{
  "export": {
    "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/1029",
    "note": "Exported from an unofficial mirror of a public mailing list. Copyright in each message remains with the person who wrote it.  Email addresses are obscured as `user at host`, the form the original archive published. This file was rebuilt from parsed fields rather than retained headers, so it is faithful in content but not byte-exact.",
    "addresses": "obscured as 'user at host'"
  },
  "archive": "urth",
  "thread": {
    "id": 1029,
    "subject": "Trust Wolfe?  As far as...",
    "messages": 1,
    "voices": 1,
    "first": "1998-07-23T15:28:12+00:00",
    "last": "1998-07-23T15:28:12+00:00"
  },
  "messages": [
    {
      "message_id": "<urth-v0017-0068@digest.urth.net>",
      "from": {
        "name": "Alex David Groce",
        "address": "adgroce at eos.ncsu.edu"
      },
      "date": "1998-07-23T15:28:12+00:00",
      "subject": "(urth) Trust Wolfe?  As far as...",
      "in_reply_to": null,
      "reply_link": null,
      "blocks": [
        {
          "kind": "quote",
          "depth": 1,
          "text": "adam louis stephanides wrote:\nI question, though, how much this is unique to 5HC.  I used to have the\nsame trust in Wolfe as you do, but lately I've been wondering.  While\nWolfe's other work may not involve deliberate deception to the extent 5HC\ndoes, there are certainly many in which the narrator fails to understand\nwhat is going on, and I'm beginning to suspect the ambiguity this produces\nmay often be unresolvable.  In the \"Suzanne Delage\" discussion, for\ninstance, while each of the participants may have been \"fairly certain\" of\nthe correctness of his or her solution, none of us seemed to get very far\nconvincing anyone else.  I've never seen a satisfactory explication of\nCASTLEVIEW.  And when mantis himself suggests that we should \"stop making\nsense\" of the first half of URTH, well, then you know there's trouble in\nRiver City."
        },
        {
          "kind": "text",
          "depth": 0,
          "text": "\tTrue.  But I think the problems with URTH and NEW SUN and LONG SUN are\n(so to speak) minor--in general, I suspect we all have the same idea as to\nwhat's going on (LONG SUN being somewhat different in that Quetzal's motives,\nfor instance, are unavailable until SHORT SUN comes out).  When I read PEACE\nthe first time, I grasped a lot (and immediately hit upon the \"Purgatory\"\ntheory), then later ran across the falling tree PROOF that Weer was dead.\n\tI'm just saying in 5HC the ambiguity is key to the thematic punch (and\na masterful punch it is).\n\tNow CASTLEVIEW is a fun read, but I can't \"make sense\" of it, but my\nreal problem with it was that the end wasn't satisfying--and Wolfe's pay-offs,\neven in stories I didn't \"get\" very well the first time (such as SEVEN AMERICAN\nNIGHTS) are usually brilliant.  Wolfe can give an ending where you don't know\nwhat happened, but it left a mark on you (something that happens to his\ncharacters all the time...)  Of course, SOLDIER OF ARETE doesn't exactly have\nan informative or satisfying ending, but Wolfe says there's more to come.\n\tActually, in the shorter-short stories, such as \"Suzanne Delage\", I\nthink Wolfe is \"playing fair\", but may be over-estimating the ability of anyone\nto guess what he was thinking.  When I ran across the name in Proust, I re-read\nit thinking \"Aha, now I'll get it.\"  Nope.  But I still think there's something\nto get, and if Wolfe were of the mood to do it, he could convince me of it\n(not, perhaps, convince me I should have seen it, but that it was there.)  Any\none hidden facet of the NEW SUN, say, is likely to be missed on any time\nthrough--and in the shorter works, where there is only one facet, as subtly\nhidden, we're really in needle-haystack territory.\n\n\tSo what on earth is \"Silhoutte\" about, other than (I'm fairly certain)\nvery unpleasant things?"
        },
        {
          "kind": "sig",
          "depth": 0,
          "text": "\"And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall set you free.\" - John 8:32\n--\nAlex David Groce (adgroce at eos.ncsu.edu)\nSenior (Computer Science/Multidisciplinary Studies in Technology & Fiction)\n'98-99 NCSU AITP Student Chapter President\n608 Charleston Road, Apt. 1E (919)-233-7366\nhttp://www4.ncsu.edu/~adgroce"
        }
      ]
    }
  ]
}