Our Quirky Classics

 

Our Quirky Classics

 

I think that many readers have a favored childhood book that they seldom talk about. It's not that they're ashamed about it, it's just they don't think many people will understand. In fact, I think that they would rather they didn't. Our quirky classics are our own secrets, our own experiences, our private little spring that we fancy our lips alone drink from.

A moment's reflection, of course, exposes the illogicality of such a thought. There must have been thousands of copies of our special book, and it must have been enjoyed by hundreds. But it never reached that cult status; it didn't spawn a series, was never part of a franchise, or had a movie, and most people who read it then have surely forgotten it today.

If you did show it to somebody today, even to a child who was your age when you read it, you couldn't expect them to respond like you did. They would be puzzled, dismissive, indifferent; and you might get impatient or even angry, but you would certainly be disappointed. Your quirky classic had reached down into the corners of your soul and found a chair just right to sit itself on.

Possibly you lost the book somehow. It could have been in the school library, and you moved on a grade, or it belonged to a friend who moved away, or it just got put away in the attic somewhere with all of your parents’ stuff. Perhaps it just dissolved through constant use (this happened to me more times than I care to remember). What you do, if you have the time, money, and energy for such pursuits, is you comb garage sales, second-hand bookstores, or the internet until you get a copy. And then you hide it away.

The Lord of the Rings: The Road to Isengard (Part Five and Last)

The Tale

‘Now Gandalf rode to the great pillar of the Hand, and passed it, and as he did so the Riders saw to their wonder that the Hand appeared no longer white. It was stained as with dried blood; and looking closer they perceived that its nails were red.’ Gandalf leads them further down the road, into the obscuring mists.

At last they reach the gates of Isengard, a little past noon. But to their surprise the iron gates are twisted and thrown down, the bowl of the valley filled with steaming and bubbling water, filled with floating wreckage. The power of Saruman has been cast down, apparently. But in the middle, unbroken, but wreathed in winding cloud, the dark spike of Orthanc still rears itself in the pale sunlight.

The king and his company marvel at the ruin and cannot imagine how it was accomplished. But then they see, sitting on a heap of rubble next to the gateway, two small, grey-clad figures ‘taking their ease’. They are surrounded by bottles and bowls and plates. One seems asleep and the other is sitting, blowing long wreathes and rings of smoke from its mouth. They are indeed, Merry and Pippin, found again at last.

As Théoden, Eomer, and their men gaze in wonder, Merry (the smoking hobbit) suddenly becomes aware of them and jumps to his feet, bowing low. Seeming to ignore his old friends of the Fellowship, he welcomes the King to Isengard, and introduces himself and Pippin as the doorwardens, giving him their formal names Meriadoc and Peregrin (and digging into Pippin with his foot to wake him up). Doubtless Saruman would be here to welcome them himself, but right now he’s closeted with one Wormtongue.

Gandalf laughs at all his formality and politeness and says surely Saruman didn’t give them this job. No, says Merry, it was Treebeard, ‘who has taken over the management of Isengard’ and asked him to greet the Lord of Rohan with fitting words.

Gimli cries out, and what about us, your friends? We’ve chased you two hundred leagues, through waste and war, to rescue you, and here we find you idling and feasting – and smoking! ‘Hammer and tongs! I am so torn between rage and joy, that if I do not burst, it will be a marvel!’

Pippin opens an eye, and placidly answers that they find the hobbits sitting on a field of victory, enjoying a few well-earned rewards, a reply that elicits a burst of skepticism from the Dwarf. The Riders laugh at the exchange, and Théoden says they are clearly witnessing the reunion of dear old friends.

Théoden says the days are fated to be filled with marvels. He asks Gandalf if these are his companions the Halflings, that some among his folk call the Holbytla? Pippin tells him that they are Hobbits, if you please, and Théoden says the name is strangely changed from his tongue, but not unfitting. Pippin is amazed to learn that his folk know anything about Hobbits. Théoden says there are no stories, just a general legend. But he’s never heard that they can spout smoke.

Merry eagerly begins to tell him the history of pipes and pipeweed, but Gandalf cautions the King about the garrulity of Hobbits, who will sit on the edge of ruin and talk about the stories of their kinfolk to the ninth degree. He asks Merry where is Treebeard?

The hobbit tells him he’s gone to the North side to get a clean drink of water. And is Saruman thus left unguarded? Well, there is the water, and several other Ents are on watch. And has Treebeard left no message, Gandalf asks.

Merry was coming to that, but he was hindered by other questions. If Gandalf and Théoden will ride to the northern wall, they will find Treebeard and food of the best selected for them, ‘discovered and selected by your humble servants.’

Gandalf asks if Théoden will ride with him and meet Treebeard, for Treebeard is Fangorn, the oldest Ent and the ‘oldest of all living things.’

‘I will come with you,’ said Théoden. ‘Farewll, my hobbits! May we meet again in my house! There you shall sit beside me and tell me all that your hearts desire: the deeds of your grandsires as far as you can reckon them … Farewell!’

‘The hobbits bowed low. ‘So that is the King of Rohan!’ said Pippin in an undertone. ‘A fine old fellow. Very polite.’

Bits and Bobs

I’ve always wondered if Gandalf put the whammy on the White Hand, or if they only noticed the red as they passed it. I’ve never seen any place that accounted for it. Just a small detail, but I wonder.

Merry’s formality with the King and his idea of ‘fitting words’ strikes me as a strange combination of his memory of ceremonial speech (as in Rivendell or Lorien) and the Hobbit notion of dignity. Such an example is his phrase that Treebeard has ‘taken over the management of Isengard’, as if it were an inn that had simply switched owners. Merry’s father’s name Saradoc recalls the Celtic name Caradoc, and Pippin’s father’s name Paladin is the Frankish term for any of the Twelve Peers of Emperor Charlemagne, and has come to mean any especially chivalric knight (and also an entire class in D&D).

The words of Gimli that he might burst recalls the fate of other dwarves in lore and legend, some of whom burst at the touch of sunlight, or who, becoming outraged, pull themselves apart and sink into the earth (like Rumpelstiltskin).

The fact that Theoden’s people dwelt in the North long ago accounts for the similarity of between their speech and the speech of the Hobbits, and bears something of the resemblance between Anglo-Saxon and English. Indeed, it sparks the creation of one of Merry’s later books, Old Words and Names in the Shire. In real life Tolkien, having created the name Hobbit, felt he must come up with a possible ancestry for it, and found Anglo-Saxon hol-bytla (‘hole- builder’) to answer the need quite handily.

I also have to remark that the King’s first amazement at pipe-smoking recalls the effect of Hank Morgan’s smoking in A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court, a book Tolkien had read but was not entirely pleased with. Here it is another juxtaposition between the 'legendary' and the 'modern' mode, as is Pippin's down-to-earth comment to Theoden's ornate farewell.

"If Not Around, It Was At Least ... Nearby"

 

Ahh, Seventies Horror. And those annoying cameo covers.

Graham Masterson (1946 - ) wrote The Djinn (1977) as part of the Harry Erskine series, which started with The Manitou in 1977. He was originally the editor of the British edition of Penthouse, as his long career of writing tales with “visceral sex and horror” and crime, as well as a series of “sex instruction books” attest to. I believe Mike bought this book, though I, at least, read it too. It was not particularly well written but had the same trashy combo of the occult and gritty sex and violence that lured in our raging adolescent transgressive instincts. I don’t think it was in our possession long into the Eighties. Masterson has received several awards (including the Edgar) and continues to produce.

Read to Rags: "The Dark Backward and Abysm of Time"

The Occult Files of Doctor Spektor #9

Where or from whom we got this I cannot say, although the bountiful multiplicity of monsters would go far to explain why we wanted it. I seem to recall thinking at some time or other that the Frankenstein Monster looked the closest to the book version that I'd ever seen. Thick black hair, straight black lips, and dull yellow eyes.

The Shadow Library: Dragon Wars DVD

 

Dragon Wars: D-Wars

The Lord of the Rings: The Road to Isengard (Part Four)

The Tale

Tolkien describes how Isengard was at the height of Saruman’s power. ‘Partly it was shaped in the making of the mountains, but mighty works the Men of Westernesse had wrought there of old; and Saruman had dwelt there long and had not been idle.’

A great ring-wall of stone, like towering cliffs, jutting out from the mountain and pierced with only one entrance, a long black tunnel hewn into the south side closed with doors of iron, encompasses a mile-wide, but shallow bowl of land. It used to be filled with trees but now there are long lines of pillars, joined by heavy chains. In the wall are hewn many chambers, halls, and passages, and the plain itself is delved with shafts to chambers underneath, treasuries, storehouses, smithies, and furnaces. The shafts are covered with mounds and domes of stone. Inside Isengard are housed workers, slaves, warriors, servants, and even wolves cared for in great stables underground. At night, colored vapors rose from these subterranean rooms.

In the center, where all the chained roads lead, rises the great tower of Orthanc, an isle of rock rearing five hundred feet above the plain.  It is black and gleaming, like four pinnacles of pointed stone, melded into one. Between the spires is a stone platform, ‘written with strange signs’ where wise men could watch the stars. This is Orthanc, whose name in Elvish means Mount Fang, but in the language of Rohan, the Cunning Mind. In the days when Saruman forsook his wisdom for ambition, the wizard imagined it was a rival to even Barad-dur, Sauron’s Dark Tower, though in comparison it was only ‘a little copy, a child’s model, or a slave’s flattery’.

‘This was the stronghold of Saruman, as fame reported it; for within living memory the men of Rohan had not passed its gates, save perhaps a few, such as Wormtongue, who came in secret and told no man what they saw.’

Bits and Bobs

Tolkien made at least five different sketches of Orthanc before he was satisfied with the final concept. He also changed the Elvish meaning of the word ’Orthanc’ several times before he arrived at ‘Mount Fang’. ‘Orthanc’ is of course an Anglo-Saxon word translating as roughly ‘cunning device or work’, or, as Tolkien expands it, ‘machine’.

In this passage we get an interesting insight into the relationship of Saruman and Sauron: into Saruman’s deluded pride into thinking himself a rival to the Dark Lord, and Sauron’s contempt of the wizard thinking he might equal his might.

In the Hildebrandt painting, their interpretation of the covered shafts reminds me of the 'Morlock holes' in George Pal's The Time Machine.

The Lord of the Rings: The Road to Isengard (Part Three)

 

The Tale

The company grows melancholy as they draw near the Fords of Isen, the recent scene of another battle. Carrion birds are flocking and there is the howling of wolves. Their hearts grow heavy at the thought of the men who fell there and how they have probably been fed on. But when they reach the actual Fords, they are greatly surprised. The river Isen has been reduced to a mere trickle. And on a small island in the middle of where its waters used to flow, a burial mound has been raised, ringed with spears.

Gandalf explains that not as many men fell at the Fords as they thought. He gathered their scattered numbers and set some to burying the fallen, some with Erkenbrand to Helm’s Deep, and some back to Edoras to guard the Meduseld against any stray raid. It is with the slain Orcs that the Wolves and carrion birds are holding their feast. The men are safely buried.

‘Here let them rest!’ said Eomer. ‘And when their spears have rotted and rusted, long still may their mound stand and guard the Fords of Isen!’

They ride on until midnight, then stop to camp. They are at the feet of the Misty Mountains, and Nan Curunir, the Wizard’s Vale, lies below them. It is dark, but they can see ‘a vast spire of smoke and vapor’ rising out of the valley and into the starry sky. Aragorn says it looks like the whole land is burning; Eomer wonders if Saruman is brewing up some wizardry to meet them, using the vanished waters of the Isen. Whatever it is, says Gandalf, they shall find out the next day.

They settle down to sleep, but they are awakened by the cries of the sentries late in the night. A darkness blacker than the night is creeping past them on either side of the empty riverbed, heading north. Gandalf warns the company to draw no weapon, and to wait. It – whatever it is – will pass them by. But it seems a long and anxious time, but at last the strange shadow goes by, vanishing between the mountain’s arms.

Away south on the Hornburg a great sound is heard and the ground trembles. None dare look out, but in the morning they find the forest of strange trees gone, and the bodies of the slain Orcs vanished. But a mile below the Dike there is a newly dug pit heaped with stones. Whether it contains only the Orcs the men have killed or also those that vanished under the trees, none can tell. In after days it is called the Death Down; no grass grows on it and no human sets foot there. ‘But the strange trees were never seen in Deeping Coomb again; they had returned at night, and had gone far away to the dark dales of Fangorn. Thus they were revenged upon the Orcs.’

Back at the camp, Theoden and the company sleep no more that night. A strange thing happens, though. The water suddenly comes rushing back down the riverbed until the Isen flows along as it ever did.

At dawn they get ready to go. The light is grey and pale, the sun hidden by a fog and reek laying upon the land around them. But they ride now along the highway, which is broad and well-tended. They pass into Nan Curunir, the Wizard’s Vale, which was once a green and pleasant land. It is so no more. Although beneath the walls of Isengard there are still acres tilled by the slaves of Saruman, most of the valley has become a wilderness of weeds and thorns, filled with burned and axe-hewn stumps. Smokes and steams lurk and drift through hollows.

After some miles the highway turns into a wide street, closely paved with flat stones, with trickling gutters on either side. ‘Suddenly a tall pillar loomed up before them. It was black; and set upon it was a great stone, carved and painted in the likeness of a long White Hand. Its finger pointed north.’ Isengard must not be far ahead, but they can see nothing through the mist.

Bits and Bobs

Not a whole lot to say here, except that Saruman seems to be a big fan of branding as an indicator of his dominance. I remember another Dark Power who had several White Hands scattered around her fortress as well.

Memories of Scratchy Family Records

 

Read to Rags: Apes? Did You Say ... Apes?

 

Read to Rags: Robin Hood, Sire

 

The Adventures of Robin Hood #6

The Lord of the Rings: The Road to Isengard (Part Two)

 

The Tale

As the company finally passes the eaves of the strange woods, Legolas turns to look back in regret. He suddenly cries out and would ride back, despite Gimli’s protests. The Elf has seen strange eyes in the shadow of the boughs. Gandalf bids him stop; now is not his time.

Even as he speaks three tall, strange figures come striding out of the woods. ‘As tall as trolls they were, twelve feet or more in height; their strong bodies, stout as young trees, seemed to be clad with raiment or with hide of close-fitting grey or brown. Their limbs were long, and their hands had many fingers; their hair was stiff, and their beards grey-green as moss.’

They are not looking at the riders. They look northward and putting their hands to their lips let out a long, horn-like call, that is answered with another call and more of the strange creatures approaching from the north. Uneasy, some of the riders set their hands on their swords, but Gandalf tells them that there is no danger; these are no enemies, but herdsmen, and are not concerned with them at all.

The figures vanish back into the trees, and Theoden asks in wonder what were they. Gandalf answers ‘There are children in your land, who, out of the twisted threads of story, could pick the answer to your question.’ They are Ents, the Ents that the Entwood and Entwash are named after in his own tongue. To them, all the years from his ancient ancestor Eorl to today are a passing hour.

The king is silent a while, then says he is beginning to understand ‘the marvel of the trees.’ His people have long busied themselves with ‘the life of Men’, paying little attention to old legends or the farther world. And the stories are fading.

Gandalf says he should be glad: he has unknown allies, even if he thought they were only tales. Theoden replies maybe, but in the coming war, who knows what strange and marvelous things could pass away, and him just only finding out about them.

‘It may,’ said Gandalf. ‘The evil of Sauron cannot be wholly cured, nor made as if it had not been. But to such days are we doomed. Let us now go on with the journey we have begun!’

Bits and Bobs

And so, we are given a refresher course on what Ents are like; in some ways a clearer, more concise description, how they appear from the outside, as it were.

We are also given some insight into the world of philology, Tolkien’s field of learning. In old names and preserved in the twisted threads of story, ancient truths and facts about the past can be divined with care and study. These details, ignored or taken for granted, preserve the bones of forgotten history.

Gandalf packs a lot of philosophy into those last statements. Evil cannot be cured or ignored; the past Good cannot return, though it may be healed in unforeseen ways. For example, Adam’s Fall cannot be undone as if had never happened; that chance is past. But it can be redeemed and go a different, even more glorious way. In the meantime, we have to ‘go on with the journey we have begun.’  

Spotlight on a Marvel Spotlight: The Seventh Voyage of Sinbad (Dec., 1975)

 

Focus on The Dragon

There is also a Marvel Adaptation of The Golden Voyage of Sinbad.

Excalibur!: The Shadow Library

 

Excalibur, by Gil Kane and John Jakes

Lured in by my hunger for Arthurian tales, I had this book for a brief time. If I knew then what I know now about John Jakes, I might have been spared that mistake. You might have thought that having lived through the Seventies I would have known Jakes, at least for his ponderous family epics, but they were entirely out of my sympathies, and what I did not like, did not exist for me. Of course, Gil Kane was a famous graphic artist who also plotted many of his own tales.

The Mystery Comics Digest of the Ages is Fulfilled

Mystery Comics Digest: Ripley's Believe It or Not #4 (June 1972)

Today I received this volume in the mail, Mystery Comics Digest: Ripley’s Believe It or Not #4, June 1972. Well do I vaguely remember the first time ever I saw it, and the circumstances under which it was purchased. It was grocery day, a Saturday, and Mike and I (at least – was John there? Did he get his own digest?) were with Pop shopping at Baenziger’s. We were at the magazine rack next to the little checkout where they bought cigarettes, and for some reason Pop agreed to buy us each a Mystery Comics Digest. Once again, I put my money on the wrong horse, and chose the Boris Karloff Tales of Mystery #2 (well, it had exciting looking reptilian monsters on it), while Mike chose the Ripley title.  After we had all read the mags and saw what was inside, I had a bout of buyer’s remorse. Although Karloff had its good points, Ripley’s had that Real Life High Weirdness that I’ve always found attractive, and (in my opinion) better art to boot.

Besides the ‘real’ life stories, my brothers might remember The Hug of Death (gypsies and wrasslin’ bears), A Tree Grows in Transylvania (Baron Tibor), and Where There’s Smoke There’s Fear (the usual irony with magic lamp wishes).

Anyway, with this volume I think I’ve finally got copies of all the Mystery Comics Digest we had as kids, and a few more that we didn’t. I find out now that although we always thought of Karloff and Ripley’s and Twilight Zone (of which, although I have a faint impression that we might have had a copy, I can’t remember anything concrete about it at the moment) as separate entities, they were all published under the rubric of Mystery Comics Digest, and were released, a different title a month, in rotation. The series came out from March 1972 to October 1975, and had 26 issues. This, according to Wikipedia, is how they played out:

• Believe It or Not!- #1, 4, 7, 10, 13, 16, 19, 22, 25
• Boris Karloff- #2, 5, 8, 11, 14, 17, 20, 23, 26
• Twilight Zone- #3, 6, 9, 12, 15, 18, 21, 24

They were all reprints from their original Gold Key titles, included some original stories, and sometimes had panel stories that were told in prose in other issues and vice versa. Altogether, I now have 8 of the 26. And there the score will probably stand, barring any fortuitous finds.

#1, March 1972

#2, April 1972

#5, July 1972

#7, September 1972

#11, May 1973

#13, May 1973

#20, November 1974