the one one incurable ailment all humans succumb to without a chance of succor. Mortality is always 100% fatal. No medicine, no therapy, no diet cure or magic pill. But as you read this, scientists are researching, seeking clues to unlock the mystery and, potentially, cure us of aging,of death by mortality. And they might achieve it. Having officially reached the two-thirds mark in my life this past weekend (based on my family history, my health and my lifestyle…), mortality is more often in my own thoughts these days. Not morbidly so, but certainly more … click below for more ↓

Decoding Alice in Wonderland

2016-01-18 2016-01-18 Books & Reviews / Literature / Scifi and fantasy / What I'm Reading NowLeave a comment

It is tempting to suggest author David Day’s lush new book, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland Decoded is the final word on the mysteries and secrets behind Lewis Carroll’s iconic children’s fantasy, but alas, it would be an over-reach. Surely others will follow, perhaps even Day himself will extend his research to a sequel. Aside from the difficulties of probing the motives of a man dead more than 125 years, there comes the question of interpretation, which is more like opinion than it is fact. Looking back 150 years at possible explanations for a reference or a character sometimes involves guesswork. But even from its original publication, … click below for more ↓

Read, Re-read, Repeat

2015-12-04 2015-12-04 Books & Reviews / Personal Reminiscences / Scifi and fantasy / What I'm Reading NowOne Comment

I’m currently re-reading Mikhail Bulgakov’s fantasy novel of Soviet life under Stalin, The Master and Margarita. Since this is actually a newer translation than the original one I read many years ago, I’m not sure it properly qualifies as “re-reading.” However, for me, re-reading a novel is uncommon. I seldom have the time to re-read, because my current reading list never dwindles (in fact it grows as I continue to add books to my library). Plus my interests and not static: I constantly seek to learn new things.* I always have a dozen books on the go, piled beside my bed … click below for more ↓

Rethinking John Carter

2015-04-22 2022-12-08 Film & Reviews / Pop Culture / Scifi and fantasyOne Comment

After recently going through the first five of Edgar Rice Burroughs’ 11 Barsoom books, I decided to give the 2012 Disney film, John Carter, another viewing. This two-hour-eleven-minute film bombed at the box office, and when I first saw it, I was deeply disappointed. But on reflection after a second viewing, it isn’t all that bad. It’s not great, but it deserves a better rating than it received, and it wears well in a second viewing. It isn’t quite the Barsoom I grew up with, true, but it borrows heavily from Burroughs, enough to make it a close cousin in … click below for more ↓

Lovecraft’s Tales of Terror

2015-04-12 2015-04-12 Books & Reviews / Personal Reminiscences / Scifi and fantasy / What I'm Reading NowLeave a comment

No new horror can be more terrible than the daily torture of the commonplace. Ex Oblivione, 1921. Along with Edgar Rice Burroughs, my teenage reading covered a lot of genres, but I gravitated to scifi and fantasy. Fantasy in those days didn’t offer the same overflowing bookshelves of cookie-cutter tales we find in today’s bookstores. But they took me out of the miseries and difficulties of my little world so easily that I made the effort to find them. Back then, fantasy was an addendum to the scifi section. You often had to hunt for the rare titles in stores and libraries where … click below for more ↓

ERB and Barsoom

2015-04-07 2015-04-07 Personal Reminiscences / Scifi and fantasy / What I'm Reading Now3 Comments

Tara of Helium rose from the pile of silks and soft furs upon which she had been reclining, stretched her lithe body languidly, and crossed toward the center of the room, where, above a large table, a bronze disc depended from the low ceiling. Her carriage was that of health and physical perfection—the effortless harmony of faultless coordination. A scarf of silken gossamer crossing over one shoulder was wrapped about her body; her black hair was piled high upon her head. With a wooden stick she tapped upon the bronze disc, lightly, and presently the summons was answered by a … click below for more ↓