Cons and Cloud-castles

[sartorias]

The Clarke continues to be delightful, developing at a leisurely pace, but so sure in structure and tone with sharp hints of big stuff to come it doesn’t feel like a rudderless boat but like a big train gradually building speed and velocity

Comments

[kalimac]

When I've programmed Mythcons, I've used an iterative approach, letting panelists and topics suggest each other. Start with the GoHs: what would be good panel topics for them? Then: who else should be on those panels? And on from there.

[sartorias]

Yes indeed! I was just ruminating on panel topics, not on persons.

You know, I was also thinking: I wish we could get Alexei on-line. Or in charge of a big con programming. Whew, what an idea, eh?

[kalimac]

I was just ruminating on panel topics, not on persons.

Of course. I understood that. And I should have added that topic-generation of this kind is a better way to program big cons: I don't think my iterative method would work for a Worldcon. It's like hand-crafting for a small production run.

[sartorias]

This is true. At least, I've never been part of programming for a giant con, but what you say makes sense.

[sartorias]

Except for Gaudy Night and Murder Must Advertize (and I think Harlequin was the inspiration for Lymond) I tend to prefer her non-fiction to her fiction. This is not because I consider her a bad writer. Far from it. The problem is, the murder-mystery portions of the other stories frustrate me because I keep wanting to read about all the other aspects of the characters' lives when they aren't endlessly discussing clues, and investigating them.

[lnhammer]

Yes, but do you like her Dante?

(I keep her Comedy only for the prefaces - the best part of the translation is the 13 cantos done by Barbara Reynolds after Sayers's death.)

---L.

[sartorias]

I confess I have not read it all the way through. It didn't grab me when I commenced it, many years ago; I preferred the translation I'd read in grad school. I don't remember why now, except that Sayers seemed stiff to me. The one I read flowed far better, and I was not sorry to have to return the volume I'd borrowed.

Same with one of her plays that I read. (I haven't read everything.) One of these days I need to do a massive Sayers reread, including the issues of the Sayers Review, so brief but so very, very good. Now hoarded and never let out of the house.

[rysmiel]

Christopher Lee to read bedtime stories at the very end of each day, so one can sail off to untroubled sleep on the tide of images from "The Prize Giving at Market Snodsbury," say, or "Piper at the Gates of Dawn"

Oh. Dear me. What a superlatively appealing image. Though it's "Postcards from Imaginary Cities" and Saki that I would request in such a situation.

[sartorias]

Hey, at ImaginaryCon, Mr. Lee will take requests!