Two Chairs Talking

Episode 12: Don’t drop your phone on the glacier

Perry and David talk about:
Perry's Return
Hiking in Iceland
Thanks to David and Carey
Dublin Worldcon
Worldcon Business Meeting
Choice of next Worldcon site
New Zealand Worldcon 2020
Future Worldcon sites
Convention experience
Membership numbers
Becoming a convention member
Too many members
Summing up the convention
Connie Willis
Oxford Time Travel Novels by Connie Willis
Doomsday Book by Connie Willis
To Say Nothing of the Dog by Connie Willis
Blackout/All Clear by Connie Willis
Lincoln's Dreams by Connie Willis
Passage by Connie Willis
The Choke by Sophie Laguna
All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr
The Chain by Adrian McKinty
Embers of War by Gareth Powell
The Lost Man by Jane Harper
Photo of broken phone from pexels.com.

Episode 11: The role of sheep in science fiction

A retrospective of Aussiecon in 1975
David and Carey remember Aussiecon
Organising the Hugos
The Entire Awards Committee
Who created the rocketships?
Getting the bases made
Paranoid about security
Panel with Ursula Le Guin
Videotaping the convention
Australian Science Fiction Foundation
Interview with Carey Handfield
Role of Sheep in Science Fiction
Ursula's GoH speech
Interview with Perry Middlemiss
Hearing about the convention
Travelling from Adelaide
Experience of the convention
Life-changing event
Legacy of Aussiecon
Subsequent Australian Worldcons
Interview with Leigh Edmonds
First DUFF winner
DUFF as promotion for '75
What actually happened at Aussiecon?
The notorious Wang Girls
Before and after the con
Hugo presentation interrupted by cricket scores
Producing daily newsletter
Room parties
Talking to individuals
An opportunity for fans in Australia
Audio-visual trend in SF
Changes nature of SF and fandom
Aussiecon this little jewel
Interview with Bruce Gillespie
Suggestion by Andy Porter
Foyster forms committee
Main effort went into fanzines
First female fans
Merv Binns and MSFC
Space Age Books
Bidding at Torcon
Travel to the US and UK
Arrives in US in 1973
Arrives in UK
Meeting Bob Tucker
Choice of Le Guin
The Writer's Workshop
Impact of Aussiecon
Photo of sheep by Michael Pearl at Pexels.com.

Episode 10: Meet Ursula Le Grong

David Grigg and stand-in host Carey Handfield discuss:
Carey and David's long association
Getting into SF fandom
David's fiction writing
ASFR and John Bangsund
Discovering a new world
1970 Australian National SF Convention
Launch of the Australia in '75 bid
Victoria Hotel venue
The Nova Mob
Carey as an organiser
Monash University SF Association
David as fanzine editor
John Bangsund
University of Melbourne SF Association
1975 Writer's Workshop
Choice of Ursula Le Guin as GoH
Idea of a Writer's Workshop
Choosing the venue
Getting the photocopier
Publishing the Altered I
'Stabbed Alive' by Randall Flynn
Ursula's challenges
Two-word challenge
Love Story challenge
The Grongs
Highlight of 1975
Legacy
Pip Maddern
Altered I book
The Fives
Intro to Ursula's speech
Ursula Le Guin's GoH speech
Wind-up
Image: the cover of "The Altered I" book about the Writer's Workshop, designed by Irene Pagram.

Episode 9: Voyage to the inverted world

David and Perry talk to Robin Johnson about Aussiecon 1975, and discuss:
Attending Conventions
Career of going to SF cons
Aussiecon
How did Robin get involved?
Coming to Australia
Meeting Merv Binns
Sydney Fandom
Murumbeena convention 1969
Syncon '70
Starting the muttering about '75
Attending Worldcon 1970 in Germany
Garry Hoff
Heidelberg
Big push
Help from the UK
Becoming chairman
Anti-fan movie
Promotional matchboxes
Moving through '72
Winning the bid in '73
A problem with Ursula
Jerry Pournelle's demand
Charter of Americans arrives
Art Show crisis
Slide Presentation panic
Convention starts
Don Tuck MIA
Continuous state of panic
Movie Program
Amount of programming
Costume Parade
Evaluation
Schools program re artwork
Art Show
Legacy
Wrap-up
Club houses for SF clubs
Image of Melbourne by Bernard Spragg on Flickr.

Episode 8: Encountering irony in the womb

Perry and David discuss:
Introduction
Perry's overseas trip
Hugo Time Machine 1955
They'd Rather Be Right by Mark Clifton and Frank Riley
The Darfsteller by Walter M. Miller, Jr.
Allamagoosa by Eric Frank Russell
Kate Atkinson
Case Histories by Kate Atkinson
One Good Turn by Kate Atkinson
When Will There Be Good News? by Kate Atkinson
Started Early, Took My Dog by Kate Atkinson
Life After Life by Kate Atkinson
John Le Carre's Karla trilogy
The Spy Who Came In From the Cold by John Le Carre
Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy by John Le Carre
An Honourable Schoolboy by John Le Carre
Smiley's People by John Le Carre
Windup
Image based on photo of sunset by Ali Arapoğlu from Pexels

Episode 7: All this I speak in print, for in print I found it

David and Perry discuss:
What are fanzines?
Amateur Press Associations
John Bangsund and ANZAPA
They also interview Bruce Gillespie, who talks about:
Melton
Bacchus Marsh
Hears about fandom
ASFR
Invited to stay with Bangsund
Meeting Harding, Turner, et al
First convention, MSFC
First 'fanzine' produced as schoolboy
Duplicators
Starting to produce fanzines
ANZAPA
Sent to Ararat
First two issues of SFC
Response from o/seas
Critical reviews of SF outside academia
John Foyster
Resigning from teaching in Ararat
Meets Gerald Murnane
Acquires own duplicator
Aussiecon
1977 extraordinary year
How have things changed?
Nostrilia Press
IBM Composer
Typesetting for Highland House and others
Desktop publishing comes in
Applying this to fanzines
Modern challenges
Bill Burns' Efanzine site
Comeback of fanzines
Will you continue?
Awards
Windup

Episode 6: Moth, rust, and men with matches

Perry and David discuss:
Are you a serial or parallel reader?
Hugo Time Machine 1954
Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
The Telling by Ursula Le Guin
A Case of Conscience by James Blish
The Sparrow by Mary Doria Russell
Chesley Bonestell
Ex Machina

Episode 5: An Incomplete History of Serious Events

Perry and David, and their guest Leigh Edmonds talk about:
Perihelion Summer by Greg Egan
Whose Body? by Dorothy Sayers
The Way We Live Now by Anthony Trollope
A Series of Unfortunate Events by Lemony Snicket
Problem of walled gardens of content
Geographical restrictions on content
Interview with Leigh Edmonds
Both past and future are unknowable
England in the 17th Century
Both SF and history written for the present
History of Technology
Tax office as example of technological change
History of Australia as a struggle to overcome distance
Science Fiction and history
The reason to read SF
History of SF fandom
Period of radical change in Australia
The sub-cultures of Melbourne
The change in Australian culture
SF floods into the country
The Sydney Push
Importance of letters and fanzines in early years
Fundamental change due to computers
Difficulty of publishing a fanzine
Fanzine publishing before WWII
Passing on technique
Why the history of fandom needs to be written about
Windup
Image copyright Netflix. Used here for purposes of review.

Episode 4: Into the Hugo-Verse!

Perry and David talk about:
Hugo Short Fiction
Hugo Time Machine 1953
The Demolished Man
Galaxy Magazine
Hugo Novels
Trail of Lightning by Rebecca Roanhorse
Revanant Gun by Yoon Ha Lee
The Expanse Series by James S. A. Corey
Standard Ebooks
Copyright
Such is Life by Joseph Furphy
An Unkindness of Ghosts by Rivers Solomon
Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse
All is True movie
Wind-up
Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse image copyright Marvel and Sony Pictures Releasing. Illustration used for purposes of review.

Episode 3: I am the one and only

Perry and David talk about:
Introduction
Hugo Season
Hugo Nominees
Spinning Silver by Naomi Novik
Space Opera by Catherynne M. Valente
The Calculating Stars by Mary Robinette Kowal
Australian Crime Fiction
The Mystery of a Hansom Cab by Fergus Hume
Bony Novels by Arthur Upfield
Scrublands by Chris Hammer
Moon - with Sam Rockwell
Windup