Transcribe
Translate
Variant, v. 1, issue 2, whole no. 2, May 1947
Page 15
More information
digital collection
archival collection guide
transcription tips
May 1947 VARIANT Page 15 When the characters are happy, the reader feels a sense of elation, and when events conspire, a feeling of foreboding is inescapable, and when darkness falls, the magic of the words engenders an artificial mental depression. Every character, Christopher Wren, the Lawyer, the Innkeeper's daughter, the banker, the prostitute Leonora, the banker's daughter, Susanne, are clearly, humanly, delineated -- they live. They are part and parcel of real life. Regis Messac, of the University of France, who wrote the introduction wrote of Arcadia -- the city in which the story is laid: "What is this city, somewhere between Paris and Madrid, where such strange happenings are going on? I think it is Apollodoros' lost city, where we are allowed to return with a privileged soul. It is the city multiform and elusive, where a few privileged souls were allowed to go time and again....Most assuredly a very strange lad." Different people may see different things in this story, and like the editors of Harpers, Messac may not have been certain what the story was about, but he knew it was beautiful. However, I felt that I knew Arcadia, and had seen her many times. Not only between Paris and Madrid, but between New York and Philadelphia, San Francisco and Los Angeles, Dallas and Houston or Denver and Phoenix. Arcadia is the city typical. A cross section of every civilized town and hamlet in the world, and a cross section of the people that dwell therein. The name could be Anytown. There has never been another story written just like The Sign of the Burning Hart. In later years you may compare others tales to the "Hart", but as of today it stands a unique achievement in a cubby hole of literary creation entirely its own. You cannot brand this work as a piece of "realism" because some of the things in it never were, or never will be, and are but a composite of the things of the world; because as it is written it reads like poetry. You cannot call this work a fantasy because there is too much of real life, and real people and everyone's dream. In the final analysis, I believe it will have to be called literature, because, like all literature, it is about people, and people are the only things you can compare it with. *********************************** Meditation upon the remarkable plethora of successful authors in our midst... When the annuals of this town are written / There will be some things to tell / For Philadelphia science fiction / To date has done astounding well Tis hard to see, this fame unmeasured / Surrounding men so fond of wine / (Sherry's famous stuff -- undouted / But writing must take up some time!) However, still the fact confronts us / That five of psfs have made the grade. / The rest of us are stupid slackers / Or else too fond of lemonade. Anna Maus *********************************** THE MISLAID CHARM by ALEXANDER M. PHILLIPS Published by THE PRIME PRESS is now for sale!
Saving...
prev
next
May 1947 VARIANT Page 15 When the characters are happy, the reader feels a sense of elation, and when events conspire, a feeling of foreboding is inescapable, and when darkness falls, the magic of the words engenders an artificial mental depression. Every character, Christopher Wren, the Lawyer, the Innkeeper's daughter, the banker, the prostitute Leonora, the banker's daughter, Susanne, are clearly, humanly, delineated -- they live. They are part and parcel of real life. Regis Messac, of the University of France, who wrote the introduction wrote of Arcadia -- the city in which the story is laid: "What is this city, somewhere between Paris and Madrid, where such strange happenings are going on? I think it is Apollodoros' lost city, where we are allowed to return with a privileged soul. It is the city multiform and elusive, where a few privileged souls were allowed to go time and again....Most assuredly a very strange lad." Different people may see different things in this story, and like the editors of Harpers, Messac may not have been certain what the story was about, but he knew it was beautiful. However, I felt that I knew Arcadia, and had seen her many times. Not only between Paris and Madrid, but between New York and Philadelphia, San Francisco and Los Angeles, Dallas and Houston or Denver and Phoenix. Arcadia is the city typical. A cross section of every civilized town and hamlet in the world, and a cross section of the people that dwell therein. The name could be Anytown. There has never been another story written just like The Sign of the Burning Hart. In later years you may compare others tales to the "Hart", but as of today it stands a unique achievement in a cubby hole of literary creation entirely its own. You cannot brand this work as a piece of "realism" because some of the things in it never were, or never will be, and are but a composite of the things of the world; because as it is written it reads like poetry. You cannot call this work a fantasy because there is too much of real life, and real people and everyone's dream. In the final analysis, I believe it will have to be called literature, because, like all literature, it is about people, and people are the only things you can compare it with. *********************************** Meditation upon the remarkable plethora of successful authors in our midst... When the annuals of this town are written / There will be some things to tell / For Philadelphia science fiction / To date has done astounding well Tis hard to see, this fame unmeasured / Surrounding men so fond of wine / (Sherry's famous stuff -- undouted / But writing must take up some time!) However, still the fact confronts us / That five of psfs have made the grade. / The rest of us are stupid slackers / Or else too fond of lemonade. Anna Maus *********************************** THE MISLAID CHARM by ALEXANDER M. PHILLIPS Published by THE PRIME PRESS is now for sale!
Hevelin Fanzines
sidebar
