# Benighted in America *The Urth list — 1 messages, 1 voices, 28 Aug 1997* > 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. --- ### Peter Cash *28 Aug 1997, 16:39* >> I wrote: >> No. On the second day, he ambles around the North of the city, gradually >> coming to realize how deformed the Americans are. The crucial thing is >> that the "fear" passage cannot have been written any earlier than the >> third day. This is because he speaks of the fear as coming on him the >> previous day. This cannot have been on the first day--the day of his >> arrival--for his narrative of that day is clearly upbeat. It may have >> been on the second day, which ends with his realization that the >> Americans are more deformed than he had thought. There may even be one >> or more entire days missing here; there's no way to tell. But one thing >> is sure: the "fear" passage _cannot_ have been written earlier than the >> third day. Everything follows from this. > Sgt. Rock, > Can't buy that. You've been misled by the non-sequential form, which starts > with evening, > where? > goes back to morning (which is upbeat, indeed, but becomes > less so) can you give me a clue as to where this passage begins? > , then night, then afternoon---the clue is that he walks > north--then early evening, then night (written the next morning). Check it > out again, sir. > -alga- Uh...Ma'am, my poor limited military-issue brain went to a lot of work to provide that analysis...and you're just going to _say_ I've been "misled"? No doubt I have--I'm just a non-com, after all--but I need more help than this to lift myself out of the morass of ignorance in which I find myself. Oh, have pity! Sgt. Rock ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Die Welt ist alles, was Zerfall ist. (apologies to Ludwig Wittgenstein) email: cash at convex dot com (sorry, spam prevention) ---