-
Thanks for the plug, but "Vance Space" has been out of print for a while. No plans to reprint, no plans for a new edition. =mantis=…
21 Dec 2002, 02:26
-
Shell is a fine Vironese name -- in fact, it was used in the text! Shell first helps Silk when Silk is imprisoned by Oosik after being shot with a needler (III), and he turns out …
19 Dec 2002, 20:25
-
It is not that late, really! I'll start with the last bit first: It is a common staple of myths, fairy tales, and genre to have prophesies come true, but with a surprise twist --…
16 Dec 2002, 23:56
-
I will agree that from an Oz-book perspective it is pretty superficial, but the obverse, from the Oz-movie(s) perspective of 1980s American society at large, I continue to think th…
15 Dec 2002, 22:01
-
I don't see the contention yet. "Ten years of hard living" (in 1807-1819) -- check. "Has not yet gone on Lewis & Clark expedition" (1804-1806) -- check. Still no contention visi…
13 Dec 2002, 15:49
-
One of them (Bob, the Army pilot?) asks where they are in time. The other one (the Naval pilot) says they are in the 1980s, "Pretty far up." Presumably this is from their briefing…
12 Dec 2002, 15:33
-
Catharine Margaret Garth, aka Candy, is the massive (250+ pound) pale prostitute who wears white (a virginal color) which is sometimes (e.g., as she is singing at the bar in the Co…
11 Dec 2002, 01:46
-
Just to keep it "real" and text-bound: iirc, Severian's return to Briah from Yesod was not by ship but by some technique which looks very much like teleportation. He and Gunnie we…
04 Dec 2002, 17:17
-
Well call me bushwacked. <Curious to see what Professor Jerry will say about using t and t(o).> =mantis=…
03 Dec 2002, 00:34
-
Unless you are trying to tell me that there is no time dilation at relativistic speeds, which would be an interesting claim, then this looks to be another flea circumcising exercis…
03 Dec 2002, 00:30
-
Which is funny, because I did detect odd flashes of Heinlein in FLF, mainly in the kitchen's "door into summer" image, but also the sort of Libertarian reading that Adam Stephanide…
02 Dec 2002, 22:28
-
Oh, oh! In 1997 I worked out the distance as 930 light years, but that was without figuring a hundred years in parking orbit. If we factor that in, so the journey is only around …
02 Dec 2002, 18:17
-
Good catch! That does narrow things down quite a bit. I agree, but rather than "circle" I think it more kind of hovers. (For the time travel from High Country 1942 to High Count…
02 Dec 2002, 15:30
-
I said before that Dr. Makee made it sound like he'd known Free for decades. Nope, only a few years according to my hc (207). Let's say that Free moves into the house in 1980. O…
02 Dec 2002, 06:14
-
My impression was that the house gizmo is not adjusted, it is set to a fixed time, which might be less of a year A.D. than it is a span of years (for example, going from 1942 to 19…
01 Dec 2002, 17:40
-
That is an interesting parallel, and I'll leave it to our Oz experts to say how Narnia might be a British "Oz." For the couples I was mentioning before, well, the Narnia four are …
01 Dec 2002, 00:30
-
Well that is true and worth pointing out. OTOH, Free does speak about his impending murder. The one detail I believe you are missing is that the "seven years" is actually an unsp…
26 Nov 2002, 19:33
-
No, no -- I meant "Charlie as son of Tilly." Smart is more like a Prometheus, a fellow who stole the fire; Smart is the usurper of the throne for which any child of Tilly would be…
25 Nov 2002, 22:15
-
Back on the PEACE channel, I've probably mentioned this a time or two, but my conviction seems to be growing. All the threads about forgery and statues and people being statues (a…
25 Nov 2002, 21:19
-
Well I've just reread FLF for the first time. I did like it better than the last time. The screwball comedy reminds me now of old films I've seen since the first read: movies lik…
25 Nov 2002, 06:02
-
Maybe it will help things to expand the timeframe a bit. As Roy has mentioned not too long ago, the end of Pas's planned time came 100 years prior to events in TBOTLS (hc II, 235)…
19 Nov 2002, 16:41
-
I dunno, Roy, but it seems to me that the same vanity of Typhon would make him more inclined to create a two-headed Pas. (I guess this is one of those "It isn't a bug, it is a fea…
08 Nov 2002, 21:20
-
This is a strangely literal take on a metaphorical painting! Unless you really think Typhon was out there driving a bulldozer at the end? <g> Iconically, the painting shows "Pas m…
07 Nov 2002, 21:56
-
To reiterate, I think that the two stories from the green book are magical and in a separate category from the other stories. (In the larger view I think that Weer is incapable of…
03 Nov 2002, 19:50
-
Hmm. Yes, I think so. In any event, we agree that Lou Gold forged one! Hmmm, that's interesting. I'm not certain as to Kate's plotting and/or desires: I am only certain that th…
02 Nov 2002, 18:17
-
It seems to me that there is a historic sweep to PEACE that reaches its climax in "The President." In ways it reminds me of Coetzee's WAITING FOR THE BARBARIANS [1980] in incorpor…
01 Nov 2002, 18:55
-
Right, I meant "Lois." (Or are you just giving me a hard time?) <g> Right, the diary is a forgery by Lou Gold. No, not at all: it presupposes that the tryst (that is, the non-ve…
01 Nov 2002, 18:05
-
Responding to Crush, hartshorn quoted That's funny, because I initially wrote it as RAMPO two or three times and then corrected it to the Ranpo that Crush gave! The humor goes fu…
31 Oct 2002, 18:04
-
No, William, the fault is mine and I knew it shortly after I posted the WAY-bee note. I had taken the LC quote as leaning on the BEE-fore and BEE-hind, when in fact for all I know…
30 Oct 2002, 18:01
-
Thank both editions that we still have "Sherry, who is sixteen now"! And all those weird antics with nurse repeatedly coming into the examining room and telling Weer to take his c…
30 Oct 2002, 06:20
-
Ahem. Damien Broderick voiced an opinion of many readers when he proposed to Gene Wolfe that Weer found buried gold in that expedition with Lois. Gene Wolfe said no he did not. …
29 Oct 2002, 17:16
-
Sherry tells Weer that joke about the immigrant who writes back to his cousin about how on the first day in the new country a person eats free in the best restaurant, sleeps in the…
29 Oct 2002, 01:36
-
In my recent re-reading I was struck by the Proustian quality of the sentence structure, and paragraph structure. The sentence structure is very dense and noodly; the paragraphs f…
28 Oct 2002, 23:13
-
Roy and I, on this list, have discussed the big plate of spaghetti that is PEACE. The most tangled noodle of the whole thing is, I believe (well, for the moment at least -- bear w…
28 Oct 2002, 04:33
-
Here's a wild thought: what if swinging Ted Singer did the honorable thing and married bad-girl Sherry Gold? There has always been a strange link between the two in the text. Whe…
24 Oct 2002, 23:19
-
Oops! Right. Says so right on the page that he was six. And I also didn't mention the "china" hen (really milk glass) that Olivia left to represent herself (as she said) in the …
24 Oct 2002, 19:56
-
William Ansley's memory of PEACE is very sharp! This is right. The only additions I would make are: "wabe" is part of the strange oath that slips out of an orange guy in an ungua…
24 Oct 2002, 18:09
-
Here are some notes from my recent rereading. Hardcover this time. 1) branding as a finalization "brand new" -- steps of a process, near end of sequence but prior to actual use. …
24 Oct 2002, 16:14
-
Long time no see, Wombat! You wrote a good post and I could follow all of it except for this one part: With this line you seem to be saying that there is a form of Gnosticism tha…
23 Oct 2002, 21:13
-
Well, yes, that is a possible funny answer to it . . . and it does put an extra twist . . . and it is a nice tie to the joke in PEACE . . . But hang on a second! The context of t…
22 Oct 2002, 16:25
-
My current position on the embedded stories has shifted dramatically from my previous position. The green book stories are blueprints for Weer's life, and this because the book is…
22 Oct 2002, 15:30
-
Just to hammer it all out and down: Olivia: had sexual relations with Peacock before her marriage, and had relations with Macafee after her marriage. She is unhappy, and the sour…
21 Oct 2002, 23:40
-
Maybe. First off, what are/were the Cardiff Bretheren, anyway, who sent missionaries to China? (Sounds more like free masons to me!) Granted Mr. Lorn is an Approved Methodist, b…
21 Oct 2002, 23:03
-
Having made my rule about ghosts, then yes, Mr. Tilly was killed by the ghost of his wife (case solved!), and Santa Claus switched the presents for Mab and Mrs. Weer (case solved!)…
21 Oct 2002, 20:26
-
I trust that Roy (and anybody else) can answer this quick question. It is quite possible we've been through this before and I've forgotten. That Margie is sure a little vixen! T…
21 Oct 2002, 18:41
-
No apology necessary! Messages cross, and I'm glad we agree so tightly on that particular point. I fell behind in my schedule of reading . . . yesterday I chopped down a 70 foot …
21 Oct 2002, 14:57
-
At Macafee's 41st birthday party, Olivia tells the China Pillow story. We've talked about this at length, but now I see two distinct readings. The personal message to Macafee seems…
21 Oct 2002, 04:48
-
The more graphic passage in the "Gold" section (or p. 180 in the old Berkley edition), begins with describing how Olivia ballooned in size during the first years of marriage, and t…
21 Oct 2002, 04:15
-
I'm re-reading PEACE now, taking a section per day in a Weer-ish sort of way. What a neat book! Anyway, the question of Smart having closer relatives than Weer. Yes, Smart does …
18 Oct 2002, 22:42
-
LOL! Very convincing! Deserving of Special Award! (And here I was wondering if the hand in question was a left hand, noodling on that flimsy angle.) =mantis=…
16 Oct 2002, 16:58
Urth Net