Author Archives: Gray Rinehart

New Video: The Dickensian Duo

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The beginning of June seems an odd time to hearken back to Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, but that’s where Dickens sets out a pair of conditions that I call “The Dickensian Duo.” In this video, I introduce them, consider the relationships between them, and discuss the importance of education in addressing them.

Let me know what you think!

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Education-Related Stuff:
– Video: The Musashi-Heinlein School
– Text: Quality Education: Why It Matters, and How to Structure the System to Sustain It

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The Author and Politics

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(Another in the continuing series of quotes to start the week.)

This past Saturday, at the ConCarolinas science fiction and fantasy convention, I was part of a panel called “Author and Politics” which was both well-attended and well-run. We agreed on some points, we disagreed on some points, but we did so like grown-ups — respectfully and without rancor.

It was, in the end, quite refreshing.

So when it came to figuring out a good quote to start the week, I thought of this one from Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, which I copied out of The Gulag Archipelago many years ago.

Is it not true that professional politicians are boils on the neck of society that prevent it from turning its head and moving its arms? And why shouldn’t engineers have political views? After all, politics is not even a science, but is an empirical area not susceptible to description by any mathematical apparatus; furthermore, it is an area subject to human egotism and blind passion.

That quote has always resonated with me, mostly because of the imagery in the first sentence but also because I was trained as an engineer and still to a small degree think of myself as one. And it hasn’t lost any of its power: certainly we saw in our most recent election plenty of instances of “human egotism and blind passion.”

Republican Elephant & Democratic Donkey - Icons
The parties don’t often see eye to eye, do they? (Image: “Republican Elephant & Democratic Donkey – Icons,” by DonkeyHotey, on Flickr under Creative Commons.)

But when I have experiences like the panel on Saturday, and I recall the adage that “all politics are local,” I am a bit more hopeful that if we conduct ourselves well we can avoid (at least in the small circles of our friends) the worst excesses of either side, and chart a course that’s mutually beneficial.

I admit that I may be hopelessly naïve about such things.

After all, I’m The Anti-Candidate, and I approved this message.

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Related Items:
– Listen to “I Think I’ll Run for Congress”, from the album Truths and Lies and Make-Believe
– Listen to “The Anti-Candidate Song”, from the album Distorted Vision

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ConCarolinas — Science Fiction, Carolina Style!

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This weekend we’ll be celebrating science fiction and fantasy in Charlotte — at the Hilton Charlotte University Place, specifically — for ConCarolinas. ConCarolinas is always a fun convention, and the Guests of Honor this year are pretty amazing:

  • Music and Artist GOH, Aurelio Voltaire
  • Writer GOH, bestselling author Sherrilyn Kenyon
  • Science GOH, Stephanie Osborn
  • Gaming GOHs, Clint and Jodi Black

In addition, Baen Books’ Publisher Toni Weisskopf is the Literary Special Guest, and the Music Special Guests include my friends The Blibbering Humdingers, Mikey Mason, and Valentine Wolfe.

I don’t have any solo events — no concert, no reading, no signing — but I have a few panels and other fun things that will get me into trouble:

Friday:

  • 4 p.m. — The Dreaded Synopsis (panel)
  • 7 p.m. — Princess Alethea’s Traveling Sideshow (variety show)
  • 11 p.m. — Campfire Songs (music)

Saturday:

  • 3 p.m. — Let’s Write a Filk Song (music panel)
  • 5 p.m. — Write What You Don’t Know (panel)
  • 6 p.m. — Author and Politics (panel)
  • 10 p.m. — Filking the Night Away (music)

Sunday:


(Love this badge logo from the 2010 ConCarolinas, by Bob Snare.)

It should be fun — hope to see you there!

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Related Items of Interest:
– Because it’s science fictional and filkish and fun, the “Tauntauns to Glory” music video
– Also speaking of filk, listen free to both of my albums, Distorted Vision and Truths and Lies and Make-Believe

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New Video: Perspective and Self-Improvement

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I’m not big into self-help or self-improvement — a little goes a long way in that regard — and I’m certainly not in any position to be a “guru” to anyone, but in this video I share some thoughts on what kind of perspective helps or hinders our efforts. Plus, I get to unpack another of my favorite quotes from samurai warrior Miyamoto Musashi.

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Related Stuff:
– More Musashi, of course, in The Musashi-Heinlein School video
– Not a “self-help” book, but a helpful book: Quality Education: Why It Matters, and How to Structure the System to Sustain It

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Quite a Favorable Comparison

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The American Library Association’s Booklist Online recently included a brief review of Walking On The Sea of Clouds, and the last line of the review compared my novel to another recent science fiction novel you might have heard of. The comparison was so nice that the good folks at WordFire Press added it to the back cover:


(Click to enlarge.)

If the image isn’t clear (e.g., if you’re reading this on a phone and it’s too small to see), the new back-cover quote is:

Much like The Martian, Walking on the Sea of Clouds puts you on a lifeless rock and makes you think about why we explore new frontiers even as it explains how it can be done.

Not too shabby. Here’s looking forward to celebrating the book’s release in a few weeks!

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P.S. I told my newsletter subscribers about this a couple of weeks ago (I usually try to tell them things first). If you’re not getting my newsletter, why not sign up here? You’ll even get a free nonfiction e-book just for signing up.

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Liberty, and Remembering

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(Another in the continuing series of quotes to start the week.)

Memorial Day 2017 happens to fall on the birthday of two key patriots in American history: Patrick Henry (29 May 1736 – 6 June 1799) and President John F. Kennedy (29 May 1917 – 22 November 1963).

Henry is perhaps best known for a 1775 speech he gave at the Second Virginia Convention, in which he famously said

Give me liberty, or give me death!

Today we remember those who made just that sacrifice, “who more than self their country loved,” as “America the Beautiful” puts it, and who, we might imagine, loved liberty “more than life.” The price they paid is beyond reckoning, as is the gift of liberty they bestowed upon each of us.

Kennedy, of course, was a renowned orator and as President took advantage of many opportunities to stir crowds with his speeches. In a speech at Amherst College less than a month before his assassination, Kennedy said:

A nation reveals itself not only by the men it produces but also by the men it honors, the men it remembers.

Though he said it to honor the poet Robert Frost, Kennedy’s sentiment holds true as we honor our fallen warriors … among whom no doubt there were more than a few warrior-poets.


(US Defense Department Image, 26 May 2017.)

May we never, never, forget.

All together now: “To absent friends ….”

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New Video: The Dimensions of Sphericity

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A follow-up to last week’s video about “sphericity” as a metaphor for helping students grow and develop in multiple dimensions. What dimensions might we choose?

Let me know what you think!

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Related Stuff:
– Last week’s Two-Dimensional Characters, and Education video
– The Musashi-Heinlein School video
– And, for good measure, Quality Education: Why It Matters, and How to Structure the System to Sustain It

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Nominate Nerdy Music for the Pegasus Awards!

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Do you like music related to science fiction or fantasy? Then you can nominate your favorite songs for the annual Pegasus Awards for Excellence in Filking — which is, as you might guess, writing and performing music often related to SF&F and other nerdy, geeky topics.

Pegasus Award Logo

(Pegasus Award Logo.)

 

In case you’re wondering, anyone who has an interest in filk is considered part of the “filk community” and can nominate candidates (and vote, later!). Since very few people make it to every convention or hear every performer, the award includes a “brainstorming” phase which wrapped up a few weeks ago; you can head to the brainstorming results for suggestions in each category.

What are the categories? The Pegasus Awards are given out in four permanent categories, as well as two categories which rotate from year-to-year:

  • Best Filk Song — any filk song that has not previously won a Pegasus
  • Best Classic Filk Song — any well-known filk song at least 10 years old that has “entered filk community public consciousness”
  • Best Performer — any filk performer who has not won this Pegasus in the past 5 years
  • Best Writer/Composer — any writer/composer of filk songs who has not won this Pegasus in the past 5 years
  • 2017 Rotating Category: Best Horror Song — any song that “elicits horror”
  • 2017 Rotating Category: Best Perky Song — kind of self-explanatory

If you have some favorites you’d like to nominate — and you can nominate up to five songs or people in each category — fill out the 2017 Pegasus Nominating Ballot. Nominations are open until the end of July.

Let your voice be heard, and have fun with it! (And let me know if you need some suggestions….)

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If you’re really not sure whether you’re eligible to nominate, the award by-laws define “exhibiting interest” using examples such as filking at SF&F conventions, attending filk conventions or “house sings,” taking part in related on-line forums, and just “discussing filk and filk related issues with other filkers.” So, if you read this whole post, you can probably claim to have exhibited interest and therefore would be qualified to participate in the Pegasus Award process. (However, this is just barracks lawyering and does not constitute legal advice or any official rules determination.)

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Half-Brained Things, Trying to Make the World a Little Better

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(Another in the continuing series of quotes to start the week.)

Today is Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s birthday (22 May 1859 – 7 July 1930). The creator of Sherlock Holmes, Doyle has been celebrated by fans and writers for decades, so of course starting the week with a quote from him would be appropriate.

To follow on the heels of last week’s entry, L. Frank Baum’s quote about “the betterment of the world”, consider these two 1894 quotes from Doyle. First, an admission that we as human beings may not be all we think we are:

What can we know? What are we all? Poor silly half-brained things peering out at the infinite, with the aspirations of angels and the instincts of beasts.

And second, a bit of his desire to improve some small part of the world simply by being a person of good character:

I should dearly love that the world should be ever so little better for my presence. Even on this small stage we have our two sides, and something might be done by throwing all one’s weight on the scale of breadth, tolerance, charity, temperance, peace, and kindliness to man and beast. We can’t all strike very big blows, and even the little ones count for something.

Your beliefs don't make you a better person, your behavior does.
(Image: “Your beliefs don’t make you a better person, your behavior does,” by SoniaT 360., from Flickr under Creative Commons.)

Even though very often I feel both “silly” and “half-brained,” I do hope that I can do more to improve the world than to harm it. I hope you can, too.

Have a great week!

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New Video: Two-Dimensional Characters, and Education

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In writing, we try to make sure our characters are realistic; rather than “flat” and two-dimensional, we want them to be lifelike. So too in education, we want students to grow and mature in multiple dimensions. But is “well-rounded” the best metaphor?

I’d already posted the video to YouTube when I caught an error in it, so this version includes a correction I inserted.

Hey, nobody’s perfect.

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Related Stuff:
– As mentioned, The Musashi-Heinlein School video
– A lot of this derives from what I wrote in Quality Education: Why It Matters, and How to Structure the System to Sustain It

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