FFB – ALIENS by Alan Dean Foster

Foster is the undisputed king of film novelizations. It has been stated that Foster claims to add an additional third to each script he novelises, such as providing the characters with thoughts and past history. Having written a screenplay of my book Death is Another Life, I know how much has to be left out for a script to work. Virtually all the description goes, as do the thought processes – though some can be verbalised if essential to the forward motion of the story.

I reviewed this way back when it was first published, but I think my comments still stand up.

Manipulation of the viewer or reader can annoy; the scene in Alien where Ripley stripped to her underwear, besides seeming unnecessary for the story, was to my mind deliberately manipulative, offering her up visibly defenceless, without even the dubious protection of clothes, and of course the scene was there for titillation, perhaps. Aliens does it, too, manipulating, that is: not only is Ripley destined to face the aliens, but she is to be accompanied by a child – a sure-fire heart-stopper. Despite these misgivings, the manipulation is effective, as it was in the forerunner, Alien.

This sequel picks up Ripley in suspension floating in her drifter, Narcissus, some 57 years after she rid herself of the alien. The character of Ripley is enlarged upon, and her susceptibility to nightmares is both understandable and well conveyed – in the event she undertakes to return to the alien planet of her nightmares in order to exorcise them. The planet now has a name, Acheron, and a colony, which inevitably succumbs to the aliens! So the space marines are sent in, with state-of-the-art weaponry which is convincingly featured.

Drawings that accompanied my original review.

 

You won’t get a great deal of style or literary writing, but the story and characters are convincing and occasionally Foster illuminates with a telling phrase or two, viz:

‘Both wore the expression of men for whom sleep is a teasing mistress rarely visited.’

There are minor irritations, such as ‘politicoporate manoeuvering’, repeated use of ‘heretofore’ outside of legalise contexts, ‘she was slipping on her equipment’ for ‘she was putting on her equipment’, a different image entirely, death is an ‘irritating finality’ – irritating seems an inappropriate description. But these are trifling quibbles concerning a good edge-of-seat read which kept me awake into the early hours. Reviewers of the film say they felt drained and limp after the movie, due to unremitting tension, and the book does read like that too. Yes, it is very well done.

 

Moor about Spain

Today, I’m discussing in brief a 2004 non-fiction book entitled Andalus by Jason Webster. The sub-heading of this book is Unlocking the secrets of Moorish Spain and it’s a follow-up of his first book Duende: a journey in search of flamenco which became an acclaimed big seller. Having studied Arabic in Oxford, Webster lived for several years in Italy and Egypt then went to Spain to learn to play the flamenco guitar; he now lives in Valencia with his Spanish wife.

Like many Hispanophiles, he’s had a long-lasting fascination with the Moorish past of this country, whether triggered by the sublime Alhambra in Granada, the dramatic and beautiful Great Mosque in Cordoba or the surprising number of Arabic root words in the Spanish language. Gibraltar which the Spanish vociferously and with inept politicians insist is theirs could realistically be claimed by Morocco or other North African countries – after all, it’s named after a Moor – jabal Tariq – the mountain of Tariq, the first Arab to conquer Spain.

For eight centuries Christians, Muslims and Jews lived and worked side by side. It was a period of great cultural and artistic blossoming. The Moors in Spain had the first universities, the first paper factories and the first street lighting in the whole of Europe. The Arabs learned paper-making from the Chinese artisans on capturing Samarkand. Indeed, the Moors first crossed the Strait to Spain in the Dark Ages, at about the same time as Bede was writing his History. At the time Spain was under Visigothic rule, the German tribes having moved in and taken over as the Roman Empire collapsed.

‘Moor’ was the term used to describe Muslims in Spain – Arabs, Berbers, Syrians, Persians and eventually Spaniards; it originated from the Latin maurus, which had been used to refer to North Africans.

Eventually the Christian Reconquest started to bite and in 1492 the Moors were expelled from what had become their country. What followed was religious intolerance, epitomised by the Inquisition. In modern Spain now annual ‘Moors and Christians’ fiestas occur in many towns and cities; these are noisy, colourful and quite spectacular events.

Two hundred years before the Reconquest, Arabic scholars translated great medical and mathematical works from the original Greek. By way of the Reconquest many of these works were translated into Latin, notably in Toledo. It could even be argued that the Arabic learning laid the foundations of the later Renaissance.

Webster was curious to see how the Moorish influence persisted even to this day, beyond these fiestas – ironically at a time when the Spanish government is having difficulty stemming the tide of illegal immigrants from Morocco and North African ports.

He read an old legend about Musa the Moor, the richest, strongest and most powerful caliph in ancient Spain. As the Christian armies were advancing, Musa asked his friendly jinn to safeguard his riches – which he did by turning them into stone in a special cave; but Musa’s daughter Zoraida didn’t want to flee, so she was turned into a tree outside the cave. But for one day in every year, as spring arrives, Princess Zoraida comes back to life and all the Caliph’s riches gleam and shine again. Only for one day the spell is broken. Webster was enchanted by this tale and wondered if, like the Caliph’s riches, much of the Moorish heritage was hidden from view, only waiting to be discovered.

The book begins with Webster incognito under the plastic sheeting of a fruit farm, doing some journalistic research on the illegal immigrants working in appalling conditions. Because they’re illegal, the immigrants are locked up at night and monitored by guards; they get no pay, only food and cramped sleeping quarters. Slavery was alive and well, it seemed. Then he was discovered and had to flee, aided by a young Moroccan called Zine. They got away but Webster now felt beholden to Zine and attempted to find work for him – a difficult task when he had no papers. [This short episode inspired me for a sequence in my Blood of the Dragon Trees].

Amazon.co.uk - http://goo.gl/fsLk3X

Amazon.com - http://goo.gl/wHQpQp

 

Accompanied by his own modern-day Moor for most of his journey of discovery, Webster meets a number of fascinating characters in Cordoba, Murcia, Almeria and Seville, among other southern Spain and Portugeuse towns. There’s an amusing visit to a clinica de enfermedades sexuales in Seville; however, I could have done without the over-long surreal Christmas party in a Valencia disco. On the way he reminds us of the Moorish legacy in the language – many words beginning with ‘a’ or ‘al’ have Arabic roots, whether English or Spanish: ‘Cotton’ – algodon in Spanish – comes from the Arabic al-qutun, for example.

Webster has an observant eye and a deceptively easy writing style which enliven a fascinating quick tour round the Moorish history via modern-day towns and cities of Spain.

Since writing Andalus, Webster has produced three detective novels featuring Chief Inspector Max Camara in Valencia: Or the Bulls Kill You, A Death in Valencia, and The Anarchist Detective.

 

Editing tips - About the sighs of it

No, that isn’t a spelling mistake. I thought we’d go on an emotional odyssey today. Sigh is one of those overused words to illustrate a character’s feelings. Others that spring to mind are smiling, shrugging, nodding and frowning. While there’s nothing wrong with any of these, in moderation, there’s a strong tendency to settle for them all the time instead of working that little bit more to evoke greater emotional response from the reader. (Memo to writers – find ‘smiled’ in your manuscript; you’ll be surprised how often it’s used. The self-edit should have highlighted the repetition, too, of course, but often doesn’t).

I’m sure we’ve all seen examples such as these:

‘What a joke that was,’ he smiled.

‘I’m not too sure about that,’ he shrugged.

‘All right,’ he nodded.

Yes, these appear even in the prose of best-selling authors; no names, but you’ve come across them. It doesn’t mean they’re right. In fact, they’re using lazy short-hand. What they mean, invariably, is ‘he said and smiled.’ And other variants. I point out that you’ll find it difficult to smile and speak at the same time, anyway, in Write a western in 30 Days (p124).

Employing the above standby words too often is both lazy and unhelpful to the reader. The attributions ‘he said’ and ‘she said’ are virtually invisible to the reader so don’t derail the narrative flow; those shrugs, nods and smiles are virtually invisible also, when they’re being used as attribution.

‘What a joke that was.’ He smiled.

This is better. It puts emphasis on his action – smiling.

However, there have to be other ways of conveying his feelings. Smiling implies happiness. It so happens that a book published in 2012 can offer guidance. The Emotion Thesaurus, a writer’s guide to character expression (by Angela Ackerman and Becca Puglisi) provides 75 emotion entries that list body language, thoughts and visceral responses for each type of emotion, from Adoration to Worry.

So our example could read,

‘What a joke that was.’ His eyes sparkled.

Or:

‘What a joke that was.’ He bounced on his toes.

It just depends on the depth of the emotion at that time. And that’s just a physical response. There are internal sensations (when you’re in that POV) – say, a feeling of breathlessness. The section also offers the cues of suppressed happiness.

 

A writer writes to affect the reader, even if only to entertain, but usually you’re also creating tension, anger, fear and perhaps tears – an emotional response which can only be evoked through experiencing the emotions of the characters.

I’ll quote from the Emotion Thesaurus: ‘All successful novels, no matter what genre, have one thing in common: emotion. It lies at the core of every character’s decision, action and word, all of which drive the story. Without emotion, a character’s personal journey is pointless. Stakes cease to exist… readers pick up a book to have an emotional experience. They read to connect with characters who provide entertainment and whose trials may add meaning to their own life journeys.’

At the risk of getting over-emotional, I believe that authors Angela Ackerman and Becca Puglisi have provided a great service to writers by writing the Emotion Thesaurus, which is for all writers, not simply budding scribes.

Music to my ears!

I’ve been a fan of film music since the 1960s. So I was very interested and pleased to view three programmes on TV (BBC4) recently. Presented by composer Neil Brand, the series celebrates the art of cinema music and demonstrates how great soundtracks work.

Neil Brand

 

Neil Brand has been accompanying silent films for nearly 30 years, regularly throughout the UK and at film festivals and special events around the world, including Australia, New Zealand, America, Israel, Sweden, Denmark, France, Germany, Ireland, Luxembourg, and, in Italy, the Bologna, Aosta, Bergamo and Pordenone festivals where he has inaugurated the School of Music and Image.  

Training originally as an actor, he has made his name as a writer/performer/composer, scoring BFI video releases of such films as South (Shackleton's Journey to the South Pole), The Ring by Alfred Hitchcock, the great lost film The Life and Times of David Lloyd George and Early Cinema, avant-garde cinema and Russian pre-Soviet cinema. New DVD releases for the Danish Film Institute and Lobster Films, Paris as well as a highly acclaimed jazz score for the 1927 Anna Mae Wong movie Piccadilly which premiered live in September 2003 at the Lincoln Centre, New York and the Barbican concert hall in March 2004. His most recent DVD scores are for Silent Dickens, Silent Britain, The Cat and the Canary (1927) and the Laurel and Hardy short ‘You’re Darn Tootin’.

Brand has toured to Finland’s ‘Midnight Sun’ Festival, Padua Opera House, Kilkenny comedy festival, the Middle Eastern International Film Festival and throughout the UK and abroad with his ‘hilarious and touching’ one-man-show ‘The Silent Pianist Speaks’. He has written the title music and many scores for TV documentaries including Silent Clowns, Silent Britain, Great Britons, The Real Stephen Hawking, The Crimean War, In The Wild: Pandas with Debra Winger, Great Railway Journeys as well as scores for over 70 Radio 4 dramas including War and Peace, the Box of Delights, Brideshead Revisited, Showboat, and Sony award winner A Town Like Alice.

In his overview of cinema music, Brand tells us that the movie score is intended to make the audience hear what you need to – altering the emotional effect the movie makes by the sound attached. Brand moved through the silent era, where films were accompanied by a piano, orchestra or an organ, through the invention of the ‘click track’ to the point in 1933 where Max Steiner made film history by underscoring King Kong.

King Kong (1933)

There were many interesting insights – the simple sequence of notes that signifies a particular character (latterly, the character’s theme), the way Erich Wolfgang Korngold utilised three different themes in a single scene to illustrate the shifting mood of a conversation in Nottingham Forest. Then there is the score of Bernard Hermann for Psycho, with the violin line for the shower scene slashing sharply down the page, in time with the knife cuts – ironically, Hitchcock hadn’t wanted any music for this scene, but Hermann overrode him!

Thanks to composers like Korngold, Steiner and Hermann, classical style of music dominated the movies for many years. Brand then looked at how jazz and pop music became acceptable for soundtracks. John Barry was shown, emerging from his pop incarnation, The John Barry Seven, to Oscar-winning composer.

And finally, Brand showed how synthesisers took over. Not least, the Theremin, invented by a Russian of that name in 1928. This instrument was used by Miklós Rózsa in Hitchcock’s Spellbound and Bernard Hermann in The Day the Earth Stood Still, which led to the sound being adopted for almost all science fiction movies thereafter!

We were treated to interviews with some of the movie soundtrack greats – though never enough are included, inevitably. Richard Sherman, talking about his Mary Poppins music, Vangelis talking about Chariots of Fire and Blade Runner, and Hans Zimmer discussing how his music affected the opening scene of Gladiator (I think he was robbed at the Oscars!). It was an audio-visual treat for any film buff.

Gladiator

 

Sadly, I feel that the music in many films (for TV or the theatre) now compromises the film, instead of complementing it. Recent films such as The Dark Knight Rises, A Good Day to Die Hard, TV’s Dr Who, and many US TV imports (though so far not Game of Thrones); the list is becoming longer. Usually, the pace of a film means that information has to be imparted ‘on the run’ so to speak, as there are few quiet moments, so drowned out exposition can ruin a viewer’s understanding of the plot and character motivation.

I get really irritated where a character is saying something in a dramatic moment but I can’t hear what was said. The music is dominant, drowning out the words, time and again. The blame must lie squarely with the director, who has the final say. The director knows what has been said by the character, so he doesn’t actually ‘not hear’ the words, they’re lodged in his head anyway. If I was the actor or scriptwriter for those drowned out scenes, I’d be mightily miffed.

 

* * *



 

Footnote: If you enjoyed this short overview, maybe you would like my book of 16 short stories, When the Flowers Are in Bloom by Nik Morton (Solstice Publishing). Many of the tales are prize winners and several are based on true events. One of the stories, 'The Busker of Torrevieja', won an international prize and concerns musicians and the love of music.

http://goo.gl/HRHNjO

 

http://goo.gl/HBTCjJ

 http://goo.gl/HBTCjJhttp://goo.gl/HBTCjJhttp://goo.gl/HBTCjJ

 

Editing pointers - Encounters

When two main characters meet, there’s the opportunity to provide a contrast in temperament, and even verbal fencing, all to establish more character and create mood. If a modicum of mystery can be maintained, all the better.

I’ll use an excerpt from Death is Another Life by Robert Morton (Solstice Publishing) to illustrate a few pointers.

Here, the mystery might even pose a threat from the reader’s viewpoint since the narrative has already revealed the evil side of Zondadari. To echo my blog on dialogue – Let’s Talk – here there is plenty of speech and interaction, yet there are only four instances of ‘said’ in this excerpt, though only two of them are actually attributions.

 

See the surroundings from a single viewpoint, in this case, Maria’s.

 

As here, try to end the chapter on a note of menace or a note of concern.

 

Mellieha, Malta

 

Maria, the Maltese-American journalist meets the mysterious Count…(p80):

 

Maria parked the car a little way up the road, just beyond a pile of dumped building material on the roadside, under an overhanging tamarisk which might keep the interior of the car cool while she reconnoitred. The road was dusty and pot-holed, the tarmac edges crumbling away with neglect.        She’d had difficulty finding the place and had stopped several people to make enquiries. Finally, she found it, to the north-east of Mellieha, down a winding road of evergreen oaks near the Selmun tower. 

            The entrance to the Tabona residence was set back from the twisting road. A drive curved up a gentle slope, through the welcome shade of shrubs and almond trees.
            Its strap over one shoulder, her bag tapped her side as she walked.
            Ahead rose the imposing tall iron gates, each side adorned with a family crest incorporating the Virgin Mary. The wrought-iron decoration was too fancy for her taste, but she appreciated it as a work of art. To the left of the gate pillars was another driveway, presumably leading to a neighbouring villa.
            Assuring herself there was nobody about, she pulled out the small binoculars. They told her little.
            The Tabona villa was built on a rocky prominence, with the veranda facing the sea. The red-tiled roof was immaculate: obviously, no moss was allowed to take root there. Roses climbed the whitewashed walls. The three separate stories of the villa blended in with the limestone rock covered with shrubs.
            A rustling sound behind made her turn and lower the glasses and her heart suddenly started hammering.
            She took a sharp intake of breath.
            A man was silhouetted by the high Maltese sun, standing in the gap that the neighbouring drive presented. A large black Alsatian sat by his side. Its hackles were up and it growled, baring big sharp teeth.

Selmun tower

 

CHAPTER 7: The chill of the shadow

“Oh, you startled me,” Maria said, trying to make light of her reaction.
            “My apologies for creeping up on you.” The man possessed a gentle, calming voice. He stepped forward, though still concealed as if by preference by the shadows from the bougainvillea. Observing her discomposure, he whispered, “Stay, Prince,” and the dog obeyed, alert ears pricked. “I’m a neighbour of the Tabonas – Count Zondadari.” And he slipped his walking stick under his arm and offered a welcoming hand. The whites of his eyes shone out of the shade.
            “Good afternoon, sir.” His hand was large, powerful, yet his touch was gentle and cool. “I’m Maria Caruana, a reporter–”
            “Ah, yes, The Sting. Quite a newspaper! I’ve read you, often. I like your writing. You’re not afraid of the truth.”
            Nice of him to say so, even if he was merely being polite. She nodded and smiled an acknowledgment. “Thank you. But I try to remember what William Blake said–
            “A truth that’s told with bad intent beats all the lies you can invent. Isn’t that it?”
            She was impressed. “Yes. I won’t use truth to hit someone over the head with.”
            “Unlike some sanctimonious reporters I’ve met! Bravo, Maria!”
            She waved the binoculars about. “I don’t normally go snooping.”
            “Why not? You must get your story, no matter what.”
            “Are you making fun of me?”
            “On the contrary, I admire you.” His eyes glinted, humour in them.
            “I’m interested in the recent sad bereavement suffered by Mr. Tabona.”
            Count Zondadari pointedly eyed her binoculars.
            She flushed. “Normally, I’m not so blatant. But word has it he’s not at home. I just wanted to look the place over. Get a feel for it. A rich man’s retreat.” She shrugged. “I really want to find out why she would throw so much away.”
            Count Zondadari stepped forward, his black fedora casting his face in shadow. “Perhaps I could be of help. My villa is next door and overlooks a fair portion of his–”
            “Bad planning, wasn’t it?” He looked askance at her. “I mean, the lack of privacy–”
            “The Tabona land was sold by my family, so I suppose whoever built their place didn’t have much choice in the matter. Some of my relatives, I must admit, were somewhat nosy!”
            His apparent candour was refreshing. “Thank you. I would like to accept, but–” There was her planned restaurant meal with Manuel. He’d phoned to say he would be back from Sicily later today: the website weather forecasts said it was ideal for sailing. She could ring George on her cell-phone to explain where she was, but she had no hard news to give him, so he’d simply berate her for wasting his time.
            “And perhaps I can tell you more about my neighbours, no?”
            Maria was hooked. Neighbourly divulgences were often useful, if treated with circumspection, of course. “Yes, if I may.” She smiled and slipped her binoculars’ strap over her shoulder.
            The count stepped closer, a good twelve inches taller than her. Then, as they turned to proceed up the drive, he called, “Follow, Prince!”
            And the dog stood and strode purposefully behind them. Whenever Maria glanced back, the animal’s eyes were on her – neither menacing nor benign, simply watching.
            Light percolated through the tree-tops onto Count Zondadari’s face to reveal a vivid purple scar, the tissue still healing; it ran from temple to chin down the left side of his face. Involuntarily, Maria started.
            Even in these mottled shades he was quick to detect her reaction. “I’m sorry if I’ve startled you afresh, but I’m afraid I was a little careless with a stone-cutting saw whilst building my beach barbecue – I’ll show you my progress later, perhaps. It will be a short while before the wound heals properly.”
            “You must think me rude, to stare–”
            “No, not at all. It’s most natural.” A stray sunbeam glinted on the white of his teeth. “There’s nothing to it, I’m sure; once you’re used to seeing it–”
            “And will it scar?”
            “I fear it will.” She did not understand his aside to himself: “Just one of many over the years...” So she shrugged it off. Maybe he was a mite eccentric.
            As their feet scrunched up the sloping gravel drive, she viewed him anew in the shadow-less light.
            Count Zondadari was tall, with a patrician nose and high cheekbones. He had a high receding hairline that suggested intelligence and dark arched eyebrows. The laughter lines around his sensual mouth and flint-grey eyes softened his appearance. Those eyes shone, as if amused by life. Here was a man with supreme confidence, someone who lived life to the full. There was something other-worldly about him; oddly, she was reminded of Wilde’s Dorian Gray.
            The two-story villa was squat and long, the walls constructed from a variety of stonework. “This plot of land has been in my family since the 1560s.” He waved his walking stick in an arc. Prince watched obediently, alert. “We’ve tended to rebuild here and there, as the mood dictated, yet we have tried to preserve the features we like – hence the porch.” It was imposing, a pillared portico, with curving marble steps leading up to the heavy oak panelled door which sported large brass ornamentation and a fish-shaped door-knocker.

            “It’s beautiful,” Maria said and meant it. The stone walls, dun and drab, were haphazardly clothed in creepers, bougainvillea and begonia. The green of leaves was a striking contrast, and softened the privations of time. The Arabic designed stonework round the roof and windows seemed to blend with nature. The place appealed to her artistic eye. “The blossom will be absolutely gorgeous in a few weeks,” she added.
            “Yes.” He smiled down at her. “Some of the stonework is sixteenth century, so it seems to be rejuvenated every year when the flowers bloom. The place really comes alive then.”
            It could have been a trick of light, as they climbed the steps, but she thought his face had darkened momentarily, the shine inexplicably absent from his eyes at the mention of nature’s renewal. And the scar-tissue glowed red. But she could have imagined it – her imagination seemed to be on overtime these days.

(When I'm editing, I tend to ask for particulars, such as the name of a book the character is reading, or the type of car she is driving. Here, I settled for ‘car’ as its make was already established).

 

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Death-Another-Life-Robert-Morton/dp/1477654194/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1380527911&sr=8-1&keywords=death+is+another+life+Morton

 

http://www.amazon.com/Death-is-Another-Life-ebook/dp/B004U6EG6O/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1380528251&sr=1-1&keywords=death+is+another+life+Morton

 

Dear editor - size isn't everything

Our alien wannabe writer has another letter to the editor...

Torn from today’s newspapers – the scum of the earth (1)

There are several groups of individuals who deserve the epithet ‘the scum of the earth’, but today we’ll look at those termed ivory poachers. ‘Poacher’ seems too tame a word for these people. Slaughterers, murderers, maybe?

A few days ago it was reported that these scum have reached a new low, by poisoning with cyanide vital drinking and bathing pools, killing more than eighty elephants. (BBC, Daily Mail et al). This happened in Zimbabwe’s Hwange National Park in July. Police say the poachers mixed a cocktail of cyanide and salt and water and poured it on to a number of salt licks – exposed deposits of minerals that the elephants use to get essential nutrients. Police found the mutilated bodies of elephants strewn around; some of the smaller elephants still had tusks, their size doubtless not worth taking. Poachers may get about £50 for each large tusk. Since discovering the carcasses, the police and rangers have searched nearby villages and recovered about twenty tusks, cyanide and wire snares. Nine alleged poachers were arrested and a South African businessman has been accused of being behind the poisonings.

Zimbabwe’s environment minister says ‘We are declaring war on the poachers… because our wildlife, including the elephants they are killing, are part of the natural resources and wealth that we want to benefit the people of Zimbabwe.’ (Here is not the place to examine where all the country’s riches have gone, Zimbabwe once being the continent’s bread basket and now just a basket case...)

Needless to say, a wide range of other animal carcasses were found near the contaminated watering holes – buffalo, lions, vultures, antelopes and jackals. Doubtless these despicable people are responsible for killing many more, since birds and animals will have fed on the poisoned carcasses.

In January 2012 a hundred raiders on horseback charged out of Chad into Cameroon’s national park and, carrying AK47s and rocket-propelled grenades, slaughtered hundreds of elephants in one of the worst acts since a global ivory trade ban was adopted in 1989. Twenty-five thousand elephants were killed illegally in 2011.  Ten Asian countries with the most ivory seized: India, Singapore, Malaysia, Japan, Philippines, Vietnam, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Thailand and China. Seizure of tusks is too late, of course: the animals are dead. Action is needed at the sharp end. And, to be fair, it is robust, but the numbers of poachers are great. In the first half of 2012, for example, six park rangers died protecting Kenya’s elephants, while the rangers killed 23 poachers.

China accounts for 4o% of the world’s trade in elephant tusks.

Some official ivory carvers in China tender the lie that they only use tusks from elephants that died of natural causes, or those acquired before the ban.  Swindlers use tea or Coca-Cola to stain ivory to give it an antique appearance.

CITES – the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species – has its work cut out, not only with regard to elephants, but also the rhino and tigers, among other at risk species.

For our ivory wedding anniversary, I drew this picture. The ivory looks best decorating the elephant.

At least in fiction, some of the bad guys can get their comeuppance!

BLOOD OF THE DRAGON TREES

Amazon.co.uk - http://goo.gl/fsLk3X

Amazon.com - http://goo.gl/wHQpQp

Laura Reid likes her new job on Tenerife, teaching the Spanish twins Maria and Ricardo Chávez. She certainly doesn’t want to get involved with Andrew Kirby and his pal, Jalbala Emcheta, who work for CITES, tracking down illegal traders in endangered species. Yet she’s undeniably drawn to Andrew, which is complicated, as she’s also attracted to Felipe, the brother of her widower host, Don Alonso.

            Felipe’s girlfriend Lola is jealous and Laura is forced to take sides – risking her own life – as she and Andrew uncover the criminal network that not only deals in the products from endangered species, but also thrives on people trafficking. The pair are aided by two Spanish lawmen, Lieutenant Vargas of the Guardia Civil and Ruben Salazar, Inspector Jefe del Grupo de Homicidios de las Canarias.
            Very soon betrayal and mortal danger lurk in the shadows, along with the dark deeds of kidnapping and clandestine scuba diving…

Stanislav Petrov

Interesting! My Make a Date blog for 26 September mentions Stanislav Petrov: The man who may have saved the world. And it now appears in the BBC news, celebrating 30 years since the event:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-24280831

FFB - Catching the Light

Friday's Forgotten Book:

CATCHING THE LIGHT – The entwined history of light and mind

Arthur Zajonc

Professor Zajonc, a physicist, sets out on a journey of discovery, to answer What is Light? He does not simply employ physics but also poetry, philosophy and art. On the way, we encounter: the ancient Greeks, who apparently had no words for green and blue; India’s Bhagavad-Gita featuring a bard who sings to a blind and worldly royalty; the Arab Alhazen’s improvement on Euclid, supposing ‘the eye, once the site of a sun-like, divine fire, fast became a darkened chamber, awaiting an external force to lighten it.’; and Kepler, Copernicus, Descartes, Goethe, Milton , Twain, Galileo, and Einstein to name but a few. The duality of lights, as both a wave and a particle (as I recall from my Open University course) is echoed in Zajonc’s theme, the duality of the two sides of the brain interpreting the artistic and the mathematical views of light, and is explained clearly and insightfully, with Zajonc mustering some quite poetic prose in the process.

Illustrations are not complex and kept to a minimum; this is not a text-book, more a detective adventure story.

Arthur Zajonc

Kepler

 

The dangers of scientists reducing everything, including beauty, to cold passionless data was long-ago appreciated by many ‘natural philosophers’ such as Faraday and poets like Keats, and every effort was made to retain a sense of wonder at the new discoveries; even the late Richard Feynman said that his appreciation of the beauty of nature was enhanced, not diminished, by his knowledge of physics.

This, then, is a celebration of Light, and of our tentative, often frustrated, fumbling in the dark for that understanding. Light is as much a part of our mind-set as it is an external phenomena. For example, Zajonc cites a patient blind from the age of ten months receiving cornea transplants when he was fifty; when his sight was restored he could not see as his brain had not learned to see: the process of learning was slow and never fully completed.

 

Straddling the scientific and artistic cultures, Zajonc may end up satisfying neither; which would be a pity, as this is an enlightening book for the scientist and the poet, for the layman and the artist.

Published in 1995.

Make a Date - 3, 15 and 26 September

Again, linking dates through history, showing only the day in brackets to avoid repetition of the month. Another section from the book in progress. This time, the random dates are:

3, 15 and 26 September

At a time when the Royal Navy is shrinking, and when UK’s political masters would rather have Britain’s naval heritage as a dim memory, if at all, let’s begin this month’s article by looking back on some great seagoing events.

In 1580 Francis Drake completed his circumnavigation of the globe in his ship ‘The Golden Hind’ (26) and was knighted by Elizabeth I.

A mere forty years later (15) the ‘Mayflower’ departed from Plymouth to settle permanently its puritan passengers in New England to discover new food, drinks and people.

And a voyage of discovery of a different kind - two hundred and fifteen years later to the day, 1835 - laid the foundations of the Theory of Evolution, when HMS ‘Beagle’ brought Charles Darwin to the Galapagos Islands (15).

 

Ninety-nine years later, the steamship RMS ‘Queen Mary’ was launched (26) into the Clyde.

Scotland also witnessed a somewhat less illustrious nautical event in 1931: the infamous Invergordon Mutiny began (15) against the Royal Navy pay cuts and lasted two days. Although mutiny then carried the death penalty, the sailors’ strike was considered to be industrial action and while it was admitted that they had a good grievance - many liable to a 25% pay-cut, when they were poorly paid anyway - the ringleaders were jailed and some two hundred were dismissed from the Navy.

While the sea can be attractive and fickle, it can be treacherous and deadly too. No less deadly are rivers. The River Thames has been linked to our history for millennia and in 1878 over 640 passengers died when the crowded pleasure cruiser ‘Princess Alice’ collided with the ‘Bywell Castle’ (3).

Before moving on from boats and ships, mention should be made of Sir Malcolm Campbell. Lake Maggiore in Italy and Lake Hailwil in Switzerland respectively in September (2)1937 and (17)1938 saw him break the speed record on water in his boat ‘Bluebird’.

He was a true speed king and broke the land speed record (3) on the Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah, the first person to drive an automobile over 300mph (attaining 304.331mph).

This month we can also commemorate two men famously associated with the motor industry. Born (3) in 1875, Ferdinand Porsche was an automobile engineer whose name can still be seen on vehicles, just like another engineer and designer, Ettore Bugatti, who was born (15) in 1881.

Civil engineer Sir Donald Bailey designed the Bailey Bridge while working in the War Office and was later knighted for that; he was born (15) in 1901.

One of the world's greatest engineers was Isambard Kingdom Brunel, who died (15) in 1859.

Kingdoms wax and wane and even though he was king for ten years, being crowned (3) in Westminster in 1189, Richard I, the Lionheart, only spent about six months of his reign in England, because he considered it ‘cold and always raining’ and didn’t particularly like rusty chain-mail.

Charles II was made King of the Scots but his army of Scots and Royalists was decisively beaten (3) at Worcester in 1651.

Then there are those who depose kings. Oliver Cromwell, Lord Protector of England, changed the face of politics, royalty and Ireland and died (3) in 1658.

After his death his body was exhumed from Westminster Abbey and posthumously ‘executed’ on the anniversary of the beheading of Charles I. Cromwell’s head was placed on a pole outside Westminster then changed hands several times before finally being buried in a Cambridge college in 1960.

Near another county’s college is the spiritual centre of the Church of England, Canterbury Cathedral. My surname-sake, John Morton was Archbishop of Canterbury and a great builder. The central tower of Canterbury Cathedral, known both as the ‘Angel Steeple’ and as ‘Bell Harry’ was erected with Morton’s help and at his expense.

The Gateway Tower of Lambeth Palace, where he lived and where Sir Thomas More served him as page, bears Morton’s name and remains as a monument of his taste and generosity. He died (15) in 1500, the same day that Thomas Wolsey was made Archbishop of York (15) fourteen years later.

Wolsey, the pope’s representative, went on to become powerful, shaping England’s power at home and abroad for over ten years; he advocated the dissolution of the monasteries which Henry VIII completed. Then he fell into disfavour with Henry, when the king wanted to be rid of Catherine of Aragon, and was summoned to London for treason but died on the way. Wolsey fancied becoming pope but this was denied him because his arrogance and greed were too obvious to all. He’d never make a saint, unlike More who was beheaded by Henry VIII and canonized in 1935.

In 608 AD Saint Boniface IV became Pope (15). He was responsible for making the Pantheon - the temple to Mars, Jupiter and Venus, built by Agrippa and Hadrian - into a Christian church and thus preserving this remarkable building for posterity. He took great interest in the fledgling church in England and had dealings with the Irish monk Saint Columban.

Three hundred and thirteen years to the day later (15), Saint Ludmilla was murdered at the command of her daughter-in-law, Drahomira who secretly favoured paganism over Christianity.

Jealous of her mother-in-law’s influence over her young son and heir, Saint Wenceslaus (Father Christmas), Drahomira hired two not so noblemen to strangle Ludmilla with her veil.

Ludmilla’s remains finally ended up in the church of Saint George in Prague and she is one of the patrons of Bohemia and her feast is celebrated on 16 September.

A saint of stone rather than flesh is the San Lorenzo del Escorial Palace near Madrid, which was finished (15) in 1584.

An intriguing mixture of royal grandeur and monastic austerity, it’s the gilded resting place of twenty-six kings and queens of Spain. It was built to commemorate Spain’s victory over the French at San Quentin in 1557.

In 1687 a building of even greater antiquity - the Parthenon - was partially destroyed (26) after an explosion caused by the bombing from Venetian forces while besieging the Ottoman Turks situated in Athens.

Greek film actress Irene Papas, star of about eighty-three films, including ‘The Guns of Navarone’, ‘Zorba the Greek’, ‘Yerma’ and ‘Captain Corelli's Mandolin’, was born (3) in 1926.

 

Talking of Captain Corelli, another string musician was Frenchman Charles Munch, who was born (26) in 1891. He was the conductor of the Boston Symphony Orchestra for thirteen years. Born in 1898 on the same day (26) was George Gershwin, the composer of such classics as ‘Rhapsody in Blue’ and ‘Porgy and Bess’. Still on the same day (26) but in 1957, Leonard Bernstein’s ‘West Side Story’ opened in Broadway.

This is the same day (26) that the Third World War was averted in 1983. At the height of the Cold War, only weeks after Korean Airlines Flight 007 was shot down by Soviet aircraft, Early-warning Commander Stanislav Petrov was facing a crisis when his Soviet computer system told him that the US had launched five missiles at Russia.

Petrov had seconds to make a decision. He came to the conclusion that if the West was going to attack it would do so in massive numbers of missiles, not just five. He declared it was a false alarm - which it was, caused by the satellite interpreting sun shining off the tops of clouds as a missile launch. Having avoided all-out nuclear war, Petrov was neither punished nor rewarded but essentially his career was over and he retired to live in poverty outside Moscow. This was all kept secret until 1999.

The other moment when the world stood on the brink of nuclear holocaust was in 1962. The Soviet ship ‘Poltava’ headed towards Cuba (15), one of the events setting in train the Cuban Missile Crisis. Krushchev backed down. He actually was the first Soviet leader to visit the United States (15) - in 1959 when things were not so tense with America.

American novelist James Fennimore Cooper was born (15) in 1789, the same day as namesake actor and director Jackie Cooper (1922). Fennimore Cooper’s ‘Deerslayer’ series, including ‘The Last of the Mohicans’ were surprisingly popular, probably influenced by the life story of Daniel Boone, frontiersman, who died (26) in 1820. Cooper’s stories defined much of the bravery and pioneering spirit of the Old West.

A pioneer of a different kind was Sir Alexander Fleming who noticed in 1928 a bacteria-killing mold growing in his laboratory and thus discovered penicillin (15).

Besides medicine and new frontiers, there were pioneers in transport systems too. In 1830 the Liverpool to Manchester railway line was opened - though the event was marred by death. The Liverpool MP William Huskisson alighted from the train to chat to the Prime Minister, the Duke of Wellington, and misjudged the speed of the approaching locomotive The Rocket. He died shortly afterwards (15).

Another casualty, hit by a train on the same day (15) though in 1885, was P. T. Barnum’s Jumbo, the circus elephant, while crossing the railroad tracks. The train was derailed and it took 150 men to haul the body off the line. Twenty-four-year-old Jumbo was later stuffed and featured as an exhibit.

I think I’ve stuffed enough linked facts and dates for now.

 

Dear Editor - rejection

All writers have to get used to rejection. It's a rare writer who has never been rejected. You need to don a thick skin in the morning, especially before the mail arrives (snail or e).

You won't be surprised to learn that many subsequently famous authors received their fair share of 'thanks, but no thanks' notes. Here are a few:

Crash (1973 by J.G. Ballard - 'The author of this book is beyond psychiatric help.'

A Study in Scarlet (1887) by Arthur Conan Doyle, introducing Sherlock Holmes to the world - 'Neither long enough for a serial nor short enough for a single story.'

The Last of the Plainsmen (1908) by Zane Grey - 'I do not see anything in this to convince me you can write either narrative or fiction.'

The Blessing Way (1970) by Tony Hillerman - 'If you insist on rewriting this, get rid of all that Indian stuff.'

The Rainbow (1915) by D.H. Lawrence - 'It is unpublishable as it stands because of its flagrant love passages.'

Peyton Place (1955) by Grace Metalious - 'Definitely too racy for us.'

Animal Farm (1945) by George Orwell - 'It is impossible to sell animal stories in the U.S.A.'

Leaves of Grass (1855) by Walt Whitman - 'We deem it injudicious to commit ourselves.'

and two of my favourites:

The Time Machine (1895) by H.G. Wells - 'It is not interesting enough for the general reader and not thorough enough for the scientific reader.'

The War of the Worlds (1898) by H.G. Wells - 'An endless nightmare. I do not believe it would take... I think the verdict would be "Oh don't read this horrid book".'

However, if you do get rejected, I do recommend you don't respond with any invective or abuse, such as our alien wannabe scribe: