Gregory Benford, Allen Steele, and Lois McMaster Bujold on Cryonics

Here's my latest entry from 2011 Reading Recollections:

Lois McMaster Bujold's novel Cryoburn, in an odd way, reminds me of Gregory Benford and Allen Steele. Gregory Benford, as a scientist and science fiction writer, is a real believer in Cryonics. When he dies, he has apparently planned to have his body cryogenically frozen, in the hopes that in the decades (or more likely, the centuries) to come, medical expertise will allow him to be brought back to life. 

In Allen Steele's novel A King of Infinite Space, the protagonist awakes in the future. His aging body has been replaced with a young one, but all his carefully laid financial plans have gone wrong. He is now a slave, the property of the person who bought him as a commodity. 

In Bujold's novel, her popular character Miles Vorkosigan investigates a cryonics corporation. He discovers that bodies have been preserved using cut-rate fluids, materials, and other processes. In the process, many of the bodies have degraded so that the people can never be resurrected. 

Cryogenics offers us hope of another life, or potentially everlasting life in our mortal bodies. Cryoburn reminds us that while the emerging field of Cryogenics holds great potential, the potential of something going wrong during the physical process of preservation, storage, and reincarnation is highly probable, given the long span of time involved, and the all-too-Human natures of those charged with caring for our delicate bodies. 

Still, like the ancient Egyptians with their mummification techniques and their pyramids, we live, and die, in hope.

Dragon Dave

Visiting Rye And Cambridge with E. F. Benson & Gregory Benford

As promised, I've occasionally checked in, and worked on my 2011 Books page. Here's two of the entries I did yesterday.

E. F. Benson's 500-year-old house in Rye, England

E F Benson: Trouble For Lucia In some ways, this sixth and final Mapp & Lucia book is my favorite of all. One of the most colorful characters in Tilling is a young spinster named Quaint Irene. Instead of limiting herself to realistic depictions of houses and landscapes, she peoples her paintings with nudes and other elements that rock local society. So while most look down on her as hopelessly out-of-touch, with no likely prospects of the future, she gains national recognition when one of her paintings becomes celebrated in London. She also spearheads a campaign to help Lucia get elected as mayor of Tilling. 

Another interesting aspect of this novel is a social one. Up until now, people in Tilling are limited to inviting their friends over to their house if they want to socialize. While this doesn't tax someone of Lucia's financial standing, others like Mapp, who calculate the cost of everything, prefer having friends over for tea because dinner is more expensive. Everything changes when Diva Plaistow opens a tea shop in her home. Her friends, including Mapp and Lucia, find it so much easier, and expensive, to gather there. Each person can order what he or she wants, and even if they pay for the party, it still costs less, and is more convenient, than hosting a party at their house. Thus we see the introduction of a social change which sweeps through England, that of the local tea shop where friends gather for tea, refreshments, and conversation.

Gregory Benford: Timescape Earth's ecosystem is collapsing as a result of pollution, the long-term effects of using chemicals in agriculture, and mankind's continual destruction of native landscapes to enlarge cities. So scientists from the present attempt to use knowledge of their mistakes to send knowledge back into the past. Nothing can save the ruin they have brought on themselves, but by alerting their earlier counterparts to the consequences of their actions, they hope to build a habitable future for themselves, even if their own future is doomed. The novel becomes a race against time, as present-day scientists at Cambridge University in England try to send these messages before their power and food supply runs out, and their air becomes unbreathable. Meanwhile, the young scientist at past-day University of California in San Diego (UCSD) in La Jolla races against time to translate the messages he's getting, and convince his more established colleagues before they pull his funding and he loses the respect of the scientific community.

This is an interesting and award-winning novel. It gained such prestige that Pocket Books used the title as an imprint for noteworthy Science Fiction novels they published. I enjoyed reading it in 2011, and then reread it a few years later for a book group. While the story still resonated with me on a number of levels, I found it difficult to convey my positive feelings to others in the group. Nearly everyone in the group found reason to criticize it in nearly every way they could. They claimed Benford didn't know his San Diego geography, as a character couldn't see a landmark from where he stood in a given scene. They criticized his characters, and claimed he must be a woman-hater. They criticized his science and math, despite the fact that he made his living as a scientist and educator at UC Irvine. For whatever reason, they didn't connect with the book, and they blamed Gregory Benford for that. Given their disdain for the novel, I had to wonder why they chose to read it in the first place. Ultimately, I left that group after a few discussions, because I didn't connect with them. They're the kinds of folks I have no desire to associate with, regardless of whether or not a meteor storm is heading toward the Earth.

It's not surprising I read all the Mapp And Lucia books in 2011, as we visited Rye (which Benson fictionalizes as Tilling) during that year's trip to England. We'll be visiting Cambridge during this year's trip, so maybe I'll end up reading Timescape again. I'll probably also reread The Babe, B.A. by E. F. Benson, in which the author takes a loving look back at his alma mater. And then, I suppose I'll have to watch "Shada" again, the Doctor Who serial written by Douglas Adams in which the Fourth Doctor and his companions Romana and K-9 visit Cambridge. While all three options appeal, the latter seems essential, somehow.

Dragon Dave

Happy Birthday Gregory Benford

It's interesting to occasionally look back at what you've done. For a long time, I blogged extensively on author Gregory Benford. I read most of the novels he published during the first decade or so of his literary career, and mused deeply on three of them: Jupiter Project, The Stars in Shroud, and If the Stars are Gods, the latter of which he wrote with Gordon Eklund. I've always meant to go back, and make more posts on those other novels, but I never have, even though I read Against Infinity, the sequel to Jupiter Project, twice.


Against Infinity is one of my favorite novels, completely different in subject matter and style than its predecessor, yet it continues the story of protagonist Matt Bowles on Jupiter's moon Ganymede. Highly recommended. Anyway, if you missed any of those early posts on Gregory Benford, or would like to reread them, here's an easy guide to them. And if you're not inclined to read them, why not read a Benford novel in honor of the author's birthday. He turns 74 today, and he's written so many Science Fiction novels, each uniquely different in style, tone, and subject matter, that you're sure to find one you'll enjoy. 

Happy Birthday Gregory Benford! May you write many more great Science Fiction stories!

Dragon Dave

Gregory Benford                  
Posts on the novel Jupiter Project

JABOL: A Space Odyssey
Jupiter Project: Life on JABOL
Matt Bowles: Renaissance Man
Jupiter Project: A Final Word 

On his novel The Stars in Shroud
Our Need for Interdependence 
Defined By Fear 
Ling’s Courage 
Those Detestable Ofkaipan 
A Completely Different World
Those Most Precious to Us 
Sensing “The Other” 
Embracing The Different 
Religion as Social Glue
Ling’s Faith and Persistence
A New Guru
Doctor Who, Ling, & the No-Win Situation
Your Personal Altar: Part 1
Your Personal Altar: Part 2
Your Personal Altar: Part 3

Gregory Benford & Gordon Eklund
Posts on their novel If the Stars are Gods

A Beautiful Mystery
The Invisible Enemy
Dilemmas in the Darkness
A Fictional Role Model
A Defining Moment
That Which Divides
The Man in the Box
What Drives Us
If the Stars are Gods: A Final Word

Star Trek & Phil K. Dick on Enlightenment

"Star Trek: The Motion Picture" reaches its climax with the vast alien entity V'ger in orbit over Earth.  V'ger sends out blasts of energy, which will destroy all carbon-based life on Earth unless Captain Kirk can supply the answers it seeks.  As a machine intelligence, V'ger cannot comprehend the validity of any other form of life.  This is a theme prevalent within Science Fiction, and is further explored in Hard SF author Gregory Benford's Galactic Center series.

At least V'ger is not arrogant.  It recognizes that it was created, and yearns to unite with its creator.  When Kirk supplies the proof that it was created by Humans, V'ger shorts out its circuitry, so that the last portion of the information it requires will be delivered by a Human.  

This time, unlike with the Klingons aboard their ships, the Humans aboard the space station Epsilon 9, and the Deltan navigator Ilia, V'ger unites with the consciousness of a living, organic being (one wholly different from itself), without destroying the other in the process.  

Up until now, V'ger has recorded carbon-based life: it has stored it like we would scan a document or photo into a computer.  It has analyzed the data gleaned from this process.  But only through becoming partly Human--only through uniting its inorganic consciousness with an intelligent, organic one--can it truly enhance its understanding of the universe.  Just as occurs with us--when we throw down our mental barriers and accept another person's viewpoint as equally relevant and insightful as our own--V'ger's paradigm, formerly limited, is blown wide open.  As Marvel writer Marv Wolfman channels the Biblical book of Genesis to suggest what is going on with V'ger, perhaps I could also reference St. Paul's epistle of 1 Corinthians.  In chapter 13, verse 11, Paul suggests how a person's consciousness can be enhanced by dedicating one's life to loving others.  "When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put childish things behind me."  And in verse 12: "Now we see through a glass darkly, but then face to face."   

In A Scanner Darkly, Phillip K. Dick compares how a human views the world to how a computer scans its surroundings.  He also suggests that St. Paul would not have studied his appearance in a glass mirror, but rather in polished metal that was incapable of generating accurate reflections.  

Through uniting with someone else whose life at first seemed completely different (and even opposed) to its own, V'ger is reborn.  It is now ready to explore the universe again.  This time, it will gain a fuller understanding of everyone and everything it encounters.  Likewise, Captain Kirk, Mr. Spock, and Dr. McCoy have each experienced transformation.  Before they lived separately, and devoted themselves to smaller, more individual tasks.  Now each can fully reengage with his former comrades and explore the universe again.  Perhaps colorist Marie Severin hints at the rebirth of the three in the above panel, where for an instant, the blackness of space is banished, and the U.S.S. Enterprise passes through a realm of light.

Sadly, Paramount Studios booted Gene Roddenberry out the door after the movie failed to bring in the projected revenue, and in "Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan," Kirk has lost the enlightenment he previously gained.  All too often, Human existence seems like a journey into darkness, illuminated only by occasional moments of clarity.  It would have been interesting to see what a more enlightened Kirk, freed from the bonds and limitations of the past, could have accomplished.  But then, we would have missed out on Khan controlling Chekov's mind from vast distances with an insect that crawled into the Russian's ear, exploding planets, Kirk's handwringing over missing out on a relationship with a son he never knew existed, and a Genesis planet with an entire ecosystem that is created--in an instant--from the dispersed particles of a nebula.  And all that would have been too cool and exciting to have missed out on, right?

Dragon Dave

Related Internet Links
Bible Apps: 1 Corinthians 13
A meditation on allusions in P. K. Dick's A Scanner Darkly

Revisiting Jupiter Project

Is this a gorgeous cover, or what?

Some books resonate with me more than others, and even though I read Jupiter Project by Gregory Benford early last year, I suddenly felt that I had to read it again.  I know I’ve covered different aspects of the book already, but for me, it represents everything that a good juvenile Science Fiction novel should.  It addresses the questions of identity that all teens strive to answer during that crazy and stressful period of their lives, when every decision seems to carry Life or Death significance.  In addition, it also serves as a metaphor for the human race.  Yes, we’ve built our cities and spread out over the planet.  We’ve developed technology far beyond the fondest dreams of primitive man.  But until we kick ourselves off our home planet, and find other places to work, live, and make our own, we’ll still be an adolescent species, clutching onto Mother Earth’s side. 

But I’ve spent enough time singing that particular song, so instead I’d like to talk about what the novel does particularly well.  First off, it addresses the topic of Fear.  This is a topic many of us like to ignore.  Like the protagonist Matt Bowles, we convince ourselves that nothing bothers us, that we are fearless.  Yet all of us have our little neuroses, those memories of pain and loss that sometimes inhibit us from doing what we know we should.  Perhaps we overcompensate in other areas of our lives, and grow antagonistic to certain types of people, as Matt does, even though (for much of the novel) he doesn’t know why he acts this way.  I particularly like Gregory Benford’s personal resolution for Matt, once he realizes how the memory of a traumatic childhood event has affected him.  He resolves to put away fear, to henceforth banish it from his life.  And for the remainder of the novel, he does so.  Yet it’s ironic that in two novels that followed Jupiter Project’s publication, If the Stars are Gods and The Stars in Shroud, he deals with adults (much older than Matt) who face very real fear and despair.  Sadly, Fear is a part of the human condition, and remains with us for as long as we live.  But Fear can be a good thing.  How many people might we hurt, if we didn’t fear to cause them injury or pain?

The second thing I still love about Jupiter Project is how Benford makes me feel like I’ve visited Ganymede.  The cover artwork reveals the moon’s stark beauty, with the ammonia fog boiling up as Matt’s Walker navigates the rocky ground.  Like, our moon, Ganymede is tide-locked, so one side of it always faces Jupiter.  This makes each “day” seven days long, and when the sun’s rays shine down, there’s no atmosphere to filter the light.  Such contrasts make for a vivid setting.  It’s a place I’d love to visit, and I’ll be forever grateful to him for transporting me there.

The final thing I really love about Jupiter Project (for the purposes of this post) is how unfantastic he makes everything seem.  I know that seems a strange way to praise a Science Fiction book, but in grounding his settings in realistic, achievable science, he convinces me that humanity could make that journey into space, and settle other planets and moons.  For example, Matt’s Walker is powered by a lightweight nuclear engine, and the process by which its oxygen and water supply is produced are explained so that even someone like me, who is weak in Science, can understand.  Similarly, there are no whimsical elements, such as the aliens Robert Heinlein often utilized in his juvenile novels.  Okay, I take it back, there are, but the humans never meet them.  Rather, Matt and his fellow humans eventually detect their presence through utilizing simple devices that a hobbyist could make.  Thus, humans make their entry into space, and prove their capability of remaining there, unassisted by any outside force.

“You do realize this is a juvenile novel,” the librarian asked me when she placed my request for Jupiter Project into the system.  She seemed surprised by my knowing smile and nod, as if I should have grown beyond a novel targeted to younger readers.  Well, perhaps I should have.  Perhaps some day I’ll consign it to the category of books I once enjoyed, but don’t need to read again.  I can already envision that day.  I’m sitting in front of the TV (assuming we’re still using such devices), and watching a broadcast from a space station orbiting Jupiter.  The station is called JABOL, and it is sending a space shuttle down to Ganymede, where people will build a habitable compound and begin the process of converting the planet’s atmosphere into something breathable by humans.  Yeah, I think on that day I’ll be ready to give up Jupiter Project.  Maybe.

In the meantime, if Gregory Benford could reissue a hardcover (or even a paperback) with easy-to-read text, and utilizing the same gorgeous cover art that adorns the first edition of his book, I’d buy it in a heartbeat.  Hint, hint, hint!

Dragon Dave

For my other posts on Jupiter Project, please see the Authors page.  

Stephen King’s Dilemma

In his memoir On Writing, Stephen King wrestled with the fact that, of all the novels he had written, the overwhelming favorite was The Stand.  While he was glad his readers liked the post-apocalyptic tale, this was his second published novel.  He believed he had grown immensely as an author since he had crafted that early work, and by the time he wrote On Writing, had published an astounding number of novels.  He had invested all his stories with imagination, creativity, and passion, and believed some of his later novels represented his best efforts as a writer. Yet by an overwhelming majority, readers loved The Stand more than any of his later stories.

Over the last few months, a few of my posts have attracted more page views than the norm.  In my Pages section, you can find a link to my current Top Ten posts.  The first four, all about authors working today, have garnered an astounding number of page views.  Fans of those popular authors evidently liked what I had to say and recommended them to their friends.  Four of my seven-part series on Ritz Cinema also got a large number of hits.  I attribute the popularity of those posts less to the James Herriot connection (or my particularly beautiful prose), and more to the fact that Ritz Cinema is a very special place, and therefore, like Steven Brust, Kevin J. Anderson, Rebecca Moesta, and David Malki, has a passionate following.  My original intention for my blog, to write about particular works of fiction, is represented by only one entry: “Envying Luke Skywalker’s Lightsaber.”  I’m not sure if this is because people like what I had to say, or if they were searching for images of Luke’s lightsaber.  

Blogger has its foibles, some of which I’ve discovered since I started using the Pages function.  One inconsistency I noticed long ago, however, was that the number of page views listed in my Posts section was often different than the numbers represented in the Statistics section.  In many cases, the number of page views is higher on the Posts list than it is in the Statistics section.  One entry in particular, “As Time Goes By in Holland Park: Part 1,” has enough page views on the Posts list that it should reside in number eight on my Statistics section’s Top Ten page.  Yet it doesn’t appear there.  I suppose it doesn’t really belong in my Top Ten anyway, as parts Two and Three only have half as many page views, and “As Time Goes By Jean’s House” frequently appears under search terms that drew people to my site.  This may also explain the popularity of “Catching a Glimpse of Norman Clegg’s House.”  The latter post, which initially attracted average interest, has steadily risen in popularity in the months since I wrote it.  In reading it, I can see why fans of the TV show “Last of the Summer Wine” would like it.  But “Norman Clegg’s House” also shows up regularly under Searches that led people to my blog. 

I apologize to all you “As Time Goes By” fans: I don’t know the address the TV crew used for the exterior of Jean’s House.  (Nor do I know the exact address of Norman Clegg’s house, but I believe the second location the production used was a cottage behind The White Horse Inn, if that’s helpful).  Part one of my three-part entry is about exploring the residential and commercial area of London known as Holland Park, and parts two and three cover the actual park.  The Dutch Garden within the park was an important place for us to visit, as it is there that Lionel first pursues Jean, and realizes that he wants to get to know her better.  (Even if you’re not a fan of the TV show, it’s a beautiful garden, and the entire park is worth a visit).  At least I know that I’m not the only one who still loves a show that started twenty years ago, and aired its last reunion show seven years ago.

One entry that I particularly love, but hasn’t gotten many page views, is my entry “Leaning on Steven Brust.”  While it’s somewhat derivative of “Steven Brust: My Ultimate Weapon,” it not only relates to my struggles as an author, but to Grand Master Robert Silverberg’s own struggles during the 1970s.  I wrote it later in April for those who enjoyed "Ultimate Weapon."  Yet, as Stephen King found with his published novels, what resonates with readers often astonishes the writer.  I know my affection for Jupiter Project, If the Stars are Gods, and The Stars in Shroud surprised Gregory Benford.  His favorites tend to be novels like Timescape and Artifact, SF stories about working physicists such as himself. 

From a business side of things, it makes sense for an author to look backward, study what books have sold the most, and attempt to cater to those tastes.  From an artistic standpoint, it makes sense that a writer should ignore past successes, and follow his muse wherever it leads him.  I hope I never find myself in a place where publishers will only buy one particular type of story from me.  Stephen King’s dilemma (and every popular writer’s dilemma), is that the type of books he longs to write may not resonate with his readers as much as some of his other types of stories.  This phenomenon should not be ignored or discounted.  As readers, we should sympathize with those writers who can only sell one type of story.  But at the end of the day, it’s an author’s job to serve his or her readers, whatever stories they’ve come to love, and for whatever reason they treasure them most.  At this point, the fact that anyone out there loves anything I've written brings me joy.  It’ll be my job to remember that, should I win a publisher’s attention, and see my novels published.  

Dragon Dave

Related Dragon Cache entries

As Time Goes By in Holland Park: Part 1

Still Leaning on Steven Brust

Of Ayrton Senna and Ray Bradbury

In 1994, during the San Marino Grand Prix, Ayrton Senna lost his life when his Williams F1 race car swerved off at the Tamburello corner and plowed into a concrete barrier.  His close friend and fellow racer, Gerhard Berger, later complained about many of the tributes paid to Senna by people who had never met the Brazilian.  He disliked how they spoke, often with tear-streaked faces, about how much Senna had meant to them.  To Gerhard Berger, such outpourings of grief seemed inappropriate. 

At the time, I didn’t know how to react to his statement.  Although I had only started watching Formula One two years previously, Senna had become a demigod to me.  He seemed immortal and impervious to harm, a superior being capable of feats mere mortals could only dream of accomplishing.  His death left me shattered.  (Or, as the English would say, gutted).  Obviously, I never knew or even met the man.  Perhaps his death should not have affected me thus.  Yet it did.

Last week, Ray Bradbury passed away.  He was a popular and award-winning author chiefly known for his short stories, although he had written influential novels and worked with filmmakers.  While I read several of his books in my youth, I'm not sure that he was ever a primary influence in my life.  Yet for many, his work proved influential, even monumental.

In previous posts, I’ve mentioned the impact that Edgar Rice Burroughs, Frank Herbert, and Roger Zelazny made in my youth. (There were many, many others).  In the past decade, authors such as Kevin J. Anderson, Kim Stanley Robinson, Dan Simmons, Robert Silverberg, and Terry Pratchett often entertained me and stirred my soul.  Janet Evanovich offered numerous moments of undemanding delight.  A quick glance at my reading list for the past year-and-a-half suggests that Gregory Benford, E. F. Benson, James Herriot, and Steven Brust have recently proven important.  Each, in his or her way, has contributed in a positive manner to my life.

Several years ago, after reading an interview in which Robert Silverberg asserted the eternal importance of The Martian Chronicles, I dug out my old, battered Scholastic edition and reread it.  At the fellowship following an Easter Vigil service, I fell into conversation with the associate priest.  I mentioned how something in his sermon reminded me of a story in The Martian Chronicles.  This older gentleman always struck me as someone better versed in Bible-related and spiritual works than the offerings of popular culture.  Looking back now, it seems strange to me that I can no longer remember any of the sermons he preached, and few of our conversations. Yet our talk that night, in which he shared how one of Bradbury’s stories had served as a minor metaphor for his life, still shines like a beacon in my mind. 

In 2009, my wife and I traveled to San Jose, California, to attend the World Fantasy Convention.  At an evening event, we filled our plates with goodies, and looked for a place to enjoy them.  As all the tables were full, one couple invited us to join them.  Unlike most World Fantasy attendees, he and his wife were not working- or aspiring-writers, but merely readers.  (Not that there’s anything ordinary about someone who regularly reads SF and Fantasy!)  His favorite author was Ray Bradbury.  With glowing eyes and a wide smile, he spoke of meeting the author, and how he would forever cherish the books Bradbury had signed for him. 

In the past week, I’ve read a number of glowing tributes to Ray Bradbury.  Most came from people who only met him a couple times, if at all.  Yet they speak of a man whose fiction loomed large in their lives.  Perhaps Gerhard Berger is right: perhaps it’s inappropriate to speak of what a person you’ve never really known means to you.  But as for how an author’s fiction has helped form the paradigm of your life, or how it enabled you achieve your own works of greatness, or even how it provided pleasant moments of connection between yourself and others...it seems to me that such contributions should not only be mentioned, but shouted from the highest mountains.

Rest well, Ray Bradbury.  You shall be well-remembered.

In respectful tribute,

Dragon Dave

Related Internet Links

Death of Ayrton Senna

A Testimonial from Kevin J. Anderson

Addicted to a Good Book

I’ll admit that I’m a compulsive reader.  Somehow, I just can’t control myself.  A whim will strike me so powerfully that I cave in.  Perhaps it’s a book I read long ago and, suddenly, I realize I must read it again.  Maybe it’s a book I bought several years ago, but somehow it never got placed in the stack by my bed.  Or perhaps it’s one I’ve just purchased or received as a gift, and it just can’t wait!  In any case, I’ll open this particular book that two minutes ago I didn’t have to read, immerse myself for a chapter or two, and then awaken to the fact that it will now have to compete with all the other great stuff I’m enjoying.  

Take, for example, my current bedside stack.  I’ve loved the Lovejoy TV series for twenty years.  Now I’m digging the Jonathan Gash novels that launched it.  Even though I’m reading out of order, my wife bought me the latest installment, Faces in the Pool, and I had to honor her gift, right?  Then there’s Dune, perhaps my favorite novel of all time.  For nearly thirty years, I’ve been intrigued by aspects of the backstory that Frank Herbert built his novel upon.  Although I bought it several years ago, I’m finally reading The Butlerian Jihad by his son Brian Herbert and cowriter Kevin J. Anderson.  Enough, you say?  Perhaps it should be, but it’s not.  We’re planning our next trip to England, this time to Yorkshire, so I’m working my way through the James Herriot books.  Currently, I’m enjoying All Things Wise and Wonderful.  

Then there are the books I’ve temporarily taken a break from.  Plutarch’s Lives and The Conquest of Gaul by Julius Caesar currently head that list.  I recently finished Dinosaur Summer by Greg Bear, and I enjoyed it so much that I had to start in on one of those old Tor Doubles that have sat in my bookshelf for...awhile.  It contains his novella “Hardfought,” as well as a story by Timothy Zahn.  It's good, just too complex for me right now.  After hearing Neil Gaiman’s Guest of Honor interview at World Fantasy last year, I figured I should check out the series of comics that put him on the literary map.  So I read the first part of the compilation The Sandman: Preludes and Nocturnes.  Last, but certainly not least, there’s The Stars in Shroud by Dr. Gregory Benford.  Although I delved so deeply into the novel last year for this blog, there are still a few aspects of it that I’d like to understand better. 

Every evening, before I pluck one of the above from my stack, I usually read a few pages of something to my wife before we go to sleep.  I think I must have missed my vocation.  With the way my voice seems to make her drift off, I should have become a priest.  Right now, we’re working our way through the Robert Silverberg story “Born with the Dead.”  

As I’ve documented in earlier entries, Steven Brust’s novel Teckla recently shoved its way into my stack, and that’s bad, because his stories tend to make me want to abandon all else until I finish them.  Yet, as I’m primarily using his fiction each morning to spur on my writing efforts, I don’t want to finish that novel too quickly, and end up opening another of his novels, and then another, until I’ve worked my way through the series.  As much as I love his writing, I don’t want to be too heavily influenced by his individual style.  As an author, I want to develop my own writing style (whatever that ends up being), not merely imitate his.  

There’s one, final, practical consideration.  Too much Vlad, or any other Brust novel, will distance me from the other novels in the stack, making them more difficult to read and finish.  My love of reading drew me to writing.  Why then must my reading time be so limited?  Why can’t I read everything I want to read, when I want to read it?  Well?

Okay, okay, okay!  Maybe I’ll read just one more chapter of Teckla today.

Related Dragon Cache entries

Captured by the Talosians  

A Journey into English Fiction Part 2

A Ramble, a Triumph, and a Risky Sacrifice

Stephen Hawking and “The Big Bang Theory”

In the March 30, 2012 issue of “Entertainment Weekly,” an article heralded two special cameos in upcoming episodes of the popular sitcom.  One featured the voice of Leonard Nimoy as Sheldon’s conscience, spoken as if by the character’s beloved Spock action figure.  Last week’s episode featured another of Sheldon’s idols, the world-famous physicist and author Stephen Hawking.  

Most everyone knows the fierce struggle Stephan Hawking has waged against Lou Gehrig’s disease over the past decades.  It’s an amazing struggle of perseverance that he has not only survived so long, but also contributed so much to the scientific community.  In a way he’s become a pop culture hero: an indomitable spirit waging war against his failing flesh, a brilliant mind struggling to convey complex subjects to everyday man.  Some might even view him as an oracle: perhaps, if we ask him just the right question, worded in just the right way, he might choose to tell us some of the secrets of the universe!

In 2001, noted physicist and science fiction author Gregory Benford spent an evening with Stephen Hawking.  As the two men were friends, this was not a formal interview, but a casual conversation.  With you and I, the conversation, no matter how unusual and wide-ranging, might be easily forgotten.  But thanks to Stephen Hawking’s wheelchair computer, as well as an attentive assistant, Dr. Benford received a transcript of their conversation, which he used to formulate a magazine article, and has since reproduced on his blog.  I read along, trying my best to follow the two men as they spoke of such exalted topics as the beginning of the universe, baby universes, and even “onion universes.”  Yet, try as I might, I could not twist my cortex (or any part of my brain) around concepts these men batted around more easily than I would expound on the ideas underlying Fiction, “Star Trek,” or Dragons.  

Perhaps a few drawings would have helped.  As Dr. Benford writes: “I feel that any device is justified to span such an abyss of incomprehension.”

Again, what fascinates me is not just Stephen Hawking’s understanding of the universe, but that he can interact with others so readily.  With just a few hand-movements, Hawking responds intelligently to any question, using words, phrases, and sentences he’s comfortable with.  He’s not willing to just sit back and let his wheelchair-computer (or others) do his communicating for him.  In last week’s episode of “The Big Bang Theory,” he could have just sat there for his scene with Jim Parsons, the actor who portrays Sheldon.  He, or others, could have overlaid the dialogue at a later time.  Instead, as Parson’s reported, “he didn’t want that.  He wanted to be the one doing it during the scene.”

Brilliant physicist, best-selling author, and actor: is there anything that Stephen Hawking cannot do?  I may not have his brilliant mind, but neither do I suffer from his physical limitations.  His example becomes yet one more that powers me in pursuit of my goals.  If Stephen Hawking refuses to let anything stand in his way, why should I?  

Why should you? 

Related Dragon Cache entries

The Fellowship of Condor

The Man in the Box

What Drives Us

From Gregory Benford’s Blog

Leaping The Abyss

Hawking Humor…