I was out for a beer with my friend Chris, the self-described language geek, and he mentioned that he'd looked up the periodic table in Chinese - try to convince me that doesn't belong on the Geek Test!
- Sid
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Yevgeny Zamyatin was a philosopher, author and dissident in a time and place that tolerated none of those roles - Stalin's Russia. His dystopian science fiction novel We, written in 1920, never saw publication in Russia. He died in Paris in 1937, exiled from Russia at his own request.
For me, his quote expresses the essential shared nature of science fiction and fantasy: a revolution that never ends - an infinite revolution.
Comments and observations on science fiction and fantasy.
Why "The Infinite Revolution"?
"Revolution is everywhere, in everything. It is infinite. There is no final revolution, no final number.
- Yevgeny Zamyatin
Yevgeny Zamyatin was a philosopher, author and dissident in a time and place that tolerated none of those roles - Stalin's Russia. His dystopian science fiction novel We, written in 1920, never saw publication in Russia. He died in Paris in 1937, exiled from Russia at his own request.
For me, his quote expresses the essential shared nature of science fiction and fantasy: a revolution that never ends - an infinite revolution.
Introduction
I've been reading science fiction and fantasy for as long as I can remember - in fact, my involvement goes back further than that, my mother used to say that she had read the Narnia books to me when I was a baby. I've maintained my interest over the years, and after my friend Colin started HIS blog (Campbell Brothers Winery), I thought to myself, hey, if no one stopped HIM*... I make no claim to being an authority in any way, shape or form, and since there are lots of lists, biographies and bibliographies out there on the net, this is just going to be a place for me to vent some of my thoughts and opinions.
*And the Campbell Brothers may be desperately in need of stopping, based on all evidence.
*And the Campbell Brothers may be desperately in need of stopping, based on all evidence.
About Me
My rating from Innergeek.us
Right now I'm reading:
- Iron Sunrise, by Charles Stross
- Renegades of Time, by Raymond F. Jones
Just for your information, the simplified 'radical' on the left hand side of a lot of the elements (metals especially) is the symbol for 'metal' (jin), one of the five elements in the old Chinese 'order of things' (or whatever you want to call it). The other four elements are the same as ours.
ReplyDeleteChris
Correction, the five elements or wu xing (wu meaning 5) and xing having many translations, one of which is 'changing states of being' are fire, earth, water, metal and wood.
ReplyDeleteChris
Hmmm...this would seem to refute the plot concept from "Omnilingual" by H. Beam Piper, in which the periodic table is used as a Rosetta Stone for an alien society - Martian, to be specific. I'm reasonably sure that the standard table of elements doesn't include "wood".
ReplyDelete- Sid
Well there are the ancient elements which one can count on your hand which weren't worked into a table, and the periodic table which has at least 100 which can be categorized into rows based on the fickleness of their electrons. Too bad they have the same word attached to them and it intersected in my discourse.
ReplyDeleteChris