December 15, 2003 - Convention from Another Planet

When I found out two of the major speakers were well-known authors Jack McDevitt and Harry Harrison, I thought this would also be a great opportunity to perhaps get interviews for my online quarterly literary magazine, Wild Violet.

We got there bright and early on Saturday morning because The Gryphon's first panel took place at 10 a.m. We grabbed a quick breakfast to go at the Reading Terminal and ate it in the room set aside for gaming, where people could either play their own games or try out anything from a library of games that was on loan to the convention.

The Gryphon's first panel was two hours long and was called "Anime 101: Introduction to Anime." I figured there wasn't much for me to learn from this, considering that for three years now I've helped run one of the biggest anime conventions in the country, Otakon.

Instead, I attended a promising sounding panel called "Can This Writer Be Saved?" The panel consisted of several SF writers and editors who would discuss frequent writing mistakes and how to avoid them.

Of all the participants, Darrell Schweitzer, coeditor of Weird Tales, was the most quotable. He showed up a few minutes late, mumbling good-naturedly about how anyone must have been crazy to put him in a 10 a.m. panel. But he earned his keep, so to speak, with remarks like, "There are a lot more people out there with talent than with the will to do anything with it" and "Life as a whole is poorly edited."

They provided tips such as be persistent, know the ending of your story before beginning (although the panel split on the need for a more detailed outline), and do research but avoid the tendency to "show off" that research.

At one point, writer Diane Weinsten said, "Life experiences, that's the thing we haven't discussed."

"It is usually a good idea," Darrell Schweitzer said, dryly. I'm not certain if he teaches, but if he doesn't, he should. He would no doubt rank among his students' favorite professors.

The next panel I attended was called "You Go, Woman!" and was about strong female lead characters in science fiction. The panel consisted of two men and two women, who had different but complementary ideas about the subject.

They welcomed input from the audience, so I got them started on a very interesting conversation about what makes up a strong female character. Does she end up being, as one audience member suggested, "a man with breasts," or can she be strong while still retraining what our society considers feminine traits?

Several of the other audience members were equally intrigued by the subject, and the panel became a very high-paced interchange between audience comments and the panelists' response, touching on everything from Xena to Star Trek to The Power Puff Girls.

I found that the people attending Philcon were very friendly. After this panel, I encountered one of the audience members in the hall. She'd been very vocal and was wearing a Jedi costume that she had created. We spent some time talking about it. I also ran into Tee Morris, who had been one of the panelists. He thanked me for my active participation and suggested I stop by and check out his books in the dealer's room later. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to find him when I did stop by.

I sat in on a little bit of The Gryphon's next panel, "The Influence of Japanese Culture on American Science Fiction and Fantasy." It was an intriguing topic, and they used a lot of video clips as examples, but I left early in order to catch Harry Harrison's keynote address.

Earlier in the day, The Gryphon and I had picked up a press badge for me in the Green Room, and I was hoping to approach Mr. Harrison after the speech and see about setting up an interview.

Unfortunately, I got to the room where it was supposed to take place and discovered the time had been changed from 1 p.m. to 2 p.m.

Perhaps my mistake was wondering through the dealer's room, admiring the jewelry and talking to an independently published author, who gave me a review copy of his book. But at any rate, I decided this would be the best time to stop in at home and let my dog, Una, out to relieve herself. The Gryphon and I had decided this would be the best way to ensure that we could stay as late as we wanted in the second half of the day.

What I didn't realize was that Saturday afternoon traffic in Philly is as bad as rush hour.

Suffice it to say that I was stuck in traffic for nearly two hours, round trip, and arrived frustrated and hungry, back at the hotel where Philcon was taking place. I called The Gryphon on his cell phone and he rescued me, whisking me away to a little Vietnamese place he knew so that I could talk out my frustrations, eat some delicious food and generally start feeling better.

He had a couple hours break from his panels, so we both attended Jack McDevitt's keynote speech. A Philadelphia native, Mr. McDevitt started out talking about how science fiction had given him a glimpse into a world where race relations were not an issue, a world of infinite possibility, the "sense of humanity as a single family."

In addition to being influenced by Flash Gordon, he loved Dickens and Plutarch. He shared with us some of the key scenes in literature that have fascinated him and driven his love of writing, such as a scene in The Star by Arthur C. Clarke, where a Jesuit priest pilots a star ship and learns the truth behind the star of Bethlehem.

Jack McDevitt's writing has gone through many stages in his life, and his most recent works, like Omega, are a sort of blend of genres, combining science fiction with mystery. He loves to tackle deeper issues, using his writing to explore not just the future of the universe but the nature of humanity. So it wasn't surprising to learn that he's been influenced by a range of authors, all of whom share similar views and goals.

After his speech, I approached him and introduced myself, asking if he could find time to work in an interview with me that weekend. He didn't have his schedule on him, so I gave him one of my business cards and wrote my cell phone on the back, telling him to call me.

We had an hour to kill before his next panel, so The Gryphon and I sought out some friends. We spent some time in the Con Suite, which offers snack food and a place to hang out. There, we learned that one of The Gryphon's friends was going to propose to his girlfriend that night during the Masquerade, which is a contest where people are judged both on costumes and on original skits.

I also got into a very interesting conversation with a woman named Maggie who claimed to be an introvert but who was starting conversations with everyone walking in the door.

The Gryphon's panel was on "What's New in Gaming?" which didn't really interest me. I wondered the halls and said hi to some friends, who were at an anime mixer. This consisted of passing around a bag of candy and watching an episode of a very disturbing SF anime called Blue Gender, which involved insectoid aliens with mandibles reminiscent of genitalia.

I also discovered some people intent on putting things on top of other things, so I snapped their picture.

I caught the end of The Gryphon's panel and then he and I roamed back to the anime mixer, where we watched most of an episode of Fruits Basket, a very funny show.

We convinced one of our friends to come with us on a dinner expedition, and we all ended up back at Serendipity, the sushi place The Gryphon and I had discovered a month or so ago.

We passed a very cool looking place that The Gryphon tells me was used as a movie set for 12 Monkeys.

The sushi at Serendipity was still just as yummy. This time, I tried out a "Tokyo Iced Tea" and was teased by The Gryphon and our friend about the fact that I was, supposedly, a Goth.

Their evidence consisted of such nonsense as: I wore black and purple, I liked vampires and I owned more than one set of fangs. Well, if you're going to be that broad with your definitions, I suppose anybody is a Goth.

Later, telling another friend about this, he insisted that I wasn't a Goth because I wasn't wearing eyeliner that you could see from a mile away.

Speaking of Goths, the evening brought out Goth tendencies in many congoers, with people who had formerly been wearing T-shirts and jeans changing into velvet and leather. We decided to check out the Masquerade and see if our friend had proposed. As it turned out, someone told us he had and that she'd said yes.

So we watched the short independent films they showed during the judging, and then saw the costumes awarded before we could sneak down front and congratulate them. We watched another short, then, Evelyn, the Cutest Little Dead Girl. I insisted that the fact that I liked it did not make me a Goth.

When the lights came up full, we realized we were sitting right behind Jack McDevitt. I waited for him to finish talking to a fan, who was dressed in an extravagant velvet costume, before asking him if we could set up an interview for the next day. This time, he had his schedule with him, so we worked out a 10 a.m. meeting at the Green Room.

Even though the evening was wearing down, there was still more fun ahead. We attended a panel called "Carnage Con Queso," about cheesy horror movies. Among the panelists were the Grim Reaper himself, his cousin Carpathian, and a goat-like devil. They were independent filmmakers and were absolutely hilarious. You never would have thought that Death could be so entertaining.

They also run a site called Patient Creatures.

Afterwards, we looked in the program book and determined their real names must be Bob Beideman, Andrew Ely and Nina Ely. They let me take their picture, and then we followed them upstairs to the Con Suite, where they presented some entertaining ghost stories, some of them funny and some more traditional. Very, very well done.

The Gryphon was getting tired, and we had to get back to Una, so we bid Philcon a reluctant good night.

 

More Philcon adventures:

December 16, 2003 - The Day of the Writers

Moral:
Death is funnier than you might expect.