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Oct 27

This is my hair dryer and you can't have it!Click for full image

Danielle Comments: The title phrase says – One man against a wonder planet. Yeah. I wonder why these guys are dressed like some weird bird-fetish group. I wonder why one is holding a ray gun, while the rest have swords. I wonder why they have to have a bird emblazoned on their chest. I guess it’s in case someone misses the fact that they’re full grown men dressed as giant birds
Published 1963

Many thanks to Danielle!

Actually, that cover IS a classical work of art!I would touch it without protective gloves.I've seen worse. Far, far, worse.Interesting, but I would still read it in public.Middlng: Neither awful nor awfully goodWould not like to be seen reading that!Awful... just awful...That belongs in a gold-lame picture frame!Gah... my eyes are burning! Feels so good!Good Show Sir! (Average: 8.50 out of 10)
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30 Responses to “Witch World”

  1. Adam Roberts Says:

    Makes me think of that old French and Saunders Stars Wars skit: ‘look at the dog! Not at me — at the dog!’

    Non-UK people, and indeed possibly most UK people, may not understand that reference.

  2. cutmanmike Says:

    Pffft you’re being a bit generous calling that a ray gun, it’s obviously a hair dryer!

  3. SeriesFive Says:

    I especially love that fluffy feathery spandex-dress…makes me want to pat him…somewhere 😉

  4. A.R.Yngve Says:

    I’m not laughing at this cover, for I see an economic vision in it: One could make a pretty good living as a hairdresser specializing in furry clients!

  5. SI Says:

    “At least I have a gun. Think how stupid I’d look with a sword and shield….”

  6. Mike Says:

    It’s like one of those awful Halloween costumes from the 70s, where it’s a Spider-Man mask, and then instead of Spider-Man’s red and blue suit, on the chest there’s a picture of Spider-Man with “Spider-Man” written under it. Yes, I was disappointed by one of these costumes as a child.

  7. Anrkist Says:

    Soon to be made into a John Waters film.

  8. Tom Noir Says:

    This book was originally entitled “Rich World” until people started saying the title too fast and too often.

  9. Kathleen Says:

    kind of looks like “four men against a wonder planet” to me

  10. Justin Leego Says:

    Sentiments shared, Mike…

    …except in this instance, the costumes appear to be made out of ACTUAL BIRDS

  11. Candy Says:

    Where oh where are the WITCHES on this Witch World? Did the artist read the book, or maybe he read BirdMan Planet?

  12. coltakashi Says:

    The story involves travel through an interdimensional gate into a parallel universe. I don’t remember anything in the story about ray guns (or hair driers). The witches are women with psychic powers. One is at a loss to know why the publisher did not insist on a sexy witch woman for the cover. It is the first in a series set in the same universe.

    “Andre Norton” is actually Alice Mary Norton, one of the female authors whose publisher felt their female identity would deter book sales. She also wrote the “Borrowers” children’s fantasy stories, about a civilization of mouse-sized humans coexisting among normal people.

  13. A.R.Yngve Says:

    Gravel-voiced Witch World Sergeant: “Atten-SHUN! One, two, three, four and… mince, mince, prance, cavort, sashay, mince, mince…”

  14. Annexian Says:

    “We do this to disguise ourselves as birds. So our enemy does not know we are coming. But our enemy must have a powerful wizard, for this does not work.”

    “Are there birds this big on your world?”

    “No.”

    “Well, then, what’s the point?!”

    “Wow! You are a very wise man!”

    —From “Mom and Dad save the world”

  15. drlemaster Says:

    Actually read this one. Liked it, but kinda weird in spots. Ms. Norton really managed to inspire some “interesting” covers. IIRC, the good guys had some sort of dart guns, and their helms had likenesses of birds on them. But I don’t recall them looking like college mascots or them park extras wielding Flash Gordon-style armaments.

  16. Muttley Says:

    I know this is a late response, but Andre Norton the American author of the Witch World and etc. is not the same person as Mary Norton, the English author of The Borrowers.

  17. scifi-guy Says:

    It is not a ray gun, it shoots poison darts if I remember correctly. The headdress was supposed to be a stylized hawk or something like that – not a beak.

  18. Alessandra Says:

    They look like their totem is Toucan Sam, the old Froot Loops cereal mascot.

    “Follow your nose …”

    The sad thing is, one can imagine from Ms. Norton’s description a really lovely, evocative medievalish alien armor. This isn’t it.

  19. Stevie T Says:

    This also seems like a good candidate for the “bird hairdo” tag.

  20. The Tag Wizard Says:

    Thanks Stevie!

  21. Perry Armstrong Says:

    “Bird Hairdo”. Your argument is invalid.

  22. anon Says:

    @Perry Armstrong: *Hairdodo

  23. Dead Stuff With Big Teeth Says:

    Hairdododo?

  24. Tom Noir Says:

    I’m glad the armor has a bird emblem on it just in case the giant beaked helmets aren’t suggestive enough of feathered fowl.

  25. A.R.Yngve Says:

    One man against a planet with no sense of shame.

  26. A.R.Yngve Says:

    “There are bird-men on that world.”
    “Which world?”
    “Witch World.”
    “Hey, I was asking you.”
    “Asking what?”
    “Which world?”
    “Witch World!”
    “THAT’S WHAT I JUST ASKED YOU!!”
    “What??”
    “WHICH… WORLD??
    “WITCH WORLD!! Are you deaf or something!?”
    “Why, I oughtta…”
    “Why, I oughtta…”
    (etc.)

  27. Dead Stuff With Big Teeth Says:

    @AR: I’ve been waiting many moons for you to recycle that joke.

  28. A.R.Yngve Says:

    And I’ll never disappoint you in that respect, my friend.

  29. Bibliomancer Says:

    “Who is on Witch World?”
    “That is correct”
    “What”
    “No, What is on Which World”
    “Which World is What on?”
    “Which is Witch?”
    “The one with Who”
    “Please kill me.”

  30. Dead Stuff With Big Teeth Says:

    @BM: Don’t make me open up a can of whoop-ass for you, too!

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