{
  "export": {
    "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/223",
    "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": 223,
    "subject": "Peace: Stories within Stories",
    "messages": 1,
    "voices": 1,
    "first": "1997-10-08T11:03:57+00:00",
    "last": "1997-10-08T11:03:57+00:00"
  },
  "messages": [
    {
      "message_id": "<urth-v0004-0333@digest.urth.net>",
      "from": {
        "name": "Michael Straight",
        "address": "straight at email.unc.edu"
      },
      "date": "1997-10-08T11:03:57+00:00",
      "subject": "(urth) Peace: Stories within Stories",
      "in_reply_to": null,
      "reply_link": null,
      "blocks": [
        {
          "kind": "text",
          "depth": 0,
          "text": "I recently read Peace for the first time and would be interested in\ndiscussing the book.  Spoilers follow.\n\nI remember the story of Finn M'Cool and his cat from Wolfe's Book of Days\n(I think).  Was it originally composed for Peace or was it published\nearlier?  Is the anthologized version the same as the one in Peace?  It\nmust be a little different because the Peace version has an aside to\nDennis (\"and [the dog] would have had this tale if you hadn't laughed at\nthe cat\"--which is odd in that it implies a version of the story with the\ndog in the cat's role).  This is one story where I think I'd like to see\none of Nutria's allegorical interpretations; the exchange \"who are they?\nWell, one is wickedness, and the other a fairy cat\" seems to invite it.\n\nI really liked the story of the sidhe at the end.  In fact, I found Peace\nto have one of the most satisfying endings of any of Wolfe's novels.  The\nlast paragraph in particular is great in which it ties Weer's story to\nthat of the ceramic pillow.  Maybe Weer isn't a ghost, but young Den's\ndream of the future.  Not only does the ceramic pillow add dimensions to\nWeer's story, but Weer's story illuminates the pillow story, helping us\nimagine some reasons that the Chinese officer might wish to relive his\noutwardly successful life.\n\nI was disappointed but not surprised that Wolfe didn't finish the story of\nthe princess and the tower.  I go back and forth between suspecting Wolfe\njust couldn't think of a good ending for the story and fearing he's given\nenough clues to guess the end of the story and nature of the fourth lover\n(\"fire\") myself.  \n\nWhere does the story of the jinni telling a story come from (in the\nnarrative, I mean, not where did Wolfe get it)?  The only clue I can find\nis that maybe Dennis is remembering it from the same book that had the\nprincess and the tower as he rides in the car, since he mentions that book\nin the preceeding paragraph.  Or maybe it's not young Dennis remembering\nbut the older Weer remembering the story because he remembered thinking\nabout the book as a boy.  Or maybe young Dennis dreaming about an older\nWeer who remembers reading a story that young Dennis might one day read.\nHa!  Wheels within wheels within wheels!\n\nDoes Weer's company make orange drink out of potatoes?\n\nAs I page through this story, I find so many wonderful bits I can't begin\nto mention them all:  \"The newspapers love correcting people, and they\nwould have had a field day explaining the difference between Eve and\nAphrodite to readers who had hardly heard of either.\"\n\nOr this:\n\n\"This book I hold in my lap was composed in the seventh century, probably\nin Damascus, by a native of the ancient city of Sanaa, in what is now\nYemen.  In 950 it was translated into medieval Greek, and a hundred years\nlater it was burned by Michael, the Patriarch of Constantinople; that\nshould have been the end of it, but two hundred years later a Latin\ntranslation of the Greek was placed on the Index Expurgatorius by Pope\nGregory IX.  It was not printed until the Latin version appeared in the\nCadiz edition of 1590, and never mentioned in print anywhere until the\nprovidential gentleman I spoke of a few moments ago made the entire thing\nup.  Now it has achieved reality, and in another hundred years ten\nthousand copies may exist.\"\n\nDoes Wolfe really think the Venus de Milo is a fake?  That sounds\ncongruent with the \"we don't really know as much as we think about the\nancients\" stance he has in the introduction to the Soldier books.  I\nwonder if this passage says anything about Wolfe's attitude toward the\nBible?\n\nPlease follow-up and tell me what you think about these things or\nsomething else about Peace.\n\n-Rostrum"
        }
      ]
    }
  ]
}