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THE MT VOID
07/31/26 -- Vol. 45, No. 5, Whole Number 2443
Editor: Evelyn Leeper,
evelynchimelisleeper@gmail.com
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Topics:
Middletown (NJ) Public Library Science Fiction Discussion
Group
Picks for Turner Classic Movies in August (comments
by Evelyn C. Leeper)
MOBY DICK (1930) (film comments by Mark R. Leeper)
A DROP OF CORRUPTION by Robert Jackson Bennett
(audio book review by Joe Karpierz)
How Seriously Should We Take UFO Sightings? (pointer
by Taras Wolansky)
Can Giant Space Mirrors Boost Green Energy on Earth?
(pointer by Taras Wolansky)
This Week's Reading ("Masterpieces of Short Fiction",
Part 2) (book comments by Evelyn C. Leeper)
===================================================================
TOPIC: Middletown (NJ) Public Library Science Fiction Discussion
Group
Aug 6: 2010: THE YEAR WE MAKE CONTACT (1984) & novel
2010: ODYSSEY TWO by Arthur C. Clarke
<
https://archive.org/details/2010odyss00clar/page/n5/mode/2up>
===================================================================
TOPIC: Picks for Turner Classic Movies in August (comments by
Evelyn C. Leeper)
For those who think the new film THE ODYSSEY is inaccurate to its
source, TCM Is running the 1930 MOBY DICK. Mark's review from the
01/03/1992 issue of the MT VOID is included below; it's a classic.
MOBY DICK (1930), Wednesday, August 5, 9:00 AM
August is also when TCM features a different star every day. For
example, they are running ten Steve McQueen films starting at 8:15
AM August 8:
8:15 AM The Getaway (1972)
10:30 AM Nevada Smith (1966)
12:45 PM The Magnificent Seven (1960)
3:00 PM The Great Escape (1963)
6:00 PM The Thomas Crown Affair (1968)
8:00 PM The Blob (1958)
9:30 PM Bullitt (1968)
11:30 PM Papillon (1973)
2:15 AM The Cincinnati Kid (1965)
4:15 AM Soldier in the Rain (1963)
And there are *fifteen* Groucho Marx films starting at 6:00 AM
August 12! (Well, Groucho's films were shorter.)
SATAN MET A LADY is the second version of THE MALTESE FALCON by
Dashiell Hammett. The 1941 version with Humphrey Bogart was the
third. (There was also a 1931 version titled THE MALTESE FALCON.)
[SATAN MET A LADY (1936), Thursday, August 27, 10:30 AM]
Other films of interest:
THURSDAY, August 6
12:00 AM Suspiria (1977)
2:00 AM House of Dark Shadows (1970)
FRIDAY, August 7
1:45 AM Sleeper (1973)
SATURDAY, August 8
12:00 AM Tower of London (1939)
SUNDAY, August 9
12:00 PM The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (1947)
2:00 PM Dragonwyck (1946)
6:00 PM Heaven Can Wait (1943)
TUESDAY, August 11
4:00 AM The Power (1968)
THURSDAY, August 13
4:15 AM The Story of Mankind (1957)
FRIDAY, August 21
3:15 PM Abbott and Costello Meet the Mummy (1955)
MONDAY, August 24
6:00 PM Brainstorm (1965)
WEDNESDAY, August 26
6:00 PM Bell Book and Candle (1958)
THURSDAY, August 27
10:30 AM Satan Met a Lady (1936)
FRIDAY, August 28
2:15 PM Soylent Green (1973)
4:15 AM Alligator II: The Mutation (1991)
SUNDAY, August 30
4:45 AM The Most Dangerous Game (1932)
MONDAY, August 31
3:30 PM Seven Days in May (1964)
[-ecl]
===================================================================
TOPIC: MOBY DICK (1930) (film comments by Mark R. Leeper)
[This originally ran in the 01/03/1992 issue of the MT VOID.]
What follows is a true and accurate synopsis of the 1930 film MOBY
DICK, starring John Barrymore (as Ahab) and Joan Bennett. Noble
Johnson plays Queequeg. It is based on Herman Melville's classic
of men and the sea.
The film opens with the camera moving in for a look at the book
Moby Dick, or The White Whale. The novel begins, "There never was,
nor ever will be, a braver life than the life of the whaler.
Compared to the game they hunted the mightiest land beast was but
a poodle dog." [Boy, that Melville! He sure can write!]
Fade to the harbor of the New Bedford seaport. The Mary Anne is
pulling into harbor; all eyes are on the callow young seaman doing
acrobatics on top of the mast. Why, it's handsome young Ahab
showing off again! Ahab comes ashore and flirts with some of the
girls and hilariously insults others. ("If they cut into you
they'd certainly get plenty of blubber.") Ahab sees his brother
Derek escorting a new girl in town--Faith, the parson's daughter--
to church. Ahab is struck with Faith's beauty but decides to go to
the grog shop instead of church. There Ahab meets Queequeg, a
primitive man who carries an idol he talks to. Queequeg becomes
Ahab's sidekick. Eventually Ahab does go to church and flirts with
Faith.
Before long Faith is losing interest in Derek's courting because,
like all the girls, she is intrigued by the handsome Ahab. As Ahab
is setting sail again Faith tells him that it is he, not Derek,
that she loves. They agree to marry when Ahab returns. Ahab and
the Mary Anne are at sea when Ahab sights Moby Dick, the black
whale with a white hump and forehead. [This allows the use of
stock footage.] As Ahab and his cronies chase the whale in the
long boat, Ahab takes one risk too many. The whale turns on Ahab
and bites him. Ahab loses a leg and it is replaced by a peg.
When Faith sees Ahab is returning she is overjoyed. But when she
sees the peg leg she is momentarily shocked and runs away. Weeks
later, we see Ahab unable to get work as a whaler. Faith asks
Derek to tell Ahab that she still loves Ahab. Derek twists the
message so Ahab thinks Faith does not really love him. Derek then
tells Faith that Ahab has cursed her.
Ahab goes to sea for seven years, but not as a whaler. Faith
realizes too late that she should not have trusted Derek. Eagerly
she awaits Ahab's return. Eventually Ahab manages to buy his own
whaling ship, the Shanghai Lady. He sails it back to New Bedford
to get a crew to go after Moby Dick.
[It should be noted that we are now fifty minutes into a
seventy-five-minute movie and are ready to start telling
Melville's story.
Melville tells only the last third of the story, which, of course,
is why Moby Dick is such a thin book.]
Ahab is unable to get a crew so must shanghai one from the
brothels and grog shops. The meaner and nastier the crew, the
better, he decided since he really wants revenge on Moby Dick.
Once at sea, however, the shanghaied crew is surly and
unmanageable. They are cutthroats one and all. There is one
exception. It is Derek who was shanghaied onto the Shanghai Lady
with the rest. Derek finds out his brother Ahab is the captain,
but the mates don't believe it and will not let him see Ahab.
During a storm Derek decides to break out of the hold to confront
Ahab. The rest of the crew take this opportunity to mutiny. With
storm and mutiny raging, Derek finds Ahab at the wheel and accuses
him of intentionally shanghaiing him. The two fight and Ahab is
winning when Derek throws a knife into Ahab's back.
Queequeg--Ahab's old friend--picks up Derek and breaks his back.
There is no explanation about what happened to the mutiny, but it
seems to have ended by the next scene.
Fair weather returns, but Ahab is depressed. He decides Moby Dick
has beaten him. "He's licked me, Mr. Stubbs," he says. Just then
Moby Dick is sighted. The longboats hit the water. Moby Dick turns
on Ahab's longboat but Ahab swims to the whale and, demoniacally
laughing, repeatedly stabs the whale with a harpoon. Moby Dick
dies. We last see pieces of Moby Dick being cut up on the deck of
the Shanghai Lady.
Ahab and the Shanghai Lady return to New Bedford. There Ahab
discovers that Faith has waited for him. The two fall into each
other's arms.
Boy, that Herman Melville! He sure can write! [-mrl]
===================================================================
TOPIC: A DROP OF CORRUPTION by Robert Jackson Bennett (copyright
2025, Random House Audio, 15 hours and 51 minutes, ASIN:
B0D5Z15LZ7, narrated by Andrew Fallaize; copyright 2025, Del Rey,
480pp, paperback, ISBN-10: 0593723848, ISBN-13: 978-0593723845)
(audio book review by Joe Karpierz)
A DROP OF CORRUPTION is the second novel in Robert Jackson
Bennett's "Shadow of the Leviathan" series, with the third and
currently final book in the series to be published in early August
of 2026. THE TAINTED CUP, the first novel in the series, netted
Bennett the Hugo Award for Best Novel in 2025. It is not
inconceivable that A DROP OF CORRUPTION will win that award in
2026. While I did enjoy THE TAINTED CUP quite a bit, given my TBR
pile and my preference for science fiction over fantasy (although
Cup did blur the lines between the two), I was not planning on
reading the follow up. Then the Hugo finalists for 2026 were
announced, and well, here we are. And I'm glad of it.
Anagosa (Ana) Dolabra and Dinios (Din) Kol once again take center
stage, this time in the investigation of the death of a treasury
official named Sujedo, a servant of the Empire, which Ana and Din
represent. The Empire and the Kingdom of Yarrow have a fraught and
antagonistic relationship. Yarrow is not part of the Empire, but
due to an agreement forged many years prior to the story will
become part of the Empire shortly. In fact, many members of the
Empire's Treasury are in Yarrow for one of their periodic meetings
to discuss the eventual merger--although that's really not the
right word, as Yarrow will become part of the Empire. In any
event, Sujedo is killed inside a room that was locked from the
inside. Actually, the word killed is a little mild and not as
descriptive as what really happened, but it's better if I spare
the reader the details. And thus, the investigation begins, and as
usual Ana and Din are hip deep in the mystery. And as you might
expect, what starts out as a murder investigation turns into
something significantly more complex than the reader might imagine.
Again, Yarrow is at odds with the Empire, and the current crop of
leaders, including the King of Yarrow himself, don't actually want
to be annexed (yeah, that's a better word) by the Empire. At the
center of the more complex plot is the Shroud, a laboratory
floating in the Bay of Yarrow which is central to the Empire's
research into creatures called the Leviathans (introduced in the
first book) as well as uses for the blood of the Leviathans, which
among other things contributes to the potions that result in the
creation of Sublimes. Sublimes (if you remember from THE TAINTED
CUP) have different abilities that are useful to the Empire, such
as perfect memory, which is Din's specialty (I do like the name
for this ability: Engraver. It just seems to fit quite nicely.)
What starts out as a locked room (well, yes, but not the way we
normally think about it) mystery morphs into a very twisted and
tricky investigation into familial and governmental politics
(yeah, I know that's obvious, but upon reading the book what I'm
saying will probably explain it a lot better than I can), almost
cult-like groups, intrigue, multiple deaths and, well you get the
idea. Along the way Ana and Din perform the same kind of wizardry
(not with actual magic, mind you) they did in THE TAINTED CUP to
solve the much larger issue that they've found themselves involved
in.
Aside from the terrifically told story, Bennett expands the scope
of information he supplies to the reader about the world of these
stories. We learn more about the structure of the government of
the Empire, the source of the powers of the Sublime, and the
relationship between Ana and Din. If you squint really hard (okay,
not so hard), you can see Ana's growing fondness for Din, and
Din's loyalty to both Ana and the Empire. I found myself liking
the two characters more as the story went on.
The story, as with THE TAINTED CUP, was well written and fun to
listen to, which brings me to my next point. As I've mentioned
elsewhere, my reading generally consists of listening to audio
books. Thus, my impression of the novels I listened to is heavily
influenced by the narrator and how they approach and read the
material. A DROP OF CORRUPTION is narrated by Andrew Fallaize, who
is also the narrator of THE TAINTED CUP. Fallaize does a terrific
job, and I especially like his portrayal of Ana. A good narrator
can go a long way in influencing the listener, and in the case of
the first two books of the "Shadow of the Leviathan" series, is
actually going to make me go and get the audio book of the third
book in the series, A TRADE OF BLOOD. For someone who doesn't
intentionally read fantasy very often, this is saying something. A
DROP OF CORRUPTION is an excellent book, and worthy of its status
as a finalist for the Hugo Award for Best Novel in 2026. [-jak]
===================================================================
TOPIC: How Seriously Should We Take UFO Sightings? (pointer by
Taras Wolansky)
Article begins:
On a recent Monday afternoon, Columbia astrophysicist David
Kipping was strolling through the quiet streets of Tunbridge
Wells, a town thirty miles southeast of London, when his phone
rang. The caller was a journalist seeking his thoughts on the new
Steven Spielberg film Disclosure Day. The sci-fi thriller,
starring Emily Blunt and Colin Firth, will serve for many viewers
as a primer on modern UFO mythology, with flying saucers crashing
down in the American Southwest, US military personnel swooping in
to sequester the spaceships and their egg-headed crew members, and
Men in Black-!-style agents fanning out to silence anyone with
knowledge of the visitation. Kipping, a Cambridge-educated Brit
who is spending the summer writing a book about the search for
extraterrestrial life, let out an audible sigh when he heard the
question. "I'm a bit disappointed it's coming out," he admitted.
"I'm afraid it may hoodwink people, and lead them down the wrong
path."
Full article at:
<
https://magazine.columbia.edu/article/ how-seriously-should-we-take-ufo-sightings>
===================================================================
TOPIC: Can Giant Space Mirrors Boost Green Energy on Earth?
(pointer by Taras Wolansky)
[Or will they just mess up astronomers' work and the biological
clocks of all living beings in the target areas? -ecl]
Full article at:
<
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-026-02218-9>
===================================================================
TOPIC: This Week's Reading (book comments by Evelyn C. Leeper)
Finishing the comments on the stories in "Masterpieces of Short
Fiction"...
13. "The Lottery" by Shirley Jackson: I find that there is little
I can add to the vast amount that has been written about this
story, other than observing what I'm sure other have noted: this
seems to be a major inspiration for the premise of THE HUNGER
GAMES.
14. "A Good Man Is Hard to Find" by Flannery O'Connor: This is in
some way a monster story--with the grandmother as the monster. She
brings the cat in a basket, which is the cause of their accident.
She insists they go down a dirt road to see some mansion she
remembers, and convinces them by lying and saying there is silver
hidden behind a panel since the Civil War (except she later
realizes that the mansion was not here but in Tennessee, so it's
the wrong road anyway).
After the accident she is the one who flags down the car with the
three escapees, and then admits she recognizes them (and even they
say it would have bene better if she hadn't).
By this point, it seems pretty clear that if the grandmother
wasn't totally senile before, She doesn't seem to recognize
Bailey's shirt or the pistol shots, or realize what they mean. She
reminds me (and others) of Amanda Wingfield, the mother in THE
GLASS MENAGERIE, totally out of touch with the present reality,
even to the extent of similarly talking about being courted by a
gentleman when she was a "maiden lady" (though she doesn't use the
term "gentlemen callers").
Ironically, the first thing O'Connor describes the grandmother as
doing--trying to get the trip changed from Florida to
Tennessee--is one of the two "good things" she does, or tries to
do--she fails. (She also keeps the children from throwing the
trash out the car window.)
15."An Interest in Life" by Grace Paley: This has made so little
impression on me that I cannot recall enough to be able to write
about it. Even looking up the plot brings no recollection.
16. "A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings" by Gabriel Garcia
Marquez: Krasny talks about how the woman who is turned into a
spider, but with "the head of a sad maiden", and how Marquez is
making a pun on "maidenhead", e.g., she retains her virginity.
This would be more convincing if it were not for the fact that
Garcia Marquez wrote in Spanish, which does not have the same
"constructed word". The Spanish reads, "Era una tarantula
espantosa del tamano de un carnero y con la cabeza de una doncella
triste," which is a straightforward, non-punning description of
someone with the head of a young girl. One is reminded of the
translation of Isaiah 7:14, where the Hebrew "almah" means "young
woman" but the Septuagint translates it as "virgin". (Well,
actually "parthenos", since it was a translation into Greek.)
There is a word for "virgin" in Hebrew, "bethulah", but that was
not the word used.
This may be an intentional pun inserted by translator Gregory
Rabassa. Or it may be just Krasny's desire to find puns where none
exist. (He also claims that the miracle given the paralyzed man is
that he doesn't get the use of his legs back, but that he wins the
lottery; however, Garcia Marquez says that he "didn't get to walk,
but almost won the lottery" ("que no pudo andar pero estuvo a
punto de ganarse la loteria")).
In terms of the elements of magical realism, Krasny notes that
this bears not a little resemblance to Franz Kafka's METAMORPHOSIS
(and also to "A Hunger Artist", though more because of the
setting), and perhaps even Shirley Jackson's "The Lottery" in its
invoking of the fantastical, or at least the mostly unbelievable.
The willing suspension of disbelief is definitely at work, though
in various degrees. (I remember trying to explain the willing
suspension of disbelief to my niece when we were reading a book
about horses with wings. I think she was about six at the time.)
17. "The Jewbird" by Bernard Malamud: Birds (or at least winged
creatures) seem to recur in fantasy stories: Poe's raven, Garcia
Marquez's very old man with enormous wings, and now Malamud's
Jewbird. Both Garcia Marquez's old man and Malamud's Jewbird are
pitiful creatures, with bedraggled wings, in need of food,
shelter, and aid.
18. "Sonny's Blues" by James Baldwin: At this point, it became
harder to find the stories. This was not because they were more
obscure, but because unlike the early stories, these were still
under copyright, and unlike the Garcia Marquez and the Malamud, I
could not easily put my hands on them in my collection. And the
Garcia Marquez and the Malamud were fantasy, meaning I could look
up in the ISFDb where they had been anthologized. On the other
hand, for "mainstream" stories there is no easy way to do this.
Back in the day, there was a set of books where one could look up
where stories were anthologized, but "the day" was over fifty
years ago, when the number of short stories, and of collections
and anthologies, was much smaller than now.
"Sonny's Blues" was relatively easy to find, because Wikipedia
said which Baldwin collection it first appeared in, and that
collection was available through inter-library loan (although not
in my library).
Of course, none of this has anything to do with "Sonny's Blues",
but frankly, I have no specific comments on it. This does not mean
it's not an important story; it just means I had no specific
response.
19: "A&P" by John Updike: Readers of the future (or even the
present) will presumably figure out that the A&P of the story is a
grocery store, though as a title that is never referenced in the
story, it could stand for just about anything. Updike wrote the
story in 1961, when the chain was just over a hundred years old;
it lasted a little over another fifty, finally going out of
business in 2015. Will readers in another twenty years recognize
"A&P" as a store name? (For that matter, will they recognize that
the bathing suits being described were considered inappropriate
off the beach then? Certainly going into a store now with your
shoulders exposed is not anything that makes people grab their
pearls.)
I have to say that Updike's style doesn't appeal to me. He seems
to love repeating words (or syllables). In the following passage,
he repeats "round" three times in the first two short sentences,
and "heels" twice in the third, longer one:
"She kind of led them, the other two peeking around and making
their shoulders round. She didn't look around, not this queen, she
just walked straight on slowly, on these long white prima donna
legs. She came down a little hard on her heels, as if she didn't
walk in her bare feet that much, putting down her heels and then
letting the weight move along to her toes as if she was testing
the floor with every step, putting a little deliberate extra
action into it."
Updike does do something that Stephen King may have picked up from
him; he mentions specific brands (HiHo crackers, Diet Delight
peaches, Kingfish herring, a Falcon station wagon, and of course,
A&P itself) to make the story more "real".
20. "No Name Woman" by Maxine Hong Kingston: Some stories just
don't generate any special comments from me; this is one of them.
21. "Happy Endings" by Margaret Atwood: Krasny says about this
story that Atwood is breaking down the third wall. Actually, it's
the fourth wall (unless you have a triangular stage).
Atwood claims that all plots lead to death. Well, this may not
always be true in science fiction or fantasy, but Atwood wrote
this before she didn't write science fiction, or rather before she
wrote science fiction but didn't realize it. (I think she's come
to terms with the field now.)
Interestingly, what Atwood has written here could be thought of as
a form of science fiction--a pseudo-alternate history--in which
she starts with two characters and then spins out different
timelines for them.
22. "The Moment Before the Gun Went Off" by Nadine Gordimer: It is
hard to discuss this without spoilers, but I'll give it a shot.
(Sorry, couldn't resist the pun.)
The story is told from the point of view of a friend of the main
character, so there's a lot left unsaid. We don't find out how
much any other characters know: not Lucas, not Lucas's mother, not
Alida Van der Vyer's, not Van der Vyer's little son, not even
Marais Van der Vyer himself. And there is much we don't know
either--what is the true back story, what are the true feelings?
And is the narrator an unreliable narrator?
23. "Cathedral" by Raymond Carver: Again, no special thoughts. As
Angelica says in JOE VS. THE VOLCANO, "I have no response to that."
24. Why Short Fiction Masterpieces?: That's easy--because they
don't take forever to read!
[-ecl]
===================================================================
Evelyn C. Leeper
evelynchimelisleeper@gmail.com
Oh what tangled webs we weave when first we practice
to deceive.
So if deception doth attract us we must have a lot
of practice.
--Mark R. Leeper
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