On this day in 1957, the BBC screened a film purporting to show Swiss farmers harvesting spaghetti from spaghetti plants.
Remedios Varo
Writing, Editing, and Publishing:
Horror Writers Association have announced some of the 2014 award recipients, including both Tanith Lee and Jack Ketchum for Lifetime Achievement Awards.
Part of a series on the psychology of inspirational female characters, this week Janina Scarlet talks about Katniss.
Are you an academic, writing a non-fiction project about speculative fiction? Check out this grant to help fund writers complete a project on popular culture, comics, or dime novels.
Or perhaps you long to be an academic, studying fantasy literature? In that case, Achala Upandren interviews Dr. Robert Maslen, creator of the world’s first M.Litt in Fantasy Literature, and he tells us about the program and his hopes in creating it.
More gorgeous pages from the first illustrated Harry Potter book, with art by Jim Kay; I cannot wait to buy this!
Cat Rambo discusses how long she had been sharing brainspace with the fictional world of Tabat,and what’s it like to finally have a book set in this world out in the real world.
Remedios Varo
Movies and Television:
Have you heard of this new show called iZombie?
New Who has been on the air for 10 years; Happy birthday, Doctor Who!
Joseph Gordon Levitt is going to be in a Fraggle Rock Movie, I repeat, Joseph Gordon Levitt is going to be in a Fraggle Rock movie.
A look back at “Shelley Duvall’s Faerie Tale Theatre” as Susan Harlan wonders when fairy tales lost their edge, blaming (in part) the Disneyfication of fairy tales. Best quote: ” It’s also the logical end of princess culture: the transformation of an actual woman into a cartoon.
Internet Stuff:
Gen Con threatens to pull from Indiana if Governor signs religious freedom bill.
Marvel releases a Pizza Dog…I mean, Hawkeye figurine.
A Harry Potter parody of “Uptown Funk”. What more do you need to be happy?
Art Feature:
Today’s art is by Remedios Varo, Spanish-Mexican surrealist.
I cannot tell you how much I’d love to pull up stakes, move to Glasgow, and study for that M.Litt. in fantasy.
I am a big fan of Pizza Dog, and I guess getting that Hawkeye figurine in the same pack isn’t a huge bummer. :P
I looked at the “spaghetti harvesting” clip last night, and laughed! Apparently, most people in Britain in 1957 were not familiar with Italian pasta, and this April Fool’s joke was readily accepted.
I liked what I saw of iZombie, but I liked Rob Thomas, who created Veronica Mars. He is the showrunner and wrote the first episode.