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En Garde, whole no. 7, September 1943
Page 5
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page 5. WHOPDOODLE: No comment. 'Twould be superfluous! SARDONYX: Your prophecy concerning the future of this country was very interesting, but not entirely convincing. It is a logical possibility. There appears to be some such trend as you suggest. But trends have a nasty habit of veering. Too bad this issue of S had to be curtailed. Hope the next is bigger. INSPIRATION: Glad to find one kindred soul regarding the stories in Astounding. Fandom is not going to pieces, we think, but the War is undoubtedly having an effect on it. Few of the fans seem to have the time to spare that they once did. And it is very true in our case.... just at a time, too, when we'd much prefer to devote all our time to fanning. You certainly rate some species of orchid, Lynn, for keeping on with Inspiration despite your Army duties. FAN TODS: To add to the confusion we suggest that "Tod" expresses a state of fatigue. A fan labors all day earning a living, then goes home and spends half the night putting out a fanzine. Hence the familiar expression, "Ugh! Fan-Tod!" Your comments on Sardonyx were exceptionally interesting and well-presented. Wish we had time to comment on them. You will find, though, in this issue of En Garde, Doc Smith's reply to your criticism of his inertialess drive. In case you don't know yet, the matchsticks in the Spring En Garde were runes. In your discussion of the quality of alien remoteness, or its lack, in stf stories, you seem to overlook Martian Odyssey. That story seemed to us to be as vivid and real as you could wish, and at the same time alien as hell. Vague settings and fearsome fauna fail somewhat of achieving that alien effect. Even illogical actions of other-world or other-time beings fall a little short of the desired effect. But when you explain those illogical actions or reactions by equally illogical (to us) motivations, then you are on the right track. Of course those motivations, can only be suggested or hinted at as a rule. And of course atmosphere etc. helps. But atmosphere is of necessity an unfamiliar combination of familiar things. For a strange or illogical action we automatically find some understandable, if slightly screwy, motivation, thus reducing the action to our own plane and robbing it of any alien qualities. But when the illogical motivation is suggested to explain the action, we are stymied. We get the feeling that the action is well motivated already, and our mind is prevented from interpolating something understandable. Understanding neither the action nor its motivation..... we get alienness. I hope. Yesterday's 10.000 Years -- the best yet! WOWSY WAMBLINGS: Come up and see us some time. And bring your own plasma. Our ration points are running out. YHOS: Hurrah! We had been intending to write and ask for details on "Interplanetary". Then came Yhos, saving us the trouble. We haven't had time to finish making the game yet, but look forward to the time when it is done and we can play it. Letter section very interesting. The word that came out "maw" in your soloosh to the runes did so because you used cryptography methods. The runic symbol for "w" is ᚹ [Wunjo rune], but the one for "th" is ᚦ [Thurisaz rune]. Thus the word was"math". Incidentally, that suggests a way to confuse and maybe foil a codebreaker. If separate symbols that closely resembled some utterly different single letter, were used to represent
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page 5. WHOPDOODLE: No comment. 'Twould be superfluous! SARDONYX: Your prophecy concerning the future of this country was very interesting, but not entirely convincing. It is a logical possibility. There appears to be some such trend as you suggest. But trends have a nasty habit of veering. Too bad this issue of S had to be curtailed. Hope the next is bigger. INSPIRATION: Glad to find one kindred soul regarding the stories in Astounding. Fandom is not going to pieces, we think, but the War is undoubtedly having an effect on it. Few of the fans seem to have the time to spare that they once did. And it is very true in our case.... just at a time, too, when we'd much prefer to devote all our time to fanning. You certainly rate some species of orchid, Lynn, for keeping on with Inspiration despite your Army duties. FAN TODS: To add to the confusion we suggest that "Tod" expresses a state of fatigue. A fan labors all day earning a living, then goes home and spends half the night putting out a fanzine. Hence the familiar expression, "Ugh! Fan-Tod!" Your comments on Sardonyx were exceptionally interesting and well-presented. Wish we had time to comment on them. You will find, though, in this issue of En Garde, Doc Smith's reply to your criticism of his inertialess drive. In case you don't know yet, the matchsticks in the Spring En Garde were runes. In your discussion of the quality of alien remoteness, or its lack, in stf stories, you seem to overlook Martian Odyssey. That story seemed to us to be as vivid and real as you could wish, and at the same time alien as hell. Vague settings and fearsome fauna fail somewhat of achieving that alien effect. Even illogical actions of other-world or other-time beings fall a little short of the desired effect. But when you explain those illogical actions or reactions by equally illogical (to us) motivations, then you are on the right track. Of course those motivations, can only be suggested or hinted at as a rule. And of course atmosphere etc. helps. But atmosphere is of necessity an unfamiliar combination of familiar things. For a strange or illogical action we automatically find some understandable, if slightly screwy, motivation, thus reducing the action to our own plane and robbing it of any alien qualities. But when the illogical motivation is suggested to explain the action, we are stymied. We get the feeling that the action is well motivated already, and our mind is prevented from interpolating something understandable. Understanding neither the action nor its motivation..... we get alienness. I hope. Yesterday's 10.000 Years -- the best yet! WOWSY WAMBLINGS: Come up and see us some time. And bring your own plasma. Our ration points are running out. YHOS: Hurrah! We had been intending to write and ask for details on "Interplanetary". Then came Yhos, saving us the trouble. We haven't had time to finish making the game yet, but look forward to the time when it is done and we can play it. Letter section very interesting. The word that came out "maw" in your soloosh to the runes did so because you used cryptography methods. The runic symbol for "w" is ᚹ [Wunjo rune], but the one for "th" is ᚦ [Thurisaz rune]. Thus the word was"math". Incidentally, that suggests a way to confuse and maybe foil a codebreaker. If separate symbols that closely resembled some utterly different single letter, were used to represent
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