{
  "export": {
    "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/2867",
    "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": 2867,
    "subject": "New Wolfe essay",
    "messages": 2,
    "voices": 2,
    "first": "2001-12-11T19:33:03+00:00",
    "last": "2001-12-12T23:52:15+00:00"
  },
  "messages": [
    {
      "message_id": "<urth-v0031-urth.v031.n014.3@digest.urth.net>",
      "from": {
        "name": "Matthew Davis",
        "address": "matthew at michaelscycles.freeserve.co.uk"
      },
      "date": "2001-12-11T19:33:03+00:00",
      "subject": "New Wolfe essay",
      "in_reply_to": null,
      "reply_link": null,
      "blocks": [
        {
          "kind": "text",
          "depth": 0,
          "text": "There's an essay by Wolfe about Tolkien in December's \"Interzone\": \"The Best\nIntroduction to the Mountains\". It's mostly autobiographical: how he\ndiscovered LOTR in 1956, the experience of reading it, poetic inscriptions\nhe made in the individual volumes, and the transcript of a letter from\nTolkien to Wolfe.\n\nIn particular Wolfe praises the books because their medieval setting\nembodies a system of social order and responsibilities, of defined duties\nand freedoms - the Christian order itself, even if there is no sight of God\nhimself in the books.\n\nCuriously, the ultra-Catholic Lafferty despised LOTR because he thought it\nwas a diminished fantasy world of second-hand people and concepts with a big\nfence set up around it and a flashing sign that proclaimed \"God Keep Out!\".\n\nMatthew Davis"
        }
      ]
    },
    {
      "message_id": "<urth-v0031-urth.v031.n015.2@digest.urth.net>",
      "from": {
        "name": "Jerry Friedman",
        "address": "jerry_friedman at yahoo.com"
      },
      "date": "2001-12-12T23:52:15+00:00",
      "subject": "Re: (urth) New Wolfe essay",
      "in_reply_to": "<urth-v0031-urth.v031.n014.3@digest.urth.net>",
      "reply_link": "subject",
      "blocks": [
        {
          "kind": "quote",
          "depth": 1,
          "text": "--- Matthew Davis <matthew at michaelscycles.freeserve.co.uk> wrote:\nThere's an essay by Wolfe about Tolkien in December's \"Interzone\": \"The\nBest\nIntroduction to the Mountains\". It's mostly autobiographical: how he\ndiscovered LOTR in 1956, the experience of reading it, poetic\ninscriptions\nhe made in the individual volumes, and the transcript of a letter from\nTolkien to Wolfe.\n\nIn particular Wolfe praises the books because their medieval setting\nembodies a system of social order and responsibilities, of defined\nduties\nand freedoms - the Christian order itself, even if there is no sight of\nGod\nhimself in the books."
        },
        {
          "kind": "text",
          "depth": 0,
          "text": "\"No sight of God\" is literally true, but God is busily arranging\ncoincidences, prophetic dreams, and stuff like that.  Sort of like TBotNS,\nas a matter of fact.  I wonder whether Tolkien was Wolfe's model in that\nbook."
        },
        {
          "kind": "quote",
          "depth": 1,
          "text": "Curiously, the ultra-Catholic Lafferty despised LOTR because he thought\nit\nwas a diminished fantasy world of second-hand people and concepts with a\nbig\nfence set up around it and a flashing sign that proclaimed \"God Keep\nOut!\"."
        },
        {
          "kind": "text",
          "depth": 0,
          "text": "It's also interesting, at least to me, that as a child I felt a bit\nbetrayed when I realized that _The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe_ was\nChristian propaganda, and I'm glad LotR didn't do that to me.  Obviously\nI've gotten over this, since I like Wolfe.\n\nJerry Friedman"
        }
      ]
    }
  ]
}