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News
& What's New - August 2011 |
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They
Twinkled Like Jewels |
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30
Aug
2011
With
the entry of August 8th I
mentioned the two new Publication-on-Demand books from Aegypan
Press of Phil Farmer's novella Rastignac the Devil.
I have received the two books, and also two other books from Aegypan
Press. This time a chapbook and also a hardcover of the novelette They
Twinkled Like Jewels.
Both stories were originally published in 1954 in the magazine Fantastic Universe.
The copyright of both have lapsed, and for that reason are now in the
public domain.
The texts of these two stories can be obtained for free in many
e-reader formats from the website of ManyBooks.
If you want the stories printed on paper, then you can do with the
books from Aegypan Press. They don't come as cheap as the
free e-Books, but they do look very nice. The
lay-out of the
books and the used font for the text are well done.
Far more better than the chapbooks of the two stories from Filiquarian
Publishing, LLC./Qontro. These were published in July 2010, and are
printed-on-demand by Amazon. They are called "High Quality Paperback"
on the cover, but there is no quality to discover with the
publications. No title page, no copyright page, no information on the
publisher, pages are not numbered, but to make things worse is the used
font for the text. The story looks like typed with an old type machine,
in the font courier, which makes it not easy to read.
For less money you can have a much better deal buying the Aegypan
Press chapbooks. They have far more quality.
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Joe Richards
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The
Always Horny Tarzan on Branches |
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22
Aug
2011
I
missed two publications with the update of the story page of "The Jungle Rot Kid on the Nod".
Two Spanish translations, with the title "El cachondo de
Tarzán
siempre por las ramas" (translates as "The Always Horny Tarzan on
Branches"), were previously credited as translations of "Tarzan Lives".
My Spanish sources had provided me with this incorrect information. I
have corrected this, and added the two publications in Spain on the
story page.
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Another
picture of Tarzan |
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16
Aug
2011
I
want to share another picture with you, made by Milo Manara for the
Italian editions of Fantasex
(Mondadori, 1993 and 1996). Every story in the anthology has a very
funny and explicit illustration. This one comes with Farmer's story "The Jungle Rot Kid on the Nod".
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Milo Manara |
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A double
pastiche about Tarzan |
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15
Aug
2011
What
if it had been William Burroughs, not Edgar Rice Burroughs, who had
written the Tarzan books?
Here is a question only Phil Farmer could have asked. Not only did he
ask this question, he also actually wrote a Tarzan story as if had been
written by William Burroughs: "The
Jungle Rot Kid on the Nod".
Farmer: "I was sure that there would be no market for such a double
pastiche if I wrote it ... Despite the lack of sale, I wrote it because
it seemed as if it would be fun doing so, and it was, and I wanted to
find out if I could emulate William Burroughs' style. It took three
hours for the first writing ... Well, it did sell and almost
immediately. But to a very strange publication. I mean by strange that
it was the very last place I would have thought it would be sold to."
It was published in the adult girlie magazine Broadside in 1968.
Two years later the story was published in the British magazine New Worlds, where
it was illustrated by Alan Stephanson (see under).
The story has had a total of 49 publications worldwide. According to
the foreign publications it was not always an easy story to translate,
but nevertheless saw translations in seven countries.
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More from
Canada |
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15
Aug
2011
Here
is a man dedicated to find all Canadian editions and printings of
Farmer's work, Fred Fischer (Houston, Texas, US). He is even more
dedicated than I am at the moment, and I know he has definitely more
time than I searching for these often unknown printings.
A Canadian printing of the first paperback edition of The
Fabulous Riverboat
(Berkley, 1973), which Fred found, was in the line of
expectations. This because of the at the same time published Canadian
printing of To Your Scattered Bodies Go
(Berkley, 1973), which we already had in the bibliography.
But a Canadian printing of the 1976 Dell paperback of The
Adventure of the Peerless Peer came as a big surprise. I
didn't expect this one.
Thanks for the info Fred, I'm glad you've found these two.
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Victor Gadino |
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More PoD
books of Rastignac the Devil |
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8 Aug
2011
Farmer's
novella "Rastignac the Devil"
was originally published
in the magazine Fantastic
Universe, May 1954. The text is in the public domain
nowadays, the copyright has not been renewed.
We had a Publication-on-Demand chapbook of this story in September 2010
from General Books LLC.
This time publisher Aegypan Press prints a PoD chapbook (May 2011)
and hardcover (August 2011) of the novella. Both publications have been
added on the book page.
It seems that FQ Books also had a PoD chapbook of the novella in July
2010. I have ordered a copy and will give more details when I receive
it.
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Clarence Doore |
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Fictional
Author Pseudonym |
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4
Aug
2011
One
of the things Farmer liked to do, really enjoyed, was writing about
fictional characters like they were true persons, and interweaving real
people in his fiction. With this he created his own mythology, like
the Wold Newton Family for instance. Fun to read, but
sometimes
difficult or complex to ´follow´.
Farmer also used fictional characters from his own work, or from that
of other authors, as pseudonyms.
And to make it more complex, or fun..., he would write a biography
about the fictional character as if it was about a real and living
person.
He did this with Tarzan
and Doc Savage,
but also with Jonathan Swift
Somers III.
Somers is a fictional author in Venus
on the Half-Shell (1975). As a 'real author' Somers wrote two
stories, about the German Shepherd dog Ralph
von Wau Wau.
And Farmer on his turn wrote a biography about the author Jonathan
Swift Somers III, first published in the fanzine Scintillation,
June 1977.
The page of the fictional
biography has now been restyled.
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Discovered
letter in Starlog |
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1
Aug
2011
Today
came with the mail a copy of Starlog
#168, July 1991. Completely as a surprise, because I didn't know it was
coming. With the magazine came a very nice letter of the
sender,
Fred Fisher (Houston, Texas, US): "...I continue to appreciate your
high quality maintenance and the sheer usefulness and completeness of
the site, a tribute to your punctiliousness..."
Thank you very much Fred for the donation and the very nice words. I
love both...
Starlog
#168 published a letter
by Philip José Farmer. The publication of this letter was
unknown till now. The new information is added on the letters page.
In his letter Farmer corrects a statement made in an earlier article,
in issue #166, about the existence of d'Artagnan, and concludes: "Yet,
In a sense, Zorro, Robin Hood and d'Artagnan did exist and still exist. The
trio we know through fiction live far more vividly than most people we
know."
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| Added
Books |
Eight publications were
added
on the book pages in August.
 The
Adventure of the Peerless Peer
A Canadian printing of the Dell paperback, 1976.
The
Fabulous Riverboat
The Canadian Berkley Books printing of 1973.
Rastinac
the Devil
Two chapbooks, a softcover and a hardcover, from Aegypan Press,
2011. Also a chapbook from Filiquarian Publishing, LLC./Qontro (2010).
They
Twinkled Like Jewels
Two chapbooks, a softcover and a hardcover, from Aegypan Press,
2011. Also a chapbook from Filiquarian Publishing, LLC./Qontro (2010).
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| Statistics |
These are the
numbers for the book pages in August.
1740
publications
1147 different
covers
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