Chastising The Pedant and the Shuffly

So, we mentioned a dozen days ago that we were celebrating the fiftieth anniversary of Bellairs's second book, The Pedant and the Shuffly. We also noted some of the Chicago influences on the book and hinted there was another Chicago story to tell. And here it is.

Celebrating The Pedant and the Shuffly

This year marks the fiftieth anniversary of The Pedant and the Shuffly, the second book of John Bellairs and his second collaboration with illustrator Marilyn Fitschen. The short, 79-page illustrated fable details the encounter of the two titular characters: the pedantic wizard Snodrog, who submits logic traps to his fellow countrymen to transform their weak-minded bodies into linen napkins, and the fury, mop-topped creature known as the Shuffly, whose cheery and playful mindset constantly circumvents the Snodrog's best laid plans.

Remembering Ursula K. Le Guin

Forty years ago The Face in the Frost was first released in paperback through Ace Books, a well-known publisher of science fiction and fantasy titles. In a June, 1978, letter to his friend Gerald Kadish, Bellairs briefly mentions his book and then shares the good news:

"[Face] is coming out in November in paperback! I was sent the lurid jacket sample by a girl who works for Ace Paperbacks. The jacket has blurbs by Lin Carter and Ursula K. Le Guin, and I am tickled."

Le Guin died last week at her home in Oregon, leaving behind a celebrated body of work, including the Earthsea series, stories in the Hainish Cycle, and numerous standalone novels and short stories. Awards for her work include the National Book Award, the Newbery Medal, and multiple Hugo and Nebula awards.

(For the record, Le Guin says Face is “authentic fantasy by a writer who knows what wizardry is all about.")

Time Capsule: Jan. 27, 1938

We noted John's eightieth birthday earlier this month on Jan. 17.  Today’s the eightieth anniversary of his coming home from the hospital.  It’s not surprising to see he was born in Oaklawn Hospital, likely similar to the hospital Lewis visits at the end of The Figure in the Shadows (1975).

These Eighty Years: #HappyBirthday #JohnBellairs

Celebrating what would have been the 80th birthday of John Bellairs, born this 17th day of January in 1938, in Marshall, Michigan.  Birthday wishes courtesy of:

#JohnBellairs, author of my fave book #HouseWithAClockInItsWalls would have been 80 today. Happy Birthday, sir. It's an honor & a life goal adapting your book into a movie. (Everyone! Read the book! Then see the movie this fall!) @eliroth #JackBlack #CateBlanchett https://t.co/vLkon8kxwL

— Eric Kripke (@therealKripke) January 17, 2018

John Bellairs' birthday is Jan 17! In celebration, I just posted about Tim Powers and Bellairs. @Bellairsia: #HouseWithAClockInItsWalls #johnbellairs https://t.co/uVw34q3uW2

— Ned Hayes (@nedwriting) January 17, 2018

Some of This Year's Book-to-Movie Adaptations

Amy Durant writes in the Watertown (NY) Daily Times of the various books being adapted for the screen this year, of which she's counted 15.  Titles include Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451, Shirley Jackson's We Have Always Lived in the Castle and The Haunting of Hill House (as Durnt points out, no "The Lottery"), and the classic A Wrinkle in Time by Madeline L’Engle.  Oh, and one this site and its fans are keenly aware of:

Playing the Torturer, By Small and Small

 

The notion of memorializing a crime in miniature caught our eye this Sunday morning, if only because it reminded us of the dollhouse room in the Childermass Clock, itself a rather macabre monument to Childermass family secrets.

The Nutshell Studies of Unexplained Death are a series of intricately-designed dollhouse-style dioramas created by Frances Glessner Lee (1878–1962), a pioneer in forensic science.  Glessner Lee used her inheritance to establish a department of legal medicine at Harvard Medical School in 1936, and donated the first of the Nutshell Studies in 1946 for use in lectures on the subject of crime scene investigation. In 1966, the department was dissolved, and the dioramas went to the Maryland Medical Examiner’s Office in Baltimore, Maryland, where they are on permanent loan and still used for forensic seminars.  The 2012 documentary "Of Dolls and Murder" celebrates Glessner Lee and her creations, the latter of which were the focus of a story on CBS-TV's Sunday Morning.

Survey: Your Favorite Judith Brown Artwork in "Treasure"

Artist and illustrator Judith Gwyn Brown created 10 full page illustrations for The Treasure of Alpheus Winterborn and, in celebration of its 40th anniversary, we want to know which one is your favorite.

2018 Kicks Off with #JohnBellairsMonth, 'Pedant' Celebration

Happy 2018!

Right out of the gate, January is Richard Denney‏’s #JohnBellairsMonth in which he and other fans will read The House with a Clock in its Walls (he’s done this month-thing before, too, so he’s no novice).  If you want some discussion topics or need some past reviews we've got you covered.

It’s a good book to celebrate and a good month to celebrate, too, as the 17th would have been John’s 80th birthday.

Film News: Barnavelt Channels Led Zeppelin

 Lewis (Owen Vaccaro), Uncle Jonathan (Jack Black), Mrs. Zimmermann (Cate Blanchett), and neighbor (director Eli Roth) go through the motions of Led Zeppelin's “Immigrant Song”.  Enjoy.

Daddy’s School Of Ragnaroth from the set of “The House With A Clock In It’s Walls”

A post shared by Jack Black (@jackblack) on Nov 9, 2017 at 10:21am PST

Spooky Stories Haunt the Shelves of Winona Public Library

Ben McLeod wrote to us last decade to tell how Bellairsia finally helped him connect the dots between Hoosac and Winona:

I cannot describe to you the frisson of reading a book about a mysterious library and a treasure hidden within while sitting in the very library being described. As I read more of the Anthony Monday books certain particulars made it very, very clear that Hoosac was in fact Winona. When I tried to point out to parents and librarians that these books were about our town, I was met with disinterested disbelief. Adults simply assumed that I was projecting myself onto the characters of the books.

McLeod discovered through the site that Bellairs had taught at the now-defunct College of Saint Teresa in the early 1960s, prompting him to finally find his white whale.  Or his Winterborn.  Or Weatherend.  Whatever.   Now he's back (McLeod, that is), this time with an article in the Winona Post just in time for Halloween that further explains the connection and celebrates the four-book Anthony Monday series:

Haverhill’s Horror Movie Heritage

WHAV radio notes some of the people associated with Haverhill that have contributed to horror movies over the years just in time for Halloween. In addition to John Bellairs - noting his Johnny Dixon series (set in "a thinly-veiled 1950s Haverhill") and the impending movie adaptation of The House with a Clock in its Walls - Dave Goudsward passes along the following biographies:

A Prime Example of the Halloween Spirit

As the midnight hour gets closer to hand, James Basile writes this weekend in the Oklahoman about one of his favorite spooky and creepy reads:

Happy Birthday, #BradStrickland!

"Coming from the South, I grew up in a family of storytellers. My aunts, uncles, and grandparents told tales of enchantment and terror involving vanishing hitchhikers, spirits of the dead wandering graveyards in the form of flickering flames, buried Confederate gold, indelible bloodstains at the site of murders … topics to make a child’s flesh creep. However, I always wanted more and never failed to listen.

"The reading audience is very special and it’s always pleasant to discover these stores’ appeal to others. I hope the young people who read my work will enjoy it half as much as I enjoy writing it, and its good to hope that perhaps some of them will go on to become tellers of tales, masters of terror, workers of wonder."

Thanks for listening, Brad, and thanks for writing. Happy Birthday from your friends and fans at Bellairsia.

Quote from Something About the Author vol. 83. © 1996.

RecordedBooks: Lewis Barnavelt and Voices I Desire Aloud

While you're waiting to see The House with a Clock in its Walls, you can also listen to House - and soon, other titles from the Lewis Barnavelt series via RecordedBooks. RecordedBooks originally released House in the mid-1990s (along with four other titles) and now it is being re-released (with some great Gorey-esque artwork, too).

You'll be able to listen to the further adventures of Lewis and Rose Rita in the months ahead.  Listen up and mark your calendars.  (Or tell Siri to do it for you.)