Books

I read…a lot. Here’s where I ramble about books and printed media.

Ten Tech Items Inspired by Science Fiction

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(Originally posted on Google Answers, I’ve taken the liberty of reformatting this fascinating look at past visions of the future that influenced the technology of today. Note that I am not the author of this piece.)

Question:

I WAS going to ask you to research whether or not there have been any women in Sci-Fi but I have answered that myself, having found Flash Gordon’s moll.

However it is a Sci-Fi question.

Can you list 10 real technological ‘things’ that have reputedly come out of Sci-Fi stuff written in the 20th Century?

Here’s an example, computer viruses were reputedly inspired by ‘When Harlie Was One’ by David Gerrold.

Answer:

I have chosen ten outstanding technological concepts which had their
popular origins in the world of sci-fi. It is debatable, in some
cases, whether the science fiction source was the actual originator,
but it’s certainly true that each of these ideas was given a boost
into reality by an SF writer.

THE GEOSTATIONARY SATELLITE: Arthur C. Clarke

Although this concept was not described in a work of fiction, it was popularized by a man primarily known for his flights of fancy, Arthur C. Clarke:

A geostationary orbit (abbreviated GSO) is a circular orbit in the Earth’s equatorial plane, any point on which revolves about the Earth in the same direction and with the same period as the Earth’s rotation. It is a special case of the geosynchronous orbit, and the one which is of most interest to artificial satellite operators.

Geosynchronous orbits and geostationary orbits were first popularised by science fiction author Arthur C. Clarke Sir Arthur C. Clarke in 1945 as useful orbits for communications satellites. As a result they are sometimes referred to as Clarke orbits. Similarly, the ‘Clarke Belt’ is the part of space approximately 35,790 km above mean sea level in the plane of the equator where near-geostationary orbits may be achieved.

— The Free Dictionary: Clarke Orbit

THE COMPUTER WORM: John Brunner

1975…John Shoch and Jon Hupp at the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center discover the computer ‘worm,’ a short program that searches a network for idle processors. Initially designed to provide more efficient use of computers and for testing, the worm had the unintended effect of invading networked computers, creating a security threat.

Shoch took the term ‘worm’ from the book ‘The Shockwave Rider,’ by John Brunner, in which an omnipotent ‘tapeworm’ program runs loose through a network of computers. Brunner wrote: ‘No, Mr. Sullivan, we can’t stop it! There’s never been a worm with that tough a head or that long a tail! It’s building itself, don’t you understand? Already it’s passed a billion bits and it’s still growing. It’s the exact inverse of a phage – whatever it takes in, it adds to itself instead of wiping… Yes, sir! I’m quite aware that a worm of that type is theoretically impossible! But the fact stands, he’s done it, and now it’s so goddamn comprehensive that it can’t be killed. Not short of demolishing the net!’ (247, Ballantine Books, 1975).

— Computer History Museum: Timeline

ORGANLEGGING: Larry Niven

A few organ transplants were being performed in the 1970s, but author Larry Niven was one of the first to write about some of the social problems that might accompany widespread use of this life-extending technology. Niven wrote several stories which involved huge “organ banks,” some of which were kept stocked by unwilling “donations” from prisoners who had committed petty crimes. A lucrative black market of human organ trafficking, which many believe exists today, was foreseen by Niven:

Organlegging is the removal of human organs by a means of theft for resale for profit. Larry [Niven] coined the phrase in his Gil the ARM Stories. The main character and detective of the future police force or ARM tracks down many of the ‘Organleggers’ and their crime syndicates and brings them to justice. Gil Hamilton’s most astonishing special ability is his telepathic psychic arm – but read the stories! The original Long ARM of Gil Hamilton collection was published in 1976.

Today the practice of selling organs for profit is becoming commonplace in the third world and increasingly these organs are being removed without the donor’s consent.

— Nivenisms in the News

THE WALDO: Robert A. Heinlein

Robert A. Heinlein, one of science fiction’s greatest visionaries, is credited with creating the name (and popularizing the concept) of the Waldo, a device with which a human can manipulate objects by remote. In Heinlein’s tale, titled “Waldo,” a wealthy genius who is enfeebled by disease uses mechanical hands to interact with the world:

Afflicted with myasthenia gravis from earliest childhood, Waldo lacks the muscular strength to walk or lift things with his arms. By living in the weightlessness of space he is able to move freely. His primary invention is a system of remote-controlled mechanical hands which the world has nicknamed waldoes.

— We Grok It: Waldo & Magic, Inc., 1942

Before their application in motion pictures and television, ‘Waldos’ primarily referred to the mechanical arms, telemetry, and other anthropomorphic gadgetry aboard the NASA spacefleet. NASA engineers in turn took the name from a 1940 Robert A. Heinlein novella about a disabled scientist named Waldo who built a robot to amplify his limited abilities.

— Character Shop: What’s a Waldo, Anyway?

GYRO-STABILIZED PERSONAL CONVEYANCE: Robert A. Heinlein

Robert A. Heinlein again. In a 1940 short story, “The Roads Must Roll,” RAH described the “Tumblebug,” a one-person vehicle that is stabilized gyroscopically, much like the Segway Human Transporter (now available) or the Bombardier Embrio (which is still in development). The same story described a public transport system, the “rolling road,” that is similar to mass people-moving devices now in use at large airports.

A tumblebug does not give a man dignity, since it is about the size and shape of a kitchen stool, gyro-stabilized on a singe wheel…. It can go through an opening the width of a man’s shoulders, is easily controlled, and will stand patiently upright, waiting, should its rider dismount.

— Danny’s Blog Cabin: Sci-fi authors predict the future (kind of)

THE WATERBED: Robert A. Heinlein

I’m not finished with Heinlein yet. ;-)

The modern waterbed was created by Charles Hall in 1968, while he was design student at San Francisco State University in California. Hall originally wanted to make an innovative chair. His first prototype was a vinyl bag with 300 pounds of cornstarch, but the result was uncomfortable. He next attempted to fill it with Jell-O, but this too was a failure. Ultimately, he abandoned working on a chair, and settled on perfecting a bed. He succeeded. His timing could not have been more perfect: the Sexual Revolution was under way, and Hall’s waterbed became enormously popular, making it one of the most notable icons of the 1970s. However, because a waterbed is described in the novel Stranger in a Strange Land… by Robert A. Heinlein, which was first published in 1961, Hall was unable to obtain a patent on his creation.

— The Free Dictionary: Waterbed

Heinlein described the mechanical details of the waterbed in Stranger [in a Strange Land], which is where the rest of the world learned about it. But what’s more interesting, and less known, is why he came up with the idea: Heinlein, a man of chronically poor health, was trying to create the perfect hospital bed.

— TSAT: Predicting the Future

HOME THEATER & WALL-MOUNTED TV: Ray Bradbury

Ray Bradbury is associated more with “soft” SF or fantasy than with “hard” science fiction. Nevertheless, there are several high-tech devices in Bradbury’s classic 1953 dystopian novel Fahrenheit 451 (which is absolutely unrelated to Michael Moore’s recent filmic diatribe). Most notable is Bradbury’s description of huge, photorealistic flat-screen televisions with elaborate sound systems in home entertainment rooms called “parlours,” which provide an array of soap operas and other mind-numbing diversions in a future society which has banned most books.

This may sound unremarkable to younger readers, but those of us who remember the tiny, indistinct black-and-white TV sets of the early 1950s were (and are) duly impressed by Mr. Bradbury’s vision.

THE FLIP-PHONE: Gene Roddenberry et al.

I’ve got to get my “Star Trek” plug in here somehow. The original, ’60s Trek looks extremely dated today; although it’s set hundreds of
years in the future, technology has caught up with it (and in some
cases surpassed it in ways that the creators could not have
anticipated). One thing that I find quite striking is the resemblance,
both in appearance and function, between the flip-open communicator
devices used by the crew of the Starship Enterprise and today’s
wireless flip-phones.

Star Trek communicatorHere’s a photo of a communicator, circa 1967.

Samsung v200 Flip PhoneAnd here’s a Samsung flip-phone.

When “Star Trek: The Next Generation” replaced the flip-style communicators with a “com badge” in the late 1980s, the future was again prefigured. Today, wireless LAN-based lapel communicators are commonly used in hospitals.

THE TASER: “Victor Appleton”

Author Victor Appleton (the pseudonym of Howard Garis, also known for the “Uncle Wiggily” books) provided inspiration for the modern personal protection device, the taser (or “stun gun.”) The word “TASER” is an acronym for “Thomas A. Swift’s Electrical Rifle,” so named because the inventor was an admirer of Tom Swift when he was a child. The book “Tom Swift and His Electric Rifle” was published in 1911. Tom Swift was the adolescent hero of a series of books aimed at juvenile readers. Tom was the Harry Potter of his day. The books typically told of Tom’s adventures involving high-tech equipment such as a “sky train” or an “electric runabout.” Monorails and hybrid cars, anyone?

The Taser was developed in the late 1960’s by Jack Cover, who came up with the idea as a result of hearing about a U.S. commission which was looking into non-lethal ways police could deal with violent offenders. Cover based the Taser on a kind of stun gun he had read about in the Tom Swift fantasy stories of his childhood, thus the acronym, ‘Thomas A. Swift Electrical Rifle’.

First used by the Los Angeles Police Department in 1976, the Taser is now used by hundreds of police departments in the U.S.

— Smith Secretarial: High-Tech Non-Lethal Weapon New Option for Police!

MULTI-USER DOMAINS IN CYBERSPACE: Vernor Vinge

While many fans attribute numerous important details of cyberspace to author William Gibson, I’d like to look a bit farther back, to the seminal novella “True Names,” by Vernor Vinge. In this striking work of fiction (written in 1979 and published in 1981, long before personal computers and the Web became part of our daily lives), Vinge offers vividly imagined depictions of many concepts which are everyday Internet realities today. Vinge’s online communities presage chatrooms and multi-user domains in an uncannily accurate fashion (complete with a few disagreeable and destructive individuals who take pleasure in wreaking havoc). Vinge was, as far as I can tell, the first writer to use the term “avatar” to describe a digital image that represents an anonymous computer user. Vinge called the online access point a “portal.” As you read this 25-year-old story, it seems totally contemporary: much of what was fictional in 1979 is factual today.

True Names is about Roger Pollack, a well-to-do individual living in the early 21st century. In this wired world, Pollack is known on the ‘Other Plane’ of the computer net as Mr. Slippery, a top-flight warlock (hacker) and member of one of the foremost covens of such. Unfortunately, the government have figured out Mr. Slippery’s True Name, and captures him. But it’s not him they want: They want his assistance in finding and stopping another warlock, the Mailman, who they suspect of far worse plots than anything the garden-variety warlocks have concocted. With no choice, Pollack agrees.

Pollack contacts the rest of his coven, which the Mailman – who only communicates through time delay – has recently joined. The Other Plane is perceived by most as a fantasy world, and the details of the network are mapped to concepts familiar to that milieu. Individuals on the Other Plane adopt new identities, but keep their true names secret, since – as Roger has found out – blackmail is all too easy when someone knows who you are in the real world…

True Names was prescient in its day, foreseeing cyberspace and virtual reality in all its glory several years before William Gibson’s Neuromancer, and building on 70s stories like John Brunner’s The Shockwave Rider. Vinge correctly understood the importance of secrecy and cryptography, the coming pervasiveness of computer networks, and how the personal computer would open up the world of computing to the everyman.

— Pages of Michael Rawdon: Vernor Vinge

Read it! You’ll be entertained and amazed.

A personal note: I regard this novella so highly that, when choosing my Google Answers screen name in 2002, I very nearly went with the name “Erythrina,” a major character from “True Names.” I decided not to use this name after I told a friend about my plans, and she said “Erythrina??? Isn’t that a disease?”

Others…

A wonderful site called Technovelgy.com has a list of 652 science fiction devices and concepts, some of which have “come true.” I’ve selected a few of the most interesting items:

Thanks

Many thanks for a truly fascinating question. I shall sign off by borrowing a charming phrase from my friend and colleague Denco-ga:

Looking Forward,

Pink

Tattoo number two: Ouroboros

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Some time ago, I got my first tattoo: a yin-yang made of smiley faces, a design I was taken with because of the symbolism of the yin-yang (light and dark intertwined and dependent upon each other) and the incorporation of the smiley face, which I interpreted as meaning that light or dark, good or bad, there’s some good in every situation.

For some time now, I’ve been pondering what to get as a second tattoo. I didn’t want to get something merely because it “looked cool” or struck my fancy for a passing moment. Rather, I wanted to get something to both complement and balance the tattoo I already had. As the smiley yin-yang is a roughly 3 inch diameter circle on my right upper arm/shoulder, I knew I something similar on my left upper arm, but I wanted to find something that matched thematically, as well as visually.

Nothing struck my fancy for quite a few years, but off and on for the past year or so, I’ve been thinking more and more seriously about one particular design that first caught my eye when I was around eleven or so.

At that time, movies often came to Anchorage months after they had wide release in the lower 48. I’d seen trailers on television for a new fantasy movie that looked incredibly cool: The Neverending Story. However, the movie just didn’t ever seem to come out, and I eventually went out and picked up the book by Michael Ende.

I completely and entirely fell in love with the book (and later was somewhat disappointed by the movie when it eventually hit Anchorage — it’s enjoyable and a lot of fun on its own, but it only covers the first half of the book, ignores roughly half of that, and scrambles what little is left), but the cover of that edition of the book featured stills from the movie, and had Atreyu’s amulet, the Auryn, featured prominently on the front cover.

The Neverending Story

The Auryn in the film was actually a stylized version of an Ouroboros: while the traditional Ouroboros is a single snake consuming its own tail, the Auryn was designed as two intertwined snakes, one light and one dark, each consuming the other’s tail.

The symbol has stuck with me ever since then, and more and more often as of late, it’s been popping into my head as what I’d like to get to complement the tattoo I already have. I spent a little time this morning trying to find good images and information on the symbol — something of a difficult task, unfortunately, as there are quite a few possible spellings of Ouroboros — but have found a bit of each. I’m not sure if I’ve found an image that’s clean enough for me to give to a tattoo artist yet, but I did confirm some of what I’d already believed of the symbolism of the Ouroboros:

The ouroboros has several meanings interwoven into it. Foremost is the symbolism of the serpent biting, devouring, eating its own tail. This symbolises the cyclic Nature of the Universe: creation out of destruction, Life out of Death. The ouroboros eats its own tail to sustain its life, in an eternal cycle of renewal. In the above drawing, from a book by an early Alchemist, Cleopatra, the black half symbolises the Night, Earth, and the destructive force of nature, yin. The light half represents Day, Heaven, the generative, creative force, yang.

So it looks to me like we’ve got a winner. Now, the search is on for a good, clean image that will work well as a black-and-white tattoo. Once that’s done, it’ll be time to get inked again!

iTunes “Behind the Wheel” by Kirk from the album Trancemode Express 1.01: A Tribute to Depeche Mode (1996, 7:30).

Alan Moore interview

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There’s a stunningly good interview on Salon with Alan Moore, creator of the extremely well-regarded graphic novels “From Hell” and “Watchmen” (unfortunately, I’ve yet to read any of his work, though I’ve heard many good things about them). A definite must-read.

We invite [television] into our own home every night; I’m sure that some of us think of it as a friend. That might be a horrifying notion but I’m sure there are people who think of television as perhaps one of their most intimate friends. And if the TV tells them that things in the world are a certain way, even if the evidence of their senses asserts it is not true, they’ll probably believe the television set in the end. It’s an alarming thought but we brought it upon ourselves. I mean, I think that television is one of the most diabolical — in the very best sense of the word — inventions of the past century. It has probably done more to degrade the mind and intelligence of its audience, even if they happen to be drug addicts or alcoholics; I would think that watching television has done more to limit their horizons in the long run. And it has also distorted our culture.

TV and politics have always made inevitable bedfellows, but the results have been disastrous. Look at the situation we have now. Let’s say that tomorrow someone who is a political genius were to emerge — and I’m not expecting this to happen, but say that it did. Say that a politician emerged who seemed, for once, basically competent, who seemed to be able to do their job as well as the average cab driver, comic writer or journalist. If they were the most intelligent, visionary, humane political thinker in the history of mankind, but were also fat, had some sort of blemish or something that made them less than telegenic, we would not be able to elect them. All we’re able to elect are these telegenic, photogenic crypto-Nazis. As long as they look good.

(via Mike)

iTunes: “Gift, The” by Way Out West feat. Law, Miss Joanna from the album Deconstruction Presents (1996, 4:23).

Power corrupts…

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I’m just starting to re-read a book I first read quite a few years ago after discovering it somewhere in Dad’s stack of books, James Morrow’s Only Begotten Daughter. I’ve since read a few more of Morrow’s books, and he has a definite knack for religious satire, but I’ve wanted to pick this one up again for a while now.

There’s one particular short conversation in the book that’s stuck with me since I read it the first time. At this stage in the book, seventeen year old Julie Katz — only begotten daughter of God, born of the virgin Murray Katz — is having a discussion with Andrew Wyvern — the Devil.

“No problems? No questions? Need a recommendation?” Wyvern closed his cigarette case. “I can tell you why the universe is made of matter and not anti-matter. I can tell you why the electron has its particular charge. I can tell you —”

“There is one thing.”

“Shoot.”

“My mother…”

Wyvern began retracting the wick. The flame grew translucent.

And so did he.

“It always comes down to her, doesn’t it?”

“Why doesn’t she care about people?” The spring air dried Julie’s tears. “Why all the diseases and earthquakes?”

With a final twist of the knob, Wyvern’s body became a gaseous haze. The dead lantern hit the beach, dug into the sand. “The Columbian mud flows?”

“Yeah. The Columbian mud flows.”

“Actually, the answer’s quite simple.” Two red eyes floated in the mist.

“Really? Tell me. Why does God allow evil?”

The red eyes vanished, leaving only the lantern and the night. “Because power corrupts,” said Wyvern’s disembodied voice. “And absolute power corrupts absolutely.”

I got such a delicious chill down my spine when I read that the first time. Of course, I’d heard the phrase before, but never thought of applying it to God.

Now, the book does have quite a bit more to say than that, and it’s certainly not always that dismissive of God — this is fairly early on in the story, and consider the source of the accusation — it’s just a particularly favorite passage of mine.

iTunes: “Rex Caeli, Domine Maris (Musica Enchiriadis)” by Capella Antiqua Munchen from the album Gregorian Chant: Sequentiae (1992, 6:30).

Okay, okay, I’m awake, I get it

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Weird night last night — no matter what, I just couldn’t sleep solidly. Tossed and turned all night long, until I finally gave up trying to get back to sleep a little while ago. It’s Saturday and I’ve been up since just before 8am. Ah, well — hopefully a nap later in the day will happen, and I’ll knock myself back onto my usual schedule before too long.

I do remember having a long, very involved dream revolving around discovering that Lloyd Alexander had written a series of companion novels to his Prydain Chronicles: two collections of short stories, and a full trilogy of three almost Harry Potter-length novels set about sixteen years or so after the end of the Prydain Chronicles. I was really excited about this, found some beautiful leather-bound editions, but the bookstore I was at was missing the first book of the trilogy, so after flipping through the ones that were there and admiring the maps of Prydain in the front leaf, I started going to another book store to find the first of the new books.

Then I woke up, realized that it was all just a dream, and was very disappointed.

I’ve had a couple people notice that I’ve just been reading the (real) Prydain Chronicles after seeing them pop up in the sidebar and ask about them. I’m planning on writing about them, but at the moment Prairie’s borrowing my copies, and I’m waiting to put up a full post until I have the books back in my hands to quote from. So no smackings and crackings of my poor tender head, please — I’m getting there!

I’m also just a few CDs short of finally having every CD I own imported into my computer. It’s almost frightening how much music I have. Almost, but not quite. ;) More details on that once I’m actually done.

And, as long as I’m up and (apparently) functioning early enough, I’ll be catching the 10:40 ferry over to Bainbridge Island for today’s blogger picnic. Should be fun!

And the day begins…

iTunes: “All I Really Need” by Machines of Loving Grace from the album Rite of Shiva (1991, 5:07).

Mac OS X Panther Hacks

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I just wanted to toss out a quick congratulations to Phil, who with the release of O’Reilly’s Mac OS X Panther Hacks, is now officially a published (co-)author!

I haven’t even managed to wrangle my infamy into that particular accolade. ;)

iTunes: “Life In Ecstacy (Long Dong)” by Trust in 6 from the album Techno-Trax Vol. 1 (1991, 6:37).

Voices of the Beat: Burroughs, Ginsberg, and more…

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The Naropa Institute has just released a large number of recordings of lectures and classes to the Internet Archive. Included are recordings of William S. Burroughs, Allen Ginsberg and many, many more beat-era poets, writers, and personalities. Incredibly cool. Right now, I’m downloading a 1980 William S. Burroughs lecture on public discourse.

A lecture by William S. Burroughs on public discourse, with an introduction by Allen Ginsberg. Topics included are nuclear weapons, disarmament, the Equal Rights Amendment, aliens, dreams, function of the artist, mind-altering drugs, reincarnation, space travel, television, and economics. Keywords: beat generation, literature and the state, technology and literature, literature and society, protest literature

(via MeFi)

iTunes: “Empire Strikes Back (Medley)” by Meco from the album Best of Meco, The (1980, 4:05).

Of Course It’s Creepy!

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(Note: the following was originally a reply to some of the questions raised in the comments discussing an upcoming Tim Burton/Johnny Depp version of Roald Dahl‘s Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. My response became long enough that I decided to give it a post of its own rather than “bl-hog” my own blog.)

I have to comment on this one : What is it with this movie [Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory] that people love it so much? It’s one of the creepiest films I’ve ever seen in my life.

Obviously I can’t speak for everyone, but as for myself, I think the creepiness is one of the major factors in just why I enjoy it.

I’ve always had a fascination for the dark, creepy, and bizarre — I count H.R. Giger as one of my favorite artists, and William S. Burroughs as one of my favorite authors, for instance — and Roald Dahl’s writing is right up my alley. It’s amusing really. So many people have this image of Dahl writing “children’s” books, born of hazy memories of the film version of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, the stop-motion animation version of James and the Giant Peach, the Jim Henson version of The Witches, and so on. And to be sure, they are children’s books, however, they’re children’s books far closer in spirit to the original Grimm Brothers fairy tales than the pablum that passes for children’s literature today.

For some reason, our society seems to have decided that children need to be coddled, pandered to, and generally sheltered at any cost from the darker areas of life (while at the same time using the television as a babysitter without bothering to supervise what the children are watching…but that’s a rant for another time). Playgrounds are torn down and rebuilt to try to prevent the merest hint of the possibility of injury, classic fairy tales are “Disney-fied” to remove elements that are deemed inappropriate (no matter that they survived unaltered for tens and sometimes hundreds of years before that without our culture spontaneously imploding), toys are re-engineered from good solid long-lasting metal to flimsy plastic that doesn’t have any sharp corners but that breaks in months rather than years, and so on.

Children aren’t stupid, though. They know that life isn’t all sunshine and roses. From the first time they fall and skin a knee, or find their goldfish floating upside down in its bowl, or any number of any other day to day minor tragedies, children are no strangers to the darker side of life. They don’t approach these events in the same way that older people do, though — more often then not, after the initial trauma wears off, they’re curious and want to know the “why’s” behind what just happened — and this simple acceptance is so alien to our over-analytical “adult” minds that we fool ourselves into thinking that the children don’t understand. They do, though. They may not have the finer details and the subtleties down, they may not see it the same way adults do, but they understand.

The Grimm brothers understood this when they wrote their classic stories. Their tales were dark and disturbing, full of violence, abusive situations, scary moments, and everything that we seem to try to shield our children from in this overly “PC” day and age. But the stories had messages and morals to them that were passed onto the children that read them or heard them from their parents, and those messages and morals were probably all the more effective because they used the imaginations of the children, and the innate ability of the child’s mind to accept dragons, beasties, ghoulies, and things that go bump in the night just as easily as they accept rainbows, fairies, unicorns, and cute little gnomes living under toadstools.

Dahl also understands this in his children’s stories. His characters are flawed, rarely ever entirely good or entirely bad. They find themselves in fantastical situations that can be as wonderously exciting as they are chilling. His heroes learn the lessons that they should, but it’s never an easy course. No triumph is ever as sweet as that which carries a real risk of dismal failure, and if that simple truth is neglected, then the audience — whether an audience of one turning the pages of a book, or an theater audience watching an adventure unfurl on the screen — is cheated.

Some of the best “children’s” literature is that which doesn’t pander to the age group that the story is aimed at (and because of this, can often be enjoyed long past childhood and into adulthood). Along with Dahl and the Brothers Grimm, L. Frank Baum’s Oz books often took very dark turns, I’ve heard good things about Neil Gaiman’s Coraline (though I’ve yet to read it myself), J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter books keep getting darker and darker (and better, and more popular) as the series progresses…I’m sure there are many, many other authors and examples that could be added to this list.

Yes, both the book and the movie of Charlie and the Chocolate factory are creepy — but that’s exactly as it should be, and that’s one of the reasons I think that the Burton/Depp collaboration could do an incredible job of re-creating the story (assuming, that is, that Burton doesn’t pull another Planet of the Apes out of his hat). I, for one, am hoping for the best.

Could be brilliant or horrible

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Coming in 2005 — a new film version of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.

Directed by Tim Burton.

Starring Johnny Depp as Willy Wonka.

Hmmmmmmm…

It’s hard for me to see anyone surpassing the inspired lunacy of Gene Wilder as Wonka, but I do tend to like Burton/Depp collaborations. Reserving judgement for now, but it could be worth keeping an eye on.

(via Ryan)

iTunes: “Peter Bazooka” by Dead Milkmen, The from the album Death Rides a Pale Cow (1995, 3:07).

Literary geek (as opposed to literal geek, that is)

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You're as literary minded as the Bard himself!

You are a complete literary geek, from knowing the classics (even the not-so-well-known classics and tidbits about them) to knowing devices used in writing, when someone has a question about literature, they can bring it to you and rest assured; you know the answers.

[How much of a literary geek are you?
Brought to you by][] Quizilla.

[How much of a literary geek are you?
Brought to you by]: http://quizilla.com/users/Sedruce/quizzes/How%20much%20of%20a%20literary%20geek%20are%20you%3F/ “How much of a literary geek are you?”
Admittedly, I’d be a bit more impressed by this particular quiz if there weren’t so many spelling errors in the quiz itself. Still, it was cute. :)

(via Alicia)

iTunes: “Marathon” by Aubrey from the album Twisted Secrets Vol. 3 (1997, 6:51).