New Analysis Shifts Theory on Shuttle Breakup [NYT]

The Times reports that the leading-edge flaw thesis just rose to leading theory, based on data recorder analysis:

Admiral Gehman also said today that the new data hinted that the shuttle already had severe damage when it began its re-entry, and not a minor flaw that was made worse by re-entry. Engineers had theorized that minor damage to the thin layer of protective silicon carbide on the panels could have allowed hot oxygen to begin eating away at the leading edge, but Admiral Gehman's comments suggest that this is unlikely.

Damage before re-entry is likely, he said, because the data show extreme heating taking place early, while the force of air passing over the wing was still quite weak. Admiral Gehman spoke in a conference call with reporters this afternoon.

The damage referred to here as "severe" is also described as extant prior to re-entry. Does this implicate the mysterious shed matter, then? The article also notes that the foam debris shower could still be the cause of the damage.

lta-mail is an informational page on Hewlett-Packard's website exploring a new intraoffice mail delivery system initaitive intended to demonstrate the many efficient ways that Compaq and HP are merging corporate cultures and adding value for shareholders the world over.

[A big TYVM to hot tipper Eric! Your prize is already lost in the mail!]

(And in contrast to the snarky tone above, I found this fascinating, and you really should read Josh's explanation of how it works... hint: it's computer guided, rather than hand-guided.)

Jim and Marianne's Jukebox is a pretty good sized collection of mp3-format recordings of old 78's, including the catchy Great War ditties, Down in the U-17, I've Got My Captain Working for me Now, and Wilhelm the Grocer. I formerly had this collection stored locally, but it was lost in the great hard-drive corruption disaster of two-thousand-ought-three ([homer] stupid upgrades [/homer]). I would play them whilst engaged in aerial combat in the rickety WW1 combat flight sim Dawn of Aces.

Some time ago, I recall seeing a pointer on MeFi, probably from the remarkable music historian y2karl, to another hobbyist's archive of material, but alas, I cain't find it.

While looking for it I did find David Lynch's "Old-Time Music Home Page," coming to you straight outta Asheville, NC. I would commend your attn. to the links section, which included a pointer to Norm's 78 Record Room, now apparently defunct - or maybe just spotty - it looks like a transient URL. I believe Norm's was one of the archives I was looking for.

honkingduck.com offers 701 78's in RA format (pfoo, but I understand).

Ah well - while I have a personal fondness for the mp3 transfers created and curated by hobbyists, academic folkorists have done a bang up job on the material, such as the music collections seen at the Appalachian Music Archives, the Smithsonian's American Memory (which I'm sure you are all familiar with by now).

This weekend we had a pleasant visit from my high-school chum John Strohm, currently deep in law school at a small Alabama college. He and I visited the Experience Music Project, and I must say the museum is improved as a result of visiting in the company of one other person with a deep, life-long interest in American popular music. I've been a couple times in the past, and I just kind of find myself lecturing people, instead of swapping stories or exclaiming over the original mechanicals for the first Husker Du album, as happened on this visit.

John also told me that both Jake and Dale, of Hoosier label No Nostalgia, will be presenting papers at a conference at the EMP, April 10-13, according to the website. Hope I get a chance to catch up with them whilst they are here.

After the EMP we strolled through Pike Place, as we're statutorily obligated to when friends, family, and acquaintances visit us here in the Damp City, and picked up some Columbia River salmon and a bag of clams (or "rocks," as our fishmonger called them). We then ate hearty and chatted deep into the night.

I've always enjoyed John's intellect, and appreciate that we're able to track each other through our lives. We jawed up a storm on intellectual property issues, the copyright wars ongoing, and the like - it's very interesting to discuss this stuff with a seasoned touring and recording musician.

His touring and recording background gives him a familiarity with basic practices and assumptions of the music industry as my experience in technology does for computing, development, and software, so a certain component of the conversation consists of comparing notes. It's a very interesting time to look at law, I have to admit, and John's certainly encouraged me to consider it as a possible school route.

We had a good time swapping gossip about pals. One person that came up was Paul Mahern, recording engineer on John Mellencamp's last record, possibly on the new one that comes out shortly, and the leader of 80's proto-hardcore rockers the Zero Boys. Out of curiosity, I took a look at the Coug's website and what the heck?

Mellencamp.com is hosting an anti-war song, "To Washington," based on a really old folk song, the White House Blues (it's the song on the Smithsonian Anthology of American Folk Music that opens with "McKinley's in the White House a-doin' his best" and refrains on the line "From Baltimore to Washington"). Apparently Mellencamp recorded the song over the past year as a part of the sessions for his upcoming all-folk and traditional record, Trouble No More, due out in May.

WHAT?

Now, let me be totally clear: my favorite Bob Dylan record of all time is a spare recording he made of traditionals called Good As I Been To You, so I have no beef with Mellencamp looking in that direction. In fact, I kind of expect that it'll be pretty good - his style of music has always had a strong traditional element.

Mellencamp's career started in Bloomington, and after he broke around 1980, he chose to keep working from his home near Seymour, very close to my hometown. His music, while aesthetically preferable to much of what was on the radio in the 1980's , was adopted as a sort of standard by the tobacco-chewing segment of my high school populace, some of whom quite literally could not restrain themselves from beating the crap out of me every time they saw me (one troubled young man was actually banned from the school's property, under threat of arrest and charges, yet his desire to beat the shit out of me – to kill me - was so great that he did indeed return to pound my ass into the dirt).

So, you know, it's a bit unsettling to hunker down behind my barricades of piled up seventy-eights, muttering imprecations, and glancing to my side see the songwriter whose little ditties were adopted by my fisticuff-oriented classmates lofting his "No Iraq War" sign. Mind you, I'm glad to see him.

I haven't listened to it yet, but will do so tomorrow - I can say that the original tune he borrows from is among the catchiest of the songs on the Anthology. And I still don't know if Mahern worked on it or not.

MovableTypeZeitgeistPlugin, from Jim Flanagan of Everything Burns, is a plugin for Movable Type (duh) to allow one to implement Jim's astonishing Zeitgeist search-engine referrer report.

It's purty neat.

In the tin-foil and baling-wire department, I'd like to announce that Athena, an elderly (maunfacture date July 1994!) Macintosh of the 9500 model variety, has undergone successful XPostFacto-assisted OS X installation (yeesh) and will soon be functioning as a backup or mirror or something for poor dear bellerophon. The lovely dowager sports a G3 daughtercard upgrade and a brand-spankin' new PCI Firewire card, which should help keep me from totally losing my mind as I try to schlep files around.

In the "yorg" department, some part of the 10.2.4 March 24 security update is making my main desktop computer not see bellerophon. Foo.

Happily, it's wholly limited to said desktop unit. But still.

Meteor Chunks Crash In South Chicago Suburb, Light Up Night Sky - [NBC5.com, via MeFi]

Does this mean that the end of Da Machine is in sight? Maybe it's more evidence of the End Times.

The New Yorker: Letter from Iraq - The Bombing of Baghdad, by Jon Lee Anderson
(from March 31, 2003 issue)

The second strike came on Thursday evening, and when I looked out my window I noticed that several Iraqis were sitting on lawn chairs on the sidewalk in front of the entrance to a small hotel nearby, as if nothing much were happening and they were just enjoying the fresh evening air. There were three big hits quite close to us, but across the river, and we watched the fires from our balcony. We could see a few cars driving around, even over the bridges. Dogs barked, and the river looked as calm as olive oil, with just a shimmer of motion on the surface.

Hallucinatory piece on last week in the Iraqi capitol. I was interested to note that I had a site vistor from condenast.com recently, on a search request for "crispin glover singing."

Another interesting visitor of late originates at cache.kuwait.army.mil - always to the front page, with no link referrer, probably as a result of the proxy configuration in Kuwait. I wonder - could it be Sgt. Therron Thomas, of the Indiana National Guard?

UPDATE: Nope. Not him.

Yee-owtch! I've been struggling to get time to update the Columbia story here for a couple weeks, and it's been tough, what with the outbreak of Armageddon and all.

Over a month ago, on February 21, when last I revisited the state of affairs in the investigation into the loss of the shuttle Columbia on mission STS-107, preliminary findings indicated that a rupture in the shuttle's wing had admitted superheated plasma into the structure, eventually destroying the wing. Debate over the cause of the rupture continued.

NASA had released audiotape and transcripts of the last few minutes of communication with the ground, and the astronaut's funeral services had begun.

Since then, several news cycles of coverage have come and gone. News links below will be largely to NYT or Spaceflight Now coverage, both of whom have continued to update their one-stop investigation centers.

Over the last week of February, a press conference revealed that some internal video of the shuttle's flight deck had survived re-entry, but that the tape ended prior to the period of catastrophic failures of interest to investigators. Additional news included the release of imagery of the shuttle in orbit taken January 28 by an Air Force telescope on Maui, probably the source of the reports that Air Force gear had been used to look at Columbia. Additionally, tiles found 40 miles west of Lubbock, Texas have unusual signs of heat damage; these tiles represent the westernmost material from the Columbia recovered to date.

Lubbock, of course, is remembered as the home of Buddy Holly. 'Nuff said.

Additionally, by the end of February, significant attention continued to be focused on internal NASA communication concerning worries about possible tile damage due to the foam impacts at liftoff – on February 28, the author of some of these emails came forward to explicitly disavow any thought that his emails were more than "what-if" scenario projections (Another author came forward on March 10).

During this same news cycle, more information was released concerning a small piece of debris that appeared to detach itself from the shuttle and orbit in tandem for a couple of days before undergoing reentry on January 20.

By March 8, investigators had narrowed to 10 the probable scenarios causing the craft's disintegration, all featuring the hypothesized front-wing gap. Foam shed at liftoff from the large external tank is continues to play the role of suspected case of the rupture.

On March 14, the board of investigation was told that a high-ranking NASA official rejected the possibility of requesting inter-agency help in the form of a spy-satellite inspection of Columbia's underside on the basis of NASA conclusions that the craft would land safely.

On March 19, the orbiter experiments recorder – unique to Columbia in the shuttle fleet – was located on the ground by search crews near Hemphill, Texas. On Monday, March 24, it was reported that the recorder's data is thought to be largely intact and may provide valuable insight into the last few seconds of Columbia's final flight.

Overall, the tone of the board of inquiry has grown increasingly critical of NASA's internal culture, building on suspicions that the same sort of risk-blindness held to be at fault in the Challenger disaster led to poor decisions in the case of Columbia. Continuing revelations about the open internal discussion of the possibility of serious tile damage leading to no investigative action have enhanced this perception.

NASA response to these concerns – and their airing in the press – has taken on an increasingly defensive tone, as participants in the discussion come forward to discount their own viewpoints expressed while the shuttle was in orbit.

War news has not obviously disrupted the reporting on the breakup, but as the Bush administration's lean to closely-held data increases in the wake of hard news from the front, I expect to see some parallel obstructionism in this investigation, especially if it becomes clearer that contractors with involvement in defense assets may have been involved in crucial maintenance activity.

It's also possible that lessened public interest as a result of the war news will actually lower the stakes somewhat and permit a fuller look at the information on the table, if NASA personnel don’t feel that the agency's future is on the line (a probable motivation for the recantations noted above).

Initial Entry: mike.whybark.com is one year old, as of yesterday.

The global archive page details the whole year's stats.

For me personally, highlights of the year have included The Death of Mr. Red Ears, The Wreck of the Shenandoah (as well as the rest of Blimp Week), the story of my sister's passing, and a carefully written, accurate account of a nightmare.

Of course, I also take pride in unmasking Watergate informer Deep Throat, the recent Kensapoppin' series, and of course, the Ken Goldstein Project.

I'm also pleased to have consistently presented original material that stems from actual journalistic activity, specifically the interviews with Man in Space creator David Sander and noted author Michael Moorcock.

I do have at least one more interview to present here, but as I'm attempting to balance the demands of writing for publication with those of blogging, mum's the word for now.

Over the past year, my writing practice has matured in ways that I think would have been difficult for me to conceptualize as a younger person. For example, I can give reliable time-based estimates for the labor involved to develop a piece to a given word count (depending on the background materials for the piece). I hope that I've mastered some of the basic technical aspects of writing for publication.

I believe that the aspect of my writing that still needs the most technical attention is consistency of tense and staying in the active voice. It's something I can edit into a piece, but getting it right the first time is a better way to go. Saves paper. Much of what I write is essentially just direct recording of my stream of consciousness, and in my head, tenses are fluid.

Regarding the active voice, (make that "Grasping the active voice,") it's probably just something I'll always have to watch ("fight with"). My inner voice is contemplative and analytical, and when musing, the personal pronoun is rarely employed.

I've also learned that my long held belief that I cannot write fiction or develop plots or imagine characters is simply wrong. What I have learned is that I have to fool myself into accessing that aspect of my creativity, and it really frustrates me.

There's a connection between this phenomenon and my native avoidance of the active voice: my fondest desires, and most rehearsed inner fantasies, from earliest childhood, involve the disappearance of not the self, but my self.

Those of you who know me personally will find this hard to believe, as you'd be hard pressed to ever meet another grandstanding blowhard who can outdo me in the monopolize-your-attention department.

Interestingly, the erosion of identity is precisely what good character visualization and development truly requires, so perhaps, if I can find a way to link the two in my mind, the lifelong block will dissolve.

Anyway, thanks for reading. I am not planning any big changes here, although I have been constantly worrying the bone above. I rather expect that I'll be experimenting with solutions to it here.

I hope to turn in a longer entry, but a picture is worth a thousand words, correct?

We spent Saturday night at a beachfront cabin on the Oregon Coast in a small town called Netarts (nee-tarts). The cabin was an outrageous bargain - directly on the beach, with a complete kitchen (dishwasher, microwave, etcetera), and feturing miscellaneous amazing antiques, including what appeared to be a completely original turn-of-the-century floor lamp, a freestanding cabinet Victrola that included a selection of 78s (but sadly, did not play becasue the tone arm was stiff), and a basket full of stereopticon views, with stereopticon (among the views were several selections from the time of the United States' 1898 invasion of Cuba, including views of American volunteers, President McKinley's cabinet, soldiers writing home, a battleship in harbor, a sentimental series depicting the veteran's return, and finally, the gravesite of the assassinated McKinley).

And topping it off, a fireplace. Damn!

However much the cabin amazed me - it felt as though we were staying in a friend's house - the spectacular beach walks wowed me more. We'll be returning, without a doubt.

Here's the full galleries: March 22 | March 23

And a few selections:

	Viv in the distance. This is just about high tide and it's around 5:30 pm.
	A Suntory whiskey bottle. One of quite a few Japanese bottles that had apparently crossed the ocean. We, in fact, found not one, but two blown-glass fishing floats.
	Clouds reflected in the wet tidal flats. The flats extend way, way out from the bluffs and are quite hard-packed. This picture was taken at around 11 am, near low tide.
	One of many factory-trawler (I assume - it's obviously for a big net) net fishing floats we saw. This one, and then all of them, became "Wilson."
	I'm holding a group of mussels, each one at least six inches long. It's heavy. We did not eat them. I believe the beach is a state park.
	The start of a long walk. The three off-shore rocks on the horizon are about two miles away, and we walked beyond them, to the beach front of the next little town to the north, Oceanside. We ate lunch there and then walked back, on the hard-packed sand of the beach the whole way.

Let's open the envelope, shall we?

So, to summarize: I got two out of seven. Almodovar and Polanski blindsided me. Anne Zender, however, knew the rule to apply when considering Nicole Kidman's performance: "Putty nose wins," she said.

While Paul Frankenstein blogged the ceremony live, Ken sat it out this year, unlike last (start here, read upwards). We were on the road back from Oregon and didn't see any of the show (not that I would have been watching anyway).

Conclusion: next time I pick Oscar winners, simply pick whatever the opposite of my choices are, and you should be in good shape.

Here is my prediction for 2003, in the 2004 ceremony:

Peter Jackson's The Return of the King wins in all major categories, allowing the competing Matrix productions only minor wins in categories that prior LOTR films have won in, such as Sound.

The World Clock - Time Zones: for you non-Mac people. Browser-based. Looks like you can set up your own customizable version, which is the key to working all this stuff out.

[via The Agonist. And yeah, this is waaay early.]

Where is Raed ? updated at 6:05p Baghdad, 7a Seattle, about two hours ago.

He notes that is about two hours until the B-52s arrive, and as I write this, reports of intensified anti-aircraft fire are on NPR and CNN.

It's World Clock Deluxe time.

(*cough* for Mac OS X *cough* Eric and Paul)

The only drawback I can find is that the clocks are numeric rather than analog... See, that would be cool, you know, the old-school newsroom clocks as a part of the desktop, you know...

Paul, I have some vague memory of you posting something like this... no, maybe it was a Risk clone. Get search!

Michael Moorcock Interview: Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four, Part Five.

From March 17, 2003 to March 21, I posted five parts of an email interview I conducted with British author Michael Moorcock in preparation for an article that was published in the April 2003 issue of Cinescape magazine. the software I use to manage this web site makes it difficult to accomplish certain kinds of archival ordering, so I'm adding this table of contents.

I conducted the interview in January and sat on it, a drawback of generating material that is destined for print first. While I was waiting for the magazine to come out (... and waiting, and waiting ...) a trade magazine broke the Elric movie story, which made me sad. Oh well, live and learn!

Hope you enjoyed, or will enjoy the interview.

Here is the final part of my interview with Michael Moorcock. I'll add a separate table of contents that presents the parts in order to overcome the awkward categorical ordering.

Readers will want to know of the author's website, multiverse.org, which has a wide range of material available, including Mr. Moorcock's online forum, in which he will happily respond to site visitor's questions at length. However, the forum is somewhat hard to find on the site, and I've been told it's by design, so I'll provide you with a link to the root of the site and permit the intrepid their own pleasure of discovery.

I apologize again for breaking up the posts with other topics, but I'm afraid you'll have to take that up with the President.

Health

You are currently facing complications of neuropathy in your foot, I believe. If I understand correctly, you may have another operation coming up. Is there anything you'd like to say about your health in general or about the specific state of it at the present time?

I’ve enjoyed good health most of my life and been generally very active. Being less active in Texas and using marijuana to offset the pain of neuropathy helped, I believe, get me into the condition where the arteries in one leg hardened, compromising blood flow to the foot which is now in jeopardy. Moral – keep walking and go easy on the wacky backy. I long to be able to walk without pain again and with luck that will happen eventually.

Other Authors

You've cited Mervyn Peake as an inspiration for your work online in the past. His best known work, Gormenghast, was filmed recently. What was your opinion of the adaptation?

I thought it was a very worthy job. It needed someone with Peake’s imagination to make the most of it. Sadly it’s rare to find such people, of course. Some of the actors were great. Some of the added lines were diabolically bad.

Alan Moore, the author of Watchmen and From Hell, has cited you as an influence in the past. Has his work been an influence on you?

An inspiration, certainly. I just recently had an idea I couldn’t use because it’s too like one of his. I thought of offering it to him, but of course he has plenty of his own.

Moore wrote a prose novel, Voice of the Fire in which his - and your - themes of geography and history are beautifully addressed. Are you familiar with it?

Yes. I’m a great admirer of Alan’s fiction.

Have there been or are there plans afoot for the two of you to collaborate?

Two recluses? I wouldn’t mind doing it some time, if Alan wanted to, but it hasn’t come up.

You are probably the most persistent, thoughtful and idiosyncratic critic of Tolkien's work that I'm aware of, carefully separating your thoughts on his work from your thoughts on the man himself. Do you see the success of the films as a triumph or a tragedy?

A triumph, though I find the films themselves deadly boring and the infelicities (potatoes, tobacco, gunpowder) irritating. But they set a bench-mark and it means it’s now possible to try to make an ambitious adult fantasy film, which I’m hoping Elric will be!

Your work, and particularly Elric, is widely understood as standing at the opposite pole from Tolkien's in the realm of fantasy writing. Is that a fair characterization?

I describe this tradition in today’s (January 25, 2003) Guardian, reviewing the US author Poul Anderson’s The Broken Sword, which preceded Tolkien’s first LOTR volume in 1954.

I think some of us are less interested in offering escape than Tolkien, less interested in stroking ourselves a la Gollum. Who, incidentally, is the only character I really like in the whole quasi-epic. Which probably says it all. That said, I was fond of Tolkien, who was a very nice, decent human being. He was, however, of his time and I am bound to react to his generation – soupy about self-sacrifice in war (because of Ypres and so on), suspicious of working classes and dark Easterners.

That said I think it’s foolish to depict him as a racist or, indeed, any sort of fascist. He was of his time. But his books don’t really rise to being a real epic simply because of that. What irritates me is not Tolkien but Tolkien-worship. I suspect those who think he’s the greatest writer in the world haven’t really read much really good fiction. I think the same of those who might say the same of me...

Did you write Elric with the conscious intent of developing a literary antidote to Tolkien?

Yes. And to Robert E. Howard, the other example in my day.

And to wind up: In a true wizard's battle, who would prevail: Gandalf or Elric? ;)

Elric, I suspect. He’s a lot less self-important and a lot trickier.

A couple posts ago I thought I should look up sources on who started the oil well fires in 1991. Here's what I found:

New Zealand's Scoop runs a February 19, 2003 press release from the Missouri-based American Gulf War Veterans Association. The release states, in part,

One veteran has now stepped forward and given a detailed account of how he and others in special teams, moved forward of the front, (behind enemy lines ahead of US forces) and then set charges on the well heads. "We were mustered into the briefing tent at which point a gentleman whom I first had thought to be an American began to brief us on the operation. I was concerned because he was not wearing a US uniform and insignias."

Here's a link to the releasing organization's site: American Gulf War Veterans Association.

Here's a link to a transcript of another unnamed veteran making the same sort of claim. However, a quick peek of the site's topics casts doubt on the site as a source of reliable information - the site appears to promote a kind of black-helicopters wolrd view, so take it with a grain of salt.

Finally, even highly critical material such as this 1991 report on the environmental consequences of the first Gulf War on the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists web site accept the view that the fires were set by the retreating Iraqi Army in 1991.

Frontline also accepts this view, the the context of their very comprehensive review of Gulf War Syndrome.

So, in a very informal survey of available internet materials on the subject, I was able to locate no credible reports of the oil wells actually being ignited by accident, or even by secret operations - the reports above do allege secret activity, but the nature of the reports means that they are insufficiently credible.

However, I'm reasonably sure that my original curiosity on this stemmed not from reports of skullduggery by classified operators, but by deliberate shelling. I found no references to back this idea up.

Serious D'Lissues: lay-DEEZ and GENTLemen: JAHNA D'LISH!

December 30, 2002: "Where is Raed" is posted on MeFi.

dhartung sez:

Also, in case it isn't clear, it's my understanding that Salam is in Baghdad, and Raed is in Amman. And although the front page of his old blogspot site is fux0red, his archives are not wiped: July 02, Aug 02, Sep 02, {somewhere in here it gets more substantial, as where_is_raed is discovered by other bloggers and begins responding} Oct 02, Nov 02. As one can find, Salam's point of view is complex: he doesn't like Saddam one bit, but neither does he whole-heartedly endorse an invasion. (Note, of course, that salam and pax are the words for "peace" in Arabic and Latin respectively.) Also, he is completely skeptical of US intent and the bona fides of exile opposition groups.

Also, MeFi overlord Mathowie posted a link to Paul Boutin's investigation into Salam's weblog.

Near Real Time Satellite Images of Iraq - [via The Agonist, whose mind must be nearly gone by now: keep up the good work, Sean!]. Smoke plumes, perhaps?

Don't I recall hearing that last time, it turned out the oil well fires were actually the result of Allied shelling? Must investigate.

What's all this talk about a "Coalition of the Willard"?

Four news choppers over my neighborhood - it borders the freeway, and the P-I reports that the freeway-blocking tactic is in use. I hate hearing 'em over the house - it means beatings and tear gas.

Even if it means that I have not see the haul-away vans that often show up when the choppers do. I've heard that lots of cops are on National Guard call-up - I wonder if that means the SWAT samurai-vaders are Over There?

Interesting war link:

The Agonist is doing a blow-by-blow. Don't miss his Annex. He points out, among other things, that Rand Beers, formerly the top U. S. anti-terror official, has resigned, apparently over concerns about the war's impact on domestic security.

On a less gloomy note, Eric Sooros is getting married, and Kurt Easterwood and his wife Naoko are new parents in Japan, my friend John Strohm will be in town or is already, and the crows above Capitol Hill are still dive bombing that red-tailed hawk.

This is the fourth part of my interview with Michael Moorcock, the next to last part. In his work, there are several themes that stand out. Foremost among them are the setting and importance of urban civilization; the use of three-part characters – three persons locked in a relationship, often of both blood and sexual love, two partners male, and one female; addiction; and anarchism as a political and personal philosophy.

For many readers of my age, our introduction to one of the serious questions of political philosophy – the relationship of the individual to the state – came through Mr. Moorcock's writing. Certainly, I personally was introduced to the tragic history of Russian anarchism through his writings. I would have been very unlikely to have looked into it further if I had not read about Mr. Moorcock's idealized portrait of Nestor Makhno.

I believe that reading much of his fantasy as a preadolescent laid the groundwork for my own receptivity to some of the ideas and ideals of punk rock. Punk's adaptation of the rhetorical posture of anarchism arguably (and ironically) stemmed from the countercultural ideals of the London and Parisian hipster scenes of the late 1960's.

Running thoughout his fiction are references to a city, Tanelorn, which in his mythos is a perfect place, a haven of rest and civilization that exists everywhere and nowhere, behind the real and physical cities we live in, and in the context of the stories, a sort a genuinely extant Platonic ideal of the city.

A similar concept underlies much of his fantasy writing, in parallel with Joseph Campbell's well-known idea of the Hero with the Thousand Faces. Mr. Moorcock calls his hero the Eternal Champion, and posits that his fantasy characters are, in essence, different incarnations of the same being. Over the whole scope of his work, this idea – that the main characters he spins tales of are in some way the same being – grants a powerful sense of vastness to the books, a kind of operatic grandeur to the material.

Mr. Moorcock has a deep appreciation of turn-of-the-century British pulp fiction, which was created for mass audiences of both the young and the working class. This fiction frequently practiced a kind of imperial pedagogy and functioned as propaganda for the economic and political structure of the day. The writing of Rudyard Kipling is a kind of parent to this genre, which will be mostly unknown to American readers – in a way, Tintin is a descendant of this genre in Europe, and Tom Swift once was here in the United States.

Mr. Moorcock has repeatedly selected particular flavors of literature from the late Victorian and Edwardian era, and affectionately made use of the linguistic style and tropes employed therein to craft his own tales wihin the skins of the mostly-forgotten books.

Among these titles are his Warlord of the Air cycle (the White Wolf/Borealis collected edition is titled A Nomad of the Time Streams), in which an idealistic young British Army officer, Oswald Bastable, comes unstuck in the multiverse and experiences a very different first half of the twentieth century than ours (his has many more airships than our did, darn the luck). The Brothel in Rosenstrasse is a moody reflection on the genesis of World War One, written with great delicacy and feeling; Gloriana is a reflection on empire and its' costs (on the page I have linked to, the brief description appears to be for another book – but there's detailed reader review that merits attention, lower on the page).

Finally, and among my favorites, are his Dancers at the End of Time, which I have a difficult time describing (There's a companion volume as well, Legends from the End of Time). It's a love story between a human with the powers of a god and the innocence of a child and very, very proper Victorian, sadly, married to man she does not love. The Dancers series was clearly written in celebration of what love can mean, and is by turns wildly romantic, incredibly silly, and deeply moving. Every time I read it, life gets a little bit better for my wife.

In this segment of the interview, Mr. Moorcock refers to Linda, his American-born wife. They live in a suburb of Austin, Texas.

Urbanity (Tanelorn, London)

Is Tanelorn London?

No. But London might become Tanelorn. We have to do our best!

Why did you leave London?

Linda’s asthma meant we had to think about moving. Linda’s nieces live in Texas. The air was better outside Austin. But we’re now thinking of moving back to England eventually, maybe to a place in the country fairly close to London. I miss London.

Did you write Mother London and King of the City primarily in London or in Texas?

Did the location have an impact on the works? If so, what can you tell us about that impact?

Mother London was written entirely in London. King’s notes and some chapters were sketched in London but the book was written mostly in Texas. Locations are important, but not where I’m writing at the time, only what they mean in terms of narrative and so on.

Dependence

Not only Elric, but other incarnations of your Eternal Champion as well, are depicted as dependent, medically or in addiction, on drugs (or souls, or whatnot).

I might just about be addicted to writing, but that’s all. I come from a totally unaddictable family, it seems (behaviour aside). My mother gave up smoking the day she found out it was bad for you. I’ve given up all sorts of things for the same reasons.

Have you ever been dependent, medically or in addiction, on drugs yourself?

See above.

What draws you to the theme?

I’m interested in human behaviour and the way people are addicted to ritual, ideas, ways of life. Often such habits are very destructive.

Would you characterize your relationship to writing per se as a dependency?

I don’t think so. If I’ve nothing to write about, which I suppose is rare, I simply stop. I can go for months just reading, watching movies and so on.

Anarchism

When did your interest in anarchism as a political philosophy begin?

Reading Kropotkin as a boy and finding that his kind of anarchism struck resonances with my own ideas of freedom and justice.

Would you describe yourself as an anarchist currently?

Yes. It’s the closest political philosophy to my own ideas. Not necessarily very practical, but it resonates, just like my feminism, with ideas of what is morally right – the freedom of the individual and so on.

Were you in the past?

Yes.

Can you describe the core values of the anarchism that presents itself in your books?

Human dignity and its importance. That’s what makes me write political books like Warlord of the Air and little cameos like A Winter Admiral. Respect for human dignity...

British Pulp

In the Warlord of the Air cycle, your inversions of this literature are so through as to be programmatic. Did the anarchist content of these books emerge from the logic of inverting the models?

Not really, since my anarchism is what resonates with my inner self. All anarchism is for me is a formal way of dealing with the political world and so on.

In the Elric material, on the other hand, the anarchist values appear largely as reflections of Elric's specific character. When you were writing the books, did the theme emerge of intent or from the character, as you wrote him?

Elric was always a version of myself, if a highly melodramatic one. So Elric’s moral struggles were mine in the early books. Somewhere in all my fantasies you’ll find a moral theme, even if it doesn’t dominate the story. And the rights of the individual to formulate their own morality is always important. I don’t necessarily APPROVE of the morality the individual formulates, of course, and I believe that morality in the end has to do with our consensus views of right and wrong.

In the works did the anarchist themes emerge organically, or did you set out with a pedagogical goal in mind?

No. As I said, my anarchism, like my feminism, comes out of my own instincts, not the other way around. Those ideas, of course, help me formulate certain ideas about action, but they don’t have much to do with ideas about stories.

Incest

The theme of the sister-lover disputed over by two brothers (or cousins, what have you) appears most clearly in the Cornelius books and the Elric books, but also in more realist form in Mother London and King of the City.

Where did this theme originate? Did you invent it, borrow it from folklore or literature, or does it reflect a personal experience in your own life?

Well, I was in love with my cousin when I was about five. Maybe that’s it. Certainly it remains a powerful emotion. She died of polio. But as an only child I suspect that I am simply fascinated by the idea of Potential relationships with siblings!

In your childhood, did you have a non-conventional relationship with others that made this theme resonate for you?

I had very conventional friendships. I am still in touch with my very best friend from my childhood.

Fate and Will

To what do you attribute the prominence of fate and will in your writing?

I suppose I’m interested in how we are driven and formed by context. In one context we become one sort of individual, in another, another. So that’s what it’s mainly about.

Do you believe, on a personal level, in destiny or in free will?

I believe in a little of both. I tend to drift into things. I drifted into writing fantasy, singing in rock bands, making records and so on. If asked, I’ll do it. If not, I probably won’t.

To what to you attribute the prominence of these themes in your work? Are there specific artists that influenced you to adopt these themes?

I can’t think any.

Do you, personally, feel that your life more reflects your exertion of will or the effects of fate?

No. Generally I don’t exert my will. When I do, however, I tend to get what I want, it’s true. But generally it’s other people seeing something in me and asking me to do something – write a fantasy series, make a record, whatever. Terrible, isn’t it!

[Next: a brief look at Mr. Moorcock's health, and words on the work of Mervyn Peake, Alan Moore, and (batten down the hatches) J. R. R. Tolkien.]

Don't touch that dial: Salam (I think!), in Baghdad, blogs the bombing. Or whatever it is at the moment.

I suspect he'll end up offline pretty quick since you'd figure phone lines will be the first things they try to knock out.

from a March 16 post:

Do support democracy in Iraq. But don’t equate it with war. What will happen is something that could/should have been avoided. Don’t expect me to wear a [I heart bush] t-shirt. Support democracy in Iraq not by bombing us to hell and then trying to build it up again (well that is going to happen any way) not by sending human shields (let’s be real the war is going to happen and Saddam will use you as hostages), but by keeping an eye on what will happen after the war.

I found this, of course, at MetaFilter, which appears a mite slow just now.

Beginning in Mr. Moorcock's New Worlds days, he began producing formalist pranks and serious high-modern pieces that eventually combined into one continuing work, the Jerry Cornelius books (if I have my history right). All four were recently reissued in the book A Cornelius Quartet, and from a formal perspective they are the trickiest of Moorcock's work. He went on to use the chops first seen in the Cornelius books in the related works Mother London, King of the City, and in the ongoing Colonel Pyat books, of which there will be four, mirroring the Cornelius series.

Three of the Pyat books have been published: The Laughter of Carthage, Byzantium Endures, and The Century. The final book, Jerusalem Commands, was completed to a first draft stage earlier in 2003.

UPDATE: I have no idea how that got by. The next paragraph is an accurate rewrite.

Three of the Pyat books have been published: The Laughter of Carthage, Byzantium Endures, and Jerusalem Commands. The final book, The Vengeance of Rome, was completed to a first draft stage earlier in 2003.

The Pyat books follow an anti-semitic Russian exile, Colonel Pyat, through the course of his life from his birth in Czarist Russia to his eventual resting point in Moorcock's London. Pyat is the prototypical unreliable narrator, and underlying his anti-semitism is the clear fact that he his himself a Jew, something that he goes to great lengths to deny to himself throughout his life.

In addition to his wildly embellished life story, recounted in the first person, it seems probable that the Colonel may also be crazy, as he clearly afflicted by a recurrent delusional paranoia in which he's stalked by a revolutionary commissar, long dead on the steppes of central Russia.

The Pyat books are in some ways the most ambitious work of Mr. Moorcock's long career, and offer peculiar rewards, in that the narrator, although charming in a roguish way, is also a deeply flawed creation, and spending psychic time with the character is emotionally trying. I'm always up for a challenge, though, and am looking forward to reading Jerusalem Commands in turn when it is published.

Colonel Pyat

Can you tell us about the just-completed Jerusalem Commands The Vengeance of Rome?

Well, all four books were supposed to investigate the origins, our complicity in, the Nazi Holocaust. They are black comedies about a Jew-hating Jew who makes friends with the top Nazis and winds up in Dachau.

Where did the idea for the Colonel come from?

A neighbour in Notting Hill.

Did you ever know a specific, factually extant Russian exile similar in background and attitude to the Colonel?

Yes, that neighbour. Who was actually Polish.

In your opinion, did your Colonel factually serve with Cossacks, or might he have stumbled upon a copy of Babel's Red Cavalry?

Sharp observation. Actually Babel’s influence was more from his Benya Krik stories, about the Jewish crook in Odessa. He did ride, against his will, however, with Hrihorieff’s so-called Cossacks, who were active during the Russian civil war.

Mother London

[Ed. - Mother London, at the moment, is my favorite of Moorcock's works. It tells the story of three people, Londoners, from the time of the blitz up through the early 1970's. One of the characters is mentally ill, and believes that he can hear the collective voices of the city in his head; as the novel progresses, it's less clear whether this hallucination is simply that, or if perhaps it's a true fact of the character's life. The book is a love letter to Moorcock's hometown, and has a lyric tone throughout.]

This struck me as your most personal novel. How autobiographical is it?

Very. Much of the boyhood of Mummery stuff is based on my own life and much of the Joseph Kiss material is based on mine, though I never climbed a palm tree in Kew’s Tropical House.

Which character do you identify most with?

In Mother London, Joseph Kiss. In my overall work, Mrs Cornelius, the rather blowsy old mum with a lot of common sense in the Pyat and Cornelius stories.

Were you consciously thinking of either Thomas Pynchon's Gravity's Rainbow or of Alan Moore's From Hell as you wrote this book?

No. I’d read neither at that time. Have you read either?

[Ed. – Yes. We then had a private email exchange on the subject. The geography of London is central to all three books, expressing itself with the force of a character in each book.]

King of the City

[Ed. - King of the City is a companion volume to Mother London, picking up the story in early 1970's London and moving up to near the present day. The main character is a rock musician and tabloid photojournalist, and Moorcock's language changes to reflect this man's aesthetic sensibilities, which I would characterize as punkish. Again, and as he usually does, three characters and their life-long relationship is the center of the story.]

In this book, you adopted a very distinct voice, very different from the rest of your work.

I always try to get the ‘tune’ right first in a book. The tone is the most important thing for me. Once I have the cadences, I can also begin on the form. I wanted a brash, aggressive, masculine, subjective voice for King.

How difficult was it to get the short sharp voice in hand?

Not hard. He’s angry, as I am, at social injustice and so on. He hates the encroachments of consumerism, as I do. Not hard at all!

What other works do you relate this book most to from your oeuvre?

The Jerry Cornelius stories. The hero of King is a sort of matured or at least more realistic Cornelius.

[Next: Broad themes in Mr. Moorcock's work are explored.]

This is part two, a day late, of my Michael Moorcock interview. In this section, Mr. Moorcock responds to my questions about the original series of Elric novels and stories.

In the late nineties, White Wolf Publishing issued a 15-volume series that collects nearly all of Mr. Moorcock's fantasy and science fiction, including two volumes of Elric stories and novels. The set comprises a good 75,000 pages, and reading it straight through is one of the more remarkable literary experiences I've ever had.

Sadly, the books now out of print, as is the case for a similar four-volume collection from White Wolf of Fritz Leiber's elegant, beautifully written, and witty Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser stories.

However, the White Wolf books are well worth tracking down, and most of the volumes can be located either via Amazon's used-book listing services or via alibris, another used-book dealer listing system.

Previous Elric publications

In the White Wolf editions, the first copyright date is 1961. is that when the albino was born?

A little earlier, in the late fifties. Then Ted Carnell, editor of Science Fantasy magazine, asked me to write some heroic fantasy stories, and the first of these Elric tales appeared, I think, in 1960.

How many original Elric novels were there?

The ones reprinted in the Fantasy Masterworks series published by Victor Gollancz in the U.K. Some novellas and one novel, Stormbringer.

Why and when did you move on from the character?

I had already written a straight novel when I was 17 and lost it, then an allegory called The Golden Barge, published many years later, and of course I had written a great deal of journalism, short stories, comic strips before I ever did Elric, so I didn't really move on. I started doing the Jerry Cornelius stories, which related to modern times, in 1964.

Elric the movie

You've recently mentioned in your online forum that an Elric movie is in the works. Can you tell us more?

Yes, I'm working with Chris and Paul Weitz. After the success of About A Boy they wanted to do an epic and Chris is an old Elric fan. They came to see me and we hit it off. I just heard Universal want to do the picture, but it's early days yet.

At what stage of the development process are you?

Very early discussions between my people and Universal's people!

Can you tell us about the changes to the story that you're making to accommodate the needs of the cinematic medium?

Yes, I want the chance to improve the dynamics of the originals, which were written out of order and over a long period. I like movies to be movies and books to be books. I see no point in producing a slavish version of the books.

How involved to you hope to be in the story, development, and writing of the film?

Quite a bit. The Weitz brothers want me involved and so far we've worked very well together on the proposal and so on.

What writers would you like to see tackling the screenplay? Any "dream team" picks to direct?

We sort of think people will appear when they know the film is about to be made!

Who do you see as Elric? Moonglum? Cymoril? Arioch? Yrkoon?

The only actor I'd really like to see in the movie is one of my stage favourites, Simon Russell Beale, who did a wonderful (plump) Richard 3 at Stratford a few years ago. He's a wonderful actor. Good singer, too.

If you were to appear in a cameo, who might you imagine yourself as?

Smiorgan Baldhead, though I'd have to shave my scalp!

[Editorial interjection: Since this interview was conducted, Mr. Moorcock has mentioned in his online forum that Jude Law's name had come up in consideration for the role of Elric.]

Elric's role in the destruction of Melniboné, I imagine, will make a persuasive case for itself as a potential focus of the tale. Can you mention the saga's highlights that you hope to address in the film, such as this particular event?

Yes, the current proposal ends with the destruction of Melniboné as a result of Elric's decision to accept the dark power of the Black Sword.

[Next: Mr. Moorcock's literary novels.]

Sorry for the outage today - bellerophon wouldn't reboot for several hours, who knows why. I'm remembering St. Patrick today, in the form of a massive hangover, and have declined to attempt detailed technical attention as a result.

So. Again, my apologies.

Michael Moorcock is one of the most prolific F&SF authors of all time, and his work is not easily collected because it spans media. Personally, I'm always discovering new bits and pieces of stuff by him that I haven't yet read.

Moorcock is one of my all-time favorite writers, and I've devoured his works since I first discovered them as a preadolescent in the fondly-remembered DAW editions, each featuring impressively pulpy paintings of the characters inside.

He wrote a book adaptation of Malcolm McLaren's Sex Pistols movie, the Great Rock N Roll Swindle, a rarity that I recall seeing in a record shop in 1982 and having a hard time believing my own eyes. He's written for and performed with Hawkwind and other musical acts. He's frequently cited as the driving force behind the late-sixties upheaval in SF termed the New Wave, due to his editorship of New Worlds.

In the eighties and nineties his work became both more postmodern and less "fantastic" as he excavated lost authors and styles in English prose composition, culminating in Mother London and King of the City, both critically acclaimed.

As my own tastes have broadened and become more literary, it's been a delight and a pleasure to find that Moorcock has been there too – and I have found his most challenging and mature works, such as Mother London, to strongly satisfy my mature tastes, while still finding new depth in the older works I first read as a child, such as the Elric cycle.

I conducted this interview by email on January 20, 2003 for a story which is printed in the April, 2003 issue (#70) of Cinescape. Email proved slightly more adventurous than we'd hoped, involving some unexpected technical hurdles. I've edited the questions for clarity and brevity and Mr. Moorcock's responses for spelling and punctuation. My questions are in bold type; his responses are not.

As I did for Man Conquers Space, I'll break it up into five parts and post nothing more while I'm running it. The final part should be up on Friday.

Michael Moorcock: Intro

To what do you credit your prolific output?

I was an infant prodigy. Usually what marks an IP is an ability to understand on some instinctive level the structure of the work you’re reading, hearing, seeing. This allows you to proceed without the usual struggles, enables you to solve technical problems very readily. To my embarrassment I was quoted in The Guardian as saying I was like Mozart. That’s the only similarity. But I could structure essays very well at school and was a prolific journalist by the time I was 17.
In your own words, introduce yourself to stranger who doesn't know you or your work.

Michael John Moorcock, b. S. London 1939, middle class, educated widely, expelled once, did badly at school, left at 15 and was earning my living writing by the time I was 16. Editor of Tarzan Adventures by 17. I’m a professional literary man!

What was your home environment like? Could you describe your family life as a child?

Very happy, probably thanks to my somewhat feckless father leaving my mother as soon as the war ended. Grew up with rockets whizzing down. Very malleable landscape. Wide family experience. One uncle raised dogs in SE London, another lived at 10 Downing Street, Churchill’s secretary. Mother allowed me wide freedom so I saw a lot of London from an early age. Read a great deal, including the ERB [Edgar Rice Burroughs - MW] books my father had left and also G. B. Shaw. First book I bought was The Pilgrim’s Progress. That’s probably how I came to think all visionary books had to tell a moral tale as well!

ELRIC: Recent and Upcoming Novels

The Skrayling Tree is due out soon. Can you describe the book for us?

It’s about the Matter of America. Lots of U. K. and U. S. writers have written about the Matter of Britain (Arthur and so on), so I thought I’d go to Longfellow and his influences, who tried to tell the epic story of native Americans. So it’s about Hiawatha on his dream quest, a young albino called White Crow on HIS dream quest and Elric of Melniboné in 10th century Europe on his dream quest! The elements all come together in ‘Vinland’. Skraeling is the Viking word for native American. I use North American Indian and Viking mythology as well as my own invented myths. Three strands of the narrative come together in a finale involving a City of Gold...

The book features your best known character, Elric. Could you describe his character and appearance?

He’s an albino with bone white skin and crimson eyes, a sorcerer-emperor of a decaying kingdom which has ruled the world for ten thousand years. But physically weak as he is mentally powerful. He learns his magical craft through a series of dreams, taking decades in the dream time but only a single night in his real time. He depends upon a soul-sucking black sword for sustenance and has certain moral doubts about this means of staying alive...

The Skrayling Tree is a sequel to The Dreamthief's Daughter, published in April 2001. What motivated you to begin writing about Elric again?

I have ideas for Elric stories about every ten years. Having completed a sequence of science fantasy stories in which I consider the nature of Chaos Theory as it relates to my multiverse idea of myriad worlds, in which similar stories are played out infinitely, I had the logic I needed to extend the stories which I wanted to deal with the authoritarian, some would call fascistic, nature of heroic fantasy and also extend the range of what I could write about from Elric’s viewpoint. He and I are growing up, after all...

When was the last time (prior to these books) you'd worked with the character?

Ten years ago with The Fortress Of The Pearl and Revenge Of The Rose. In those I wanted to refine the writing and ideas about Elric’s character somewhat. They are more ambitious in different ways to these new ones.

Will there be more in this series?

One more, The White Wolf’s Son, which will open in my old home village of Ingleton, W. Yorkshire and involve Elric landing outside my house in a balloon…

Did you reread the original books before you opened this new chapter in Elric's life?

No. For some reason I seem to be able to keep all this stuff in my head. Chaos Theory, when I first read Mandelbrot, was like being given a map of my own mind. Made it possible to work with and formalize certain instinctive ideas.

Can you describe the role of female characters in the original books in comparison to their role in these newer books? To what extent is there a specific intent to revisit the feminine in the newer works?

I’ve been a convinced pro-feminist since I read Kate Millet’s Sexual Politics in Evergreen Review. My female characters have often been active, from Queen Yishana in the early Elric stories, but I have developed other active female characters and worked from female viewpoints at least since The Adventures of Catherine Cornelius and Una Persson in the Twentieth Century which was published in the mid-1970s.

[Tomorrow: More on Elric, this time the original books – and yes, a movie, at long last.]

The Ken Goldstein Project appears to be minimally functional again.

Not to go into detail, but for the devheads out there, it appears that some file corruption was disallowing access to the tables - duping them at the system level, and renaming, solved the problem.

Er, make that 'solved,' since I don't have a genuine technical solution, just a functional site again. It's quite possible there are hidden problems, but, as usual, I must do other things now.

The New Yorker March 17, 2003	Harper's April, 2003

Art director's chagrin strikes again.

I noted a ways back ago that I'd come across Argall, by William T. Vollmann, in my peregrinations and snatched it up with greed.

I read the book in about four sittings; it's Vollmann's crack at the Pocahontas story. It's also one of his Seven Dreams, seven books that undertake to re-envision the encounters between Native American and European cultures that underpin our current culture here in North America.

The other books which have been published are The Ice Shirt, The Rifles, and Fathers and Crows.

The Ice Shirt relates the tale of the Viking settlement at l'Anse aux Meadows, Newfoundland; The Rifles is about the encounter between the northern peoples of Canada and the twentieth century around 1900 via the story of the ill fated Franklin expedition (it should be noted that Vollmanns' treatment of the expedition prefigures but inverts the publishing industry's embrace of the later Shackleton expedition); and Fathers and Crows tells the story of the mission to the native peoples along the St Lawrence waterway by French Jesuits and the resultant sainthood of the only Native American saint, the Iroquois St. Catherine Tekakwitha (which also has a counterpart in the mass media, the beautiful film Black Robe, a very different work, but lovely to look at and very useful for it's meticulous visualizations of the pace and time).

I recommend all of these books, but my favorites to date are Argall and Black Robe. I intend a full-scale review of Argall, but, erhm, later.

Vollmann's work is unique. He's a very post-modern writer, injecting a first person authorial voice into the work at whim, incorporating drawings and personal reminiscence into the fabric of the novels. Despite this he is unafraid of the traditional projection of the writers' voice into his characters, and I swear, with each book his control of the language become more assured.

There's a tension in his work, most clearly seen in the books he's published that are not a part of Seven Dreams, between his moral repugnance and personal fascination with what I can only term squalor. This boundary between repulsion and fascination is where, for example, fetish sexuality lies, but Vollmann's adoption of the boundary as the prime element in his work is, in my opinion, in most cases not sexual in nature. Even when he's writing about sex and sexuality, it's neither porn nor erotica, for me at least.

In Seven Dreams, this fascination takes on an added dimension, in that he assumes a demonstrable truth: the Native peoples he is imagining as well as the European persons who frequently left greater amounts of first-person documentation behind each had systems of moral behavior and considered their actions in relation to it.

The preponderance of the narratives we're exposed to in American primary and secondary educational institutions and in the popular culture emphasize the savagery of one or another of the events, depicting the actions as originating with either an evil sense of values or none.

Vollmann's efforts provide the opportunity to see how, in conflict, morality is simply lost, and at the same time how as humans our differing value systems may simply be impervious to reconciliation.

I do not know what further Dreams Bill intends to bring forth, but it seems likely that the conquest of Mexico is likely, and the defeat of the Indians of the plains may be another. In the case of Mexico particularly, it's not possible, I think, to imagine a greater conflict of values.

Viv and I have been casting about, unsuccessfully, for the next read-aloud book to share in bed, after this past years successful journey through The Lord of the Rings . We tried some of my favorite literary SF and fantasy, which was an utter bomb - instead of trusting the book to provide the visualization of the alternate world, Viv would constantly ask me questions which I couldn't answer about the props and settings of the specific book. By setting the story otherwhen, the authors of the genre left Viv behind. The (to me) overhwelming, not very interesting detail that is so beloved in Lord of the Rings, and which has been so lamentably imitated by countless lesser creators, appears to have provided her with a sense of place, a grounding for the fantasy epic that I largely prefer not to encounter.

Let me boil that down; in SF and fantasy, if I like it, Viv probably won't.

Therefore, we've searched for material that Viv has enjoyed that I haven't read and might enjoy. There's been no luck there either, I think largely because of my omnivorous reading. We were taking a stab at Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister by Gregory Maguire, a followup to the same author's brilliant Wicked. In Stepsister, he reimagines the Cinderella story, locating the events of the story in Reformation Holland. Wicked is the story of the Wizard of Oz, retold from the perspective of the Wicked Witch of the West. Maguire's a witty writer, but the nature of the projects is such that they are confections - I read Wicked in one sitting - and the bite-size nature of bedtime read-alouds is perfectly unsuited to a book that I know I can read in about three hours. Rather than enjoying the tale, I become grouchily impatient, and my heart rate rises as I realize how disinterested I am in the characters and literary devices of the narrative.

I had begun a 1938 prose translation of The Iliad, (by W. H. Rouse – I suspect the edition I had in had may have been an abridgement) optimistically describing itself as free of flowery language (If only Steinbeck had finished his Arthur!). In the event, it has not proved free of flowery language, and the antique paperback edition I was reading it in robbed me of whatever pleasure was left. Having very much enjoyed a brilliant, moving stage adaptation of The Odyssey a few years ago here in Seattle, and vaguely recalling that the production drew its' language from a recent translation of the book, I learned that both The Iliad and The Odyssey version I'd seen used as the basis of a play were available by the translator, Robert Fagles, and that the versions had indeed been at the center of some adulatory hoo-hah when originally released.

So I marched on down to Bailey/Coy and picked 'em up. Viv, on seeing this, remarked, "Let's read these books out loud!"

I was taken a back for a minute, as I'd been greedily looking forward to reading the books myself. However, woman's wisdom here, as in so many things, proves superior. Are not these compositions intended to be read aloud?

I can't wait.

On a constitutional with Viv this morning, I saw that the current ish of Cinescape is out; in the magazine, I have several pieces, including an article based on a long interview I had with none other than childhood favorite Michael Moorcock. As is the case for the previous interview-based piece from the magazine, I will post that material here, probably over the course of the next week.

This means, in all likelihood, that no 100-post stunt blogging will be forthcoming. I'll revisit and reconsider the issue after the interview is all in place.

Viv and I went to see the new Willard, as one might expect from my chortling appressssiashion of the video the other day. Alas, ALAS, the film does not adopt the oddball, Lynchian Weimar cabaret setting of the video - dang it, that's STILL a film I'd love to see.

BUT I really enjoyed it. Reviewrs to date have been offput by the lack of sympathy that Glover's peformance provides - he's not a real human, the characters in the film in general are caricatures, the film has no emotional center, and so on.

Does this sound familiar? It's the grounds whereby most of Joel and Ethan Coen's work is generally dismissed, the basis of the dismissive critique of Dan Clowes' early work, and the single least-praised element in Chris Ware's work.

Translation: I LOVED THIS FILM! I laughed and laughed until my sides hurt. Misanthropy does not do justice to the underlying value system, or lack thereof, in the film. Viv was occasionally embarrassed at my raucous laughter.

Here's a sample: Willard buys some rat-and-pest control stuff at the beginning of the film, including some items branded "Tora Bora." At the end of the film, these items are lit, like dynamite, and tossed into the basement full of rats, whose corpses are later burned.

As I recall it, I was the only one that got the joke, and I howled.

Let me assure you, it's far from grisly, with only the smallest amount of onscreen gore.

A note should you attend: about half of the audience that attended the screening we were at were African-American, and took great pleasure at vocally interacting with the film. It's harmless, but a surprise when you don't generally attend what I hear they call "urban audience" oriented films.

I actually do hope more 70's horror flicks like the original Willard get remade, number one on my list being my favorite vampire movie of all time, George Romero's Martin. Remakes are currently underway or completed for The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (emphatically NOT what I'm interested in) and (what the HELL are they thinking) Romero's masterpiece, Dawn of the Living Dead (you know, the shopping mall one), unfortunately without Romero's involvement.

Martin, unlike Dawn, is not completely successful, largely because Romero was attempting to combine a radical reimagining of the vampire legend with 1970's available-light filmic sensibilities. It's aesthetically appropriate, but not nearly as entertaining as it could be. Where Dawn's satiric content is what makes it a complete success, Martin's extremely serious tone weighs the film down, even as the central idea - the character Martin's adolescent sexuality expresses itself in vampirism - is not only strong but so obvious that it's surprising how little it's been used.

Pursuant to my pointing out that some folks engaged in stunt blogging back 'round January, Felicity has applied stylus to wax, and bravely stepped into the breach.

As I write this, it's just over 12 hours in, and she's doing well - post 59 went up at 10:23 am.

A substantial portion of the posts have concerned her former career as a classical musician - a violinist, I think, but she's not clarifed it that I saw within the boundaries of the 100 Thrilling Posts.

She wonders I might be considering such a stunt myself. In all honesty, I have to say yes. However, there are two things that force me to defer until at least a bit later - possibly Tuesday or Wednesday.

First, it's been print week for Cinescape, and thus my short pointer-posts this week.

Second, honestly, 100 posts in 24 hours seems insufficiently challenging - I guesstimate the total word count would be about 5400 words, and I already know I can do that in a day. I want to not know if I can accomplish the goal.

Some further theme is needed, or some further constraint. 100 posts in three hours, like. Or maybe 100 posts with one hand tied behind my back. Or 100 drawings in six hours, scanned and posted. Or 100 good drawings in 12 hours, scanned and posted that same day.

Or rules: The first twenty-six posts must not use the letter a, b, c, corresponding to the numeric position of the letter, and thereafter, cycle back through the rules. Or something.

Each post is a two-sentence reflection upon a word chosen at random from a dictionary, but the whole must relate a coherent theme or story which is allowed to emerge organically from the series.

So obviously I'm thinking about it.

0format: 100 Thrilling Updates in a Day: Dennis Mahoney lost his mind on January 16th of this year.

The next day others followed suit.

I have no idea how I missed this.

Idle Words declares it to be French Week, and proposes that the site provisioner will spend seven sweet days of bloggin' love on the French! En garde!

Via childhood partner in all sorts of shenanigans Eric Sinclair, whose TiBook has been pressed by a feline of late.

Crispin Glover does "Ben" [MeFi]: Viv and I have been jokingly singing "Ben" to each other for three weeks now.

But I NEVER expected this.

Ladies and gentlemen, in celebration of the upcoming release of the Crispin Glover remake of 1970's rat-pack classic "Willard," Crispin Glover in performance, singing the immortal Michael Jackson number, "Ben."

Ragga fragga bowsrabberl humbert grunk and so forth.

In my insomnia, I have the bright idea - "why, I'll do that gol durn MySQL upgrade I've been puttin' off."

All goes well, when I see that the Ken Goldstein project has been disrupted. Somewhere within the guts of PostNuke, a well-intentioned geek has applied a regularizing lower-case to the name of the database that postnuke uses.

Which, of course, has been named with a scheme that includes an uppercase letter - not by me, I hasten to add! It's the default postnuke everything!

So, hm, sez I, and mosey over to the postnuke website, to see that they recommend an upgrade and patch. Ok, sure, boys. So I get the materials.

The recommended upgrade procedure is: remove your old version, making a backup of everything, then add it back, bit by bit, after you've set up the new version. Geez.

Now, I have some insomnia, but, uh, that will have to wait.

Kitty Joyce Logs On - warning: cute cat picture behind this link.

Did you know I once made a logo for dear Kitty Joyce?

Here it is:

Monkey Hot or Not? (Modren humorist via house8)

Because it's ALWAYS better with monkeys.

SpirographX (via Jerry, who is moving to MT shortly) for Mac OS X.

Oooh! Select "animate".

But can I get the gears to grind? An' what about the ineffable pleasure of the pushpins?

(I hear the Balvenie calling my name from down the street. MUST ... RESIST ... ... MUST ... NOT ... GIVE ... IN ...)

Over at Dent's Glacial Erratics Single Malt Tasting is underway, via a clearly unorthodox method employed by Queer Barney.

I'm a longtime Laphroaig man (when I gots the cabbage and some quirk steers me away from the Mark), but Barney's endorsement of the Balvenie Doublewood will certainly move me in the direction of the liquor store.

Barney has access to one of the all-time great liquor stores: Big Red Liquors, in three or more convenient locations all over Bloomington, serving first-time drunken sorority girls as well as snobbish alcohol-dependent academics for over three generations.

I see that the feature of the month is a $42.99 bottle of Glenfiddich 15 year.

Mmm, I can still smell the store today. Mmmmm.

Barney, it should be noted, is a groundhog. Is that like a woodchuck?

Women Gleeful at Return of Sponge Contraceptive [NYT]

best quote from the article:

In 1998, Gene Detroyer, a businessman who had started out developing disposable plates and cups for the maker of Hefty bags, heard that the rights to the sponge were for sale. He said he told his partner at Allendale, a scientist who exclaimed, "That's a great product!"

Mr. Detroyer said he had since read enough letters from women echoing that same thought to believe that the new incarnation of Today would be a big seller. He sees a whole new generation of users among women in their 20's who were not sexually active when the sponge was available.

"This is going to make millions of women very happy," Mr. Detroyer said. "As happy as paper plates may make them, this is going to make them happier."

I also learned that one may purchase not only the Today sponge from Canadian sources, but two other varieties of sponge as well.

Broadway Goes Silent As Musicians Strike:

NEW YORK (AP) -- The sound of music has stopped on Broadway. Virtually every musical shut down Friday after their musicians went on strike, and actors and stagehands refused to cross picket lines.

Eighteen shows, including such big hits as ``Hairspray,'' ``The Lion King,'' ``Mamma Mia!'' and ``La Boheme,'' went dark, and producers canceled all performances through Sunday.

Interesting how this went down on the last day of the big Kensapoppin' story here, eh?

Let me add a handy table of contents to the Kensapoppin' cycle:

KENSAPOPPIN': a fond look back (part 1)
KENSAPOPPIN': a fond look back (part 2)
KENSAPOPPIN': a fond look back (part 3)

A casting dispute

Kensapoppin'!, as the world will recall, was the briefly-produced big budget "one-man" show featuring noted blogger and Skee-Ball historian Ken Goldstein. The show was never reviewed and first-hand accounts of the three full-scale performances that were mounted after weeks of full-cast practice and countless rewrites are rare.

We are fortunate to be able to offer a reproduction of a one-sheet produced in support of the show. The image seen here is linked to a larger-scale graphic, and we also have a pdf available. The Kensapoppin' Emporium is pleased to offer the design on a variety of undergarments, as well. Feel free to browse the Ken Goldstein Project store too!

The production was doomed by a mid-course casting change mandated by the show's producers over the protests of Goldstein, who was disappointed after several weeks of practice to find himself replaced – in the role of himself – by showbiz veteran Rosie O'Donnell. Goldstein, while initially claiming to have been a reluctant participant in the stage show, fought like a tiger to win back the role from the considerably more experienced O'Donnell. (Goldstein's prior experience was restricted to a single unpaid appearance in a Seattle production of Bill Irwin's Fool Moon.) He directed a no-holds-barred campaign via cell phone while engaged in a massive whiskey-and-bingo binge in Atlantic City.

His tactics included hiring Jersey City goons to intimidate the former talk show host, filing lawsuits in both New York and New Jersey, and attempting to spread rumors via the tabloids concerning O'Donnell's sexuality, apparently ignorant that she had come out prior to her engagement in the show. This backfired, earning him the enmity of the tabs and his own brigade of paparazzi.

O'Donnell, displaying her signature gracefulness, voluntarily stepped aside, appearing at a joint press conference with Goldstein. Unfortunately for Mr. Goldstein, the combination of the tabloid press's desire to "nail" him and the effects of his binge left him disoriented and disheveled. Pale and perspiring, the nervous energy of the triumph combined with his massive hangover to tragic effect. The press conference came to an end with an unfortunate bout of projectile vomiting, greedily splashed across the front pages of the tabs the next morning. "KG IN VOMIT SHOCKER," "THE PRINCESS AND THE PUKE," and, memorably, "SKEE HURLER HURLS," screamed the headlines.

Gamely, the production opened seven days later, but the damage was done. Kensapoppin'! closed after only three performances.

(At press time, an apparently inebriated Goldstein has given an email interview to one of our ace reporters, with shocking new revelations... there may be a special extended edition Ken Goldstein Of The Week Week entry!)

Kensapoppin': an excerpt

Kensapoppin' was a very short-lived musical which attempted to fuse Skee-ball, then thought be on the verge of a national vogue, with an examination of the burgeoning issues of privacy in the age of the internet and celebrity, using the metaphor of the everyman and the superhero. We at mike.whybark.com are devoting the final three instalments of our ongoing Ken Goldstein of the Week Week to spotlighting the show.

mike.whybark.com is proud to be able to present this excerpt from the book for Kensapoppin'. It's drawn from the final version, after Goldstein had returned to the lead role as KEN.

Our image today is a shot from an early practice for the production, illustrating one of the most common costumes as noted in the stage instructions below. The masks seen here are the very early paper variety, as opposed to the full-head latex models eventually employed in the production.

[The curtain rises. The set is pseudo-Busby Berkeley – a sweeping stair-stepping stage with two curved wing staircases and a central staircase that narrows at the top, creating a mild forced perspective.

The backdrop is a silvery mylar curtain, and within the staircases are spots directed into the eyes of the audience that strobe randomly throughout the production, emphasizing musical phrases and rhythms.

Between the wings of the staircases are bubbling fountains, and tethered at various levels and in varying sizes are balloons that reproduce the face of KEN GOLDSTEIN, our star.

Ranged about the stage are about forty persons, backs to the audience. They vary in dress, stature, size and gender. Some wear a blue anorak with a buff lining, worn open. Others sport a sweater vest; some wear a cable-knit sweater. Jeans, khakis. One wears a peculiar old-time sporting uniform. The word "Spats" is stitched on the back, above the number. Another wears a colonial American getup. There are others – one sports an Elvis-style jumpsuit, another wears Bob Dylan's ensemble from Highway 69 Revisited. About a third of the cast wears these various costumes, sprinkled amidst the anoraks and sweaters.
The music swells into a crescendo, a live-orchestra version of the Dolby sting, and as the music proper starts, the theme emerging from the upwelling of music behind a big cymbal splash, the cast turns.

They hold the turned pose for one beat, two, as the music comes into focus, and begin hoofin' with every ounce of their showbiz souls. Each castmember is wearing the well-known Ken Goldstein Mask (already seen on the balloons, and of course available in the lobby as a mask, poster, or tee shirt). Naturally, they burst into song. The music is uptempo, nearly a patter song's backing.]

Who's the little man
with the ever-cunning plan
who smiles upon his hand
as you find to your surprise you've bet the farm?
Kensapoppin'!

Who's the little pisher
always showin' in a picture
of a scene he later swears that wasn't there?
Kensapoppin'!

Who's the cheery bumpkin
I've seen eat his share of pumpkin pie
if there's any pumpkin pie there to be had?
Kensapoppin'!

[The following is chanted in a stage whisper by the whole cast. The cast is all facing the crowd, and crouches, snapping their fingers as they move toward the front of the stage, one step on each syllable. At the end of each word, three balloons pop, in a triplet, providing percussive punctuation. They are immediately replaced after each set of three bursts, rising from below the stage to the same height as the prior balloons.]

Kensapoppin',
Kensapoppin',
Kensapoppin',
Kenaspoppin'!

Who stands astride the mighty
in his blindin' tighty whiteys,
ever at the soivice of the goils?
Kensapoppin'!

Who’s the hidden hand
in the game of kick the can
that leads from off-off-Broadway to the woild?
Kensapoppin'!

Who's the pale dry boy
who fills us each with joy
and later has great fits of anxious doubt?
Kensapoppin'!

Kensapoppin',
Kensapoppin',
Kensapoppin',
Kenaspoppin'!

[Set piece dance break. The break lasts for three full cycles through the main musical phrase, and begins with an ensemble piece, moves into two solo features, and back into the ensemble. A key change leads us back to the finish.]

Let us reflect upon his praises,
the sweet phrases that amaze us,
words of wit and whimsy from his pen!

Although he might deny it,
and blushing try to hide it
to those of us who know it's crystal clear:

He's the nebbish with no blemish,
a perfect everyman,
exceptional in each mundane and boring way;

Keep his face nearby you
for it may profit you to hide yours
neath a mask that's been fashioned after Ken!

Kennnnn-
Sa-
POPPIN!

KENSAPOPPIN'!

[As the end of the song builds, a rotating platform rises into view with KEN standing on it, wearing his mustard-yellow-and-red caped SKEE-MAN superhero outfit in preparation for the next number. A mask obscures his face, allowing the tension between KEN's avowed interest in and preference for anonymity and his taste for the high life to be symbolized by his red and gold uniform – and, of course, by the singing, dancing crowd of masked Kens that surround him, singing his praises. He begins to sing a plaintive solo number at variance with his superhero uniform.]

This has been your Ken Goldstein Of The Week Week Entry NUMBER SIX!!! Thank you.

(Tomorrow: the mud-slingin' tale of the musical's downfall!)

Introduction

Lost to the ages, the short-running show Kensapoppin' examined issues of public and private identity and is hailed as a lost masterpiece of early-21st century musical theater.

A high-profile spat doomed the show just before opening day. Join us at mike.whybark.com as we go backstage to unveil the mythos – and some of the surprising material – behind Broadway's most spectacular flop in three generations.

Today, we'll share a publicity photo of on-again, off-again star Ken Goldstein in his Skee-Man uniform, the primary costume for the first act of the wide-ranging show. Promoted as the first one-man musical "with a cast of millions," the show's gimmick was that the supporting cast always appeared on stage wearing masks that reproduced the visage of Goldstein.

The masks were also slated to be distributed to the audience of each show, but at the last minute it was determined that this would be likely to cut into expected concession sales (which included a molded-plastic Halloween-style mask in both adult and children's sizes).

When the show closed tragically early (subsequent to an astonishing media circus which we shall examine in greater detail later in the week), the masks were simply loaded onto barges and taken out to sea for dumping, where they are still tracked around the world today.

From time to time, a mask will surface on eBay, where they reliably fetch sale prices of three and four dollars each.

We encourage our readership to join us in reminiscing about this overlooked show business milestone. Perhaps some of you were involved in the production or were fortunate enough to catch the show itself. Some of our readers may even have covered it for the press.

If you have recollections or memorabilia, please, feel free to share them with the world, and let us know about them here at Ken Goldstein Of The Week Week.

In a welcome relief from our foray into the seamy underbelly of Kenny G's secret life as wanna-be Vegas playa, our entry today will be familiar to assiduous readers of Ken's comments section.

The lovely Heather of Little Cabbage made it known that she'd recieved a certain sort of drinking vessel from the KGP Emporium.

Man, what a relief! Those last two pictures were making my SKIN CRAWL!

This has been your Ken Goldstein of the Week Week Entry NUMBER FOUR!!! Thank you.

Aw, you didn't think that Ken really dressed up in an Elvis fat suit, now didja?

Nope, his REAL career in Vegas is as a croupier. Here's a candid shot of Ken engaging in some harmeless horseplay with the tableboss's ex-wife.

Whoop it up you, you scamp!

This has been your Ken Goldstein of the Week Week Entry NUMBER THREE!!! Thank you.

The preceding entry, naturally, brought thoughts of Vegas to your suspicious minds. That would of course be both correct and appropriate.

By incredible coincidence, later that same evening, the main attraction was introduced to a sell-out crowd, fans eagerly awaiting a chance to hear the famous and stirring main theme from Kensapoppin'.

To the crowd's stunned surprise, a legendary entertainer made an appearance instead.

(Don't be fooled, it's a fat suit. Plenty hot in there, I bet!)

A visibly moved Patrick Murphy was there, camera in hand, to record the appearance.

This has been your
Ken Goldstein of the Week Week
Entry NUMBER TWO!!
Thank you.

Due to a surprising wave of third-party Ken Goldstein of the Week submissions, I have no choice but to declare this to be

Paul Frankenstein gets things rolling with a riff on a post of his own, bringing concrete photographic proof that our dear L'il Kay-Gee is - yowsa - kw-ITE the playa.

I didn't get around to mentioning a few things this week past, and I wanted to be sure to squeeze them in before Ken Goldstein of the Week Week kicks in.

First, Chris points out that the FBI has confirmed to the H-T that they are performing aerial surveillance over my hometown of Bloomington, Indiana.

As for what surveillance can be done from the air, Davis said with image-stabilizing binoculars, FBI agents in a small plane can track a person on the ground. They also sometimes can follow their vehicular movements better than a car can, as well as keep businesses they might frequent under surveillance.

As an example of businesses that could be under surveillance, the two [agency sources] cited ones open late at night from which somebody can send faxes or e-mails.

Scott also noted this, as did Gulcher records honcho Bob Gulcher in an email to me. Bob saw it on a wire source, and I saw it in the P-I this morning.

Second, I'm working on a piece about the Reel Cinerama Film Festival and had the pleasure of sepnding part of Thursday afternoon at the Cinerama theater here in Seattle, part of it in the company of the Vulcan, Inc project manager who ran the theater's restoration project in 1999. Last night we went to the opening, a screening of 1962's How the West Was Won, and it was plenty neat.

Third, (my Cinescape visitors will know this already) I am off the case as the online news editor at Cinescape, although I will be continuing to contribute to the magazine for print and possible online features.

Fourth, I will be assembling a week's roundup on Columbia, but won't post it until after Ken Goldstein of the Week Week is over.

Fifth, Mr. Rogers, R. I. P. You are missed, neighbor.