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III: Oliver Postgate and Naomi Linnell, Becket: An Illumination of the Life and Death of Thomas Becket (London: Kingfisher, 1989)
Unusually this is drawings by Postgate, and very much in the Smallfilms style. This is based on a Bayeaux Tapestry style frieze (actually poster paints) of the life of Becket, which may be found in the Canterbury museum. It is accompanied by two texts by Linnell, Postgate's partner in later years, one a brief account of Becket's life, death and apotheosis, to accompany the cartoon strip, the other a more detailed telling of the story with more about the medieval world and politics. Charming, and signed.
IV: Arthur C. Clarke, Rendezvous with Rama (1973) [London: Futura, 1978]
I'm not sure, but I suspect I've only read a reduced vocabulary version of this book. One of the three classic Big Dumb Object novels of the early 1970s, with Ringworld and Orbitsville (watch this space). A giant asteroid is spotted coming into the solar system on a path dangerously close to inhabited planets, and a mission is launched to investigate. Closer inspection reveals it to be a huge spaceship, and the mission has three weeks to explore it before the object leave the solar system. Perhaps inspired by 2001, this is nuts and bolts sf, played in a realist mold, although as always with Clarke (flashes of deja vu) there are hints of the ... supernatural. It's a methodical, and safe novel, reminding me of Robinson's Mars books, and the fast one he's pulled is forgivable. (The sequels, on the other hand...)
V: Erich von Daniken, Chariots of the Gods? (1968) [London: Corgi, 1971]
Reread so I can watch Battlestar Galactica (1978) and rewatch Close Encounters of the Third Kind, but it felt appropriate as BDOs brought down to Earth (and coincident with 2001). Here von Daniken throws together pyramids, cave paintings, giant statues, ancient calendars and old maps, along with scriptural quotation and contemporary UFO accounts. His conclusion that we were visited by aliens who built some stuff and inspired others at various points in history - after all, primitive people would be confused by seeing astronauts. Problematic for all kinds of reasons, and entirely lacking in footnotes.
Unusually this is drawings by Postgate, and very much in the Smallfilms style. This is based on a Bayeaux Tapestry style frieze (actually poster paints) of the life of Becket, which may be found in the Canterbury museum. It is accompanied by two texts by Linnell, Postgate's partner in later years, one a brief account of Becket's life, death and apotheosis, to accompany the cartoon strip, the other a more detailed telling of the story with more about the medieval world and politics. Charming, and signed.
IV: Arthur C. Clarke, Rendezvous with Rama (1973) [London: Futura, 1978]
I'm not sure, but I suspect I've only read a reduced vocabulary version of this book. One of the three classic Big Dumb Object novels of the early 1970s, with Ringworld and Orbitsville (watch this space). A giant asteroid is spotted coming into the solar system on a path dangerously close to inhabited planets, and a mission is launched to investigate. Closer inspection reveals it to be a huge spaceship, and the mission has three weeks to explore it before the object leave the solar system. Perhaps inspired by 2001, this is nuts and bolts sf, played in a realist mold, although as always with Clarke (flashes of deja vu) there are hints of the ... supernatural. It's a methodical, and safe novel, reminding me of Robinson's Mars books, and the fast one he's pulled is forgivable. (The sequels, on the other hand...)
V: Erich von Daniken, Chariots of the Gods? (1968) [London: Corgi, 1971]
Reread so I can watch Battlestar Galactica (1978) and rewatch Close Encounters of the Third Kind, but it felt appropriate as BDOs brought down to Earth (and coincident with 2001). Here von Daniken throws together pyramids, cave paintings, giant statues, ancient calendars and old maps, along with scriptural quotation and contemporary UFO accounts. His conclusion that we were visited by aliens who built some stuff and inspired others at various points in history - after all, primitive people would be confused by seeing astronauts. Problematic for all kinds of reasons, and entirely lacking in footnotes.
