Author Archives: JE

Arthur Clarke is dead, it seems. Behind every man alive now stands one more ghost. [Seen at jimvanpelt‘s LiveJournal.]

Today it’s Belle Rêve but tomorrow it’ll be Belly Rave… This never bothered me before, but it seems like Belle Rêve is a solecism; it should be Beau Rêve, according to the infallible penguin who wrote my French dictionary. Oh … Continue reading →

Okay, okay–maybe I’m going a little overboard on the garfish. But today is (a.) the Ides of March, when a bunch of Julius Caesar’s close personal friends (some of them garfish or pipefish for all we know) stood around him … Continue reading →

This afternoon, in an increasingly desperate attempt to avoid useful work, I was reading the Gospel of Luke and I came across this familiar line: εὐκοπώτερον γάρ ἐστιν κάμηλον διὰ τρήματος βελόνης εἰσελθεῖν ἢ πλούσιον εἰς τὴν βασιλείαν τοῦ θεοῦ … Continue reading →

In the wake of the now-bountifully-bipartisan sex scandals afflicting American politicians, one has to assume there is an inevitable link between intense moralism (as opposed to morality), the drive to seek public office in the US, and the compulsion to … Continue reading →

Apparently, in the shockingly corrupt world we live in, not even a man’s suffering from entomological dysplasia is sacred. The NYT broke the story: In a scandal that’s sending shock waves through both the publishing industry and academia, the author … Continue reading →

I hear these guys have reformed and are touring. The odds that they’ll show up anywhere near the Black Swamp seem a little slim, but you never know… I’m not sure Katharine Whalen can act even by the lowish standards … Continue reading →

I was just thinking about Janet Kagan’s Mirabile today because of a line in Gail Collins’ NYT column, which is a sort of FAQ about the Texas and Ohio primaries: While we’re at it, would you please explain the Texas … Continue reading →

Janet Kagan has died. I loved her series in Asimov’s about genetic mishaps on a colony planet (“The Loch Moose Monster”, “Return of Kangaroo Rex” etc), collected in Mirabile, and was sorry when we stopped getting new stories from her. … Continue reading →