{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/4788", "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": 4788, "subject": "In Glory Like Their Star", "messages": 11, "voices": 6, "first": "2007-01-30T06:00:56+00:00", "last": "2007-04-19T20:05:42+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "<642919.52363.qm@web54403.mail.yahoo.com>", "from": { "name": "Nathan Spears", "address": "spearofsolomon at yahoo.com" }, "date": "2007-01-30T06:00:56+00:00", "subject": "(urth) In Glory Like Their Star", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I'm just reading Saltwater Strains, and I wondered if anyone could provide me with some insight into this story.\n\n(spoilers follow)\n\nThis is the jist of the story as far as I can tell. An alien landed on Earth, presumably at some distant point in the past when humans didn't possess any technology. He lands in the desert in a big ship, goes out on a smaller craft to explore. The smaller craft's navigation malfunctions and he can't get back to the ship until he is aided by a human, who thinks the alien is a desert spirit. He promises the human godhood via nanobots while in a desperate, starved condition. After he reaches the ship he realizes that he can't provide what he promised and takes off, burning the waiting human to death \"in glory like their star.\"\n\nIn typical Wolfean fashion the narrator (the alien) is telling the story both to the reader and to another group of humans, in some other location, who also think the aliens are gods. The narrator also makes reference to other creatures on board the main ship, but as if they are not part of his species. I think.\n\nAnyway, I feel as if I have missed some crucial piece to this story to provide it with some significance. Wolfe talked in the introduction about reading another story about aliens appearing to humans that he found lacking, so maybe I should be familiar with whatever he is responding to.\n\nAny help?\n\n\n\n\n " } ] }, { "message_id": "<000c01c78180$e83a99a0$40c85a42@rclackey.stic.net>", "from": { "name": "Roy C. Lackey", "address": "rclackey at stic.net" }, "date": "2007-04-18T06:14:59+00:00", "subject": "(urth) In Glory Like Their Star", "in_reply_to": "<642919.52363.qm@web54403.mail.yahoo.com>", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Back on Jan. 30, Nathan Spears wrote:\nAnyway, I feel as if I have missed some crucial piece to this story to\nprovide it with some significance. Wolfe talked in the introduction about\nreading another story about aliens appearing to humans that he found\nlacking, so maybe I should be familiar with whatever he is responding to.\n\nAny help?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "It is less important to know which story Wolfe was trying to \"fix\" than it\nis to know why he thought it needed fixing. Given that he is a religious\nman, it might be assumed that he resented the implication that people in Old\nTestament times were more gullible than modern people, unable to distinguish\nbetween superior technology and divinity. But he also says in the\nintroduction that once a story has been 'fixed' by rewriting it, that the\nresult is a \"different story\".\n\nConsider that the story is told from the point of view of the alien. The\nalien never tried to pass himself off as a god; indeed he took pains to tell\nthe Earthlings that he was not. Still, the natives were clearly treating the\naliens as gods (burnt offerings on an altar). And he stated flatly, \"They\nrevere our ship and us.\" (69) And the camel rider obviously thought the\nalien some sort of desert spirit.\n\nThe alien became disoriented in the desert and would have died but for the\nhuman's help. To bind the human to him he made rash promises, promises that\nwere based on logic but invalid; the biologies of humans and aliens were\nincompatible. When he reached safety, the alien was intellectually honest\nenough to try to make good on his promises and honest with himself to admit\nthat he couldn't do it. But he lacked the moral or ethical wherewithal to\nadmit his failure to the camel rider. He fired up his engines and blasted\noff, killing the deluded believer who died \"in glory like their star\".\n\nThe sun would rise again the next day; not so the camel rider. Still less\nwould he \"live forever\". (73)\n\nI don't know what the moral is, exactly, but the twist on the aliens-as-gods\nstory seems to be that the better judgement of technologically superior\nbeings can be seduced by too much reverence. Remember, the title phrase is\ntaken from a pronouncement made by the alien. Maybe he intended it as irony.\n\nIf Wolfe were not a religious man, I might be tempted to say that *he*\nintended the title to mean that belief itself was sufficient, whether the\nbelief be true or not. Glory is a slippery word.\n\n-Roy" } ] }, { "message_id": "<9a33123d0704181343w6160a0d2ke0a5919a129218b1@mail.gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "Tony Ellis", "address": "tonyellis69 at btopenworld.com" }, "date": "2007-04-18T20:43:26+00:00", "subject": "(urth) (Urth) In Glory Like Their Star", "in_reply_to": "<000c01c78180$e83a99a0$40c85a42@rclackey.stic.net>", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Roy C Lackey wrote:\nI don't know what the moral is, exactly, but the twist on the aliens-as-gods\nstory seems to be that the better judgement of technologically superior\nbeings can be seduced by too much reverence." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "This sort of chimes with my reading, but I'd go further and say that\nwe're being invited to feel outright contempt for the narrator. Far\nfrom being divine, he's an ass.\n\nAlmost the first thing he says is that from his perspective, the tribe\nwho want his people's help are indistinguishable from the enemies they\nwant help against. Fair enough: that sounds like a suitably godlike\nopinion, we're all equally sinful in the sight of God, etc, etc. Then\nhe casually says he may indeed propose that his people destroy their\nhosts. He's sitting there, eating this tribe's food, and coolly toying\nwith the idea of exterminating them. Not nice.\n\nBut then, his whole attitude towards these natives is arrogant and\ncondescending. \"The natives could not understand, saying again and\nagain in many different ways that knowledge is a thing one uses. We\nsought to explain by the Great Disciplines that such things have\nnothing to do with its value... It is the interior change that\nsuffices, the transformation that rewards... They could not\nunderstand.\"\n\nSuch lofty conceits about knowledge may be all very well when you're a\ntechnologically advanced super-race, but these are primitive\ntribespeople. From their perspective *of course* knowledge is a thing\none uses, and maybe if the narrator and his people deigned to impart a\nlittle they could learn things like medicine and irrigation.\n\nEverything the narrator says sounds superficially wise and gnomic, and\nthen, when you think about it, pompous and unrealistic. I'm reminded\nof the Laputians in Gulliver's Travels - a race so advanced they're\nactually kind of stupid. Even more than that I'm reminded of a Wolfean\ntype: the arrogant academic. Doctor Marsh is one; Doctor Finch in\nTrip, Trap, another. In particular I'm put in mind of Quoquo in\nFeather Tigers, the alien psychologist who decides we must have built\nour computers to lie because sometimes he can't understand what they\nmean. Like Quoquo, our narrator sets off alone into the wilderness, in\nthe belief that he is a match for it, and like Quoquo he finds that he\nis not.\n\nThere's a little detail here which for me is the icing on the cake.\nThe narrator is mysteriously reticent about exactly what went wrong in\nthe desert, but it comes out anyway: \"I told him of my plight... my\nmachine broken when it collided with a stone.\" Yes, you read that\ncorrectly: the mighty, godlike alien drove his vehicle into a rock.\n\nAs Roy says, the narrator makes rash promises to the camel rider that\nhe can't fulfill - and isn't it telling that the thing he promises and\ncan't deliver is eternal life - precisely the thing God is supposed to\nprovide.\n\nAs for morals... Brian Aldiss has said, with his tongue only slightly\nin his cheek, that the theme of science fiction is \"hubris clobbered\nby nemesis\", and I think this story is a good example of that. More\nspecifically, I think Wolfe wants us to think - in his typical\nconvention-inverting way - not about the vast gulf between primitive\npeople and a super-race with godlike technology, but about the far\nvaster gulf between such a race and actual divinity. Either you *are*\nGod, or you're infinitely far from God. The sci-fi cliche of godlike\naliens fails to deal with what 'godlike' really means, and possibly\nthat was what bugged Wolfe about the original story he read." } ] }, { "message_id": "<725920.78741.qm@web54406.mail.yahoo.com>", "from": { "name": "Nathan Spears", "address": "spearofsolomon at yahoo.com" }, "date": "2007-04-18T22:10:18+00:00", "subject": "(urth) (Urth) In Glory Like Their Star", "in_reply_to": "<9a33123d0704181343w6160a0d2ke0a5919a129218b1@mail.gmail.com>", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Thank you both for your replies. My reading was more sympathetic to Mr. Lackey's, but I wish I hadn't taken the book back to the library so I could read the story again to look for Mr. Ellis' perspective. From what I can remember of the tone of the story I think that Mr. Ellis is putting something of his own ideas into it - I remember feeling that the narrator was basically blackmailed into making promises he couldn't keep to the native. He was dying in the desert and this local thought he was a djinn or something.\n\nHaving thought about it since then, I find your comments revealing in another direction I hadn't considered. The story also acts as an illustration of not only how badly, but how strangely, relations between vastly technologically different cultures might be. The alien finds himself in the strange position of having to emulate a god in order to survive, ie The Man Who Would Be King. He tries to make good on his word but is unable to, and his shame leads him to abandon the native in question.\n\nI still am not clear on why he has to incinerate the native as he leaves. That bit weighs favorably for Mr. Ellis' reading as far as I can see.\n\nHowever:\n\"It is the interior change that suffices, the transformation that rewards\"\nThis statement is Christian doctrine reworded, so I doubt that Wolfe intended it to bathe the narrator in a negative light. Unless the story is also a commentary on how missionaries to impoverished nations should spend more time distributing medicine and less time evangelizing. \n\n----- Original Message ----\nFrom: Tony Ellis \nTo: urth at lists.urth.net\nSent: Wednesday, April 18, 2007 3:43:26 PM\nSubject: (urth) (Urth) In Glory Like Their Star" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Roy C Lackey wrote:\nI don't know what the moral is, exactly, but the twist on the aliens-as-gods\nstory seems to be that the better judgement of technologically superior\nbeings can be seduced by too much reverence." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "This sort of chimes with my reading, but I'd go further and say that\nwe're being invited to feel outright contempt for the narrator. Far\nfrom being divine, he's an ass.\n\nAlmost the first thing he says is that from his perspective, the tribe\nwho want his people's help are indistinguishable from the enemies they\nwant help against. Fair enough: that sounds like a suitably godlike\nopinion, we're all equally sinful in the sight of God, etc, etc. Then\nhe casually says he may indeed propose that his people destroy their\nhosts. He's sitting there, eating this tribe's food, and coolly toying\nwith the idea of exterminating them. Not nice.\n\nBut then, his whole attitude towards these natives is arrogant and\ncondescending. \"The natives could not understand, saying again and\nagain in many different ways that knowledge is a thing one uses. We\nsought to explain by the Great Disciplines that such things have\nnothing to do with its value... It is the interior change that\nsuffices, the transformation that rewards... They could not\nunderstand.\"\n\nSuch lofty conceits about knowledge may be all very well when you're a\ntechnologically advanced super-race, but these are primitive\ntribespeople. From their perspective *of course* knowledge is a thing\none uses, and maybe if the narrator and his people deigned to impart a\nlittle they could learn things like medicine and irrigation.\n\nEverything the narrator says sounds superficially wise and gnomic, and\nthen, when you think about it, pompous and unrealistic. I'm reminded\nof the Laputians in Gulliver's Travels - a race so advanced they're\nactually kind of stupid. Even more than that I'm reminded of a Wolfean\ntype: the arrogant academic. Doctor Marsh is one; Doctor Finch in\nTrip, Trap, another. In particular I'm put in mind of Quoquo in\nFeather Tigers, the alien psychologist who decides we must have built\nour computers to lie because sometimes he can't understand what they\nmean. Like Quoquo, our narrator sets off alone into the wilderness, in\nthe belief that he is a match for it, and like Quoquo he finds that he\nis not.\n\nThere's a little detail here which for me is the icing on the cake.\nThe narrator is mysteriously reticent about exactly what went wrong in\nthe desert, but it comes out anyway: \"I told him of my plight... my\nmachine broken when it collided with a stone.\" Yes, you read that\ncorrectly: the mighty, godlike alien drove his vehicle into a rock.\n\nAs Roy says, the narrator makes rash promises to the camel rider that\nhe can't fulfill - and isn't it telling that the thing he promises and\ncan't deliver is eternal life - precisely the thing God is supposed to\nprovide.\n\nAs for morals... Brian Aldiss has said, with his tongue only slightly\nin his cheek, that the theme of science fiction is \"hubris clobbered\nby nemesis\", and I think this story is a good example of that. More\nspecifically, I think Wolfe wants us to think - in his typical\nconvention-inverting way - not about the vast gulf between primitive\npeople and a super-race with godlike technology, but about the far\nvaster gulf between such a race and actual divinity. Either you *are*\nGod, or you're infinitely far from God. The sci-fi cliche of godlike\naliens fails to deal with what 'godlike' really means, and possibly\nthat was what bugged Wolfe about the original story he read." } ] }, { "message_id": "<20070418235004.GUCZ13782.eastrmmtao106.cox.net@eastrmimpo01.cox.net>", "from": { "name": "James B. Jordan", "address": "jbjordan4 at cox.net" }, "date": "2007-04-18T23:50:28+00:00", "subject": "(urth) (Urth) In Glory Like Their Star", "in_reply_to": "<725920.78741.qm@web54406.mail.yahoo.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "At 05:10 PM 4/18/2007, you wrote:\nHowever:\n\"It is the interior change that suffices, the transformation that rewards\"\nThis statement is Christian doctrine reworded, so I doubt that Wolfe \nintended it to bathe the narrator in a negative light. Unless the \nstory is also a commentary on how missionaries to impoverished \nnations should spend more time distributing medicine and less time \nevangelizing." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": " I have not reread the story before writing this post, so \nthis may be off the mark; but a comment: This is not Christian but \nGnostic doctrine. Wolfe is a good sacramentalist, and for him the \nKingdom is surely more than mere interior change. Good intentions do \nnot suffice. Jesus came to change the world, not merely inward \nfeelings. And I can say that Wolfe does believe that unless \nimpoverished people are fed, they cannot hear. The gospels really \nshow the same thing: Jesus helps people and then asks them to listen.\n Now I need to find this story and re-read it.\n\nNutria " } ] }, { "message_id": "<136978.23481.qm@web54409.mail.yahoo.com>", "from": { "name": "Nathan Spears", "address": "spearofsolomon at yahoo.com" }, "date": "2007-04-19T02:54:00+00:00", "subject": "(urth) (Urth) In Glory Like Their Star", "in_reply_to": "<20070418235004.GUCZ13782.eastrmmtao106.cox.net@eastrmimpo01.cox.net>", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "At 05:10 PM 4/18/2007, you wrote:\n\n\nHowever:\n\n\"It is the interior change that suffices, the transformation that\nrewards\"\n\nThis statement is Christian doctrine reworded, so I doubt that Wolfe\nintended it to bathe the narrator in a negative light. Unless the\nstory is also a commentary on how missionaries to impoverished nations\nshould spend more time distributing medicine and less time evangelizing." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": " I have not" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "reread the story before writing this post, so this may be off the mark;\nbut a comment: This is not Christian but Gnostic doctrine. Wolfe is a\ngood sacramentalist, and for him the Kingdom is surely more than mere\ninterior change.\n\n\nI didn't mean to imply that it was the entirety of Christian doctrine. I think Matthew 5 and Mark 7 show that Jesus was as interested in the state of men's hearts as with their behavior. I also didn't intend to start a lengthy religious debate, esp. over terminology, so please eschew that path if at all possible. But my feelings about the aliens in the story were initially that they were trying to \"enlighten\" man by helping him learn what it had taken their race millennia to learn - and that this teaching, while aphoristic, was meaningful.\n\nMr. Ellis expressed the idea that Wolfe might have been feeling indignation at the idea that \"primitive\" man would have been unable to distinguish between alien and god. I think that if that is our starting position, we ought also to feel indignation at the prospect of aliens \"teaching\" us anything - philosophical or practical. \"We were alive before you got here, so we were doing something right,\" as it were. How would we (the primitive humans) be any more able to distinguish between \"good technology\" and \"bad technology\" than we would good/bad philosophy? For instance, aliens that gave us nuclear technology, or something superior, might be calculating that, as an immature, fractured species, we would manufacture superbombs galore from our own materials and blow ourselves off the planet, saving the aliens a lot of expense. That's not a bad idea for a story, actually.\n\nMy point is that I don't think Wolfe was trying to draw that distinction (that the alien \"teaching\" was bogus or useless) - he would have focused on it more. I think the distinction is between the alien's teaching and what the alien actually does to the human - he betrays his own doctrines and murders this (quasi) innocent guy." } ] }, { "message_id": "<000c01c7824c$d87944e0$5ec95a42@rclackey.stic.net>", "from": { "name": "Roy C. Lackey", "address": "rclackey at stic.net" }, "date": "2007-04-19T06:34:50+00:00", "subject": "(urth) (Urth) In Glory Like Their Star", "in_reply_to": "<136978.23481.qm@web54409.mail.yahoo.com>", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Nathan Spears wrote:\nI still am not clear on why he has to incinerate the native as he leaves.\nThat bit weighs favorably for Mr. Ellis' reading as far as I can see.<" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "The alien must have known that the blast from his engines would kill the\nnative, so the question becomes: Was it his *intention* to kill?, and, if\nso, why? The alien had been safe inside the scout for three days; neither\nthe desert nor the native were a threat to him.\n\nWas the native's death unavoidable? That is, was it merely the unfortunate\nconsequence of the native's faith, his refusal to abandon the hope of\nsupernatural reward? Like a moth, he stubbornly hovered too near the flame\nthat inevitably consumed him? He just wouldn't (couldn't?) give it up and go\nhome?\n\nThey had killed and eaten the camel; there was no oasis at hand. The native\ncouldn't breath the air in the scout. Presumably he could not eat the\nalien's food. Did the alien kill him to hasten a prolonged death in the\ndesert? Or was the alien callously indifferent to the native's fate,\nblasting off without giving it a thought?\n\nThe story title suggests otherwise. It goes back to what was meant by\n\"glory\". There are many definitions, largely religious in nature. There is\none other usage of a form of the word in the story, and it is unusual enough\nto call attention to itself. After regaining the scout: \"It was a triumph,\nand I inspected every part of the scout glorying, and tested every\ninstrument in every possible way, recalling my navigator. They functioned\nwithout a flaw, all of them. I was ecstatic.\" Perhaps this usage is a clue\nto the other.\n\n-Roy" } ] }, { "message_id": "<9a33123d0704190851l9994c66qa0aea197cbfaafb3@mail.gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "Tony Ellis", "address": "tonyellis69 at btopenworld.com" }, "date": "2007-04-19T15:51:10+00:00", "subject": "(urth) In Glory Like Their Star", "in_reply_to": "<000c01c7824c$d87944e0$5ec95a42@rclackey.stic.net>", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Nathan Spears wrote:\n...my feelings about the\naliens in the story were initially that they were trying to \"enlighten\" man\nby helping him learn what it had taken their race millennia to learn\nand that this teaching, while aphoristic, was meaningful." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "If the aliens were trying to teach the natives compassion and mercy,\nfair enough. But they're not. They're telling them that the value of\nknowledge doesn't lie in its use - an absurd thing to tell a primitive\npeople who are just starting out on the road to civilisation. Let's\nnot forget Wolfe is an engineer as well as a Christian." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Mr. Ellis expressed the idea that Wolfe might have been feeling\nindignation at the idea that \"primitive\" man would have been unable\nto distinguish between alien and god." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Actually, that's not what I said at all. Of course a primitive race\nwill be unable to distinguish between alien and god - there's no blame\nin that. What I said was that Wolfe might have been feeling\nindignation at modern writers making the same mistake." } ] }, { "message_id": "<138241.11561.qm@web54405.mail.yahoo.com>", "from": { "name": "Nathan Spears", "address": "spearofsolomon at yahoo.com" }, "date": "2007-04-19T16:52:34+00:00", "subject": "(urth) In Glory Like Their Star", "in_reply_to": "<9a33123d0704190851l9994c66qa0aea197cbfaafb3@mail.gmail.com>", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Mr. Ellis expressed the idea that Wolfe might have been feeling\nindignation at the idea that \"primitive\" man would have been unable\nto distinguish between alien and god." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Actually, that's not what I said at all. Of course a primitive race\nwill be unable to distinguish between alien and god - there's no blame\nin that. What I said was that Wolfe might have been feeling\nindignation at modern writers making the same mistake." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Apologies - I was thinking of this remark by Mr. Lackey:\n\"Given that he is a religious\nman, it might be assumed that he resented the implication that people in Old\nTestament times were more gullible than modern people, unable to distinguish\nbetween superior technology and divinity.\"" } ] }, { "message_id": "<933967.2427.qm@web32404.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "from": { "name": "don doggett", "address": "kingwukong at yahoo.com" }, "date": "2007-04-19T18:24:13+00:00", "subject": "(urth) In Glory Like Their Star", "in_reply_to": "<138241.11561.qm@web54405.mail.yahoo.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "--- Nathan Spears wrote:\n\nApologies - I was thinking of this remark by Mr.\nLackey:\n\"Given that he is a religious\nman, it might be assumed that he resented the\nimplication that people in Old\nTestament times were more gullible than modern\npeople, unable to distinguish\nbetween superior technology and divinity.\"" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "iirc I think Wolfe may have said something along these\nlines somewhere, that it's a mistake to think ancient\npeople were less sophisticated than their modern\ncounterparts. \n\nDon\n\nThe Evangelists: a Lesser Apocrypha http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendid=178109961" } ] }, { "message_id": "<1111.67.142.130.45.1177013142.squirrel@brunians.org>", "from": { "name": "brunians at brunians.org", "address": "brunians at brunians.org" }, "date": "2007-04-19T20:05:42+00:00", "subject": "(urth) In Glory Like Their Star", "in_reply_to": "<933967.2427.qm@web32404.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "--- Nathan Spears wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "iirc I think Wolfe may have said something along these\nlines somewhere, that it's a mistake to think ancient\npeople were less sophisticated than their modern\ncounterparts." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "It is one of his major themes, as it is one of my major positions. I'd say\nthat a good fifty percent of the things we talked about, last we met, were\nrelated to this one way or another.\n\nAs an aside, there are no primitive people. All the people extant, and all\nof the people we know about historically have basically the same level of\ndevelopment, in various different directions.\n\nWho was that fool who came to the conclusion that the Trobriand Islanders\ndidn't know where babies came from? Malonovski orsomething like it. And\nthen there was Richard Burton, measuring penises across the continent of\nAfrica. I bet the Africans had a lot to say about him. And Margaret Mead,\nwho can forget her? I understand the grandchildren of her informants still\ntell stories as to what an idiot she was, how gullible.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n." } ] } ] }