Published bimonthly.
Contents copyright 1997 The Nutmeg Point District Mail and assigned
to individual contributors. All rights reserved.
TEMPORARY CULTURE
P.O. Box 43072
Upper Montclair, NJ 07043-0072
Electronym: wessells@aol.com
Use the electronic address for requests to be added to or dropped from the mailing list.
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RECENT PUBLICATIONS ; or, WHO ARE YOU REALLY?
The New York Review of Science Fiction for August 1997 (single issue $3.50 from Dragon Press, Box 78, Pleasantville, New York 10570) includes a selection of the correspondence between Avram Davidson and Philip K. Dick, with a short introduction by Grania Davis, entitled "Avram and Phil: Memoir of a Literary Friendship." In letters dating from late 1980, Avram and Phil question each other's reality, and pose questions to aid in determining who is real and who a simulacrum or imposter. The five letters include three addressed to Professor Pickle or Doctor Duckweed, and retain eccentric spellings). In one notable passage, Dick writes, "a test by which I can absolutely determine if you are indeed my friend Avram Davidson or merely someone pretending to be (that is, seeming to be; what the Greek philosophers called dokos)." This letter raises a question of cause and effect regarding the composition of the next item.
The issue of Asimov's Science Fiction for September 1997 includes "Vergil and the Dukos," an excellent and unsettling Vergil Magus tale of doublings and doubted identities, painted doors, and Vergil's memories of an old friend. The "Dukos" of Avram's story refers to "living" simulacra created by magicians who have since been executed for bringing to life (life?) such images of themselves. This "dukos" and the "dokos" in the Philip K. Dick letter are interchangeable; which came first? Compare also Robert Sheckley's "The Robot Who Looked Like Me" (needless to say, Sheckley's narrator shrugs off rather lightly any possible doubts as to who is real and who the robot).
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DELVING INTO THE ARCHIVES (continued)
Among the holdings of the Rare Book and Manuscript Library at Columbia University are the archives of Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine and the papers of Frederick Dannay (1905-1982). There are three folders of letters from Avram Davidson, as well as manuscripts for the numerous stories he published in the magazine. These shed considerable light on when certain stories were actually written. "The Third Sacred Well of the Temple," initially titled "The Feet of the Messenger" for example, was one of the first stories Avram wrote during his residence in Amecameca, Mexico. Apparently written in September 1963, it was published in Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine in December 1964. It is also apparent that many stories "languished" for years before seeing publication: "Amphora" was written in 1963, and only published in 1973; "The Man Who Was Made Out of Money" was written in 1971, when Avram was living in Sausalito, but did not see publication until 1993. A hell of a way to make a living.
Among the other correspondence is a November 1971 letter to an editor explaining the meaning and import of the short short story "The Lesson," published in December 1972 as "The Last Wizard." The letter is nearly as long as the story itself.
The manuscripts for the Ellery Queen novels are also at Columbia, and the accompanying documentation clearly indicates Avram's involvement in writing And on the Eighth Day and The Fourth Side of the Triangle. The successive drafts of the manuscripts (particularly And on the Eighth Day) reveal how extensively Manfred Lee (1905-1971) revised the novel Avram wrote from an early outline. One passing reference in a letter indicates that Avram looked at the outline for The House of Brass; apparently he decided not to take on the project, while Theodore Sturgeon later did.
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BIBLIOGRAPHIC UPDATE ; or, DELVING INTO THE ARCHIVES (continued once more)
Received today from the University Archives of the College of William, in the Earl Gregg Swem Library, a photocopy of the title page and colophon of an item not recorded in "A Preliminary Annotated Checklist of the Writings of Avram Davidson" (commonly known as Wessells): Polly Charms, The Sleeping Woman [Williamsburg, Virginia: The English Department of the College of William and Mary, 1977]. A 25 page chapbook reprinting the story from The Enquiries of Doctor Eszterhazy (1975). Printed offset in an edition of 100 numbered copies, signed by Avram Davidson on the colophon. Copy number 5 is in the University Archives of the College of William and Mary.
This item presumably constitutes the second-rarest Davidson publication, the smallest edition being the 15-copy hardcover issue of And Don't Forget the One Red Rose (Seattle: Dryad Press, 1986).
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On the Veracity of Certain Ancient Texts
The New York Times for Sunday 21 September 1997 reported the controversy over the purported discovery of an account of an Italian trader's visit to the southeastern Chinese port of Zaitun in 1271. While a translation of the manuscript of Jacob son of Salomone of Ancona is to be published in England in October, the translator, David Selbourne, has declared himself unable to make the manuscript available for scrutiny by other scholars. It is apparently in private hands, and Selbourne said that he was allowed to see the manuscript on condition that he not reveal information about the owner. A scholar's dilemma, indeed; a devil's bargain, perhaps. . . .
The New York Times for today, 30 September 1997, indicates that because of skepticism on the part of U.S. academics and prospective reviewers, a U.S. edition from Little, Brown has been postponed from a scheduled November publication date. No matter how enticing, until the authenticity of the Italian manuscript can be confirmed, the editor of The Nutmeg Point District Mail calls it fiction, and refers readers to Marco Polo and the Sleeping Beauty (1988), by Avram Davidson and Grania Davis. This novel is not concerned with facts, but with truths, and thus its veracity is unimpeachable.
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Footnote to "Or the Grasses Grow"
In An Apache Lifeway: The Economic, Social, and Religious Institutions of the Chiricahua Indians (1941), anthropologist Morris Opler notes that "The length of day or night can also be controlled through power," and records and informant saying, "When he was on the warpath, Geronimo fixed it so that morning wouldn't come too soon. He did it by singing. Once we were going to a certain place, and Geronimo didn't want it to become light before he reached it. He saw the enemy while they were in a level place, and he didn't want them to spy on us. He wanted morning to break after we had climbed over a mountain, so that the enemy couldn't see us. So Geronimo sang, and the night remained for two or three hours longer. I saw this myself."
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WHERE? WHICH? A short quiz (published works only)
The prize is one grumpkin (redeemable in the New York, New Jersey, or Philadelphia area in vino or in coffee).
Discuss stories by Avram Davidson in which species of the genus Felis appear. Answer in essay form only.
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ANSWERS TO WHERE? WHICH? from the eighth issue
Name three stories by Avram Davidson set in New York City.
There are, of course many more than three:
Efforts are underway to get past issues of The Nutmeg Point District Mail archived at the Avram Davidson Website.
The editor reminds readers that letters, anecdotes, contributions and fulminations are welcomed.
Payment will, of course, be negotiated in the form of grumpkins.
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Next issue will appear in November 1997.
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