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 JGB NEWS Number Fourteen. October 1984. BALLARD ON BOOKER LIST Yes, J. G. Ballard's Empire of the Sun has been shortlisted for the Booker Prize. All of my British readers already know this, as the news has been widely disseminated via the press, radio and TV. The announcement was made on 18th September, and the five other shortlisted novels are: Flaubert's Parrot by Julian Barnes (Cape); Hotel du Lac by Anita Brookner (Cape); In Custody by Anita Desai (Heinemann); According to Mark by Penelope Lively (Heinemann); and Small World by David Lodge (Secker). Over a hundred novels were submitted by British publishers, and the judges who arrived at this shortlist (and who have still to pick the winner) are Prof. Richard Cobb (Chairman), Anthony Curtis, Polly Devlin, John Fuller, and Ted Rowlands, MP. The winner will be announced on the evening of Thursday 18th October at a ceremony in the Guildhall, London. The truly amazing thing is that Ballard is already tipped as the favourite to win: the Guardian has said so, as has the Observer, the Sunday Times and the Bookseller (see the list of media mentions, below). Even if the judges confound everyone's expectations, Ballard is already in a sense the moral winner. The novel has gone straight to number four on the Sunday Times bestseller list (23rd September), so its success in sales terms seems assured. The reviews have been astoundingly good. For the first time in his life, Ballard is the toast of literary London: a strange turn of events. JGB'S SEPTEMBER 1984 MEDIA COVERAGE The following is an attempt to keep tabs on all the reviews, interviews and news mentions which Ballard has received so far. The list is certainly not complete. If anyone knows of any reviews or interviews which are not on this list I should be most grateful if they could send me cuttings or photocopies... 1) Books and Bookmen. September issue. “A Unique Vision” by William Boyd, a lengthy review in which he describes the novel as “important” and “excellent.” Also: “J. G. Ballard Interviewed” by Christopher Tookey (pp 12-14). 2) Observer Magazine. Sunday 2nd September. “Ballard's Worlds,” a profile interview by Martin Amis (pp 50, 53). 3) London Review of Books. Thursday 6th September. “The Great Exhibitition” by John Sutherland, a review in he says “I believe that this work, which has evidently risen like a slow bruise from Ballard’s childhood, will exercise a claim to be considered the best British novel of the Second World War” (p 20). 4) City Limits. Friday 7th September. “Empire Road,” a profile/interview by Colin Greenland (pp 15-16). 5) Sunday Times. Sunday 9th September. “The Artist as a Young Prisoner,” a profile interview by Claire Tomalin in which she says: “an astonishing piece of adventure fiction... certainly the best book that Mr Ballard has yet written” (p 43). 6) BBC Radio 2. Monday 10th September. Interview conducted by disc jockey Ken Bruce, approx. 7.05-7.25 pm. 7) BBC Radio 4. Tuesday 11th September. “Woman's Hour” interview conducted by Sue MacGregor (?), approx. 2.15-2.25 pm. 8) BBC Radio 4. Wednesday 12th September. “Kaleidoscope” interview (very brief) conducted by Natalie Wheen, plus a review of the novel by Peter Kemp, approx. 9.45-9.55 pm. 9) Daily Mail. Thursday 13th September. “This Chilling Sun” by Allan Prior, a review which states: “This wonderfully well-written book... is not a bitter novel, it is a brilliant one. It should win the Booker Prize” (p 7). ? 10) Times Literary Supplement. Friday 14th September. “Lurid Lights” by Peter Kemp (“a novel that not only brilliantly illuminates aspects of the war in the Far East, but also offers piercing pictures of human capability”) (p 1018). 11) Observer. Sunday 16th September. “Tides of War” by Anthony Thwaite, in which he says: “one of the most gripping and remarkable novels I have read for some time... I have never read a novel which gave me a stronger sense of the blind helplessness of war... its atmosphere is unforgettable” (p 20). 12) Sunday Times. Sunday 16th September. “Tom Sawyer in Shanghai” by Nicholas Shrimpton, a review which begins with silly comparisons with Mark Twain but ends well: “Horror and humanity are blended into a unique and unforgettable fiction” (p 43). ? 13) BBC 2 Television. Tuesday 18th September. “Newsnight” interview by Joan Bakewell, implying heavily that Ballard will win the Booker, approx. 11.20-11.30 pm (uses some interesting documentary footage of old Shanghai). 14) Guardian. Wednesday 19th September. “Booker Novel Contenders Named,” a report by Stephen Cook, with added commentary by W. L. Webb: “with the possible exception of Rushdie's Midnight's Children, it would be hard to find a more original novel among the entire list of previous Booker winners than Empire of the Sun, J. G. Ballard's mordant and extraordinary story..." (p 1). 15) Times. Wednesday 19th September. “Six on Booker Short List Under Starter's Orders,” a report by Philip Howard in which he says: “The favourite in literary gossip is Ballard's Empire of the Sun. Literary chatter in these matters is less reliable as a method of forecasting the winner than a pin and shut eyes for picking horses" (p 1). 16) Guardian. Thursday 20th September. “Primal Disaster Area,” a review by Robert Nye in which he unashamedly repeats verbatim the opening of his 1976 review of Low-Flying Aircraft; goes on to say: “It is a very considerable achievement, a novel of clear moral purpose and power, excellently designed and beautifully written" (p 18). 17) Listener. Thursday 20th September. “Lands of Terror” by Richard Jones, the first partially dissenting review: “This, for all its pace and clarity, is a Boy's Own Annual view of the world -- and who would look there for pity, for a real understanding of what was going on or for an awareness of tragedy?” (p 27). 18) Times. Thursday 20th September. “Sharp Eyes Behind the Barbed Wire” by Philip Howard (“... this deeply felt novel... In its expression of the heart of darkness in the human condition, experienced by a small boy, the book explores the same dark jungle as Lord of the Flies”) (p 11). 19) Daily Telegraph. Friday 21st September. “A Hard Up-Bringing” by Selina Hastings, the second carping review: “... a curious deadness in Mr Ballard’s narrative method which makes it impossible to feel involved. Part of the trouble is that Jim himself is so detached...” (p 15). 20) New Statesman. Friday 21st September. “Lost Boy” by Roger Lewis, a review in which he says: “Ballard, in the finest piece of modern fiction I have read for some time, incarnates the spirits of Kim and of Barrie's Peter Pan. It is very much more than a war novel” (p. 29). 21) Bookseller. Saturday 22nd September. “Is it a Camel? Is it a Horse? Can We Flog It?” An anonymous leading article which discusses the Booker shortlist. Features a photo of JGB at the Forbidden Planet bookshop signing session on Saturday 15th September, and opines: "Gollancz, which had nothing on last year's shortlist, has arrived with what looks likely to be the hot favourite, Empire of the Sun" (pp 1319-1320). 22) Observer. 23rd September. “The Sick-as-a-Parrot Novelists Who Just Miss Booker Shortlist” by Robert Low. Features a photo of JGB and the front cover of the novel, with the caption “Hot favourite.” An interesting article because it indicates that one of the judges has already broken ranks: “of the nearly-but-not-quites, Angela Carter's omission is provoking the most controversy. Even one of the judges, sworn to secrecy about their deliberation, expressed her surprise publicly. Polly Devlin, author and journalist, said 'I was bewildered. It's a tour de force, an amazing book” (the title in question is of course Carter’s Nights at the Circus (Chatto)). Goes on to quote Polly Devlin on the Ballard: “One reason for its popularity is, according to Devlin, that it is the only novel on the shortlist that is not about writers writing” (p 3). ? 23) Sunday Telegraph. 23rd September. “Englishwoman Abroad” by Patrick Skene Catling, a review which gives precedence to Anita Brookner's Hotel du Lac (hence the title of the piece) but goes on to say of the Ballard: “a vivid, poetic, realistic autobiographical novel... a cathartic literary triumph” (p 16). 24) Sunday Times. 23rd September. “Booker Talk,” an anonymous article which says the “short list this year is characterized by elegance, chastity and intelligence... Only Ballard's book is entirely outside the world of literature-as-subject-for-literature, and it must be said that Empire of the Sun is as refreshing as a great gust of air across that somewhat stuffy room” (p 41). 25) Time Out. Thursday 27th September. “The Inner Spaceman” by Angela Carter, a profile/interview/review, and a delight. She describes the novel as “rich, complex, heartrending... The obsessive pursuit of his own imagery to its origins has brought us this riveting and sombre and, yes, funny (humour blacker than black, this time) and, finally, humane novel that is the kind of novel we used to think we no longer had the energy to write, that Ballard was writing all the time” (pp 17-18). 26) Illustrated London News. October issue (but on sale by last week of September). “Recent Fiction” by Sally Emerson, a review in which she commends the novel highly -- I don't actually have a copy of this as I was loth to part with £1.20 for the magazine (p 97). AND LOTS MORE TO COME... In October, watch out for the Bookmark programme on BBC2 TV which will feature an interview with JGB conducted by Ian Hamilton. Also, the Book Four programme on Channel Four, with Hermione Lee's interview. Then there will be Channel Four's special “live” programme on the Booker award ceremony, 18th October, and no doubt lots more on the radio and in the press. I have myself conducted a new interview with Ballard, provisionally entitled “Psychoanalyst of the Electronic Age,” which should appear in a new magazine, UK Omni, in December (alongside a reprint of one of JGB's stories). The US edition of Empire... should be out in October. I shall be most grateful to any of my American readers who send me copies of reviews and interviews which appear over there. Likewise, I'd appreciate news of the novel's reception in France when the Denoel edition comes out. (I've heard that the novel has now been sold to a Danish publisher, though there's no definite news as yet of a sale to Japan -- that one should be really interesting!) HISTORY OF 'THE SECRET AUTOBIOGRAPHY' Ballard's short piece which appeared in Ambit 96 early in 1984, “The Secret Autobiography of J. G. B******,” has a more complex publishing history than I had realized. It was written for a French fanzine, Etoile Mecanique, which appeared in July 1981. Apparently, Ballard sent the editor, David Saingery, his only copy of the story. It was translated into French by G. W. Barlow. Ballard lost contact with David Saingery and was unable to retrieve his original manuscript. So when it came time to produce a “new” piece for Ambit he back-translated his own story from Barlow's French into a fresh English version... Etoile Mecanique numero triple (1,2 et 3), Juillet 81-Mars 82, also contained an interview with JGB, “Le mariage de Freud et de Roland Barthes,” conducted by Denis Guiot on 10th October 1976 (when it seems Ballard was in Paris for a signing session), and a critical article, “Pour une lecture du Reveur Illimite de J. G, Ballard,” by George W. Barlow. MORE FROM THE FRENCH 5/9/84 Dear David: I wanted to mention a couple of items I read recently. Both were in French as it happens, so I shall translate: “Bruno Lussato (in Le defi informatique, Fayard, 1981) mentions the new markets opening to travel agents. He gives the example of a programme currently available which offers the possibility of a never-before-experienced discovery of Venice. All possible images of all the streets, of all the floors of the houses, of all the reflections from the canals, of all the skylines, are filmed and stocked in the immense memories of a videodisc. A computer arranges the real (or the imaginary?) in accordance with the particular desires of the spectator: turn left then right, go down three steps, sit and look at the sky, set off again, continue straight ahead...” (from Philippe Lemoine, “L'objet post-industriel,” in Autrement No. 37, 1982). I couldn't help thinking of “The Intensive Care Unit”... The other piece of some interest was the paragraph contributed by Ballard via a letter of 29/8/75 to a rather trivial and sloppy book by Igor and Grichka Bogdanoff, L'effet science-fiction: a la recherche d'une definition (Paris: Laffont, 1979). It's nothing new or mind-blowing. Page 290: “1) Une definition 'legere': La science-fiction est ce sujet particulier qui suscite le besoin irrepressible de definitions complexes, contradictoires et inutiles. “2) Une definition 'serieuse': La science-fiction est une fiction inspiree par la science. On pourrait alors penser a l'imaginaire. Mais l' imaginaire, quant a lui, n'est q'une fiction inspiree par... la fiction. La tient toute la difference.” The book contains similar off-the-cuff responses from all sorts of people from Giscard d'Estaing to Cassius Clay and David Bowie (“La science-fiction: c'est moi”). -- Jonathan Benison, Norwich Thanks for those snippets. Jonathan's own essay, “Jean Baudrillard on the Current State of SF,” will appear in Foundation 32 (November 1984). It's a weighty assessment of the points at which Baudrillard's thought touches sf, and it's of particular interest in that it contains a paraphrase of Baudrillard's essay on JGB's Crash. Jonathan also tells me that his earlier essay, “J. G. Ballard and the Current State of Nihilism,” has still to appear (though it is listed by Bernard Sigaud in his recent Ballard bibliography). It is due to come out in a book called Just the Other Day: Essays on the Suture of the Future edited by Luk de Vos, and Jonathan states in a letter dated 21/9/84: the “book was supposed to come out in 1983; then 1984. I've been in touch but get no reply -- so I can't guarantee that 1984 is the correct publication date.” NEWS IN BRIEF... Two new Ballard paperbacks are just out in Britain. From Dent comes The Voices of Time (£2.95), attractively packaged as are all the Dent books, with a good cover illustration by Grizelda Holderness. (This is, of course, The Four-Dimensional Nightmare appearing under its “true” title for the first time -- it's also due out in hardcover from Gollancz in January 1985.) From Granada comes Myths of the Near Future (£1.95), the first of their 'B' format paperback editions of JGB's works (Crash to follow in early 1985). This one has a cover painting by James Marsh of a bird-woman (Marsh also did the cover on Dent's edition of The Terminal Beach, and I am told he will be illustrating all the forthcoming reissues of Ballard's books). Cover painting aside, this Granada book is not as attractive as the Dent editions and is printed on cheaper paper. In the same week that Gollancz released Empire... Jonathan Cape republished four of JGB's earlier titles in hardcover. They are The Drought, The Crystal World, The Disaster Area and Concrete Island, and all are priced at £8.95 each. I haven't seen these books, but apparently they are new editions with new covers (to the best of my knowledge, Cape have only ever reprinted one of Ballard's books before now -- they did a second imprint of Crash in 1974). An article by K. V. Bailey entitled “There are No Nightmares at the Ritz: An Exploration of The Drowned World” appeared in Vector, the journal of the British SF Association, No. 121, August 1984. It deals with the novel in terms of traditional literary and religious symbolism. In a subsequent letter to me Kenneth Bailey has divulged the interesting fact that he was living in Singapore at the time of the Japanese takeover of that city during World War II. He is looking forward to reading Ballard's Empire of the Sun -- and I look forward to hearing his response to it. SOME FRAGMENTS FROM A RECENT INTERVIEW As I mentioned in the last of these newsletters, Colin Greenland has sent me the tape of the interview he did with JGB on 1st August 1984. A small part of this has now been published in City Limits (see item 4 in the “September Media Coverage” list, above). I have now done a rough transcript of the tape, and shall present you with a few extracts. To save space, I've omitted Colin's questions: “I didn't set out to write the book in the context of my feelings about other novels about internment... Very little has been written about the war in the Far East, and very few novels. Most of those have either been by people who were never there at all, like Pierre Boulle, who wrote Bridge on the River Kwai, or by people like Mailer and Laurens Van der Post who were soldiers. Most of the military personnel who were captured by the Japanese were men who were conscripted, sent out to the Far East on troop ships, pitchforked into strange territory, usually jungle, which they'd never seen before, captured within a very short space of time and then interned for three or four years with little contact with the surrounding country. My experiences were completely different... To my knowledge Empire... is one of the few eye-witness accounts of how British civilians behaved under the heel of the Japanese... “Violence is very addictive, and if one's immersed in a situation of extreme privation it becomes the norm. In a paradoxical way, one becomes attached to it and wants to perpetuate it. But it's a mistake to associate hunger, privation and disease with insecurity. One can be in prolonged states of malnutrition and disease and yet feel great security. In our case the external perimeter of the camp was maintained and guarded. One welcomes the status quo simply because it provides the only reassuring element in one's life... “Everybody who has gone through that sort of experience is corrupted by it. It's like any extreme, harrowing experience. People aren't ennobled by suffering... People are corrupted by it, but at the same time it does strip away a lot of illusions one has about the way the world is... “'The Dead Time' was my trial run, I suppose. Empire... is a realistic novel, underpinned by a mass of naturalistic detail, whereas that long short story is really a piece of imaginative fiction -- although it uses the same landscape as Empire.... I was feeling my way, testing out the ground to see if I could leave the apocalyptic mode behind completely... A novel is so much more than a short story. One can actually control a short story; the writer's imagination can be larger than the universe of the story. A novel is so open-ended in all directions. No writer could dominate the novel he's writing, it's something that multiplies in his hands... “This was an important period of my life which obviously provided the power-house (that's a self-complimentary term) for much of my later fiction. Not all, though -- one isn't affected only by adolescent experiences. As you get older you're equally influenced by the experiences of marriage and having children, which take place in one's twenties and thirties. But this was obviously a very important world, the door to which was closed when I left China in 1946, and to which I've never been able to return. I needed to return to it at least once in my life, imaginatively speaking, to face it all -- probably, I hope, as a prelude to a new direction of some sort. It remains to be seen in the next few years...” YOU MAY BUY YOUR 'RE/SEARCH' NOW About twenty people have written to me to say that they definitely want to buy a copy of Re/Search 8/9, the special JGB issue described in detail in the last newsletter. My supply of extra copies has arrived at last (thanks, Vale and Andrea!), so purchasers may send me their money now. This offer is open to British and European readers only. Please make your cheques payable to David Pringle (£7 plus £1 postage and packing). Persons elsewhere in the world may order direct from Re/Search, 20 Romolo B, San Francisco, CA 94133, USA. I believe Forbidden Planet bookshop in London will be importing some copies in due course, so you may wish to buy it from them... 'GOLDEN NUGGET' Richard Glyn Jones has kindly sent me a copy of an 18-year-old soft porn magazine called Golden Nugget. The Features Editor is one “Bill Barclay,” the Fiction Editor one “Edward Powys.” Fans of Michael Moorcock's work will recognize elements of his old pseudonyms... One of the features in this issue is entitled “Ballard: Prophet of British New Wave.” It consists of a large picture of the man (the same photo used four years later to adorn a Penthouse interview, as I recall) and a single paragraph of text. It says: “J. G. Ballard, Britain's leading experimental writer, breaking new literary ground in the manner of James Joyce or William Burroughs, is a modest man who lives in a semi in Shepperton, is 36, a widower, was interned in Shanghai Jap Camp during the war, served in Canada as an RAF pilot, and has been in advertising, films and scientific journalism. Now a fulltime writer... he is building a good reputation in literary circles and his books are beginning to sell big. Ballard made his writing debut in sf ten years ago with a story everyone thought must be by a well-established name writer, it was so good. But is Ballard writing sf today? He doesn't think so -- he says he's writing 'speculative fantasy' -- work that looks wholly at the present in terms of the future and not in terms of the past. He's impatient with the social novel or what he calls the 'retrospective novel.' His short fiction appears almost entirely in three very different magazines -- Playboy, New Worlds, and Ambit. The really experimental stuff appears primarily in NW and is what Ballard names 'condensed novels' (after Borges). They are certainly condensed -- packing the equivalent of a conventional novel into six or seven paperback-sized pages. His images are powerful ones -- visions of World War III (he calls our own era the Pre-Third) -- visions of the 'real' identities of the people who appear on giant hoardings -- Kennedy, Malcolm X and Lee Harvey Oswald -- visions of a world in which reality is disintegrating around us. Ballard is the first major writer to emerge from a movement that might well become the British New Wave -- tougher, essentially more serious than the French -- producing a consolidation of all the literary experiments and ideas of the past fifty years. Watch him. Watch his work. Ballard is ahead of us all.” On the opposite page we have photographs of “pixyish, green-eyed, German-born Erica Huber.” Ah, those were the days... This newsletter comes from David Pringle, 124 Osborne Road, Brighton BN1 6LU -- please send me two 17p stamps or two IRC's if you want to receive the next issue. News, contributions and comments are always welcomed. Appendix to David Pringle's JGB News number 14; as a favour to Monsieur Sigaud... BERNARD SIGAUD, BP 97, 93203 SAINT-DENIS CEDEX 1, FRANCE presents HARD COPY SPECIAL 1: BIBLIOGRAPHIE DE J.G. BALLARD (1984) Up to date to April 1984, this French-language bibliography covers (nearly) everything written by and about J.G. Ballard. There are nearly 700 entries distributed in 9 sections: A: Romans et Recueils (Fiction: Novels and Collections) B: Prefaces, Essais & Commentaires parus dans des romans, recueils, anthologies (Non-fiction published in novels, collections, anthologies) C: Oeuvres de Fiction parues dans des periodiques francophones et anglophones (Fiction published in French-language and English-language periodicals - mostly short stories) D: Articles et Essais parus dans des periodiques (Non-Fiction published in periodicals) E: Entretiens (Interviews) F: Romans et Recueils traduits en francais (Novels and collections translated into French) G: Nouvelles parues dans des anthologies francophones (Short stories translated in French?-language anthologies) H: Critique (Essays, Articles, Reviews, Odd Mentions, etc. on JGB and his work) J: Documents Divers (Miscellaneous) All quotations from items referred to in Sections B, C, D, E, H have been translated into French. This Bibliographie is a revised and much-expanded version of J.G. Ballard, 1951-1981: Essai de Bibliographie (Montpellier, 1983, unpublished). It will be part of a PhD Doctorat de 3eme Cycle) Thesis on Ecriture et Representation chez J.G. Ballard (Montpellier III; dissertation supervisor: Professor Pierre Vitou). Research on location was made possible by a bursary from the British Council and a 6-month stay at Reading University as an Academic Visitor attached to the Sociology Department. Apart from the very efficient Inter-Library Loan Scheme, I was helped by visits to the Newspaper Section of the British Library at Colindale, London, the Bodleian Library in Oxford, and of course the Science Fiction Foundation in Dagenham. Vital assistance has been constantly provided by David Pringle, Editor of Foundation and co-Editor of Interzone, the foremost Ballard scholar and archivist. Special thanks to Brian M. Stableford and Patrick Parrinder at Reading University, Joyce Day at the SF Foundation, plus Jonathan Benison, Leslie Hurst, Maxim Jakubowski, Colin Greenland, David Bridges, Peter Ronnov-Jessen, Catherine Bresson, Roger Bozzetto, Jean-Pierre Fontana and Anne Sugrue - my Programme Officer. Facts: 75pp (incl. Forewords & Introduction, Indexes, Illustrations) typed in 1/15" Raumspar - like this circular - photocopied on 80 gsm paper on Canon NP equipment. Will be sent bound (thesis fashion) at the Book Rate in a padded envelope for £5 (France: 50F). THE HARD COPY 1984 OMNIBUS: ISSUES 1-5 (JAN, FEB, MCH, APR, JLY) Binds under one cover 4 English-language and the first French-language issue of a news bulletin on things and people Ballardian, originally produced from Reading for J.G. Ballard, David Pringle and friends of the Editor. Issue 5 starts a series of translated pieces of rare fiction and non-fiction (interviews) with some critical appendages. Issues have been sent, over a period of six months, to: JG Ballard, David Pringle, David Bridges, Jonathan Benison, Maxim Jakubowski, Anne Sugrue, Catherine Bresson, Roger Bozzetto, Daniel Riche, Denise Terrel, Pierre Vitoux, Deborah Davis,Genevieve Reversat, Jean-Pierre Fontana, Emmanuel Jouanne, Peter Ronnov-Jessen, Jannick Storm, Patrick Parrinder, Brian Stableford, Leslie Hurst, Waclaw Skorupski, W.S. Burroughs, Sam Scoggins, Joyce Day, Jack Chalkley, Chris Fowler, David Palfreyman, Brahim Harouni, Annwyl Williams... Number of pages: 100 (production data as above). Yours for £6 (France: 60F). Save £1 or 10F when ordering both items (bound separately) together. 13 September 1984. BERNARD SIGAUD, BP 97, 93203 SAINT-DENIS CEDEX 1, FRANCE HARD COPY C0NTENTS GUIDE 1984 HC 1 (JAN 1984) 'Testing Reality: J.G. Ballard Talks to Bernard Sigaud about The Day After and The Right Stuff' - recorded 13 DEC 1983 in Shepperton. 6pp. incl. Illustrations and covers (2nd reset xeroxing). HC 2 (FEB 1984) MAIN FRAME: 'Missing Persons' (Help us trace the character set behind the literals in Generations of America, p.2); 'This Cargo Has Landed' (Ray Roussel Makes His Debut, p.3); 'Northern Lights' A cold introduction to the Norwegian edition of Vermilion Sands, p.4); 'Hot Metal' (Musing around a dejected metaphor, p.4); 'RanXerox' (Italian-French comic strip quotes Crash without permission, p.5); 'A Royal Collage of Art' (Sam Scoggins' film The Unlimited Dream Company, p.7); Brion Gysin's Dreamachine (A Bibliography, p.8); Index Update '84 (Introducing the characters of Empire of the Sun, p.9); 'B & B: Ballard and Burroughs' (Exclusive glimpses from the Scrapbooks, p.10); 'Piping Hot and Softly Blowing' (Automotive perversion); 'For My Eyes Only' (Aqua-revent les jeunes filles?). ADD-ONS: Do You Have Nightmares about Exhibitions? (p.5);'Pharmacopeia', 'Lieutenant '70' (p.5); Roger Bozzetto Writes (p.7); Recognition Test (p.14); Collector's Item, p.15; Unidentified Cassiopeia, 15; Jon Benison Writes, 15; A Student of Science Fiction, 15; The Space Age Is Over (Repeat) 16; Jon Bing's Index, 16; Zapruder Frame 237, 16; Forthcoming, 16. 20 pp. incl. ill. & covers. HC 3 (MAR 1984) MAIN SEQUENCE: Questions, Always Questions, pp-3-4 (JGB's personality inventory from the Scoggins film); Dancing With The Hamatcha, PP-5-6 (2 pages from an invisible book by Brion Gysin); A Taxonomist's Dream Diary (Editor's vestigial listings), pp.8-9; Ballard Ex Machina (Index of first lines in all his fiction), pp.11-13; Myths of the Near Future (J.G. Ballard talks to Book Four's Hermione Lee), pp.13-17. SUBROUTINES: MotorpsyCau Nightmare (Rare rave review of Crash), p.2; JGB News (Not this magazine!) p.2; Random Notes (70,000 Japanese may be dead wrong), p.2; Journey through an Artificial Garden (The crystal world of Heinz Mack, pix by Thomas Hopker), p.3; Tomorrow's World (Speak up, ye polysensi tives!), p.3; Computer Graphics (State of this art), p.6; Hot Metal, Contd. (Reality beats fiction under Arizona sun), P.6; Montpellier Se Schtroumpfe (Top of comix page), p.7; Editor's Statement (The page is not the forest), p.7; The Corn Belt News (A message from WS Burroughs), p.7; RanXerox (Letters: D. Pringle, J. Benison), p.7; How Old the Moon? (18 lines of BASIC for the Continuous Count), p.10. Generation of America (JG Ballard writes), p.10; Andre Ligeon-Ligeonnet (Concrete Island on the Paris circular?), p.10; Home and Clear (HC goes underground), p.13; Count Alfred Korzybski (A map is not the territory; letters), p.10; Terminal Zone, p.17 (Just what it says, Dutch). 19pp. incl. ill. and covers. HC 4 (APR 1984) MAIN MENU: Cover Stories (5 Japanese girls in uneven transits), pp.3-4. Generations: End (Last call to missing characters), pp.7-8. Concrete Island the Film & the State of Video in France, pp. 8-9. Two Kinds of Sorts (Leslie Hurst on Basic-Plus), pp.9-10. K Numbers (A routine), p.11. Elektrition: Violence in the Weeks (Sound impressions of High-Rise), pp.12-15. Cage on Four (First of "Four Composers" on Joyce & mesostics), pp.17-18; Afterword (by Channel 4 producer Peter Greenaway: filming Roaratorio), p.18; Foreword to The Atrocity Exhibition (From Nagasaki to Copenhagen: preface to the 1969 Danish edition), pp.20-21; Not an Interview: An MDDX Routine (Prelude to a Nippon KKK Slide Show at Jim's home), pp.22-24. FILLERS: Introducing Empire… Editor's Self-Aggrandizement, p.2; Inner Space Ad Courtesy Honda UK Ltd, p.4; 3-Level Embedding… Tarmac Terror Strikes Again... Rare Sighting of a Late Night Star… Which Side Are You On?... Midsummer, p.5; The Inner Ear, p.7; Key to an Escape, p.8; A Taxonomer's Dream Diary, p.10; Burroughsiana... Letter from Jannick Storm, p.19; KG Ballard... latest French homage to JGB... Mellow Bird, p.21; Afterword to A MDDX Routine... Closedown Notes, p.24. 26pp all told. HC 5 (JUL 1984) *French-language issue* INVENTAIRE: Le reveur illimite (bande-son du film de S. Scoggins), pp.2-7. Ballard a la question (Notes sur le film), p.7. L'Autobiographie secrete de J.G.B*** (Fiction de JG Ballard), pp.8-9. L'Eternel estivant ou Les vacances de l'homme de plume (Parcours critique autour de Shepperton), pp.10-13. Paysages Interieurs (Entretien de JGB avec le Dr CR Evans), pp.14-22). 24 pp. HARD COPY is photocopied on order only after a token first run of complimentary or review copies has been mailed out. Costs: quality copying on Canon NP or Xerox 9500 machines 50 centimes (5p) per page. Each page on 80 gsm stock weighs 5 grammes. Airkraft or Jiffy-type padded envelopes (you can recycle) are anywhere between 2.20F and 2.80F (20p-25p) and weigh 110-130g. Fare steps book rate: 1.70F (15p) up to 100g; 3.30F (30p) up to 250g; 5F (45p) up to 500g; 8.40F (75p) up to 1000g; 11.60F (£1) up to 2,000g. Note that HC 1 cannot be sent separately. Round off to the nearest pound and mail us the note(s) or your contribution to the next issue!
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