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Ori wrote (of Daniel D Jones and I): Not quite, but I'll get to that in a moment. And hearsay in a novel is a million times more significant than hearsay you or I hear down the p…
28 Jul 2006, 18:08
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The similarity of Marsch's bite and Eastwind's is very suggestive, I agree, and something I've often wracked my brains over. However, my problem with your theory is the same prob…
26 Jul 2006, 19:08
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Apologies for dredging this up yet again, but I missed b_sharp's post when it appeared. <snip> ...the Actually, what that sentence says is that Agia was *trying* to kill Severia…
23 May 2006, 18:16
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Actually I think b_sharp is correct here, that Apu-Punchau is from "the early days of Urth." That is, from our own history. The clincher is that when Famulimus and co find Severian…
26 Apr 2006, 22:37
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Dan'l wrote (of time travel) Chapter 9 of In Green's Jungles, if people want a reference. Fava is telling the story of what is clearly her own childhood on Green, and for some rea…
06 Apr 2006, 18:56
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Well, there is evidence in the fact that the Piteous Gate is packed with a multitude of travellers - including experienced wanderers such as Dr Talos, Baldanders and Jonas. No one …
23 Feb 2006, 00:14
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Maru wrote What Joturna says is that Abaia "might have destroyed you... In a day, or a few days. He's sought to tame you instead." UOTNS, XLIII. Destroyed, not taken. Abaia wants…
07 Apr 2005, 01:32
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Yes, mere preservation. The Green Man future 'already is'. It's just as real – or unreal - as the ice future. We meet someone who lives there. Bringing the New Sun preserves the ge…
02 Apr 2005, 13:35
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Maru said, quoting me: In the post you're quoting from, the question was whether the mere preservation of future generations could be used to justify Severian's mass-murder *at al…
02 Apr 2005, 06:30
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And later: Well, this is the thing. Severian doesn't even start to travel the streams of time until after he has returned to Urth from Yesod, New Sun in tow. His very first time-h…
25 Mar 2005, 10:18
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Crush countered: Master Ashe says. "At this time, many of your people are already gone," Master Ashe continued. "Those you call the cagogens have mercifully carried them to faire…
23 Mar 2005, 11:45
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If what counts is the number of descendants the survivors of a mass slaughter might one day have, then mass slaughter on any scale, no matter how horrifically vast, can always be j…
22 Mar 2005, 13:17
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I True. Ozymandias chose to sacrifice the few to save the many. Severian does it the other way around. :-)…
21 Mar 2005, 12:22
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Thank you for that Gaiman quote, Charles. I found it very interesting - but then I would, since Gaiman's take on Lewis and Narnia seems to be an exact match for mine. But I also t…
07 Dec 2004, 11:52
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Turin wrote <snip> In the essay 'Where I get my ideas from' collected in Castle of the Otter, Wolfe writes (movingly, for me): The horrible thing has happened. Father and Mother…
07 Dec 2004, 11:22
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The Procreation stories are among my all-time favourite Wolfe short stories (admittedly, it's a long list). They're funny, inventive, moving, and wonderfully concise - all things I…
17 Oct 2004, 08:04
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I¹m always surprised when I see people post that they don¹t rate Wolfe so much as a short story writer. If they¹re expecting the big, multi-layered mysteries of his novels, as you …
26 Jun 2003, 09:08
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<snip> The Haunted Boardinghouse too, by the sound of it. House Absolute hunters might also find a visit to the Doge's Palace in Venice of interest. Although the Doge did have a…
20 Jul 2002, 22:42
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While there's nothing in 5HC that lets us say for certain Roy Trenchard is Victor's biological father, that I'm aware of, I can think of several subtle indicators. One is that Vict…
04 Jul 2002, 14:20
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That's Nurture. The law he is citing concerns Nature, or heredity. Neither do I. He's talking about why he could never write when he held a pen properly. I think he is either cit…
23 May 2002, 17:40
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Then why not say that, using just those simple words? Why instead cite, at length, a specifically evolutionary process? In any case, this is the answer which Victor has already di…
20 May 2002, 10:49
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Sorry to seem at loggerheads with you again, Adam, but a few quibbles spring immediately to mind: If Victor thinks he is descended from French settlers gone native, why, when he t…
10 May 2002, 15:31
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This one is hardly subtle, but I like it too much to miss the opportunity to quote it: "Also he's big in aquarium supplies -- that's quite a small market altogether, but Ffoulkes …
07 May 2002, 19:03
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Why yes, it would be, but then I don't think that is the only purpose of 'A Story'. It also serves to tell us a lot about Annese culture, among other things, and on top of that it…
07 May 2002, 18:58
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No? :-) I find the idea of 'A Story' as fiction incredibly sterile. Saying that Victor was trying to "know himself" may tell us why Victor wrote it, but it doesn't tell us why Wolf…
06 May 2002, 16:20
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That was Andy Roberston. And it's 'tergiversation', I believe. :-) Only if you assume Victor is writing fiction. And if Wolfe wants us to assume that, why go to the bother of maki…
05 May 2002, 18:20
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That's not the same thing. When Wolfe weaves the siege of Sestos into Soldier of the Mist, he's using a real historical fact. When Victor weaves the pit seen in 'V.R.T.' into 'A St…
04 May 2002, 21:17
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We're not told what sort of communication went on between the first settlers and Earth. But if we're going to indulge in speculation, we can just as easily speculate that there was…
02 May 2002, 11:54
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Jerry Friedman wrote (of the non-existence of the abos): None of which is supported by the text. And none of which disproves the existence of the abos, until you also invent simil…
30 Apr 2002, 11:47
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Jerry Friedman wrote (of the account of Robert Culot): Actually, you remember wrong. He remembers his grandfather as "'a most honest old man. He would not tell lies to anyone, you…
28 Apr 2002, 11:27
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Pro abo: Having primed us with the knowledge that abos can't use tools, Wolfe tells us over and over again that Victor is completely ham-fisted. More than that, he makes Marsch, th…
27 Apr 2002, 09:44
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The first time I ever read 'V.R.T.' I took it as read that girl and cat were one, because hey, weren't these abos supposed to be shapeshifters or something? But that's never felt s…
27 Apr 2002, 09:07
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Jerry Friedman: Ooh now I see. Sorry Jeff. Well, Gondwanaland broke up a pretty long time ago, and Atlantis and Mu both sank. But I see a long and slippery slope here, at the bot…
27 Apr 2002, 09:04
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Only if you ignore something yourself: the not-insubstantial continent of Africa, which is also in the list the Old Wise One gives. The Old Wise One has pulled these names out of …
26 Apr 2002, 11:17
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Hey Robert, glad to know you're still out there. I go for explanation 2: the Annese had the ability, but lost it, and cannot recover it due to Dollo's Law. If that doesn't make ev…
25 Apr 2002, 17:07
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My reading is that at some era predating all known civilisations on Earth, a (now long-dead) civilisation arose on Earth that developed space travel, colonised St Anne, and became …
25 Apr 2002, 13:29
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I mean "from the period of humanity's development predating recorded history." 5000BC or older, I suppose. Not "predating recent Annese colonial history" if that's what you thought…
24 Apr 2002, 17:25
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Remarkable similarity of form to, and ability to interbreed with, human beings, you mean? The explanation is that abos -are- human beings. They are the descendants of prehistoric c…
24 Apr 2002, 09:09
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Personally I feel all of 'A Story' should be taken literally, but that's a whole debate in itself! I think there's enough material in 'V.R.T' to argue that the Shadow Children can'…
23 Apr 2002, 17:21
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Hmm. It's not clear what point is being made here, but I'm sure it can't be that we should be satisfied with explanations of Wolfe's stories that are in no way backed-up by the sto…
22 Apr 2002, 10:06
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... And prion, very commendably, includes his own refutation of the idea. He says that there are too many holes and that it requires adding too much to the story, and I agree. Th…
21 Apr 2002, 08:58
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This is a question I've come back to and come back to over the years. You can find a rather-too-condensed synopsis of what I understand to be the truth in a post I made called '5HC…
20 Apr 2002, 09:17
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Hmm. There used to be some sort of in-joke in SF publishing circles that publishers (or editors?) didn't discover their writers, but grew them from magic beans. Please don't ask me…
18 Apr 2002, 10:16
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Hey, -my- hypothetical child occasionally looks words up when it finds them being used in an unexpected manner, or asks a grown-up. I can't help it if your hypothetical child is to…
04 Aug 2001, 15:45
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Pedant that I am, I have to point out that the black beans don't equate to the black hole gnawing away at the sun. The story of the black beans is the story of how Erebus and co. c…
06 Mar 2001, 13:47
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Rostrum said: :-) LOL! No mere summary of mine can hope to create such an amusing mental picture as that, alas. But surely “how it ends” is just your good old-fashioned pagan fe…
07 Dec 2000, 18:34
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Let’s not get carried away here, chaps. :-) A lack of new buildings may be a consequence of -partial- infiltration by the Annese into the human colonies, certainly, but it’s no pro…
30 Nov 2000, 13:45
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Or if you want a more secular reading, from someone who doesn’t believe 5HC is intended as a Christian allegory in the first place… :-) …If I was to call the last line “disturbing…
14 Nov 2000, 14:19
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Borges includes this story in his collection A Universal History of Infamy, published in 1954, so it's pretty much a dead cert that Wolfe knew it. The parallels are quite striking…
07 Nov 2000, 10:07
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Actually, that wasn’t quite what I was trying to suggest. House as a danger, yes, but as a ‘mad computer’, no. I think that ‘…And When They Appear’ is, among other things, a rite-…
19 Oct 2000, 12:54
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