Off Topic - Roger Zelazny's Unicorn Variation As Read By Rene Auberjonois

     I'm going off the beaten path today.  Usually I'm all about Southern Gospel Music, or things that have some bearing on getting this blog where I want it to be.  Today, it's still about audio, but not about music.  It's about searching for one thing, and finding another.  It's about synchronicity.  It's about searching the shed for a 35 year old audio tape of my Uncle playing the family piano, and in the process, finding a 28-year old audio tape that I wasn't even thinking about.

    One of my favorite writers, Roger Zelazny, wrote several of my favorite stories.  That includes "Unicorn Variation", and to a lesser extent, "Angel Dark Angel."  Both of these stories are on an audiocassette, and read by Rene Auberjonois.  The tape was produced by Durkin-Hayes in 1995.  If you don't know who Auberjonois was, you'd probably recognize him as Odo, in Star Trek: Deep Space 9.  If you like niche sci-fi (syfy), you may recognize him as Hugo Miller, from Warehouse 13.  Numerous other things, but what you may not know is that he "read" for a large number of audio book productions.  And that he could breathe life into his readings with majestic ease.  When you listen to him, the characters came to life.  Each had their own voices, and mannerisms.  I've always loved to read, but listening to Rene read the stories out loud, added another layer to my enjoyment.  

    I've intended for years to find that tape, and transfer it to an MP3 file.  Because tapes wear out.  They degrade, the audio fades, the tapes stretch.  28 years later is stretching my luck.  Recently, I've been on a related quest to upload old audio recordings of my Uncle Freil on piano.  In the process, I've had to buy a new tape player, and re-learn how to use Audacity, something I haven't worked with in over a decade.  So finding "Unicorn Variation" might have been unintended at this exact moment, but it's been in the back of my mind for years.  And this was the perfect time to find it again.  For the most part, the audio quality is still nice and clear.  There was one section that had some trouble, but the words were still clear, so I'm okay with a bit of hiss and clicking.

For anybody not familiar with Zelazny, I usually think of him as a fantasy/sci-fi writer.  But that's like saying the sun's hot.  Zelazny wrote concerts with words.  He's not for everybody, and I'm not thrilled with everything he wrote.  But he used words like Leonardo da Vinci used paints.  Like Michelangelo used a chisel.  Everything he wrote was a work of art.  In Unicorn Variations, a lone traveler meets a chess-playing unicorn at an abandoned bar in a ghost town, with the fate of the world hanging on a single game.

    It's the kind of story I love;   nobody is 'the bad guy.'  The story is full of charm, wonder, and wit.  I've read it many times, and listened to this tape off and on since the mid-1990's.  Angel Dark Angel is also a "read many times" story, but it lacks the wonderful whimsy of "Unicorn."  

    So now I have both stories, read by the remarkable Rene Auberjonois, as mp3 files.  I'll back them up on a few hard drives, download them to my cell phone, and never lose it again.  PLUS, at the end of the tape, Rene mentions he's also recorded Zelazny's "Last Defender of Camelot."  Now that one... that one is arguably my most favorite short story in my entire life.  

    Monique and I both spent some time today trying to track down a copy.  Not on eBay, not on Amazon, nor AbeBooks.  Not on any niche sites I ran across.  Not on Youtube (I searched, in case another fan felt like sharing).  Youtube did have an old Twilight Zone episode base on it, but it didn't live up to the book.  Not even close.

    So, still hunting for an audiobook of "Last Defender of Camelot."  If you know how I can get hold of one, I'd appreciate a comment or email.  :^)