Subject: (urth) Wolfe misc.

From: Ron Crown <crownrw at slu.edu>
Date: Fri, 24 Mar 2000 12:00:50 +0000

Since things are rather slow on the list, I thought I would share a couple
of recent extra-genre references to Wolfe which show that our man is making
his mark in the larger world.

The first is from the book A General Theory Of Love by published recently by
Random House.  I haven't read the whole thing but on p. 32-33 there's a
discussion of "humanity's three brains" which eventuates in this comment
followed by a quote from Wolfe.

	'From modern neuroanatomy,' writes a pair of neuroscience researchers, 'it
is apparent that the entire neocortex of humans 	continues to be regulated
by the paralimbic regions from which it evolved.'  The novelist [!] Gene
Wolfe makes an identical, 	albeit lovelier, observation:

	We say, 'I will,' and 'I will not,' and imagine ourselves (though we obey
the orders of some prosaic person every day) our own 	masters, whhen the
truth is that our masters are sleeping.  One wakes within us, and we are
ridden like beats, though the 	rider is but some hitherto unguessed part of
ourselves.

Quick, those of you with Severian-like memory, where is the quote from?

The second reference is from a mystery novel by John Dunning with the title
Booked to Die.  It's about an ex-Denver cop turned used(antiquarian sounds a
little high falutin for the kind of books mentioned) bookseller (really) and
is full of interesting details about that world of used book dealings, etc.
(The author is former used book dealer himself.)  The murder victim in the
book is a "bookscout" (someone who haunts estate sales, etc. looking for
that rare item that will make his fortune).  When one of the characters is
asked about the last time he saw the bookscout, he replies, 'You mean the
bookscout?  He knows I don't buy stock from scouts.  They want too much for
the run-of-the-mill stuff.  He comes in if he's got a King or Burroughs, or
maybe an early Gene Wolfe."

I assume that "Burroughs" is Edgar Rice rather than William S. so Wolfe is
still being associated with genre authors.  And I suppose he specified "Gene
Wolfe" to avoid confusion with Thomas and Tom.  But at least he's
collectible!  (And why didn't I pick up that 1st ed. Shadow in the book
store in 1980?!)

Ron Crown, D.Phil., M.S.L.S.
Reference Librarian
Pius XII Memorial Library
Saint Louis University
crownrw at slu.edu
Phone:  314-977-3593
FAX:     314-977-3108

*More Wolfe info & archive of this list at http://www.urth.net/urth/