because some people can't be original enough to come up with their own monsters and copy Tolkein consistently...Dwarves, Elves, Orcs, Hobbits, Goblins etc...

Part of why i get bored to death of D&D...

makes sense. thanks SS :)

was just curious cuz i have no idea how copyright works.

thanks tad :)

and don't worry, i'm sure they'll let you have a laptop in your cell after a bunch of impatient smarchers swarm them.

eta:
hmmm. there seems to be some reference as to a sea monster called an orc but otherwise everything that pops up is tolkien or dnd related. bah. stupid internet.

[ January 09, 2006: Message edited by: Ceywren ]

Orc:

 

Orc (sometimes spelled Ork) comes from the Latin word Orcus, a title of the god Pluto, the king of the underworld. It was later used to refer to the underworld itself. The word appears later in the Germanic languages without its Latin ending, in the more familiar form of "Orc". It was then revived by J. R. R. Tolkien in his fictional stories of Middle-earth as the name of a race of creatures that are often used by evil forces as soldiers.

Link to the full article (for what it's worth).

Seems like it was some kind of sea monster before Tolkien made orcs what they are now.

Edit for spelling.

[ January 09, 2006: Message edited by: Kunohara ]

just tell the jailers they're all part of a virtual reality program, then make a break for it while they scratch their heads.

You know what I'd liek to see in fantasy creatures? Some really bizzare stuff...
stuff not based on modern mythologies or faerie-tales. Something not based on stereo-typed angry mobs...I'd like to see a race of creatrus that walk on their hands and talk out their butts...oh wait those are politicians...Thats why I like hard-core sci-fi where the Aliens are truly alien, tri-lateral symmetry, octahedral symmetry...puddles of sentient goo, hyper-sentient shaded of blue...
Gimme some originality!
Hrm...maybe I should work on that myself...

Possibly but it might be a good excercise to try...*ponders*

Timothy Zahn wrote an interesting trilogy about a first encounter situation that goe horribly awry due to miscommunication errors...turns out the aliens communicated through the dead spirits of their ancestors, but the radio waves from Human radio technology were killing the spirits so the initial attempt at first contact looked to the aliens like an attack on their ancestors..,the first book was written from the humn perspective, the second from the aliens and the third was split between them. It took me until about halfway through the book to relaize what was goign on...very cleverly crafted...

Stuart wrote:

There's a good sequence in Peter Hamilton's latest novel (Pandora's Star/Judas Unchained) when the alien Prime experiences two humans for the first time and is utterly confused by their behaviour as it "investigates" them thoroughly to see how they work.

Eeek.  That part very nearly squicked me - and I'm not very squickable.

I woulda liked the first book a LOT more if every single female (with one exception) wasn't a nymphomaniac bimbo, even the intelligent ones.  He writes his women like a 30something whose sex drive is still in college.

Stuart wrote:

I suspect truly alien behaviour probably wouldn't make for a good story.

The Gods Themselves.

Also, most current day hard science fiction authors have done at least a couple of short stories with pretty alien perspectives (no humans involved at all). The one I best remember at this point are some by Baxter in his collection Phase Space. Life does look pretty different when you're an energy fluctuation in the first few microseconds of the lifetime of the expanding universe. :)

[ January 11, 2006: Message edited by: Aan allein ]

@Tad

do you like to get the articel from "Frankfurter Rundschau"?
I asked you at page 10 in this blog?

:-(

Meike

Stuart wrote:

There's a good sequence in Peter Hamilton's latest novel (Pandora's Star/Judas Unchained) when the alien Prime experiences two humans for the first time and is utterly confused by their behaviour as it "investigates" them thoroughly to see how they work.

Exactly the example I would give.

Haime wrote:

Eeek. That part very nearly squicked me - and I'm not very squickable.

Yup, but I liked it because of that. It means it was very well written.

Edit: Oh, wait, the / thingie closes something.

[ January 12, 2006: Message edited by: Kunohara ]

that reminds me I need to check TMC's schedule for tonights studio Ghibli Films...last week had two movies I've already seen...waiting to see "Porco Rosso"