Jayne, your question is a bit like "How long is a piece of string?" We won't know until we finally reach the end.

I haven't counted Martin's entries, but I'm sure that they could keep the Oldie going for years.

The sad thing is that among all these brilliant entries, only four of them can win. And - gulp - it's always possible that none of the winners will be from the Sphere.

But it might already be the longest D & A thread, Brian; I wouldn't know, and I'm too busy to bother finding out!

If the winners aren't Spherians those people had better sign up to join us! ;)

"How long is a piece of string seems less important than how frayed it is." I have forgotten where I read this.

Has the large lady sung? Well, the competition has closed, but Graham's Pioneer (page 16) captured my imagination, hence this -


Remnant

A traveller moves across my barren plains,
Its tireless progress mars with stops each day.
What's worth the finding that it drills away
Then blasts and sniffs particulates? The stains
That pock its armoured shell describe the pains
Its quest inflicts; what promises of May
Provoke such steel? I, Sentinel, must play
At let's suppose. The Earth you left has rains,
Envoy, which here does not; all liquid leaves
A planet's hard-baked crust: no life form suns
Itself upon this soil, no gathered sheaves
Remark upon fecundity, no breath
Of Martian air is taken. Logic runs
To life - so why do you come visit death?

.

Royston, I like "Remnant." (I also like Graham's Pioneer.) Have you seen my Martian Rovers on page 3, post 29?

I am currently reading Genesis (an epic poem) by Frederick Turner. Bill Carptenter, knowing I like SF, recommended it to me a while back. It's a riveting story, which also contains some interesting philosophising.

Hi Martin,

Yes, I had read (and enjoyed) your Martian Rover, and was more than happy (it's right up my street) to do so again. I'll try to lay my hands on a copy of the fascinating-sounding 'Genesis' that you mention.

By the by, Iain M. Banks, an author whose work I greatly enjoy, has been diagnosed with terminal cancer. He says he will not live another year and that he asked his long-time girlfriend if she would do him the honour of being his widow; one must admire such deliciously dry wit in the face of adversity - no?


Go well.