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Yes, He had some nice moments. It was nice when he didn't make Abraham kill his son and nice how he saved Noah's family and some animals when the rest of earth had to die. (pleas…
08 Mar 2012, 14:14
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Yes, Jerry, I confirm that I think Christians can (and ought to) embrace God as 'dark' in ways distinct from implying evil - this is in poetic counterpoise to the passages about hi…
08 Mar 2012, 13:20
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Lee, I'm not the least offended - my passionate response to you is from a desire to see a* good reading* of the Bible and theology. And, brother, you should not be 'comfortable' w…
07 Mar 2012, 21:22
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Wow. That *was* lovely. And awe-inspiring right at the end. (Would have been even more so if I'd not seen the illustration first.) If Gene Wolfe wrote that recently, he has mos…
07 Mar 2012, 21:05
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In the Old Testament, God is a self-proclaimed angry God. A jealous God who acknowledges the existence of real, rival gods. An unforgiving God who viciouly slaughters those who dis…
07 Mar 2012, 14:57
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Yep, what he said. On Tue, Mar 6, 2012 at 11:06 PM, Andrew Mason <andrew.mason53 at googlemail.com…
06 Mar 2012, 23:08
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Furthermore, the Christian God is deeply merciful at his core and perhaps that too is 'dark' and 'scary' to people who would give everything to neither receive that mercy nor be me…
06 Mar 2012, 23:06
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Uh, I think you guys may be getting a little confused here. The Christian God is Good in a 'dark' and even 'scary' way because he is HOLY. There is no 'nastiness' or 'meanness' i…
06 Mar 2012, 23:02
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Yeah, I'm trying to remember if* any* god or goddess comes out well in that series...…
06 Mar 2012, 21:57
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That sounds good but it just isn't what I am seeing in the Sun Series. BotNS ends with the worship of a pantheon of gods based on normal people from the past, with demonic fish wom…
06 Mar 2012, 20:47
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in the Sun Cycle, where we may see female beings of power, but they are ultimately trumped and always seem to be stuck in a primarily sexual mindset (Kypris, etc) Except, except,…
06 Mar 2012, 19:41
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Yeah, Lee, the whole point in Wolfe is for there to be few and oblique Christian references that are completely outnumbered and out-everything-elsed that still end up subverting th…
06 Mar 2012, 18:46
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*if we didn't already know going in that Wolfe was a Catholic, we wouldn't be making these conclusion. It is only because we know he is a devout Catholic that we put more emphasis…
06 Mar 2012, 16:51
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Aw, come on, guys. It's not too hard to know which is 'primary' for Wolfe. And that doesn't have to take away from the enjoyment of reading for those who disagree with Wolfe. I …
06 Mar 2012, 14:35
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well, hard-headed, certainly...…
02 Mar 2012, 19:15
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Aye, Dan'l, Wolfe is undoubtedly ludic in his writing, not least in this multi-level interplay of mythologies (pace Quinn). -DOJP…
02 Mar 2012, 17:41
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Yes, thanks for that, James. I'm not at all surprised to find Wolfe referencing a 'pagan' myth and absorbing it into the 'myth' of Christ, which he as a Catholic would take to be …
02 Mar 2012, 15:05
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Ah! Thanks for pointing this out. To be honest, Wizard-Knight was what got me properly into Wolfe and I hadn't yet really read the Solar Cycle and other works to see his themes a…
28 Feb 2012, 17:47
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Sorry, I should clarify that I didn't detect any overt Judeo-Christian elements (especially compared to other major Wolfe works) except Michael. But, yes, as has been mentioned, th…
28 Feb 2012, 10:11
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It's been some years, but for what it's worth, the world struck me as more Gnostic - which, as I understand it, is about the opposite of a 'most high and most low are really the sa…
27 Feb 2012, 18:36
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Yeah, the writing style is different than the earlier Suns. But I really like it. I really like Horn's character developed through the journal entries. It's a mounting trilogy t…
09 Jan 2012, 19:30
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Ah, that's very helpful. I really need to study what 'magic' might encompass. All these are plausible, but I would not normally have called 'inherent power' a magical quality. T…
21 Dec 2011, 23:16
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Ok, Jerry, so I think you, like me, have 'magical' as a subset of 'supernatural' or 'paranormal'. But, if not in terms of spells, etc., then in what sense are these phenomena 'mag…
21 Dec 2011, 09:02
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Uh, yep, looks like it. (Hey, I've got my teenage daughter reading her first Wolfe over the holidays - Innocents Aboard. She's loving it so far. She read the opening of 'The Leg…
20 Dec 2011, 23:41
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Yep, David, you were one of the 'others' I was thinking of. -DOJP…
20 Dec 2011, 23:35
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Thanks Jerry. Yes, I wasn't clear in the essay. I meant 'magical' in the spells and incantations sort of sense. If you're explaining the Inhumi and alzabo phenomena in non-natur…
20 Dec 2011, 21:24
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Alas, nor have I, Antonin! I was speaking of people's comments online. -DOJP (The friend whose comments I shared that started this thread lives across and ocean from me - when I…
20 Dec 2011, 21:16
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Wow, wow, wow. I can't tell you all how pleased I am that my pagan-gods-fulfilled-in-Christ comment didn't bring down a firestorm. Quite the reverse! It seems all who've comment…
20 Dec 2011, 21:13
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On this note, I want to weigh in on something I've wanted to comment on for a while. Surely Wolfe sees all other heroes and legends and divinities and rites and so on finding thei…
20 Dec 2011, 10:09
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On the other hand, I often find those who love Wolfe's ornate verbosity in BotNS don't like his more bare and minimalist style in the other books. I think he's an unspeakably tale…
20 Dec 2011, 10:00
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Ok here's the passage. Severian is speaking I believe (chapter XXI in SotL): "What I was going to tell you was that the existence of that relic seems to have given some people th…
19 Dec 2011, 20:07
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Ha, thanks, Lee! (You just got on my good side - let's see how long you can stay there, heh heh.) The rest of your post is unfortunately beyond me. I'm not that intimate with th…
19 Dec 2011, 19:51
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Thanks, Dan'l. I'm usually the type that at least tries to start at the beginning and slog my way through chronologically. We'll see.... -DOJP ut it didn't do much for me. I re…
19 Dec 2011, 19:31
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Yeah, I've been hearing about all these books and Stephenson's skills for a while and am totally hooked in already. I also saw him do a brilliant Google video talk and heard a rec…
19 Dec 2011, 19:08
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Oh yes, Antonin: happens to me all the time. Dan Simmons, for example, writes a very compelling yard in perfectly capable prose. But if I read him too close to an immersive readi…
19 Dec 2011, 18:40
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Yeah, that part's brilliant, Dan'l. Oh and now I remember the line well into SotT (Chapter XVI 'The Rag Shop') that really awoke me to the fact I was reading a great writer: 'If …
19 Dec 2011, 18:36
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You know, it's funny. The first chapters of SotT did *not* terribly impress me as to writing style when I first tackled BotNS over a decade ago. There was nothing *wrong* with th…
19 Dec 2011, 18:25
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Yes, so many truly wonderful lines and passages. I remember loving the really robust mountainous language at the beginning of SotL, starting with the sentence: 'Thrax is a crooke…
19 Dec 2011, 18:08
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Actually, I should just paste it here for ease: ' The other way Wolfe is generally different than Tolkien is that most of his world-building is in authentically *science fictional…
19 Dec 2011, 01:42
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Well, Lee, I'm one of the newer 'very intelligent, insightful, well-read contributors' who is in danger of being chased away even by your 'free thought' postings. But never fear, …
16 Dec 2011, 21:03
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To be honest, David, I was completely sympathetic with you in your response to Gerry. I even knew that's what you were getting at. I was just worried the derisive-seeming shortha…
16 Dec 2011, 20:21
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Thanks for your generous interpretation of my comments, Lee. I actually am well known among family and friends as being the aggro one at times - I have to fight hard with myself t…
16 Dec 2011, 18:48
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Ha, 'The Honour of Israel Gow' applied to this list. Spot on! -DOJP 2011/12/16 Ant?nio Pedro Marques <entonio at gmail.com>…
16 Dec 2011, 18:28
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I tend to think of Robert Howard and Tolkien as two differing and interesting streams that find their mutual source in Dunsany (at least in so far as each of the former embody mode…
16 Dec 2011, 18:27
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Good points again, Craig. But I wonder if Tolkien is to some degree High Brow Sword & Sorcery, and Conan and the like are Low Brow Heroic Fantasy? Wolfe, would again perhaps fall…
16 Dec 2011, 15:03
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I'd actually have to agree with Gerry here. Well, first of all, as to your rhetorical question, it doesn't at all follow from the fact that your 'observations' evoke resentment th…
16 Dec 2011, 14:56
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My second sentence should read: 'I though that "to recommend..."' (i.e. erase the second 'I' - a typo).…
16 Dec 2011, 14:35
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Ah, Lee, I kind of sympathise sometimes with some of the things you seem to be saying on this list, but mostly I don't understand you very well and your comments directed to me her…
16 Dec 2011, 14:31
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Dang it. This thread totally got away from me. Since I started the current genre discussion with a comment to the effect that BotNS has a 'feel' of SnS (at first), let me just re…
16 Dec 2011, 11:23
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a spoiler warning in the subject line should take care of it...…
14 Dec 2011, 22:29
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