@RUTGERS.ARPA:RAOUL@JPL-VLSI.ARPA (01/16/85)
From: Alvin Wong <RAOUL@JPL-VLSI.ARPA> A friend of mine here is looking for a short story that was published in Analog some time ago. He doesn't know the title or author but has described the main gist of the plot to me which follows : The main character repeatly gets drunk and suffers from blackouts. During his blackout periods he manages to invent machines. When he recovers from these blackouts he doesn't remember inventing the machines and spends his sober periods trying to find out what they do. All the machines serve some useful purpose and sometimes the inventor almost kills himself while trying to discover it. He also makes acquaintances during his blackouts and doesn't remember them either when sober. There is some comic relief as the main character pretends he remembers everything. Any suggestions and/or pointers would be welcomed. ------
mjc@cmu-cs-cad.ARPA (Monica Cellio) (01/16/85)
This is one of the Gallagher stories by Henry Kuttner. They were collected in a book called The Proud Robot. (The robot started out as a bottle opener, he thinks. He hasn't found a use for it and it just stares at itself in mirrors and complains about the ugly humans.) These stories are fun reading. Gallagher has this habit of making promises when he's drunk that he has to face up to when sober, while putting on the pretense of knowing exactly what his clients want. He spends great amounts of time just trying to find out *what* he promised to build. And of course, there are the things that just show up in his lab that seem to have no useful purpose in life.... -Dragon -- UUCP: ...ucbvax!dual!lll-crg!dragon ARPA: monica.cellio@cmu-cs-cad or dragon@lll-crg
ndd@duke.UUCP (Ned Danieley) (01/17/85)
[] The drunken inventor was named Gallagher, and the stories were written by Henry Kuttner. I can't remember how many stories he wrote, but there is at least one collection; I believe the title was 'Robots Have No Tails'. The stories are a lot of fun. One of Gallagher's inventions was a 'liquor organ' that would mix drinks and dispense them through a hose so he could get drunk lying down. Ned Danieley
wenn@cmu-cs-g.ARPA (John Wenn) (01/20/85)
>One of Gallagher's inventions was a 'liquor organ' that would >mix drinks and dispense them through a hose so he could get >drunk lying down. The idea of a 'liquor organ' was published by Joris-Karl Huysmaus in his book "A Rebours" <Against the Grain>, in 1884. This is a classic work in the field of decadent literature. One of my favorites in my "Evil and Decadence in Literature" class at MIT. John Wenn
@RUTGERS.ARPA,@MIT-MC:LS.SRB@MIT-EECS (01/22/85)
From: "Stephen R. Balzac" <LS.SRB%MIT-EECS@MIT-MC.ARPA> Sounds vaguely like the Beast by A. E. van Vogt.
muffy@lll-crg.ARPA (Muffy Barkocy) (02/01/85)
> This is one of the Gallagher stories by Henry Kuttner. They were collected > in a book called The Proud Robot. (The robot started out as a bottle opener, > he thinks. He hasn't found a use for it and it just stares at itself in > mirrors and complains about the ugly humans.) > > These stories are fun reading. Gallagher has this habit of making promises > when he's drunk that he has to face up to when sober, while putting on the > pretense of knowing exactly what his clients want. He spends great amounts > of time just trying to find out *what* he promised to build. And of course, > there are the things that just show up in his lab that seem to have no useful > purpose in life.... > > -Dragon > -- > UUCP: ...ucbvax!dual!lll-crg!dragon > ARPA: monica.cellio@cmu-cs-cad or dragon@lll-crg I agree with all of the above. The Gallagher stories have also been re-released, about a year and a half ago, in an English edition called "The Proud Robot" (the title of the narcissistic-robot story). Other stories by Henry Kuttner and his wife, C. L. Moore, both under their own names and together as "Lewis Padgett" are also well worth reading. C. L. Moore was the creator of Jirel of Joiry and Northwest Smith. As for the latter, forget Stephen King for horror. If you want to read something really disturbing, read NW Smith late some evening or early some morning. Jirel is almost as good. The atmosphere is very dark and *scary*.