{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/3955", "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": 3955, "subject": "Gray, Wolfe, Heinlein", "messages": 3, "voices": 3, "first": "2003-04-19T02:12:34+00:00", "last": "2003-04-20T03:39:41+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "ArchD'Ikon Zibethicus", "address": "zibethicus at hotmail.com" }, "date": "2003-04-19T02:12:34+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Gray, Wolfe, Heinlein", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Malco:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "But the text does give the impression that\nan alternative was at least possible and that it\ndepended largely on Lanarks actions." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "But Nastler _intended_ Lanark to fail...you might recall that Nastler \ndescribed the sort of success which Lanark fantasised about when he accepted \nthe gig - people listen to him at the council, his speech sets profound \nreforms in place, he returns in triumph to a saved Unthank and is reunited \nwith a chastened and finally appreciative Rima...and then says that he is \nnot going to provide Lanark with anything of the sort, because \"[i]f I give \nyou an ending like that I will be like ten thousand other cheap \nillusionists! I would be as bad as the late H. G. Wells! I would be worse \nthan Goethe. Nobody who knows a thing about life or politics will believe \nme for a minute.\" (p. 492)" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "All of these things echo with Severians story" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "That's right...and it clarifies one of the commonalities I would point out \nbetween the fictions of Mr. Gray and Mr. Wolfe; their 'heros' fail, blunder, \nare confused and fail to understand important things. Perhaps this humanity \nis a part of their attraction..." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "And you are _spot on_ about Sludden/Blair… *g*" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "...glad I'm not the only one who sees it that way...we just _call_ him \nSludden in my family...\n\n\nAllan:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I can think of few who are further from Gene Wolfe's view of the world \nthan Alasdair Gray, brilliant though he is;" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I wonder...is it actually possible to ascribe a world-view to either author \nwhen both have produced such diverse works?\n\nIf you mean politico-religious outlooks, well certainly they're different, \nbut not necessarily as vastly as some might think." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "All of these writers produce intelligent complex fictions but if there >is \na difference between them and Wolfe, I would say that they all >write books \nwhich are character driven, whereas Wolfe's books possibly >use the \ncharacters to promote or act out his ideas." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Jonathan Carroll? I wonder...I have the greatest admiration for Mr. \nCarroll's work, but if we are to draw a dichotomy between character and idea \nI'd have to say that I've always thought of him as a novelist of ideas \nrather than character." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "This could be why I have lost some of my admiration for Wolfe's recent \nwork, and I would agree with Alga about his more recent short stories, \nsome of which seem lacking in content and obscure for the\nsake of obscurity. I still have enormous admiration for the man, but \nsometimes it makes more sense if you just say what you mean." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I can't judge the recent short stories, but ever since reading someone's \nstatement on this list that Mr. Wolfe is not at his best in the short story \nformat, I've been winding up to take mild exception, mostly on the strength \nof 'Forlesen', which I personally think is one of the most memorable 'SF' \nshort stories I've read...it's actually one of the few that I _do_ remember \nat all.\n\nI don't think that Mr. Wolfe obfuscates for the mere love of mystery, or at \nleast right up to the Short Sun series, which is the last I've read. And I \nbelieve that some of the enjoyment of reading him comes from the mysteries \nand ambiguities...which are a decided incentive to re-reading...and \nspeculation...and, as the discussions on this list show, the mysteries seem \nto have a purpose, and sometimes even admit of explanation...\n\n\nBlattid:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "It's entirely possible, and I suspect even likely, that Isangoma, Robert, \nand Marie are actually citizens of the Commonwealth who wandered in and \nwere caught in this way." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Actually, I've suddenly entirely re-visioned the Botanic Gardens in my mind \n... In other words, Father Inire has built (for whose amusement?) a theme \npark, a sort of posthistorical Walt Disney World with living \naudioanimatrons." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "...precisely...caught and reprogrammed according to the best information \navailable at the time, which _was_ the movies and/or the books of the 20th \nCentury...of which perhaps a handful survived in the Library...they took the \npeople from one source, and the fauna from another...millions of years have \npassed since then, even the continents have changed...how are they gonna \nknow what went where?" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "(The horror! The horror!)" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Well...the autarchy plays pretty rough as it is...and one presumes that the \nexhibits have their meals supplied regularly...which doesn't always happen \nin Nessus proper..." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Like every SF/F writer from the 1950s on, Moorcock uses (consciously or \nnot) rhetorical techniques and moves invented or improved by Heinlein to \nestablish the nature of his discursive pseudo-realities." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "_Every_ SF/F writer?\n\nBallard?\n\nLeGuin?\n\nBurroughs?\n\netc." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": " My wife still won't believe that anyone could call nipples \"those twin \nspiggots of desire\" or claim that one woman's \"nipples went spung\")." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "These are classic, aren't they ... Up there with \"five minutes of \nsquelching noise.\"" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "..not to mention having one of his supposedly 'sexually liberated' \ncharacters declare, in 'Stranger in a Strange Land', \"[n]ine times out of \nten, if a girl gets raped, it's partly her fault.\" (p. 281, NEL pbk, 1976)\n\nI was trying to read the book with all due sympathy after quarreling \nseverely with my mother-in-law, who takes the work as gospel, but it fell \nfrom my hands at this point, never to rise again...\n\n...presumably Mr. Heinlein has never been raped himself...I daresay he would \nfeel quite differently about the matter if so...but at least I now \nunderstand why Charles Manson adapted the book as his bible...he even called \nhis son Michael Valentine Manson...\n\n(ducks to avoid return fire from water-brethren...)\n\n\nChris:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "something that I find a little disturbing in Wolfe's novels- the >frequency \nof rape committed by his protagonists or major characters." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "...see above...perhaps it (sometimes) takes a female writer to present rape \nas a disgusting and humiliating experience with no symbolic or redemptive \nvalue...Le Guin does it rather well...\n\n*\n\nWhat a gloomy note to end on...how about this, instead: Happy Easter to \nthose who believe!\n\n->Zx<-" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Mark Hall", "address": "markhall at gol.com" }, "date": "2003-04-20T03:21:35+00:00", "subject": "Re: (urth) Gray, Wolfe, Heinlein", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "On 4/19/2003, \"ArchD'Ikon Zibethicus\" wrote:\nLike every SF/F writer from the 1950s on, Moorcock uses (consciously or\nnot) rhetorical techniques and moves invented or improved by Heinlein\nto\nestablish the nature of his discursive pseudo-realities." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "_Every_ SF/F writer?\n\nBallard?\n\nLeGuin?\n\nBurroughs?\n\netc." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Edgar Rice Burroughs was dead and buried by 1951. William burroughs i\nreally wouldn't consider as a science fiction writer...\n\nBest, MEH\n\nMark Hall\nmarkhall at gol.com" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes", "address": "katbarx at hotmail.com" }, "date": "2003-04-20T03:39:41+00:00", "subject": "Re: (urth) Gray, Wolfe, Heinlein", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I wrote and Deacon Mushrat responded:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Like every SF/F writer from the 1950s on, Moorcock uses (consciously or \nnot) rhetorical techniques and moves invented or improved by Heinlein to \nestablish the nature of his discursive pseudo-realities." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "_Every_ SF/F writer?\nBallard?\nLeGuin?\nBurroughs?\netc." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Yes, yes, yes, sort of, and yes. I say \"sort of\" for Burroughs\nbecause he's writing outside the SF genre, using tropes from\nthe SF/F toolbox ... In fact, his SF owes more to Edgar Rice\nBurroughs than to modern SF, but even he uses the strategic-\ndeployment-of-details riffs Heinlein pioneered (especially,\nbut not solely, in NOVA EXPRESS).\n\nOf the three you mention, Le Guin is actually the easiest\nto demonstrate the point for; read the first few pages of\nTHE DISPOSSESSED. The technique used there, to establish\nthe border and contrast between two worlds, is pure Heinlein;\nwhat's pure Le Guin is the repurposing of that technique to\nput the two societies in a meaningful [juxta|op]position.\n\nBallard is the toughest one, because so much of his SF is\nin a deliberate rejection of Campbell-Heinlein SF/F; of the\nNew Worlds \"movement\" that, in the late '60s, sought to\nradically recreate the storytelling style of SF, Ballard is\nperhaps the only one who succeeded to any significant degree.\n(The next candidate would be Aldiss, but even work like\nBAREFOOT IN THE HEAD and CRYPTOZOIC depend heavily on the\nuse of Campbell-Heinlein rhetorical devices and deployments.)\nSome years ago I suggested in a review that THE ATROCITY\nEXHIBITION, CRASH, etc., are what happens if you write \"hard\nSF,\" but do your speculating in abnormal psychology instead\nof physics or chemistry. The result is an SF where the\nalienation takes place at the level of character rather than\nlandscape; this work does not use much-or-any of the\nrhetorical devices developed under Campbell, by Heinlein and\nthe others, and required a raft of new techniques.\n\nBut if you go and (re-)read his earlier novels -- his \"cozy\ncatastrophe\" quartet and a number of short stories -- you find\na lot of those techniques in play. Played by a writer rather\nthan a storyteller, to be sure; played in ways and in ranges\nHeinlein could never on his best days have come near; but those\nsame techniques.\n\nEnough." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "These are classic, aren't they ... Up there with \"five minutes of \nsquelching noise.\"" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "..not to mention having one of his supposedly 'sexually liberated' \ncharacters declare, in 'Stranger in a Strange Land', \"[n]ine times out of \nten, if a girl gets raped, it's partly her fault.\" (p. 281, NEL pbk, 1976)" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Which isn't about sex at all (as the feminist movement spent many\nyears informing us), but is nonetheless boneheaded." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "...presumably Mr. Heinlein has never been raped himself...I dareUnforsay he \nwould feel quite differently about the matter if so...but at least I now \nunderstand why Charles Manson adapted the book as his bible...he even \ncalled his son Michael Valentine Manson...\n\n(ducks to avoid return fire from water-brethren...)" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Unfortunately for your understanding, the whole business about\nManson basing his religion on STRANGER turns out to be a sort of\nSTFnal urban legend; he had never even read the book before\ngoing to jail. Oh well, it's a good story anyway." } ] } ] }