{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/4000", "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": 4000, "subject": "Tree Hat Contributors", "messages": 3, "voices": 3, "first": "2003-05-12T17:59:59+00:00", "last": "2003-05-13T00:54:35+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Nigel Price", "address": "nigel.aprice at virgin.net" }, "date": "2003-05-12T17:59:59+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Tree Hat Contributors", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Thanks to Mantis, Patera Nutria and Robert Borski for their helpful\ncontributions to the analysis of \"The Tree is My Hat\".\n\nI was going to comment on their comments in detail, but a lot of it boiled\ndown to \"Yes, I agree!\" and \"Oh, that's interesting!\", which was amicable\nbut not particularly scholarly or insightful on my part. Instead, then, I'll\nbroadly agree with them, thank them here and comment on just one or two\ndetails.\n\n(And still go, \"Yes, you're right!\" occasionally.)\n\nGood stuff from Nutria on the names Mark and Adam, but I'm still puzzled as\nto the significane of Mary having twins." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Nutria: I noticed that after his deal with the\nshark, Baden is unable even to visit the church,\nbeing too sick on Sunday." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Good spot - yes!" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Nutria: A google search shows that Mervyn can mean \"sea\nhill,\" \"sea ruler,\" or \"high hill.\" There seems a\npregnant reason by Robbins rejects that name, in\ncontext." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Maybe it's because Rob gets off his metaphorical hill of western affluence\nand authority and comes down to work with the people by the sea. He has\nturned his back on ruling and become a servant. Note that Rob welcomes\nBaden's can of coke from the fridge as a great western luxury. He himself\nseems to have access to neither coka cola nor refrigerators." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Nutria: Internet: A \"spiritual\" medium that links\nBaden both with a witch and with Yule Christmas.\nAnother manifestation of the choice before him." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "OK, I'll buy that. Maybe it's a reminder too that magic and spiritual evil\naren't restricted to the South Seas. They exist back in America as well.\n\nOn the subject of the UFO which Baden sees, Nutria comments..." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "My best guess is that Baden as a modern man\nperceives a spiritual reality in terms he\nunderstands, since he (initially) does not believe\nin a spirit realm. Given that the shark is Satan\n(see below), it feels wrong to me for Wolfe to\noverlay an SF dimension to this story. And, there\nis much discussion of perception in the story. So\nI'm more comfortable, at this point, with a\n*Castleview* explanation of the flying saucer." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "This has to be one possibility. If it's right, we can go back to seeing the\nPolynesians as being the descendants of an ancient Andean ruling class. Over\nagainst this, though, is all the talk about the stars being like islands.\nYour comment on the SF dimension feeling wrong is the very thing I was\ngetting at when I suggested that Wolfe might be \"overegging the pudding\", as\nthe expression goes. I don't think that we can completely rule out the\nscience fictional element, though. It's still there, at least as one of the\nstory's explanations of what is going on. Whether its significance is\nultimately literal or metaphorical is hard to define.\n\nAgree entirely that \"Baden\" = \"Bad'un\". So far I have managed to resist the\ntemptation to make any reference to the founder of the scouting movement,\nrunning round in shorts on Brownsea Island in Poole Harbour...No, I don't\neven want to think about it...\n\nI agree with Robert Borski that it would be thematically convenient if\nBaden's mystery ailment were some sort of sexually transmitted disease." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "RB: Then I came across your musings about\nHIV and thought a-ha: at least a sexually-\ntransmitted disease would help make sense\nof Baden's reluctance to come out and name\nthe disease; it also shows he may have\nstrayed from the marital bed; and if he's\npassed it on to his wife, it may help\nexplain their estrangement." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "The trouble is, while is all eminently possible, there just doesn't seem to\nbe enough evidence in the text to support this interpretation in any\nconclusive fashion. My instinct is that if Wolfe wanted us to think that\nBaden's disease were sexually transmitted, there would be a reference\nsomewhere in the story to the risk of his passing it on either to his wife\nMary or to his new partner Langi. But there's nothing remotely about that -\nin the audio version, anyway." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "RB: Curiously also, in the text version of\n\"Tree,\" the following passage occurs. Baden,\ntalking about his new island neighbors, states:\n\"The people are fat and happy, and my guess is\nnot more than half are dumb. Once or twice one\ngets yaws or some such, and Rev. Robbins gives\nhim arsenic. Which cures it. Pooey!\" (The italics\nare Wolfe's; had he not used them I would have\nhighlighted the Pooey.)" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "(In Robert's original message, it was the sentence \"Which cures it.\" which\nwas in italics.)\n\nDoes anyone know about the medicinal uses of arsenic?\n\nReading the quotation in cold print makes me realise how patronising and\ndismissive Baden is about the very people he is supposed to have come to\nhelp. Nutria has already mentioned the contrast between Baden's apparent\ninactivity and Rob's industry. They also represent two different streams of\n\"development\" for the island: Baden's is materialist and secular and Rob's\nis spiritual and, apparently, medicinal. Of the two, the sensitive\nmissionary comes out better in this story than the federal development man.\n\nI seem to remember that in one of his interviews, possibly the one in\n_Across the Wounded Galaxy_, Wolfe spoke approvingly of a friend of his who\nwas going off (to Africa, I think) to be a Christian missionary." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "RB: \"Baden,\" for those of us who speak German,\nmeans \"to bathe,\" and surely this is the most\nrelevant onomastic." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Yes! Baden does indeed go bathing in the shark-infested bay.\n\nRobert refers to the story's titular tree being a possible reference to the\ncross, while Mantis mentions a possible link with the Tree of Knowledge in\nthe Garden of Eden. Both seem likely. I'm sure that Baden's paradise isle\nwith a devilish shark is a deliberate, fallen, counterpart to Eden with its\ncunning snake. I'm sure that the comment \"The tree is my hat.\" is also an\nindication of Hanga's underground and therefore, traditionally, hellish\nnature. The Lord may refer to the Earth as his footstool, but Hanga's spirit\nis dead and under the earth, with the tree as the marker of his grave.\n\nNigel" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Josh Geller", "address": "brunians at brunians.org" }, "date": "2003-05-12T19:00:03+00:00", "subject": "Re: (urth) Tree Hat Contributors", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Mon, 2003-05-12 at 10:59, Nigel Price wrote:\nDoes anyone know about the medicinal uses of arsenic?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "The use of arsenic to cure syphillis was discovered by Dr. Paul Ehrlich\nI think around 1900 or maybe a little before. The treatment remained the\nstandard treatment until the invention of penicillin. \n \nJ." } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "mournings glory", "address": "mourningsglory at hotmail.com" }, "date": "2003-05-13T00:54:35+00:00", "subject": "Re: (urth) Tree Hat Contributors", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Mon, 2003-05-12 at 10:59, Nigel Price wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Does anyone know about the medicinal uses of arsenic?" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "The use of arsenic to cure syphillis was discovered by Dr. Paul Ehrlich\nI think around 1900 or maybe a little before. The treatment remained the\nstandard treatment until the invention of penicillin." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Salvarsan (or 606 as it was sometimes called) was discovered in 1909.\n\nA relatively good movie about it (considering the times and the topic) was \nmade in 1940, \"Dr. Ehrlich's Magic Bullet,\" and starred Edward G. Robinson.\n\nmsg (chemically unrelated to arsphenamine)" } ] } ] }