{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/3706", "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": 3706, "subject": "Get a bigger hammer", "messages": 2, "voices": 2, "first": "2002-12-23T08:27:51+00:00", "last": "2002-12-23T17:35:15+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Roy C. Lackey", "address": "rclackey at stic.net" }, "date": "2002-12-23T08:27:51+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Get a bigger hammer", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Chris wrote:\nThe second possibility is to, as a reader, come up with a reading of the\ntext that is as aesthetically pleasing (to you) as you can. In this sense\nwe\nare in some way pushing each other to come up with more beautiful\ninterpretations in consistency, form, and symmetry among other things - and\nin this context, what the author *meant* has little if anything to do with\nmatters." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I cannot agree. Authorial intent is not to be dismissed so casually.\nPropagandists of one stripe or another have historically cited respected,\neven revered, sources in support of their cause. The Bible is a good\nexample. Verses can be (and have been) quoted from it that would seem to\njustify a whole host of evils, from slavery to war to genocide. The Nazis\nquoted Nietzsche. Madison and Jefferson are often cited in church/state\ndebates by atheists and believers alike as authorities in support of\nopposing agenda. Authorial intent, where it can be discerned, has everything\nto do with it. Quotes out of context and those that are not representative\nof the whole distort the meaning of the work.\n\nGranted, readers may discover more in a given work than the author was\nconsciously aware of having included, but those findings, even if they are\ntextually viable, may not belie the internal logic of the work or subvert\nthe author's conscious intent. Authors, especially good authors, are often\nsurprised, not always pleasantly, by the things readers find in their work\nthat they never thought to put in it. Such findings tend to be harmless if\nthe story was well written in the first place; that is, if authorial intent\nis not compromised by such a reading. Nutria has, in the past, stated rather\ndogmatically that Wolfe--the man, the Christian, the whatever--would never\nput this or that in his books, where the character espousing this or that\ncould be taken as representative of Wolfe's view. I tend to agree. If Wolfe\nhas a character killing babies in a story, you can bet that character is a\nbad guy, and Wolfe isn't a bad guy.\n\nIIRC, Dan'l, some months back, wrote something to the effect that not all\nreadings are equal, by which he meant that some readings just can't be\njustified by the text. Such readings say more about the reader than the\nwriter. There seems to me to be an attempt by some to pound Wolfe's round\ntexts into the square holes of external models. Such readers see, or think\nthey see, similarities in Wolfe's fiction to other things they have read.\nSure, Wolfe doesn't write in a vacuum. Any well-read reader can see\ninfluences--stylistic, thematic, or what have you--in Wolfe's work. It's\nobvious that Wolfe has read some history, mythology, religion, science,\netc., as well as the work of other authors, in and out of the genre. But\nWolfe is his own man. He may borrow ideas from others, but he doesn't\nrewrite others' work. He isn't Vance, or Baum, or Graves, or Proust, or God;\nhe's just on familiar terms with them.\n\nMantis has sought in vain for the original sources of the embedded stories\nin PEACE. The stories seem so familiar to readers of Burton or Lang or\nwhomever, that it seems almost as if we have read them before. But he can't\nfind them because they don't exist, not quite. He can find stories like\nthem, but not entirely the same. Even Cinderella is twisted. I have likewise\nshown that the Sidhe story is a distortion of another Celtic folktale. Wolfe\nrecast them all to serve his own ends. I believe that the same is true for\nother detectable influences. A one-for-one correlation between Wolfe's work\nand any external model just isn't going to be found, because he doesn't\nwrite that way.\n\nSeverian isn't Jesus, despite demonstrable similarities in their stories.\nSilk isn't Moses; hell, he actually got to the promised land. North isn't G.\nGordon Liddy. The resemblance of CASTLEVIEW to the Arthurian cycle isn't\nvery deep. The list can be expanded, but the result remains the same;\nattempts to force what Wolfe actually wrote to fit an external model won't\nwork, and using a bigger hammer won't make it so.\n\nSome readers see what they want to see and disregard anything in the text\nthat is not convenient to their theories as attributable to opinionated but\nignorant characters or disingenuous narrators, even when said individuals\nare the authors of the entire text, including those parts on which their\ntheories were founded. What's worse, some of those mouthpieces _are_ wrong,\nfor whatever reason. Deciding what is textually true and what is not then\nbecomes an exercise in belief or reason, and those two remain poor\nbedfellows." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Chris - wondering if \"Cheese\" is a valid Vironese name." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I dunno, but with alga's pet Rat on the list, I'd think twice about it. \n\n-Roy" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Chris", "address": "rasputin_ at hotmail.com" }, "date": "2002-12-23T17:35:15+00:00", "subject": "Re: (urth) Get a bigger hammer", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Roy: I don't disagree with a lot of what you've said, so I won't go point by \npoint. What I feel you've overlooked, though, is that I mentioned *two* \ntypes of interpretation, of which you are looking at the second. The *first* \nis the one that is concerned with authorial intent, and can be the source of \nmisinterpretation of the author.\n\nThe second, as I presented it, should never be employed with *any* \npretension of being able to present what the author actually meant. It is \ncommonly used in cases where the text simply can't be \"decoded\" using the \nmaterial at hand. I see it often used with Wolfe - though quite often \nincorrectly, where someone has conflated the two methods and, like you \ndescribe, got it into their head that what they think sounds good *must* be \nwhat Wolfe meant. But perhaps a better example of what I'm talking about \nwould be the Art of War, or even better the I Ching. These texts are \nrenowned for their ability to be interpreted distinctly out of context - and \nyet still yield readings that are often applicable to a vast variety of \nthings. The author's intent is cast aside quite early in that process.\n\nChris\n\n(Point taken on the cheese)" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Chris wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "The second possibility is to, as a reader, come up with a reading of the\ntext that is as aesthetically pleasing (to you) as you can. In this sense\nwe\nare in some way pushing each other to come up with more beautiful\ninterpretations in consistency, form, and symmetry among other things - \nand\nin this context, what the author *meant* has little if anything to do \nwith\nmatters." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I cannot agree. Authorial intent is not to be dismissed so casually.\nPropagandists of one stripe or another have historically cited respected,\neven revered, sources in support of their cause. The Bible is a good\nexample. Verses can be (and have been) quoted from it that would seem to\njustify a whole host of evils, from slavery to war to genocide. The Nazis\nquoted Nietzsche." } ] } ] }