mantichore 9

8/14/2019 Mantichore 9

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Back to front: PerryGrayson, Phillip A. Ellis,Danny Lovecraft, Benjamin

J. Szumskyj, LeighBlackmore: (The AustralianKalem Club) at theAustralian Museum,

Sydney.

MANTICHOR

E3, No1 (WN9)

A

Contribution by LeighBlackmore for the Sword &Sorcery & Weird FictionTerminus (Mar 2008

mailing), & Esoteric Orderof Dagon (April 30 mailing)

amateur pressassociations.Leigh Blackmore, 78 RowlandAve, Wollongong, NSW 2500.

Australia.

Email: [email protected] Website: The

Blackmausoleum http://members.optusnet.com.

au/lvxnox/

Mantic Notes(Pronunciation:'man-tik. Etymology:Greek mantikos, from mantis : of or

relating to the faculty of divination:prophetic).

Nothing seems tochange. Im more or lessslinging this issue together atthe last minute as deadline hascrept up on me and life hasbeen busy! [Stop press: I didntmake deadline! Im nowwriting my report on the AustKalem Club meeting on March29, and have received Mailing#29 in which this should havebeen included. *Sigh* Ill beemailing this to somemembers and mailinghardcopies to others, so I canstay in sequence with mymailings].

Probably should resignmyself to the fact it will alwaysbe much this way though Iam trying to balance my healthagainst the number of projectsI take on, and not thrashmyself

Over summer I did acourse in Graphic Design(required for my Journalism

degree) and had hoped todemonstrate my newfound
mailto:[email protected]://members.optusnet.com.au/lvxnox/http://members.optusnet.com.au/lvxnox/mailto:[email protected]://members.optusnet.com.au/lvxnox/http://members.optusnet.com.au/lvxnox/http://members.optusnet.com.au/lvxnox/


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Photoshop & Illustrator skillshere, but that will have toawait a more leisurely issue.For now its a matter of get itout in time for deadline! I

received a Distinction for theGraphic Design, pleasinglyenough. Im now back at unidoing my last year of CreativeWriting and my second year ofJournalism.

In February I was takenby surprise when I had amassive allergic reaction tosomething (virus, food, whoknows?) and wound up inhospital for five days, with mywhole body covered in ahorribly itchy rash. Doses ofPrednisone, recommended bythe dermatologist, shut off thereaction but Ill probably neverknow what caused. A badepisode that cost me twoweeks of off-uni time which

could have been better spent.Im very grateful to myfantastic partners Margi andGraham for looking after mereally well while I wasstricken.

However, I did manageto read afew bookswhile in

hospital JohnTytellsEzraPound:SolitaryVolcano(excellent);

James Doigs anthology Australian Gothic (very

enjoyable); an occult bookcalled The Book of the Glyph

which had some remarkablethings to suggest aboutreallocating certaincorrespondences on theQabalistic Tree of Life; and The

Voynich Manuscript by GerryKennedy and Rob Churchill ( afascinating overview of thehistory of attempts to decodethis mysterious manuscriptwhich some have attributed toRoger Bacon). I also listenedto quite a few tapes andspoken word CDs while flat onmy back, including episodes ofthe Twilight Zone radio seriesthat was scripted by DennisEtchison a few years back.Good stuff.

There were three familybirthdays over the summer Graham and Rohan both havetheir in November, and Margisis in February. The papers onour house have been signed at

last and we are just awaitingthe loan from the bank so wecan start paying our mortgage oh, joy! Margi is back at TAfecontinuing her librarianshipstudies and Graham isteaching school as always, andabout to recommence hisanatomy teaching at KarunaCollege locally.

I just ran a successfulworkshop at Lotus Bookshopon Aleister Crowley which I hadneeded to reschedule due tomy illness. Im proud to say myPowerpoint presentation forthis (Mythbusting the Beast:The Life and Magick of AleisterCrowley) probably includesmore photos of Crowley and

his associates than have everbeen assembled in one place.


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I now have no less thanthree occult groups with whichwe are regularly involved, andwe also do quite a bit ofnetworking with other sections

of the pagan community inNSW. Graham gave a talk onPagan Ethics at a recent PaganCommunity Weekend whichwas a sort of ecumenicaltalkfest bringing togethervarious pagan groups andcovens from around the state.This is all enough to keep onebusy!

Ive also been flat outover summer reading novelmanuscripts for the agencies Iwork for several quite longones. While this brings a bit ofneeded money for the family,it doesnt exactly advanceones own creativeendeavours. I also proofreadfor pay the manuscript of a

nonfiction work, Skintight: AnAnatomy of Cosmetic Surgery

byMeredithJones.Meredithan

academic and the wife of myfriend Richard Trowsdale, whoused to help me put togetherRlyeh Texts publications. Thebook has now appeared(Oxford and New York: BergPublishers, 2008) and will belaunched in Sydney in April. Through Facebook, I

reestablished contact with myold friend Jon Marshall now

Dr Jonathan Marshall ofUniversity of TechnologySydney. He has a book due outshortly, Living on Cybermind,about internet communities,

and well be attending thelaunch for that in March. Jon isalso an alchemist and aleading member of the JungSociety in Sydney, so Imlooking forward to catching upwith him in person anddiscussing matters esoteric.

Im delighted to say thatthe new journal I co-edit with

BenSzumskyj,Phillip Ellisand JamesDoig hasnowappeared Studies inAustralianWeird

Fiction No 1is 200pages

chock full of good stuff abouthorror and the weird in thiswide brown land, capped offwith a tasty cover by CatSparks. perhaps the least of itsattractions is the inclusion ofan interview with me. BenSzumskyj brought this issue

about almost single-handedly,and his dogged persistence(and vision) is to be applauded.I will be contributing moreeffort to future issues, andhave a couple of interviewsand articles lined up forinclusion in Issue 2. ASiWF canbe obtained directly from thepublisher, Equilibrium Books,

at:http://www.equilibriumbooks.c
http://www.equilibriumbooks.com/siawf1.htmhttp://www.equilibriumbooks.com/siawf1.htm


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om/siawf1.htm (as can JamesDoigs anthology mentionedabove). Doig will be bringingout a second volume of storiesby early Australian horror

writers, and I applaud hisremarkable research as well. James is a great new contactand I look forward to workingmore with him in the future. Hemay be appearing with DannyLovecraft and me on a panelon fantasy poetry at this yearsConflux 5 in Canberra, so Illget to meet him in person.

Speaking of Conflux 5,Margi and I have been invitedto repeat our very successfulworkshop on real magick fromlast years Conflux, so we bothcored free memberships forthe con this year. Ill lookforward to running that again.The main aim is to give writerswho use concepts of magick in

their fantasy work a taste ofwhat its like to cast a magickcircle and work with differentmagical energies. Last year weincluded some sigil magick,though we may remodel ourworkshop this year to coversome different modalities.

I lent S.T. Joshi somesmall assistance over the last

few months with info onentries for his new updatedbibliography of HP Lovecraft,now (I believe) handed in tothe University of Tampa Press.My contributions were minor,though; I was unable to fill inmuch of the info about missingitems that Joshi put forward;merely drew to his attention a

few items that had escapednotice (and many that he had

already taken notice of!). Imlooking forward to the newbiblio, which will be currentright to the end of 2007.

With all this activity, Ihavent written any new fictionthis year so far, though Imworking with Danny Lovecraftto bring out a small edition ofmy weird poetry. By the way,Danny Lovecrafts Prea Presshas recently published Richard

L. Tierney: A BibliographicalChecklist a 48 pp thoroughchecklist of the work of thiswriter who looms large in theLovecraftian community.Copies can be obtained bycontacting Danny at:[email protected].

Nearly forgot to mentionthat my story Water Runs

Uphill finally appeared inAurealis38/39(technicallySept 2007but didnthit printuntil Jan2008). Ittook

another 3weeks after
http://www.equilibriumbooks.com/siawf1.htmmailto:[email protected]://www.equilibriumbooks.com/siawf1.htmmailto:[email protected]


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I received the issue to receivethe payment - $180 Aust. Thisis the highest payment Iveever received for a short story.I was pleased about this

appearance for a couple ofreasons one, the story isbarely fantasy (save a twist atthe end) and secondly,Aurealis is Australias longest-running and, I suppose, mostprestigious sf magazine, and Iwanted to crack that market. Itwas also my first storypublished to receive its ownfull-page illo. Still, I wont bebuying too many Rolls-Royceswith the proceeds. Writing forprofit is, as my grandfatherwould have termed it, amugs game.

This time around Ihavent kept a good record offilms Ive seen, so Ill skip myusual commentary on those. I

have been watching, though,THE HUNGER _ a boxed set ofepisodes of a TV series hostedby Terence Stamp. many ofthe episodes are based onstories by decent horrorwriters such as Karl EdwardWagner, Gemma Files, GrahamMasterton, Robert Aickmanand others. Ive been enjoyingthose still have many

episodes out fo the 30 or so inthe box set to watch.

I have become interestedin trying to track down all thefilms based on works by orwritten by Robert Bloch andRichard Matheson. SawScream of the Wolf , aMatheson TV movie from the

70s Id not seen before. It was just OK. Im on the hunt to

track down all the Dan Curtisproductions of Mathesonstories (and indeed of otherclassic horrors that Curtisproduced for TV in the 70s).

This will be an ongoing project!By the way, if anyone has anyof Blochs three Star Trekepisodes (from the originalStar Trekseries) please let meknow I may be able to tradeor buy copies if youre willing.Im also mildly obsessed withfinding out if any of Blochs 39-episodes radio series Stay Tuned for Terror survives.Most sources say the wholeseries is lost, but I wonder ifanyone has really looked intothis. Does anyone have anyknowledge about good radioseries archives? I believe theseries was also broadcast bythe Canadian broadcastingCorporation, so I may contactthem to see if they still have

recordings.

I feel I should commenton a situation which affectedmy friend, the Holmesian andgraphic novelist ChrisSequeira. Chris is activelyinvolved selling comics scriptsboth here and overseas. Hehas also recently landed threenew Sherlock Holmes stories

with two important overseasanthologies. One is edited byCharles Prepolec forpublication in Canada, andwith that there is no problem. The other project is forpublication by Wordsworth inthe UK, and after beingcommissioned by their editorto write two Holmes stories,

which Chris duly delivered, hewas informed there would be


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no payment. This strikes bothof as odd for a number ofreasons the editor is well-known, the publisher is a majortrade publisher in England

(though not renowned forgenerous payments, they gogenerally pay editors who thenpay authors). The problem is,there was no contract signed. Ithink its unfortunate that Chrisdidnt insist on a contract forthese stories, but sometimesthe writer follows promisingleads in order to get a projectin print, and he is the innocentvictim in this situation.

Writers should alwaysguard themselves by clarifyingterms of payment and gettinga contract signed if possible,setting out the terms (whetherit be payment on acceptanceor publication, or whatever). Ifthere is no payment involved,

the writer should be told soupfront. In this case, thereappears to have been a degreeof deception on the part of theeditor (whom I will not name).At least Chris stories willappear in print but deservedto be paid for this work, andnow will not be. All writers takeheed! I

Im going to devote mostof this issue to two things mailing comments, on which Ihave been woefully deficientmy last couple of issues anda report on the inauguralmeeting of the AustralianKalem Club.

MANTICHORUS:MAILING NOTES

SSWFT Mailing #28Quill (Ben Szumsky):

Congrats on the GraduateDiploma! No idea how youmanaged studying andworking fulltime. Im lookingforward to your essaycollection on Blatty (AmericanExorcist). And of course TheMan Who Collected Psychos(on Bloch) for I will have anessay in the latter! I enjoyedyour essays on the

Lovecraftian influences inHellboy and the essay onLeFanu, as well as the poetryreviews (good to see PhillipEllis receiving due attention forhis verse). Re: Hellboy andLovecraft we have the otherconnection, of course, ofGuillermo del Toros havingfilmed Hellboyand also being a

Lovecraft fan who intendsfilming At the Mountains ofMadness. Ive not read enoughLeFanu, though many yearsago I saw a TV version ofSchalken the Painter whichwas strangely haunting. Lastyear we were at Berkelouwsbookshop near Mittagong inNSW a mine of rare anddesirable books and I

stumbled across a copy of aLeFanu reference rarity Wilkie Collins, LeFanu & Othersby S.M. Ellis (1931). Cost me$22 probably worth fivetimes that! I append theportrait of JSLF that appearsin the volume.Hyperborean (MartinAndersson):Ah, those book acquisitions!Ive got a Sheila Finch book Reading the Bones but


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havent read it yet. I wish I hadthe Spiralling Worm Conyersis a fellow Aussie but althoughwere both in Southern Horror(the AHWA e-list) Ive yet to

really make contact with him.Nice that got HPLs Marginalia!My copy has a very sunnedspine I think the pale jacketis prone to that. Yes, thephotos are worth having. Yegods, all those others I haventgot yet, including recentHippocampus Books. I MUSTalso get Shadows Seen andUnseen by Smithcant affordnot to have a completecollection of CAS! You read alarge number of books as well!I like Fred Phillips term Terminal Bibliomania Iconfess that I too suffer fromthe disease! Yep, TierneysDrums of Chaos seems to beon the way finally fingerscrossed.Tolkien is not

foremost amongst my literaryinterests, although Margi andGraham are devoted fans. Tolkien is somehow nothorrible enough for me, thoughhis and Lovecrafts world-building techniques weresimilar in their sense ofauthenticity. Interesting pieceabout John Morressy, whosework I havent read; always

nice to see a biblio checklist,too. Hi Freya enjoyed yourmusings and indeed youramusing story about jumpingthe line with the great tractsof land! (youre obviously aMonty Python fan, too!).Change-Winds (JohnHoward): Yay for pics in apamags! I like seeing other

peoples bookshelves. I used tohave a lot of the Derleth

mainstream novels all the Judge Pecks, the various kidsbooks etc, the poetry, but Isold them all off and kept onlythe weird. Had to do it, to fund

purchase of other weird books.Oh how I wish I could afford tobuy Ash Tree Press books. Ihave em all in my Book Moochwishtlist but people rarelyseem to give them away wonder why (lol). Typos areindeed very annoying AustStudies in Weird Fiction No 1has some bad ones and I must

talk to Ben about betterproofreading next time around!Nightmayericana (JohnMayer):Well, we missed you for acouple of contributions but itwas nice to see this one. Imsure well appreciate whateveryou can put in, even if its notevery mailing. I like yourimage of being a pirate

nurse! Sad but poignant pieceon the death of your dog. I loveanimals and I know that allanimal-loving members wouldhave been touched by thispiece. I used to love Fredricbrown, but havent read himfor many years. Interestingreflections on organ donation. Ihad cause to reflect on theissue when I was in hospital.The guy in the bed next to mewas awaiting a kidneytransplant and had beenwaiting six months, withoutknowing when or if he wouldget a good organ. Id hate tobe in that position. That poemyou quote was indeed byLovecraft. It is The Dweller(No XXXI of his Fungi from

Yuggoth sonnet sequence).


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You left out four lines of theend sextet, which reads in full:And then we saw those stonesteps leading downThrough a choked gate of

graven dolomiteTo some black haven ofeternal nightWhere elder signs and primalsecrets frown.We cleared a path but racedin mad retreatWhen from below we heardthose clumping feet.The Dweller first appeared inThe Providence Journal (7 May1930), was reprinted in ThePhantagraph in 1935, in WeirdTales (March 1940) and WeirdFiction Times (Feb 1976). Itappeared in book form inCorwin Stickneys rare tributeHPL (1937) , in DonaldWollheim (ed) The MacabreReader (1960), in HPLsCollected Poems (Arkham

House, 1963), and in his The Ancient Track: CompletePoetical Works (Night Shade,2001 see pp. 76-77). If youfirst read it about 50 yearsago, maybe it was the WeirdTales appearance you recall?

Elegant Amusement (PhilEllis): I think your Lovecraftparody On Being Shat on by a

Swan is hilarious. It perfectlycaptures the flavour ofLovcecrafts rather appallingPope-influenced verse, whiletaking the piss completely.Most amusing! I believe myhorror writer friend BryceStevens (no respecter ofLovecrafts more dignifiedposes) would also find it so. If I

were more familiar with thepoetry of Wallace Stevens, I

might have greaterappreciation for ThirteenWays of Looking at a Mi-Go.Strangely enough, yourLovecraftian version clearly

follows the structure of atypical (or famous) Wallacepoem, so get some idea whatthe original was like simplyfrom reading your parody.youre a clever man, Mr Ellis. Your four prose poems thisissue are beautiful. Myfavourite is In the Groves, anOcean Broods. Also like theincorporation of your zine titleinto Winter Wolves. Yourpiece replying to SimonWhitechapels criticism anent Tolkien and CA Smith wasintriguing. I suspect whatWhitechapel means in referringto Tolkien as sentimental isthat Lord of the Rings (thework for which Tolkien is bestknown) is essentially what M.

John Harrison would termfantasy of consolation. Wecould consider in this regard aquote from Iris Murdoch:

Art presents the mostcomprehensible examples of thealmost irresistible human tendencyto seek consolation in fantasy andalso of the effort to resist this and thevision of reality which comes withsuccess. Success in fact is rare.

Almost all art is a form of fantasy-consolation and few artists achievethe vision of the real. - Iris Murdoch,The Sovereignty of Good

M. John Harrison has written:

The idea of consolatory fantasymakes me want to puke. Its not thatyou cant have comfort, or even ahappy ending of sorts, but to me theidea that the purpose of a book

should be to console intrinsicallymeans the purpose is therefore notto challenge or to subvert or to


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question; it is absolutely status quooriented - completely, rigidly,aesthetically - and I hate that idea. Ithink the best fantasy is about therejection of consolation using thefantastic aesthetic to do the opposite

of Consolation.

For further on this theory, seea LiveJournal entry byCameron Willis: - http://cain-devera.livejournal.com/8997.html

Some writers consider thatfantasy overall too easily takesrefuge in consolatory visions of

how the world could be, ratherthan confronting it as it is. There is a dialectic here thatcould be (and has been)discussed at length. I cantenter it at length in mailingcomments. Far be if from meto criticise Tolkien, or todefend Whitechapel, but I thinkthere is no doubt that Tolkiens

political stance was essentiallyreactionary and conservative,and that the values espousedin LOTR tend to theconsolatory in that they holdup a view of a vanished, pre-industrial England as the ideal.This, of course, doesnt detractfrom the many complexspiritual and fantastical ideasin his epic masterwork, nor

from the fact that hundreds ofthousands of people have beenturned on to fantasy via themedium of his fantasy trilogy.Certainly his immensescholarly knowledge givesMiddle Earth a sense of realitythat is rarely found in other,less academic fantasy writers. The matter of Tolkiens stylecould also be debated atlength. And I agree withWhitechapel that Tolkiens

titling one of his volumes TheReturn of the King is an anti-rational, loss assuagingelement. (But it is also avariant upon the old Arthurian

myth of the Wounded Land, afundamental trope of fantasy).Whether one can respectTolkiens yearning for a long-vanished pastoral England ornot depends on ones ownpolitical views. TolkiensCatholicity, I believe,contributed to a worldview inhis fiction that is essentiallyconservative and consolatory(yes, thats a pejorative whereIm concerned); but I respectthe richness of his imaginationwithin his imagined framework.I would like to know moreabout Shippeys theory ofentrelacement as a structuralelement in Tolkiens work.

Dalriadic (Scott Sheaffer).:

Congrats on 51 issues! I hopethings with the job anddaycare for Owen work out.Nice essay on the TwilightZone episode. I appreciate thissort of material, for as a near-50 year old, I find myselfbecoming fonder and fonder ofthe type of programmes inhorror/sf/fantasy that Iwatched when I was growing

up TZ, The Outer Limits, andall those great old horrorshows like Ghost Story, and soon. The difference seems to bethat in those days they ofteneither adapted the work ofdecent horror writers(Bradbury, Bloch, Matheson,Beaumont, et al) or had thosewriters scripting for the TV

shows. Ya just dont get thelikes of Rod Serling writing for
http://cain-devera.livejournal.com/8997.htmlhttp://cain-devera.livejournal.com/8997.htmlhttp://cain-devera.livejournal.com/8997.htmlhttp://cain-devera.livejournal.com/8997.htmlhttp://cain-devera.livejournal.com/8997.htmlhttp://cain-devera.livejournal.com/8997.html


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TV anymore. Curiously, Irecently picked up a box set ofa TV show called Ridley ScottsThe Hunger. Some of itsepisodes are hosted by

Terence Stamp, others byDavid Bowie. Some of itsepisodes are based on storiesby decent horror writers e.g.Robert Aickman and KarlEdward Wagner. Though not allthe filmed episodes of thisshow hold up to their initialpromise, it was still refreshingto see filmed versions ofstories that were well-craftedin the first place. Itsmentioned in your mailingcomment that Martins partnerFreya is dyslexic. So is mypartner Margi. We find that hercondition means that often shetalks things through at greatlength, as its easier to cometo conclusions by verbalisingthoughts. Occasionally Margi

misspells things or getsdirections wrong, but thisdoesnt detract from herremarkable talents as a poetand novelist. I still dontunderstand dyslexia all thatwell, though. Its a mysteriouscondition that Ill probablycontinue to explore as we goalong in our relationshiptogether.

Opharion VI (Mark Valentine): Ahem, yes, thatSherlock Holmes anthology!Your story sounds fascinating, Imust admit. I like thefragments of information thatcan sometimes lead toinspiration for a tale. CrowleysDiary of a Drug Fiend is a hoot

- I read it years ago in an oldAbacus paperback edition. I

envy yoru easy access to theContinent! Bruges, Florenceand Trieste indeed! We get anannual trip from Wollongong toCanberra.I see you know Ben

Fernee, an occult booksellerfrom whom I have purchased,on occasion. Im veryinterested in Dee and theEnochian magic system, andmoderate a group on Facebookabout it. Im interested in yourde la Mare collection. I intendto do work on de la Mare atsome stage, taking advantageof the extensive collection atSydney universitys FisherLibrary. Des Lewiss seriesNemonymous series soundsimilar to the publicationConsensual, out of WesternAustralia. These are erotic sfstories, and authors namesare withheld until the issuefollowing. I enjoyed theoverview of the year you

offered in this contribution(pace Wordsworth!).

Koshtra Belorn (MikeBarrett): Enjoyed this furtherpiece on Paula Volsky. I mustget hold of that Giant Rat ofSumatra story for myLovecraft-related collection.Marvin Kaye is a too-littlerecognised anthologist and

author I have his ThePossession of Immanuel Wolfand Other Improbable Tales.

EOD Mailing #141Hesperia (John Haefele).Congratulations, Grandpa. Iread the Derleth article withinterest. It always seems thereis still more to add to the saga!

What is Anything? (Joshi) Ialways read of your doings


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with admiration verging onwonder, and am sorry that atpresent you feel close toexhaustion. Your prolificoutput is truly astounding, and

I wonder how you can keep upthe pace. Thanks for theextracts from the forthcomingHPL biblio. Years ago (as ayounger HPL fan) I wrote allover the world for copies oftheses on Lovecraft cost mea pretty penny. These days its just nice to know of them.Perhaps Ill have a chance towrite my own sometime soon I may do postgraduate workwhen I finish my currentDouble Degree. I confess thatwhile I have followed yourplungings into Bierce, andeven read several of yourbooks about atheism andprejudice, I probably will notbuy all the Mencken projects.But I admire your ongoing

research on such writers. Riseand Fall of the Cthulhu Mythosshould be a delicious read. Ican hardly wait to hold a copy!Ive been in touch lately withGemma Files, a good friend ofCaitlin R. Kiernans if youenjoy Kiernans work youmight enjoy Filess as well. Theforthcoming Hippocampusbooks are making my mouth

water only pray that I dontactually salivate onto theLetters of HP Lovecraft andAugust Derleth when Ieventually tremblingly hold acopy in my hands! As for theslate of other projects in whichyou are engaged, I can onlyecho your gag me with aspoon!.

EOD Letter (Ken Faig):Loved reading about Ben

Clough, and even thetranscribed annotations in hiscopy of Marginalia werefascinating!Criticaster (Stephen

Walker): Always enjoy yourfindings about Lovecraft in popculture and various media.Forgotten Horror Icons(Randal Everts): Fascinatingread about Rondo Hatton. Ivenot yet seen any of Hattonsmovies, though always readabout them in reference books. This has piqued my interestagain.Aurora Borealis (MartinAndersson) : Yeah, I wish ahad a spare hundred thou forThe Shunned House ms. Ohwait, here it is my in my piggybank. Lol John Pelans projecton Longs fiction is intriguing Im yet to learn to what extentit may overlap with materialintended for publication by

Perry Grayson (now resident inOz see Aust Kalem Clubreport below).XIIth Legion (SeanMcLachlan): Interesting pieceon Lovecraft in Spain. I wonderwhy no bios I would havethought Joshis Lovecraft: ALife would have made it intoItalian, French and Spanish bynow. And surely the Spanishwould have a version ofHoullebecqs Lovecraft:Against the World(not that itsa bio, but its a Europeanappreciation of the Old Gent).Also enjoyed the piece onPhillips Gamwell. And while Idont intend buying into theongoing Koran/terrorismcontroversy, I applaud your

bringing forth of originalquotes from which Mr Burleson


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took some of his arguments inprevious issues. If one is goingto criticize, one must contendwith the actual texts incontext.

Morgan & Rice Gazette(Don&Mollie Burleson): Enjoyablenotes on doings and holidays,including the festivalSolstice, which soundswonderful. I think its goingoverboard, (and simplistic) -whether or not one agrees withthe viewpoint of radical Islam to claim that the contributionsof the Islamic world to cultureof various sorts is long ago andelementary. The problem I findwith the ranting youre doinghere, Don, is not youropposition to religiousfanaticism to which youreperfectly entitled - but the wayin which you seem to beidentifying all Muslim peopleas irrevocably extremist,

stupid and fanatical. Its justnot so. In Australia, people ofMiddle Eastern appearanceare continually being subjectedto prejudice and legal action,and as with most of the 9-11suspected terrorists, oftenwithout a shred of evidence forany wrongdoing. Lets face it,religious fanaticism exists ingreat degree in America, with

its fundamentalist Christianmillions who are quite willingto support a saber-rattlingPresident who wants to bombthe hell out of most of theMiddle East to protect oil andmilitary-industrial complexinterests Im also curioushow you reconcile yourphilosophy as a scientist with

the interest in UFOs that youhave many people may

regard that as simplymindless superstition, whichis what you accuse theMuslims of. Now Im anoccultist, and I share the view

that there are more things inheaven and earth than aredreamt of in your philosophy but your anti-Muslim stanceseems to me to be vergingextremism itself, and I thinkany form of extremism is to beguarded against. There areelements of Muslim religionwhich are extremelyoppressive certainly towomen but again I wouldpoint out that systems ofdomination and oppressionexist deeply in Westernsocieties its not just theMiddle East that has amonopoly on that. What aboutthe Popes plan to reintroduceexorcists and fund a wholenew batch of witchhunters in

every parish throughout theworldwide Catholicdominions?...Well, I didnt come in on thebeginning of the conversation,but Ive followed it through afew issues. It seems to me tobe a complex issue, and not assimple as you are (in someways) making out. Enough onthis, I am more interested in

other issues.Raw New Things (JohnGoodrich):Just got DissectingHannibal Lecter and will readyour essay this week.Comments next time if Iremember. So you know DavidConyers? Maybe we could allhook up one day and write aCthulhu Mythos story! (lol).

The review of the JapaneseLovecraft series was


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informative. One day Ill getthese suckers and the otherbooks reviewed in your issue.Redux (TR Livesey): Thispiece on Lovecraft and

astronomy is certainly themost solid piece of Lovecraftian criticism I haveseen in the mailings for awhile. It encourages me to tryand do some more solidarticles instead of just waffling!Ibid (Ben Indick): Glad tohear youre better. I envy youyour meetings with St, Wilumet al. Glad you get Ned Brooksfanzines. I dropped off his listfor a few years, but now get ItGoes on the Shelf and ItComes in the Mail again.I agree they are delightful.Nice piece on The Outsiderand your wartime activities.Also enjoyed the piece onMerritt and HPL. Ive beenreading Merritts The Moon

Pool for the first time. My storyThe Return of Zoth-Ommogis set in Ponape I conceivedthe idea before I realised thatMerritts novel was set there and I steadfastly avoidedreading the Merritt until myown story was written andpublished, to avoid influence.Ill get around to reading therest of Merritt at some stage.

Drakes Potpourri (DavidDrake): Nice insight into yournotetaking and researchtechniques David.Kommati (Fred Phillips): Iwas intrigued by the folklorereference about spiders andLovecrafts poem Lament forthe Vanished Spider. And yes,that CS Lewis quote sounds

surprisingly Lovecraftian! TheCommentary

Resh was a good read and Ilook forward to the next part.In Thelemic (Crowleyanmagick), Liber Resh is a dailyadoration to the Sun

performed by all good Thelemites. Much as I enjoyreading your contribution,Fred, the typeface you use isso tiny it does my eyes nogood is there any chance youcould switch to a 12point font?Its been good to communicateby email with you on a fewoccasions recently.

THE AUSTRALIANKALEM CLUB:

SOME RECOLLECTIONS OFTHE INAUGURAL MEETING,

JAN 2008.

In January I had what I considerto be an historic meeting withfellow fantasy and horror fansin Sydney. My close friendsChris Sequeira and BryceStevens were bothunfortunately unable to makeit, but the gathering that didresult consisted of myself,Danny Lovecraft (poet and

proprietor of Prea Press,Sydney); Phillip A. Ellis (poetand bon vivant); Benjamin J.Szumskyj (definitely not a poetas far as I know butaccomplished in many fields);and Perry Grayson (rock muso,and proprietor of TsathogguaPress).

The occasion was really thatBen was visiting Sydney fromWA (thousands of miles away


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on Australias west Coast fromSydney, which is on AustraliasEast), and it was a rare chanceto meet with him. Phillip alsotravelled all the way down

from Banora Point in NorthernNSW for the occasion. Therewas quite a Lovecraftianflavour to the day, althoughtalk ranged far and wide acrossour favourite authors in thefields of horror and fantasy.Despite the intense summerheat of the day, I had athoroughly delightful time such a gathering was one I haddreamt of for many years.We started at the steps ofSydneys Town Hall, where weexchanged gifts (mainly books)and I believe everyone wasquite chuffed to engage thisact of potlatch! I received a CDof Donald Sidney-Fryer readingClark Ashton Smiths TheHashish Eater and a copy of

his CAS: The SorcererDeparts (Tsathoggua Press)from Perry; and Ben gave me amagnificent gift the firstvolume of Smiths CollectedPoems (Hippocampus Press).Danny also gave me thingswhich I cant recall at thisdistant date, but suffice to sayI was bowled over byeveryones generosity!

L-R: Perry, Danny, Phil &

Ben.

We then visited GalaxyBookshop, Sydneys premier sfbookshop. Various of us madepurchasesMy budget couldonly stretch to one book. I

bought the English-languageedition of Michel HoullebecqsH.P. Lovecraft: Against theWorld, Against Life (I had it inFrench, thanks to bookmooch,but needed the English text).There were many other books Icould happily have snaffledhad the funds been there, but Itired to content myself withthis. Then we adjourned toAshwoods, a secondhandbookshop of many yearsstanding in Sydney, where afew further purchases weremade. I bought back a copy ofPenelope loves Castle of Eyes(inscribed to me by the author)which I had sold (amongstmany others) when in thethroes of divorce some years

previously! Phil and Perryducked in to have a look atAbbeys, another bookshop witha fearsomely good andtempting range of stuff. Thenwe went for breakfast at JetCaf in the Queen VictoriaBuilding. Danny, as is his wont,had been entertaining myselfand Ben with pointing outvarious architectural features

of the Queen Vic Bldg,reminding one more thananything of how his namesake,the great HP himself, used tohold forth knowledgably aboutarchitectural features whenaccompanied by his friends.


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L-R: Phil and Danny at JetCaf

L-R: Perry, me and Ben atJet cafe

Over food, I had various of theattendees sign copies of booksand things they had published

(its called being a groupie!). Ibelieve I also signed an old outof print copy ofTerror Australisthat Ben had gotten hold ofsomewhere. Ben wasextremely generous inshouting us all (good Aussieterm that) to our repast,having paid before the rest ofus had any chance to protest.

Ice-cream eating in honourof Lovecraft! L-R: Phillip,Perry & Ben (at back),

Leigh (front), Danny, onGoulburn St, Sydney.

We then made our waythrough St Andrews Cathedral -

I wish I had room to include allthe photos here, but this issuewould be too large if I did. Afew religious differencesbetween us surfaced duringthe visit but all was amicable!Then it was a slow amble downto Darling Harbour. En route,we stopped off for ice-cream this was a truly Lovecraftiantouch, and necessary , for theday was extremely hot.

Danny and I (at least) weretempted to engage in a replicaof HPLs famous ice-cream-eating contest where he andcolleagues sampled all theavailable flavours, but wecurbed our enthusiasm enoughto be content with getting five

different flavours between usand sampling some of each.Another fab experience I hadalways wanted to indulge inwith like-minded fans!

At the shores of DarlingHarbour, today a highlycommercialized touristprecinct with parks, rides,convention centres, museums

and hotels, we picked a spot tostand while Danny declaimed apassage from Lovecrafts theCall of Cthulhu, concerningthe arrival of the Vigilant withNew Zealand yacht in tow, anda rescued seaman found inpossession of an odd stoneidol. While we didnt go to theplace where the old paddle-

steamers would have actuallypulled in, it felt right and


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proper to be honouringLovecraft in this way in thisvicinity.

The age-hoared wharves ofeldritch Darling Harbour! L-

R (back): Ben, Phil, Perry;(front): Danny, Leigh.

From Darling Harbour wetrudged back via the Town HallSquare and across Hyde Parktowards the AustralianMuseum, which is (of course)the location in Lovecraftsstory of the hideous stone idolof Cthulhu. We talked long of

our favourite authors and evenof their sexual proclivities, and(of course) of the multifariouspublishing projects we havegoing between us. For me itwas truly the nearest thing Icould imagine to walking thestreets of some city like New York with HPL and his friendsin the original days of theKalem Club. Phillip had a habitof darting ahead of the packat the traffic lights, and weoften found ourselves wavingat him across the traffic-choked byways.

In Hyde Park we sat beneath ashady tree, and recuperatedour energies while continuingour meeting of the minds.

Perry was a mine of information on American

Lovecraftians and Smithians,as he has met many of them.Phillip, Ben and Danny all hadnuggets of information andcurious, eldritch speculations

to make anent currentdevelopments in Robert EHoward studies, fantasy poetryand other aspects of ourchosen genre.

Here the encumbring weight of ageIts bitterest force a while resigns,

For sylvan spells reverse the page,And bare the long-hid earlier lines

(HP Lovecraft).L-R: Phil, Ben, Danny, Perry inHyde Park, Sydney.

Then we entered the hallowedhalls of the Australian Museumitself. I have been there manytimes over the years, as mygrandparents used to take methere when I was a child. And Ihad written a Cthulhu Mythosstory (Close to the Bone) inthe 1980s that is set there.


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In the Aboriginal cave,Australian Museum, Sydney: L-R: Perry, me, Phil andBen.After a bite to eat in the

museum caf, we had a fineand intriguing time lookingaround the exhibits on variouslevels. The photograph of usinside shows us within areplicated Aboriginal cave. Itwas part of an exhibit ofindigenous paintings andculture.I have included a photo at thebeginning of the issue showingus all in the Museums centralhall. Other photos from the daywill have to await futurepublication, but theres onehere of us standing outsidenear the Museum steps.

At the Australian Museum,Sydney. L-R: Phil, Ben,

Danny, Perry.

Finally, we crossed again toHyde Park (the other section ofit, this time). The SydneyFestival was on, and acrossfrom the amphitheatre wherewe were sitting, I glimpsedwhat looked like a circushoarding. I suggested we takeour final photograph in front of

it, for it put me in mind of suchclassic horror stories as

Bradburys The Jar andCharles Finneys The Circus ofDr Lao. It should perhaps havebeen called The Circus of DrSzumskyj! We parted on a

cordial note, having had anexhausting but extremelyenjoyable day. Thanks toDanny for preparing theitinerary, and thanks to all theguys for one of the mostmemorable and enjoyableexcursions I have ever had. Ihope that the Australian KalemClub will meet at leastannually, as Ben promises tovisit Sydney again in thefuture.

Freaks of Dr Szumskyjscircus: L-R: Danny, Phil,Perry, Ben.

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