All reviews copyright 1984-2008 Evelyn C. Leeper.
THE BEST JAPANESE SCIENCE FICTION STORIES edited by John L. Apostolou and Martin H. Greenberg:
[From "This Week's Reading", MT VOID, 12/12/2003]
Though it was published in 1997, John L. Apostolou and Martin H. Greenberg's THE BEST JAPANESE SCIENCE FICTION STORIES doesn't include anything more recent than 1989. I suppose the time and effort required to translate works makes it more reasonable to choose older ones that have proved their worth--certainly the Seiun Awards for translated works are for older works as well. At 174 pages, this book is much shorter than many anthologies, but because the stories are all fairly short it does include thirteen stories. (No novelettes or novellas here!) I don't know if most Japanese stories are this short, or if these are atypical. Not surprisingly, the best stories in this volume are by what everyone seems to refer to as the "big three" of Japanese science fiction: Ryo Hanmura, Shinichi Hoshi, and Sakyo Komatsu. I loved Ryo Hanmura's "Cardboard Box", though I can't say why. And I would call it fantasy rather than science fiction. Shinichi Hoshi's "He--y, Come on Ou--t!" was science fiction but a bit predictable. However, it was somehow short enough that the predictability didn't bother me. Sakyo Komatsu's "The Savage Mouth" was so disturbing that I actually stopped reading it, so I have to say it was effective horror. His "Take Your Choice" was another story that seemed predictable, but again, this didn't bother me. Thinking about it, I think there is a difference in ... something. Not style, but perhaps purpose. The predictable stories don't have the purpose of giving you an amazing new idea, but they do let you consider the implications of what is happening while you are reading the story, rather than the "American" style of having the reader think about the implications only after the story is finished. It's almost as if you are re-reading the story, even the first time through. On the other hand, some of the other stories I found rather opaque, suggesting that there may be some major literary differences between English and Japanese science fiction. Still, a good anthology. One might wish for more like it, but I suspect that there aren't enough Japanese translators, or enough of a market for the translations to pay them very well. If Japan wins the Worldcon bid for 2007, it would be nice if they could do a similar book as a souvenir book. (And I wrote this review before I realized that this issue would end up as a Japanese-themed one.) [-ecl]
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All reviews copyright 1984-2008 Evelyn C. Leeper.
[From "This Week's Reading", MT VOID, 10/17/2008]
I recently read a selection of THE ARABIAN NIGHTS (a.k.a. "Kitab Alf Laylah wa Laylah", a.k.a. "Mille et une Nuits", a.k.a. "The Book of the Thousand Nights and One Night", a.k.a. "1001 Nights"), in this case the Barnes & Noble edition (ISBN-13 978-1-59308-281-9, ISBN-10 1-59308-281-9).
When talking about THE ARABIAN NIGHTS, one is almost obliged to talk about the various translations. The translation I read was by H. W. Dulcken (also spelled Dulken) (1863-1865) from Antoine Galland's French translation (1704-1712). As a sample passage, consider the beginning of "The History of the First Calender, the Son of a King":
"That you may know, madam, how I lost my right eye, and the reason why I have been obliged to take the habit of a calendar, I must begin by telling you, that I am the son of a King. My father had a brother, who, like himself, was a monarch, and this brother ruled over a neighbouring state. He had two children, a son and a daughter; the former of whom was about my age."
By comparison, Edward William Lane's translation (1840) calls it "The First Mendicant's Story of the Royal Lovers" and starts:
"Know, O my mistress, that the cause my my having shaved my beard and of the loss of my eye was this: -- My father was a King, and he had a bother who was also a King, and resided in another capital. It happened that my mother gave birth to me on the same day on which the son of my uncle was born; and years and days passed away until we attained to manhood."
And Sir Richard Francis Burton's translation (1879-1888) calls the story "The First Kalandar's Tale" and begins:
"Know, O my lady, that the cause of my beard being shorn and my eye being out-torn was as follows. My father was a King and he had a brother who was a King over another city; and it came to pass that I and my cousin, the son of my paternal uncle, were both born on one and the same day. And years and days rolled on; and as we grew up, ..."
Obviously, which one prefers stylistically is a matter of taste, but the consensus seems to be that Lane "toned down" some of the scenes, and Dulcken bowdlerized them even further, while Burton left it all in. On the other hand, Dulcken's translation stressed readability, which I think one might agree is not a strong point of the Burton translation. Even Jorge Luis Borges, in his lecture "The Thousand and One Nights", says that Burton writes "in a curious English partly derived from the fourteenth century, an English full of archaisms and neologisms, an English not devoid of beauty but which at times is difficult to read." (It should be noted that English, not Spanish, was actually Borges's first language.)
By the way, Borges confirms Burton's "raciness", saying that he loved THE ARABIAN NIGHTS when he was young, but, "La obra de Burton, llena de lo que entonces era considerado obsceno, me estaba prohibida y tenía que leerla a escondidas en la azotea. Pero en aquella época yo estaba tan entusiasmado con el mágico que no prestaba atención a las partes censurables." ["Burton's work, full of what was then considered obscene, was forbidden to me and I had to read it secretly on the roof. But at that time I was so enthusiatic about the the magic that I did not pay any attention to the censurable parts."]
Borges also says, "The Arabs say that no one can read THE THOUSAND AND ONE NIGHTS to the end." He adds, "Not for reasons of boredom: one feels the book is infinite," perhaps to head off anyone from responding, "That's because they are reading the Burton translation." Borges also provides an example of how one must be cautious of reading too much into a work from a translation. He describes the story of the fisherman and the genie as saying that the fisherman goes down to "a sea" and casts his nets. "Already," Borges says, "the expression 'a sea' is magical, placing us in a world of undefined geography. The fisherman doesn't go down to *the* sea, he goes down to *a* sea and casts his net." This may be true in some translations, but Dulcken says, when [the fisherman] had got to the sea-shore..." No indefinite article here (although no specific sea is named either). Lane says, "One day he went forth at the hour of noon to the shore of the sea..." Even Burton says, One day he went forth about noontide to the sea shore...."
Lane and Burton provided notes; indeed, Lane's notes are now considered the main "selling point" of his translation. My edition of Lane has 963 pages of text and 300 pages of notes--and the notes are in a smaller font than the main text--say 70% story, 30% notes. Burton's are not collected at the end of the book, but appear with each story, so the calculation is not as easy, but it appears that the division is about 80% story, 20% notes. Barnes & Noble provides no notes from Dulcken, and I don't know if he even published any.
However, the Barnes & Noble edition does include a lot of introductory material by Professor Muhsin al-Musawi, a renowned scholar of Arabic studies. He points out (among other things) that the tales of Aladdin and Ali Baba are not authentic to the "Kitab Alf Laylah wa Laylah", having appeared first in Galland's translation and apparently based on stories narrated to him by a Syrian, and not found in any written sources. But they are included, partly because they have traditionally been included, and partly because they are so enormously popular with readers (and filmmakers, I might add).
Now if someone would produce an edition combined the readability of the Dulcken translation with both Lane's and Burton's notes--I envision a sort of "Arabian Nights Talmud (*)"--that would be ideal.
(*) The Talmud (for those who don't know) consist of text and annotations from multiple sources, these annotations being arranged on the page around the text such that a given source is always in the same place. So, for example, one might put the text of THE ARABIAN NIGHTS in the center of three columns on a page, with Lane's annotations in the left column and Burton's on the right.
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PREDICTABLY IRRATIONAL: THE HIDDEN FORCES THAT SHAPE OUR DECISIONS by Dan Ariely:
[From "This Week's Reading", MT VOID, 01/16/2009]
PREDICTABLY IRRATIONAL: THE HIDDEN FORCES THAT SHAPE OUR DECISIONS by Dan Ariely (ISBN-13 978-0-06-153544-4, ISBN-10 0-06-153544-0) addresses questions such as "Why are we happier to do things when we are not paid for doing them?" and "Why are free things frequently more expensive than things we pay for?" I don't necessarily always agree with Ariely's conclusions, though. For example, Ariely claims that more people will choose a free $10 gift certificate than a $20 gift certificate that costs $7, but that the latter is a better deal because one gets $13 of profit rather than $10. Well, he uses amazon.com as an the vendor and they are probably reasonably priced, but consider a more extreme case: you have the choice between a free $100 gift certificate for Tiffany's or a $200 gift certificate for $70. Unless you are the sort who buys in Tiffany's, most of what they have will appear over-priced (and unnecessary). You may very well prefer something that requires no expense on your part than a "better" deal that puts you out of pocket for $70. Or, put another way, if you think everything at Tiffany's costs four times what you are willing to pay (i.e., what it is worth to you), a free $100 gift certificate gets you $25 worth of goods for nothing, while a $200 gift certificate that costs $70 gets you only $50 worth of goods for that $70--hardly a good deal.
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FLYING THROUGH HOLLYWOOD BY THE SEAT OF MY PANTS by Sam Arkoff:
Sam Arkoff's autobiography, FLYING THROUGH HOLLYWOOD BY THE SEAT OF MY PANTS is a much less polished autobiography than one usually finds. It is more informal chatting than thorough, and I have to say that it doesn't necessarily paint a completely favorable picture of the man who started American International Pictures. (Of course, this may be more that's it's not the usual self-aggrandizing autobiography we have become used to from celebrities.)
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THE BIBLE: A BIOGRAPHY by Karen Armstrong:
[From "This Week's Reading", MT VOID, 11/21/2008]
THE BIBLE: A BIOGRAPHY by Karen Armstrong (read by Josephine Bailey) (audio ISBN-13 978-1-400-10394-2, ISBN-10 1-400-10394-0; book ISBN-13 978-0-871-13969-6, ISBN-10 0-871-13969-3) seems to be more a condensation of Armstrong's book THE HISTORY OF GOD than a book about the Bible per se. For example, she spends a lot of time on the Talmud and the Mishna, which are not part of the Bible. (She justifies this, as far as I can tell, by talking about them as an oral rather than a written Bible, even though they are eventually written down.) There are also odd slips, such as when she contrasts second Isaiah with "the rest of the Pentateuch," even though second Isaiah is not part of the Pentateuch at all. I thought THE HISTORY OF GOD was excellent, but I have been disappointed in all her other books that I have read.
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"Walk in Silence" by Catherine Asaro:
[From "This Week's Reading", MT VOID, 06/25/2004]
I found "Walk in Silence" by Catherine Asaro a fairly standard human-alien love story, competent but nothing special.
THE MAMMOTH BOOK OF NEW JULES VERNE ADVENTURES edited by Mike Ashley:
[From "This Week's Reading", MT VOID, 06/24/2005]
THE MAMMOTH BOOK OF NEW JULES VERNE ADVENTURES edited by Mike Ashley (ISBN 0-7867-1495-6) is twenty-one new stories and two reprints based on the writings or life of Jules Verne. They are arranged chronologically by their connection to Verne's life, though Ashley does find reason to spread out the Captain Nemo stories rather than have them consecutive. (One serious flaw of the book is that there is no chronological bibliography of Verne's works. They are mentioned in the introductions, but there's no way to get the "big picture".) For each reader, the stories that will be most appealing or enjoyable will probably be those which are based on the works familiar to that reader. So for me, stories based on "Maitre Zacharius" or THE CASTLE OF THE CARPATHIANS are harder to appreciate than those centering on THE MYSTERIOUS ISLAND or JOURNEY TO THE CENTER OF THE EARTH. I probably should admit that while as a teen I read and re-read THE MYSTERIOUS ISLAND until it literally fell apart, my knowledge of most of the other works is more through the movies. (Even for those for which I read the books, I have seen the movies many more times.) As with most Ashley anthologies, there is a good assortment here: some straight sequels, some alternate histories, some works which include other authors' creations as well (to say which ones would be to spoil some of the stories), and some which are a bit of this and a bit of that. Recommended, but obviously more for people familiar with Verne's work.
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THE MAMMOTH BOOK OF EGYPTIAN WHODUNNITS edited by Mike Ashley:
[From "This Week's Reading", MT VOID, 12/10/2004]
THE MAMMOTH BOOK OF EGYPTIAN WHODUNNITS edited by Mike Ashley (ISBN 0-786-71065-9) is a collection of mysteries set in ancient (and not so ancient) Egypt. As in Ashley's other anthologies, the stories are all well-written, although these are a little harder to follow because of the alienness of the setting, and the occasionally unwieldy (to modern ears) names. Recommended for mystery fans with an interest in Egypt (obviously).
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ROYAL WHODUNNITS
edited by Mike Ashley:
THOU SHALT NOT KILL
edited by Cynthia Manson:
THE ANNOTATED INNOCENCE OF FATHER BROWN
by G. K. Chesterton with annotations by Martin Gardner:
[From "This Week's Reading", MT VOID, 10/24/2003]
I have been doing a lot of "popcorn" reading--short mystery stories that can fill in short periods. This included Mike Ashley's anthology ROYAL WHODUNNITS, as well as Cynthia Manson's anthology THOU SHALT NOT KILL, and THE ANNOTATED INNOCENCE OF FATHER BROWN by G. K. Chesterton with annotations by Martin Gardner.
The first is one of a series of mammoth mystery anthologies by Ashley; in fact, many are called "Mammoth" (e.g., THE MAMMOTH BOOK OF HISTORICAL DETECTIVES). He has also done science fiction and fantasy anthologies (e.g., THE MAMMOTH BOOK OF COMIC FANTASY) as well as other categories, and may be the British Martin H. Greenberg. Though the forward of this book, by Paul C. Doherty, talks only about English kings (and queens), the book also include Scottish, Bohemian, Italian, and Russian royalty as well in its twenty-five stories. (I find it interesting that Morgan Llywelyn, best known for her many books about Ireland, wrote instead about Anatasia of Russia.) I got started on Ashley's theme anthologies (for so they are, with all the stories written especially for this volume) with his two on Shakespearean mysteries. I have since branched out, and find them all pretty good for what they are--basically puzzle stories with an occasional literary piece thrown in. (I miss the sort of science fiction puzzle story one used to see fifty years ago or so.)
Cynthia Manson's THOU SHALT NOT KILL has only a dozen stories, centering on clerical sleuths.
And reading the Chesterton story in THOU SHALT NOT KILL led me to re-read THE ANNOTATED INNOCENCE OF FATHER BROWN. I know these have their (dare I say) devout followers, but I find them far less engaging than the Holmes canon, or even the better pastiches (such as Solar Pons). In part this is because they are a very different style, but also because they seem to have underlying flaws. Gardner points some of these out in his all-too-sparse annotations. He says he is attempting to do with his annotations what Baring-Gould did for Holmes, but he fails. Most of the annotations are to give explanations of British usages that are clear from context, and little to examine other details. He does, however, point out the major logic errors in some of the stories' plots. And I find Father Brown annoying in his speech. (I also don't agree with his theology, but I don't think that is why I have a problem with the stories--I think A CASE OF CONSCIENCE a fine book.)
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SHAKESPEAREAN WHODUNNITS edited by Mike Ashley (Carroll & Graf, ISBN 0-7867-0482-9, 1997, 422pp, trade paperback):
This anthology of twenty-five stories should appeal to most Shakespeare lovers. That means it will probably still have fewer sales than, say, Psychic Cat Detectives, but one can't have everything.
Let's start with what isn't covered. No one deduces who the "Dark Lady" of the sonnets was. And no one deduces who wrote Shakespeare's plays (other than that Shakespeare wrote them). The stories fall into two major and one minor categories. The minor category (two stories) includes mysteries set in the real world of Shakespeare and centering around the writing of the plays. The two major categories are stories which attempt to unravel a mystery within a play (e.g., how did Mamillius really die in "The Winter's Tale"?) and stories which follow the action of a play (e.g., what happened to the people left alive at the end of "King Lear"?).
To the purist, of course, the former is more satisfying. It takes only what Shakespeare has given us and derives its story from that. It is like the "deductive puzzle" mystery in that we have all the information necessary; while additional details are revealed in the story, the basic facts are already established.
The latter is a bit dicier. The author can add all sorts of characters and events to the existing story. But he or she must tread carefully to avoid having a completely unrelated mystery that just happens to have Marc Anthony as the detective who solves it. (I made this one up. No one does anything this blatant.)
Ashley organizes the stories as follows: those based on the histories, in event-chronological order, then the rest of the stories based on plays, in historical order based on the plays' settings (though I don't agree with his placement of "King Lear" or "A Midsummer Night's Dream"), and finally the stories based in Shakespeare's real world. The problem with this from a reading perspective is that there's a fair amount of heavy history all in a lump at the beginning. It also violates standard anthology placement: strongest first, second strongest last. At the beginning of each story, he briefly recounts the events of the play so that those of us who are a bit rusty on what exactly happened in "Coriolanus" (for example) are brought up to speed. (I suppose I should note that I have actually read all the plays as part of my reading plan a couple of years ago. That doesn't mean I remember them all perfectly.)
And the stories themselves? Well, I'll list them all, with the plays upon which they are based, but comment only to the extent that seems necessary.
King John: "When the Dead Rise Up" by John T. Aquino: Not an auspicious start for the anthology, in that the play is not one of the most familiar. To some extent it creates its own mystery.
Richard II: "The Death of Kings" by Margaret Frazer: This actually looks at what might be considered a real mystery in the play, which makes it one of the more interesting stories to me. (The fact that "Richard II" is one of my favorite plays might have something to do with this.) It also seems inspired by Agatha Christie, but I won't say more than that.
Henry IV: "A Villainous Company" by Susanna Gregory.
Henry V: "The Death of Falstaff" by Darrell Schweitzer: A well-written story, with a disappointing resolution.
Henry VI: "A Serious Matter" by Derek Wilson: A bit of an attempt to create a mystery where none existed before, with a somewhat predictable ending.
Richard III: "A Shadow That Dies" by Mary Reed & Eric Mayer: Well, it's not very hard to pick a mystery regarding Richard III. Reed and Mayer decided to take a psychological approach rather than a forensic one; I think I prefer Josephine Tey.
Coriolanus: "Mother of Rome" by Molly Brown: An interesting interpretation of Coriolanus's death. One of the better stories in the book.
Timon of Athens: "Buried Fortune" by Peter T. Garratt: Garratt borrows an idea from "Hamlet" as well in this mystery.
Julius Caesar: "Cinna the Poet" by Tom Holt: A straight mystery based on the rioting following Caesar's assassination. While there is nothing in it that requires it be connected with those events, it works well and feels right.
Cymbeline: "Imogen" by Paul Barnett: As with many stories, this one looks at the events in the play and asks whether Shakespeare was accurate. While that's a valid approach--and Barnett writes a very atmospheric story--the problem is that this approach occurs too often in this volume.
King Lear: "Serpent's Tooth" by Martin Edwards: Another look at "what really happened" in the play in question, this one taking place a generation later, which adds a completely new set of people to keep track of.
Macbeth: "Toil and Trouble" by Edward D. Hoch: It's not surprising that the best stories in the anthology are by the best-known authors. Hoch tells the story from the perspective of the three witches in a way that one might expect from a woman author. Or it is just that men rarely write female main characters? In any case, he does an excellent job.
Hamlet: "A Sea of Troubles" by Steve Lockley.
A Midsummer-Night's Dream: "A Midsummer Eclipse" by Stephen Baxter: Another story which really has nothing to do with the play it is linked to. Somehow it doesn't work as well as "Cinna the Poet"--maybe it's the inclusion of fantasy characters in what is basically a mundane mystery.
Much Ado About Nothing: "Much Ado About Something" by Susan B. Kelly: Adds more levels to the impersonations in the play, with another predictable ending.
The Winter's Tale: "Who Killed Mamillius?" by Amy Myers: This story is one of those that finds (or creates) a mystery in the original play. Whether it succeeds depends in large part on whether you find the claim of mystery convincing.
Twelfth Night: "This Is Illyria, Lady" by Kim Newman: Another one of the gems. It's short, and deals more with the general tone and setting of the play than any specific murder or robbery.
Romeo and Juliet: "Star-Crossed" by Patricia A. McKillip: As the introduction says, if Friar Lawrence arrived at the tomb after everyone was dead, how did he know what happened?
The Two Gentlemen of Verona: "The Banished Men" by Keith Taylor: Sets up a mystery during Valentine's time among the bandits.
The Taming of the Shrew: "The Shrewd Taming of Lord Thomas" by Mary Monica Pulver: Focuses on the framing story of Shakespeare's play. Or rather, the framing half-story, since after starting off with the conceit of having a sleeping beggar dressed as the lord of the manor and treated as such when he wakes up, no existing versions of the play have anything at the end to wrap up what happens.
Othello: "Not Wisely, But Too Well" by Louise Cooper: More about the motivation behind what happened in the play, but no additional mystery per se.
As You Like It: "Murder As You Like It" by F. Gwynplaine MacIntyre: Well, it certainly a different take on the impersonations going on, with a distinctly down-to-earth approach, and a lot of understated word play. Not for all tastes, I suspect.
The Merchant of Venice: "The House of Rimmon" by Cherith Baldry: Well, I never thought the ending of The Merchant of Venice a particularly happy one, and Baldry seems to agree, with a story that helps put the original in perspective.
"An Ensuing Evil" by Peter Tremayne: A mystery set in the world of Shakespeare's theater.
"The Collaborator" by Rosemary Aitkin": I can't tell if Aitkin is seriously proposing what the main character discovers in Shakespeare's plays, or parodying literary criticism, or what. As a result, this formed an unsatisfying end to the volume, though its content made it a logical conclusion.
So the best ones (in my opinion) are "The Death of Kings" by Margaret Frazer, "Mother of Rome" by Molly Brown, "Cinna the Poet" by Tom Holt, "Toil and Trouble" by Edward D. Hoch, and "This Is Illyria, Lady" by Kim Newman, and "The House of Rimmon" by Cherith Baldry. But even the others are interesting, even if only for their settings. If you've read this far, you're a Shakespeare fan, so I feel safe in strongly recommending this. As Ashley notes in his introduction, not all the plays are covered, so there's still material for a companion volume if this one is successful.
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