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2010 UnConvention

I went to see Michael Moorcock, Alan Moore and Iain Sinclair, talking about London, last year. Moore's not actually a Londoner, but he's blown the place up a few times, in his comic book stories. Moore and Sinclair on psycho-geography, particularly that of London, would be well worth the admission fee. Especially when they get to the bit about their attempt to summon up the shade of Dr John Dee, using a polished obsidian scrying mirror.

Michael Moorcock would be a bonus, few writers have quite the feel for London that he has. However, he tends to have his feet planted a bit more firmly on the ground than the other two. His London sounds fantastical, but is actually much more grounded in reality, A hidden London, but a Londoner's London, nonetheless.

Any of the three of them would be v.good.
 
I absolutely and unequivocally second this ^

By coincidence, after years of wanting to (I don't often visit 'that London'), I finally went to see Dee's obsidian mirror in the British Museum .... bloody thing is away on loan til next month :x ..... mind you, there were a few other things of interest in there ;)
 
Or an IT guy with an interest in the Fortean, and who could use some help covering the airfares from Australia?

Thought not.
 
Woohoo! Just picked up my copy of FT and was pleased to discover it's back on.


Are the burlesque act going to be back again this year?
 
I finally went to see Dee's obsidian mirror in the British Museum .... bloody thing is away on loan til next month

try getting in to see the double headed Aztec serpent.
 
oldrover said:
I finally went to see Dee's obsidian mirror in the British Museum .... bloody thing is away on loan til next month

try getting in to see the double headed Aztec serpent.
I saw that - it was a bit busy in there mind you. Amazing stuff.
 
Looks like NDE researcher Ornella Corazza is going to be able to make it after all.

Still no reply to my invite to R Dawkins though... what a rude fellow he is.
 
Dawkins is attenting the James Randi event in London the week prior to UnCon.
 
I was in London with my son, last year. We went to the Aztec exhibition, getting there when the BM opened. Well worth the effort. I´ve got a photo of Dee´s scrying mirror somewhere.

I wouldn't mind hearing, Kim Newman, talking about, 'strange cinema'.
 
Has anyone said Richard Wiseman and James Randi?

If not, Richard Wiseman, and/or James Randi.
 
ttaarraass said:
Has anyone said Richard Wiseman and James Randi?

If not, Richard Wiseman, and/or James Randi.
'Fight! Fight! Harry Hill style.

Wiseman and Randi battling it out in a paddling pool filled with cold custard.

That would be worth the admission.
 
My services have been offered to talk about the Kraken and disappearing islands and/or monsters of welsh folklore (it's not just dragons).

Hopefully I'm not too late and hopefully I get accepted and hopefully you'll enjoy the talks. (that's a lot of hopefullys)
 
I can do a nice 10 - 30 minute filler on deals with the devil.

Signatures in blood only. No magic beans. :twisted:
 
Sadly, the hypothetical talk I was going to offer to do is not only unwritten as yet, but the person I was co-writing it with has disappeared off the face of the message board.

Just saying.

Never mind.

Carry on...
 
I'm allays amazed at what an old stay at home Alan is. With a mind like his i thought he would be a great travler.
How about Alan Friswell, he makes monsters and mermaids like the old victorian ones. He could do a good talk on weird taxidermy.
 
Hello!

I've mostly been a lurker, but came back to lobby for my Dad to do a talk on his pet theory, The Human Bottleneck.

"There is a paradox: The world we inhabit and experience through our senses, appears incredibly detailed and rich in information. However there is little scientific evidence that we are able to absorb more than a tiny trickle of fresh information, leading to the conclusion that most of the world we are experiencing is just an internal construct or simulation based on our history.

I believe that this process represents a "Bottleneck", a narrow constraint on the rate at which we can learn something new."


http://www.humanbottleneck.co.uk/

This I think ties in very well with many aspects of Forteana, as it shows how little of what we perceive at any time is actually "real".

My Dad Richard is a scientist with a very open mind with regards to the "paranormal".

Just a thought.
 
For all you Doctor Who geeks, long-time Who writer (and a whole load of other stuff, from comics to TV) Paul Cornell has just come aboard the good ship UnCon 2010.

He wrote Father's Day, Human Nature and Family of Blood, as well as a lot of the audio adventures, comics etc.

He'll be speaking about fortean themes in the series - should be fun!
 
Billiant news! Paul Cornell is a topbloke and Dr Who is the greatest SciFi show of all time, no scratch that Dr Who is the greatest tv show ever,period.
PRAISE BE TO JON PERTWEE
 
Any chance of getting Gary Lachman over to give a talk along the lines of celebrities and the occult?
 
Dr_David_Sutton said:
For all you Doctor Who geeks, long-time Who writer (and a whole load of other stuff, from comics to TV) Paul Cornell has just come aboard the good ship UnCon 2010.

He wrote Father's Day, Human Nature and Family of Blood, as well as a lot of the audio adventures, comics etc.

He'll be speaking about fortean themes in the series - should be fun!


Ooooh! *geekgasm*


I'll second Pietro's request for Gary Lachman.
 
We're getting more and more keen on the idea of doing a special Evening UInCon on Saturday 23rd Oct after the main event.

Idea would be to adjourn to a pub/club/venue we've hired for the night and enjoy an evening of entertainment in a more informal atmosphere than the lecture-based trad UnCon.

We're talking live bands and performers, stand-up, readings, DJs, a pub quiz - the sort of weird stuff that doesn't really fit into the ususal weekend line-up. I think it would be a fun, sociable sort of evening with suitably off-kilter entertainment and a chance to just drink a lot of alcohol, kick back and chat. Better than everyone just disappearing off into the autumn night to different pubs around London...

We're already talking to FT-reading musicians and others who are keen to get involved.

I'm guessing that if we can keep costs down we could probably do this for £10 a head for all UnCon-goers, maybe a bit more for non-attendees. It would be ticketed seperately from the main event and I'd imagine we'd be able to sell tickets up to the last minute, depending on size of venue.

If it actually worked, then it might be the start of something fun, and we'd be able to host special FT nights like this again, hopefully not just in London but elsewhere around the UK.

Would appreciate your thoughts, suggestions, questions - we'd like to get this off the ground, but if nobody wants it, then there's no point in trying - please let us know what you think and whether you'd support an event like this.
 
What a marvellous idea! No more desperate groups of Fort-geeks wandering the streets, looking for a pub that will agree to serve us. We got slung out of one once because there were "too many of us", you'd think they'd be pleased. :roll:
 
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