A Short Movie About Foundation's Friends

An anthology of stories written as an homage to Isaac Asimov. The contributors include Ray Bradbury, Ben Bova, Robert Silverberg, Harry Turtledove, Connie Willis, George Alec Effinger, Barry N. Malzberg, Frederik Pohl, Poul Anderson, Robert Sheckley, Hal Clement, Harry Harrison, Orson Scott Card, and Janet & Isaac Asimov. Sounds like a can't miss deal, doesn't it? Au contraire. It is awful, definitely not worth your time or money. There's only one good story in the whole 464 pages. And that one's by homophobe Orson Scott Card. 

It definitely lands with a thud.

Multiverse Madness

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse came out December 14, 2018. It only made $375.5 million, so maybe knowledge about it wasn't pervasive. But Spider-Man: No Way Home is due out December 17, 2021, and Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness will follow on March 25, 2022, and one or both of them is going to make a shit-ton of money. Which means that there will be lots of eyes there.

Meanwhile, The Flash isn't due out until November 4, 2022.

So you know what's going to happen. Assuming it hasn't already happened.

And it's probably already happened.

People are going to conclude that Marvel invented the concept of The Multiverse, and that DC decided to copy it.

And this won't be the first time that that kind of thing will have happened. 

So many times DC has done something innovative, Marvel followed and got more attention, and then it became "Common Knowledge" that the DC folks were a bunch of copy cats. 

This Multiverse business is an easy one, though.

DC writer Robert Kanigher wrote "Wonder Woman's Invisible Twin" (and Harry G. Peter drew it) in Wonder Woman Volume 1 #59, which was cover dated May, 1953. And that, my friends, was when The Multiverse was invented. I've never read the story, I'm sorry to say, but I've read the synopsis, read a couple of its ten pages (and am still trying to hunt down the rest of them), and this panel alone proves that what I'm saying is true:

You know when Marvel did its first Multiverse story? It was What If? Volume 1 #1, which was cover dated February, 1977. Yep--24 years after the Wonder Woman story appeared. (Written by Roy Thomas and drawn by Jim Craig, by the way.) It was, "What If Spider-Man Had Joined the Fantastic Four?" (And I think I could make a good case for this being more along the lines of an "Imaginary Story"... which DC had been doing since Superman #19 (by Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster), which appeared in December of 1942! But let's not get into that. A 24 year whoopin' seems sufficient to make the point here.)

Of course, there are those who would argue that the first DC Multiverse story was "The Flash of Two Worlds" by Gardner Fox and Carmine Infantino (which appeared The Flash Volume 1 #123, September, 1961)...but that's just misogyny speaking. And if that's you, then (1) seek help, and (2) that still puts DC ahead of Marvel by 16 years. 

By the way...along the way to all of this ⬆, I read an article by Scott Shoyer (published September 19, 2020 @  https://www.cbr.com/wonder-woman-invisible-twin-multiverse/) which suggested that you could make a case for All-Star Comics Volume 1 #3 (December 1940) being the first DC Multiverse story, since "Prior to All-Star Comics #3, characters from the different comic books seemingly existed in different, separate worlds." And since many of the heroes met up here to form the All Star Squadron, Mr. Shoyer saw that as a Multiverse story. But I don't buy that, do you? 

Nope. This one goes to Wonder Woman, wherein we clearly see a doppelgänger-ish character from a parallel world interacting with the hero of the story. 

Set and match.

So when The Flash movie comes out and you start hearing people say, "They ripped that idea off of Marvel!" please tell them that they don't know what they're talking about, and that history shouldn't be a mystery.

Thank you.

Evil

 I am not nor have I ever been a Bible Thumper. 

I know it pretty well... probably better than most Hard Time Christians, since I've (1) read it cover to cover two and a half-times, (2) went to a Christian school (Lutheran) from Kindergarten through sixth grade, (3) went to a Catholic College (now Bellarmine University) where 9 hours of credit in Theology were required, and where I took 15 hours, (4) read all of the textbooks assigned to my then-wife when she was studying for a master's degree in theology from Notre Dame, and (5) have attended services at at least 70 different churches over the years, including all but three of the Catholic churches in Louisville.

And I'm reading it again now. Out loud, to my daughter. We read a page a day, and as of today we're on page 747. Getting close to the halfway point.

And in our reading today, a line from Psalm 96 * struck me.

It's pretty simple, isn't it? 

And yet...how many "Christians" have supported Donald Trump, not only knowing that he was evil, but even willing to defend his evil nature because it served their agenda? 

According to Psalm 96, you don't cut bargains with Evil because it's expedient. The ends do not justify the means. When you see Evil, you speak up against it. You oppose it.

Pretty simple.

Seems like pretty good advice for non-parochial territory, too, doesn't it? Obviously there are times when you have to compromise in order to achieve something, but that doesn't mean you have to kowtow to evil. When you do that, you're just giving yourself an excuse to do something that you know you shouldn't be doing. I can't help but think that that is the way you attenuate your spirit, and eventually you pay big time for that kind of shit.

* It might be Psalm 97 in "your" Bible. I'm reading the Orthodox Study Bible--published by Thomas Nelson, New King James Version--a gift from a very devout Greek Orthodox friend, and it gives the number as 96, but it's followed by a 97 in parentheses. 

Misreadings

A long time ago, I was watching a reality tv show with my #1🌞. Whenever an "actor" came onscreen, a little label identifying her/him would appear stating name and profession. A guy came on, and #1🌞 looked at the label and said, "The Rapist?" 

It was "Therapist." And I've never thought of that word the same way since.

This morning a similar thing happened to me. I was watching FOX News, as I try to do on a regular basis. (Keeping abreast of the competition and all that.) And when I read this caption--

via Imgflip

I read, "Flawmakers." And since the story was discussing Republican lawmakers, I thought that that was entirely appropriate.

Again, Orson Scott Card

Well. I was getting ready to post another quote from Orson Scott Card's "The Originist," and I was starting to think I really needed to read some more OSC, since he seemed like a pretty wise fellow. But in my Googling around I came upon a reference to his "offensive" beliefs. I had no idea what that meant...and I thought that I probably should have a clue, since I'd read two novels and 1/2 of a long short story by him. Usually that stuff flashes out like shining from shook foil. Which is an ironic thing for me to say, since the quote I was thinking about posting was this:

"Nobody can lie for long about who they really are. Not even to themselves."

ANYway. I thought about it, and then I Googled "Orson Scott Card's Obnoxious Beliefs." And one of the first hits was an article from Wired * by one Rachel Edidin entitled "Orson Scott Card: Mentor, Friend, Bigot." There were several potent lines, but I think this was the big cut:

"Card's hate has come to color my experience of his fiction -- as, I think, it should. Neither fiction nor its creators exist in a vacuum; nor is the choice to consume art or support an artist morally neutral. Orson Scott Card is monstrously homophobic; he's racist; he advocates violence and lobbies against fundamental human rights and equates criticism of those stances with his own hate speech." 

Oh. Wow. And then I looked around a bit more and found this on  Wikipedia:

"In an August 2013 essay called 'The Game of Unlikely Events', which Card presented as an experiment in fiction-writing, Card described an alternative future in which President Barack Obama ruled as a 'Hitler-or Stalin-style dictator' with his own national police force of young unemployed men; Obama and his wife Michelle would have amended the U.S. Constitution to allow presidents to remain in power for life, as in Nigeria, Zimbabwe, and Nazi Germany. In the essay, first published in The Rhinocerous Times, Card attributed Obama's success to being a 'black man who talks like a white man (that's what they mean by calling him 'articulate' and a 'great speaker')."(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orson_Scott_Card)

So. 

Wow.

I think I'm finished with Orson Scott Card now.

* Wired.com, actually: CULTURE 10.31.2013 09:30 AM (https://www.wired.com/2013/10/enders-game/).

DDR: The Path Between the Seas: The Creation of the Panama Canal, 1870-1914 by David McCullough

 

The Path Between the Seas: The Creation of the Panama Canal, 1870-1914 by David McCullough

Day 2 (DDRD 1,361): July 24, 2021

Another "crossover" day, as this was really the last day for The Great Bridge, but the 2nd day for The Path Between the Seas. I read about twenty pages (including the table of contents, etcetera) on the 23rd, just seeing if I wanted to go through with another McCullough (since my first such experience left something to be desired), so I wasn't even sure that it was Day 1. Actually, even as I write this (and refer to it as Day 2) I'm not sure that I'll go through with this book. I'm going to read a little bit more before I commit. If I decide to bail, then the Day 2 designation is irrelevant. Either way, it's still DDRY 1,361, and tomorrow, no matter what I'm reading, it will be DDRD 1,362. Yeah, I know. But I'm writing this for Future Me, so there is one eye with a GivuhShit in it. 

Speaking of Days, there have been other crossovers, so (Future Self) the Grand Total for Books Read Days is now at 1,363 if you add up the separate book totals, but it's really only 1,361 at this moment.

Carry on.

Here's a bit which caught my eye: 

Reference the idea of building a canal from the Atlantic to Pacific oceans, Francisco López de Gómara (a Spanish priest & historian of the 16th century) said, "There are mountains, but there are also hands." That is definitely tattoo worthy. Too bad I'm finished with that shit. I'm also thinking that if I ever decide to go back to work on my novel, ...then there is no mountain..., this would be a very nice quote to have under a chapter number. Try to remember that, Brother K., okay? 

Day 3 (DDRD 1,362): July 25, 2021

Read to page 60...and it looks like I'm in for the full pound. For one thing, the story has kind of caught my interest. 

Here is a thing:

"From each according to his ability, to each according to his work." Claude Henri de Rouvroy, Comte de Saint-Simon (1760 - 1825) So a bit before Karl Marx on that one.

Also, there has been a mention or two (possibly three) of Jules Verne, especially of Around the World in Eighty Days, which reminded me that McCullough had also made a mention or two of Verne in The Great Bridge. It also reminded me that I was quite the Jules Verne fan in the days of my youth, and that I read at least a half-dozen of his novels, maybe more. Which made me think, "I'd like to read a biography of Jules Verne." So I just put in a request for Jules Verne : The Definitive Biography by William Butcher--yet another Remote Shelving book. Sheesh. I wonder if I could get the library to pay me to be a Remote Shelf? Ah, now I have a new goal in life.

And even though I am enjoying this book so far, McCullough's style has already begun to irritate me anew. For one thing, he feels the need not only to describe the physical appearance of most of the people he introduces, even if they are of little consequence to the larger story, but even worse, he seems to delight in evaluating how attractive they are. He also mades unnecessary adjectival insertions, such as when he refers to the "ridiculous suicide" attempt of a woman. I mean...for fuck's sake. What a presumptuous son of a bitch. 

But I think I will stick with this thing. Let's see...617 pages of text, of which I've read 60, so 557 to go. And as for the rest of the stuff, I read the Notes as I go, and I will nip away at the other stuff, so let's just estimate that this book will take me 28 more days to read. I think that's an acceptable investment. I am also pretty sure that this will be the last David McCullough book I ever read, though. News as it happens.

Day 4 (DDRD 1,363): July 26, 2021

Read to page 80.

McCullough seems overly preoccupied with the fact that one of his leading characters (at least at this point) in the story of the Panama Canal, Ferdinand de Lesseps (1805 - 1894), was married to a woman who was 43 years younger than him: Louise-Hélène Autard de Bragard (1848 - 1909). (They were married in 1869, when she was 21 years old.) Perhaps the fact that McCullough is married to a woman his own age...and that he met her at age 17, married at 21, and are still married to this day, has something to do with that preoccupation. (Also known as  envy .) 

Also, I found a couple of videos of "full length journeys" through the Panama Canal. Both of them are time lapsed.

Shortest (1:52): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-vi19z4LEi0

But if you have the time, this longer one (6:54) is more interesting: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m8TkcWhmByg

I have to confess that before I started reading this book, my image of the Panama Canal was essentially a 50 mile long concrete trough. As perhaps you already know, it's nothing like that. Not at all. In fact, looking at a journey through the Canal, I have to admit I started wondering how the hell it could have taken so long (French 1881–1894, USA 1904–1914). Because about half of the so-called Canal is Gatun Lake. With three sets of locks along the way. So when you watch the video, it looks like a trip down a lake, then a river, with a few narrow spots in between. REALly narrow. As in it looks like a big ship would be scraping the sides. But watching the video made me even more interested in reading about how this thing was built. 

So there's that. 

And lastly, McCullough continues to be preoccupied with the physical appearance of his "characters"...and continues to be determined to insert snide comments every once in awhile. Fuuuck.

Day 5 (DDRD 1,364): July 27, 2021

Read to page 100. The majority of those pages consisted of the first picture section, though, so I might read a bit more later on.

Day 6 (DDRD 1,365): July 28, 2021

Read to page 120. Had some "crossover" with The Great Bridge: a visit to the bridge-in-progress and a mention of Emily Warren Roebling. 

Day 7 (DDRD 1,366): July 29, 2021

Read to page 140.

Day 8 (DDRD 1,367): July 30, 2021

Read to page 160.

Q: How do you get from Yellow Fever to the Louisiana Purchase?

A: Napoleon had plans for an American empire. He sent troops to Haiti to put down a black instruction led by Toussaint L'Ouverture, and after that, the troops were supposed to go to occupy New Orleans and Louisianna. However, while in Wait, these troops became infected with yellow fever, and thousands died. According to McCullough, "...this was a major contributing factor in the ultimate triumph of the black patriots. Haiti achieved independence, and Napoleon, thoroughly disenchanted with his American venture, decided to sell all of the Louisiana Territory to the United States." (141)

And here's a fascinating bit of historical trivia. When new prostitutes arrived at the work site in Panama, the code to announce this was "Langoustes arrivées," which means "the lobsters have arrived." Pretty fuckin' demeaning, but probably a good title for a novel.

And here is a good example of something I really despise in McCullogh's writing style. This opening to Chapter 6--

--could have 

gone like this:

"Jules Isidore Dingler--pronounced Danglay in French--had been a shining star in his student days at the Polytechnique, finishing near the top of his class...."

The only thing that The Reader would have lost out on would have been a scanty physical description which (1) was irrelevant anyway and (2) would have quickly been forgotten...and some insulting suppositions. McCullough can be a real asshole.

Day 9 (DDRD 1,368): July 31, 2021

Read to page 181 (chapter end). Lots of death and destruction, and pretty obvious that at this point in the narrative, the attempt to dig the canal (by the French) has been an almost complete failure. The most interesting thing in Today's Twenty was the revelation that Paul Gauguin spent some time working on the canal. He didn't last long.

Day 10 (DDRD 1,369): August 1, 2021

Read to page 200. Today's Twenty (-ish) was primarily about the financial aspects of the de Lesseps Era canal project. Also known as the financial disaster of the de Lesseps Era canal project. I wasn't all that interested in this stuff, I'm sorry to say. But at least we found out that some of the men involved had beautiful wives. Thanks, David McCullough. If I'm ever on Jeopardy!....

Day 11 (DDRD 1,370): August 2, 2021

Read to page 220. And now it's all about the shady goings on behind the de Lesseps project. I suppose that could be interesting, but to be honest, I just want to read about the ditch. Also, McCullogh goes out of his way to give insulting portraits of several more characters. What a lovely human being he must be.

Day 12 (DDRD 1,371): August 3, 2021

Read to page 240.

You know, there are times when I look around the world and think, "People are stupider now than they've ever been before." We've got people who won't take a vaccine which would save them from a horrible illness. We've got people who won't wear a mask to protect others from their infectious exhalations. We've got people who don't believe that the 2020 election was valid. Etcetera. But reading The Path Between the Seas today, I happened upon this "explanation" for why the French attempt to build the canal failed: "Jews had created Panama...." Yep. The Jews did it. And they didn't even have their space lasers in place yet. So I guess there's some consolation in knowing that we've ALWAYS been stupid, it's not just the current situation.

Day 13 (DDRD 1,372): August 4, 2021

Read to page 260.

In Today's Twenty, after the usual derogatory statements about some people's appearances / casual comments on the beauty of some women, McCullough went on a bit about the book The Influence of Sea Power Upon History by Alfred Thayer Mahan. (Whose appearance also came under scrutiny, of course...and not in a positive way.) And it rang some bells. I know that I've read references to this book elsewhere. But a search through my previous DDR didn't come up with anything. As a matter of fact, I am pretty sure that when I last read references to this book, they were so over-the-top in extolling its virtues that I sought out, found, and downloaded a copy. Must check Kindle asap.... And? Nope. Oh, well.

Day 14 (DDRD 1,373): August 5, 2021

Read to page 280. Which means I'm getting pretty close to the halfway point. Though I have to admit that I am interested in the story, despite the fact that I do not like McCullough's writing, I am also looking forward to finishing this one off and moving on. And I can guarandamntee you that I will not be reading another book written by McCullough.

Forgot to mention a day or so ago...a bit of trivia which I thought would be good to remember for Jeopardy! someday: Theodore Roosevelt was the first president to refer to his official residence as The White House. So there you go.

Day 15 (DDRD 1,374): August 6, 2021

Read to page 304. (Pictures.)

Day 16 (DDRD 1,375): August 7, 2021

Read to page 320.

Day 17 (DDRD 1,376): August 8, 2021

Read to page 340.

So let me get this straight: two of the options Teddy R's USA was seriously considering vis-a-vis the acquisition of the Panama territory were (1) war with Columbia and (2) fomenting revolution on the part of Panama so that it could become an independent nation. 

So tell me again: why do "they" hate us?

In other news, part of The Suicide Squad (2021) was filmed in Panama. So there's that.

Day 18 (DDRD 1,377): August 9, 2021

Read to page 360.

Day 19 (DDRD 1,378): August 10, 2021

Read to page 382. Because I was appalled. AP-PALLED.

I was shocked when I read (see above) that the T. Roosevelt presidency was considering fomenting a revolution to get Panama to break away from Colombia...because that would make it easier for the U.S. to dominate the canal zone. So imagine my surprise when I read Today's Twenty (+ Two) and found out that they not only planned it, they actually DID it. Maybe not news to you, but it sure as hell was to me. And post the successful revolution, there's this:

Roosevelt said of people who chastised him for his actions with respect to the Panamanian revolution by saying, "Criticism of it can come only from misinformation, or else from a sentimentality which represents both mental weakness and a moral twist." (382) So people who called him out were either ignorant, stupid, or evil. 

And then there was this:

When Roosevelt asked attorney general Knox to "construct a defense" of his actions, Knox is said to have remarked, "Oh, Mr. President, do not let so great an achievement suffer from any taint of legality."

Anybody else thinking of Trump?

Day 20 (DDRD 1,379): August 11, 2021

Read to page 400.

Day 21 (DDRD 1,380): August 12, 2021

Read to page 420. More trickery. 

Had a thought vis-à-vis What Comes Next: Maybe it's time to re-start and finally finish Don Quixote? After my Book Pal clocked out on it, I didn't have the will to go on...but I'd really like to have another go at it before I die. (Read it when I was a young fellow, about 50 years ago.) Hmmm. The version I have is only 1,050 pages long, so that's just a 53 day commitment. It could happen.

Day 22 (DDRD 1,381): August 13, 2021

Read to page 440. Finally getting back to the actual work on the canal (I think) after lots of pages on finances, corruption, and disease. (Not that there's anything wrong with that.)

Also, looks like a mere 9 days until I finish this book off, which is pretty exciting. I've enjoyed some parts of this book, but I am ready to be finished with David McCullough.

Day 23 (DDRD 1,382): August 14, 2021

Read to page 460. Hey, did you know that Teddy was the youngest person to serve as President of the USofA? I'd have lost that bar bet.

Day 24 (DDRD 1,383): August 15, 2021

Read to page 480.

Day 25 (DDRD 1,384): August 16, 2021

Read to page 500. So Teddy Roosevelt was also the first President to travel outside of the United States during his term of office. Hmpf. 

Only 120 text pages to go now, and we've just started digging the canal. Seems unbalanced, but I suppose there's only so much one can say about the actual digging, though, hmmm?

Here's a rather telling quote:

"With intense energy men and machines do their tasks, the white men supervising matters and handling the machines, while the tens of thousands of black men do the rough manual labor where it is not worthwhile to have machines do it." (498)

I think it's also telling that David McCullough makes no comment about this at all. He never misses a chance to slip in an adjective to describe someone's appearance in a detrimental fashion, but he has no adjectives for the callous exploitation of black men in a very dangerous work environment. In fact, to the contrary, he reports (several times) on the insulting comments that white men made about the "laziness" of the black workers. I really don't like David McCullough at all. I'm tempted to try to read more pages per day just to get this fucking thing over with now, but I don't think I have it in me.

Day 26 (DDRD 1,385): August 17, 2021

Read to page 530. Also took a look at the sources pages (a pretty impressive 15 pages' worth) and the Index, which means that I now have 92 test pages and 4 pages of notes before I'm finished.

Day 27 (DDRD 1,386): August 18, 2021

Read to page 550. 

On page 544, McCullough describes the colors that could be seen in excavation aea. He uses these adjectives: blue-black, warm gray, pale ocher, yellow, bright orange, slate blue, crimson, vibrant green, sea blue, and lavender. This is in the context that although pictures were taken then, they were in black and white. So here's the thing: there is nothing in the endnotes to show that these descriptions were taken from a document written at the time. And the only way that you could have seen these colors in that area would have been to be there at that time, since now (and for the past one-hundred years) that area has been topped off with water. My conclusion? Poetic license. Which is fine for poets. Not so much for historians, I think.

Day 28 (DDRD 1,387): August 19, 2021

Read to page 570.

After several references to clean white people at the railway station, McCullough quotes someone as saying, "...this clean, prosperous, flourishing Anglo-Saxon civilization in the very heart of the jungle, was...unlike anything before in history." (556)

And a few pages later on (559), McCullough quotes Harry Franck as saying, "...even with seven years of American example about him the Panamanian had not yet grasped the divinity of labor. Perhaps he will eons hence when he has grown near true civilization."

Well. That's called r-a-c-i-s-m, I believe. And McCullough doesn't seem to be bothered by it at all.

I am SO ready to be finished with this book. And I can guarantdamntee you that I will not be reading another David McCullough book in this or any subsequent lifetimes.

LATER: Decided that I didn't feel like cutting the grass or going for a walk, so I read some more pages of this book instead. Got to page 593. So you know what that means: I could finish this thing off tomorrow without working up too much of a sweat. We'll see. Meanwhile, McCullough actually did get around to discussing the racial problems, and while I was not completely pleased with what he had to say about it (at one point he threw in the argument, The Black workers weren't treated fairly...or well...but they still had it better than they did back home), at least it showed that his own racism didn't go all the way down to the bone. I guess that's better than the full marrow variety. 

EVEN LATER: What the hell. Read to 602. Tomorrow is going to be IT, man.

Day 29 (DDRD 1,388): August 20, 2021

Read to page 698. Finished. The end. Onward.

DDR Day 1000 to Day 2000:

(1) Leviathan 63 days, 729 pages

(2) Stalingrad 27 days, 982 pages

(3) Life and Fate 26 days, 880 pages

(4) The Second World War 34 + 32 + 40 + 43 + 31 + 32 days = 212 days, 4,379 pages 

Sub-Total: 6,970 pages...more than 1/2 of my first 1,000 DDR days total, btw

(5) Baron Wenckheim's Homecoming 10 days, 572 pages

(6) The Great Bridge 25 days, 636 pages

(7) The path Between the Seas 29 days, 698 pages

Anita Desai sums it all up in two sentences:

 

"We 

are 

all 

in 

this 

together, 

this 

world 

of 

loss 

and 

defeat.

㊌ 

All of us, 

every 

one 

of us, 

has had 

a moment 

when a window opened, 

when we caught a glimpse 

of the open, sunlit world beyond, 

but all of us, 

on this bus, 

have had that window 

close 

and remain closed."

Anita

Desai

"Translator

Translated"

ri-ˈlā-shən-ˌships

 

I've been no fan of the anthology Foundation's Friends, for sure. You can find a copy for a couple of bucks and free shipping online, but it's totally not worth it...despite the impressive array of talent listed on the table of contents. I continued to slog through it only because I am very OCD about some things, and I wanted to read "the complete" Foundation series...or at least what I deemed to be the complete series, since definitions of that vary wildly. If I'd been reading from any other perspective, I would have quit much earlier on. Probably after the first ten pages, because it was around that point that I realized that this was a real shit show.

But being me, I read on. And now I'm reading my last story in it. (I jumped ahead a bit out of sheer frustration, so my last story is not THE last story in the book.) It's "The Originist," written by Orson Scott Card.

I know Orson Scott Card a little bit, having read Ender's Game (pretty good) and Speaker For the Dead (superb), so I was hoping that this story would leave a less acrid taste in my mouth than any of the previous outings. And pretty much from the get go, I found that to be true. For one thing, this story was actually set in the Foundation Universe. (You'd think that that would've been a given, referencing the title of the anthology, but turns out there were only three of such included...and the other two of them were very short and pretty useless.) For another thing, Orson Scott Card is a good writer...and he didn't peel something off the bottom of his DISCARD pile for this anthology--as I suspect several other writers did.

Anyway...like all good writers, Orson Scott Card can't help making wise comments about Life in his story. Specifically comments about relationships. There was some very good stuff about doing things you didn't want to do because your significant other wanted to do them--gladly making sacrifices for love, in other words--which I almost quoted, since that struck very near to the heart of my second failed marriage, but I ended up letting it ride. No use kicking the bones of the dead, right?

But this bit. Oh, my. Yes, I had to capture this bit:

"Thus he discovered what he supposed all faithful men eventually discover - that no human relationship is ever anything but tentative. There is no such thing as an unbreakable bond between people.... Nothing can last. Nothing is, finally, what it once seemed to be.... Anyone who thinks he has a perfect marriage, a perfect friendship, a perfect trust of any kind, he only believes this because the stress that will break it has not yet come. He might die with the illusion of happiness, but all he has proven is that sometimes death comes before betrayal. If you live long enough, betrayal will inevitably come."

Now admittedly that is some cold, cold shit, but...in my experience, it's at least 70% true of friendships, and 100% true of romantic relationships. And I just have to wonder if maybe admitting this "fact" could lead to better relationships? It seems to me that confidence might be the root of all relationship trouble. If you feel sure that the bond you have with The Other is absolutely certain, then you start to allow yourself to be less than careful sometimes, and that means you start to treat that Other with less than the care that you would if you thought the relationship was less stable.

Something to think about, anyway.

Roots

 It had been a few weeks since I'd spoken to Louis on the phone, so needless to say I was stunned when I got a Facebook message from a former student telling me that my friend had died. To be honest, I didn't believe him at first. As far as I knew, Louis had been in reasonably good health...and this former student was living in Denver. How could he know this ahead of me when I lived in Louisville with Louis? But of course that was just denial. I still had to find an obituary online before it really sank in. And because this was still during the COVID lockdown, there was no funeral, no memorial.

The former student told me that he wanted to do something in memory of Louis, and he proposed reading a book together and asked if I had any suggestions. That was an easy one. Louis had shown the mini-series Roots every year that I'd known him when he was teaching...and that was a couple of decades' worth of knowing. So I suggested it, warning FS that it was a long book. He was undaunted, and so we started in on it.

I'd suggested we go for 5 chapters a week. FS kind of agreed, but pretty soon we were putting away a lot more than that, and before too long we had finished the book. It was a powerful read, for sure. I tried to watch the mini-series, too, but it was just so watered down from the book's contents that I couldn't stick with it. Maybe once the memory of the books has faded I can go back to it.

Anyway...I decided that I would launch my copy of Roots back out into the universe, so I made the trip up to the Little Library in my neighborhood. First I wrote a note in the front of it:

If you don't recognize it, the quote is from Star Trek. Well, the sentiment is, anyway. The language is a bit warmer in this version. But it's what the dying Spock says to Kirk...and of course its emotional power is enhanced by the fact that Spock seldom expresses anything that could be called human emotion. But it's more than that, too, to me. It's an acknowledgement of a bond that goes beyond time, beyond life, beyond everything.

I think about Louis every day. In fact, he is the featured player in the prayer for blessings that I say every night. Down on my knees, just like in the old days. And I miss Louis every single day, too, but I know that he had a very strong hold on his Christian faith, and there's no doubt in my mind that if there is a heaven, he's in it...being loud and having fun.

I checked back a couple of days later, and Roots was gone. 

Good.

Good.

Black Lightning's Back

I more or less watched all four seasons / 58 episodes of the CW's Black Lightning. It was hard going at times, because the stupidity factor was very high at times, but I hung in there as best I could. And I'm sorry that it's been cancelled, because for all of its faults, at least it was a tv show which had some empowered Black folks. In case you haven't noticed, there's not a whole lot of that going on out there. 

It also had a consistently great soundtrack. I often found myself summoning up remembrance of great tunes past or Googling to find out what that most excellent song was.

But now it's gone, and I started thinking about the comic book version of the character. I'm sure I saw Black Lightning in a cameo or two along the way--in fifty-five years of comic book reading, you bump into most of the characters in one way or another--but I'd never read an issue of a Black Lightning comic book. And then I remembered that Trevor Von Eden, one of my favorite comic book artists (and probably my favorite lay-out artist ever) had been there at the birth of Black Lightning. (In fact, he was co-creator with Tony Isabella.) So I decided to have a read.

The library had Black Lightning Volume 1, which collected issues 1 - 12 of the first run at the character. 232 pages. Normally that would take me a day or two to read. I'm sorry to say that it took me a couple of weeks. And it was not a pleasant slog. 

For one thing, every page was packed with stupid cliches. Characters who talked in stilted fashion, using slang that I'm pretty sure no one-- Black, White, Brown, Yellow, or Red--has ever used. For another thing, there were always White characters in authority positions who dominated the power structures...from Jefferson Pierce's mentor / stand-in dad 

Black Lightning #12 appeared in Cancelled Comics Cavalcade #1 and later in World's Finest Volume 1 #260 January, 1980...which surprised me, as I didn't realize that DC had done much of that kind of thing, but when I looked into it, quite a few of the Cancelled Comics Cavalcade stories had found there way into print somewhere or other...even the two issues of Kamandi that I had spent many a year pining over. 

I was also struck by a few parallels between Black Lightning and one of Trevor von Eeden's other Big Projects, Thriller. (I always had a soft spot in my heart for Thriller, and have read the series several times. It is also a book which showcases Trevor von Eeden's breakdown skills quite magnificently.) Both of these books featured Trevor von Eeden's art. Both ran twelve issues (well...more or less, right?). And in both books, the writer left first (after 7 for Thriller, after 10 for Black Lightning) and then the artist left before the end of the series (after 8 for Thriller, after 11 for Black Lightning). Of course, there's no comparison between the two in terms of quality. Black Lightning is journeyman work for von Eden, and features what The Comics Journal used to refer to as "dopey, inspired comic book" writing. Thriller features superb artwork (for 8 issues--though Alex Niño, who took over for the last four issues, was no slouch) and some very interesting writing (for 7 issues--and then Bill DuBay carefully extracted everything original out of the book and insured that it could not survive much longer).