{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/5207", "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": 5207, "subject": "Change of Topic: Latro", "messages": 6, "voices": 5, "first": "2008-11-04T01:56:36+00:00", "last": "2008-11-04T17:21:58+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "PMorris33 at aol.com", "address": "pmorris33 at aol.com" }, "date": "2008-11-04T01:56:36+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Change of Topic: Latro", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Does anyone know if a fourth book in the Soldier series is being \ncontemplated? After all, Latro has not been returned to his home. \n \n \nIn a message dated 11/3/2008 5:09:14 P.M. Pacific Standard Time, \nurth-request at lists.urth.net writes:\n\nSend Urth mailing list submissions to\nurth at lists.urth.net\n\nTo subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit\nhttp://lists.urth.net/listinfo.cgi/urth-urth.net\nor, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to\nurth-request at lists.urth.net\n\nYou can reach the person managing the list at\nurth-owner at lists.urth.net\n\nWhen replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific\nthan \"Re: Contents of Urth digest...\"\n\n\nToday's Topics:\n\n1. Re: AEG: Is AEG Lovecraftian? (Bryan Alexander)\n2. Stingray (Nigel Price)\n3. Stingray (Nigel Price)\n4. Re: Stingray (James Wynn)\n5. AEG: Is AEG Lovecraftian? (Nigel Price)\n6. Stingray (Nigel Price)\n7. Re: Stingray (Matthew Keeley)" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "----------------------------------------------------------------------\n\nMessage: 1\nDate: Mon, 3 Nov 2008 17:10:48 -0500\nFrom: \"Bryan Alexander\" \nSubject: Re: (urth) AEG: Is AEG Lovecraftian?\nTo: \"The Urth Mailing List\" \nMessage-ID:\n\nContent-Type: text/plain; charset=\"iso-8859-1\"\n\nI admit to bringing a Lovecraftian perspective to my reading of AEG. That\nwas due in part to various things I'd heard about the novel, which were then\nbrought to mind with the HPL inscription. So I suspected far more cosmic\nhorror from various quarters, including the flapping creature, than I ended\nup with.\nMy Phil Dick-style expectations were confirmed instead.\n\nOn Mon, Nov 3, 2008 at 3:55 PM, Dave Tallman wrote:\n\nKieran Mullen wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": " That needs a bit of explanation. For a work to be Lovecraftian I \ndon't\nthink it is simply sufficient to stick in Hastur and Cthulu and call it\nthat. Lovecraft (IMO) came up with a truly original ontological horror\npremise for his fiction: the universe is dominated by inhuman forces \nwhich\nwe don't have a hope of understanding or defeating. At best we can only\nhope that they ignore us. (We can't even pray that they do - there is \nno\nGod, only atoms and a void). Humanity is a minor irrelevance in a dark\nand hungry universe. Any attempt to try to change that will only draw \nthe\nattention of forces that will destroy the inquirer." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Given that Wolfe is a Christian I doubt very much that he would write a\nwork consistent with such a nihilistic Lovecraftian premise. But other\nwriters, such as August Derleth (also a Christian), have expanded the\nLovecraft universe to include a more classical view of good vs. evil. To \nme,\ntrue horror cannot exist in a universe where our ideas of sanity and\ngoodness are a mere fluke, a cosmic joke. The efforts of the protagonists\nbecome simply silly.\n\nBut I don't think the Lovecraft parts are simply tacked on. From the\nbeginning Reis announced his intention to retire to the South Seas (p. 14).\nThis cannot be a coincidence. Reis may have learned something during his\ntime as ambassador to Woldercan. He may have realized there was a connected\nmenace on Earth and determined to fight it. To some degree his provoking a\nfight between Squiddy and the Navy seems to have been a success. At the \nvery\nleast the storms took out many Cthulhu worshipers on the neighboring\n islands.\n\nEven Lovecraft allowed the forces of good to succeed sometimes, for example\nin \"The Dunwich Horror.\" Even he could not help rooting for humanity \nagainst\nthe monsters.\n\n _______________________________________________\nUrth Mailing List" } ] }, { "message_id": "<94068DCC00AD4810A13E1E440136D85C@GATEWAY>", "from": { "name": "James Wynn", "address": "crushtv at gmail.com" }, "date": "2008-11-04T02:13:58+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Change of Topic: Latro", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Actually, I don't think Latro will ever get home until he passes through India, Micronesia, Columbia, Ireland, Britain, Germania, and Slavakia. I asked Wolfe once if he anticipated a wrap-up to the series and he said no.\n ----- Original Message ----- \n From: PMorris33 at aol.com \n To: urth at lists.urth.net \n Sent: Monday, November 03, 2008 7:56 PM\n Subject: (urth) Change of Topic: Latro\n\n\n Does anyone know if a fourth book in the Soldier series is being contemplated? After all, Latro has not been returned to his home. \n\n In a message dated 11/3/2008 5:09:14 P.M. Pacific Standard Time, urth-request at lists.urth.net writes:\n Send Urth mailing list submissions to\n urth at lists.urth.net\n\n To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit\n http://lists.urth.net/listinfo.cgi/urth-urth.net\n or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to\n urth-request at lists.urth.net\n\n You can reach the person managing the list at\n urth-owner at lists.urth.net\n\n When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific\n than \"Re: Contents of Urth digest...\"\n\n\n Today's Topics:\n\n 1. Re: AEG: Is AEG Lovecraftian? (Bryan Alexander)\n 2. Stingray (Nigel Price)\n 3. Stingray (Nigel Price)\n 4. Re: Stingray (James Wynn)\n 5. AEG: Is AEG Lovecraftian? (Nigel Price)\n 6. Stingray (Nigel Price)\n 7. Re: Stingray (Matthew Keeley)" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": " ----------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n Message: 1\n Date: Mon, 3 Nov 2008 17:10:48 -0500\n From: \"Bryan Alexander\" \n Subject: Re: (urth) AEG: Is AEG Lovecraftian?\n To: \"The Urth Mailing List\" \n Message-ID:\n \n Content-Type: text/plain; charset=\"iso-8859-1\"\n\n I admit to bringing a Lovecraftian perspective to my reading of AEG. That\n was due in part to various things I'd heard about the novel, which were then\n brought to mind with the HPL inscription. So I suspected far more cosmic\n horror from various quarters, including the flapping creature, than I ended\n up with.\n My Phil Dick-style expectations were confirmed instead.\n\n On Mon, Nov 3, 2008 at 3:55 PM, Dave Tallman wrote:\n\nKieran Mullen wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": " That needs a bit of explanation. For a work to be Lovecraftian I don't\nthink it is simply sufficient to stick in Hastur and Cthulu and call it\nthat. Lovecraft (IMO) came up with a truly original ontological horror\npremise for his fiction: the universe is dominated by inhuman forces which\nwe don't have a hope of understanding or defeating. At best we can only\nhope that they ignore us. (We can't even pray that they do - there is no\nGod, only atoms and a void). Humanity is a minor irrelevance in a dark\nand hungry universe. Any attempt to try to change that will only draw the\nattention of forces that will destroy the inquirer." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Given that Wolfe is a Christian I doubt very much that he would write a\nwork consistent with such a nihilistic Lovecraftian premise. But other\nwriters, such as August Derleth (also a Christian), have expanded the\nLovecraft universe to include a more classical view of good vs. evil. To me,\ntrue horror cannot exist in a universe where our ideas of sanity and\ngoodness are a mere fluke, a cosmic joke. The efforts of the protagonists\nbecome simply silly.\n\nBut I don't think the Lovecraft parts are simply tacked on. From the\nbeginning Reis announced his intention to retire to the South Seas (p. 14).\nThis cannot be a coincidence. Reis may have learned something during his\ntime as ambassador to Woldercan. He may have realized there was a connected\nmenace on Earth and determined to fight it. To some degree his provoking a\nfight between Squiddy and the Navy seems to have been a success. At the very\nleast the storms took out many Cthulhu worshipers on the neighboring\nislands.\n\nEven Lovecraft allowed the forces of good to succeed sometimes, for example\nin \"The Dunwich Horror.\" Even he could not help rooting for humanity against\nthe monsters.\n\n_______________________________________________" } ] }, { "message_id": "<44fb53d10811032006j6f2bc71blbbef1a47ef2c8e20@mail.gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "Matthew Keeley", "address": "matthew.keeley.1 at gmail.com" }, "date": "2008-11-04T04:06:58+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Change of Topic: Latro", "in_reply_to": "<94068DCC00AD4810A13E1E440136D85C@GATEWAY>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Mon, Nov 3, 2008 at 9:13 PM, James Wynn wrote:\nActually, I don't think Latro will ever get home until he passes through\nIndia, Micronesia, Columbia, Ireland, Britain, Germania, and Slavakia. I\nasked Wolfe once if he anticipated a wrap-up to the series and he said no." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "You forgot Japan and China.\n\nI wouldn't mind Latro in Ireland - Wolfe seems to have a penchant for\nIrish myth, but I don't know how much he's explored it outside of\nshort stories and Peace. I wouldn't mind reading Latro meets Cu\nChulainn and the leprechauns...\n\n-Matt" } ] }, { "message_id": "<44fb53d10811032010m419ef6eo923d0bc1bb82531f@mail.gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "Matthew Keeley", "address": "matthew.keeley.1 at gmail.com" }, "date": "2008-11-04T04:10:05+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Change of Topic: Latro", "in_reply_to": "<44fb53d10811032006j6f2bc71blbbef1a47ef2c8e20@mail.gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Mon, Nov 3, 2008 at 11:06 PM, Matthew Keeley\n wrote:\nYou forgot Japan and China.\n\nI wouldn't mind Latro in Ireland - Wolfe seems to have a penchant for\nIrish myth, but I don't know how much he's explored it outside of\nshort stories and Peace. I wouldn't mind reading Latro meets Cu\nChulainn and the leprechauns...\n\n-Matt" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I need to proofread these messages more - two uses of the \"I wouldn't\nmind\" construction in two sentences. I apologize for the offense to\ngood English.\n\nAnyone know if Wolfe has spent time in Ireland? Or just read a lot of Yeats?\n\n-Matt" } ] }, { "message_id": "<7511.67.142.130.44.1225809670.squirrel@brunians.org>", "from": { "name": "brunians at brunians.org", "address": "brunians at brunians.org" }, "date": "2008-11-04T14:41:10+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Change of Topic: Latro", "in_reply_to": "<94068DCC00AD4810A13E1E440136D85C@GATEWAY>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "He was home for a while off-stage, between volume two and volume three.\n\nHe forgets.\n\n\n." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Actually, I don't think Latro will ever get home until he passes through\nIndia, Micronesia, Columbia, Ireland, Britain, Germania, and Slavakia. I\nasked Wolfe once if he anticipated a wrap-up to the series and he said no.\n ----- Original Message -----\n From: PMorris33 at aol.com\n To: urth at lists.urth.net\n Sent: Monday, November 03, 2008 7:56 PM\n Subject: (urth) Change of Topic: Latro\n\n\n Does anyone know if a fourth book in the Soldier series is being\ncontemplated? After all, Latro has not been returned to his home.\n\n In a message dated 11/3/2008 5:09:14 P.M. Pacific Standard Time,\nurth-request at lists.urth.net writes:\n Send Urth mailing list submissions to\n urth at lists.urth.net\n\n To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit\n http://lists.urth.net/listinfo.cgi/urth-urth.net\n or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to\n urth-request at lists.urth.net\n\n You can reach the person managing the list at\n urth-owner at lists.urth.net\n\n When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific\n than \"Re: Contents of Urth digest...\"\n\n\n Today's Topics:\n\n 1. Re: AEG: Is AEG Lovecraftian? (Bryan Alexander)\n 2. Stingray (Nigel Price)\n 3. Stingray (Nigel Price)\n 4. Re: Stingray (James Wynn)\n 5. AEG: Is AEG Lovecraftian? (Nigel Price)\n 6. Stingray (Nigel Price)\n 7. Re: Stingray (Matthew Keeley)\n\n\n ----------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n Message: 1\n Date: Mon, 3 Nov 2008 17:10:48 -0500\n From: \"Bryan Alexander\" \n Subject: Re: (urth) AEG: Is AEG Lovecraftian?\n To: \"The Urth Mailing List\" \n Message-ID:\n \n Content-Type: text/plain; charset=\"iso-8859-1\"\n\n I admit to bringing a Lovecraftian perspective to my reading of AEG.\nThat\n was due in part to various things I'd heard about the novel, which\nwere then\n brought to mind with the HPL inscription. So I suspected far more\ncosmic\n horror from various quarters, including the flapping creature, than I\nended\n up with.\n My Phil Dick-style expectations were confirmed instead.\n\n On Mon, Nov 3, 2008 at 3:55 PM, Dave Tallman \nwrote:\n\n > Kieran Mullen wrote:\n >\n >> That needs a bit of explanation. For a work to be Lovecraftian I\n don't\n >> think it is simply sufficient to stick in Hastur and Cthulu and\ncall it\n >> that. Lovecraft (IMO) came up with a truly original ontological\nhorror\n >> premise for his fiction: the universe is dominated by inhuman\nforces which\n >> we don't have a hope of understanding or defeating. At best we\ncan only\n >> hope that they ignore us. (We can't even pray that they do -\nthere is no\n >> God, only atoms and a void). Humanity is a minor irrelevance in\na dark\n >> and hungry universe. Any attempt to try to change that will only\ndraw the\n >> attention of forces that will destroy the inquirer.\n >>\n >>\n > Given that Wolfe is a Christian I doubt very much that he would\nwrite a\n > work consistent with such a nihilistic Lovecraftian premise. But\nother\n > writers, such as August Derleth (also a Christian), have expanded\nthe\n > Lovecraft universe to include a more classical view of good vs.\nevil. To me,\n > true horror cannot exist in a universe where our ideas of sanity and\n > goodness are a mere fluke, a cosmic joke. The efforts of the\nprotagonists\n > become simply silly.\n >\n > But I don't think the Lovecraft parts are simply tacked on. From the\n > beginning Reis announced his intention to retire to the South Seas\n(p. 14).\n > This cannot be a coincidence. Reis may have learned something during\nhis\n > time as ambassador to Woldercan. He may have realized there was a\nconnected\n > menace on Earth and determined to fight it. To some degree his\nprovoking a\n > fight between Squiddy and the Navy seems to have been a success. At\nthe very\n > least the storms took out many Cthulhu worshipers on the neighboring\n > islands.\n >\n > Even Lovecraft allowed the forces of good to succeed sometimes, for\nexample\n > in \"The Dunwich Horror.\" Even he could not help rooting for humanity\nagainst\n > the monsters.\n >\n > _______________________________________________\n > Urth Mailing List\n > To post, write urth at urth.net\n > Subscription/information: http://www.urth.net\n >\n\n\n\n --\n Bryan Alexander\n http://infocult.typepad.com/\n http://twitter.com/BryanAlexander\n -------------- next part --------------\n An HTML attachment was scrubbed...\n URL:\n\n\n ------------------------------\n\n Message: 2\n Date: Mon, 3 Nov 2008 22:33:59 -0000\n From: \"Nigel Price\" \n Subject: (urth) Stingray\n To: \"Urth List\" \n Message-ID: \n Content-Type: text/plain; charset=\"iso-8859-1\"\n\n As I was writing about evil undersea cities and civilisations in AEG\nand the\n Urth Cycle, one part of my mind facetiously wandered and wondered\nwhether\n Gene Wolfe had ever watched the Gerry Anderson puppet show \"Stingray\"\nin the\n 1960s. As I thought whimsically about it, the parallels scattered\nthrough\n his books became stronger and stranger. Was Seawrack inspired by\nMarina? Was\n the idea of the US Navy attacking the Storm God inspired by the sight\nof\n Troy Tempest and the WASPs attacking Titan and his aquaphibian\nminions?\n\n No, of course not, it's a silly idea. It's not as if Wolfe ever refers\nto\n puppetry in his stories.\n\n Hang on there, wait a minute...\n\n What about that dream Severian has of the toy theatre and the\nmarionette\n versions of himself and Baldander?\n\n Goodness! If I'm right, anything can happen in the next half hour...\n\n Nigel (in a playful mood)\n\n\n\n ------------------------------\n\n Message: 3\n Date: Mon, 3 Nov 2008 23:00:41 -0000\n From: \"Nigel Price\" \n Subject: (urth) Stingray\n To: \"Urth List\" \n Message-ID: \n Content-Type: text/plain; charset=\"iso-8859-1\"\n\n Weird but true: Gerry Anderson and Ray Harryhausen were both speakers\nat the\n 1987 WorldCon in Brighton, England, which Gene and Rosemary Wolfe also\n attended.\n\n Did Wolfe hear Gerry Anderson talk about his work?\n\n Then again, for anyone interested in creating submarine squid deities,\n Harryhausen's amusing account of animating the six-limbed giant\noctopus in\n \"It came from beneath the sea\" might well have been inspirational.\n(The\n octopus only had six limbs because Harryhausen was on a tight budget\nand an\n even tighter timetable. Animating extra limbs takes time, and time is\n money!)\n\n Nigel (who is trying to write a serious analysis of AEG - coming soon\n- but\n keeps getting distracted by whimsical notions)\n\n\n\n ------------------------------\n\n Message: 4\n Date: Mon, 3 Nov 2008 17:57:00 -0600\n From: \"James Wynn\" \n Subject: Re: (urth) Stingray\n To: \"The Urth Mailing List\" \n Message-ID: <8349DBE9E74F4391A5D742992EE9395D at GATEWAY>\n Content-Type: text/plain; format=flowed; charset=\"iso-8859-1\";\n reply-type=original\n\n > No, of course not, it's a silly idea. It's not as if Wolfe ever\nrefers to\n > puppetry in his stories.\n\n In The Book of the Short Sun, Horn remembers the following from his\n childhood:\n\n \"I once had a toy, a little wooden man in a blue coat who was moved by\n strings. When I played with him, I made him walk and bow, and spoke\nfor him.\n I practiced until I thought myself very clever. One day I saw my\nmother\n holding the two sticks that held his strings, and my little wooden man\n saluting my youngest sister much more cleverly than I could have made\nhim do\n it, and laughing with his head thrown back, then mourning with his\nface in\n his hands. I never spoke of it to my mother, but I was angry and\nashamed.\"\n On Blue's Waters, pg. 158\n\n Soon he after he was assaulted by the triple-jawed leatherskin---an\nobvious\n reference to Pinnochio's Dog-fish.\n\n J.\n\n\n\n\n ------------------------------\n\n Message: 5\n Date: Tue, 4 Nov 2008 00:04:01 -0000\n From: \"Nigel Price\" \n Subject: (urth) AEG: Is AEG Lovecraftian?\n To: \"Urth List\" \n Message-ID: \n Content-Type: text/plain; charset=\"iso-8859-1\"\n\n Kieran Mullen asks...\n\n >>So what do you think? Is AEG just a romp\n >>through different genres or is it really meant\n >>to be a horror novel?\n\n No, I don't think that AEG is a Lovecraftian horror story in the sense\nthat\n you define. As far as I understand - which is not very far at all - it\n borrows some Lovecraftian elements, but does not share their\nunderlying\n philosophy, their \"ontological horror premise\" (great phrase!).\n\n I've read back through all the posts here on AEG and I've reread bits\nof the\n story but I still don't really understand how all the parts of the\nbook fit\n together. I'm trying to work it out. The nature of Gideon Chase seems\nto be\n key. That in turn, because Gideon was born there and is probably a\n human-Woldercanese hybrid, is tied up with the moral status of the\nplanet\n Woldercan.\n\n Wolfe depicts Woldercan as a place which has talking fish, dangerous\n forests, alchemy and different physics. The inhabitants superficially\n resemble humans but are subtly different. They can breed successfully\nwith\n lower animals, including humans, and male Woldercaners try to seduce\nand\n mate with human females. All in all, Woldercan sounds more like\nFairyland\n than a conventional science fiction alien planet. If it is a sort of\nSF\n Fairyland, that would make the Wolders fairies, or fairy analogues\nanyway.\n\n The moral status of fairies and Fairyland is moot in the European\ntradition.\n Sometimes they are morally equivalent to humans, with the \"good\" and\n\"bad\"\n fairies familiar in children's stories. Often, though, they are\ndepicted as\n being amoral and \"other\", outside human schemes of morality and, when\ntheir\n stories get merged with the Christian tradition, outside the divine\nscheme\n of salvation.\n\n Yet another tradition, evident in stories like that of Tam Lin and\nsome\n versions of Thomas the Rhymer, has Fairyland as a subsidiary dominion\nof\n Hell to which it pays tax (usually every seven years) in the form of\nhuman\n souls. Fairies in this tradition become similar to devils or demons.\n\n In the opening chapter of AEG, Gideon tells the President that there\nis no\n such thing as good and evil. His position seems to be that there is no\nsuch\n thing as absolute good or evil, only things that we ourselves\ndisapprove of.\n If he means that no person is ever wholly good or wholly evil, he must\n surely be right. If he means that good and evil do not themselves\nexist,\n then, from Wolfe's perspective as a Christian, he must surely be\nwrong. He\n seems to mean both, which is confusing!\n\n Gideon's perspective is either that of an amoral alien, analogous to\nthe\n amoral fairies I described above, with no human sense of good or evil,\nor he\n himself is evil and is deceiving others with his untruths, which makes\nhim\n more of the \"demonic\" type of alien/fairy.\n\n Wolfe has stated in interviews that his starting point for AEG was the\nidea\n of a detective who was a wizard. Gideon is a wizard, and certainly the\n archetypal wizard, Merlin, is half-human and half-devil in some\naccounts of\n his parentage.\n\n By this account, Gideon is at best amoral and at worst positively\nevil.\n\n At the start of AEG, the President of the United States attempts to\nrecruit\n Gideon to work with the FBI in catching Bill Reis. In many stories,\n certainly in the 1930s pulp stories which Wolfe is pastiching, this\nwould\n make Gideon the good guy, an untouchable science fictional Eliot Ness.\nBut\n there's a strong element of satire in AEG. The USA over which the\nPresident\n presides is a place where abortion has become legalised child murder,\nand\n where the various federal agencies fight an endless turf war against\neach\n other, possibly under the manipulative influence of demonic submarine\n aliens. The moral status of the President in this story is pretty\ncloudy,\n especially as we later come to see that Bill Reis himself may be far\nfrom\n being the evildoer the President claims. As the President's agent,\nGideon's\n moral status is equally suspect.\n\n That's at the start of the story. Does Gideon change?\n\n I'm not clear in my own mind whether Bill Reis starts off bad but is\nchanged\n by the transforming power of his love for Cassie, or whether he was\nalways\n good and it just takes Cassie and the reader a long time to find the\ncorrect\n moral orientation within the confusing landscapes of AEG. I think that\n there's at least an element of the former because Bill Reis learned\nhis\n alchemy and other tricks on the morally dubious Woldercan.\n\n Either way, Gideon's transforms Cassie into a star (her name, after\nall, is\n that of an astronomical star) and its her loveliness which captures\nboth\n Gideon and Bill Reis' hearts. Somehow, this love helps to orientate\nall\n three of them. Cassie chooses to marry Bill and Gideon goes to work\nfor him,\n although he doesn't seem to break his agreement with the President so\nmuch\n as suspend it.\n\n That seems to be one half of the story. Bill is inspired to\nself-sacrifice,\n Cassie loves the Christ-like Bill and Gideon is working, at least for\nthe\n moment, for the good guys. Gideon may have transformed Cassie into a\nstar in\n order to trap Reis, but the her power of beauty has transformed all\nthree of\n them for the better.\n\n But the other half of the story seems to involve putting the bad guys\ninto a\n properly inverted hierarchy of wickedness.\n\n Cassie's story of how she came to love the neighbour's dog is\ninstructive in\n this context. Scared of the neighbour's dog but even more scared of\nher\n violently abusive father, she finds herself sheltering with the animal\nand\n accepting its protection. Her clear perception of the greater source\nof\n danger enables her to accept the dog just as she later accepts the\nhelp of\n the bat creatures which would otherwise have terrified her in order to\n escape the agents of the evil Storm God.\n\n The US Navy act as agents of the bad American President and pursue\nBill Reis\n for his gold. Reis uses that gold, however, to direct them against the\nSquid\n God. If the US President, his navy and other agencies are not made\nvirtuous\n as such, they are at least properly directed against the greater evil\nof the\n malevolent underwater alien.\n\n I still don't fully understand the ending. Why does Gideon return to\n Woldercan? Because it is his true home? Perhaps it's because the spell\nof\n Cassie's star quality has been broken and without it he has fallen\nfrom\n virtue back to his old immoral/amoral ways. I don't know what Cassie\nis\n looking for.\n\n As an allegory, AEG is confusing. But I don't think it is an allegory\nany\n more than it's Lovecraftian horror. It uses allegory, or has an\nallegorical\n dimension, but there's a lot more going on and the correspondences\nbetween\n characters and qualities seem to be dynamic rather than static.\n\n Nigel\n\n\n\n ------------------------------\n\n Message: 6\n Date: Tue, 4 Nov 2008 00:10:14 -0000\n From: \"Nigel Price\" \n Subject: (urth) Stingray\n To: \"Urth List\" \n Message-ID: \n Content-Type: text/plain; charset=\"iso-8859-1\"\n\n Thanks for that, James. I'd forgotten about that marionette reference\nin\n OBW.\n\n There's the story \"The Toy Theater\" in TIoDDaOSaOS too. That's all\nabout\n marionettes.\n\n I started this thread as a sort of joke on myself, but now I'm really\n beginning to wonder!\n\n Nigel\n\n\n\n ------------------------------\n\n Message: 7\n Date: Mon, 3 Nov 2008 20:08:43 -0500\n From: \"Matthew Keeley\" \n Subject: Re: (urth) Stingray" } ] }, { "message_id": "<491084B6.8050903@io.com>", "from": { "name": "Jeff Wilson", "address": "jwilson at io.com" }, "date": "2008-11-04T17:21:58+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Change of Topic: Latro", "in_reply_to": "<7511.67.142.130.44.1225809670.squirrel@brunians.org>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "brunians at brunians.org, crushtv at gmail.com, and PMorris33 at aol.com, kindly \ntrim the quoted material in your reply posts. You can read more about \nthis genteel practice here:\n\nhttp://www.greenend.org.uk/rjk/2000/06/14/quoting.html" }, { "kind": "sig", "depth": 0, "text": "Jeff Wilson - jwilson at io.com\n< http://www.io.com/~jwilson >" } ] } ] }