Rushed away without staying for a cuppa

Crude snaps of today's visitor to our front yard ~

Re-reading pleasure

MindMeld's latest question posed to a dozen (of which I was one):

Sometime we love certain books so much that we like to read them again from time to time, so we asked this week's panelists:

Q: What science fiction, fantasy, and/or horror books do read and re-read again?

You might find the answers and comments interesting. Rachel Swirsky's side-step into her reasons for reading would make a beaut column all on its own.

Today's mystery

What am I?

Better than a poke in the eye

Well, well.

I've just been told that the new infinity plus e-edition (now enhanced with some extra somethings to be opened up only after reading the book) of

is #10 on Amazon UK's contemporary fantasy Kindle chart.

So I guess this means that if you live in the UK, you can help make history, too.
Amazon says:
"Kindle Price: £2.15 includes VAT* & free wireless delivery via Amazon Whispernet"

I say: You don't have to have an overpriced Kindle to read this. This can be read on many screens, including an antediluvian monitor. And of course the delivery is wireless and should bloody well make less noise than a whisper. You could download this in a library and not earn a librarian's frown.

Untouched-up landscape

The case of the galloping case moth caterpillar

My hero of the photography of the small, Paul Harcourt Davies, in Raindrops on roses … and whiskers on kittens, the best essay about nature photography that I've ever read, opened my eyes to some of the reasons for the spectacular difference in wildlife photos. His horror stories of artifice to create breathtaking beauty remind me of Octave Mirbeau's Le Jardin des Supplices (The Torture Garden), and of some discussions I've had with other haiku poets whose poems spring from newspaper articles that they pick from and exaggerate, rather than finding the profound in actual life.

Davies, and the equally superb photographer and teacher, Niall Benvie, spoke about an ethics declaration that I've now signed, too, as I not only agree with it, but until they mentioned it, wondered if anyone else felt like I do — that all this fiddling with nature and the image to create the best shot isn't respecting nature at all, but setting up people to find nature as deficient as a pooping dog when you can get your kid something that only needs to be recharged, or your grandmother something that can not only clean up after her, in a perfectly imagined future, but pretend interest at appropriate intervals.

Which brings me finally, to yesterday's extremely hot day, and the galloping c.

This case moth case was in the middle of a road, so I picked it up before it could be flattened.

Oeceticus elongata

I thought to keep it with my other case moth cases, which I find fascinating, but little did I expect it to wriggle. Not only that, but its caterpillar inhabitant was extremely active. I put it down in a place more friendly than the middle of a road, and watched it for a while, as it emerged from its case and began to move, surprisingly fast, dragging its case behind it. But the time was noon, and the heat, intense.

"In walking, the caterpillar has only the head and three pairs of horny legs without the case, and this part of the body is consequently hardened, and is much darker in colour than the rest of the body which is protected by the case. It drags the case along as it walks … Everyone has noticed these case moths and the wonderful arrangement of the 'sticks' or leaves. The inside of the case is smooth and silky. If the caterpillar be placed in a box with a glass lid, one will soon see regular transverse lines of short silken threads, not unlike railway sleepers, all over the surface of the glass. These are the 'foot-holds' of the caterpillar to enable it to move over the smooth surface of the glass. It does it so quickly that one can hardly see the placing of the threads."

– from Life Stories of Australian Insects by Mabel N. Brewster, Agnes A. Brewster, and Naomi Crouch, Dymock's Book Arcade, Sydney, 1946


I left my pen by it and went out again two hours later to take further (and I hoped, better) pictures, but if there was any sign of it when I returned, I am illiterate. The case moth caterpillar had scarpered, taking its home with it.

For more about case moths, see my earlier post with pictures:
Case moth feelings and feltings

How you can help the Egyptian people

Here are three ways.

1) Join the Access campaign, to help open up communication.

2) Disagree in public, if you think your country's government is hypocritical about democracy. Ours is, and Australia isn't alone. Two excellent and informative posts are:

• Supporters of freedom, right? by Jeff Sparrow
• President Obama, say the 'D-word' by Mark LeVine

3) Say in public that you want your government and the mass media to stop fear-mongering about what is the most beautiful sight in society — mass demonstrations for the common good. One of the chants is my favourite, a simple one that has gone truly international and been translated into countless languages, in the universal language of audacious hope:
The people united will never be defeated.

Many stories and headlines have called the mass protests "riots", a term that would please any dictator, just as Mubarak called the demonstrators "gangs" and "thugs", but the thugs are his.

This is a dangerous and thrilling time when a people stops fearing a dictatorship, and audaciously hopes to seize the future for themselves — and by themselves, I don't mean the self-centred hysteria that our media has focussed on, wherein tourists can't get out of Egypt soon enough, now that real history is being made. And I don't mean the self as in Australia's relentless taxpayer-paid "More for me" campaign that tells us over and over again, that we have more TV channels (with even more repeats!) in which to channel surf in our homes with more TVs than people. Sure it's a dangerous time now in Egypt, but what was called riots were demonstrations in which fathers held their children on their shoulders (an act that wouldn't be allowed here) so they could see with their own eyes what they would never forget.

As for all those commentators saying how this can only end, as some Iranian-style "French revolution"— democracy is messy, and an educated electorate can still make mistakes. After all, Ms Palin could almost see the White House from her governor's office, and sees it glittering before her now. And Mr Bush was not only elected once, which could be forgiven as an accident, but . . .

One important under-discussed element in Egypt is the army, which is of the people. If these demonstrations and this army were in Europe, we'd be cheering them on.

Finally, I think that the best assessment has been put forward by Ergun Bahaban here:
Human Dignity and Egypt

"Some claim that a society that has lacked any democratic organization for many years cannot transition to democracy overnight. I think they’re wrong. But the most well-organized powers will obviously benefit greatly from this change … Turkey is a good example of how Islam and democracy can coexist and how people can receive equal treatment despite their different beliefs. Of course, there is a long way to perfection, but even its current position is sufficient to be taken as a model. As a country that has been a cradle of major civilizations, Egypt can successfully implement the Turkey model."

Now with extra &s: Kindle editions of two Tambour titles

From infinity plus, both of these are Kindle editions that are sort of deluxish, in that each contains never-seen-before additions to the still-available dead-tree editions. All the infinity plus Kindle editions are so cheap and easy to buy that they are seductive, especially since buying them delivers instant gratification, as soon as that annoying Kindle graphic with the boy reading what has to be a printed book (look at the angle) scarpers and your ordered book opens at the tap of your finger. And you don't have to buy a Kindle. I read mine on my computer.

Keith Brooke at infinity plus has taken great care with these Kindle editions as well as all the books in this new infinity plus range, making reading on a screen as pleasurable as reading on a screen can be. They have style, too. I don't know how he does it, because when I tried, all I got was the disgraceful default of Kindle "publishing" that I want to yell at, but am too ignorant to command into shape.

These are new covers, too, and are entirely self-indulgent. I just love any chance to design books and book covers. In designing Monterra's &&&, I also ticked off another "to-do" on my list that only grows. Nowadays there is huge interest in the personal details of anyone who is anyone, even if they're not. So bowing to pressure, I have not only given in, but made a narcissimostity of the cover itself. My eyelids might have flickered when the shot was taken, but I am willing to bet you'll never find another author picture that is so intimate. The portraitist told me at the time, "You have a beautiful brain," but I'm realistic enough to think that was a well-worn line to suit vanity.

Now to the guts of the books. You might think that only Monterra's Deliciosa & Other Tales & has a


And yes, Monterra's Deliciosa & Other Tales &'s Big Fat Bonus & is packed with more stories, poems, and excesses, and even some ripped-out pieces from the Onuspedia (An expert is someone who always makes sure of the spelling.)

But
even Spotted Lily has a new section added that demanded this entitlement:

Hereafters: Not to be even peeked at until after reading Spotted Lily

Review: The Adventures of the Gutenberg Boys (of Edinburgh)

A good memoir is one that takes a reader into a different time and place, and in which the scribe is the least of the story, there is so much to experience and so many surprises otherwise. So it is a supreme irony that this memoir that would take its place with the best of them (and by 'the best of them', I include Era Bell Thomson's American Daughter, Adewale Maja-Pearce's In My Father's Country, and B. N. Jubal's The Smile of Herschale Handle) in my heart and physically, in my bookcase, is only able to take its place in my computer, served in a shit-on-a-shingle Kindle presentation.

(I've called it a memoir, but it never mentions the author,
he who must have been the invisible elephant in the room.)

The Adventures of the Gutenberg Boys
by Ian Boyter

The irony is that one must suffer the presentation (I read my Kindle edition on my PC) to find out that this book by Ian Boyter is not just a sharply focussed picture of being young and randy and working in Edinburgh in the early 1960s, an engaging story with a fine sense of humour similar to that of Bruce Robinson and J.P. Donleavy (before he imitated himself)—but a unique and detailed description of printing that would be engrossing to all lovers of books of the kind created physically by people who cared about how a letter looks on a page, and a word, and the relationship between letters, words, lines, and the white space on the page.

This book could be used as an enjoyable reference by people who love type, paper, layouts, and look back with longing at the philosophy of say, Dard Hunter. We wish that every publisher today knew what should constitute a paragraph (Adventures doesn't sin in the common Kindle way, which chokes the lily by indenting each paragraph, and spacing between them just to make sure. This is as correct as adding an extra zero in numbers of more than one integer, just to make sure.) Adventures could be loved (in this edition, through gritted teeth) by people who hate Kindle, and who wish that all publishers would own, and use references for book lovers such as Robert Bringhurst's The Elements of Typographic Style. (more about Kindle in my next post–I've got my own relationship with the devil and my books, but hypocrisy gives spice to strong opinion.)

The Adventures of the Gutenberg Boys describes the life of the men (and yes, they were men) who made those books back when type compositing was a brutally physical and a maddening finickity job, with mallets swinging and blood spurting from crushed hands, and those same hands wielding tweezers to set a 6pt Bodoni full stop, or shave the swell of a "b" from a "bugger" that someone snuck into a forme as a joke. This is a story of a time back when leading and kerning and actually reading what was in a forme—even though, to a reader not in the trade, that type would be inscrutable as a mirrored equation—gave unusual and uncelebrated levels of knowledge to the anonymous skilled specialists in a number of related trades that no longer exist.

Back when the Cuban missile crisis was a matter of a wager amongst them, the Gutenberg Boys were apprentices to a quality printer in Edinburgh, a bookish town that should rightly have a publisher that should be putting out and promoting this memoir that is as unflinchingly truthful as an illegal wiretap. This book should also be reviewed by History Today.

It's a truly rollicking read, and a visceral one. That the author isn't writing-degreed, but has juggled several careers including professional jazz and visual arts, shows in the storytelling. It's untamed, irrepressible, and fresh; and the best part is the totally unacceptable (by modern standards) faithfully recorded speech. It's probably no accident that Boyter's favourite novel is a screenplay, as this memoir would make a movie reeking with great dialogue, and wicked fun. I'd like Steve Barron to direct it as well as he did the unique and vastly under-appreciated Rat.

Here's an excerpt from The Adventures of the Gutenberg Boys.

The paper store was an enormous brick-built warehouse building on three floors descending from ground level into inky blacknesses accessible by a goods lift or by concrete stairs. It was far enough away from the main printing works buildings to provide good cover for any dubious activities you may wish to pursue out of sight and sound of the gaffer. A great place to sleep off a hangover, for instance, high up on a soft pile of paper reams. Or if you wanted to read the sports pages you could do that too. If you had a band to rehearse, well, it was made for it.

Blackie was playing a couple of controversial chords in quick succession on his battered guitar. This piece of junk had only four strings and they were tuned C-G-D-A like a tenor banjo. He could really only play the tenor banjo, but the bandleader, Collins’s father, Davy (bass kazoo), caseroom pressman, poet and impresario of impeccable musical taste, preferred the sound of the guitar.

At the sound of the two lost chords, Clark’s Krazy Kazoo Band disintegrated with dissonant toots of rage. The band, ten strong, turned with steel in their eyes and tin kazoos in their mouths towards Blackie, the only musician in the rhythm section. The other member of the rhythm section, Murray, (washboard and thimbles) was playing brag with embezzled money in the storeroom.

“Zazzzooot, zezzeezz, zozoooot?” zooted Davy furiously. Then, remembering to remove his kazoo from his mouth, repeated: “What the hell was that, a flattened third? We’re supposed to be playing ‘In Apple Blossom Time,’ no’ ‘Scrapple from the curséd Apple!’ Forget all that new-fangled bebop, will ye Blackie? We’re rehearsin’ for the Chapel Outing, no’ the Blue Note Café. Charlie F Christian!”

The Chapel was the printing trade union operating within the printing works. These inky printers were carrying on the function of monks of earlier, pre-printing times. They didn’t have a Shop Steward; they had a Father of the Chapel. In days of yore, only the religious scribes who hand-copied holy texts in beautiful uncials and sloping italic scripts could supply the fortunate few with books. When Gutenberg invented his system of moveable, re-usable types, he mechanised the way bibles were manufactured. Mass production was born.

“It sounded more like a flattened turd to me,” chipped in Davy’s son (second soprano kazoo), “or even a demented seventh. Or maybe it was a demolished ninth.” He always had something constructive to say, and for a high-note kazoo player he certainly had a convincing grasp of musical theory.

and another:

Blackie’s heels had mysteriously sprouted spurs. It was Monday, he was on his knees, up inside the maw of a huge printing machine and he was imagining that Big Murray the dim-witted machineman would forget he was there, press the on button and pull a proof of him. The forme of type that he was kneeling on would shoot forward at hellish speed carrying him under the huge, rotating cylinder and he would be flattened and pulped right into the hot metal pages of Dante’s Inferno. When he was a message boy four years before, he had read R & R Clark’s hardback edition of Dante’s riveting best seller while waiting for the caseroom gaffer’s bell to ring. Dante’s imaginary horrors did not compare with the actual possibility of him becoming an integral part of the paperback edition.

Clark’s No 1 machineroom was an enormous factory building with opaque windows high up in the pitched roof, letting in the only daylight. Long lines of fluorescent light units hung from the roof struts, casting a harsh glare on the rows of pulsating printing machines. The light was bright so that the printers could check the tonal density of the ink as printed sheets of paper came flying on to the delivery pallet at up to ten thousand an hour. The machineroom was where the profits were made, or so Gogs Peters, the works manager said. But the compositors disagreed. Try selling books with blank pages. Scobie, the burly, bullet-headed machineroom foreman, striding up and down between the machines, officiously wielding his Biro and clipboard, ruled the room with a bully’s swagger. A compositor in his machineroom was a cowboy in Indian territory. To Frank Scobie, a compositor was no more than a necessary evil, something annoying that was preventing his precious machines from running non-stop.

“What’s the fuckin’ problem, Blackie? You’ve been half an hour in there already. Extract the digit, will ye. You and Professor Bell between ye are costin’ me money,” he shouted above the din of the machines. Blackie pretended not to hear. He was feeling less than sub-human. Breathing a foul mixture of printing ink and naphthalene fumes and picking away at the type with his tweezers, replacing bashed letters and doing the last-minute alterations to the text, he had been doggedly trying to forget that he had ever seen the two-inch single-column article in the Saturday edition of the Edinburgh Evening News two nights before. A cold dread had entered his soul. Maybe Murray should just press the start button and put him out of his misery.

FORGED KRAMER CONCERT TICKETS
Lothians and Borders Police have today issued a warning to look out for forged tickets . . .

Recommended boggling

The latest Circus of the Spineless #58, hosted by Mike Lisieski, cephalover of impeccable taste, who naturally starts with mollusks, "because they are my favorites!" and soon finds a way to show a "baby photo of Cluthu", which naturally leads to my recommendation here to read the newest "Winter 2001" issue of the Subterranean Online. Something cephalic stirs on the cover. Continue in till you find an unforgettable story that will change the Lovecraft mythos, and is a powerful story even if you can quote Wodehouse but think that Lovecraft is a greeting card maker:

"The Boy Who Followed Lovecraft" by Marc Laidlaw. Highly recommended.