{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/3992", "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": 3992, "subject": "Names and Pacific Specifics", "messages": 2, "voices": 2, "first": "2003-05-10T16:42:33+00:00", "last": "2003-05-10T18:36:29+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Nigel Price", "address": "nigel.aprice at virgin.net" }, "date": "2003-05-10T16:42:33+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Names and Pacific Specifics", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Special thanks to mantis, who comments..." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Wow, Nigel, you have suddenly burst into high activity!" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Yeah...Won't last!" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "I can help you there:\n\nBaden\nRev. Rob Robbins (his first name is really \"Mervyn\")\nAnnys (witch in L.A.)\nJulius R. Christmas (Mary's dad)\nHanga\nLangi, the native girlfriend (seems to be the pet form\nof \"Langitokoua\" which is also used in the text)" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Brilliant! Thank you, Michael.\n\nSeeing the names like this, I wonder whether the significance of Rob's name\nis its connection with Christmas. That would make him a Christmas\nRobin...But no, this really isn't a very Christmassy story, either in theme\nor date. Though perhaps Wolfe has a geographic joke going on, placing the\nFebruary events on his fictitious island not only mid way between Christmas\nand Easter in the calendar but half way between Christmas Island in the\nIndian Ocean south of Java and Easter Island in the eastern Pacific.\n\nDon't know what to make of Annys, the Internet witch from L.A. Guess I'll\nhave to listen to the story again.\n\nAh...OK, the shark's name is spelled \"Hanga\". Rob and Baden compare the\nruined palace in the forest to Stonehenge in some place called Wiltshire. I\nwondered whether there was supposed to be some connection between the shark\nand the standing stones, but in the story they seem to exist in some sort of\nantithesis.\n\nLooking on the web, I discover that \"Hanga Roa\" is the name of the only town\non Easter Island. It also seems to be the Maori word for \"building\", which\nwould tie in with Hanga being the guardian spirit of the sunken building.\nRob specifically mentions the Polynesians sailing from Hawaii to New\nZealand, a distance of 4,000 miles.\n\nI'm going to ignore the fact that \"hanga\" is Japanese for a print (picture),\nand that there is a Benedictine abbey in Africa, though not in Uganda, named\nafter a \"St. Maurus Hanga\".\n\nI've got nowhere with the names \"Langi\" and \"Langitokoua\". There's a Mount\nLangi Ghiran in Victoria in Australia, but that doesn't seem to get us\nanywhere. (I quote: 'Pronounced \"Mount Langee Jeeran\", the name is\nAboriginal for \"Home of the Yellow-Tailed Black Cockatoo\".')\n\nFinally, a couple of further comments on my own meandering thoughts on the\nstory.\n\nAfter telling how he met with Rob in the ruined jungle temple, Baden\nspecifically writes in his journal that they split up and went home by\ndifferent ways. This also seems to be a fairly clear, symbollic reference to\nBaden's rejection of the faith which Rob the missionary represents.\n\nAs for the flickering shark, ignorring my own whimsical ruminations on\nhyperdrives, Baden's explanation of the phenomenon seems to imply that the\nvision has an independent spiritual reality, although the perception of it\nis subjective and individual, and a response to an effort at manifestation\nin the mind of the subject on the part of Hanga. I speculated earlier on\nwhether Baden's illness made him more susceptible to Hanga's spiritual evil.\nPerhaps his fever enables him to receive Hanga's \"broadcasts\" more clearly\nor in a more sustained fashion?\n\nNigel\nMinety, Wiltshire" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Michael Andre-Driussi", "address": "mantis at siriusfiction.com" }, "date": "2003-05-10T18:36:29+00:00", "subject": "Re: (urth) Names and Pacific Specifics", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Nigel wrote:\nI'm going to ignore the fact that \"hanga\" is Japanese for a print (picture),\nand that there is a Benedictine abbey in Africa, though not in Uganda, named\nafter a \"St. Maurus Hanga\"." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Normally I'd agree with you about ignoring all that stuff, but for the odd\ndetail that the Japanese Army had occupied the island during the Pacific\nWar. I don't know if this tidbit made it to the audio or not. Proably\ncoincidental, but there it is. (I don't know about the audio, but the text\nis clear that hanga means shark.)" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I've got nowhere with the names \"Langi\" and \"Langitokoua\". There's a Mount\nLangi Ghiran in Victoria in Australia, but that doesn't seem to get us\nanywhere. (I quote: 'Pronounced \"Mount Langee Jeeran\", the name is\nAboriginal for \"Home of the Yellow-Tailed Black Cockatoo\".')" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "The big nearby settlement seems to be Kololahi, connected by telephone\nwires but transport by boat. The island is in the Takanga Group. Nearest\nleprosarium in the Marshalls.\n\n=mantis=\n\n\nSirius Fiction\nbooklets on Gene Wolfe, John Crowley\nhttp://www.siriusfiction.com/\n\neBay Auctions\nhttp://cgi6.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewSellersOtherItems&userid=mr.sirius" } ] } ] }