| Author | Message | ||
     Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 83.98.9.4 |
...when you look out of the window in the morning and see a covering of snaow across the land - and your first thought is "Oh shit!" | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.37.199.45 |
Are you from Dunwich, Weber? | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 83.98.9.4 |
No - Gateshead - that's worse | ||
| Des (Des) Username: Des Registered: 06-2008 Posted From: 86.157.25.29 |
I love the Angel of the North. Bet it looks good in the snaow. | ||
| Niki Flynn (Niki) Username: Niki Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.32.69.29 |
The airplane of the North, you mean. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 213.219.8.243 |
Weber - are you really from Gateshead? Whereabouts? I too love the Angel of the North. | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 83.98.9.4 |
Born in Gateshead General. The first house I can remember living in was on Ravensworth Road in Dunston. Moved to North wales aged 6 and moved to salford aged 18. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 213.219.8.243 |
Bloody hell. I think I know Ravensworth Road - and a bit of Dunston in general. I used to live by Saltwell Park, on Patterdale Avenue, just down from Low Fell. Small world. | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.152.198.220 |
Er, tenuous link: Ebert's getting a little old, but seems to have more fire than ever. Celebrity culture is not harmless: http://blogs.suntimes.com/ebert/2008/11/death_to_film_critics_long_liv.html | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.157.53.174 |
He's right, of course. And yet at the same time some newspapers bug me for saying too much; I HATE supplements - so long-winded, so pointless. The length of their articles actually detracts from the subjects because it cannot take so long to make a point. The point is made in the first paragraph, and the last. I'm not griping because my attention is short but because it's as long as it needs to be. It's not creative to go on too long, but to say it through a select number of well-chosen words. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.110.169.231 |
Ebert's piece is excellent. Though it's ironic that the article appears as a blog. Nothing gets reviewed in print any more. New books get no reviews, just lots of blogs written by self-appointed reviewers with no editor and no publisher. Apparently Amazon's 'reviews' (the idiot droolings of media-saturated illiterate brainless fools) make more difference to sales than actual reviews written by critics for journals. The Internet is driving the obliteration of functional literacy. Which, of course, suits the ruling class just fine. People used to know things. That was a problem. Now even well-qualified people in good jobs know everything about 'media tropes' and reality TV stars, but are too ironic to bother with the news. And our world turns to shit. And we dare, we actually dare, to voice opinions about the deterioration of the underclass, as if we represented something better. Our grandparents (or some of them) went to Spain to fight for democracy against a fascist regime our government did little or nothing to challenge. We're too busy anatomising children's cartoons to notice that there is a world offline. We're too fucking clever to think. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.110.169.231 |
A colleague of mine, by no means unintelligent in the professional context, informed me the other day that the cauise of the recession is that all our money is being spent on giving paedophiles new identities. Maybe people don't read newspapers any more because the newspapers are full of shit. | ||
| Des (Des) Username: Des Registered: 06-2008 Posted From: 86.157.25.29 |
Today is as good and as bad as it gets. Every 'today' since time began. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.22.239.86 |
I know I'm getting old, for yesterday I was interviewed for a school newspaper: apparently I'm now the oldest student on campus  They'd also asked the youngest student, a 17-year old cute little doll who didn't have much to say. We had our pictures taken etc. Should be fun to see the end result. | ||
| Des (Des) Username: Des Registered: 06-2008 Posted From: 86.157.25.29 |
Joel mentioned: "... with no editor and no publisher." ============ Who appointed the editors and publishers in the past? Money and influence?? Knowing people? Talent? | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.74.221.2 |
The Ebert article is spot on unfortunatly. The prevalence of reality TV is another disaster. I really can't believe how much broadcasters continue to churn out crap like that. It is depressing. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.37.199.45 |
Des, there used to be a culture where reputations were earned. There used to be standards and processes that made the literature we both value possible. Now we are in the universe of Smilemime where nothing means anything. The literature of the future will be random drivel for random, drooling netheads to download and snore though. The future is dead. If, by chance, any good books are written, the Amazon 'reviews' will rip them apart like a gang of playground bullies around a suspected sissy. The literary culture we grew up with is being dismembered, burned, scattered and pissed on. The game is up. Don't talk to me about the Internet. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.157.53.174 |
I have actually found some good reviews on amazon, though. Maybe the thing to do is review on that site to the best of our example, set an example. I also wonder that people have decided war and other such difficulties are best ran away from - if you become involved you get criticize, like the government, who did decide to, for good or ill. There is so much doubt around we've all ecided to hide rather than risk judgement. Judgement is something it seems there's no shortage of, action's another thing. I must say that Ebert for me has become in recent years a philosopher, and no-one has noticed because he functions under the banner of 'movie critic'. I have learned things from Ebert that have informed my life. | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.152.206.149 |
I agree, Tony, and also agree that many newspapers are boring. That lack of brevity is simply poor writing. You do find the odd good Amazon review, but most online reviewers are shocking in their inability to construct a sentence. If Orwell was correct about the relationship between language and thought, then these people can not think. Brr. I'd urge patience, Joel. Keep your eye on the long game. The current "culture" is loud but feeble and won't survive the winter. Not much that's crap has survived from Shakespeare's time. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.157.53.174 |
'Best of our ability' I meant. Sheesh. The net at the moment is the pen door being open, everyone running round it like mad things. I think it'll settle. Remember early cinema, how very simple and sketchy it was (film of trains coming into stations is so near the world of Youtube when you think about it)? It was an art that had to be got to grips with. This is where the net is, I think and hope. And remember Roman graffitti; trivial in the extreme but how much it told us of those people, and how scintillating it is to read that they were once very much like us. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.157.53.174 |
God, that previous post - sounded like I'm suffering what this guy I support calls 'Old Timer's disease' (Alzheimer's). | ||
| Des (Des) Username: Des Registered: 06-2008 Posted From: 86.157.25.29 |
Yes one must ride the waves not try to stem them like Canute. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.157.53.174 |
But Canute was trying to show his over-adulatory followers he was human, trying to show he couldn't stop the sea! A very nice man, apparently. But yes, your point holds! | ||
| Des (Des) Username: Des Registered: 06-2008 Posted From: 86.157.25.29 |
I know nothing about history! :-( I don't know any geography, either, but I still keep up my membership of a pub quiz team for my knowledge on other things (and the beer). :-) | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.74.221.2 |
And just to add some further unsettling dimension to the debate above from cold scandinavia- Denmark has closed 103 libraries in the past 3 years I believe, and the new director of the library association has suggested that libraries remove any books from the remaining libraries that have not been checked out the last 5 years. She then suggested that an emphasis be placed on 'current bestsellers'- mirroring sales in bookshops. Recently up to 90 percent of children's books were removed from some libraries and replaced with computers in the hope of attracting more children. The local library in my grandparent's town looks like a mausoleum- the aisles are essentially gone and I don't know what the building is for any longer. | ||
| Jamie Rosen (Jamie) Username: Jamie Registered: 11-2008 Posted From: 99.240.155.122 |
That's terrible. From what I can tell, our libraries are doing quite well here. And it seems that at some point there was a horrorphile on the purchasing committee, because I've come across a signed copies of Masques V and Bloch's The Fear Planet posthumous collection (signed by Stefan Dz... Dzie... the editor.) | ||
| Jamie Rosen (Jamie) Username: Jamie Registered: 11-2008 Posted From: 99.240.155.122 |
And out of curiosity, Karim, do you know what they're doing with these books they're removing? It seems to me like it would take more cost and effort to remove them than to leave them be. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.157.53.174 |
Karim - that is awful. What do do, eh? because I can see this spreading. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.37.199.45 |
The UK second-hand market in a number of great weird fiction authors (Aickman in particular) has, over the last decade, been flooded with ex-library copies sold to the general public at 10p each and bought up in bulk by dealers who made 10,000% profit on each book. Good news for collectors (where else could you obtain SUB ROSA for £10?), but those books will never ever again be available to library users. Neither will Bierce, Bradbury, Campbell, Blackwood, Lovecraft, etc, etc. The library books that brought me into the genre as a kid are now in private collections. Another crucial aspect of our collective literary heritage privatised and lost forever. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.157.53.174 |
All we can do is publicize these authors on the net, keep talking about them. I don't know what else. I recently bought an Ian Rankin - 'Wolfman' - for 20p from the library. It's from the late eighties/early nineties. I've been told it could be worth up to £300. | ||
| Des (Des) Username: Des Registered: 06-2008 Posted From: 86.157.25.29 |
Perhaps all books should be available on the internet free - Government financed - with tax deductions for printing them out. Literature as a utility like water and electricity. Given where we are. Making the best of a bad job. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.4.228.155 |
Neither will Bierce, Bradbury, Campbell, Blackwood, Lovecraft, etc, etc.... Release the copyrights, oh families... at some point, when the blood has been fully squeezed, release them... like Lovecraft and others, they won't be able to keep them out of print.... Great author's legacies must not be bones in the mangers of dogs. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.37.199.45 |
Craig and Des, your suggestions may not appeal much to living authors who would, all things considered, rather get paid for their work than see it join the infinity of up-for-grabs merchandise that is the public domain. Being out of copyright does not guarantee you a single additional reader. Books should be affordable, but they should still be books and authors should benefit when they are sold or borrowed. Anyone who puts my work out on a blog without my permission will be picking up his teeth with broken fingers. | ||
| Des (Des) Username: Des Registered: 06-2008 Posted From: 86.157.25.29 |
Well I've put my lifetime's work on the internet. This is (perhaps laughably)a literary fiscal stimulus. Nobody (including any author) is going to be paid for their work in the forthcoming financial meltdown that may last for a generation. We need big actions. Clean the slate. Make literature a necessity not a luxury. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.157.53.174 |
We must remember that music is struggling, too, in pretty much the same way. It is computer's fault, really. It gives and it takes. | ||
| Des (Des) Username: Des Registered: 06-2008 Posted From: 86.157.25.29 |
we are where we are John McFall (Chairman of teh Treasury Select Committee) has just said - "we are in apocalyptic times". | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.157.53.174 |
And it's why we're all going slowly insane. To hear a rain of bad news is terrible, especially when I am rarely witness to it actually happening. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.157.53.174 |
I do, on the whole, thank the net for helping me get stuff in print, and letting me find books I might otherwise not have been able to find. But my world is noisy now, and spent too often on it looking for yet more opportunities, or rather games like Pathwords. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.5.14.234 |
Joel, stealing is one thing - and your stated reaction would be a proper one. And I have said that when the blood's been squeezed.... But there comes a time when lamenting the fact that no one (i.e., publishers, distributors, etc.) wants to buy what you've written and disseminate it, is superfluous. No author must sell his work, and no reader is entitled to read it. Personally, I found the recent ultra-expensive special edition of the unexpurgated DARK CARNIVAL to be an elitist and unnecessary move on Bradbury's part - a snub to his legion of fans who aren't graced with great sums of discretionary funds... but, it's his work, he can do what he wants; and you may have the right to complain, but not to use that as justification to sieze it by force. "Books should be affordable" - so there exists this tug-and-pull, because if the books can't be made affordable, then the authors will be content to languish in obscurity, rather than sacrifice present gains, or find more creative means for distribution (to Tony's point, this is what many musicians are faced with doing). But we should still be UN-happy, that books are leaving libraries, and everywhere else?... It's all too difficult to sort out. Better to just keep reading Lovecraft and King. | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 83.98.9.4 |
"Personally, I found the recent ultra-expensive special edition of the unexpurgated DARK CARNIVAL to be an elitist and unnecessary move on Bradbury's part " Was it on the part of Mr Bradbury, or his publisher? | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 80.167.124.223 |
And out of curiosity, Karim, do you know what they're doing with these books they're removing? It seems to me like it would take more cost and effort to remove them than to leave them be. Some were sold, some put away for storage, some unknown. I did try to buy some of them- I got some Ballards/Bradbury firsts that I had read in my childhood- so full circle, but this as Joel says, stops another kid adventuring down the isles and picking up seminal things at random- removes the sense of discovery and adventure. Try walking into some scandinavian libraries now-feels like going to the dentist. That aside- I do feel that the net has a role to play as Des says, in reaching an audience. Clearly people like Cory Doctorow have made the net work for them- people read his stuff online, then go out and pick up the book in stores with extras etc- and boom- you have a NY times top twenty seller. But there are lots of problems with this model as an author would need to have another major platform like boingboing for example to make it work because to some extent you already have a built-in audience. But he's obviously active in all sorts of good work- bless him- but that model is problematic for different kinds of authors and those in the so called 'midlist' category who have been making some sort of living, who are suddenly wiped out in new corporate publishing strategies despite long relationships...} | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.5.14.234 |
Weber, does it matter? Either way, Bradbury signed off on it. I am being blunt when I say, I can't help but lose respect for Mr. B. He has all but said through action: You with loads of money can have this, but you with none cannot. That kind of thing I find elitist and an affront to literature... but that's Bradbury's choice, and in the end, so what? A few stories that aren't exaclty going to shake the world with their brilliance. Of course, the whole tome was a handsome edition, and only the very rich could experience it.... Correct me if I'm wrong someone. Even sue-happy Shakespeare didn't go after the quartos of his work going around London, gathering moneys for their illicit publishers... he was too smart for that.... | ||
| Des (Des) Username: Des Registered: 06-2008 Posted From: 86.157.25.29 |
I said: "Nobody (including any author) is going to be paid for their work in the forthcoming financial meltdown that may last for a generation." ============== Please insert the word 'fully' before 'paid'. Sorry for this omission. | ||
| Gcw (Gcw) Username: Gcw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.43.119.113 |
"..Books should be affordable" I agree, but all too often they aren't - and often for good reason (small presses....Cost of manufacture...Short runs...). I spent about £150 on books at Fantasycon.. Money well spent and I am lucky I can afford it right now..may not always be the case. gcw | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 83.98.9.4 |
Correct me if I'm wrong but does the publisher not have the final say on the presentation and cost of the printed book. All the author does is supply the text that goes inside the package the publisher prints and prices. Can the published peeps here confirm if I'm right on this? If the publisher decides to overprice a book, the writer doesn't necessarily have an effective say in the matter. even one as respected as Bradbury. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.5.3.239 |
PUH-LEEEEAAASE, Weber... please tell me you're smarter than you look....  If an author gets a whiff of anything going wrong, s/he's raising holy hell. Don't tell me writers just sit back and throw up their hands and say, "Me no have no control - swahwy!" | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 79.78.114.244 |
I've just realised that in a pile of books...from the library I bought Robert Bloch's Psycho for 40p...I'm going back tomorrow and ask if they will put it back on the shelf. I've done the if you don't like horror why do you read Titus Andronicus and Wuthering Heights with them so they should be prepared for it. I agree with Harlan Ellison ...pay the writer. | ||
| Chris_morris (Chris_morris) Username: Chris_morris Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 12.165.240.116 |
The amount of influence an author has on any aspect of his published book (other than the text) depends on (a) the power and marketability of the author and (b) the inclination of the author to muck about in publishing matters. Bradbury may once have been an automatic bestseller, but he isn't any longer. In the small presses, a name like Bradbury's still holds a degree of power and influence, I'm sure, but it's hard to say what sort of control Ray exerts over a major publisher these days. Very little, probably. (Although Craig's right that he very likely did agree to the book's price point.) I wonder to what extent Bradbury involves himself in the creation of his books, especially these days. For him, the next book is just another one on the pile, no? After all, he is nearing 90. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.242.126 |
Weber's correct - the publisher decides the price of a book, but the author signs a contract for the rights ona certain edition so isn't usually wholly ignorant of the price tag. | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.152.209.188 |
You've all seen this. It's astonishing how prescient it is. 1976! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WINDtlPXmmE Just saw a slogan on a banner (don't know or care what it's advertising): ANYTHING IS POSSIBLE. KEEP THINKING. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.242.126 |
If that happened today, in real life, people would simply switch the channel and watch The X factor... | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.242.126 |
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=p0XK5V4TN4g&feature=related | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 83.98.9.4 |
The new dark Carnival edition is from Gauntlet publishing isn't it? That's a small press and already a lot more expensive than a m ajor publisher. Do you criticise Ramsey because his PS editions are at least twice the price of a normal hardback? | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.242.126 |
PS hardbacks are 15 quid, Weber - more or less what you'd pay for a new hardback in Borders. I do agree, though, that generally these limited editions are overpriced. I'm a reader not a collector, so I rarely buy 'em. | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 83.98.9.4 |
They're the ones I was talking about - the expensive ones. Unfortunately my local waterstones only seems to buy in the limited versions. I rarely see the affordable editions till they stock the American Tor copies. | ||
| Jonathan (Jonathan) Username: Jonathan Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.143.178.131 |
Our author's have input at every stage of the edit and basically after the final MS is delivered it's a collaborative effort between both myself and the author to get the text in a form we are both satisfied with. 9/10 it comes in without having to be changed too much. As for covers, the author also gets input there. My first stage in getting a cover done is to ask the author what image he/she thinks would work well. The author and myself then chat to our in-house artist, he sends us roughs, we okay them, then he paints the thing up. Price, that's very much down to us as publishers and what the market is doing. The author gets paid the same whatever the price of the book. For the record our paperbacks are currently £6.99/$7.99 and then Amazon usually slap a discount on that. Usually sold at that price in regular bookstores though. | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 204.104.55.243 |
Actually US limiteds- usually priced around 45 dollars say, are still cheaper than the mass market hardbacks you get from large publishers. And the small press ones are signed and beautifully bound etc. Mass market hardbacks- even if you are careful- are still in quite rough shape after reading them just once. | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 204.104.55.243 |
I am of course speaking about import prices of UK books to Denmark. It has become more expensive however, with rising postage costs from the US- and then you have to factor in getting busted in customs- and voila- you've just paid 80 dollars for a 45 dollar book. | ||
| Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey) Username: Ramsey Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.74 |
'PUH-LEEEEAAASE, Weber... please tell me you're smarter than you look.... If an author gets a whiff of anything going wrong, s/he's raising holy hell. Don't tell me writers just sit back and throw up their hands and say, "Me no have no control - swahwy!"' And what do you think happens if they "raise holy hell"? Like (for instance) John Brunner, they find no publisher will publish them, because they're too troublesome. I'm reminded of Joe Lansdale's on a panel once, about book covers. Do you have control of your covers, he was asked. He replied that publishers often let the author see the proposed cover but that the implicit message was "If you don't like it, fuck you." | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 82.3.65.135 |
Tim Lebbon makes the same point. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 82.3.65.135 |
I'm reminded, Ramsey, of your succinct definition of a horror cover: "a skull". | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 218.168.192.2 |
I like PS's system: they generally bring out a deluxe edition for collectors (and avid fans of the author in question) and less expensive editions for those who mainly just want to be able to read the book. | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 204.104.55.243 |
or a scary house... | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.4.240.109 |
I think there's a big difference between all these small press examples, and the specific one I was using with the recent Bradbury DARK CARNIVAL; because, from what I gathered, it was to be printed only in that hugely expensive limited edition, and then never to be reprinted afterwards, in cheaper editions, mass paperback editions, etc. Bradbury really doesn't like those early stories in DC: he'd have released them long before now if he wanted to - let's not suddenly cry author's-hands-tied arguments out of the blue. Bradbury doesn't care that his fans want to read these early stories. He's willing to fleece the rich for them, though, apparently... so one must conclude: he's unconcerned about what his loyal fans want. If I detest Bradbury but had ponied up the bucks, he'd have served me his stories; if I adored his work my whole life, but had not enough money - kicked to the curb! Not the attitude I savor in my writers, I must say.... | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.110.248.42 |
I bought a second-hand copy of the Gauntlet Press DARK CARNIVAL – still cost me an inordinate amount of money. However, Craig, I think your argument can be reversed: the fact that these stories are either available elsewhere (mostly in revised, superior versions) or are minor really means that the book is for obsessives only. If it came out in a mass-market edition, it would undermine the status of the revised versions. So a limited edition makes good sense in this case. Sure it could have been cheaper, but it's still a lot cheaper than trying to buy the original Arkham House volume or even the abridged (wartime) edition from Hamish Hamilton in the UK. I'm sure the high price was a way of keeping the book out of general circulation. Bradbury's books are normally available in all kinds of mass-market paperback editions – not that any author would routinely turn down that opportunity. DC does have one very nice early short-short that I've never seen anywhere else: 'The Night Sets', a weird tale of Hollywood. Someone put it in an anthology now! No, actually I go out all the time. My social diary is packed. | ||
| Frank (Frank) Username: Frank Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 79.187.206.46 |
 | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 82.3.65.135 |
PLUS, there's a context involved in many cases (I've only recently considered this): with some small press imprints, I believe that bigger names (and what bigger than Bradbury?) are priced in that way in order for the company to also take 'risks' on lesser known folk. I for one am delighted to see PS Publishing putting out limited Stephen King, even at that price, because Pete Crowther obviously uses some of the profits to also publish nobodies like me. The big fish, in this way, give the minnows a chance. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.4.252.136 |
But why deny the "obsessives," Joel - which is code word for "loyal fans"?... I suppose, however, seeing your point, that the one factor not taken into account is: time. One does not know what will happen in the future; perhaps another cheaper version is available on the horizon. I admit, one could take my argument against Stephen King some 20 years ago, when THE DARK TOWER was only available in a very limited, impossible-to-find edition... for, what, a decade it was like that? Finally the book got around: it takes time. Time sorts out all of these problems... and the forlorn readers, lying in their mouldy graves, denied their Bradbury stories... to wax romantic.... | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.110.248.42 |
Regarding the cover illustrations issue – one of the reasons why authors like working with specialist publishers is that they get original cover illustrations from respected genre artists, not generic covers better suited to other books or none at all. There's nothing better than seeing a front cover with an image based on your work and embodying the creative talent of a gifted artist. Getting an ill-judged and handed-down cover image from a mass-market publisher's 'horror stock' is, I suspect, the complete reverse. But of course, quality cover illustrations are not restricted to expensive limited-edition hardcovers. The PS Publishing unjacketed hardcovers, various trade paperbacks and even some commercial hardbacks are lovely books that cost no more (sometimes less) than a couple of ordinary paperbacks. Getting a balance between production quality and price, where the likely readership is not massive, is a headache for most publishers. I'm not crazy about the 'slipcased, signed, lettered, bound in night-gaunt hide' culture, but if it gives specialist publishers an opportunity to boost their returns while also putting out an affordable edition, fair enough. Until we get back the bookselling and publishing infrastructure that made lots of great weird fiction available in mass-market paperback (i.e. never), we need to make the best of things. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.4.252.136 |
Gary, that's the argument in Hollywood: the big movies, the tentpole movies, they allow the smaller, Oscar-fodder ones to get made. But then, Oscar-fodder or not, there's no elitist movies in Hollywood... there are no films made for the select and wealthy and above-it-all... something not intended for all eyes to see... might make a good story, though, about a film going around like that.... | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 83.98.9.4 |
But most of Dark carnival was reprinted in The october Country. The Night Sets is the only one that's not been reprinted. It is a collectors thing the new edition - collectors thing = expensive almost by definition | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.110.248.42 |
It's called child porn. Limited editions, high cost, intended only for a select audience of the extremely wealthy. Who are invariably scum. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.110.248.42 |
Er, my response was to the previous post, not to Weber. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.4.252.136 |
I'm almost positive that "The Night Sets" is not the only one, Weber... but not indeed positive.... Also: there are (? - pretty sure about this too) stories in that new DC that were never even in the original, or any other edition (King refers way back in DANSE MACABRE about some of these great uncollected Bradbury stories from the 1940's)... but again, this is Mr. B's choice to make.... | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.110.248.42 |
Yikes, that doesn't look good. Oh dear.  | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.4.252.136 |
Yes, indeed, Joel - and up above, you are even so eager to see "The Night Sets" reprinted! For shame! | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 82.3.65.135 |
But there's an issue here about the storage of such material - that is, films invariably come on pretty generic DVDs which are easily replicated, whereas limited books with autograph etc are essentially uncopyable. That's what results in the high price. If you stick a DVD in any new PC, you'll get a good copy, but if you scan a limited book, it'll look crap. Imagine a film in such an edition: this DVD is made from the highest quality metal with the lettering stamped in emu blood; the case is crafted by Balinese virgins and the inlay is signed by the director and stars in liquid gold... | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.4.252.136 |
...this DVD is made from the highest quality metal with the lettering stamped in emu blood; the case is crafted by Balinese virgins and the inlay is signed by the director and stars in liquid gold... You're right, Gary - even as such, DONNIE DARKO would still suck. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.110.224.160 |
Er, getting back on track, the UK edition of DARK CARNIVAL contains half a dozen stories (all very dark and very strong) from the original DC that didn't appear in THE OCTOBER COUNTRY. These also appeared in two UK editions of a Bradbury paperback called THE SMALL ASSASSIN. The Gauntlet Press reissue of the original text adds a further five stories, four of which had practically disappeared. I only like one of those four. Eleven stories from the original DARK CARNIVAL were revised (some quite heavily, such as 'The Emissary' and 'The Scythe') for THE OCTOBER COUNTRY, and another four were reprinted pretty much unchanged. Four new stories were added. Craig, I think the Gauntlet Press edition has two or three previously uncollected stories. Very minor ones. THE OCTOBER COUNTRY gets my vote for the most brilliant weird fiction collection of all time. DARK CARNIVAL is lesser but still remarkable. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 82.3.65.135 |
The critic Don Herron finds some of Bradbury's early tales overly gimmicky, Joel. He cites 'The Small Assassin' as being one such case. Whatchathink? | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.4.252.136 |
Ah - you've reminded me, Joel, that in the UK the situation was different: indeed there were paperback editions that gathered more stories from DC than ever appeared over here in the U.S. I guess the true fan can work hard at assembling his own definitive collection of DC. And hard work, as opposed to strolling down to the corner and buying it off the shelf... the mettle that makes a true fan, true?... to now wax philosophicalisticishly.... | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.21.235.45 |
But what does he mean by 'gimmicky'? That the tales hinge on a single clever plot device but are otherwise badly written? | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.242.126 |
THE OCTOBER COUNTRY gets my vote for the most brilliant weird fiction collection of all time. I might have to agree with that. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 82.3.65.135 |
Hubert: Herron says that since he had a baby, he found the Bradbury tale inane. He demonstrates what he means by comparing King's short story 'The Last Rung on the Ladder' with his 'The Woman in the Room' - the former is gimmicky, the latter not so. | ||
| Weber_gregston (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 83.98.9.4 |
Methinks Herron has no taste. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 82.3.65.135 |
I think he's one of the best genre critics. Never mentions Campbell, to my knowledge, however. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.4.253.172 |
Then what the hell good is he?!? | ||
| Jamie Rosen (Jamie) Username: Jamie Registered: 11-2008 Posted From: 192.26.212.72 |
By my count, of the 30 stories in Dark Carnival, 23 of them were reprinted in either October Country two years earlier, or Bradbury Stories two years later. This includes all the stories that were not in the original 1947 edition. Of the seven that didn't, three had appeared in the massive The Stories of Ray Bradbury -- which means a total overlap of 25 stories.} And I'm sure in another 10 or 20 years we'll get another 100-story collection that will account for the rest. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.4.240.82 |
...of the 30 stories in Dark Carnival, 23 of them were reprinted in either October Country two years earlier, or Bradbury Stories two years later.... ?!? - OCTOBER COUNTRY came long after DARK CARNIVAL. And what's BRADBURY STORIES?... Or was this the U.K. series of publishing events?... | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.242.126 |
Herron says that since he had a baby, he found the Bradbury tale inane. He demonstrates what he means by comparing King's short story 'The Last Rung on the Ladder' with his 'The Woman in the Room' - the former is gimmicky, the latter not so. He had a baby? Is he some kind of seahorse? I'd argue that King's The last Rung on the Ladder is far from gimmicky. I don't even know what the guy's trying to say there. :-/ This is why I never read genre critics. Their opinions never tally with my own. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.21.235.45 |
I'd go so far as to say that these two King stories aren't even horror stories, properly speaking. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.242.126 |
That depends on your definition of a horror story, Hubert. I'd certainly call them horror. But I'm awkward like that (as Stu Young will testify). | ||
| Jamie Rosen (Jamie) Username: Jamie Registered: 11-2008 Posted From: 192.26.212.72 |
?!? - OCTOBER COUNTRY came long after DARK CARNIVAL. And what's BRADBURY STORIES?... Or was this the U.K. series of publishing events?... I'm referring, of course, to the limited edition of Dark Carnival that caused the hubbub, and to the 1999 reissue of October Country from Avon. And then there's the 2001 reissue from Del Rey. Bradbury Stories is available here: http://www.amazon.com/Bradbury-Stories-Most-Celebrated-Tales/dp/0060544880/ref=p d_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1228417201&sr=8-1 It was also available from the Science Fiction Book Club. |