{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/3353", "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": 3353, "subject": "blonds of the Commonwealth", "messages": 6, "voices": 4, "first": "2002-07-15T19:03:31+00:00", "last": "2002-07-16T15:53:59+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Michael Andre-Driussi", "address": "mantis at siriusfiction.com" }, "date": "2002-07-15T19:03:31+00:00", "subject": "(urth) blonds of the Commonwealth", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Hartshorn wrote:\nI never really understood this point. Isn't there somewhere in the BOTNS\nwhere Severian says that it is known that each continent has a pattern for\nhumanity, and that if people move from one land to another they will change\nto fit it?\n\nIf so, how come there are European lloking people in South America (or for\nthat matter, North America?)" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Right, the implication being that the Europeanoids have not been living on\nthat continent long enough to be genetically altered into looking like the\nred-brown people of Apu-Punchau. If you can find the quote, iirc Severian\ngives the number of generations that the transformation requires.\n\nSo, like the blond Argentines today, the Europeanoids have come from\nelsewhere, in their case arriving maybe just a few thousand years before\nSeverian's time.\n\n=mantis=\n\n\nSirius Fiction\nbooklets on Gene Wolfe, John Crowley\n31 copies of \"Snake's-hands\" until OP!\nhttp://www.siriusfiction.com/" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Alice K. Turner", "address": "aturner6 at nyc.rr.com" }, "date": "2002-07-16T06:35:12+00:00", "subject": "Re: (urth) blonds of the Commonwealth", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Hartshorn wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "I never really understood this point. Isn't there somewhere in the\nBOTNS\nwhere Severian says that it is known that each continent has a pattern\nfor\nhumanity, and that if people move from one land to another they will\nchange\nto fit it?\n\nIf so, how come there are European lloking people in South America (or\nfor\nthat matter, North America?)" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Right, the implication being that the Europeanoids have not been living on\nthat continent long enough to be genetically altered into looking like the\nred-brown people of Apu-Punchau. If you can find the quote, iirc Severian\ngives the number of generations that the transformation requires.\n\nSo, like the blond Argentines today, the Europeanoids have come from\nelsewhere, in their case arriving maybe just a few thousand years before\nSeverian's time." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Logically, this is ridiculous. Here in New York, when Wombat, Ranjit and I\ntake the subway (not all together, or not yet), when we look up and down the\ncar we see profiles that could have come off Mayan tomb reliefs, bright\npurple turbans, giggling teenagers with Asian faces and Brooklyn accents,\nsheerly Slavic faces. noble Arab features and those that resemble African\ncarvings, neon hair, every shade of black, brown, yellow and white, and\nsometimes the wildest costumes (including those of Orthodox Jews)--and we're\nso cool that if an exultant or a character like Ossipago walked in we'd only\nflick an eyelid. The daughter of one of my colleagues is\nItalian-Chinese-Irish-something-else-that-I forget. That's the present and\nthe sure future, in reality. And that, I think, would be true in the\nCommonwealth. Though not among the Ascians, who are satirically presented.\nAnd GW has chosen to take the satire further in the next two series: the\nTrivigaunts are not racially satirized, but in terms of feminism, a cliché\nof male American humor in fantasy (see -The Land of Oz- 100 years ago). But\nin the SS series, he does racially satirize societies, specifically Indian\nand Italian. To me not very successfully--a real ho-hum genre feel here--but\nfeel free to disagree.\n\nSo the world of Apu-Punchau represents the far, far past, when tribes are\nseparated and racially alike. Severian's time sort of mirrors the realities\nof America, very mixed (blonds quite normal, as they definitely are in\nIllinois--first time I ever saw blond construction workers), with some\nskiffy exoticism thrown in--Europeanoids needn't come from \"elsewhere\"\n(though in my own schema the whole thing is set in a transposed Europe\nanyway). And then Wolfe makes a right (I thought of using left, but it's\ndefinitely right) turn into Vancean satire (lots of separate societies to\nmake fun of) in the next two series.\n\n=alga" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Andy Robertson", "address": "andywrobertson at clara.co.uk" }, "date": "2002-07-16T07:18:32+00:00", "subject": "Re: (urth) blonds of the Commonwealth", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "----- Original Message -----\nFrom: \"Alice K. Turner\" " }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Logically, this is ridiculous." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Not at all. Massive mixing of populations is historcally a very new thing,\nthe consequence of massive, fast, travel, and that has stopped in Severian's\ntime for reasons of technological exhaustion. The peopel of the\nCommonwealthe are not a pan-human mixture: travel is by foot, and\nimmigrants are very rare. You can argue about the relevance of this to\nthe real future, but not Wolfe's internal logic.\n\n hartshorn" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Alice K. Turner", "address": "aturner6 at nyc.rr.com" }, "date": "2002-07-16T15:36:38+00:00", "subject": "Re: (urth) blonds of the Commonwealth", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "A thought to add to my own last post: there is a logical explanation, or at\nleast a novelist's explanation, for the culturally, racially and sexually\nsegregated cities (or enclaves) of the Whorl and Blue. It's that old joker\nTyphon/Pas at it again. He wants his \"ark\" to preserve as many or Urth's\ncustoms and bloodlines as possible, so he sets up these artificially\nsegregated cities and preserves \"ethnic purity\" (or the cultural equivalent)\nby setting them all at each other's throats. (Helps keep the population down\ntoo--a lot like Yahweh, our Typhon.)\n\n-alga" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Andy Robertson", "address": "andywrobertson at clara.co.uk" }, "date": "2002-07-16T15:53:37+00:00", "subject": "Re: (urth) blonds of the Commonwealth", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "----- Original Message -----" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "From: \"Alice K. Turner\" \nA thought to add to my own last post: there is a logical explanation, or\nat\nleast a novelist's explanation, for the culturally, racially and sexually\nsegregated cities (or enclaves) of the Whorl and Blue. It's that old joker\nTyphon/Pas at it again. He wants his \"ark\" to preserve as many or Urth's\ncustoms and bloodlines as possible, so he sets up these artificially\nsegregated cities and preserves \"ethnic purity\" (or the cultural\nequivalent)\nby setting them all at each other's throats. (Helps keep the population\ndown\ntoo--a lot like Yahweh, our Typhon.)" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Seems obvious enough.\n\nMore to the point, it is obviously the best policy for colonising a new\nworld, preserving the greatest variability and making sure someone will be\npreadapted to survive at a low tech level whatever the environment.\n\nBut Pas did not make the cities war with each other: that just comes\nnaturally. Rather he separated the cities as much as possible.\n\n hartshorn" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Michael Straight", "address": "straight at email.unc.edu" }, "date": "2002-07-16T15:53:59+00:00", "subject": "Re: (urth) blonds of the Commonwealth", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Tue, 16 Jul 2002, Alice K. Turner wrote:\nA thought to add to my own last post: there is a logical explanation, or at\nleast a novelist's explanation, for the culturally, racially and sexually\nsegregated cities (or enclaves) of the Whorl and Blue. It's that old joker\nTyphon/Pas at it again. He wants his \"ark\" to preserve as many or Urth's\ncustoms and bloodlines as possible, so he sets up these artificially\nsegregated cities and preserves \"ethnic purity\" (or the cultural equivalent)\nby setting them all at each other's throats. (Helps keep the population down\ntoo--a lot like Yahweh, our Typhon.)" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Isn't there a passage in the Long Sun books that all but says this\nexplicitly? Maybe when Silk is talking to Sand about all the cities\nhaving armies and being set against each other so they won't gang up and\nstorm Mainframe?\n\nBut yeah, it's Typhon's version of Babel.\n\n-Rostrum" } ] } ] }