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I'll second the recommendations for _Lolita_, which is a fine book. My personal favorite Nabokov novel, however, is _Pnin_. It is not the tour de force that _Pale Fire_ is, but ha…
16 Apr 2003, 21:20
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I read Wolfe & Gaiman's _Walking Tour of the Shambles_ last night. I'd say it's fairly entertaining, and worth picking up for completists, but reminds that neither one of these fel…
17 Jun 2002, 16:20
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I've finally managed (I think) to get back onto the list after some struggles due to CMU's bizarre email setup. I've semi-read the archives for my time away. I'm actually rereadi…
16 Apr 2002, 19:24
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Blish was Catholic? Somehow I'd gotten the impression he was, at some point, an atheist and at another point (I forget the ordering) an Anglican, and that heresies and theology we…
11 Jun 2001, 13:39
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Hey, how hard should I try to track down "Try and Kill It." Nov. 96 Asimov's, someone recently compared this to "The Ziggurat*" and claimed it was Wolfe in Faulkner territory in c…
27 Apr 2001, 16:42
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Long ago, I said: Yup. Twice. Maybe. Rather, Silk is the means by which the ghost of Horn returns to Blue to say goodbye. mantis raised the issue of why at some point Silk i…
19 Feb 2001, 12:58
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Indeed. Silk the suicide I can buy, but not Silk the clumsy, vandalistic, self-mutilating suicide. I'm not convinced yet of Pig as assassin, but I think _someone_ must have attac…
13 Feb 2001, 00:14
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1) I'm unconvinced that Silk was actually attempting suicide in the manse, in any sense other than not binding his wounds and hoping that he would die. I'm still not sure how he w…
12 Feb 2001, 13:02
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Hmmm... Tiredness is forcing me to bed. I think it's interesting to note that Horn is quite literally playing the "detective of dreams" quite a bit so far, as of page 107. Last …
25 Jan 2001, 02:55
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One thing that has always struck me about 5HC is this: I think one of Wolfe's central ideas in the work is that a man is more than the sum of his genes and his environment, more th…
15 Nov 2000, 02:44
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So when did the disaster happen, anyway? I saw Michael's post about PEACE, then a great silence (but I assumed nobody wanted to talk about PEACE, which discouraged me from saying …
17 Oct 2000, 15:05
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Thanks to alga, I read "The Night Chough." The Scylla element there is indisputable, but it hasn't convinced me that the other suggested places in LONG/SHORT sun are instances of …
19 Sep 2000, 14:32
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Does anyone remember where Wolfe says something to the effect of "I'm always stunned when a reader asks me why two people in one of my stories describe an event differently. Don't…
11 Sep 2000, 15:58
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There are certainly some gnostic-seeming elements, but I think the key may be to realize that Wolfe (even more than, say, Flannery O'Connor, who was often seen as writing despairin…
31 Aug 2000, 13:28
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I just read the Lafferty story, "You Can't Go Back," that Adam pointed out. Even Wolfe doesn't seem to be up to the task of imitating Lafferty--while "Junie Moon" works ok as a tr…
15 Aug 2000, 11:30
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I finished this on Friday, but haven't had access to email over the weekend. Also, Saturday I talked at length with another Wolfe addict who had just finished it, which clarified …
24 Jul 2000, 08:37
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I read this recently, thought it was a entertaining, a nice little tribute to Lafferty with an interesting "Gene Wolfe, militia man" undercurrent, but nothing special. Did I miss …
17 Jul 2000, 08:42
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I found it in the Borders at the World Trade Center (random chance-- I was just idly scanning the shelves while waiting to meet somebody for lunch). They only had one copy. Argh.…
17 Jul 2000, 08:29
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Ok, I'm trying to find where in New Sun Severian says something roughly like "Our one unforgivable sin is that we remain capable only of being what we are." I can't find it anywhe…
05 Jul 2000, 10:29
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Alga: Sometime back (archives taking forever to come up for me) you suggested that the "action" of Long Sun can be attributed largely to one non-divine character. I'm rereading L…
16 Jun 2000, 10:17
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Alga spoke: He certainly did to some extent--somewhere or other there's a "conversation" published in which Lewis and some other people (Brian Aldiss is the only one I remember) s…
29 May 2000, 16:35
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Hmmm... I think I know what I'm reading as soon as I finish the Lafferty fest that I'm indulging in at the moment. Thanks to all for the various useful insights on LB. Michael: …
30 Apr 2000, 15:00
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I don't agree with Robert's theory, but it sounds more plausible to me than Max. Del. If Wolfe intended Max. Del., I think he signally failed to put in enough hints for us to pars…
30 Jan 2000, 11:09
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Actually, the whole ring business is going to bother me until I know what is going on with it, because it reminds me of something very strongly: Thomas Covenant. Yes--Horn rapes …
30 Jan 2000, 11:03
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mantis says: I tend to think of "Behold the Man" as being less anti-religious than a lot of Moorcock that seems less directly critical of religion. Certainly not positive, per se…
17 Dec 1999, 13:29
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(writing from old account) Ori, the best argument "justifying the ways of God to man" in BOTNS is not a quick quotation I can pluck out--although Severian, whose meditations I do …
24 Nov 1999, 11:42
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Aha. Thanks, Roy. I was under a misapprehension--I think we're in much closer agreement than I would have thought about things--our final interpretations still differ, but are b…
18 Nov 1999, 18:41
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Continuing the "Tintin" post's tradition of offering spurious sources for Wolfe's ideas: "He has a way of suddenly materializing at one's side like one of those Indian blokes who …
17 Nov 1999, 12:59
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Maybe the best distinction is one of underlying epistemology/ontology, as it applies to non-literary things that can be labeled modernist or post-modernist as well. Modernists bel…
28 Oct 1999, 12:13
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Robert Aickman's collection COLD HAND IN MINE (which I strongly recommend to all Lupines) opens with a quotation from Sacheverell Sitwell's "For Want of the Golden City": "In the …
25 Oct 1999, 11:33
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Here we go: Galatians 4:13-15:…
18 Oct 1999, 12:54
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I'm sending this to both lists, since the general issue of narrative reliability seems to be coming up on both lists. I'll try to avoid OBW spoilers, which shouldn't be too hard--…
18 Oct 1999, 12:35
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Various random points: (1) On the Black Hole engulfing history--it seems to me that the problem with Asimov's Foundation/Robot mess was that it completely undermined the original…
12 Oct 1999, 19:05
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This is purely coincidental, I'm sure, but I just noticed the resemblance between the Miracle of Apu Punchau and the means by which Tintin, Captain Haddock and Professor Calculus a…
08 Oct 1999, 13:10
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Nor, for that matter, had Severian become a perfected being in URTH. Despite the Christ-imagery, none of Wolfe's heroes are Christ. They're better viewed as apostolic, blessed fi…
07 Oct 1999, 14:04
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Besides the relevant answer mantis gave, it's obvious that Christianity is present in a metaphysical sense. The coincidences involved in the miracles and "plot-lines" favored by t…
06 Oct 1999, 18:34
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I'm replying to a number of points at once--a local mail problem resulted in me getting today in "digest" mode, all arriving in about five seconds. 1. Wolfe clearly DOES want us …
06 Oct 1999, 18:28
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Well, it's possible the relationship between Jolenta and Dorcas is intended to strain our credulity--it seems unlikely that Severian has _witnessed_ anything, and I think there's a…
03 Oct 1999, 15:36
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No spoilers for after what Alga's read, btw. The undine theory has already been offered up, but nobody has commented on it--I suggested it, so I guess I can't say more than "it se…
01 Oct 1999, 12:28
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I finished Blue last week, but have remained silent until now, waiting for someone else to speak first. My awe is the same--considering that NEW SUN, URTH, LONG SUN and SHORT SUN …
28 Sep 1999, 14:39
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Well, I'm on page 170, having just finished the Chapter "Seawrack" before going to bed and have some random comments: (1) I'm glad to see Wolfe returning to first-person narrativ…
24 Sep 1999, 12:38
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I think the Occam's Razor explanation for the Whorl is that it was sent out for the greater glory of Pas--i.e. to spread Typhon's rule to new places. I actually think it would be o…
23 Sep 1999, 12:17
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Aha. My own classification (which I avoided giving in the original post to get a feel for whether anyone was interested) is that the difference between Severian and Veidt can be b…
16 Sep 1999, 12:38
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I finally got around to reading Moore's WATCHMEN yesterday, and this morning got an email from a friend 2/3 through CLAW asking if the House Absolute is the "Satan's castle." This…
15 Sep 1999, 12:07
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Alas, my memory was faulty. Mary, not Barbara, is Eleanor's sister-in-law's name. I wonder if Barbara Bold is named for anyone in Trollope or Dickens? The PEACE hypothesis is und…
19 Aug 1999, 14:33
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I nominate Patrick for pithiest and wisest post of the month--although his first statement is definitely false (if you doubt me, read one of his books).…
01 May 1999, 12:50
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I have to agree with James Jordan's take here (after Wolfe talked him out of the gnostic universe with Sev. as Antichrist) and say that Severian isn't an Incarnation, but a "Christ…
01 May 1999, 12:48
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Nigel Price's statements seems to be dead-on-target. Jonathan Laidlow's elaborated presentation of Wolfe's modernism also rings mostly true. Wolfe isn't writing a 19th century nov…
29 Apr 1999, 12:56
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Re: Weer First, I'd like to welcome Ed van der Winden to the list. You definitely have some interesting insights into PEACE, although I think I'm going to disagree with them so…
13 Apr 1999, 13:46
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Does Horn actually say that? I'm reading the lines: ". . . no more have character than a hus; but those who trap hus and tame them have told me that they differ at least as much …
12 Apr 1999, 13:50
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