Subject: (urth) Essential Background Reading for Soldier Series

From: Michael Straight <mfstraight at gmail.com>
Date: Thu, 30 Nov 2006 22:17:31 +0000

On 11/30/06, thalassocrat at nym.hush.com <thalassocrat at nym.hush.com> wrote:

> Theseus was supposed to have kidnapped an Amazon & taken her as his
> wife. When the Amazons invaded Attica seeking revenge, Theseus
> defeated them.

Holy essential background reading, Batman!  I wish I'd known that ten years ago.

Now I'm wondering what else I need to have read.

Essential:

1.  Story of Spartans slaughtering their slaves under pretext of
making them citizens (I defy you to figure that one out just from
Wolfe's text.)

2.  Story of 300 Spartans at Thermopylae.

Less important, but helpful:

3.  Sisyphus.

4.  Demeter and Persephone.

5.  Cupid and Psyche.

(Lots more I'm forgetting)

What else?  Is there anything I'm going to definitely need to make
sense of Soldier of Sidon?

Rostrum

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From: don doggett <kingwukong at yahoo.com>
Date: Thu, 30 Nov 2006 22:49:50 +0000

> sense of Soldier of Sidon?

The Illiad, Odyssey, Herodotus' histories, a good
general history of Rome that covers the etruscans and
the early Rebublic, a good book on Greek mythology (I
like Graves' Greek Myths because it offers alternate
versions) Frank Miller's 300 (just kidding - it is
entertaining as hell, though). That's all I can think
of off the top of my head.

Don

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From: Transentient <transentient at gmail.com>
Date: Fri, 01 Dec 2006 02:28:52 +0000

> making them citizens (I defy you to figure that one out just from

Does anybody have any leads on this? I can't find mention of it in  
Herodotus (doesn't mean it isn't in there, though) and I'd really  
like to find a source to corroborate this.

It will make for interesting conversations when the 300 movie comes  
out.

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From: thalassocrat at nym.hush.com <thalassocrat at nym.hush.com>
Date: Fri, 01 Dec 2006 02:41:05 +0000

On Fri, 01 Dec 2006 09:17:31 +1100 Michael Straight 
>Now I'm wondering what else I need to have read.

I think knowing something about what happened afterwards is useful. 

Pausanias was supposed to have conspired with the Persians with the 
intent of taking over one of the Spartan king positions. He was 
also supposed to have plotted to arm & free the helots in supports 
of this coup (or something like that; can't remember exact 
details). He was betrayed, and the ephors/"judges" locked him up in 
a temple & starved him to death.

Apart from the color this sheds on the Gaea/Artemis stuff, I think 
it also helps to make sense of the oracle spoken by Cleomenes at 
Acheron. "Seek peace" is obvious. "Don't drink from Lethe's cup" = 
don't rely on Latro the forgetful as a talisman of vistory. "Ask 
who will make  the defenders of Sestos yield" = "Hunger", a warning 
about his eventual fate.

Themistocles was dogged by accusations of arrogance and corruption. 
Interestingly, one example of the former was supposed to have been 
his building a temple to Artemis next to his house (or something 
like that). He was exiled & then hounded out of Greece, also 
accused of Persian plots by the later Spartan leadership. He did in 
fact "defect", and ended up as an aristocratic subject of the Great 
King in charge of <somewhere>.
 
One thing I don't quite understand is Gaea's alternative plan for 
the helots: if she doesn't succeed with her Pausanias as helot-
liberating king play, she will nevertheless use them to destroy 
Sparta via an uprising. There was some kind of uprising in the next 
decade, after an earthquake, but the Spartans suppressed it fairly 
quickly. After that I don't know of any real revolt until the 
helots were "freed" a few centuries later by some of the later 
kings. Is it just that Gaea in this part of the world is too old & 
feeble to make her plans work?

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From: Alan Lewis <alanarc1 at optonline.net>
Date: Fri, 01 Dec 2006 03:00:43 +0000

> of off the top of my head.

One vote of respectful disagreement for all of the above.  As far as I can 
tell, there is no required reading to make sense of Soldier of Sidon.  It's 
not without its mysterious passages, but its far more of a straight read 
than Arete.  That said,

[potential slight spoilers to follow]

passing knowledge of some basic Egyptian mythology and geography would be of 
use, also throw in the Egyptian Book of the Dead, add a dash of King 
Solomon's Mines, along with knowledge of the search for the source of the 
Nile a la Burton/Speke.

Alan

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From: Michael Straight <mfstraight at gmail.com>
Date: Fri, 01 Dec 2006 05:20:10 +0000

[Stuff about the fates of Pausanius and Themistocles deleted]

Wow, Thalassocrat!  You just made my head explode for the second time
in 24 hours.

I appreciate Don's suggestions to read the Illiad, Odyssey, and
Herotidous -- all of them worth reading for their own sake, of course
-- but I guess I was looking for something a little more specific.
Thalssocrat's two bits of information in this thread (Pausanius and
the stuff about the Amazons) just shed enormous amounts of light on
the plot for me.

Are there other stories or facts like that in Homer or Herotidous I
ought to know?

Rostrum

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From: Nils Göransson <nils.goransson at skatteverket.se>
Date: Fri, 01 Dec 2006 06:30:33 +0000

Hi everybody!
No further enlightenment on the Soldier series, but if you enjoyed the 
Egyptian setting of the latest volume
I urge you to seek out 'the Egyptian' by Mika Waltari, wich has some of 
the same mood!
Very good, still not Wolfe though -wonder when he writes the next one...

Thanx for all ideas,

                              NissE

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From: Bob Miller <bob_bageera at hotmail.com>
Date: Fri, 01 Dec 2006 11:36:34 +0000

Needed to  understand SoldierofSidon?  Time,the first two Latro books and 
definitely some knowledge of Egyptian mythology--many available resources 
there, of course .    And did I mention a fair amount of time?

/information: http://www.urth.net

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From: don doggett <kingwukong at yahoo.com>
Date: Fri, 01 Dec 2006 21:06:11 +0000

Alan Lewis <alanarc1 at optonline.net> wrote:
One vote of respectful disagreement for all of the above.  As far as I can 
tell, there is no required reading to make sense of Soldier of Sidon.
    
  My bad. I was a little dopey from cold meds and I read "Soldier Series" instead of Soldier of Sidon. You are correct Sir.
  
  Don

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From: Michael Straight <mfstraight at gmail.com>
Date: Sat, 02 Dec 2006 15:23:13 +0000

You're both right!  My first question was about background reading for
the first two books.  Then I asked if there was anything I ought to
read before starting Sidon.

(Too late for that!  Maybe I'll do some homework before the second
time through.)

Rostrum

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From: Transentient <transentient at gmail.com>
Date: Sun, 14 Jan 2007 23:27:26 +0000

In case you didn't read Soldier of Sidon and are reading this, well,  
hey, what's taking you so long? It was good. Superbly done, in fact.  
But please delete this mail or put it away and come back to it  
because I don't want to spoil it for you.

One of the things that really stood out about the book was the  
overall narative structure. The part of the book dealing with the  
voyage down the river was smooth and sequential. Then there is the  
scene with the council discussing whether they should look for Kames  
and the mines, and it is really a discussion of whether or not the  
narrative structure should be changed. I've always loved how Wolfe  
can play games with your head by changing your expectations of the  
story. Sure enough, chaos ensues after Latro leaves the boat. The end  
of the book basically "perks up" as he starts returning north.

I've got a couple of questions that I'm wondering if anybody caught  
answers to in their readings so far.

1) Does anybody know what the Hellenes actually call the last page?  
(page 302)

2) Was the bulls-head amulet of Myt-ser'eu's the one that Sehuset  
made for her to seal her from Sabra? Or was it the one that he told  
Latro would ensure her loyalty to him?

3) Anybody know what it was about Thotmaktef that Latro, upon first  
meeting him, thought "Perhaps I should not write of it at all/" Was  
it just that he first noticed Thoth, the baboon at this point? (page 48)

4) What the heck is in that scroll that he recovered from the temple  
beyond the last temple? I'm wondering if that is actually mentioned  
and I just missed it.

5) Is it too obvious, given the lion symbolism, that Mehit is the  
very goddess who wounded his memory in the beginning? One thing that  
works against this is the passage where he helps Arensnuphis hunt  
her, and Latro thinks he sees astonishment in her eyes in being seen  
by him.

6) The glossary entry on Falcata indicates that she is, in fact, a  
Falcata. I seem to remember a passage in the first book where it is  
said that Falcata was actually a kopis. I wonder if there is anything  
to this.

Thanks for your thoughts.

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From: Dan Rabin <wolfe-lists at danrabin.com>
Date: Mon, 15 Jan 2007 01:47:15 +0000

>1) Does anybody know what the Hellenes actually call the last page? 

The best candidate I could find in an hour of online research was 
"colophon".  This is the term used today for an account of the making 
of the book, such as the designer, the type selected, the paper and 
printing process chosen, the binder, and so forth.  As in "written by 
Lucius on papyrus of Riverland with reed pen".

I thought this was just Wolfe being playful with the way he provides 
a fictional providence for the work.  Lucius has a vague notion that 
he should be writing something like what I just suggested, only he 
can't remember any of the facts he should set down.  Anyhow, the 
story isn't over just because the book is done.  I think we're being 
set up for a sequel in Babylonia.

Of course, at the end of _Soldier of Arete_ I thought we were going 
to have a sequel in Phoenicia, but Wolfe skipped over that and merely 
gave us Phoenicians.

   -- Dan Rabin

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From: Michael Straight <mfstraight at gmail.com>
Date: Tue, 16 Jan 2007 00:28:49 +0000

> Latro would ensure her loyalty to him?

I think they are the same.

I remember Sabra claiming the amulet was Sehuset's tool for stealing
Myt-ser'eu from Latro.  But that was a lie designed to manipulate
Latro into delivering his wife into Sabra's hands.

I don't quite remember Sehuset telling Latro about an amulet to make
his wife loyal, but I would guess that was also a fiction designed to
do the opposite--get Latro to keep it safely around her neck--without
having to explain everything about the danger of Sabra that Latro
would have forgotten that day.

I think the item in your question #3 was what you said.  Latro didn't
want to mention the baboon.

-- Rostrum