{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/3146", "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": 3146, "subject": "alga's experiences with 5HC", "messages": 2, "voices": 2, "first": "2002-04-14T01:11:40+00:00", "last": "2002-04-14T14:07:01+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Michael Andre-Driussi", "address": "mantis at siriusfiction.com" }, "date": "2002-04-14T01:11:40+00:00", "subject": "(urth) alga's experiences with 5HC", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Alga wrote:\nIn my own case, I fell for 5H because of its perversity and cruelty. I think\n(I really don't recall) that I first read only the first novella, which I\nfound (and find) dazzling, a model of what science fiction could do if it\ngrew up.(Does that mean I consider perversity and cruelty to be grown up?)" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Well iirc you don't like (Harold Bloom's favorite) A VOYAGE TO ARCTURUS\nenough to re-read it because it is too much in the perversity and cruelty\ndept. So maybe the 5HC novella marks the practical limit for your tastes?\nTerminus est, as it were." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I don't\nthink it was till after I was hooked by the New Sun that I read the second\nand third novellas, which take some patience, but when I did and put them\ntogether in my mind--well, it's quite an achievement." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "This is the bit that still surprises me! Because you were so enthused\nabout \"Tracking Song,\" I find it hard to remember that you don't like \"`A\nStory' by John V. Marsch.\" I always expect that this would be your\n=favorite= of the three novellas in 5HC, because, in my mind, at least, I\ntend to think: \"A Story\" is like \"Tracking Song\" and \"The Tale of the Boy\nCalled Frog.\"\n\nYou don't have to explain or anything, alga! I'm just saying that it\nsurprises me, which in turn shows my shaky grasp on things.\n\nI can see differences between \"A Story\" and \"Tracking Song\" and \"Boy Called\nFrog,\" and among them, or maybe among the differences I can't see, must\nloom a . . . well, a world of difference in your eyes.\n\n=mantis=\n\n\nSIRIUS FICTION\nbooklets on Gene Wolfe, John Crowley\n39 Lexicons left until OP!\nhttp://www.siriusfiction.com/" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Alice K. Turner", "address": "aturner6 at nyc.rr.com" }, "date": "2002-04-14T14:07:01+00:00", "subject": "Re: (urth) alga's experiences with 5HC", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "From: \"Michael Andre-Driussi\" \nAlga wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "In my own case, I fell for 5H because of its perversity and cruelty. I\nthink\n(I really don't recall) that I first read only the first novella, which I\nfound (and find) dazzling, a model of what science fiction could do if it\ngrew up.(Does that mean I consider perversity and cruelty to be grown\nup?)" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Well iirc you don't like (Harold Bloom's favorite) A VOYAGE TO ARCTURUS\nenough to re-read it because it is too much in the perversity and cruelty\ndept. So maybe the 5HC novella marks the practical limit for your tastes?\nTerminus est, as it were." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Not fair: Arcturus is crude beside 5H, and the violence is cartoonish and\nnasty (though not nearly so dumb as in Bloom's own book, Lucifer). 5H's\nviolence is subtle and dreadful; if you recall I also lovved \"Shayol\" for\nthe sheer ingenuity (and perversity) of its cruelty. New Sun has some of the\nsame flavor. especially in the first book. To admit the dreadful truth, I\neven liked the Elric books when they first started coming out--of course I\nwas pretty young then. So I guess I'm sort of attracted to cruelty, but\ntotally repelled by coarseness and crude violence. Come to think of it, I\nlike J.M. Coatzee for some of the same reasons, though there is (for me)\nmore pathos in his writing (the good books--Ratty, you would like some of\nCoatzee; if he's not a Christian, he does a good imitation of one)." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "This is the bit that still surprises me! Because you were so enthused\nabout \"Tracking Song,\" I find it hard to remember that you don't like \"`A\nStory' by John V. Marsch.\" I always expect that this would be your\n=favorite= of the three novellas in 5HC, because, in my mind, at least, I\ntend to think: \"A Story\" is like \"Tracking Song\" and \"The Tale of the Boy\nCalled Frog.\"" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "You have far too good a memory! I myself don't recall not liking that\nstory...er, may I say as gracefully as possible that I have changed my mind?\nI love that story. In fact maybe I'll read it again today." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "You don't have to explain or anything, alga! I'm just saying that it\nsurprises me, which in turn shows my shaky grasp on things." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Oh yes I do! And you're the least shaky of us. I have just proved my own\nshakiness.\n\n-alga" } ] } ] }