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In a thought-provoking post on PEACE (I'll have to reread the book now; PEACE is one of my favorite books, and I want to take part in this That had been my impression on reading t…
20 Oct 2000, 11:05
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I finally got around to reading STRANGE TRAVELLERS, though I'd read a number of the stories in it before. On a first reading, I'd say the major one I'd missed is "And When They Ap…
20 Sep 2000, 11:50
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I was the one who suggested Cruithne as relevant to the Blue/Green question. (A couple of clarifications: it's not Earth's moon but Earth that Cruithne is a companion of; and it's…
06 Sep 2000, 11:40
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An anthology recently appeared edited by Martin H. Greenberg entitled "My Favorite Fantasy Story" (published by Daw) in which a selection of prominent fantasy authors were each ask…
29 Aug 2000, 11:27
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Okay, here's my scheme (it would take up nearly as much space to ask whether I should post it): My reasoning is mostly pretty self-evident, but if anyone has any questions, I'll a…
12 Aug 2000, 12:17
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It's not explicitly stated that Silk committed suicide (or even that it is Silk and Hyacinth), but to me, the combination of Silk's bleeding, the fact that Hyacinth is in her coffi…
10 Aug 2000, 18:06
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I was reviewing the altar scene, and I just noticed the following sentence, where Horn is narrating the manifestation of the Outsider: "I knew that he was there, that if I turned, …
09 Aug 2000, 23:17
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stilskin at sff.net wrote: [This originally appeared on the whorl list, but I'm replying here because my reply deals solely with non-Whorl novels] It's striking that the three novels…
04 Aug 2000, 09:19
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I had earlier posted a list of the clues regarding the inhumi's secret I had found in IGJ. I just came across one I'd overlooked. I also came up with a fairly wild speculation as…
02 Aug 2000, 22:43
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I can't find the spot now, but iirc somewhere in IGJ Horn says "Silk is now an aspect of Pas," or words to that effect. He doesn't say it as a conjecture, but as something definit…
02 Aug 2000, 11:26
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I found the passage. It's actually Fava and not Jahlee, and her exact reply is "'I've wondered about that. It must have been marvelous. Miraculous...For them [the inhumi], I mea…
02 Aug 2000, 11:01
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I think you're thinking of this dialogue from the last chapter, where just after Jahlee has argued that she is human inside: "What about the inhumi who destroyed the vanished …
25 Jul 2000, 09:59
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I don't think Alex's theory is the secret either, although it may be true. I don't see why the inhumi would see Alex's theory as more of a weapon against themselves than the fact …
25 Jul 2000, 09:38
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Christopher Culver wrote [spoilers omitted]: Any ideas why "Blanko" and "Duko" are spelled with a k, while the other Italianate names are spelled in the conventional Italian manne…
22 Jul 2000, 09:55
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So far, aside from the few people with advance copies, nobody but me has mentioned reading IGJ, or even seeing it. I checked out a B&N "superstore" yesterday, and they didn't have…
16 Jul 2000, 16:11
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These are just a few scattered impressions gleaned from a quick first reading. Although you don't want to read this message if you want to come to IGJ absolutely fresh, I've tried…
15 Jul 2000, 11:17
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I got my copy at Midtown Comics (40th St. just west of 7th Ave, Manhattan). I'm up to page 104 and so far it's thoroughly absorbing; I doubt I'll be able to go to bed until I've f…
14 Jul 2000, 22:33
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If you're asking about the punctuation of Smoky's legal name, he does put a period after the S. Truman's name, on the other hand, appears as "Harry Truman," no S at all ("A Suit o…
27 Jun 2000, 23:13
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Wait, it gets better. Crowley actually refers to Smoky's "evanescence" in the passage I quoted explaining the origin of the nickname, and I still didn't get it. So Smoky's "evane…
27 Jun 2000, 09:58
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I haven't reread the whole book in a long time, but the only evidence bearing on these questions I can find offhand is in the section dealing with Smoky's childhood: Smoky "lived a…
24 Jun 2000, 22:40
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Have any of Horn's dreams in OBW turned out to be prophetic yet? I remember thinking that Horn spent rather a lot of time telling us his dreams, and none of them had any obvious r…
22 Jun 2000, 09:46
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But the 100 years is not the time the Whorl has been in the system, but the Rajan's guess at the interval between Whorl-Green conjunctions (and even this guess is based on the hypo…
17 Jun 2000, 17:40
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The Tarot discussion got me wondering whether Wolfe ever alludes to the Tarot. I couldn't recall his doing so at all. Then it occurred to me that not only does Wolfe ignore compl…
09 May 2000, 08:54
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I can only cite page numbers for the original 1981 Bantam trade paperback. But I'll do that, along with chapters. 52 cards: "The Least Trumps," II, 3, p. 156; confirmed in "Fifty-…
08 May 2000, 09:32
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Heh. For those who don't get it (I didn't until I read up a bit on the Tarot), "Crowley" here is not John but Aleister, the well-known British occultist, who designed his own Taro…
07 May 2000, 09:49
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Not that similar (at least according to alga's essay); TD removes the numbers and suits from the "people" cards, and cuts down the number of trumps much further. Aside from the fe…
07 May 2000, 09:43
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When was this posted? I'd like to read it. After my earlier post, I went looking for the passage where Sophie first guesses that the fairies now number only fifty-two. I found it…
04 May 2000, 23:03
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You're welcome. That's one good habit, at any rate, I derived from my years in grad school. An ingenious scheme to save your theory, and one which neatly solves the problem of th…
04 May 2000, 09:20
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Jim Jordan wrote: Because, among other things, the book is a family saga. And because it adds a temporal depth and richness to the book to know how the Drinkwaters got where they…
03 May 2000, 10:32
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I agree with the first of these sentences, but not with the second. I don't recall any indication that the presence of the fairies brought any benefits to the world at large, eithe…
01 May 2000, 22:45
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1. What is the function of the opening section, about Caspar Last? I can actually think of several possible functions: it provides a glimpse of our world; it's a prelude to the "o…
01 May 2000, 22:27
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Me, actually. (The second Alex is really Alex.) I remembered the part about August being everyone's progenitor. And, from a later post, you regard the single eyebrow as the sign …
01 May 2000, 10:50
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That was one of George's false "recollections" when lost in the forest; and even within this delusion, George is the only one who is high (and it's Franz, not Sophie, who is the fo…
29 Apr 2000, 23:09
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There is very little humor in OBW (a trait it shares with most of Wolfe's books), but a while ago Kieran Cleary posted one humorous bit. Here are two more. 1) On p. 126 Horn refe…
13 Apr 2000, 09:20
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Some comments and a question on this story (in the anthology MOON SHOTS, ed. Peter Crowther). First, Roy T. Laffer is of course R. A. Lafferty, whom Wolfe has praised in print. L…
10 Apr 2000, 09:37
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Apologies in advance to those bored by "techie stuff"; you can just skip this message. Kieran Mullen wrote: [I wrote:] After reading your reply, I realized I didn't really know…
09 Apr 2000, 17:47
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The possibility of Silk being in a two-headed Pas-body hadn't occurred to me. My thoughts had simply been that if Horn is in Silk's body, and Horn thinks Silk is still out there a…
07 Apr 2000, 09:00
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I agree that of the sins I listed, Horn's betrayal of his family in the pit is the easiest to forgive; and I may have been led by my rhetoric to speak more harshly of it than it de…
05 Apr 2000, 23:36
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Read what I wrote again. My reference to Green's period being six times as long applied to the case in which Green orbited Blue (or Green and Blue orbited each other) while Blue o…
05 Apr 2000, 10:08
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From reading the archive, this seems to be the consensus. It is clear that Horn is in a new, or at least transformed, body. I have a problem with this body being Silk's, though: …
02 Apr 2000, 14:52
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I just finished rereading OBW. It's quite impressive, but also puzzling. In particular, Horn's character remains an enigma to me, although the narrative is saturated with his per…
04 Jan 1980, 10:44
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It's exactly like "The Cold Equations": the author stacks the deck to force a "tragic" choice upon his characters, which when examined more closely is not really forced at all. Th…
27 Aug 1956, 20:42
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