Stephen Rynas
Morehead City, NC
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Dear Dr. Schmidt,
I am writing to complain both about Harry Turtledove's Sherlock Holmes takeoff in your May edition, “The Scarlet Band,” as well as what I feel was a poor editorial decision on your part to print it. Without commenting on the quality of the idea, the writing, or any apologia to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Dr. Walton's overt bigotry served no literary purpose in this story and was extremely offensive.
As a Holmes buff, I know Watson was often prejudiced, particularly as a literary device to set up and elevate Holmes’ compassion and knowledge, or to show (and hopefully correct) the ignorance and contempt of the typical Englishmen towards the WOGs (and that's work order guys, never directly a racial epithet) that arose from the manifest destiny idea of the British Empire on which the sun never set. However, Watson was never vulgar or racially prejudiced, as Turtledove's Dr. Walton certainly is.
I was personally affronted and insulted, and surprised that you would publish such a story where derogatory language (consistent with the historical period, but still, if not therefore more so, upsetting) served in no way to further the story line, to set up conflict to be resolved, or to teach some moral lesson to the reader (or to Dr. Walton). In fact, despite the one sentence comment (yours or Turtledove's) before the story begins, and despite Walton's diatribe at the end of the press conference as to Helms seeing facts unclouded by beliefs, thin platitude by a character revealed to be duplicitous and opportunistic is much too little, much too late. There are much better ways to have painted Walton as the ignorant, bigoted buffoon. The author far overstepped the bounds of artistic license for no true need.
I hope that you will continue to publish your usual, high quality fiction in the future.
Douglas A. Smith, Ph.D.
Camp Hill, PA
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The author replies...
I fear Dr. Smith is satire-challenged, which is almost sure to be incurable. If poking some fun at the classics affronts and insults him, I suggest that he needs to find a more wholesome vent for his spleen. Yes, I'm guilty of making explicit what's implicit in much writing from the comfortably secure and even more comfortably superior world of nineteenth-century Britain. If this be treason, he may make the most of it.
And at least according to the OED, he's dead wrong about wogs. It doesn't accept his proposed etymology (any more than it accepts “port out, starboard home” as that for “posh"), saying that the term is of uncertain origin, and defines “wog” as “a vulgarly offensive word for a foreigner, esp. one of Arab extraction.” One illustrative quote is, “King Zog Was always considered a bit of a Wog, Until Mussolini quite recently Behaved so indecently.” Another is, “We have travelled some distance from the days when Wogs began at Calais.” So much for the Work Order Guys.
Harry Turtledove
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Dear Dr. Schmidt,
I've always liked Jerry Oltion's work, but I got an extra kick out of this story ["Slide Show,” May 2006]. I went through very much the same scenario about ten years ago; my trigger was when I discovered that nobody carried the projection lamps for my slide projector any more. I finally found a source, bought an extra back-up projector, and bought what I hope is a lifetime supply. I haven't gone through the same situation on slide film yet, but there's no question that it's coming, so I've stocked up on that, too. (I've currently got about 31,000 slides, mostly of trips around the world that my wife and I have taken over the last 47 years.)
Jack E. Garrett
Monroe Twp, NJ
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The author replies...
It's good to know I'm striking a chord with people, even if it's based on a sad note.
Jerry Oltion
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Dear Stan,
I did enjoy the article “The Terrestrial Search for Extraterrestrial Life” by Catherine Shaffer [May, 2006] and learned quite a bit from it. I would however argue with some of the points made in the article.
Green is not a universal color for plants that photosynthesize. I grow chard in my garden that has purple leaves and photosynthesizes quite nicely, thank you. The article denies the possibility of photosynthesis using another compound than chlorophyll. Photosynthetic organisms growing on planets with a markedly different spectrum of light from their primary may find some other molecule to be more efficient. Indeed, it seems a bit strange that the peak of the solar spectrum is not utilized by chlorophyll, suggesting that even for Earth, chlorophyll may not be the most efficient molecule for photosynthesis.
Toward the end of the article, the argument is made that ammonia is unsuitable in forming membranes since it cannot form hydrogen bonds. Ammonia does have inter-molecular hydrogen bonds. If it did not, its boiling point (-33C) would be a lot closer to that of methane (-161C) since it has virtually the same molecular weight. Hydrogen bonds form between the hydrogens of one molecule and the lone pair orbitals of another molecule. Water, ammonia, and hydrogen floride all have hydrogens and lone pair orbitals and all of them form hydrogen bonds. And, all of these molecules are polar molecules. The main difference is that water can form interlocking three-dimensional structures with hydrogen bonds whereas ammonia and hydrogen floride can only form chains. Water can form an average of two hydrogen bonds per molecule whereas ammonia and hydrogen floride can only form an average of one hydrogen bond per molecule.
Finally, and assuming I am reading the article correctly, the author implies that one would not be expected to find a sentient life form where alternate chemistries produce much lesser amounts of energy than photosynthesis provides on the Earth. Certainly, large and mobile organisms require a lot of energy, but even on Earth, the intelligent life is not photosynthesizing, but rather consumes photosynthetic organisms for its energy. Why cannot a sulfur based alternate chemistry produce sufficient “food” to support the development of higher life forms and even sentient life forms?
Prognostications that limit the range of possibilities are often wrong.
Ken Young
Petrolia CA
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Dr. Schmidt,
Catherine Shaffer's article on the search for extraterrestrial life was beautifully written and very instructive. As a chemical engineer, it has been over 60 years since my last class in organic chemistry, but she made everything easy to understand. I was immediately curious about her background and wondered if she were a tenured university professor or perhaps a senior scientist in industry.
Imagine my delight in reading Richard Lovett's Biolog and finding that she is young and pretty and happily married! What a pleasure it must be to have an intelligent, skilled wife like that, and how great it would be to have a teacher who can explain things so clearly.
Robert A. Stanton
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UPCOMING EVENTS
by Anthony Lewis
22—24 September 2006
FOOLSCAP VIII (Washington state SF conference) at Bellevue Sheraton, Bellevue, WA. Guests of Honor: C.J. Cherryh, Kage Baker. Registration: $50 until 21 September 2006, $60 at the door. Info: www.foolscapcon.org, [email protected], Foolscap, c/o Little Cat Z, PO Box 2461, Seattle WA 98111-2461.
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2—5 November 2006
WORLD FANTASY CONVENTION at Renaissance Hotel, Arboretum, Austin, TX. Guests of Honor: Glen Cook &
Dave Duncan; TM: Bradley Denton; Editor Guest of Honor: Glenn Lord; Artist Guest of Honor: John Jude Palencar; Robert E. Howard Artist Guest: Gary Gianni. Registration: $125 until 31 July 2006; supporting $35. Info: www.fact.org/wfc2006/ [email protected]; FACT, Inc., Box 27277, Austin TX 78755.
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30 August—3 September 2007
NIPPON 2007 (65th World Science Fiction Convention) at Pacifico Yokohama, Yokohama, Japan. Guests of Honor: Sakyo Komatsu and David Brin. Artist Guests of Honor: Yoshitaka Amano and Michael Whelan. Fan Guest of Honor: Takumi Shibano. Registration: USD 180/JPY 20,000 until 30 June 2006, for thereafter. This is the SF universe's annual get-together. Professionals and readers from all over the world will be in attendance. Talks, panels, films, fancy dress competition—the works. Nominate and vote for the Hugos. This is only the third time Worldcon will be held in a non-English speaking country and the first time in Asia. Info: www.nippon2007.org; [email protected]. Nippon 2007/JASFIC, 4-20-5-604, Mure, Mitaka, Tokyo 181-0002. North American agent: Peggy Rae Sapienza, Nippon 2007, PO Box 314, Annapolis Junction, MD 20701, USA. UK agent: Andrew A. Adams, 23 Ivydene Road, Reading RG30 1HT, England, U.K. European agent: Vincent Doherty, Koninginnegracht 75a, 2514A Den Haag, Netherlands. Australian agent: Craig Macbride, Box 274, World Trade Centre, Victoria, 8005 Australia.
ANTHONY LEWIS
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Visit www.analogsf.com for information on additional titles by this and other authors.
Analog SFF, September 2006 Page 25