{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/2412", "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": 2412, "subject": "PEACE: Adam & The Princess", "messages": 2, "voices": 2, "first": "2000-10-22T16:21:49+00:00", "last": "2000-10-23T11:02:41+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Michael Andre-Driussi", "address": "mantis at sirius.com" }, "date": "2000-10-22T16:21:49+00:00", "subject": "(urth) PEACE: Adam & The Princess", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Adam wrote:\nIn a way, though, Peacock's and Macafee's courtships are inversions of\nthe fairy tale. Peacock discovers rare, hidden things but (presumably\nunlike the prince of gnomes) keeps them for himself. And in the Chinese\negg affair, Olivia tries to maneuver Macafee into using his trading\nprowess for her benefit, like the merchant; but her plan backfires\nsomehow, and she ends up buying the egg herself." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "And the inversion also applies to Blaine: he makes out that running a\nbank doesn't interest him and is beneath him, but from his overheard\nwords to Ricepie (p. 91 of the first edition) we know this is a pose." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I can agree with at least some of these points. The relation of the fairy\ntale to the \"realistic\" version we can glimpse is rather elastic at points\nof fine detail, and this in the one case that is \"easy\": tagged by Den\nhimself, as it were, as a bridge between what he will write and what he\ncannot bring himself to write.\n\nWhat we can see of Olivia and her mate-selection, she seems to be\n\"wrestling\" with each suitor within his realm of expertise: she plays\nintellectual/academic games with Peacock, undercutting belief in factual\ntruth with a faith that most things are just colorful lies (see for example\nher lecture on new names of flowers); she does the merchant game with\nMacafee, but notice how again there is a tension between \"artificial\"\n(i.e., chinoiserie; her socially acceptable forgery) and \"authentic\" (the\nChinese Egg; which seems to have begun as an olive pit [signifying\n\"Olivia\"] inside a china hen left in the Cave of the skull on that trip\nwith Peacock and Den--talk about weirdly beautiful!)." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "The story itself seems to be one taken from Andrew Lang's fairy books\n(based upon the context it appears in; the style of the story; the\nillustrations it has), and since the text of PEACE mentions THE GREEN FAIRY\nBOOK, we might reasonably assume it to be there.\n\nIt is not. Nor is it in any of the many other Lang books." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Are any of the many embedded tales in Wolfe's works taken directly from\n(as opposed to being modelled on) an earlier work? None spring\nimmediately to mind." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "In the case of \"The Student and his Son,\" the story is presented as\noriginal but is obviously based upon \"Theseus and the Minotaur\"; likewise\nother brown book tales, like \"The Tale of a Boy Called Frog.\"\n\nWhile it isn't an embedded story, in the case of \"The Death of Koshchei the\nDeathless,\" Wolfe says it is Lang, and it is Lang.\n\nThe funny (or is it somehow \"punny\"?) thing is, Smart's tale of Mr. Tilly,\nhaunted by the ghost, is actually the closest thing I've found to a real\nstory in ARABIAN NIGHTS; yet you probably wouldn't guess it, since the\nstyle is straight Southern Gothic . . . but now I've jumped the gun. I'll\nsay no more on that for now." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "If the princess is a virtual prisoner, we would expect the king to act more\nlike her jailor, but instead he asks after each vanished suitor, and the\nprincess gives vague, ellusive answers. This suggests that the princess\nhas the power, and is living apart by her own design and desire (which\ncertainly seems to fit Olivia); and it almost seems as if the princess has\nactually _consumed_ the three men.\n\nWell! This puts a different spin on things: the princess is perhaps less\nAndromeda than she is a siren. Her exile is perhaps less for her safety\nthan the safety of the kingdom. In short, she is a monster-bride." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Cute; but Weer explicitly attributes the princess's exile to the king's\njealousy of the princess's future husband (62). Nor does his\nquestioning strike me as inconsistent with his role as jailer: he wants\nto know if the unwelcome suitors are still threats." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "While I may have over-stated her oddness in order to shock people away from\nseeing her as a helpless princess, I will argue strongly against your\ninterpretation of the king's reaction: look here, at the first case.\n\n\"In time, of course, word of this young man's fame reached the king, and he\nsailed out to pay a second visit to his daughter. He found her alone, but\n[when?] he asked the whereabouts of that paragon of paladins, the youngest\nson of the king of the gnomes, she would say nothing but that his kisses\nhad tasted too strongly of fresh-turned earth\"\n\nThe king seems to think highly of the gnome prince! Likewise, the second\nsuitor: \"When her father asked what had become of the enterprising merchant\nlad . . . \" (If the king is paying any attention at all, he would =like=\nthe girl to marry suitor one, two, or even three! )\n\nWell, having said that, if you still believe what you believe, then we just\nmove on to the next story.\n\n=mantis=" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Adam Stephanides", "address": "adamsteph at earthlink.net" }, "date": "2000-10-23T11:02:41+00:00", "subject": "Re: (urth) PEACE: Adam & The Princess", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Michael Andre-Driussi wrote:\n\nAdam wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Cute; but Weer explicitly attributes the princess's exile to the king's\njealousy of the princess's future husband (62). Nor does his\nquestioning strike me as inconsistent with his role as jailer: he wants\nto know if the unwelcome suitors are still threats." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "While I may have over-stated her oddness in order to shock people away from\nseeing her as a helpless princess, I will argue strongly against your\ninterpretation of the king's reaction: look here, at the first case.\n\n\"In time, of course, word of this young man's fame reached the king, and he\nsailed out to pay a second visit to his daughter. He found her alone, but\n[when?]" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "\"when\" is correct, according to the 1975 first edition. Is it omitted\nfrom your edition?" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "he asked the whereabouts of that paragon of paladins, the youngest\nson of the king of the gnomes, she would say nothing but that his kisses\nhad tasted too strongly of fresh-turned earth\"\n\nThe king seems to think highly of the gnome prince! Likewise, the second\nsuitor: \"When her father asked what had become of the enterprising merchant\nlad . . . \"" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "To me, \"that paragon of paladins\" sounds sarcastic; even in a fairy\ntale, I can't see someone seriously saying \"Oh, where could that paragon\nof paladins, the youngest son of the king of the gnomes, be?\" The\nsame could be true of \"the enterprising merchant lad.\"\n\nBut the question is of doubtful relevance to the main story anyway. The\nking's counterpart might be Olivia's father, who leaves most of his\nmoney to Den's father, or it might be Den's father; but there's no\nindication that Olivia's father ever met the suitors, or that Den's\nfather cared (unless his willingness to go all out on her wedding to\nJulius indicated his relief at her not choosing any of the others).\n\nOn, as you say, to the next story.\n\n--Adam" } ] } ] }