News...vol 3, LOST WORLDS etc.
Posted by:
Scott Connors (IP Logged)
Date: 26 July, 2007 06:46PM
Here's some news for y'all: Ron and I handed in the finished texts for A Vintage from Atlantis, volume three of Night Shade Book's "Collected Fantasies of Clark Ashton Smith" series. It is on track for release late this year. Introduction is by Michael Dirda, which is something of a coup IMHO. Big changes in the text of "The Seed from the Sepulcher," for reasons we discuss in the notes to that story. We're also including the prose poem "The Flower-Devil" as an appendix, since it was the source for "The Demon of the Flower." Jason van Hollander is doing the covers for the entire series.
The bonus booklet is still delayed because of artwork problems.
Lost Worlds issue 4 is at the printer right now. This issue is largely devoted to a variorum edition of "Necromancy in Naat," showing what CAS originally wrote, what he cut out, and what he changed. This takes up the bulk of the issue, but there's also an essay on the history of the story by Yr Obt Serv't; a memoir of the pioneering Smith scholars Charles K. Wolfe, who passed away a few years ago, by Don Herron; reviews by Donald Sidney-Fryer (of The Shadow of the Unattained) and John Alfred Taylor (of The Freedom of Fantastic Things). Cover is another fine color painting by CAS, and we're also reprinting Virgil Finlay's illustration for "Naat" from Weird Tales. There are also letters from Don Herron, Donald Sidney-Fryer, and Ron Hilger; I really want to start running a regular letter column, so please, guys, let me know what you think of the issues!
Issue 5 is almost finished as I write this. Part of the problem with our somewhat less than stellar attempts at maintaining something resembling a regular publication schedule (which doubtless contributes to the lack of letters referred to above) is the fact that the publisher is in New York and I'm in California. I was blocking out a rough amount of text and sending it to Seele-Brennt publisher Nick Curtis, who would lay it out and send me the proofs. Since I couldn't be sure just how well what I sent along would fill the 54 pages in each issue, there's be some back-and-forth while we tweaked things. This took up a lot of time, especially when you add in computer crashes, problems in personal lives, and other complications.
No more. I am now laying out each issue, sending PDFs to the writers to correct, and sending the corrected final files to Nick, ready-to-go. The only things we need for issue five are two brief pieces by me. Here's what we have on board so far: a charming and previously unpublished "cat" poem by CAS; essays on Smith's poems "Ode to the Abyss" and "Connaissance" by Carl Jay Buchanan and Phillip A. Ellis; excellent essays on botanic horror in CAS's work and on "The Seven Geases" by Philippe Gindre and Geoffrey Reiter; a memoir of CAS by Sam Sackett; and reviews by Jim Rockhill (of the Bison reprints of OST and LW) and Brian Stableford (of volume three of CAS' Collected Poetry and Translations).
On hand for future issues are: "Dawn of Discord," an unreprinted story rewritten by E. Hoffmann Price from a CAS story; Jean Marigny's long essay (published as a chapbook in France) "The Lost Worlds of Clark Ashton Smith;" essays by Donald Sidney-Fryer, John Haefele, Dwayne Olsen, Ron Hilger, Robert M. Price, Douglas A. Anderson, Morgan Holmes, S. T. Joshi, and Philippe Gindre (some of these are still in progress, but I'm nothing if not persistent). Plus still more CAS material: artwork, letters, photographs, etc. And a portfolio of Smith-inspired artwork by Tim Kirk. Plus Jason van Hollander is doing some art for future issues. We hope to use some more artwork as we cultivate relationships with artists capable of doing justice to Smith's work. Contact me if you think you fit the bill.
There is also a rather unusual new Smith book out called Shadows Seen and Unseen. It comes as a bit of a shock to Ron and me, not to mention Bill Dorman at the Estate, but it contains facsimiles of a number of Smith's poetry mss, some unpublished, as well as color plates of a number of paintings, one owned by the editor/publisher but the others taken (without credit) from this website. One of them, "Spring Clouds," is hanging on the wall beside me as I type this, and it is not a good reproduction. In addition, the editor used Photo-Shop to add a pink flamingo to the foreground. ... That's right, you read it correctly. Now sit down and take some deep breaths. Take a Valium if you have one. And think about how I feel, seeing my treasure defaced in such a crude manner. If CAS hadn't been cremated, we could have wrapped him in copper wire and magnetized his coffin, and he'd generate enough electricity to solve Norcal's power problems.
Anyway, there's a booksigning in Auburn this Saturday, and I'll try to get some more information on this.
Scott