So I have been binging the Sandman podcasts, and got up through the end of Dream Country (actually heard the first few minutes of the first issue of Season of Mists), and, since the forum is sadly closed (RIP), I thought I'd leave a few thoughts here. Doesn't look like the most active subreddit, but hey, maybe someone will see this.

It's a lot of fun, and a lot of fun to revisit the Sandman issues with Glenn and Brent (who needs a bio on the Claytemple Media page, just sayin'). I love their picking of favorite panels (never once what I'd pick—I like the big splash panels), and their recaps. It's gotten me rereading some of the issues, which is of course fun too.

I do have a few big pieces of... perhaps you could say "complaining", but I prefer to think of it as "constructive feedback", so here goes.

(I am going to put in spoilers of all of Sandman because I know that Glenn and Brett have read them all, and I suspect most people have, and I find myself weary of the literary pretense that this is our first time reading this material.)

First, I am not sold on the attention being paid to Gaiman's metaphysics, because I think he doesn't create them that systematically or rigorously. This sort of thing works very well with Gene Wolfe on his podcast, and would work with Tolkien too, but I just don't think Gaiman is that type of writer. More: I think Gaiman's techniques (which are of course very effective) are sort of counter to this way of thinking. Gaiman creates mystery and wonder and strangeness and a sense of a vast and inscrutable cosmos by simply asserting two contradictory things and saying they're both true, without having himself or particularly expecting his audience to work out how they're true: it's just we know these two things are true, and feel our smallness in the world and the limitedness of our understanding, with all the terror and wonder that invokes. This is a technique he uses throughout his work, and it's true in Sandman true. So all the Gods are real—how does that work? Never mind, it just does. At the end of The Wake, Dream is and is not the previous dream—he has met his family before and is meeting them for the first time. In Endless Nights, the people are stars, not metaphors, they just are them. It's a very effective technique: but to then ask how the metaphysics works is to at best make a category error and at worst try and figure out how the magic is done.

For the same reason, asking about Dream's "powers" seems to me wrongheaded. This isn't a superhero comic (even if it does have some superheroes in it.)

Secondly, Glenn and Brett seem very censorious, particularly of Sandman, but also of all the characters. When they pick favorite characters they want nice people. But of course a good character isn't necessarily a good person.

Let's take Morpheus to start. They talk about his character arc (appropriately, it's a big part of the story), but also sort of complain a lot that he's mean (e.g. to Jed). But think of the other endless! The nicest of them is Death, and she literally goes around killing everyone. Despair, Desire, Destiny, Delirium... do you think these are caring people? And Dream is the same. He is the lord of dreams and nightmares. Of course he doesn't care about people. (And in the scope of the story, doing so arguably kills him.) I am not sure we are supposed to think he's nice and caring any more than we think that of the Norse gods or the Greek (or the God of the bible for that matter).

Similarly, while it is true that Shakespeare is shown as a negligent father, I think that Gaiman is talking about how artists are distracted by art: I bet he would say he is the same way, and certainly many artists do. (Compare Isaac Asimov's "Dreaming is a Private Thing", for instance.) To simply write him up as the villain of the piece (which they don't quite do but come close) is to miss the complexity and richness of the story.

Even Richard Madoc, who is of course a villain, is a complex villain in the way that Glenn and Brett's desire for niceness blinds them to. I think that this also distorts their evaluation of the stories—"Calliope" got somewhat short shrift, because it is a great look at "the darkness in the human heart", which is a lot of what storytelling is about.

Third, Glenn and Brett have a somewhat narrow idea of what Sandman is. They talk a lot about how an issue does or does not advance the plot, and talk about how it's weird when Dream (who is the titular Sandman, but he's never called that in the series if memory serves) is only a marginal character. But Sandman was a monthly comic: it was about a world, not a person. Yes, we get Dream's arc over the series. But we also get Hob Galding's and Rose Walker's and lots of other peoples, and those are no less what the comic is about. As early as issue three they said that it wasn't like an issue of Sandman; I think the better thing to say is that Gaiman was teaching you early on what Sandman is, namely, a comic which will focus on different characters at different times.

Ok, those are my main points, but here are a few specific comments on a few specific issues, largely lovely details they didn't. mention:

• Scarecrow: G & B left out my favorite motif in talking about this, his lists of (and invention of) phobias.
• In "Sound of Her Wings" they don't note that (as is true through the series) none of the endless ever call Death "Death". They always say "our sister" or things like that. Nor does she call herself that—when people ask who she is, she just says "Don't you know?" or the equivalent. And I don't think that Death is ever named in that issue. A first time reader has no reason to know who she is at all. Part of what is going on in that issue is that you figure out who she is: and it's powerful when you do. (And speaking of Dream not being nice, they didn't remark on the fact that he calls himself here "more terrible" than Death.
• They mention this in the wrap-up episode, but in the actual episode on issue #9 they undersell the brilliance of the layout. At one point Glenn says the panel moves from words to actually showing us, but the grounding of every single page in a tier of the storyteller means they don't. It's an extraordinary way to make something both a shown and told tale (far more effective, IMO, than the much less rigorous way that Gaiman combines the play and the rest of the story in Midsummer Night's Dream). It's a genius use of the medium & deserved a lot more focus & praise.
• The mini dream in the Dollhouse: we see Lucien and Dream watching Rose. I thought that the mini dream was the visual depiction of that: she sees him watching her. Not that he's "really" there: I think that no one else would see him. Presumably she sees him that way because she's a vortex.
• In the issue with Jed in the basement, I think G&B undersell the Little Nemo connection. They mention it, but again they don't really talk about how brilliant a use it is as a pastiche (one that ties Gaiman's mythos into the early history of comics), how close it is artistically, or how important Little Nemo was in the history of comic strips. (It wasn't the first comic, but I think it was the first great comic, extremely important & influential).
• In the same issue: G&B talk as if Hypolita and Hector were happy. But he is ignoring her and not taking her seriously all issue—which is why she is so unhappy, and spends so much time on the past. And it makes her horror when he is "killed" ironic: she wasn't really happy with him, not any more. (Of course Dream doesn't kill Hector, but it's important that Hypolita thinks he does, and while he contradicts her, he then drops it.)
• The Corinthian: Dream is disappointed, and G& B say that they can't imagine how he could have been worse. But I think Dream is actually pretty clear on this. He says "You were my masterpiece... A nightmare to be the darkness and the fear of darkness in every human heart. A black mirror, made to reflect everything about itself that human ity will not confront." The Cornithian was supposed to be, not evil himself, but a mirror to show humanity the evil in us. He is, if you like, a portrait of original sin. The "fear of darkness" in that quote is not our fear of the (external) dark but rather our fear of the darkness within us. That is why Dream is disappointed: The Corinthian is "merely something else to be scared of" rather than showing humanity that what is to be scared of is in us. (The right Corinthian would have had a lot to tell G&B about how to read "Calliope": Madoc is not a bad artist, or not just: he is all of us, in some way. Not to that extent (obviously!) but in some way in our hearts.)
• Glenn said that Dream killed Unity, which I assumed was a mis-speaking but it's never corrected, not even in the wrap up episode. He doesn't: she is dying of old age. (That is why she says to Rose: "we don't have much time".) The point is she is going to die anyway. If she is the Vortex when she dies, then her death also solves that problem. She manages to keep Dream from having to kill (and contrary to what G&B says, I think he does clearly have to kill to solve the Vortex, given what Gilbert says at the end of the penultimate Doll's House issue). Gilbert offers his life for Rose's, but that wouldn't and couldn't work: but Unity manages to do the same and make it work.
• They also missed this great dialogue in the issue: "What happened?" "You died. Let me help you up."
• On the issue of Gilbert's punishment, G&B speculate that he might be punished later. I am reading the "not now" (I can't find it in my heart to punish you now) differently: he is not going to be punished. Why? Because he offered his life for Rose (whose life Dream was hesitant about taking in a way that, pre-imprisonment, he probably wouldn't have been), because of his wonder and confusion about Unity not being the Vortex, Rose being instead and then Unity becoming it; etc.
• Another missed bit: G&B circle back and quote the lovely dialogue where Richard Madoc calls himself a feminist writer (oh the irony!), but they miss the last line of it, the next line: "So, where do you get your ideas?", which brings the irony up to 11.
• Another great line they don't mention: Death's final line in "Facade": "be seeing you". Because of course she will. She'll see all of us, sooner or later.
• Finally, about the first issue of Season of Mists (this is what made me decide my "notes" file was long enough and I needed to go write this already): I agree the layout doesn't work. But I think the extra Destiny is a mirror. Every Endless's gallery has all seven places, and almost always in birth order: Destiny, Death, Dream, Destruction, Desire/Despair, Delirium (this is occasionally messed up). Destruction's is covered, or otherwise out of commission. But their own is a slot too, which is variously represented. E.g. in Delirium's gallery (issue 10, p. 4), the blank panel is Destruction's, but then her own panel as her smile in it. This will be seen again. Sometimes that slot is a mirror (I suppose because who else would be looking); that's what I think is going on here.
• Also, maybe they fix this later (as I said, I just started that episode) but so far they mentioned Destiny's garden, the paths in it, and the use of the word "forking", but have not yet put that together as the Borges reference it is.

Okay, obviously that is plenty of gripes & feedback. Suffice to say that while I have complaints, I would not have written all this, nor would I have kept listening, if I did not really enjoy the show and the revisiting of Sandman. Like Glenn's harping on the voice of the actress in the audible version of "Facade", don't let my talking about this disguise that overall I think it's great.

If you are looking for a roleplaying experience you might try The Stygian Library.

So, I was binging on Connie Willis on Audible and had just finished her lighthearted, laugh a minute (/s) “Doomsday Book” which I highly recommend, when I, needing a break from the tragedies the amazing work covers, thought back to the first work that made me aware of her.

I was commuting from the Beverly Neighborhood on the Far South Side of the city of Chicago to a job about 40 miles northwest of my house via CTA and Pace Suburban Bus which could be made in 2-4 hours for $2 - $3 in the early 80’s. Thus the post-collegiate choices available to someone on the runt end of the Baby Boom when my reading life included a great deal of science fiction.

I became addicted to Asimov’s, Analog, and all sorts of pulp fiction enhanced by anything I could check out of the Chicago Public Library’s main branch at (then) Michigan and Randolph.

It was 1984 when I encountered Connie Willis, which helped me begin the long romantic recovery needed after a catastrophic romantic loss in May of 1979 that would take decades to resolve.

But the story really made me laugh out loud. Over, and over, and over again, and helped me begin some baby steps back towards romance.

Over the decades since, I’ve read and listened to quite a lot of her work but I really didn’t expect to find a podcast about the story.

So first: thank you or whomever it was on your Patreon, etc team that moved you to do an episode about this story.

Second, it was a great episode for so many reasons, Not the least of which it got me on a time traveling jaunt to my reading past.

Re: jargon: a book called “The Ropes to Skip and the Ropes to Know, Ritter, et Al, that I picked up while working for Follett’s college textbook warehouse on summer and Christmas in the late 70’s at a steep discount, covered a great deal of useful knowledge that would help me a great deal in the future but one thing it covered was business jargon. If I’m remembering correctly it compared business jargon to the sacred language of religious institutions in how it made all technical fields more mysterious and difficult to get into by mystifying daily business practices.

I agree that Connie was probably tweaking her hubby a bit but also probably looking at a real problem in our American society of the 80’s and later. Of course, you could ask her, a quick Wikipedia check shows her as still with us.

What’s amazing to me is how 38 years later, how relevant some of the issues the story raises still are.

Sadly, on another of the points in the podcast, many schools have abandoned the idea of a core curriculum, and providing education in logic, public speaking, history and in general not only a world view, but the ability to understand how our individual views of reality are being manipulated because so many don’t worry about whether what they are being sold is consistent or makes sense.

I won’t go pointing any fingers here, but I do think there are distinct advantages of learning how to think in college especially, learning how to avoid being manipulated.

Finally, I really enjoyed this first episode of the podcast that I found, and hope to hear a great deal more of interest in upcoming years. I do wonder how you will be able to do justice to longer and more complex works by this and other SF authors. If nothing else I hope to find new authors to read and listen to.

In the latest Wolfe podcast they talked about the use of the name Julius. Coincidentally, I just learned from a recent Jeopardy! clue that the Pringles mascot's first name is Julius.

I just listened to the latest Wolfe podcast when Lang's fairy tale books were brought. It occurred to me that Lang had an Olive fairy tale volume. It's on my shelf. I'll have to skim through it to see if Gene used any part of it while writing Peace.

I'm excited about this casting news: https://about.netflix.com/en/news/the-sandman-latest-castings-and-the-stories-behind-them Others thoughts on it?

Thank you sirs for yet another great episode, especially since I listened to it right after the Forbidden Brides episode. The line between homage and pastiche was quite thin in both. Also, thank you for refering to A Night in the Lonesome October, as it will surely be a great addition to the secondary corpus for my thesis.

The message left by the landlady was absolute gold as it both serves the dark humor, the absurdity of the situation but also anchors Talbot to a very mundane reality whereby he should defintely be mindful of noise. Anytime I read about these down-to-earth bits and pieces, it reminds me of Wendy Faris definition of magical realism (here applied to Coraline) and the importance of anchoring the fantastic to seemingly insignificant details parts of everyday reality.

Concerning the Kraken from Tennyson, it felt to me (and this idea came from what you guys talked about in the forbidden brides episodes) that Gaiman was taking a jab at detractors of speculative and weird fiction. It seems he was basicallly showing them that even the greatest and most respected authors too were fascinated by topic sometimes only attributed to weird/horror fiction writers.

Quick note to Glenn: since you seem to enjoy both Hardboiled and fantastic fiction I strongly recommend Stephen King "Umney's Last Case" part of Nightmares and Dreamscapes and Murakami's novel "Hardboiled Wonderland and the end of the world". Without spoiling the stories, both works have surprising connections to other works you, Brent, and Brandon worked on previously. All the best.

I've been listening to old episodes of the Lower Decks podcast. In one episode, the tendency for alien races to have monocultures is noted. This tendency is commonly ascribed to modest budgets, the limitations of television, or just inattention to detail. I think there might be something else going on.

When reading old science fiction stories, one is struck by the absolute confidence in technological progress. Stark Trek is heir to a particular strain of science fiction where that technological progress is coupled with what we might call social progress. Yes, the moons of Jupiter will be colonized in a few short decades, but also petty parochialisms will be sloughed off and war outgrown and left behind.

The thought was that something like the League of Nations or the United Nations would come along and drive an enlightened assimilation of nations into ever greater political structures until the desired end--a single world government. This was seen as inevitable and even desired. With humanity united as never before, formerly intractable social problems could finally be solvable. Cultural appendages standing in the way were to be lopped off.

In other words, maybe the monoculture thing is a product of the utopian thinking that informs Star Trek.

Just wanted to thank Brent and Glenn for their spectacular episode on this sandman issue. Lots of incredible insights (GK Chesterton is going to be my weekend reading). Also, as usual, I am delighted that you took your time with the art, references from other DC comics, and influence of religion. My favorite episode of yours so far, even if the gunslinger, or weird heroes in comics was excellent too.

Quick comment I'd like to add concerning Morpheus as a creator and God: as Nimrod introduces the Corinthian as guest of honor, he says "an inspiration to us all" which got me thinking: as creator of the Corinthian, Morpheus is in part responsible for the death and suffering of hundreds of humans, but does not seem to regret this fact, which further reinforces the paradox you introduced of the benevolent/merciful vs malevolent/cruel deity. Also, having gone to a few conferences and panels for my job, I found this platitude ("an inspiration to us all") absolutely delightful. Anyhow, thank you for the fantastic series of podcasts.

Anyone else think there should be a True Detective-based episode of Elder Sign? There is a lot of text out there documenting Nic Pizzolatto’s influences, including R. W. Chambers, Ligotti, Laird Baron, etc, among others... TD was my introduction to “Weird Fiction,” at least the first thing I truly liked in that genre. I imagine others are in the same boat, so a literary breakdown-based discussion of True Detective S1 would be AWESOME!

I'm here to talk Brandon and Glenn's fantastic gunslinger coverage. I've just worked out that Claytemple is on Reddit, because I'm so hip and with it...

Just got caught up with 'The Keys to December' and I thought the allusions to Jarry as Moses were really insightful, and when I thought about it, staring me right in the face the entire time. I mean he wanders -in the desert- for what may as well be 40 years. That got me looking more closely as Jerry as god and I think the allusions carry on into the New Testament as well. There are hints of judeo-christianity throughout, both mainstream and esoteric. The language of the story itself has the ring of scripture about it, and I tend to feel that the narrator is actually a redform writing down the Gospel of Jarry some few hundred years after his death.

I may be getting a bit too far into the weeds here, but Zelazny played a lot with mythologies from various world religions, especially more esoteric ones, and I think that's very much evident in 'Keys'.

In Kabbalic traditions, Moses is often paired with the Shekinah, a sometimes physical manifestation of the feminine presence of God. It is under the light of the Shekinah moon that Moses is born, and it is to the Shekinah that he is wed after his death and ascension. Moses, for all his faults, still manages to ascend this plane of existence to become worthy of the love of the divine. Saintly Sanza could be a surrogate for the Shekinah while Jarry as Moses toils the remainder of his life to be worthy of her.

By the same token, Sanza is the gnostic Sophia, twin sister of Christ and she who causes the sinful physical earth to come into being. However, by her grace, she provides humanity with a spark of divinity, granting them access to a deeper wisdom before ascending back to her place among the divine. Sanza initially joins in the hubris of creating a world according to her own desires, but realizes the sin of her ways and teaches the redform and Jarry the grace of sacrifice. A deeper knowledge and understanding is born from her death.

When Jarry visits the redforms to teach them to communicate, he is Christ descending from the Godhead to enter Normal Time, and the Holy Spirit at Pentacost delivering glossolalia. He has given up his immortality for them. Their god walks among them, present but silent.

I haven’t actually read this story, but have really been enjoying the episodes. One of these day, I’m just going to dig deeper into Zelazny’s oeuvre.

I know that there are parallels with Wolfe’s Tracking Song, but to me, the plot seems much more similar to GRRM’s Sandkings. (Is there an episode planned for Sandkings? Ugh, I hope so.)

Thank you, mysterious patron for recommending this one.

Hey Clay Temple Crew,

I just finished listening to the breakdown on Tracking Song and I was surprised that neither of you mentioned how closely Tracking Song mirrors "The Jungle Book". This is going to be a long one, but here we go.

Cutthroat and Mowgli are both lost humans being raised by animals, most specifically wolves. They are both driven from their packs when their new abilities prove to overshadow the wolves (Cutthroat's leaps and Mowgli's access to Man's Red Flower). Both quickly overcome their 'cub' status within the tribe thanks to their innate gifts as men.

Both Mowgli and Cutthroat also find themselves trapped underground by half-men jealous of humanity. For Mowgli it's the Bandar-log monkeys (and maybe King Louie if Wolfe had seen the Disney cartoon. As a dad in the 70's, it's pretty likely that he had) while Cutthroat had to deal with Mantru and the Min. Mowgli and Cutthroat escape with the help of 3 creatures. Mowgli is rescued by Baloo, Bagheera, and Kaa the serpent, while Cutthroat escapes with Roller, Bug, and Dragon.

Red Kluy is described as a red flower, while Mowgli eventually gains the mastery of Man's Red Flower. Even the name of the story, 'Tracking Song' follows the conventions of the different chapters of 'The Jungle Book', ie, 'Mowgli's Song', 'Song of the Bander-log'.

There are a probably a few similar allusions, but those are the ones that stuck out at my last reading. Love all your shows and thanks for providing a critical eye to genre writers that sadly don't get the respect they deserve.

Share your thoughts on the final issue in the first Sandman story arc.

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Share your thoughts on the second installment in The King in Yellow. I wear no mask!

Does it signify something? Share your thoughts on Sandman issue #7.

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We're giving away three prizes to randomly selected listeners who review our podcasts. Details below the fold.

It's a new year(ish) and we have some goals for the network in 2020. In particular, we've got our eye on doubling our audience, getting to around 2,000 listeners on average per show. This will ensure that we can stay on the air for the long-term.

We’re doing some things on our end – there’s going to be at least one new show this year, and we’re looking at advertising in some SF magazines – but we’d like your help, too.

What we’d like you to do is review our podcasts.

The more reviews we have, the more likely we are to show up in a search and to be recommended to people browsing their app for a new podcast. We think Elder Sign is at least the tenth-best podcast that discusses H.P. Lovecraft, but if you search for Lovecraft in Apple Podcasts, we’ll never show up because we don’t have enough reviews. Hanging Out With the Dream King doesn't yet show up if you search for Neil Gaiman, either, and we’d like to change that, for all our shows.

So what was that we said about prizes? Well, we’re going to give away three prizes to reviewers:

• A free commissioned bonus episode on a story or topic of your choice.
• A free nomination on an upcoming Patreon vote – (and even if you aren’t a Patreon supporter we'll count that as a vote for it, too)
• A free trade paperback book inscribed by us thanking you for your help.

And on top of that, if we get to 100 reviews on a show during this period, we’ll do a bonus episode of that show – so potentially five bonus episodes coming your way this summer.

We'll choose the winners in early May by drawing names from a hat. You get your name in the hat by writing reviews -- you get your name on a slip of paper each and every time you write a review. So if you review each of our five shows on the app you use, that’s five entries in the hat. If you go wild and review each of the shows on apps you don’t even use, you can get even more entries. So the more you do, the greater your chances. (Also, if you've already written a review, that's going to count for the drawing).

And while we certainly appreciate honest assessments of our work, all we're really trying to accomplish here is to make the cyberpunk algorithms work for us rather than against us, so you can absolutely write a review for a show you don't listen to and even just copy and paste the same review across all our shows. "I love this show and I think you will, too" is perfect (and then give it five stars, please).

We'll see the reviews coming in, so you just need to let us know which reviews belong to you, which you can do with a screenshot (a collage will be great) or even just make a list. Send us that by the end of April, which you can do at our email, which is ClaytempleMedia@gmail.com, or you can message us on Patreon or Twitter or use our new Reddit page to brag publicly about how awesome you are.

So, five shows? But you only listen to one or two of them? No problem, here's the list of our five public shows with links to Apple Podcasts:

• Agnus: The Late Antique, Medieval and Byzantine Podcast
• Elder Sign: A Weird Fiction Podcast
• The Gene Wolfe Literary Podcast
• Hanging Out With the Dream King: A Neil Gaiman Podcast
• Lower Decks: A Star Trek Podcast
• (And Atoz: A Speculative Fiction Book Club Podcast will debut in June!)

Thank you so much for helping us out with this. We want to be around for a while, we want to keep sending two podcasts a week out into the ether for years to come, and your reviews will go a long way to helping us reach that goal. And we're very excited to work with someone on a special episode commission and to inscribe a book.

We're excited to be publishing John De Gruyther's Star Trek: Picard blog. You can find the first post here.