ON THE LEVEL

Dear Sir,

Although you have not previously included a correspondence column in your excellent magazine. I hope you will consider the following to be worthy of a little of your precious space, inasmuch as it is directed against a most serious menace, a ghastly spectre that is now brooding over British fandom! That it is the spectre of a dead horse does not render it any the less obnoxious, for certain of our brethren, who shall be nameless, have so far taken leave of their senses as to attempt to revive the hideous carcase by flogging it in the pages of otherwide worthy fanzine.

I refer of course to the nonsensical fantastics of RICHARD S. SHAVER, which have against all probability succeeded in lowering the status of certain prozines. Now no one enjoys nonsensical fantasies, as such, more than I; but when they are puerile and ill-written, and interspersed with absurd 'proofs', ludicrous attempts at sex-interest, and hysterical ravings against 'the authorities', resembling the last stages of persecution mania, then I confess my patience becomes somewhat strained.

We are told that we should reserve judgment on the 'mystery', that we should study the 'proofs' offered by Mr. Shaver. Well, where are they? Usually in the 'next issue!' Is there, in the whole dreary waste of Mr. Shaver's works, even one little oasis of evidence that would justify the consideration of an hypothesis a thousand times less ridiculous than his own?

I have not been so foolish as to retain the relevant magazines but I do recall that importance was attached to the alleged key of a basic language from which all present languages are said to have degenerated. Have any of Mr. Shaver's followers shown this 'key' to a philologist? He could have told them, first, that the 'key' being founded on our own alphabet, was irrelevant not only to European-type languages based on other alphabets but to that great group of tongues which, like Chinese, are not based on an alphabet at all, but on ideographical pictures. And secondly, that the derivations suggested by Mr. Shaver are quite absurd. For example, Mr. Shaver picks the word 'derogatory' to illustrate that 'dero' represents the principle of evil. But the word in reality derives from the Latin 'regare', meaning to ask, or in the case of a law, to propose. Hence 'de-regare', to repeal or reject a law, and, by extension, to condemn it. The word's association with evil is purely coincidental.

So much for the evidence which convinced Mr. Palmer. The only 'evidence' offered by the British disciples so far is Mr. Deacon's assertion that fish never die of old age. This is more easily disproved of. It is simply not true.

An open mind is a good thing, but it is not the same as gullibility. Let us remember that in America organized Fandom, to its eternal credit, flatly rejected Shaver and all his works: and make it known to his would-be resurrectors, by means of letters, articles in fanzines and general weight of opinion, that their attempt is nothing but an insult to the intelligence of every serious-minded lover of sciencefiction in Europe. I urge this from a sincere belief that such moronic rubbish only lowers further the status of science fiction in the minds of the public, who already because of certain magazines and their covers associate it with dirty back-street shops and cheap pornography.

This seems an appropriate point for us to say that opinions expressed in this magazine are not necessarily those of the editor. SLANT is open to anyone who has something worth saying and says it succinctly.

First spokesman of the big wheels (that was a good one, was it not?) to write us was FORREST J. ACKERMAN, who says:

'I set the brand new TWS aside to glance through SLANT 2, got interested in reading the contents. 'The Still Small Voice' IS Ray, markedly Bradburyesque, and I'm sure my friend Ray would be amused to have a copy.'

Mr. Ackerman goes on to refer to Clive Jackson as 'solid' (an American expression indicating, I believe, that he is in the groove) and offers to try and place both his and Walker's stories on the professional market. He also sent us his own 'Atomic Error' and asked his client E. E. Evans to send us a contribution. (Evans, as you know, is a contributor to several prozines, including STARTLING STORIES and WEIRD TALES.) That explains the presence of the two guest contributors in this issue. The letter finishes:

'Haha: The Prying Fan: That's a funny twist. Congrats. Think I'll steal it: make everybody in America think I'm awful clever instead of just awful.'

Turning now to another famous name we are delighted to tell you that although he may have stopped working for TWS, RICK SNEARY has started writing to SLANT. The Great Illiterateur says (and we have not made any misprints):

'Have shipped a prozine to you. Was a bit surprised the postage was so low. Of course it is no doubt going by fast tertales . . . Let's see what I think of SLANT 2. Despite the fact that I'm becoming a (whisper the word) critic, and find fault with nearly everyone. Something that shouldn't happen to a dog, or even Shaver.

. . . Your woodcuts are wonderfull. They litterly improve your magazine a good 20 per cent all by themself. . . .

Of course, not all the comment was favourable . . .

'Why don't you say which side of the page the illustrations are supposed to be on?'

'A most striking demonstration of osmosis. I congratulate you.'

'The cover woodcut has already oozed its way like a hiseous beast as far as page 17. I am standing by with a gun in case it gets out the back.'

'The most absorbing magazine I have ever read.'

Possibly this seepage was what Merwin had in mind in referring to our illustrations as 'spotty'. Another rash statement was that they were 'pseudo woodcuts'. Well, I don't know what pseudo wood is, but I can assure you we don't use it. And while we're on the subject of this review in SS, I would have Mr. Merwin remember that SLANT was the first not only in NORTHERN Ireland. This is a Gael warning. But the most damaging inaccuracy in that slightly slipshod review was the statement that our subscription was one prozine per issue. A flattering evaluation, perhaps, but it should have been plain to the most pulp-headed reader . . . Looking back I can see my notice WAS ambiguous, and that anyway I was rude and ungrateful to Mr. Merwin. It's too late to change it now, but I apologise. His review was fair, even generous.

Having already had to reset part of the page, perhaps I had better just say that one prozine will entitle you to no fewer than FOUR issues of SLANT. (Any s-f fantasy or weird mag, but we already get ASF TWS & SS.)

I had meant to give here a selection of your letters, but there's room for only a brief summary. Jackson's 'Still Small Voice' was 'worthy of a promag' thought NORMAN ASHFIELD, and EVA FIRESTONE said: 'I nearly burst into tears and that is the way all of Ray Bradbury's affect me.' H KEN BULMER thought it TOO like the real Bradbury! 'All Dogs Are Equal' was voted first by many, others praised it with faint damns . . .

'Walker wields a likely pen, though on somber consideration I rather think heredity is too firmly established to be dismissed quite so ruthlessly.' (CLIVE JACKSON)

'A good idea, but presented in the style marked 'British' and that somehow seems so juvenile, a fault of NEW WORLDS, at least I think so,' (TED TUBB)

'Best in the issue, why not pad it up and try for ASF?' (TED TUBB)

'Great yarn, highly original.' (PETE PENNINGTON)

As for my other two efforts, they were generally passed over in pained silence. But not by CEDRIC WALKER . . .

'The aptly-titled Corn Exchange could be quietly forgotten without any great loss. I'm dead against deliberate attempts at humour like this.'

'For some odd reason (me perhaps) The Solution was my favourite bit. Could be because of a shameful liking for puns.' (WRAI BALLARD)

In the present issue we have added a further 2 pages and some technical improvements, but we hope next time to make a much greater advance. We cannot give you the detailed contents (not having heard from Mr. Hoen) but we hope that SLANT 4 will be quite an event.

Data entered by Judy Bemis

Updated April 27, 2000. If you have a comment about these web pages please send a note to the Fanac Webmaster. Thank you.