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This makes the most sense to me of anything so far. NeighborHorn is NeighborHorn, not Neighbor/Horn--he doesn't have the Neighbor's memories/personality/soul, but does have his li…
20 Mar 2009, 17:28
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I started to say, "Yes, that made it look like the miracles were a religious thing--regilding things, making them more perfect, et cetera, which is not obviously connected to time …
20 Mar 2009, 17:04
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Dorcas thinks that the Claw works by reversing time. I've always thought that that was wrong-headed--that it just works because it's divine power--magic. Now that I read this pas…
20 Mar 2009, 16:54
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TROGDOR!…
19 Mar 2009, 23:00
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But it isn't just like Mani the Cat, is it? Mani the Cat is the unity of a spirit with the body of a cat. His catlike characteristics come from the fact that his spirit is now de…
19 Mar 2009, 22:51
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I think the sine qua non has got to be that it's really Silk talking to Remora at the big reveal, right? Either Silk was clinging to his body when Neighbor/Horn(?) got poured into…
19 Mar 2009, 22:21
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I'm sorry, that's just not true. The Dwarves have Durin, a direct creation of Aule who they believe to reincarnate every several generations. Whether or not it's true, it reflect…
19 Mar 2009, 19:47
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Agreed...but this is in the context of a discussion of Tolkien's work. Tolkien veers between a benign anarchism (The Shire) and divinely-appointed or at least divinely-sanctioned k…
19 Mar 2009, 19:20
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I just remember another passage where Wolfe seems to explicitly endorse a Thomistic theory of the soul...it's in Urth of the New Sun when Severian is talking with the Hierodules ab…
19 Mar 2009, 19:06
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That's basically all an Aristotelian or Thomistic soul is, though--a pattern. In Thomistic philosophy, humans *have *souls, but they *are *the unity of the soul and the body. Thi…
19 Mar 2009, 18:58
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Thanks, I appreciate it.…
19 Mar 2009, 18:39
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Like *The Sixth Sense* for smart people.…
19 Mar 2009, 18:16
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Ok, why is Incus a woman rather than, as he seems, a gay man?…
19 Mar 2009, 17:54
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I thought that was a Freudian headfake...Silk associates romance and his mother, so to some extent his interpretation of Kypris's romantic interest in him (as her reincarnated love…
19 Mar 2009, 16:11
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I see your point...the third "horn" is Typhon if Horn is a clone of Typhon. Or Horn's soul--the actual soul of the honest-to-goodness Horn goes into Babbie, who has two horns alrea…
19 Mar 2009, 15:19
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The Most Low God does claim to be the Most High God. But he's lying--the text is fairly clear (given that it's Wolfe) on the point.…
19 Mar 2009, 15:11
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That said, I do think that Wolfe flirts with the Origenism we see in George MacDonald and, to a lesser extent, C.S. Lewis.…
19 Mar 2009, 13:54
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That's basic Thomism, which of course Wolfe is familiar with. It's possible that Thomistic rules apply only in Wizard Knight, which is explicitly a medieval-style world, but I dou…
19 Mar 2009, 13:52
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Dark Knight Returns is a mess philosophically, but it has some fantastic dialogue (well...fantastic inner monologue.) This mud pit...is an operating table. And I'm the surgeon. …
18 Mar 2009, 19:57
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Yes and no...I think Wolfe is interested in the question of how the human mind approaches the divine and in the way that the Divine approaches the human mind.…
18 Mar 2009, 19:49
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That's the freaking plot of Alan Moore's second Swamp Thing story and I'm an absolute moron for missing it. This always happens with Gene Wolfe, doesn't it?…
18 Mar 2009, 19:41
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I'm actually rereading it right now...read chapter one of On Blue's Waters last night. I'll keep an eye out for signs that Horn is Typhon's clone. My theory is that it all comes …
18 Mar 2009, 19:29
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I thought *Silk* got loaded into *Pas* at Mainframe, "healing" Pas in the sense of turning him into, in part at least, the "Silver Silk" who later possesses Pig.…
18 Mar 2009, 19:03
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Horn is a clone of Typhon? I also don't think Silk was possessed by Pas...…
18 Mar 2009, 18:58
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Jerry, My understanding is that, to a 1st century Jew, the teaching about turning the other cheek when slapped wouldn't be a teaching about self-defense at all--the slap wasn't a …
18 Mar 2009, 17:49
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This thread is now officially unbecoming.…
18 Mar 2009, 17:08
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While I don't doubt that guns can make killing more impersonal, I'm not so sure that your example is well-chosen. Point-blank gun killings, like gratuitious killings of mugging vi…
18 Mar 2009, 15:30
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I'm just starting my first Short Sun reread, so I may have more thoughts on this later, but wouldn't the Babbie/Pig parallel underscore the likelihood that some or all of Horn's so…
17 Mar 2009, 18:35
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I'm well-acquainted with the Fourteenth Amendment, trust me. It's still a historical compromise that promoted a strong central government over the states. Most people, including …
17 Mar 2009, 15:30
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James, we don't disagree. In my ideal (MacIntyrian, Tolkienesque, whatever) world, we'd be people of the city-state. As it sits in today's political balance, however, with all th…
17 Mar 2009, 15:12
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I guess I'm a moderate conservative or libertarian on the issue. I think the Second Amendment creates an individual right and that that individual right clearly isn't meant to cov…
17 Mar 2009, 14:24
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My reading, which isn't so much a theory as just how the book hits me on reflection, does not rely on traditional Catholic uses of the color red, but on Wolfe's familiarity with *O…
13 Feb 2009, 18:18
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(slaps self on forehead) I wish I'd thought of that myself--it makes incredibly good sense. I loaned my books out to a friend. I do know that Michael's feathers are white and th…
13 Feb 2009, 17:53
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Yes, "Spenser reference" may have been too confident. I think the intended meaning originates with Spenser, but does not end there. I think that although Redcrosse has the plot fu…
13 Feb 2009, 17:22
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I think it's a Spenser reference as well, and likely a Chesterton reference.…
13 Feb 2009, 15:55
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Although Dan Simmons, in *Hyperion*, doesn't hesitate to posit a Catholic Church with only a few thousand members.…
11 Feb 2009, 16:24
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Do you mean the New Testament or the Gospels? In the Gospel of John Jesus obliquely lays claim to divinity twice. In the other Gospels he is reticent. It is fairly clear the the…
09 Feb 2009, 20:13
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Virgil's Fourth Eclogue, which contains the Sybil's supposed prophesy of Christ, also praises Apollo. Severian has as much Apollo imagery around him as Christ imagery, so the refe…
06 Feb 2009, 18:04
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I take it that that is the point. The so-called "angels" of the story are not angels. They are aliens. Contrast them with the "messengers" in "The Queen" or Michael in The Wizar…
06 Feb 2009, 15:39
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I broadly agree. The words "in a sense" are doing a lot of lifting in that paragraph. People who talk about God usually simply nod to the fact that the words they use will not be…
06 Feb 2009, 15:05
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No doubt Stanislaus meant that Christ's divine nature is in this sense unknowable. As Jeff observes, part of the point of Christianity is that Christ is not simply divine, but pos…
06 Feb 2009, 11:59
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Thanks! I think about this stuff too much. This leads me to suspect that although Severian is a false messiah figure propped up by artificial insectoid lifeforms pretending to be…
05 Feb 2009, 16:15
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Well, no, you really shouldn't, because a) your opinion about the historical consequences of the Filioque is irrelevant, as far as I can tell, to anything Wolfe has ever written, …
05 Feb 2009, 15:23
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Actually, Son of, as someone who happens to believe in those doctrines (like about a billion others), I do feel like you were "harshing" on me--it seems as though you blame my beli…
05 Feb 2009, 04:08
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Catholics are, I believe, considered schismatics, not heretics, by the Orthodox.…
04 Feb 2009, 17:43
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I chuckled here because this isn't a great example of your point (which I do take.) Frodo obviously does not have a stigmata or a spear wound in the side (he is stabbed in the sid…
04 Feb 2009, 16:33
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RRrRRrrrRrRRRRrRrrrRRR…
23 Jan 2009, 03:50
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And the lyrics of Moby. Don't forget Moby.…
22 Jan 2009, 23:14
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It might be a miracle, or it might be the work of Technology Sufficiently Advanced, which, as we know, is indistinguishable from magic. Either way, the Hierogrammates are the appa…
22 Jan 2009, 23:12
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I don't see your argument here, other than the use of the slippery term "Christs." If Wolfe is deliberately contrasting what he believes to be the imperfection of a uni-nature mes…
22 Jan 2009, 22:01
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