Mimosa Letters
{{  Before we begin with letters commenting on
Mimosa 9, we should tell you something about the other fannish
project we're working on. It's another 'Living Fanzine', sort of. We've decided to
do an audiotape version of Mimosa 9 that'll feature the four essays in
Mimosa 9 read by their corresponding authors, plus as many letters of
comment from that issue read by their writers as we can get. Please be informed,
however, that this audio fanzine, Mimosa 9.5, won't be finished for some
time yet; there are still (as we write this) several people we're trying to get
recordings from.
Meanwhile, we were gratified by the
sizeable number of letters (and trade fanzines) Mimosa 9 brought us. Even
though there were only four articles, the overall response was at least as high as for
other, more diverse issues. Our opening comments about our Worldcon vacation, "Across
Europe on Rail and Plastic," drew comment from just about everybody who wrote us.
First up are a selection of comments about it. }}
- - - - - - - - - -
Steve Swartz, Arlington, Virginia
I enjoyed the story of your travels in
Europe. I've been twice. Your stories about food and restaurants certainly brought
back memories. Since I'd studied German throughout high school and college, I made a
point of speaking German in restaurants. This amused my friends -- after a few
egregious misses early on [I remember getting two (zwei) bowls of chicken broth when
I'd tried to order Zweibelsuppe (onion soup)] they started keeping track of the number
of times I could actually use my German to control what would end up on my plate.
They would make me write down what I thought I was getting after I had ordered, and
compare my description with what actually appeared. I believe I won the contest
(eight meals to six, I think), but only because none of them could tell one schnitzel
from another. Schade.
- - - - - - - - - -
Els Somers, Den Haag (The Hague), Netherlands
I have read your experiences in Holland
before the Worldcon. It is always funny to hear what people noticed in another
country, but it was pleasant for me to read what you two noticed in Holland. I
myself, for example, had never noticed that many cafes and other places had cats
around. Now I noticed and I have seen some of them!
The days of the Worldcon amused me very
much. I never expected that it would be so nice. For sure, I am going to another con
in the future. Two days at the convention I was dressed in a fantasy costume. People
came to me and asked me how I liked Holland before they realized that I was a Dutch
girl. This happened a few times, and I asked myself why. Why should only foreigners
dress themselves up in costumes? Later on, I found an explanation. I myself come
from the south of Holland. There it is more normal to wear special clothes for the
Dutch carnival. In the north, it is not so normal to do so.
I have a general question. I read
Mimosa 9 and it seemed that there are not enough young fans. I myself am
26 years old. When I was 14 or 15 years old, I was also a sf fan, also in Dutch
fandom. It appears that I am one of the youngest. Is this happening in each
country?
{{ It's possible, and even likely. Back in the 1950s,
teenage fans were commonplace. In fact, some of the best fanzines were published by
teenagers -- Joel Nydahl's Vega, Lee Hoffman's Quandry, and Gregg
Calkins' Oopsla! are examples that come immediately to mind. Nowadays, we are
not only unfamiliar with any teenage fan publications, we don't even know any teenage
fans (except for children of other fans). So, has fandom changed, or have
we? }}
- - - - - - - - - -
Ben Indick, Teaneck, New Jersey
I envy your visiting Prague, which I
would like to see before the Russians re-take it. I would visit the ancient Jewish
cemetery and see the grave of Rabbi Lowe, fabled creator of the Golem, inspirator of
Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley and a horde of her poor doctor's children. And I would
try to find the spirit of an unassuming little law clerk whose writings caught and
influenced the thinking of the world -- he understood what was and is happening.
{{ Actually, we did visit that cemetery, which is
located right in the heart of old Prague. We didn't know about and therefore look for
the grave of Rabbi Lowe, but we did visit the Jewish Museum located next to it; in it,
beckoning to onlookers decades later, were preserved drawings and writings of children
and their teachers who did not survive the holocaust of Auschwitz. And while, unlike
Rabbi Lowe, these are not likely to influence the thinking of the world, it was still
only too easy to get caught up in the spirit of those people, which is still strong
almost a half-century later. }}
Eva Hauser, Prague, Czechoslovakia
Thank you very much for
Mimosa 9, which is interesting and amusing. I especially liked its
beautiful illustrations. Of course, I feel a need to comment on what you said about
Czechoslovakia and Czech fans.
I also went to the Confiction by a bus
chartered by fans; but it wasn't such an awful trip as it seems possible to you! Most
of the fans slept in tents, which is a very common way how Czechs spend their
holidays. It's quite easy to go to Bulgaria, Romania, or Yugoslavia by car and to
stay there, camping on a shore. It's advantageous because camping is cheap and you
can take your food with you. In Den Haag, I didn't stay in a tent because our editing
house paid for a hotel room, but I wouldn't have minded it so much. And I also took
some canned food, crackers, biscuits, and so on, so that I didn't have to spend so
much money on food. But it was all rather fun, and I didn't mind it. It was like
going to the high mountains where there are no shops and no restaurants.
I must protest against this statement:
"It seems clear now that currency rates were probably a much stronger shackle to keep
Czechs confined to their homeland during the Cold War than any fence or iron curtain
ever could." This is completely wrong!!! We are not richer now than we were a few
years ago. But traveling was actually banned, or extremely suppressed by the
regulations of Communists.
I can explain to you the whole
mechanism, which reminds me of novels by Franz Kafka.
Nobody could travel if he didn't have
hard currency. But if you happened to acquire some hard currency as a gift, in
unofficial exchange, or in money earned abroad, you were obliged to exchange this
currency at the bank for Czech crowns or special 'tokens for imported goods' and you
could spend these tokens in special shops with western goods. You were not allowed to
own any hard currency.
In case you wanted to travel to some
country of þevil capitalistsþ you were obliged to ask the bank for a special exchange
of money for traveling. Let us call it 'hard currency contingent'. In theory, you
had the right to get hard currency contingent every three years, but in practice, the
largest part of these applications was rejected. I was successful only once in my
life and I went with my parents on a three-week trip to Italy -- but that time my
father went to the director of the bank and explained to him that we never got hard
currency contingent and that my parents deserved a lot for the development of society
by their scientific work, etc. After rejection, you couldn't do anything -- just wait
one year and try it again. But some people got the hard currency contingent not only
once every three years but every year, as they had a friend or a relative in the bank,
or managed somehow to bribe the clerk who decided about these contingents.
If you were lucky enough to get the
contingent, you got 100 dollars in exchange for your two months salary, and you had
to continue dealing with bureaucrats: to get permission of the Police, one day waiting
in line for a visa. And then to get train or air tickets, or car insurance, and (if
you were a man) permission of the Military office, several more days spent in lines
and a lot of encounters with arrogant clerks everywhere. When you finally managed to
get everything, you felt completely exhausted and promised yourself that you will not
travel any more in your life!
And that was exactly what the
Communists intended.
Ha, ha! "Chci voda mineralna,
prosím;" the proper form is "Chci minerální vodu, prosím."
The first phrase sounds rather like a Polish one. It's interesting that people of
most nations are pleased if you try to learn some phrases in their language, but
Czechs usually don't acknowledge it -- I don't know exactly why it is so. Perhaps
they don't have enough respect and love for their own native tongue.
Irwin Hirsh, East Prahran, Victoria, Australia
I always enjoy Mimosa and
appreciate the efforts you take into its presentation, particularly in getting so many
of the articles illustrated. I tend to think of drawings illustrating an article as
being fanzine art at its highest form. In part this is because artists tell me it is
harder to draw illustrations for an article than to draw a similar number of drawings
straight from their own mind. It is also because in having to choose the artist to
illustrate a particular article, the faneds skill gets involved in the process. One
thing I haven't noticed before (but I'm sure it happens) is the practice of getting a
number of artists to each provide an illustration to an article. I'm particularly
impressed with the effort you put into this aspect of your fanzine.
{{ Thanks. We deliberately set out to have as many
artists as possible provide illustrations for our "Across Europe..." article, since
the article itself was a collage of the most memorable events of our European Worldcon
vacation. Usually, though, it's easier to let one artist do the illos for an article.
That way, we don't have to wait until the last minute after all the artwork is in to
work on layouts. }}
I enjoyed the comments on your trip to
Europe. It is always interesting to see someone's views on meeting new lands, and
yours was particularly interesting because you talk about some of the things which
struck Wendy and I when we were on my GUFF trip -- the Eurorail system, communicating
with people whose language is not English, the art museums, etc. Your restaurant
experience in Utrecht sounds similar to a lunch we had in Albi (south-west France)
where the waiter's limited English didn't allow him to tell us what was on the lunch
menu. He enlisted the help of the couple sitting at the next table in telling us
about the main courses. When it came time for sweets, we were the only people in the
restaurant and he was having a frustrating time trying to use hand-movements and
slowed-down French to describe the sweets. Then he hit upon the idea of going back to
the kitchen and bringing out one of each sweet, enabling Wendy and I to make our
selections with the time-honoured pointing of the index finger.
It was traveling around Continental
Europe which made me realise the extent to which I've missed out by having grown up
in a land where one language predominates. In Europe the distances, particularly in
the modern era, between the different languages are quite small, and it is easy to see
why so many Europeans are pretty fluent in a language other than their native tongue.
For part of our time, we stayed with fans and I often mentioned to them that I felt it
was a pity that I knew only one language. In saying that, I always made the point
that I didn't necessarily mean knowing their language, just knowing a language other
than English. Their response was that if I had to know only one language, English was
the one to know. That seems reasonable, but only if you ignore that English just
happens to be my language. If my language was, say, Japanese, I'd still be putting it
upon them to make the effort in trying to communicate. By not knowing another
language, I'm not even allowing for the possibility of finding some middle ground
where we can be equally handicapped in our mode of communications.
I'm not sure why, when you said a lack
of car parking spaces is why Amsterdam is a city of bicycles, you added the remark
"worst of all." I would hate to think that you feel it is a pity that there aren't
more car parking spaces in the city. I think that if a city provides an effective
public transport system it doesn't have to meet the needs of those who wish to use the
car within the city. Amsterdam fits the bill nicely, being well served by its transit
system. It struck Wendy and I that the single item which separated the larger cities
of Europe from Melbourne was that their public transport systems are easy to use, are
reliable and meet the everyday needs of their citizens, while Melbourne's system is
unreliable and inconvenient to use for so much of its population. I'm pretty sure
that it is this mass-transit orientation in Europe which encourages people to make
good use of their streets, adding an attractive character to the cities.
{{ Well, maybe we should have said 'most of all'.
We'd hate to think of what Amsterdam would be like if those thousands of bicycle
riders had been driving cars instead. The city of Amsterdam (and Europe in general,
for that matter) predates motorized transportation by centuries, and streets are so
narrow in many parts of the city that two-way traffic is physically impossible.
Luckily, the network of trams, metro, and buses is so good there, you don't have to
have a car to get around. }}
Teddy Harvia, Euless, Texas
What is it with all the cartoon cats
on the cover of Mimosa? Do y'all think you're still publishing Chat or
what?
I loved Jeanne Gomoll's menu illustration for
your Europe trip article. I don't know what is more amusing -- the thought of a
waitress posing as an artist or an artist posing as a waitress.
- - - - - - - - - -
Ken Cheslin, Stourbridge, West Midland, United Kingdom
I deduce by your remark "Europe's fine
railway system" that you didn't visit the U.K., or if you did, the U.S. railway system
must be indescribable. Our railways are falling to bits due to underinvestment; that
includes rails, bridges, rolling stock, the lot. I believe the B.R. spends more money
on adverts telling us how good they are than on actual hardware.
{{ You deduce correctly -- we only had enough time in
our two week vacation to visit parts of Continental Europe. The "fine railway system"
remark was a compliment on the relative ease of going from one place to another by
train, as well as the quality of the facilities (which for the most part were pretty
good). }}
Dave Luckett's article {{ "Prose Is the Wine; Poetry the Whiner" }} was
great, its mixture of prose and poetry an inspiration. (I still remember, though
mercifully dimly, the piles of smelly nappies. Once, when we were driving in the
country, there came this awful smell. "Matthew!" we exclaimed, but the (then) little
soul was innocent that time for as we came round a bend we whizzed by a farm and about
200 pigs. It became a family joke, "it's either Matthew or 200 pigs." Oh, well, it
sounded funny to me.)
{{ We liked Dave's article, too, but some of our
readers seemed less than impressed. Among them was Harry Andruschak, who
requested to be informed with a *Baby Alert* should we try something like this again.
You just can't please everyone... }}
David Bratman, San Jose, California
I enjoyed your trip report very much. Why
else should fans spend time and money on traveling to far-off places like Europe (or
America, for that matter), if not to accumulate interesting stories to tell when they
get home? Particular kudos to the Messrs. Williams for contributing cartoons even
more amusing than the stories they illuminate.
Dave Luckett's light verse is brilliantly
funny, fit to stand with the masters of the form. I almost caught myself thinking
that it's a shame someone who can write like that has to spend time caring for
infants, but then I realized that he has to; otherwise what would he use for
inspiration? So keep changing those dirty nappies, Dave!
- - - - - - - - - -
Craig Hilton, Collie, Western Australia, Australia
Thank you for Mimosa 9. I
loved Bob Shaw's dreadfully funny piece, but top of the tops of my list was Dave
Luckett's bunch of poems. Dave once proved his ability to make even the most base
subjects poetic by writing a page of verse to serve as instructions on how to deal
with the outside toilet when it tended to block up in wet weather. He finished it off
in exquisite calligraphy and nailed it to the door, where it performed its utilitarian
function until the first rain shower soaked and ruined it. Such is the transience of
art.
- - - - - - - - - -
J.R. Madden, Baton Rouge, Louisiana
Your article "Across Europe on Rail and
Plastic" was interesting and made me feel good about our visit to the Netherlands for
the Worldcon. We stayed entirely within the borders of that country spending time in
Amsterdam, Maastricht, and The Hague/Scheveningen. We met lots of nice folks while
there: one was our cab driver in Amsterdam, who turned off the meter when he couldn't
get to our hotel by his usual route due to road construction and had to wend his way
through streets not usually on his route. Did you have trouble, as I did while in
Amsterdam, trying to imagine Gestapo vehicles rolling through those streets? Or,
German panzers guarding intersections? Or, military convoys moving through those oh
so peaceful streets? Hard to imagine it ever happened.
Dave Luckett should be warned: He has
to deal only with primarily physical attributes of his offspring at this time. Just
wait for the intellectual assault which will come when said offspring has acquired
sufficient language skills to append a question mark to the end of a string of words!
When watching a movie: "Did he really die?, Why did she do that?, What is he doing to
her?" While riding in a car: "How do you know where you're going?, What does that
sign (which one out of twenty?) say?, Why do you have to put gas in the car?"
Many thanks for the publication of Bob
Shaw's latest Serious Scientific Speech {{ "Corn is
the Lowest Form of Wheat" }}. I enjoyed it at Confiction and appreciate
having a permanent record as well. Did you note that Bob's speech was better attended
than any of the three Professional Guest of Honor speeches? I am not sure if that's
good or bad, to be honest.
Mike Glicksohn, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
I'm so busy nowadays that I can no
longer afford the luxury of reading fanzines before I loc them, so
Mimosa 9 will be enjoyed and commented on almost simultaneously. I know
we warn against this in Advanced Letterhacking For the Serious Professional but
sometimes expediency rules, okay? I just thought I'd warn you in case I put my foot
in my mouth and don't get to take it out for several paragraphs.
Interesting trip report (although
might have liked just a little about the worldcon itself) which made me envious
I didn't get to go this year. I agree with your choice of the train as an excellent
way of both getting to places and seeing the country while you do so. It lacks the
freedom of having one's own vehicle but may well be cheaper, especially with a good
pass.
{{ If we'd written more about the Worldcon, it
probably would have degenerated into a series of "then we met so-and-sos," not the
kind of thing that makes for a snappy, amusing fanzine article. Besides, the article
wasn't about the Worldcon at all -- it was about the Voyage of Discovery we had
getting there and back. }}
On one of my trips to England some years ago I
managed to circumvent the Shaw Exclusion Principle, albeit unwittingly. I discovered
I'd be seeing Bob later in my travels, so while visiting a London one-day comic mart,
I bought two paperback Shaw novels so I'd have something to get autographs on.
Apparently Bob wanted to spare me the agony of the S.E.P., because when I actually
looked at the books they were already autographed, thereby saving me the trouble of
carrying them around constantly until I ran into him. I wonder to this day how he
managed that but I thought it a noble and unselfish gesture.
The only thing I can possibly say about Bob's
Serious Scientific Talk is that I'm glad I got to read it and I'm sorry I didn't get
to hear it presented. Well, maybe the only two things I can say are those and that
I'm delighted you published it. Whoops. Anyway, it was funny and the illustrations
were a delight, and you're very lucky faneds indeed to have published it. Just as I'm
a lucky fan to have read it. Whether Bob's a lucky pro to have written it I leave to
your imagination.
I don't think, in answer to Pam Boal's
musing in the loccol, that younger fandom lacks a sense of fun. What it lacks is a
sense of communicating through the written word which results in only a few younger
fans becoming interested in fanzines. Those that do, though, such as the self-same
Harry Bond who graces Mimosa's loccol, can write the same sort of material as
the Skels of fandom, although perhaps not yet quite as well. But then, I can't write
as well as Skel and I've been trying for longer than Harry has been alive.
What made many classic fanzines classic
was actually quite simple: superior creative talent in those producing them, coupled
with a high level of interaction among a group of such talents, creating a
whole-greater-than-the-sum-of-its-parts effect. Talent still exists in fandom, but
that special sense of interactive community has either disappeared or weakened, which
may be why there are still good fanzines around but few (if any, depending on who is
talking) great ones.
- - - - - - - - - -
Walt Willis, Donaghadee, Northern Ireland, United
Kingdom
My favourite piece in
Mimosa 9 was your European trip report. I admired your bravery and
enterprise, and thought the piece was well written. It made me nostalgic for a place
I have never been, but which has all sorts of memories for me. The most poignant is
of hunching beside my homebuilt radio listening in anguish to Radio Praha at the time
of the Nazi takeover which led to WW2. While the country was dying, there were long
periods of silence on the radio filled only with the interval signal, which was a
phrase from Dvorak's New World symphony on a solo oboe. It was indescribably sad and
lonely, and I have remembered it all my life. In 1952, en route from Chicon II
to Los Angeles, I played it on a deserted piano in a forest in Utah. Another memory
is of listening to that New World symphony one cold day in the London Epicentre, while
Vince Clarke and Ken Bulmer were reading New Worlds, and noticing with an eerie
feeling that it was a New World cooker we were all huddled around. And now here you
from the New World with news of Prague today, bringing all those memories with you.
There's timebinding for you.
Of course, with Karel Capek and all,
there is something subtly fannish about Czechoslovakia. Recently I remember a
newspaper correspondent mentioning a conversation he had with a waiter just after the
1989 revolution. Emboldened by the celebrations, he asked if he could possibly have
some seasoning with his steak. "This month freedom," said the waiter. "Next month,
horseradish."
Dave Kyle and Bob Shaw were marvelous
in their different ways. I admire how Bob was able to make fun of Whitley Streiber so
effectively without saying anything remotely actionable. In the letters section, I
was pleasantly surprised by the cartoon in place of my letter, and curiously impressed
by Gorecki's letter about rediscovering Jack Darrow. I don't quite know why, because
I barely even remember the name of Jack Darrow: it's something like seeing a lost
piece being inserted in an enormous jigsaw puzzle.
Roger Waddington, Norton, Malton, North Yorkshire, United
Kingdom
I enjoyed your trip report, not the
least for the hint it gave, that placing the Worldcon outside America occasionally
achieves its purpose, encouraging homebound Americans to experience other countries,
other cultures (and the rest of us stay-at-homes, of course); in fact, you grasped the
opportunity with both hands, didn't you? Can't help commenting on the restaurant cats
holding their own in the face of more modern methods of pest control (no, not the one
about the original ball-bearing mousetrap); they surely are the real environmentalists,
the truly green. Mind you, I'd think twice about eating in a restaurant where their
mouser was forced to beg for scraps; either it's been so efficient that there aren't
any mice left, or they're there in such numbers that they've forced it out of the
kitchen. One restaurant to avoid?
{{ We think the cat was probably just interested in
making two visitors feel at home. Cats like to snack as much as people and we were
probably eating its favorite meal. That cat did not look
underfed! }}
And I have to admit to enjoying hugely
the latest Bob Shaw lecture. Well, on my own discovery of SF, that Sense of Wonder
came just as much from considering the true professionals who were also prepared to
give their time and effort to contributing to the amateur fanzines, remembering
especially long-ago issues of Niekas with Jack Gaughan and Dan Atkins. Now,
having become more blase, and not being a writer myself, I see time spent away from
the desk as being one novel less; so it's with a certain guilt that the other half of
me has to confess as to how much he's enjoyed it. Though for his method of helping
the totally lost motorist, I can offer a remarkably simple and similar device of
finding out the time when your clock has stopped, especially at night. No, not by
switching on the radio; all you do is keep a trumpet by your bed, and if your clock
has stopped, just open the window and start playing the trumpet. It never fails;
you'll be sure to hear someone shouting, "Who's that idiot (or words to that effect)
playing a trumpet at three o'clock in the morning?"
I suspect that the legend of
Hyphen and Le Zombie and all the other zines, good as though they might
have been, owes as much to nostalgia and the rose-coloured spectacles that we all
wear. In fact, the enlightenment on one of them in this issue, The WSFA
Journal, shows the true story; and who's to say that the story behind those wasn't
remarkably similar? I'm inclined to think that the only thing that can turn a
fanzine into a legend is time, and word of mouth; so, going by those criteria, who's
to say that Mimosa wouldn't have as good a chance as any other? But there's
surely no way you can sit down and consciously create a legendary fanzine, one that
will live forever. Likewise, you can never re-create a fanzine fandom, in the face
of the relentless tread of history; or evolution. If fanzine fandom really has had
its day, its moment on the stage, there's nothing anyone can do to halt its night.
- - - - - - - - - -
Pamela Boal, Charlton Heights, Wantage, Oxon, United
Kingdom
Nein, Von Felines, haf you no mercy,
sending out these flowers that plunge the readers into a welter of nostalgia? This
zine is definitely in a time warp; it is in the style of the zines I used to receive
20+ years ago. Those were the wonderful days when even the crudzines I received
seemed to have merit because it was all so new to me.
As if the style and content were not
enough, in the transcript of the talk you published this ish, Bob Shaw mentioned my
all-time favourite of his Convention Inventions, the Uri N 8. I only have
to close my eyes to see and hear his deadpan delivery and people almost literally
rolling in the aisles.
Lloyd Penney, Brampton, Ontario, Canada
Blessing on BoSh for mentioning
Stephen Leacock. Leacock lived most of his life in a massive mansion on the shores of
Lake Couchiching, not far from Orillia, Ontario, where I grew up. Leacock was famous
not only for his writing and economic theories, but also for his temper and his
legendary drinking. Even though scholars and family deny it, Leacock was renowned for
having the finest wine cellar in the province in his basement, and one of the most
complete bars on the main floor in the billiards room. Like many fans, Leacock had a
cast-iron liver.
- - - - - - - - - -
Harry Warner, Jr., Hagerstown, Maryland
Bob Shaw is as funny as ever. I just
don't understand how one individual like him can create unaided a line of patter that
is consistently funnier that the monologues by big names like Bob Hope and Johnny
Carson which are pasted together from the contributions or several professional
jokesters. Come to think of it, maybe I'm laboring under a false assumption. Could
it be that Walt Willis, John Berry, and Eric Bentcliffe were inactive in fandom all
those years because Bob was paying them to think up bright remarks for his convention
speeches?
Dave Kyle must have an amazing memory.
Lots of information is included in his latest article {{ "Dave Kyle Says You Can't..." }} that didn't see print when the
events happened and, to the best of my knowledge, hasn't been put down more recently
in reminiscences of other fans. I was particularly happy to see his reference to the
comparatively small place alcoholic beverages played in fanac during the first ten or
twelve years after Repeal. This bears out my contention that the drinking problem has
been growing steadily as the years have passed since the 1930s, instead of having been
just as bad during and immediately after Prohibition as it is today.
Now I wonder if Dave has to courage to
tackle another retrospective into fandom past, in this case the WSFS, Inc., dispute
that practically tore fandom apart for several years, back in the 1950s. I don't
think many of today's younger fans have even heard about it, although it was
infinitely more serious than the feud that split New York City's fandom in the 1930s.
Maybe the topic is still too sensitive and bitter to be exhumed at this time, but I
think a light touch would permit it to be retold without starting up any new slander
or libel suits.
Dave Gorecki really should have written
an article about his visit to Jack Darrow. I had no idea Jack was still alive, since
I believe he was older than most fans back in the late 1920s and early 1930s when he
bobbed up in almost every prozine issues's letter section. Maybe Jack could be
recruited to give a talk or preside at a panel at some large convention in Chicago,
where he could see and be seen by some of the fans who were with him at that first
Worldcon. I suppose Jack could qualify as the pioneer figure in the trend away from
fanzine fandom, since he never did much in the fanzine world while he was a pro
letterhack. Today's congoers and screen watchers who never look at a fanzine don't
know what they owe him.
Mark L. Blackman, Brooklyn, New York
It's always a pleasure to read fannish
reminiscences from Dave Kyle. I did my own bit toward clearing his name at this past
Lunacon when, writing about the Fanzine Lounge in the Program Book, I noted, "Dave
Kyle says you CAN sit here."
And likewise to read (though more so to
hear) one of Bob Shaw's "Serious Scientific Talks." After all, Bob made science
stupid long before Tom Weller. (Some of us were mildly frightened when Science
Made Stupid won a Hugo for NON-fiction Book.) Given the expense of
Trans-Atlantic travel or travel to Australia, some of Von Donegan's ideas might be
worth a second look (that is, a look for one second).
- - - - - - - - - -
Michael Sherck, Granger, Indiana
Dave Kyle sez I have to write, eh?
Does he say what I have to write about? I don't suppose he's gifted me with a
subject, not to mention witty prose...
Kyle's fannish history essay was
interesting, as I find all such. I think it singularly appropriate that such history
is printed in your zine on what some of us might term biodegradable pulp paper: one
wonders whether the memory will outlive the rememberer...
But what I really like about
Mimosa is the cartoons and the letters from other readers. In
Mimosa #7 my favorite cartoon was the one mixing Star Trek with
Star Wars. (I'm the stormtrooper on the left.) In #8 my favorite was Alexis
Gilliland's on page 33: as a smoker who is determined to hang on to his vice
(since I have so few and I simply refuse to go through life without at least some bad
habits) I've experienced that more than once. Like the time the woman wanted me to
leave the house because I was smoking. Dammit, it was my house!
- - - - - - - - - -
Richard Brandt, El Paso, Texas
Thanks for Mimosa 9.
(Geez, it's like leafing through that stack of Fanacs again...) Nice covers
from Joe Mayhew, who impresses me more and more after making a modest first
impression. Especially neat to have Dave Kyle explain the origins of his famous
edict. I was surprised, when I was in charge of the Press Room for Noreascon Three,
to receive a volunteer form from none other than Dave Kyle -- yes, that Dave Kyle.
It's a peculiar sensation, I can tell you, to realize that you have the opportunity to
boss Dave Kyle around. Now that's egoboo.
Craig Hilton's letter reminds me of a
veteran English nurse who came to the States to help fill a nursing shortage. Asked
to name the single biggest difference between hospitals here and in England, she
promptly replied, "Gunshot wounds." Until she came Stateside, she'd never seen
one.
Of course, I once attended a lecture
and slide show by a British Army surgeon who'd been stationed in Northern Ireland,
and learned a great deal about entry and exit wounds, as well as the results of
sitting in a car with a bomb going off underneath it. "Not a lot we could do for this
one," as he cheerfully described it.
Great loc from Joseph Nicholas
(recapping many points made in his fanzine Flagrantly Titillating Title or
whatever). It will be interesting to see how the history books view the ongoing
upheaval in Eastern Europe: as a response to the shining egalitarian example of the
States (as Bush would clearly prefer to think it), or as a response to the
reformist example of noble Mikhail Gorbachev (the Martin Luther of the USSR) -- or as
a temporary aberration, should the feared hardline backlash materialize in Moscow.
(As some have remarked in re the prospect of the Soviet Union disintegrating, you
don't really want anarchy among a band of states sharing one of the world's largest
arsenals of nuclear warheads.)
Janice Murray, Seattle, Washington
Richard Brandt's comment "Of course,
at the same time we bemoan the scarcity of new blood we often view with alarm the
barbarian hordes at the gates," really hit a familiar chord.
When I first became involved in fandom
a dozen years ago, it was thorough a conrunning fan who roped me into working on
Norwescon. At Norwescons I met the local fanzine fen at a fan-oriented panels. Once
I tired of club politics the relatively anarchic atmosphere of The Other Fandom was a
welcome change.
That was way back when Norwescons were
famous for being literary-oriented. Sure, there were dances, ice cream socials, and
John Shirley's band *shudder* but there was also lots of fascinating people to meet.
The pinnacle was Norwescon Three in 1980 where I met Judith Merril from Toronto, A.
Bertram Chandler from Australia, and Mack Reynolds from Mexico. Those Norwescons drew
intelligent, articulate, literate people like flies.
From there it went downhill. Somewhere
along the way someone figured out that appealing to the gamers, vidiots, and costumers
would be a lot more lucrative. As a result, ten years later Norwescon has no fanzine
room, no fan guest of honor, minimal fan programming (not counting the obligatory
panel where local conrunners get together and tell us how wonderful they are), and
damn few people I would want to meet.
Insofar as Norwescons can no longer
offer me a good return for my thirty bucks, I have gone to the last few only to sit at
the bar and go to dinner with friends up from the Bay Area. In this, rich brown would
say that I am in disagreement with Mike Glicksohn about the definition of 'deadbeat'.
Well, I've disagreed with him before and no doubt will again. But I don't consume
anything in the consuite, I don't try to get into programming, I don't even dance. In
fact a few people said we had better panel discussions in the bar than they did in the
function rooms.
I also go to the bid parties -- they
want my vote, they'll answer my questions. Why should the concom get part of that
action?
{{ It's sad that so many good cons have gone downhill.
We think you're right that cons appeared to have changed when fringe fans got in
change and were out only to make money. When a 24-hour video room or gamers'
tournaments gets bigger billing than some of the invited guests, it's easy to see that
times have changed. Like you, we've occasionally gone to cons as 'non-attending'
members, where our only purpose was to see people we know and visit a bid party or
two. And like you, as long as we're not gate crashing by pretending to be paying
customers, we feel there is no harm. }}
This year even the Bayareans stayed
away. Most of them said they're saving up for the Vancouver Westercon. Three of them
are hucksters who would rather brave the Canadian customs officials than sit at a
convention notorious for lousy book sales.
So when the conversation known as
Whither Fandom (or is it wither fandom?) comes up here I just point at the
disintegration of book-oriented cons in Seattle. Fanzine fandom used to recruit from
Norwescons. We can't do that any more.
So where will Seattle fanzine fandom
recruit new blood, now that Norwescons are no longer good hunting grounds? Probably
from the Clarion West workshops. Think of it: intelligent people, people who write
even unto the point of paying a thousand dollars to be verbally abused... sounds like
fanzine fandom to me.
Martyn Taylor, Cambridge, United Kingdom
Charlie Williams' "Rat du Jour" illo
on page 6 in M10 really got me, although I couldn't for the life of me say
why. I just thought it was hilarious. Then I divined the reason. I spent a brief
time in Vienna (from what I saw of it, one of the most over-rated cities you will
find) and the one memory which keeps on coming back is of a lunch in the royal
gardens or some such tourist trap. Ratsherrentoast it was, and I have to admit I
enjoyed it, but I don't even have schoolboy German to know that it doesn't mean
gentleman rodent on toast.
{{ And that isn't even the illo we expected we'd get
when we sent that page to Charlie! We'd left a spot at the end of the page, where
we'd compared the elevator at the Brussels Beaux-Arts Museum with a shuttlecraft of
the Starship Enterprise, figuring that lead-in would be an easy one for him to pick
up on. Instead, he found an even better spot for a cartoon on that page. He
continues to amaze us in being able to come up with funny illustrations for even the
most mundane of descriptions. }}
I believe you are aware that
Mimosa is just too friendly for its own good, which is why the letter column
always appears to be made up of little articles in their own right rather than
specific letters of comment.
{{ Lots of people have been telling us lately, in one
way or another, that Mimosa is a hard fanzine to LoC. You're the first one
who's said we're too friendly for our own good, though! Thanks (we think). Anyway,
there's no good answer to the comments about it being difficult to find comment hooks.
Maybe one reason is that fan history articles are not easy to relate to. Or that
amusing, anecdotal articles are fun to read but not very comment-inspiring. Or maybe
it's just that we're too damn friendly for our own good... }}
- - - - - - - - - -
Shelby Vick, Panama City, Florida
rich brown's comment that Mimosa
left no handles to grab reminded me of a bit of self-analysis I indulged in recently
to Norm Metcalf in a LoC to his fanzine Tyndallite. Lack of handles seems to
have been my trademark in fandom; not only with my fanzine, Confusion, but also in
letters and articles. I bring up a point, then look at both sides of it and -- if I
reach any conclusion at all -- say something like, "Of course, that's just my
personal opinion..." I try not to be offensive, I try not to be argumentative, and
just attempt some mild humor.
Admittedly, this has some advantages;
I don't collect enemies, I don't get into feuds... but I also leave little trace
behind me. If I hadn't been in on the revelation that Lee Hoffman was NOT a sixteen
year old boy, and then followed that by the Willis Campaign, my other works in fandom
would have left barely a ripple. You know, a pleasant occurrence, but nothing
memorable.
But, transferring this to Mimosa,
I'm NOT advising that you start a feud or raise Cain in some other way just to be sure
you're remembered. Don't change... unless, of course, you want to launch some
worthwhile Campaign for a worthy fan... (But be careful that it's a fan who is
willing to devote 48 hours a day to making the campaign succeed.)
Roger Waddington hit a point I have
often remarked on: All the advances in desktop publishing have made it too easy to
put out a polished-looking fanzine, far superior in appearance to the old mimeoed or
hectographed zines. Note I said 'appearance': there were some zines that were hard
to read but well worth the effort -- and, if nothing else, you appreciated the effort
it took to put it out.
Peggy Rae Pavlat, College Park, Maryland
Thank you for sending me a copy of
Mimosa 9. Your fanzine and those of Mark Manning are extremely
reminiscent of the wonderful fanzines which were being published in the early 1960s.
I didn't intend to write a tale of the past, but I seem to have done so. Use it if
you wish.
My reluctance to write letters of
comment stems from an experience I had when I was (probably) seventeen. At the time,
I was dating Ron Ellik (the Squirrel) and he had come to the east coast to see me.
During his stay, we traveled to New York City and visited with both the Lupoffs (Dick
and Pat) and the Shaws (Noreen and Larry).
This was the period when the Lupoffs
were publishing a marvelous fanzine, Xero, and the Shaws were publishing a
frantically-paced newszine named Ax. Ax was the kind of fanzine which
may only have been possible in that era. It served to keep all of us in the science
fiction family abreast of Important Affairs (and other matters of state). During
this same period I was publishing a little-known and long forgotten fanzine named
Etwas. (I saw a copy in the fanzine room at a Worldcon not too many years ago
-- how nice to say that I enjoyed re-reading it! Even the first issue!!!)
While we were at the Shaw's home, the
mail was delivered. I was shocked to see Noreen bring in about TEN INCHES of
fanzines! When I made some smart comment about the mail being light today, Noreen
looked at me ruefully and replied that this was "about normal."
Some years later, I brought in my own
mail and there were TWO INCHES of fanzines!
Since I wasn't publishing Ax,
and I wasn't doing anything but publishing my 80-copy fanzine and sending letters of
comment to interested fanzines, I quickly figured out where this could lead if I
didn't change my behavior!
My last letter of comment was sent the
day before the Three Inch Day. Ever so slowly the mail carrier's expression changed
when we happened to meet on the street. No longer did he cower and turn his back
should we meet. Occasionally he even smiled.
- - - - - - - - - -
Harold P. Sanderson, North Lindenhurst, New York
It was interesting to see that Dave
Kyle is still going strong as is (obviously) Bob Shaw. The last time I saw Dave was
when we discussed `50s fan-type things on a panel during a Denver Worldcon. That was
about ten years ago and it was the last con I attended. I haven't seen Bob since we
left England to come over here, and that is over thirty years ago.
I don't mean to ignore your own
sterling effort (any more than I mean to pound in the fact that I'm British -- damn
you Shaw, you're still contagious) or the amusing piece by Dave Luckett which I did
luckett and read, but I wanted to spend most of the time with your letter column.
Letter columns have always been the major element of `50s fanzines. I almost said
'major focal point' but I think I killed that phrase stone cold dead in several issues
of Aporrheta (1958-60).
In connection with the general subject
of the letters in Mimosa 9, I could claim that the major reason I stopped
going to cons was, in fact, the sheer size of the monsters. To be truthful tho', I
have to admit that was only a part of the reason. (Although a big part. Prior to
arriving in the States, the largest con I had attended was the first Worldcon held
outside the North American continent. That was the first London con and I was the
Treasurer and I don't even want to think about what that meant. I still have
nightmares...) I suppose the main reason was that Joy and I found so much to do in
this New World that we just naturally gafiated. We did have a little fan life at the
start of our time here, but it was mainly limited to local New York events.
I have to object to a point made by
Marc Ortlieb that "It is only hindsight that gives zines a legendary status." This
might be true of some fanzines, but not the two he mentions, Hyphen and Le
Zombie. I'll limit myself to Hyphen and simply point out that this was
very much a legend in its own time. My God, grown men were known to go around weeping
and moaning and suffering terrible withdrawal pains each time that Hyphen was
late. Walt Willis, Bob Shaw (he of the Typewriter), James White, George Charters,
Chuck 'Down with King Billy' Harris (Irish Fandom's very own London Circle spy), and
later, John Berry -- all were an essential part of this heady mixture that we all had
to have at any cost. And let us not forget ATom. His 'Church, anyone?'
after-the-con-party cover for Hyphen is one I will never forget. I will always
be thankful that he did the covers for me for Aporrheta (all 17 of them), but
his work for Hyphen was simply superb.
I would like to try to respond to
Lloyd Penney's question as to what made the `50s fanzine writing so fannish, but it
seems to me this is one of those things that is almost impossible to define. If you
have to explain a joke, it ceases to be funny. In an attempt to at least try to offer
some insight, I've just taken time out to scan through Guy Terwilleger's The Best
of Fandom -- 1958 and as a result I am at more of a loss than ever. How do you
explain Bloch's "Bah! Humbug" from Oopsla!, or Burbee's "The Mind of Chow"
from Innuendo, or Tucker's "The Biter Bit" from Grue... For that
matter, would they be as funny today, anyway? They still are to me, but then I was
there, so to speak. And then, surely that is colored by the period, the events, the
environment in which these pieces were created. All of that is gone. The style is
dead, long live the style.
- - - - - - - - - -
Don Fitch, Frijo, California
Richard Gilliam's description of The
Founding Fathers Period of Fanzine history rather frightens me. It seems to be an
accurate description of the era which ended a decade or so before I entered fandom,
but also of Media Fandom today, and the latter group is so much larger than ours was
(and publication is so much easier now, albeit perhaps more expensive) that I don't
want to think about what's going to happen in the next 50 years.
Like Lloyd Penney, I see no dearth of
fanzines. I don't receive as many as I would like, of course, but far more than I
can handle as a very slow writer of very long LoCs. As Lloyd says, fanzines are now
"just one of the many activities fandom encompasses;" what he doesn't mention is that
they used to be one of the things every fan did.
- - - - - - - - - -
Alexis Gilliland, Arlington, Virginia
A postscript to my letter in
Mimosa 9. Looking through my art files for something else, I found The
WSFA Journal covers for #83 and #85, issues I don't have in my fanzine collection,
so I was clearly mistaken when I said #76 was the end of Don Miller's run of
TWJ, even though it did sort of mark the finish, or the beginning of the end.
Don was very, very tenacious.
Martin Morse Wooster, Silver Spring, Maryland
Thanks for Mimosa 9. Since
Don Miller isn't around to answer Alexis Gilliland, may I say a few words in his
defense?
I first met Don in 1975, after he split
with WSFA but while he was still publishing. Yes, Don was a bit of a nerd; he
was the sort of person who thought the epitome of fun was to hide in his attic and
type stencils on a battered old Underwood. And WSFA was probably right to institute
a divorce with Miller, since few WSFAns, then or now, are interested in fanzines or
fan publishing. (I can only think of one fanzine, Mary Hagan's The Mad
Engineer, published by a WSFAn during the 1980s. All of the zines Gilliland cites
were published before 1980.)
But Miller's fanzines were good sercon
zines. They always had items of interest, and featured major articles by Thomas
Burnett Swann and Gene Wolfe. Miller also was one of the first mystery fanzine
publishers. His zines were not flashy, and certainly not faanish, but they still hold
up well. Miller should be regarded as one of the major fan editors of his time
(1970-1977).
Don Miller's wife did not sell
his fanzine collection "for scrap paper." The collection ended up in the hands of a
Pennsylvania dealer, who sold fanzines from the collection at East Coast conventions
for several years after Miller's death. And Don Miller's wife was the quintessential
Antifan; even if Don had published the sort of fanzines Gilliland prefers, she would
have still hated fandom.
- - - - - - - - - -
Barry Newton, Sandy Spring, Maryland
I hope you will be suitably impressed
at receiving my first LoC of the new year. Almost my first ever, but that went off
to some folks in England shortly after Confiction.
A few impressions on form and content;
firstly as to form: this looked a lot like the zine I'll publish if I ever find the
gumption. You don't use too many type styles, which suits me just fine. One thing I
had trouble with was the typeface you use for your comments and responses. On shiny,
coated white paper, it would probably stand out from the text very nicely, but on
your solid, trufaanish stock, most of the contrast is blotted out.
{{ That typeface is called 'Tongue-in-Cheek'... Well,
not really, but we do agree that some typefaces look better than others in a mimeo'd
fanzine. We're still experimenting to see which of the ones we have available will
reproduce readably. }}
In the general category of form, let
me include style. As someone who has only occasionally picked up a fanzine in the
last twenty years, let me say that it's nice to be able to follow the text without a
key to acronyms. Also, there's very little stridency of tone or coarseness of
language. Are all of your writers this gentle, or do they get a bit of editorial
help?
{{ We (usually) let our writers be as #*&#ing
coarse and ungentle as they want to be... }}
As for content, before I ever consider
publishing anything ever, I will study your techniques for getting material. Forty
pages of coherent language from fans. People even I have heard of. Art, by artists
who had been given a chance to read what they were illustrating. There's a lesson in
production by itself.
{{ Our technique for getting material is a simple one
to master -- it's called 'begging'. Some of our contributors refer to it as
'pestering'. Seriously, it does take quite a bit of effort to gather all the
contributions for each issue, and we've got the telephone bills to prove it! If you
keep publishing a fanzine year after year, though, it eventually gets easier and
easier to get enough material for each succeeding issue, as if there's a fannish Law
of Inertia that eventually takes effect. And we're glad that it does; with the high
cost of new clothes, we can't afford to wear the knees out of too many more
bluejeans! }}
- - - - - - - - - -
We Also Heard From:
Harry Andruschak; Martha Beck; Sheryl Birkhead; Redd Boggs; Bill Bowers; Ned Brooks;
Brian Earl Brown; Gary Brown; Roger Caldwell; Gregg Calkins; G.M. Carr; Joan W. Carr;
P.L. Caruthers-Montgomery; Joe Celko; Russ Chauvenet; Vincent Clarke; Buck Coulson;
Richard Court; Don D'Ammassa; Gary Deindorfer; Carolyn Doyle; Jenny Glover; Ian Gunn;
David Haugh; David Heath, Jr.; Arthur Hlavaty; Lee Hoffman; Alan Hutchinson; Ruth
Judkowitz; Arnie Katz; Irv Koch; R'ykandar Korra'ti; Fred Liddle; Guy H. Lillian III;
Mark Manning; Norm Metcalf; Pat Molloy; Chris Nelson; Spike Parsons; Bruce Pelz;
Dave Rike; David Rowe; David Schlosser; Julius Schwartz; Bob Shaw; Ricky Sheppard;
Ruth Shields; Dale Speirs; Alan Stewart; Alan J. Sullivan; Phil Tortorici; Paul
Valcours; Wally Weber; Toni Weisskopf; Taras Wolansky
(Thanks also to those who sent Canadian and Australian stamps.)
Illustrations by William Rotsler, Alexis Gilliland,
Brad Foster, William Rotsler & Steve Stiles, Teddy Harvia (Chat cartoon), Terry
Jeeves, Roger Caldwell, Joe Mayhew, and David Haugh
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