Re: A good weird/horror/sci-fi book to recommend
Posted by:
Sawfish (IP Logged)
Date: 23 February, 2019 11:17AM
Knygatin Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Thanks Sawfish. I am particularly curious about
> the collection Strange Relations, because I
> understand it is about Man's meeting and
> interaction with alien and weird animal/plant
> life, a subject related to Smith's bizarre
> conceptions.
>
> There is an omnibus collection by the same name,
> which includes Strange Relations and the novels
> Flesh and The Lovers. All those works seem
> connected in subject matter.
>
> I have never read anything by Philip José Farmer.
> As a teen I remember handling his Riverworld books
> while they were on the shelves in the book stores,
> but did not find them teasing my curiosity enough.
This is understandable. I got pretty tired of dialogues with famous deceased characters. It was amusing in a sort of irreverent way, and now that I think of it, one of the main characters, Mark Twain, was probably a big influence on Farmer as a wit. I suspect that he wanted to have the same playful sensibilities as Twain.
But Flesh is something else...
Imagine a future world that has some of the same grounding entities--there's a sort of United States--but the central feature of this alternate universe, at least in this alter-US, is a fertility cult that is the national religion.
Each year a sort of sacrificial "stag king" is selected and treated with both hormones and cultural veneration until each spring, when he is turned loose on a sort of ceremonial procession along the east coast, to Washington DC, or what passes for it, fornicating all women in his path. This is considered highly desirable, to give birth to the child of the stag king, and the entire progress is played for ironic, comic effect.
The authorial tone is lighthearted and absurd, and is quite an amusing read.
No serious topics are broached, which is fine for entertainment, but lots of cultural icons are parodied. Baseball as the national pass time, in one notable instance.
So once I read a short story by a 1950s SF author in a large anthology. Maybe I was about 11 or 12. The theme was loss of religious faith by a starship's chaplain because the mission had happened on the burnt out remnant of the planetary system destroyed by the nova that was the star of Bethlehem. There had been an advanced, but planet-bound civilization that had known of the impending immolation, prepared and preserved artifacts for subsequent explores to discover, then perished.
This understandably depressed the chaplain.
Farmer does not write stuff like this; he'd like to be Twain.
> Instead I picked books by Alan Dean Foster, H. P.
> Lovecraft, and Jack Vance. Clark Ashton Smith was
> not readily available at the time, and I
> discovered him only ten years later.
Me, too, and it did not take long for him to stand out once I'd read Zothique, my first exposure.
That was 1969 or 1970, I think.
Always nice to exchange with you!
--Sawfish
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"The food at the new restaurant is awful, but at least the portions are large."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~