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Horizons, v. 2, issue 4, June 1941
Page 4
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HORIZONS GLANCING BEHIND YOU doesn't sound so pedantic, or the whole situation usually can be seen coming and re-phrasing affected before trouble starts. For a nice discussion, "We Who Speak English," by, if memory serves, Charles Allen Lloyd, is recommended. We untangled the sentences diagram: that wasn't the way we had to do it! Pictures on last page really deserve some sort of special award. What under the sun was used to make them slick? Ramblings: Not much can be said about it without breaking our resolution not to start talking about affairs outside of stf & related subjects in Horizon until we feel half-way capable or saying something and not sounding too silly. ------------------------- It were best to mention here that if there's a cover for this issue, it's drawn and very kindly put onto hekto paper with hekto inks and crayons, by Walter Earl Marconette. Uncertainty is because we never get it until the last minute. Reason for being so explicit is that WHM nearly had trouble renewing his FAPA membership for lack of activity, since he doesn't sign his work and we either didn't mention who does these covers or put it in an inconspicuous place. Of course, there's no waiting list, so he could have re-joined at the time activity or no activity, but it's best to go into detail about such things. Uses up space, at least. ....................................... Which slides us very gently up to another topic. It seems there's to be yet another proposed amendment to be voted on in the mailing this issue of Horizons, knock wood some more, appears in. We already came out for the increased dues. But this one is to require members of the FAPA who have not been active for the twelve-month period covered by due to refrain from re-joining for a period of two mailings, waiting list or no waiting list. That's remarkably unclear, but you'll get it in due form elsewhere in this mailing. In other words, if you join the FAPA, are a member for a year without activity through the organization but have had credentials published elsewhere and there's no waiting list, under the proposed amendment you wouldn't be able to re-join as you used to. Object, of course, is very commendable: to saw away some of the dead wood that is wrecking all of the other Amateur Press associations and is beginning to plague the FAPA a bit since the once-big waiting list disappeared. But we can't recommend it just yet. There's one important factor, on which there is no time to check. In one case this angle isn't presented elsewhere in this mailing, here it is: At present, "activity" in the FAPA is almost completely limited to publishing. Perhaps half of the magazines are theoretically open to outside contributions, but actually publish little if anything from other than their publishers -- The Lovecraftian, for instance. I'm pretty sure that a few of us who joined the FAPA did so with any definite intentions of putting out a magazine. We thought activity could take care of itself by sending a short article or poem somewhere, or even without it there might not be any waiting list and thus we could get in at the end of a twelvemonth. So we joined. The point is -- if such a regulation were in effect, would it discourage potential new members from joining? Once you get in the organization, you're much more likely to make plans to publish something through it than before you joined -- that is, your membership and your seeing what the other members are doing are likely to stir you up to publishing heights. The trouble is we haven't any idea just how much dead wood there is. If it's only half a dozen members who are regular parasites, the amendment should be passed, very obviously and positively. But if a lot more than that go along just for the ride, it might in the long run do more harm than good. Obviously, when a former member would be forced to miss a couple of mailings, he'd be unlikely to renew after his period of purgatory was over. The question, as we see it, is not whether the amendment is in the right spirit or not; it's whether the amendment is likely to stir up activity or cause membership to drop off to a dangerously low point. You'll just have to look over the membership lists from past Fantasy Amateurs and decide for yourselves: we've had our say. Period.
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HORIZONS GLANCING BEHIND YOU doesn't sound so pedantic, or the whole situation usually can be seen coming and re-phrasing affected before trouble starts. For a nice discussion, "We Who Speak English," by, if memory serves, Charles Allen Lloyd, is recommended. We untangled the sentences diagram: that wasn't the way we had to do it! Pictures on last page really deserve some sort of special award. What under the sun was used to make them slick? Ramblings: Not much can be said about it without breaking our resolution not to start talking about affairs outside of stf & related subjects in Horizon until we feel half-way capable or saying something and not sounding too silly. ------------------------- It were best to mention here that if there's a cover for this issue, it's drawn and very kindly put onto hekto paper with hekto inks and crayons, by Walter Earl Marconette. Uncertainty is because we never get it until the last minute. Reason for being so explicit is that WHM nearly had trouble renewing his FAPA membership for lack of activity, since he doesn't sign his work and we either didn't mention who does these covers or put it in an inconspicuous place. Of course, there's no waiting list, so he could have re-joined at the time activity or no activity, but it's best to go into detail about such things. Uses up space, at least. ....................................... Which slides us very gently up to another topic. It seems there's to be yet another proposed amendment to be voted on in the mailing this issue of Horizons, knock wood some more, appears in. We already came out for the increased dues. But this one is to require members of the FAPA who have not been active for the twelve-month period covered by due to refrain from re-joining for a period of two mailings, waiting list or no waiting list. That's remarkably unclear, but you'll get it in due form elsewhere in this mailing. In other words, if you join the FAPA, are a member for a year without activity through the organization but have had credentials published elsewhere and there's no waiting list, under the proposed amendment you wouldn't be able to re-join as you used to. Object, of course, is very commendable: to saw away some of the dead wood that is wrecking all of the other Amateur Press associations and is beginning to plague the FAPA a bit since the once-big waiting list disappeared. But we can't recommend it just yet. There's one important factor, on which there is no time to check. In one case this angle isn't presented elsewhere in this mailing, here it is: At present, "activity" in the FAPA is almost completely limited to publishing. Perhaps half of the magazines are theoretically open to outside contributions, but actually publish little if anything from other than their publishers -- The Lovecraftian, for instance. I'm pretty sure that a few of us who joined the FAPA did so with any definite intentions of putting out a magazine. We thought activity could take care of itself by sending a short article or poem somewhere, or even without it there might not be any waiting list and thus we could get in at the end of a twelvemonth. So we joined. The point is -- if such a regulation were in effect, would it discourage potential new members from joining? Once you get in the organization, you're much more likely to make plans to publish something through it than before you joined -- that is, your membership and your seeing what the other members are doing are likely to stir you up to publishing heights. The trouble is we haven't any idea just how much dead wood there is. If it's only half a dozen members who are regular parasites, the amendment should be passed, very obviously and positively. But if a lot more than that go along just for the ride, it might in the long run do more harm than good. Obviously, when a former member would be forced to miss a couple of mailings, he'd be unlikely to renew after his period of purgatory was over. The question, as we see it, is not whether the amendment is in the right spirit or not; it's whether the amendment is likely to stir up activity or cause membership to drop off to a dangerously low point. You'll just have to look over the membership lists from past Fantasy Amateurs and decide for yourselves: we've had our say. Period.
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