{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/3889", "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": 3889, "subject": "DOORS: more places", "messages": 2, "voices": 2, "first": "2003-03-09T16:16:06+00:00", "last": "2003-03-09T18:24:49+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "StoneOx17", "address": "stoneox17 at aol.com" }, "date": "2003-03-09T16:16:06+00:00", "subject": "(urth) DOORS: more places", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "While we're on the subject, I've had some more ideas on Marea. \nMarea means \"tide\" in Spanish. This should mean it's on the \nPacific, in a formerly Spanish-speaking area. (Does this mean \nthe Mexican-American war still took place in Otherworld?) The \ntwo obvious candidates are San Francisco and Los Angeles, and\nneither of these names is possible in Otherworld. The red-faced \nman says Marea is at the \"foot of the mountains,\" which \ndescribes Los Angeles somewhat better.\n\nSo Marea is probably Los Angeles. Where would Overwood be? \nIt contains Crystal Gorge, the Metal Forest, Giants' Castle, The \nGoddess's Pleasure Garden, forbidding narrow valleys and \nmountains with snow-white peaks, including Mt Hieros. So it's \nprobably somewhere in the Sierras. Mt. Whitney and Death \nValley? King's Canyon and Sequoia National Park? Yosemite \nand Hetch-Hetchee (in which case Marea would have to be San \nFrancisco)? My current favorite is Death Valley and the \nsurrounding mountains; it's very apropos for a forbidden place, \nand fits in beautifully with mantis' theory that men go to \nOverwood to sacrifice themselves.\n\n-- Stone Ox" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Michael Andre-Driussi", "address": "mantis at siriusfiction.com" }, "date": "2003-03-09T18:24:49+00:00", "subject": "Re: (urth) DOORS: more places", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Stone Ox wrote:\nWhile we're on the subject, I've had some more ideas on Marea.\nMarea means \"tide\" in Spanish. This should mean it's on the\nPacific, in a formerly Spanish-speaking area. (Does this mean\nthe Mexican-American war still took place in Otherworld?) The\ntwo obvious candidates are San Francisco and Los Angeles, and\nneither of these names is possible in Otherworld. The red-faced\nman says Marea is at the \"foot of the mountains,\" which\ndescribes Los Angeles somewhat better." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I googled \"Marea\" before, if I didn't mention it, and one of the\ninteresting things that bubbled up was a town of that name, in ancient\nEgypt. Located, iirc, to the west of the Nile on the side of a nice lake.\n\nOh, here's the note: city, 331 BCE to 16th century, 44 km SW of Alexandria,\non Lake Maryut. Name meaning \"By Lake.\"\n\nRe: that red faced man, I keep meaning to bring this up: he must be an\nalcoholic, right? His red face. (And he's probably a visitor, since he\npasses on cryptic information which seems to be right on target.) This\nbecomes important later when it is shown that visitors and other public\noddballs are brought into the hospital under the cover of alcoholism." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "So Marea is probably Los Angeles. Where would Overwood be?\nIt contains Crystal Gorge, the Metal Forest, Giants' Castle, The\nGoddess's Pleasure Garden, forbidding narrow valleys and\nmountains with snow-white peaks, including Mt Hieros. So it's\nprobably somewhere in the Sierras. Mt. Whitney and Death\nValley? King's Canyon and Sequoia National Park? Yosemite\nand Hetch-Hetchee (in which case Marea would have to be San\nFrancisco)? My current favorite is Death Valley and the\nsurrounding mountains; it's very apropos for a forbidden place,\nand fits in beautifully with mantis' theory that men go to\nOverwood to sacrifice themselves." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Another point of geography: California is mentioned in the text, but by\nGreen who wonders about wine . . . can't find a note of it, can't find it\nin the text right now. Anyway, California is mentioned, I'm pretty sure,\nbut only in speculation by Green as to what the rest of Otherworld is like.\n\nIn addition, there is Marcella the movie star, with implications of\nHollywood (there's that \"-wood\" again), pointing toward California.\nEspecially since Marcella is just a mundane cover for the goddess . . . but\nthis cuts both ways: if Marcella and her implied Hollywood are a mundane\ncover, then they cannot be the real thing (goddess and Overwood).\n\nMarea. On a lake, it could be Salt Lake City, which is hardly at the foot\nof the mountains when I was thinking of something more like Denver.\nAnother point is that it can be reached by train directly (which\ntechnically might rule out San Francisco).\n\nNorth says the goddess's place is 10,000 square miles (p. 60). This\ntranslates into something like 640 * 10,000 = 6,400,000 acres. Death\nValley is 1,907,760 acres, so yes, that would be something like one third\nof the total. The goddess's land seems contiguous, so building out from\nthere it shouldn't be too hard to carve out an area.\n\n\"Crystal Gorge,\" \"Metal Forest,\" and \"Giant's Castle\" sound like they could\nbe desert locations: the second could be a \"petrified forest\" and the last\ncould be any of the rock formations at Joshua Tree (or even a take on Death\nValley's \"Scotty's Castle,\" if we haven't mentioned that before).\n\nSo maybe Marea is on Lake Havasu, and the goddess owns counties San\nBernardino and Inyo?\n\nIf Yosemite, then I think Marea would be at Mono Lake on the Eastern Side.\nActually, this rings very strongly with my sense of what Marea is like!\nMono Lake is at the foot of the Sierra Nevadas, in a desert area; yet up\ninto those mountains you get into the wonderful greenery of Yosemite. Plus\nMono Lake is an unusual landscape all its own (yep, you've seen it in\nphotos from Pink Floyd's \"Wish You Were Here\" to who knows where else).\n\nSo yes, a connection between Yosemite, Kings, Sequoia, and Death Valley\nlooks quite good, I think!\n\nPLACE ACRES\nYosemite 761,320\nKings/Sequoia 386,863\nDeath Valley 1,907,760\nConnective Land ?\n\nI wonder if Gene Wolfe isn't also thinking about divorce laws: about how\nwomen used to go to Reno (or any other place in Nevada), stay in a camp to\nestablish residency, and then be able to get a quick divorce? This would\nbe a goddess-like thing to do: to a viewer from the Otherworld it would\nlook like a pilgrimage to a place sacred to the goddess, afterwhich the\npilgrim would become more like the goddess herself.\n\n=mantis=" } ] } ] }