Speaking of Irish Fandom, Walt Willis now continues his look back at the year 1954
in this newest installment of "I Remember Me." The thread of Walt's correspondence
file this time takes us from London Circle fan club meetings with Vincent Clarke, to
learning touch-typing with Chuck Harris, to James White's hospital stay... with lots
more yet.
 Once again you
are entering into the golden age of frequent letters from me.Thus wrote Vince Clarke in a remark which
went straight into the Hyphen back cover quotes. He went on to explain that
he had lost his job, his boss admitting under questioning that he had given it to
his own brother. Halfway through his letter, Vince touched on London Circle
parties.London fan parties are
odd things in that, fandom and sf not being well known, the talk usually borders on
the fantastic embroidery of some current news or set of facts (this latter commonly
known as s-c-a-n-d-a-l), and Ted Tubb and Bert Campbell being two of the best
extempore talkers around, the party usually hinges on their topics. The funniest
party I've been to in London was at the Ratigans' old place, when Bea
{{ ed. note: Bea Mahaffey }} was here, and
Ted and Bert were discussing the possibilities of founding a new religion. I shall
never cease to regret not having a tape recorder for that. After laughing for three
hours I had such a violent pain in my side I had to go and walk in the garden out of
earshot. That was 3.30 am.I'm getting a tape recorder this week...in
bitter opposition to Dot {{ ed. note: Dorothy Ratigan
}}, who's been trying to mother me, and who still expects fans to act like
normal human beings. Would I be mothered if I moved to Belfast,
Madeleine?((Madeleine commented: No. It would be more
likely that she would find you two at an auction.))On 20th January 1954, Chuck Harris reported
getting his typewriter back from the repair shop, a development greeted with relief
by all his friends, who had been suffering from stiff necks from trying to read his
backward sloping handwriting. I had quoted at him Napoleon's comment on the
handwriting of Marshal Nez, "Who has been sending me maps?"Top o' the morn from
the top o' the heap, keed. A veritable frabjous day! "Dear Mr. Harris," the chit
said, "the Management have decided to increase your salary." All this and a FAPA
mailing too.The typer came back on Friday, but I didn't
write before, because I didn't have anything to say -- which is, come to think of
it, a peculiarly fuggheaded reason for not writing to you.I did intend to spend some time stencilling
that Redd Boggs thing, but I got carried away on a Ken Slater letter and didn't have
enough time left. If I'm impotent or not working on Sunday, I'll do it then. I
want some normal sex life this Sunday. Sublimation is all very well, but it gets
tedious.27 Jan 54. After the egoboo from Vince, I
think the last two pages (of Hyphen) pleased me most of all. I always think
you are at your very best when you're being icily rude to someone you dislike. I'm
awfully glad that I always seem to be on your side.Whaddaya mean, "no one, literally no one,
will be told anything until the poll for TAFF closes"? Do you
mean me?????? Ghod, eighteen nicker in the kitty, and you go have an
attack of scruples.
Feb 54. I lent an Ellery Queen book from
the library months ago and I owe about twice its value in fines. I used to get
special treatment down there, but I've antagonized the woman and she'll insist on
every damn farthing. She's one of those motherly types, and got the wrong idea
about me. At first, she used to save me all the new Westerns because she approved
of them. (I didn't mind because my father likes cowboys and indians.) When I kept
a book out late, she would gently chide me and let me off the fine. This suited me
very well. I don't mind being polite at all, if it saves me money. But it's all
changed now. I put in a reservation card for Sexual Behaviour of the Adult
Female and she hasn't gotten over it yet. She told my mother, too!!! My mother
isn't very tactful and told her that, "He already has the other volume, but he
couldn't afford this one so he's going to get it out of the library."Somewhere about this time an undated letter
from Vince Clarke, containing some unused quotes...I will face my fate
steadfastly and go down with a smile on my face and a water pistol pumping in each
hand. -- James WhiteAre we oneshots in some cosmic FAPA? -- WAWBea Mahaffey trod on these paving stones. -- James WhiteI'll retire to fondle my tramcar
collection. -- FAPAAnything that can't be done in New Orleans
is impossible. In America's Most Fascinating city it is impossible for a Science
Fiction Convention to fail -- if the Con Committee should drop dead to a man, the
Chamber of Commerce would all hastily become fans and carry on... -- advert in
Dawn, August 1950Here's a curiosity from Chuck, undated, and
containing an average of about two typos per line, each corrected in ink by hand.Haven't heard from
anyone at all since I last wrote to you. Every time this happens I start to worry.
Do I stink in the nostrils of all decent fen, along with Bill Morse? Is Walt sore
about the advert? Has he got pneumonia again? Did Vince finish off his part of the
zine? Have I been banished to the outer wastes? Has fandom aborted again, and all
my friends started to write for dirty pros?Say something, if it's only goodbye.
I haven't been wasting my time. I am
learning to touch-type. I bought a Pitman's Commercial Typing and have
been spending all my spare time (about 15 hours so far) in practising.Sprague de Camp is to blame for all this.
In his SF Handbook he advises all would-be authors to learn touch-typing.
That's me, Bud.The main trouble with learning is that
there is a constant temptation to cheat. It has been a little tough for me. The
family have a low sense of humour and seem to find something funny in the curtain I
have invented. This is a piece of cloth with one end tied to the baseboard and the
other round my neck. For some reason this seems to amuse them. Last night, I
forgot about the curtain and got up to fetch my cigarettes from the mantlepiece. I
nearly broke my neck. They nearly bust a gut.As you'll have gathered, this correspondence
file includes Vince Clarke as well as Chuck Harris. We were at this time sending
each other carbons of our letters. Here is part of a general reply from Vince,
dated 10th February, 1954.Mike Wilson and self
were at Ted Tubb's over Christmas and we had borrowed Arthur Clarke's tape recorder.
About 1 am Boxing Day morning, Ted and I were sitting at the table with the
recorder... it had been going rather oddly and we were testing it. Suddenly, Ted
leaned forward, and in the appropriate tones, went into quite a long monolog that
left me with bugged eyes and a tremendous admiration for him. I won't give it all
now, but this is the beginning... quite without preparation, mind..."For there in fairy planets of long gone, the crystalline towers of civilisations long dust remain a mute memorial to their wanton pride. And there the sons of men do walk arrogant in heart and questing of mind, to mould amid the rotting dust, strange secrets of civilisations spent, relearn and with their new toys do hunt and kill their brother men. ... On such a ship once I served, many years ago now, Aye, young I was then... Now, withered and old and bent as a tree... Wed! Not once but thrice... and red with wine and sitting 'neath this foreign sky, this instrument of music playing softly, speaking to those who wander by..." And then he went into histrionics, with self
playing anti-strophe. Of course, it's not the sense in the above that matters, but
the realisation of the rhyme of the words: Poetry lost an asset when Ted took up
sf.I notice from a letter of mine a mention of
an issue of Hyphen that never appeared, a 'Special Science Fiction Issue'.
This imaginary issue was to be......partly a burlesque of the serious constructive fanzine, with for instance a scholarly deadpan analysis of something utterly trivial, and partly our usual fannish stuff in thin disguise -- Chuck's "The Decline of Astounding" (with particular reference to James' story) and James' review of the second issue of the Vargo Statten Magazine (in which Chuck's first and only professional offering appeared). And partly genuine serious constructive stuff better than the serconmags can do it. (Vince is the main hope for this, I think.) I'm expecting an anti-London Circle blast from Hamilton which should fit in nicely. Even Toto could fall into line, right down to cartoons like the Rotsler one: "We know all about him -- he throws away his old prozines." 
On 25th April 1954, I was reporting to
Chuck on James' admission to hospital: "After his food poisoning
cleared up and they put him on the new insulin, his metabolism went haywire. Medical
profession baffled. They were pumping him full of insulin but his sugar count or
whatever it was still up there in the googols. It got so that every time he asked
them how long it would be before he was out they'd double the previous answer. The
last one would have taken him away past Easter (when he was to get engaged. He is
engaged now officially and I can clear the information to you. They went down to
Dublin for the ring on Easter Tuesday because it's cheaper to buy them there free of
Purchase Tax and smuggle them across the border, and you're in fine fettle for the
honeymoon when you get out of prison), and he was getting really worried. Then one
evening, the doctor stopped as usual by his bed, and shook his head over him. Just
as he was moving away, he asked the nurse idly to confirm that this patient hadn't
been getting any drugs. "No," she said. "Huh," said James, "that's what you
think." (He'd been getting them every other day, on the average.) The nurse
clapped her hand over her mouth, and she and the MD had a hurried consultation.
Next day, James was back to normal and they sent him home. Apparently there had
been another patient in the ward called White, and every so often James had been
getting his medicaments. Now don't go around telling people like Wilkie Conner
about this, as if it was a reflection on the National Health Service. After all, he
didn't have to pay for the drugs, did he? He was getting killed perfectly free of
charge."In another letter to Vince, I asked him, did
he ever feel that one of his hoaxes had ever been too successful:
"Mal Ashworth, evidently prompted by my cracks about first
issues, sent me an 'advance copy' of BEM consisting entirely of spoiled
sheets, scrap and slipsheets (one of them featuring the outline of a neck tie) with
a neofannish note explaining it was the best they could do. Naturally I cut a hole
in the stencil of p.2 of Hyphen 8 and inserted a violent denunciation
of BEM as a disgrace to fandom, urging everyone to refuse to sub to it as a
dreadful botch, and ran off one copy for Ashworth. Just got a bitter letter from
him -- he's going to run off a circular over the weekend, explaining how his
hoax was too successful, and write to KFS {{ ed. note:
Ken Slater }}, Orbit, Space Times, and Ghod knows who else.
Poor Mal, he's all worked up about the unfairness of it all. I've just been out to
send him a telegram suggesting he call on Tom White and look at his copy. Heigh ho.
But gosh, he should have guessed. I hadn't time to do a proper job on the stencil
and there's blank space and black lines round the inserted bit." -- To Be Continued --
All illustrations by Peggy Ranson |
|