The Letters to the Editor department is intended to be a forum for our readers to express their own opinions and ideas. While we appreciate the many complimentary letters we receive each day, you won't find them on this page. Instead, you will find letters that go beyond or even contradict what we have written, letters that offer a different perspective and provide a different view of science fiction. If you would like to submit a letter, please use our feedback form or send a message to scifiweekly@scifi.com.
-- Craig E. Engler, Editor
SubSpace doesn't look as good as XPilot
've just read your review of Virgin's Subspace. Sigh. Once again some company, somewhere, is trying to get us to pay money for something that you can get better, more cheaply, elsewhere. If you want the
original multi-player, Internet-ted, fast-action space game, look up XPilot.
Totally free; you get the source. Design your own map. Design your own ship.
Mines, cluster mines, lasers, tractor beams, pressor beams, missiles, nukes,
big nukes, odd gravity, robots, team games (throw a ball around), freelance
mayhem... XPilot's got it all, and from the looks of it, Subspace doesn't look
nearly as good.
And, unlike Subspace, which is free! (for a while), XPilot is, in fact,
genuinely free.
David Given
dg@freeyellow.com
Not how deep, but how far
n the current issue of SFW, you have a heading that reads as follows:
"Classic Sci-Fi: Before the ABC TV version, before the NBC TV version, there was the original Jules Verne novel, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea."
The correct title of Jules Verne's novel is Twenty Thousand
Leagues Under the Seas. Look it up for yourself. It seems that there are many translations of the classic novel from the original French into English, but only a couple have gotten it right. The gentleman who first translated the book was not that good at French or science. He flubbed the title and several scientific concepts as well. He was also some sort of minister and would edit the work if it didn't meet his standards or ideals. If you want to adapt the classic story for TV or other media, you have three choices:
- translate the book from French into whatever language you use and
then use your own translation as the basis, or
- use one of the modern translations already in circulation, and pay the translator for his work or,
- use the free public domain translation and not pay anything.
Most people choose the latter.
Think about it though, the different titles give a whole different spin
on the meaning. Did Captain Nemo go 20,000 leagues deep? Or did he go on a journey that was 20,000 leagues from start to finish? I know Mr. Verne, with his knowledge of science would not imply that the crew of the famous submarine were to go that deep.
Mike Berger
mberger@solve.net
Editor: The ABC series takes great pains to emphasize that Verne went long and not deep, so at least they got something right.
What about the Naval Academy translation?
ou reviewed Jules Verne's 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, but you did not mention the new translation done by the Naval Academy (Institute?). Shame, shame. The book was a standard read in submarine classes for naval officers. Some visiting French naval officers noticed that the English version was substantially different from the original French they had read. It came out that the first (and probably only) translation left out huge amounts of the book. Bowdlerized it all to hell. The main vicitms were all the submarine technology bits and lots of metaphysical philosophy and dreams. The best analogy I have heard was it was like reading Moby Dick with all of the chapters on whaling cut out. To think that for over 100 years no one noticed the difference.
Brent Heustess
heustess@mail.utexas.edu
Ah, excuse me?
ust read Tasha Robinson's review of The Fifth Element...ah, excuse me? Was I the only one watching
this movie? To compare Fifth to some of its predecessors, i.e., Total Recall, 12 Monkeys (where'd that come from?) and Blade Runner is quite ludicrous. The Fifth Element stands alone, and also outclasses what came before it ideologically, visually and has an incredible soundtrack (not even mentioned) that stitched together this gem of a movie.
Holes in the plot?
Put away your Shakespearean Star Trek plots and find some old Philip K. Dick novels (Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said is a good one) and kick back and have some real fun...and as far as holes in the plot goes, I didn't find any, but I was watching the film.
The Fifth Element is campy, but that's just a parody of the
junk culture we live in...I'm just hoping that Besson directs Snow Crash if that should ever come about as a film project. Better yet, maybe he'll create another "original." That's what this film was,
and most likely it will define the future of science fiction films
upcoming...
Doug Jenkinson
toughykid@aol.com
