Posted from 5 addresses as Marc Aramini, maa32, aramini1, marcaramini, A Aramini, Marc A Aramini, Marc
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there is that "thing" sleeping in the mine with the ape men, that Severian says he might "now" know what it is - related to tectonic movement? What is down there? Does a throwaway …
08 Sep 2013, 13:56
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Sent from my iPhone…
06 Sep 2013, 14:02
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And to Chelle, those guns represent moral authority more than the Saints would, with her almost completely secular understanding of the world. ________________________________ …
04 Sep 2013, 16:08
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Horn had that attachment to sea wrack, but silk confused this with hyacinth in his mind. He was programmed, I think, to love Mother and listen to her. For what it's worth I see…
03 Sep 2013, 19:59
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I do think Long Sun Silk is ever so slightly idealized by Horn in light of that final decision to leave everyone for Hyacinth. I also think Horn's idealization of Silk and the pos…
03 Sep 2013, 15:13
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Infinite reproducibility certainly, as a name can be written over and over, but can it be effectively erased, as when Scylla vacates Oreb, or the fragments of Pas are retrieved in …
03 Sep 2013, 13:51
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Characterization also changes in the two books: while he IS mixed up in OBW, the preachy "it is best to go to your marriage bed clean" seems like hypocrisy on the part of Horn, but…
01 Sep 2013, 16:25
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Also, some sublime irony in OBW when Horn wishes Silk where there to help him and he thinks how Silk would never, ever lie to himself like Horn does, then Silk winds up doing it fo…
01 Sep 2013, 16:20
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In OBW, the character index indicates Horn is the protagonist. In IGJ, he is no longer listed as such, though Incanto is called the former Rajan of Gaon. Silk is capable of EXTREM…
01 Sep 2013, 16:17
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Lee, I have posted my scheme of their respective "percentages" of Horn and Silk several times, so I won't do it again in full, but the first book of long sun ends with Horn imitati…
30 Aug 2013, 14:00
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Actually one of the darker scenes that recurs several times in Wolfe is a guy perceived as harmless kicking someone to deat (Blue Mouse, Silk and Jahlee, pretty sure Auk did it) an…
28 Aug 2013, 18:34
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________________________________ From: Lee Berman <severiansola at hotmail.com> To: "urth at urth.net" <urth at urth.net> Sent: Wednesday, August 28, 2013 10:33 AM Subject: (urth)…
28 Aug 2013, 18:10
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________________________________ In addition to what has already been posted about dogs as gods, I tend to take a meta-interpretation of it in addition to the other suggestions. …
28 Aug 2013, 16:10
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I almost feel as if Wolfe was very interested in metafiction in the early to late 80s and then gradually lost interest in it, reverting back to more traditional narrative in the 90…
28 Aug 2013, 16:06
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all of which begs the question, I suppose, of what we are to make of the authorial voice in the afterwords to the New Sun books ... part of the fictional allusive text or just a ra…
28 Aug 2013, 16:02
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________________________________ From: Lee Berman <severiansola at hotmail.com> To: "urth at urth.net" <urth at urth.net> Sent: Tuesday, August 27, 2013 10:58 AM In addition to w…
28 Aug 2013, 15:59
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Silk is the shepherd who puts others first, Severian the culler and the butcher whose salvation leaves only himself standing alone. I am still thinking that Typhon did more good fo…
28 Aug 2013, 01:43
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Severian is a tricky case as far as free will and determinism goes - a WAY more ambiguous guy than Silk. The whole might makes right attitude he shows in taming eata and the exter…
28 Aug 2013, 01:39
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Last post this morning - the intro to Enangered Species and several other essays indicate a vague hostility to an academic environment that promulgates the cult of dead authors. Y…
27 Aug 2013, 13:48
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"Things weaker than our words for them" - I have found this quote actually quite invaluable in approaching Wolfe. Words have meanings - Wolfe often implies all of those meanings d…
27 Aug 2013, 13:42
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One of the oddest moments in New Sun comes when Severian reflects on how the language he uses is perspicuous, with one word having only one meaning, when the wording of every state…
27 Aug 2013, 13:26
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Gerry, I agree on the blasphemous inversion of mere dogs being called gods, but I think that too is a symbol of the presumptuous sleeping men who were called gods. That blind fell…
27 Aug 2013, 13:19
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Yes Sent from my iPhone…
27 Aug 2013, 13:07
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Yes silk doubting the outsider is, I think, because he has come to doubt some feature of his enlightenment or its sincerity( in addition to no doubt questioning how so many bad thi…
27 Aug 2013, 03:08
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The only significance it had in ww2 as far as I could see was that Ethiopian ruler in exile there and the heavy damage it suffered, but I have absolutely no knowledge of the banki…
24 Aug 2013, 13:59
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As far as I can see the only two changes before the story starts are that Germany focused on economics instead of military might after the Great War, and that Churchill's career ne…
23 Aug 2013, 20:24
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Thanks Aaron. The criticism is correct in one thing - the solar system's state has to be extremely altered by something for it to be the future. I have read that piece, Ma…
23 Aug 2013, 15:03
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also, Sims was a research scientist (physicist?) and made an officer super fast - clearly an important person to some. Perhaps this is why Skip feels so compelled to have Chelle, b…
21 Aug 2013, 01:43
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I will repost some things to address your questions. on page 282 it is revealed zygmunt, skip's investigator, is dead and two women are missing. On page 285 skip hands some people…
21 Aug 2013, 01:40
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I made a lot of comments in June http://lists.urth.net/pipermail/urth-urth.net/2013-June/thread.html? You might want to take a look at a few of the speculations there under the …
21 Aug 2013, 01:32
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Some points I picked up I think mostly from this list: I'm not sure at all that this Charles Blue is Chelle's father. The old one was a fat, easily controlled man. This one is thi…
21 Aug 2013, 01:30
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Originally I wanted to make a case that the guns in the voodoo ceremony represented certain characters. I am certain now the officers gun Chelle chooses indicates that Jane sims i…
21 Aug 2013, 01:21
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I think Pynchon is decidedly more postmodern - when things fall apart they tend not to come together again. Scatophages(i?), giant octopi, erections summoning death from above ...…
20 Aug 2013, 00:22
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Critiques of New Sun in particular are almost universally asinine. Later Wolfe lacks the universal appeal but is still great, but the balance in New Sun between theme, atmosphere, …
19 Aug 2013, 17:06
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I do mention that a reader could easily be critical of a ruler who sits in luxury leaving his people in a slum and offering to help them only indirectly (ie not at all) but I think…
19 Aug 2013, 12:24
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David Duffy wrote: ??? Because he is a tricksy Modernist. Joyce had to put the chapter headings back in _Ulysses_, otherwise it was too hard, he was told. Similarly - in a respo…
19 Aug 2013, 04:50
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Wolfe is still Wolfe - my favorite parts of home fires were the first person sections. There is clearly still a patterned and discernible plan behind it (even if it is as vague as…
17 Aug 2013, 18:32
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???I spoke of the west wind in the bible making the plague of locusts dissipate into the red sea, and the east wind bringing so many travails and scorching hardships, but I failed …
15 Aug 2013, 14:03
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One more thing that just struck me is the nature of this self referential myth making - Deepdelver is a hero from his perspective and the point of view of his fellows, but his succ…
14 Aug 2013, 14:20
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How much harder would this story have been if Wolfe had named it "Deepdelver and the Everdark" or "Greylock's Last Story"? I feel like in the 90s he might not have given us the int…
14 Aug 2013, 13:14
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Yes I got the impression that the tears were way more common after Singer was captured- I agree with that feeling. Depression might have made her more susceptible to a simple bacte…
14 Aug 2013, 13:12
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Wolfe outside the text doesn't portray that attitude very much? - it's more like, if you were paying attention, there are no secrets. (Our vice is failure to observe what is import…
12 Aug 2013, 17:51
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Not too much information - the last several years have been interfering to some degree with Wolfe's ability to write without distractions. Legal issues over his wife's care situati…
06 Aug 2013, 16:27
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Well ... I really like Andre-druissi. His lexicon urthus is great. My issue with gate of horn is pretty simple - while Borski goes way too far and ignores theme in ephemeral conc…
05 Aug 2013, 19:33
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Publishing has also slowed down considerably in the last few years save for sure thing name sales. Land across is in November and Wolfe is working on A Borrowed Man, about checkin…
05 Aug 2013, 18:15
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Not to be all negative, and not that a title can't have two connotations, but there is a pretty explicit rumination on that shadow that comes from the hand of the secular authority…
05 Aug 2013, 15:37
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There are some interesting things in thinking of the generation of aquastors here. I haven't read new sun in a long long time, but the idea of Katherine as an eidolon is kind of i…
01 Aug 2013, 16:52
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Lee wrote: "Given Jeff's consideration of Wolfe's assessment of the reality of pagan gods, this re- combining theme makes Wolfe's personal theology very interesting with regard to…
31 Jul 2013, 14:38
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Yeah the trauma is only the most superficial touch of realism- gods and the wellsprings of human faith are as real as they can be in those books, but the religious scheme is syncre…
30 Jul 2013, 00:30
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Yeah his last is a bit cropo-mucophagic. Delany is a good writer who writes about some nasty stuff. Not sure if his later output is worth the effort, but Dark Reflections was at …
25 Jul 2013, 14:52
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