{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/2240", "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": 2240, "subject": "the JCdeck; fairies", "messages": 1, "voices": 1, "first": "2000-05-07T09:43:09+00:00", "last": "2000-05-07T09:43:09+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Adam Stephanides", "address": "adamsteph at earthlink.net" }, "date": "2000-05-07T09:43:09+00:00", "subject": "Re: (urth) the JCdeck; fairies", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "mantis wrote:\nThe decks of cards John Crowley invents and uses in first THE DEEP (1975)\nand much later LITTLE, BIG (1981) are remarkably similar" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Not that similar (at least according to alga's essay); TD removes the\nnumbers and suits from the \"people\" cards, and cuts down the number of\ntrumps much further. Aside from the features they both derive from the\nTarot, the only similarity is the number of people cards." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "But LB is set on our world, and our world has a real set of cards that we\nknow as \"Tarot.\" So it seems to me that the JC deck is either the \"true\"\norginal, of which all Tarot are just poor imitations (shades of Zelazny's\nAmber and/or its deck of cards); or the JC deck is a final version\n(endproduct of Tarot-as-secret-history-of-fairies, as I mentioned before)\nand is \"true\" because it has been tweaked by the fairies themselves; or the\nJC deck has no relation to Tarot, because it is based upon playing cards,\nwith a few new \"action\" cards thrown in." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Well, the LB deck is clearly based upon Tarot; its suits have the same\nnames as do the Tarot suits, and in both the trumps are numbered\nstarting with zero. Of your other two alternatives, the first is more\nlikely than the second, for reasons I gave earlier. But it seems most\nlikely to me that the LB deck is simply a variation of the Tarot deck,\nneither \"initial\" or \"final\" necessarily, and not \"truer\" than ordinary\nTarot in any metaphysical sense, though specially adapted for\nexplicating the Tale (whether by their inherent nature or because the\nfairies have \"supercharged\" them)." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I doubt that the second really occured to John Crowley, but I dreamed it up\nas a way of answering the relationship between the Tarot and the JC deck\n(since both do exist in the world of LB, iirc)." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Yes; the regular Tarot is referred to explicitly in \"Something\nHorrific,\" II, 1." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Re: fairy bloodlines, Adam's arguments seem less and less arguments than\nagreements with alga. He writes that the fairies are not interested in\nreproduction, but he also says that they do want a one-to-one substitution\nof themselves when they go to the next level in\n\n . . . well, this is \"zero population growth\" reproduction; reproduction\n=is= biological survival; it fits with what alga is saying--not that they\nwant to multiply in such numbers as to swarm over the Earth (Adam's \"mate\nwith as many humans as possible\" strawman), but to multiply in numbers\nsufficient to start the colony in the next world, when it becomes vacant." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "It seems kind of pointless to argue with you about whether I disagree\nwith alga. But since my position is apparently unclear, I'll go over it\nagain. The Drinkwaters have become fairies, but there is no sign that\nthe original fairies (whom I will just call \"fairies\" for convenience)\nlook upon them as of the same race as themselves. The fairies' goal is\nnot the production of new fairies, which is what \"reproduction\" means to\nme. Nor would I call the Drinkwater-occupied outermost fairy world a\n\"colony\" of the fairies; at any rate, the fairies will have no contact\nwith it once they themselves go further \"in.\"" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Adam likewise argues against the notion of a fairy bloodline, insisting\nthat Alice & Co. are all 100% human, but he also writes that there is only\none kind of fairy." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "My assertion that there was only one kind of fairy (as far as we knew)\nwas meant to refer to before the Drinkwaters moved in, and was meant as\nan argument against the idea of this event as cyclical. The Drinkwaters\nbecome fairies too (though I was late seeing this); whether they are\nreally \"the same type\" as the original fairies I don't know." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "So then I guess Adam is arguing the human colonization\nof the next world as a truly new event (a sort of \"Firebase Alpha\")," }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Yes, in the sense that it's not cyclical; no, in the sense of non-humans\nmoving into fairyland." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "with\nfurther human journeys of conquest inward ahead;" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I don't see this as taking place. My sense is that the Drinkwaters are\nfixed in the roles the fairies have placed them in, and will not change\nexcept to act out the fairy-tale adventures planned for them. As in ES,\nthey have \"become parables.\" (You can see I lean towards the negative\nview of the ending.)" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "or perhaps a human group\nthat has been made fully fairy. Through hardware (genetics) and/or\nsoftware (theosophy)." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Yes. The latter rather than the former (which is my principal\ndifference with alga)." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "That is to say, Adam agrees with alga: there is only one race of fairy, and\nAlice & Co. is fairy as much as the old fairies were/are; and the fairies\nare the ones and the only ones who plumb the worlds-in-worlds." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "In regards to these points, I do agree with alga. Do you agree also?" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "As for \"bringing the cards in line with the house,\" no, no, no: it is the\nother way around. JC invented the cards years before, for TD: he built the\nhouse around it." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Yes, the fact that a fifty-two card deck also appears in TD does suggest\nsomething more is going on than my guesses in my earlier post. But I\ndon't agree that JC built the house around the cards. The house has\nseveral calendric attributes, of which the fifty-two doors is only one." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "And yes, I use the toy from \"In Blue\" (from NOVELTY) to peg the number of\ninner worlds in LB at five:" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Which would also argue against your \"eternal cycle\" theory, it seems to\nme: after five repetitions, the first group of fairies would be unable\nto go inward any further.\n\n--Adam" } ] } ] }