{
  "export": {
    "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/4435",
    "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": 4435,
    "subject": "SV: (urth) cthulhu mythos, BotNS",
    "messages": 2,
    "voices": 2,
    "first": "2005-06-03T19:30:28+00:00",
    "last": "2005-06-04T00:21:49+00:00"
  },
  "messages": [
    {
      "message_id": "<17725996.1117852225403.JavaMail.root@wamui-mouette.atl.sa.earthlink.net>",
      "from": {
        "name": "harlekin at earthlink.net",
        "address": "harlekin at earthlink.net"
      },
      "date": "2005-06-03T19:30:28+00:00",
      "subject": "SV: (urth) cthulhu mythos, BotNS",
      "in_reply_to": null,
      "reply_link": null,
      "blocks": [
        {
          "kind": "text",
          "depth": 0,
          "text": "I appreciate the feedback on my post and as always there's something edifying to be found, but I feel the need to clarify myself.  I'm suggesting that Wolfe might have been influenced more by Derleth than by Lovecraft.  There is a qualitative difference between the two in that Derleth recast Lovecraft's mythos into a battle between the benevolent/indifferent Elder Gods and the malevolent Great Old Ones with earth and humanity as a fulcrum of that battle.  Lovecraft just leaves us in space hoping that we don't catch the eye of some entity looking for a snack.  Derleth also casts the Great Old Ones as elemental beings, and one of them rules the cold northern wastes.  I guess I'm saying Wolfe's take on Erebus and Abaia made more sense as an homage after reading some of Derleth's Cthulhu stories.\n\nDon\n\n-----Original Message-----\nFrom: Jeff Wilson <jwilson at io.com>\nSent: Jun 3, 2005 5:22 PM\nTo: The Urth Mailing List <urth-urth.net at lists.urth.net>\nSubject: Re: SV: (urth) cthulhu mythos, BotNS"
        },
        {
          "kind": "quote",
          "depth": 1,
          "text": "Andy Robertson wrote:\nnastler writes:"
        },
        {
          "kind": "quote",
          "depth": 2,
          "text": "Small point; The book 17 Megatherians dosn't go in the\nsabertache, it stays in the library. The \"corrupting\"\ninfluence on Sev probably comes to him through Thecla,\nwho is a good bet for having read 17 Megs...\nI'd like to hear more discussion about the Great Old\nOnes / Elder Gods. I think it's only been referenced\nbefore, not chewed to the marrow the way things are\nusually done on this list....  :-)\nnastler"
        },
        {
          "kind": "quote",
          "depth": 1,
          "text": "I honestly don't think there is much direct reference.\nHowever, Lovecraft's \"Old Ones\" were really non-supernatural alien \nentities of such power that they could not be distinguished from gods, \nfrom the human perspective.\nIt's arguable that he was the first really influential writer to do this \n- to address the idea of gods, from a rigorously non-supernatural \nperspective.\nWolfe has many non-omnipotent \"gods\" of this type: Erebus and Abia are \ngodlike in their power as far as humans are concerned, but there is \nnothing really supernatural about them."
        },
        {
          "kind": "text",
          "depth": 0,
          "text": "Perhaps; they are certainly an order of being below that of the \nPancreator, but they and their servants have qualities and insights into \n  the divine truth beyond that of mere mortals, even if they attmpet to \ndeny that truth. Lovecraft's axioms in the background of his Mythos \nstories do not admit a difference in kind of the natural world and the \nsupernatural forces at work, only that the fallible human mind calls the \nparts of nature that escape its full grasp \"supernatural\" and that the \nnature of these ancient beings are so alien that the mind destructivetly \nfails in its attempt to perceive their character."
        },
        {
          "kind": "sig",
          "depth": 0,
          "text": "Jeff Wilson - jwilson at io.com\n< http://www.io.com/~jwilson >"
        }
      ]
    },
    {
      "message_id": "<E1DeSxn-000OCY-VS@oceanus.uk.clara.net>",
      "from": {
        "name": "Andy Robertson",
        "address": "andywrobertson at clara.co.uk"
      },
      "date": "2005-06-04T00:21:49+00:00",
      "subject": "SV: (urth) cthulhu mythos, BotNS",
      "in_reply_to": "<17725996.1117852225403.JavaMail.root@wamui-mouette.atl.sa.earthlink.net>",
      "reply_link": "header",
      "blocks": [
        {
          "kind": "text",
          "depth": 0,
          "text": "harlekin at earthlink.net writes: "
        },
        {
          "kind": "quote",
          "depth": 1,
          "text": "I appreciate the feedback on my post and as always there's something edifying to be found, but I feel the need to clarify myself.  I'm suggesting that Wolfe might have been influenced more by Derleth than by Lovecraft.  There is a qualitative difference between the two in that Derleth recast Lovecraft's mythos into a battle between the benevolent/indifferent Elder Gods and the malevolent Great Old Ones with earth and humanity as a fulcrum of that battle.  Lovecraft just leaves us in space hoping that we don't catch the eye of some entity looking for a snack.  "
        },
        {
          "kind": "text",
          "depth": 0,
          "text": " \n\nTo be honest: I don't think so.   Derleth's deomachy simply echoes an \nhundred religions, and Wolfe gets independent input from religions"
        }
      ]
    }
  ]
}