Posted from 6 addresses as thalassocrat, Andrew Bollen, Mr Thalassocrat, Ed EDson
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I don't think Sev was in any danger. The volunteers had seen him before, at the gate. If he had to intervene, it could have been on their side, and he could no doubt have killed …
05 Jun 2008, 12:39
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Also for what it's worth, recall the old boatman talking about the corpses submerged in the botanic gardens. He says the waters turn their skin to leather - not like a boot-heel,…
04 Jun 2008, 22:35
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But don't downplay Hammett. On the weekends & Wednesdays I'm sure he was a better writer than Chandler. Of all the stories written by either of them, I think "The Glass Key" is t…
19 May 2008, 12:29
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My guess: Ignacio got a big share of the loot from Lesage's hijacking of Burt's expedition. Further, he was actually in charge, with Lesage fronting for him.…
16 Mar 2008, 10:21
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Some people seem to think it would have been a good thing if Wolfe had intended to rewrite Graves, Nabokov, Dostoyevsky, Borges, Joyce, Dante, The Green Knight, Parsifal, The Mag…
19 Jan 2008, 06:50
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A couple of things. First, I think the Hierodules are dupes. They probably believe all this hogwash. (I think Father Inire is a dupe also, whether or not he's actually a Hierodul…
08 Jan 2008, 13:08
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I guess the really-truly God gets a free pass to do whatever he wants & it is by definition "good", since it's his game. I don't think the same applies to creatures, like Hierog…
08 Jan 2008, 02:29
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There's the cock story, and other bits and pieces also. in Dr Talos' play, Nod tells Gabriel that he's only guessing at what the Increate wants. G sees he was afraid of that; cle…
07 Jan 2008, 09:19
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Remember that Sev saving Vodalus is the key event in the whole story: without it, nothing else would have followed. So says Sev; and this is why he starts with it. In his recou…
05 Jan 2008, 08:55
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I was struck by how many of the female saints (Lucy, Agatha, Catherine, umm another one?) were tortured and matyred for refusing the marriage proposals or amorous advances of pag…
04 Jan 2008, 03:13
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Oops, sorry - misread that - you're referring to Capt Blood, which I don't know at all.…
01 Jan 2008, 12:14
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I disagree with that, obviously. I think it's about a guy who decided he wanted to be a pirate & then blamed God for it.…
01 Jan 2008, 12:05
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I think we find this out right at the end. After he came back from the 17th century, "this and that happened", and he almost landed in jail a couple of times. Then he entered the…
01 Jan 2008, 11:58
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A little while ago Roy agreed with me on something: But actually, this problem crops up even in UOTNS. From his cell, Sev tells Herena et al: "Great Erebus, who has established h…
28 Dec 2007, 14:02
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Sorry, didn't make that clear. I think that Sev1 did not bring the New Sun. If there was still a possibility that he might have for some time, it indeed went poof with SilkHorn's…
24 Dec 2007, 12:28
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Maybe he was in fact dead, and Sev1 had just enough New Sun-mojo to resurrect his little doggie life. As I said before, I think of Sev and his timelines as being some kind of q…
24 Dec 2007, 02:51
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I thought of the Ymar story right after posting the message - one of those nice little flashes which can fool you into thinking that what you've said actually makes sense :) Tri…
24 Dec 2007, 01:06
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LS/SS was surely more confusing than it had to be, peaking at something not far off maximal confusion in RTTW. Would Wolfe really be influenced by his audience in that way? If …
23 Dec 2007, 09:52
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How does that work with travel times of perhaps hundreds of years?…
22 Dec 2007, 06:48
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And also: how could he have been the ruler of many worlds without some kind of FTL travel?…
22 Dec 2007, 06:06
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Thanks for that. All the other readers I've seen are crap. I think I'm the perfect target given that I carry a book everywhere. A Kindle wouldn't make me any less geeky but at le…
21 Dec 2007, 05:51
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There are Kindle editions of PF and WK, for what it's worth. Does anybody here have a Kindle? I kind of want one, but they're not for sale outside the US.…
21 Dec 2007, 05:15
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Sure - I was just talking about what I think you'd know or infer if you only had LS/SS, not NS. Again, my point is that I think if you just had LS/SS, you wouldn't have any reas…
20 Dec 2007, 13:16
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One thing which points the other way: chem soldiers were stockpiled "for maybe 20 years" before being loaded onto the Whorl, according to Hammerstone.…
18 Dec 2007, 20:03
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I think people should feel free to discuss whatever they find interesting so long as it's vaguely on topic. For me Urth=Blue=zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz, but it's easy enough to ignore and…
17 Dec 2007, 22:00
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I think this is right. Maybe also explains SilkHorn's frustrating omission of any details of his meeting with Chenille & Auk in Sinew's village on Green. I assume that he arran…
17 Dec 2007, 00:23
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I think they're separate planets. There's no hint of gravity differences, so they're about the same size, presumably (SilkHorn says he doesn't know if one is bigger than the othe…
16 Dec 2007, 12:09
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I am cluless when it comes to orbital mechanics, but if Wikipedia can be trusted I think that lander voyages between Blue and Green will only be feasible at around the time of co…
16 Dec 2007, 09:29
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Maybe the lander only has the delta-vee for the trip when Blue & Green are at or near conjunction? That's when Horn's trip to Green on it happens.…
16 Dec 2007, 00:35
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Off topic in this thread, but I don't think Blue & Green are supposed to touch atmospheres in SS. The inhumi supposdly fly through the void between them, and one Blue-ish astrono…
15 Dec 2007, 15:06
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Yep, that's certainly a soggy spot in the theory. I guess Fr Chris could be lying about the events of the night - eg maybe what actually happened was that he was tied up while as…
15 Dec 2007, 00:09
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I think Wolfe is playing around with our preconceptions about his themes and other narrative tropes. IMO, WK is the story of a young guy striving to excel with respect to the h…
09 Dec 2007, 03:49
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But "himself" with a beat-up face, taller and possibly engineered in other ways - so maybe not a huge suprise if he doesn't recognise "Ignacio". There's perhaps two things whic…
02 Dec 2007, 16:51
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Oh, surely not. It could only be a "proper penance" if he did everything he could to stop "Chris1" from turning into a murderer. But he doesn't do that; he wants "Chris1" to do e…
02 Dec 2007, 13:44
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In fact, isn't it quite clear that Chris is a monster? He sins, wilfully and in complete knowledge of what he is doing. Even when he is given a chance to undo his sinful acts, he…
01 Dec 2007, 12:26
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Oops - screwed that up. The Veracruz episode happens before he is taken by Captain Burt, of course. But I think the point stands: he does have lots of opportunities to become wha…
30 Nov 2007, 23:16
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That's an excellent review. One point: was it really to protect Chris that his father put him in a monastery? I thought about that, but how much protection would it actually of…
30 Nov 2007, 20:45
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I think it has to be something Sicilian. Chris says he's Sicilian; one of his favorite saints is St Lucy (of Syracuse in Sicily); he travels under the alias "de Messina". Don't …
28 Nov 2007, 10:21
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I think this fable might be partly a conflation of the Theseus myth with a story which is in fact Jonas' own. Something like this: The enclave of magicians is a research instit…
27 Nov 2007, 12:27
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Also, Agilus has some kind of permanent mask attachment points on his neck. Sev can still see them when Agilus removes the mask. What's with that? On the fish part: Just after t…
15 Nov 2007, 03:21
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On Wed, 03 Oct 2007 05:46:40 +1000 "Roy C. Lackey" <rclackey at stic.net> wrote, inter alia: I disagree with that. When Able transforms Dsiri, he does it in the presence of a Va…
02 Oct 2007, 21:20
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Well, to be precise, Able only says that Aelf spirits are mortal, whereas human spirits are immortal. I guess it may be reasonable to assume that a mortal spirit doesn't count as…
29 Sep 2007, 07:36
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Actually, the Aelf first tried to defeat her on their own, and when that didn't work, they called in the dragons. They tried again, under Setr, and failed once more. I assume tha…
25 Sep 2007, 23:46
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On Tue, 25 Sep 2007 17:51:13 +1000 "Roy C. Lackey" <rclackey at stic.net> wrote, inter alia: I thought it was fairly clear that they cross the Bridge of Swords into Hel's domain…
25 Sep 2007, 09:53
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I think the Toug character puts a spike in this. He's pretty much Able minus the "power-ups", and if Wolfe had been indulging just in Gary-Stu-ism, I don't think he would have bo…
24 Sep 2007, 07:54
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... which is probably one of the reasons why the stories sometimes might not seem to work so well as adventure stories. You're right of course: the heroes usually have the deck m…
20 Sep 2007, 02:51
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I think a common theme in Wolfe has to do with the balance between the virtues of Aphrodite and Ares. They are, I think, his prime virtues, but an imbalance is a distortion. Aphr…
19 Sep 2007, 12:00
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Nice piece, thanks! To enjoy Wolfe I generally have to hold my nose & swallow his political & religious assumptions whole, and then grit my teeth to deal with the crappy genre t…
19 Sep 2007, 10:12
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Here's the argument: - The Aelf built the tower under Setr's compulsion. - Setr was the son of Uthor. - Uthor was born 100+/- Mythgathr-years ago. - Therefore Setr was born (proba…
14 Sep 2007, 22:42
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Another data point comes from Beel, who says he's a younger son of Uthor's younger brother. (Wizard, Ch. 48) Art calls Beel "middle aged" - say 50. Say he was born when his fath…
14 Sep 2007, 13:41
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