{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/2027", "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": 2027, "subject": "Urth bibliography update/alert", "messages": 2, "voices": 2, "first": "1999-12-13T14:26:46+00:00", "last": "1999-12-16T23:54:53+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Michael Andre-Driussi", "address": "mantis at sirius.com" }, "date": "1999-12-13T14:26:46+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Urth bibliography update/alert", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Some FAQs can be relatively debate free--the struggle 'round here has been\ndue to the fact that the subject matter is \"Mysteries\" rather than, say,\nPublishing Facts.\n\nQ: Where can I find out more about Gene Wolfe? Is there a survey of his work?\n\nA: Joan Gordon's GENE WOLFE by Starmont Press. \"Urth-Man Extraordinary\" is\nthe working bibliography of Gene Wolfe by Phil Stephensen-Payne & Gordon\nBenson Jr. (They can be tricky to find, but that is another Q&A).\n\nQ: Are there any recorded songs relating to Urth?\n\nA: Yes. At least two by, oh, I'm blanking out on her name. She's a\npublished sf author, she also plays acoustic guitar, she records\nprofessional quality cassette tapes on her own label . . . one song is\n\"Terminus Est\" . . .\n\nQ: Are there more stories about Urth?\n\nA: Yes. And if you already have a copy of \"Urth-Man Extraordinary\" (UMX,\nsince UME usually means \"Ultra Marine Edition\") then I want you to add\nthese additions and corrections =right now.= I'm not kidding--this is\nimportant.\n\nUMX lists, under \"C. Series\":\n\n\"C2. Books [omitted here]\n Stories: A14, B12\"\n\nCorrection: that A14 (\"Bernard A. French\" of BIBLIOMEN) should be A16. And\nthen add some more after that.\n\nThe corrected string should look like this: \"A16, A20, A44, A51, A88, A137,\nB12\"\n\nWhich means:\nA16 = \"The Boy Who Hooked the Sun\"\nA20 = \"The Cat\" (in ENDANGERED SPECIES [hereafter \"ES\"])\nA44 = \"Folia's [sic] Story: The Armiger's Daughter\"\nA51 = \"The God and His Man\" (in ES)\nA88 = \"The Map\" (in ES)\nA137 = \"The Tale of the Student and His Son\"\nB12 = EMPIRES OF FOLIAGE AND FLOWER\n\n. . . and there is also \"The Old Woman Whose Rolling Pin Is the Sun,\" which\ndoesn't have a UMX number yet.\n\nWhy this is important: well, I've had plenty of warning over the last ten\nyears or so, but until this morning it didn't register and I didn't\nremember that A51 is an =Urth= story--I incorrectly recalled it as being an\nUrth-ish fable along the lines of \"The Legend of Xi Cygnus\" (gosh, I'd\nbetter go recheck that one, too, asap); with less direct reference to Urth\nthan, say, the non-Urth stories \"A Solar Labyrinth,\" or \"Procreation,\" or\n\"The Sailor Who Followed the Sun\" (if I got that title right--it seems I've\nfailed to note it in my UMX), or even \"My Book.\"\n\nAnd I mean Urth in the sense that it says \"Urth\" within itself. Which is\nwhy \"The Old Woman Whose Rolling Pin Is the Sun\" is an Urth story, because\nit says there is a planet named Skuld; nothing vague about that.\n\nSo A51 really should have been included in the Lexicon, but it wasn't, due\nto some strange oversight on my part. And that is a pity.\n\nWhile I'm opening a vein, I might as well mention a new mistake I've\ndiscovered: my dear, dear friend \"Fish's Mouth,\" where I wrote: \"Fomalhaut\n. . . is a white (A3) star in the Piscis Austrinus constellation. The fact\nthat it is red when seen from Urth indicates a degree of stellar evolution\nand the gulf of time separating Earth from Urth\" (p. 106).\n\nWell, no. I mean, the first sentence is mostly true; and because I am an\namateur astronomer-by-books rather than -by-telescope, it didn't really\noccur to me that the very familiar stellar class \"A3\" could possibly\nproduce a red light (since \"red\" is associated with stellar classes K\n[orange] and M [red]).\n\nBut it can and it does. You can go outside tonight and see it. Or at\nleast, that is what another book says, one written for telescope-using\nastronomers:\n\n\"[Fomalhaut] Alpha [Piscis Australis], 1.3 [magnitude], reddish\"\n(STAR-NAMES AND THEIR MEANINGS, p. 345).\n\n\"Well blow me down,\" as the sailor said when . . .\n\nSorry to have let everybody down! The Lexicon, or even one of the\nsupplements, really should have entries for: \"Isid Iooo IoooE\" (a god);\n\"Maser\"; \"Master\" (a weapon); \"Tarnung\" (a magic cloak); \"Zed\" (a world).\n\nFurthermore: A51 might have some relevance to OBW; Zed, although just a\nsketch, seems rather like Blue (and the adventures that narrator has there\nare rather like those that Man has on Zed). Plus, a special bonus for\nalga: direct applications to THE DEEP.\n\n=mantis=" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "William H. Ansley", "address": "wansley at warwick.net" }, "date": "1999-12-16T23:54:53+00:00", "subject": "Re: (urth) Urth bibliography update/alert", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "\"Well blow me down,\" as the sailor said when . . .\n\nSorry to have let everybody down! The Lexicon, or even one of the\nsupplements, really should have entries for: \"Isid Iooo IoooE\" (a god);\n\"Maser\"; \"Master\" (a weapon); \"Tarnung\" (a magic cloak); \"Zed\" (a world)." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "mantis,\n\nSurely you can't believe that the fact that the \"enchanted\" sword in _The\nGod and His Man_ is referred to as \"Master\" instead of \"Maser\" the first\ntwo times it is mentioned is anything but a (particularly annoying) typo.\n\nSorry. I shouldn't make any assumptions about others' beliefs. But *I*\ncan't believe it. The only way I'll accept the idea that Wolfe meant to use\nboth names for the sword is if he said so somewhere (and I'll lose a degree\nof respect for him as an author at the same time).\n\nI have always assumed that the name of the sword Maser comes from our term\nmaser (Microwave Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation; just\nlike a laser but with microwaves instead of light). I am pretty sure a real\nmaser emitter couldn't be made the size of a swordhilt and I don't know if\nit would behave as Maser is described to; I am assuming the term will\nbecome generalized to mean any energy-beam weapon.\n\nI won't deny I could be way off here. Certainly \"Tarnung\" doesn't suggest\nthe name of any piece of present day technology to me. Unless it's Romulan\nfor \"cloaking device.\"\n\nHowever you slice it, Maser sure sounds like an azoth to me. \"... the\nenchanted sword ... whose blade is as long as the wielder wishes it (though\nit weighs nothing) and against which not even stone can stand.\"" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Furthermore: A51 might have some relevance to OBW; Zed, although just a\nsketch, seems rather like Blue (and the adventures that narrator has there\nare rather like those that Man has on Zed). Plus, a special bonus for\nalga: direct applications to THE DEEP." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "\"Isid Iooo IoooE\" has long plagued me. It seems as if it is a puzzle Wolfe\nis setting us and one he expects us to be able to solve (like the name\nEyebem in the story of the same name). I have always suspected that the\nanswer involves replacing the capital Is in the second and third parts of\nthe name with 1s and the lower-case os with 0s. Thus I get ISID 1000 1000E,\nif I make the first part uppercase at the same time. Unfortunately, this\ndoesn't suggest anything definite to me either, although it does look like\nthe identifying number of a machine, a computer model number, for example.\nCertainly Isid Iooo IoooE is an artificially intelligent computer (or\nsomething very much like one) as well as a god.\n\nDouble-trunked elephants are found on both Zed and Blue does. It is a pity\nthat we are not told how many legs Zedian elephants have.\n\nWilliam Ansley" } ] } ] }