andrewducker

Eh, Christopher Tolkien does not particularly inspire my sympathy, I must say. It's nice that they got some cash, fair enough, and you can see from the context here that CT put a lot of work in himself (which we knew already of course). But the Alan Moore Problem it ain't. The LotR trilogy is magnificent, and absolutely true, I think, to the spirit of the books - unless you count the fact that it's way less boring and a little less sexist and racist. Cry me a river.

I have no sympathy with him, because I don't think he should have any control over something his father wrote 60-70 years ago.

I mean, I have as much sympathy with him as I do with anyone else who doesn't like it when movies come out based on their favourite novels. Possibly a little more because of his unusually close emotional connection. But it's still a pretty teeny amount.

Christopher seems to be an old fart. I have a sneaking suspicion that it was actually Guy Gavriel Kay who did most of the actual work in editing The Silmarillion, not Christopher (GGK was an 'assistant' as a student).

Also, did you know that Christopher disinherited his eldest son over a dispute about the films?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/donotmigrate/3590335/A-leaf-torn-from-the-family-tree.html#

Ouch, that's really unpleasant.

I seem to remember hearing Guy Kay talk about, "The problems of working with Christopher Tolkien" which sorta boiled down to, "I thought we ought to tell a story and Christopher thought we should just do all the notes" during the editing of The Silmarillion. Considering What Christopher Did Next, I kinda believe Kay.

Interesting. I have no evidence for my theory, except that a jumbled collection of notes and scribblings was turned into what I think was a great piece of fantasy literature ('novel' probably isn't the right word) by two people. One of those people was an academic and the other would go on to become a very successful, critically-acclaimed fantasy author.

For the later 'History of Middle-earth' stuff (or 'Book of Lost Exam Papers' as I like to think of them), Christopher did it on his own, and they hang together only very loosely. They aren't something to read, more something to refer to, and only then if you're a true obsessive.

So of the two people responsible for collating JRRT's work into a readable Silmarillion, one was a gifted writer (or would be) and the other was someone who "thought we should just do all the notes". Hmmm...

It was a very well attended lecture at a British Worldcon - possibly Conspiracy. A lot of people told me they had arrived to hear Kay "dish the dirt" on Christopher Tolkien. On the whole, he was fairly restrained, but it was clear that they had clashed on the issue of whether they were producing an academic work or a piece of fiction.

I'm probably biased. I love some of Kay's work. He's one of the few writers who can make me cry.

It depends. Kay is a great writer but not a great original, even in fantasy terms. All of his books take place in a multiverse based on Plato's Doctrine of Forms which was, I think, first used in fantasy by C.S. Lewis in The Last Battle, though Kay's feels more like Amber or the World of Tiers. His first trilogy, The Fianovar Tapestry starts out as a standard Tolkienian-style portal fantasy, with elements that seem to be pulled from sources as wide as Marvel's Thor comic (dead ringers for The Warriors Three) and The Golden Bough, but suddenly goes Arthurian on us and, again, marries sources as wildly separated as Malory and the Triads. I rather admire this, but a friend of mine who is an expert on 'Dark Ages' Britain loathes it with a dark and dreadful loathing.

From then on (with the exception of the award-winning Ysabel which uses characters from The Fianovar Tapestry and is set in the France of our own world) all Kay's books are revisionings actual historical events but set in other worlds - other reflections of Fianovar - where things turn out differently. His research is often impressive. So A Song for Arbonne which I personally adore, is set in a reflection of the Albigensian Crusade, and the duology The Sarantine Mosaic is an analogue of Constantinople at the time of Justinian.

Tigana, his first work after The Fianovar Tapesty is an award winner and got on to a number of recent 'Best Fantasy' lists. It is set in an analogue of medieval Italy, but I'm not sure whether any of it is based in actual events. It's probably a good place to start, though not a personal favourite.

Depending on what area of history interests you (and whether you are well-read enough to pick up on errors that cannot be excused by being an 'alternate universe' point) The Lions of Al-Rassan uses the history of El Cid, The Last Light of the Sun Alfred the Great, Under Heaven the Ani Shi rebellion of Tang China. All have few elements of magic, if any, and a lot are about the clash between pagan religions and an analogue of Christianity. All have strong characterisation with a romantic element, political complexity, and often brutal violence. I see a theme of redemption as the strongest element in all of them, though it is often not the main character who is redeemed.

Thanks for that. I've read a little of the actual history of the Albigensian Crusade, so maybe I should start with Song for Arbonne.

It's a great book.

Rational suckers: a good example of why we need the Second Foundation. Or in its absence, governments: somebody observes the behaviour, decides to close that stretch of road permanently, everybody bitches about it (and penpushers, and the EU, and so on) but is actually better off :)

Yup. And transparency to make sure that we _are_ actually better off, and they aren't just closing the road because it goes past their house and they don't like the noise :->

Oh, cool. That's pretty bold, but on balance I think it's good.

On a similar dystopian note, perhaps they could reissue Fahrenheit 451 as a small pile of ash...

Hah! I like that!

Doesn't really work with ebooks, sadly.

I fear that the role of Gandalf in The Silmarillion would be something of a waste of Mr McAvoy's talents (I thought he was excellent in 'The Last King of Scotland').

Olorin ("Olorin I was in the West that is now forgotten") is mentioned once (as the "wisest of the Maiar") in the Valaquenta, which is a short essay which explains who all the Valar are, as well as some of the more notable Maiar. He also appears as often as you'd expect on the short essay "On the Rings of Power and the Third Age" which compresses three thousand years of the Third Age into twenty-odd pages. Olorin / Gandalf / Mithrandir / Tharkun does not appear at all in the main Quenta Silmarillion. Most of that is set in Middle-earth in the First Age, while Olorin is safely away in the West.

He only arrived in Middle-earth around the start of the second millennium of the Third Age, together with the other four wizards.

If you wanted to do a Gandalf movie, you have about two and a half thousand years of exploring Middle-earth that isn't really covered in any of the books to use.

I was thinking that, although I've not read all the way through yet so I wasn't sure if I was right. (I mean, if he wants to play a small but important cameo, that's fine, it's not really a waste, but it is if want you want is more gandalf :))

I am looking forward to Gandalf: The College Years.

http://philmophlegm.livejournal.com/268065.html

March: Peter Jackson announces plans to make 'Farmer Giles of Ham' into a trilogy of films.

Et cetera...

I'm waiting for the Pixar animation: Roverandum.

That I could see. Except that isn't Pixar owned by Disney, and didn't JRRT despise Disney so much that just about the only creative stipulation he ever made with movie rights was that they could never fall into the hands of the evil empire?

It'll have to be Dreamworks instead.

It seems pretty clear that ebook readers were a one-hit wonder now that tablets are here. I wonder if that transition will noticeably affect the "ebook" market.

(That "Friends" thing has to be some sort of benchmark for Too Much Time on His Hands.)

I am absolutely not giving up my ebook reader for a tablet. e-ink is massively superior for book reading.

And much though I loathe the idea of Too Much Time, if you're looking for people investing time in their hobbies, this wins:
http://cairmen.livejournal.com/438839.html

"e-ink is massively superior for book reading."

Just out of interest, why? I prefer paper, and have never read an ebook. bunn has a first generation kindle which she rarely uses (mostly because most of the books she wants to read don't seem to be available). I do own a tablet (an iPad 2) but have never read books on it. I do use it as a handy RPG reference library.

From what I've seen of bunn's kindle, it has some disadvantages as something to read books on compared to a tablet and some advantages. Battery life is much better, and it's lighter, which would make reading while holding the device in one hand more comfortable. And of course it can't show cover pictures or illustrations in colour. On the other hand, the display is a low contrast black-on-murky-grey (although I understand that newer models now have a white background) and turning pages is both slow and involves an annoying flicker reminiscent of a Sinclair ZX80.

It's the fact that it's reflective rather than lit from behind. I find long-form reading much easier when I'm not having light shone in my eyes. Which isn't to say that I can't read on tablets/monitors/whatever, but I find reflective surfaces much easier on my eyes.

The flicker/slowness of earlier generations is thankfully now much reduced, and now takes less time than it takes my eyes to go back to the top of the screen.

Ah ok. I don't think that's something that would bother me, while I could see the advantage of being able to read without a reading light. Swings and roundabouts I suppose.

this is where the new paperwhite version of the Kindle gives you best of both worlds: still reflective, but lit (and it doesn't have to be nearly as bright as they show it in the pictures to be comfortable to read in a dark room). Reading under the covers without a torch! Yay! It's higher contrast, too. I can't read on a tablet or screen for hours without sore eyes, and they are too damn heavy for reading when flat on your back. E-ink? Yes, absolutely.

I'm not giving up paper books, but I do have a lot of love for my Kindle for reading long-form text.

Oh, for RPG books and other reference manuals the iPad/other tablets is definitely better, because there's more text being displayed and the layout is a lot more important.

I think the maths in the Rational Suckers article is reasonable, but I don't think the author's sociological position is sound. I'm not even sure it's honest.

In particular, he says this in a comment: "A selfish rational individual will by definition not forfeit a sure gain. There is really nothing more to say about the whole thing. Those who sympathize with Hofstadter's idea that selfish and "superrational" beings would forfeit a certain gain in the game PD, seem to have a distorted version of this game in mind."

So, a "selfish rational" individual is quite unable to cooperate with fellow selfish rational individuals to ask for a road to be closed so everyone can travel faster? Games theory uses "selfish" and "rational" in precisely-defined ways, but these are technical terms, not meaning the same thing as they do in ordinary conversation. Koelman seems to be determined to ignore that distinction.

What about the people that live at D and want to get to C? You've just added 10 minutes to their journey!

It's not about ordering road closures - it's saying that if we all agreed that 50% of people would go by one route and 50% by another then we'd all gain, but because we don't do that, we aren't. I can't think of many examples of this happening in real life. Commuting is actually a pretty good example. If people named A-M started work at 8am and people named N-Z started at 9am then rush hour would be dramatically less bad. But instead everyone piles onto the trains at the same time and it's awful for everyone.

Fair point, I picked my specific suggestion quickly, and probably badly. Perhaps, similar to what you and Momentsmusicaux said above, I should have said "So a "selfish rational" individual is quite unable to cooperate with fellow selfish rational individuals to form a government which will constrain their own behaviour?" But I stand by my concern that he is pushing an ideological position that isn't actually supported by the maths he quotes.

Also, he dissed the Hof. Humph.

There is probably something in your commuting example, but there is more to it than that - speaking as someone who usually leaves for work late, partly because that gives me an easier journey. I think lots of people choose to travel at the peak times because they value the time they get up more than the quality of their journey. And, of course, lots of people do it rather than lose their jobs!