Mission Spork will be taking the rest of the week off to celebrate an act of heartwarming charity that was betrayed a thousand times over, and then I'll have to decide what to do next. I still have a few more Hubbard "classic" pulp stories to consider, so we may explore his attempts at a spy thriller (or rather early attempt) and whatever "If I Were You" is. From the cover art it looks set in a circus, and I'm not sure how to classify such a story.
A question looms over all this like an erupting volcano: whither Dianetics? Thus far I've been skirting the topic of Scientology, or maybe I should say mocking it when I recognize its influence on Hubbard's fiction (or vice versa) rather than tackling it directly. Doing so would seem to be the logical next step, but on the other hand, I'm not sure how I could "spork" it since it's not really literature. It'd be like critiquing a self-help book, or grading some undergrad's half-assed attempt at a thesis.
Additionally - well, it's been done. Tony Ortega and Vance Woodward have completed a 25-part series, Blogging Dianetics, and you can probably guess what they wrote about during it. From what I've read, it seems pretty informative and hits Dianetics' highlights (who knew constipation during pregnancy could seed a developing mind with negative thoughts?) while also providing a good perspective on all the crazy, since Mr. Woodward is an ex-Scientologist turned lawyer and writer. I'm not sure what I could add.
But maybe something will occur to me when I have the time to go through the whole series in-depth. At any rate, busy couple of days, then back to pondering the next step, and then I should have something next week. Until then, enjoy the annual turkey genocide.
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