{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/2378", "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": 2378, "subject": "Mopsa the Fairy", "messages": 3, "voices": 2, "first": "2000-08-29T11:27:41+00:00", "last": "2000-09-07T13:48:36+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Adam Stephanides", "address": "adamsteph at earthlink.net" }, "date": "2000-08-29T11:27:41+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Mopsa the Fairy", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "An anthology recently appeared edited by Martin H. Greenberg entitled\n\"My Favorite Fantasy Story\" (published by Daw) in which a selection of\nprominent fantasy authors were each asked to \"pick the one fantasy story\nthat spoke to them, touched them, made them reexamine the genre in a new\nlight.\" Wolfe was one of the authors included, and his choice was\n\"Mopsa the Fairy,\" a nineteenth-century children's story--really a short\nnovel--by Jean Ingelow. Among the things that Wolfe says about the\nstory in his brief introduction is that \"Ingelow dared answer a question\nthat no other such writer has even dared ask: If there really were a\nfairy princess, what would she be like?\"\n\nSo we Wolfeans have another text to mine for possible allusions by\nWolfe. I confess that after a first reading, no examples of influence\nsprang to mind, though there are thematic similarities with THERE ARE\nDOORS.\n\n--Adam" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "William Ansley", "address": "wansley at warwick.net" }, "date": "2000-09-06T23:24:25+00:00", "subject": "Re: (urth) Mopsa the Fairy", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "An anthology recently appeared edited by Martin H. Greenberg entitled\n\"My Favorite Fantasy Story\" (published by Daw) in which a selection of\nprominent fantasy authors were each asked to \"pick the one fantasy story\nthat spoke to them, touched them, made them reexamine the genre in a new\nlight.\" Wolfe was one of the authors included, and his choice was\n\"Mopsa the Fairy,\" a nineteenth-century children's story--really a short\nnovel--by Jean Ingelow. Among the things that Wolfe says about the\nstory in his brief introduction is that \"Ingelow dared answer a question\nthat no other such writer has even dared ask: If there really were a\nfairy princess, what would she be like?\"\n\n\n--Adam" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I find this a very odd thing for Gene Wolfe to say, considering it is \na certainty (based on the evidence of \"The Eyeflash Miracles\") that \nWolfe read Baum's Oz books. Ozma is nothing if she is not Baum's idea \nof what a \"real\" fairy princess would be like. She may not be a \nterribly *inspired* fairy princess, but she is definitely a fairy \nprincess.\n\nI suppose it all depends on what Gene Wolfe means by 'really' in \"if \nthere really were a fairy princess\". Based on my (mostly failed) \nattempts to understand his fiction, I must admit I have no idea how I \nwould go about trying to understand his reality." }, { "kind": "sig", "depth": 0, "text": "William Ansley" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Adam Stephanides", "address": "adamsteph at earthlink.net" }, "date": "2000-09-07T13:48:36+00:00", "subject": "Re: (urth) Mopsa the Fairy", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "William Ansley wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Among the things that Wolfe says about the\nstory in his brief introduction is that \"Ingelow dared answer a question\nthat no other such writer has even dared ask: If there really were a\nfairy princess, what would she be like?\"\n\n\n--Adam" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I find this a very odd thing for Gene Wolfe to say, considering it is\na certainty (based on the evidence of \"The Eyeflash Miracles\") that\nWolfe read Baum's Oz books. Ozma is nothing if she is not Baum's idea\nof what a \"real\" fairy princess would be like. She may not be a\nterribly *inspired* fairy princess, but she is definitely a fairy\nprincess." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Wolfe explicitly mentions Baum in his introduction; he says: \"You will\nfind much here that recalls Oz; you will also find the eeriness that L.\nFrank Baum set out to banish from his own fairyland. (He was thirteen\nwhen 'Mopsa' was issued, and it must have frightened him.)\" And:\n\"Ingelow was writing for boys as single-mindedly as Baum ever wrote for\ngirls...\" I haven't read enough Baum since childhood to judge the truth\nof these statements." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I suppose it all depends on what Gene Wolfe means by 'really' in \"if\nthere really were a fairy princess\". Based on my (mostly failed)\nattempts to understand his fiction, I must admit I have no idea how I\nwould go about trying to understand his reality." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "And I must admit that after a single reading of \"Mopsa,\" I don't know\nwhat it is about the fairy princess in this story that makes Wolfe\nregard her as realer than any other fairy princess. Nor do I share\nWolfe's enthusiasm for the story, although that's a common reaction of\nmine to the writers Wolfe lauds (with the exception of Lafferty).\n\n--Adam" } ] } ] }