Subject: (urth) PF as YA

From: Jonathan Goodwin <joncgoodwin at gmail.com>
Date: Wed, 15 Apr 2009 21:50:28 +0000

For those of you who suggested that Pirate Freedom was a YA novel,
does your definition of that genre include an element of didacticism?
If so, what lessons would you a young person take away from the book?
Though this is a disputable claim, I find it plausible that younger
readers are more apt to identify uncritically with the protagonists of
books they read. Another generalization is that writers of YA fiction
try to create sympathetic (and perhaps even instructive) protagonists
for these identity-seeking young readers. I find it difficult to
believe that Wolfe intends Christopher to be such a character. At the
same time, however, was there any doubt in your minds that Christopher
as American priest is intended to be sympathetic in his current
actions and beliefs?

In an interview with Peter Wright published in Shadows of the New Sun
(Liverpool UP: 2007, p. 143, viewable via google books), Wolfe says in
an interview that There Are Doors came closest in execution to his
original conception as any of his work. I wonder how PF would measure
on that scale. (He also mentions on that page his bafflement at the
unexplained/unexplainable strong reactions that readers have to his
work.)

---

From: JBarach at aol.com <jbarach at aol.com>
Date: Wed, 15 Apr 2009 22:15:43 +0000

Jon writes:
 
> For those of you who suggested that Pirate Freedom
> was a YA novel, does your definition of that genre
> include an element of didacticism?

I'm baffled.  Why should a YA novel include "an element of  didacticism"?  
Some YA novels have that, I suppose, but hardly all of  them.  Read, for 
instance, Megan Whalen Turner's The Thief (and  sequels).  Or, going a bit 
older, John Bellairs' novels, which are entirely  fun and not at all didactic.  
I don't know if you'd say there's a didactic  element in, for instance, N. 
D. Wilson's recent 100 Cupboards and  its sequel Dandelion Fire.
 
If you find a didactic element in these novels, I suppose you could make  
just as good a case for saying that adult novels include "an element of  
didacticism."  In fact, it would be easy to make that case for Flannery  
O'Connor or Walker Percy or G. K. Chesterton or C. S. Lewis.  Or Gene  Wolfe, whose 
books frequently (and especially recently) seem designed to teach  wisdom 
and spur the reader (as well as the characters) toward maturity.   That's 
something you see pretty strongly in Short Sun and Wizard Knight, for  
instance, the latter of which especially is about a boy becoming a man and a man  
becoming a true knight.
 
John

**************Why pay full price? Check out this month's deals on the new 
AOL Shopping. (http://shopping.aol.com/?ncid=emlcntinstor00000001)
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From: Jonathan Goodwin <joncgoodwin at gmail.com>
Date: Wed, 15 Apr 2009 22:47:03 +0000

I know that "didactic" has a pejorative connotation in many
circumstances (which might be derived from New Critical orthodoxy, at
least in part); but I meant it only descriptively.

In the interview that I quoted in my original message, Wolfe goes on
to address the very issue of the necessity of fictional moral
ambiguity in a morally ambiguous world. (He mentions Treasure Island
specifically). But it also seems clear that he takes the instructive
or moral exemplar aspect of writing seriously. Is it significant
_morally_, for example, that Christopher is or believes himself to be
genetically modified?

On Wed, Apr 15, 2009 at 5:15 PM,  <JBarach at aol.com> wrote:
>>?was a YA novel, does your definition of that genre
>>?include an element of didacticism?
>
> older, John Bellairs' novels, which are entirely fun and not at all
> didactic. I don't know if you'd say there's a didactic element in, for
> instance, N. D. Wilson's recent?100 Cupboards and its sequel Dandelion Fire.
>
> didacticism."? In fact, it would be easy to make that case for Flannery
> O'Connor or Walker Percy or G. K. Chesterton or C. S. Lewis. Or Gene Wolfe,
> whose books frequently (and especially recently) seem designed to teach
> wisdom and spur the reader (as well as the characters) toward maturity.
> That's something you see pretty strongly in Short Sun and Wizard Knight, for
> instance, the latter of which especially is about a boy becoming a man and a
> man becoming a true knight.
>
> John
>
> ________________________________
> Why pay full price? Check out this month's deals on the new AOL Shopping.
> _______________________________________________
> Urth Mailing List
> To post, write urth at urth.net
> Subscription/information: http://www.urth.net
>

---

From: Mo Holkar / UKG <lists at ukg.co.uk>
Date: Thu, 16 Apr 2009 09:19:42 +0000

>least in part); but I meant it only descriptively.

It seems to me likely that Wolfe means all of his work to have a 
didactic element (in that descriptive sense). Otherwise, what would 
be the moral purpose of writing it?

And to go back to your slightly earlier question -- while Chris 
surely isn't held up as a moral exemplar, he does seem to me to be 
portrayed sympathetically, and his exploits laid out in such a way 
that instruction might be drawn from them. So this might be a more 
sophisticated take on the identify-with protagonist of simplistically 
didactic YA. I'm not an expert, but I'm sure there must be a 
tradition of other such in the YA canon.

Mo

# ~ # ~ #

WolfeWiki -- a wiki about Gene Wolfe
http://www.wolfewiki.com/pmwiki/

---

From: Jonathan Goodwin <joncgoodwin at gmail.com>
Date: Thu, 16 Apr 2009 17:40:50 +0000

I think by the time that he's writing his narrative, in America, as a
traditionalist priest, he is meant to be a wholly sympathetic
character by Wolfe. I do not find him so, for any number of reasons,
but my feeling is that Wolfe does intend him to be. I solicit other
reactions to this, from those of you who read the book and still care.

Also, about the wiki, while I have you on the horn here: The "Seven
American Nights" entry ends with the following line:

"It shows us that Americans could behave as horribly as the
third-world people they look down on, were the roles reversed. "

I know it's a wiki, etc.; but is that what whoever wrote it really meant to say?

On Thu, Apr 16, 2009 at 4:19 AM, Mo Holkar / UKG <lists at ukg.co.uk> wrote:
> It seems to me likely that Wolfe means all of his work to have a didactic
> element (in that descriptive sense). Otherwise, what would be the moral
> purpose of writing it?
>
> And to go back to your slightly earlier question -- while Chris surely isn't
> held up as a moral exemplar, he does seem to me to be portrayed
> sympathetically, and his exploits laid out in such a way that instruction
> might be drawn from them. So this might be a more sophisticated take on the
> identify-with protagonist of simplistically didactic YA. I'm not an expert,
> but I'm sure there must be a tradition of other such in the YA canon.
>
> Mo
>
>
> # ~ # ~ #
>

---

From: John Watkins <john.watkins04 at gmail.com>
Date: Thu, 16 Apr 2009 17:46:05 +0000

No, I didn't find Adult Chris to be sympathetic and I'm not sure I was
supposed to.  I don't really have a developed argument for that, though.

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From: Fernando Q. Gouvêa <fqgouvea at colby.edu>
Date: Thu, 16 Apr 2009 18:05:14 +0000

Hmm, I thought it was obvious that PF (and, before it, The Wizard 
Knight) were intended as books for young adults! Both books are about 
manliness and what it implies, about honor and courage, about danger and 
our reaction to it. Those are long-standing themes of young adult 
fiction, though I'll admit that these days they are minor chords amidst 
a slew of plucky heroines and folks who overcome their disadvantages 
and/or oppressions. In both PF and WK the main characters are young, 
come from "our world" or something close to it (which makes them easier 
to understand and identify with), and have to deal with a completely 
different reality. How they deal with it is what makes the books 
interesting.

Is Chris intended as a sympathetic character? I think that to some 
extent he is, though Wolfe has never really written a character that was 
a "good guy" in every way; he knows that all of us have flaws. One of 
the things Wolfe was trying to do in PF, I think, is to complicate our 
sense of what is right and what is wrong by having a young man be formed 
in an utterly foreign culture (piracy in the 17th century). Things we 
consider horrible are routine for him. Things we consider routine (see 
his comments about his life as a priest) are horrible to him. I know 
it's easy to just say Chris is a "bad guy", but most of us haven't been 
shot at and had to fight for our lives. Could we? If we could, should 
we? Nor have we been hungry and had to decide whether to steal.

This is why, I think, the time travel motif is essential to the book. It 
allows the kind of distancing that is required to embed us (via Chris) 
in a different cultural world.

Of course, all this is going on while Wolfe is also taking a look at 
pirate adventure stories and rubbing our noses in the parts that don't 
usually get much attention: the easy brutality, the way women and slaves 
were treated, and all that. But he does it through Chris's eyes, who 
sees much of it as "just the way things are"...

Fernando

-- 
=============================================================
Fernando Q. Gouvea             
Carter Professor of Mathematics   
Colby College                     Editor, MAA FOCUS
5836 Mayflower Hill               Editor, MAA Reviews
Waterville, ME 04901              http://mathdl.maa.org/mathDL/19/
http://www.colby.edu/~fqgouvea

A man either lives life as it happens to him, meets it head-on and licks it, or he turns his back on it and starts to wither away. 
  -- Dr. Boyce, "The Menagerie" ("The Cage"), stardate unknown

---

From: James Wynn <crushtv at gmail.com>
Date: Thu, 16 Apr 2009 18:21:08 +0000

>Hmm, I thought it was obvious that PF
>(and, before it, The Wizard Knight) were
>intended as books for young adults!

I haven't read PF, but I can pretty well guarantee that WK will not end up 
in the library at any junior high I know about. It's violent and overtly 
sexual. And it's tone would definitely not hold the attention of any but the 
most exceptional young teen. I'd as soon label "A Voyage to Arcturus" as YA 
fiction as I would WK.

J.

---

From: Mo Holkar / UKG <lists at ukg.co.uk>
Date: Thu, 16 Apr 2009 18:38:13 +0000

>I know it's a wiki, etc.; but is that what whoever wrote it really 

That particular bit was written by DaveTallman, who's also on this 
list -- hopefully he can answer to his intention.

The url is:
http://www.wolfewiki.com/pmwiki/pmwiki.php?n=Stories.SevenAmericanNights
for anyone else who's interested,

best,

Mo

# ~ # ~ #

---

From: brunians at brunians.org <brunians at brunians.org>
Date: Thu, 16 Apr 2009 18:41:51 +0000

Now why do you dislike him as a modern priest, because he thinks children
should be taught to violently resist sexual predation? Someone else was on
about that, they thought that it was 'blaming the victim', something I
don't see.

.

>> didactic

---

From: brunians at brunians.org <brunians at brunians.org>
Date: Thu, 16 Apr 2009 18:43:49 +0000

I sort of liked him. I think he was probably a valuable priest in his
inner-city parish there.

.

>> I know it's a wiki, etc.; but is that what whoever wrote it really meant
>> to
>> say?
>>
>> > might be drawn from them. So this might be a more sophisticated take
>> on
>> the

---

From: Jerry Friedman <jerry_friedman at yahoo.com>
Date: Thu, 16 Apr 2009 20:15:54 +0000

--- On Thu, 4/16/09, Jonathan Goodwin <joncgoodwin at gmail.com> wrote:
> but my feeling is that Wolfe does intend him to be.
...

Mostly I find him sympathetic.  However, I didn't like his
sophistry about why it didn't matter that he planned to break
his vow of chastity, or the fact that he broke his vow of
obedience and planned to break his vow of poverty without a
word to us on the subject.  I'd have liked him better if
he'd said, "I know I took these vows, but I'm going to break
them because my wife and our unborn, long-dead child are the
most important things to me."

It also seemed that he wasn't serious about the religion he
was professing.  When he discusses moral problems such as
whether it's okay to knock down obstreperous teenage boys
("the fighting priest who can talk to the young"?) or
teach children to violently resist molestation, I don't
remember him ever mentioning the Church's view.  He
certainly believes in God, but I remember no sign that
he believes in the divinity of Jesus or the holiness of
any saint.  I don't find this sort of thing sympathetic in
a clergyman, but I don't know what Wolfe intends.

Do we ever find out why he chose the priesthood when he
returned to the 21st Century?  Or whether, when he chose it,
he was already thinking that he'd leave for the 17th if
Communism fell in Cuba?

Jerry Friedman

---

From: Jerry Friedman <jerry_friedman at yahoo.com>
Date: Fri, 17 Apr 2009 17:45:21 +0000

--- On Thu, 4/16/09, James Wynn <crushtv at gmail.com> wrote:

> From: James Wynn <crushtv at gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: (urth) PF as YA
> To: "The Urth Mailing List" <urth at lists.urth.net>
> Date: Thursday, April 16, 2009, 12:21 PM
> I haven't read PF, but I can pretty well guarantee that
> WK will not end up in the library at any junior high I know
> about. It's violent and overtly sexual. And it's
> tone would definitely not hold the attention of any but the
> most exceptional young teen. I'd as soon label "A
> Voyage to Arcturus" as YA fiction as I would WK.

I don't think "for young adults", quoted above, means
junior high.  Maybe "YA", which I used, does, thought I
thought it included high-school-age kids too.

Jerry Friedman

---

From: Henry Eissler <henryeissleriii at mindspring.com>
Date: Fri, 17 Apr 2009 17:53:05 +0000

Fernando Q. Gouv?a wrote:
> extent he is, though Wolfe has never really written a character that 
> was a "good guy" in every way; he knows that all of us have flaws. One 
> of the things Wolfe was trying to do in PF, I think, is to complicate 
> our sense of what is right and what is wrong by having a young man be 
> formed in an utterly foreign culture (piracy in the 17th century). 
> Things we consider horrible are routine for him. Things we consider 
> routine (see his comments about his life as a priest) are horrible to 
> him. I know it's easy to just say Chris is a "bad guy", but most of us 
> haven't been shot at and had to fight for our lives. Could we? If we 
> could, should we? Nor have we been hungry and had to decide whether to 
> steal.
    For what it's worth:
    It always seemed to me that PF was about situational ethics- or 
rather, morals.  I didn't walk away with the impression that Chris 
considered the horrible things he and his crew did to be anything less 
than horrible.  It took a long time and a lot of pushing for him to 
finally become a pirate, even with his gangster background.  After that, 
he did everything in his power to influence his crew and anyone he came 
into contact with to be better, more devout people.  Just like so many 
other Wolfe protagonists.
    Bram Burt was a privateer.  Chris took his orders directly from 
Burt.  Essentially, they were at war with Spain.  This was the situation 
he'd been thrust into- that God placed him in.  He made the best of it, 
and tried to be the best man he could be within it.  And I believe that 
Father Chris knew that no good man would be likely to understand or 
forgive the life he'd led.  That only God could be his judge.  And would 
be.  And perhaps had been.
    Anyway, that's my take.  Father Chris knew it was a rougher, tougher 
world than his fellow priests would like to imagine; he wanted to give 
the boys in his care some guidance that they could accept.
    But I never thought of it as a Young Adult novel.  Wizard Knight 
yes.  Not Pirate Freedom.
    ---H

---

From: Jeffrey Brent McBeth <mcbeth at broggs.org>
Date: Fri, 17 Apr 2009 18:04:27 +0000

On Fri, Apr 17, 2009 at 10:45:21AM -0700, Jerry Friedman wrote:
> > It's violent and overtly sexual. And it's

Most definitions of YA put it in the range of I've seen are tween-16

Jeff

-- 
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
"The man who does not read good books has no advantage over 
 the man who cannot read them."
 -- Mark Twain
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From: Fernando Q. Gouvêa <fqgouvea at colby.edu>
Date: Fri, 17 Apr 2009 18:05:16 +0000

I actually thought a bit before phrasing it as "for young adults" 
instead of "YA", for that very reason. "YA", after all, is a marketing 
category. Today it seems to mean "preadolescent".

That said, however, the scuttlebut among authors is that folks have been 
asked to *add* sex and violence to their books in order to make them 
appropriate for the YA market. If you've read a review of Margo 
Lanagan's "Tender Morsels", to choose an example that I happened to 
notice, you know that the "YA" category today embraces a lot of stuff 
that junior high librarians used to frown at.

Fernando

A thing may be too sad to be believed or too wicked to be believed or too good to be believed; but it cannot be too absurd to be believed in this planet of frogs and elephants, of crocodiles and cuttle-fish. 
  -- G. K. Chesterton

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From: James Wynn <crushtv at gmail.com>
Date: Fri, 17 Apr 2009 18:07:41 +0000

> thought it included high-school-age kids too.

Well, when I browse through the YA section of my local used bookstore, I see 
"Wizard of Oz", "Chronicles of Narnia", OS Card's "Ender" series, "Tom 
Sawyer", the "Harry Potter" series, Susan Cooper, and Madeleine L'engle. 
None of these could be categorized with Wizard Knight IMO.

High school libraries might include these books as well and books that 
students might be assigned in college (such as "Huckleberry Finn").  High 
school literature is a "tween" category which doesn't seem to have a 
specific shelf in the publishing industry. For example, L Ron Hubbard's 
"Battlefield Earth" is pulpy and probably especially appealing to a 14 to 17 
audience, but I can't imagine it being marketed as Young Adult.

But you're probably right in this sense: If WK had any chance of becoming a 
"Gold Book", it would happen for an exceptional older teen. But I stand my 
analogy to "A Voyage to Arcturus".

J.

---

From: Fernando Q. Gouvêa <fqgouvea at colby.edu>
Date: Fri, 17 Apr 2009 18:08:35 +0000

That is my reading as well, though I think that we're also expected to 
see that some of Chris's choices are pretty bad choices. The business at 
the end about the vow of celibacy is a particularly discomforting one.

See my other comment about "YA". I'm not sure what that means any more. 
But I still think the themes in PF are appropriate for young adults, and 
especially young men. This seems to be a concern of Wolfe's. Our society 
seems no longer interested in "manliness", but Wolfe is.

Fernando

Henry Eissler wrote:
>> was a "good guy" in every way; he knows that all of us have flaws. 
>> One of the things Wolfe was trying to do in PF, I think, is to 
>> complicate our sense of what is right and what is wrong by having a 
>> young man be formed in an utterly foreign culture (piracy in the 17th 
>> century). Things we consider horrible are routine for him. Things we 
>> consider routine (see his comments about his life as a priest) are 
>> horrible to him. I know it's easy to just say Chris is a "bad guy", 
>> but most of us haven't been shot at and had to fight for our lives. 
>> Could we? If we could, should we? Nor have we been hungry and had to 
>> decide whether to steal.
>    For what it's worth:
> finally become a pirate, even with his gangster background.  After 
> that, he did everything in his power to influence his crew and anyone 
> he came into contact with to be better, more devout people.  Just like 
> so many other Wolfe protagonists.
> Burt.  Essentially, they were at war with Spain.  This was the 
> situation he'd been thrust into- that God placed him in.  He made the 
> best of it, and tried to be the best man he could be within it.  And I 
> believe that Father Chris knew that no good man would be likely to 
> understand or forgive the life he'd led.  That only God could be his 
> judge.  And would be.  And perhaps had been.
>    Anyway, that's my take.  Father Chris knew it was a rougher, 
> tougher world than his fellow priests would like to imagine; he wanted 
> to give the boys in his care some guidance that they could accept.

---

From: Adam Thornton <adam at io.com>
Date: Fri, 17 Apr 2009 18:12:30 +0000

On Apr 17, 2009, at 1:07 PM, James Wynn wrote:

>  For example, L Ron Hubbard's "Battlefield Earth" is pulpy and  
> probably especially appealing to a 14 to 17 audience, but I can't  
> imagine it being marketed as Young Adult.

It should come with a warning label of SOME kind, though.

Adam

---

From: Fred Kiesche <recursive_loop at yahoo.com>
Date: Mon, 20 Apr 2009 03:32:23 +0000

Funny...I was in junior high in the mid-1970's. We had "Voyage to Arcturus". And a lot of stuff by Robert Silverberg, Samuel Delany, and others that was pretty dang "adult".

And a lot of the stuff I see marketed as YA is explicit one way or the other.

In the "teen room" of the town library they have shelves of manga. Some manga can be pretty dang adult. My wife or I check whatever our daughter wants to borrow, less to censor than to provide guidance and offer advice. (If she wanted to take out any of the really "hard" stuff, I'd probably censor/ban, but that's me.)

So there might be more in that junior high library than you know of!

But I doubt you'd find Gene Wolfe, as I don't recall him ever getting a teen/YA marketing push.

F.P. Kiesche III  "Ah Mr. Gibbon, another damned, fat, square book. Always, scribble, scribble, scribble, eh?" (The Duke of Gloucester, on being presented with Volume 2 of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire.) Blogging at The Lensman's Children and TexasBestGrok!

Date: Thursday, April 16, 2009, 2:21 PM

I haven't read PF, but I can pretty well guarantee that WK will not end up
in the library at any junior high I know about. It's violent and overtly
sexual. And it's tone would definitely not hold the attention of any but the
most exceptional young teen. I'd as soon label "A Voyage to
Arcturus" as YA fiction as I would WK.

J. 

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From: Matthew Keeley <matthew.keeley.1 at gmail.com>
Date: Mon, 20 Apr 2009 03:37:50 +0000

My Catholic all-guys high school had copies of The Wizard and The
Knight; that is not, however, how I got into Wolfe.I remember that the
librarians put both books on display (along with lots of other sci-fi
and fantasy stuff, including Watchmen). I was always tempted to read
them, but it's just as well I didn't - I think New Sun was a better
introduction to Wolfe for me.

-Matt

---

From: Henry Eissler <henryeissleriii at mindspring.com>
Date: Mon, 20 Apr 2009 05:50:01 +0000

Fernando Q. Gouv?a wrote:

> See my other comment about "YA". I'm not sure what that means any 
> more. But I still think the themes in PF are appropriate for young 
> adults, and especially young men. This seems to be a concern of 
> Wolfe's. Our society seems no longer interested in "manliness", but 
> Wolfe is.
>
    I think I would have worded that differently, but that in the end 
we'd be talking about the same thing.  I agree.  I hadn't thought the 
novel was intended for a younger audience, but it could have been.  I 
think the spectre of "Treasure Island" helps that impression.
  
> see that some of Chris's choices are pretty bad choices. The business 
> at the end about the vow of celibacy is a particularly discomforting one.
    I realize now that I was somewhat stating the obvious.
    I didn't get the part about Chris making bad choices.  His plan to 
break the vow of celibacy, for instance- didn't disturb me.  At that 
point Chris was long past having decided that his own relationship with 
God was unique.  Perhaps the danger of that is part of what the book 
tries to explore.  But also, the woman in question was his wife.  Why he 
made such a vow in the first place, I don't know; but the idea of 
breaking it bothered him enough to mention it in his "confession".
    All I can say is that upon my first read, I wasn't struck by any 
moral qualms.  I don't know if I'd say that I found the character 
sympathetic, but I felt his actions to be contextually appropriate.  
That is, though I probably wouldn't have done the same things in the 
same situation, it seemed to make sense for him.  It never occurred to 
me to doubt his (young Chris') relationship with his own conscience.
    As I said in a previous post, there were points where I felt that 
Father Chris was tempted to take a dark road.  That owing to freedom of 
choice, there were necessarily a Good Ignacio and a Bad Ignacio in the 
17th century.
    Anyway, thanks for your kind response.
    ---H

---

From: Allan Anderson <rubel at goosemoon.org>
Date: Mon, 20 Apr 2009 14:31:21 +0000

> think the spectre of "Treasure Island" helps that impression.
I should ask my sister the youth librarian what she thinks. She's pretty 
much of the, "hey, if it gets them to read, it's okay" school when it 
comes to sex and swashbuckling in novels. But would it draw in and 
reward a Young Adult audience, that slippery category?
>  
>> That is my reading as well, though I think that we're also expected 
>> to see that some of Chris's choices are pretty bad choices. The 
>> business at the end about the vow of celibacy is a particularly 
>> discomforting one.
> point Chris was long past having decided that his own relationship 
> with God was unique.  Perhaps the danger of that is part of what the 
> book tries to explore.  But also, the woman in question was his wife.  
> Why he made such a vow in the first place, I don't know; but the idea 
> of breaking it bothered him enough to mention it in his "confession".
>
You make some very good points! Hey, do you think he took his vow 
partially because he thought, "there can be no other woman for me but 
Novia"? IIRC, he doesn't figure out that he can possibly go back until 
after doing so; I'm not 100% on this chronology, though.

It's still creepy. Hey, you know that old monk guy who's living with 
you? Well, he's really the same person as your dashing teenage pirate 
husband! On the up side, you have someone to help take care of the baby 
(possibly with a lot of loot). On the down side, you've traded in your 
handsome young man for someone much older (something you ran away from, 
if I recall). Plus, there's this priest who keeps checking out your ass.

At what point does Chris wearing the cassock become seriously deceitful?

---

From: Fernando Q. Gouvêa <fqgouvea at colby.edu>
Date: Mon, 20 Apr 2009 15:29:48 +0000

I don't quite remember the rules, but isn't there some special provision 
for men who were married before becoming priests?

Fernando

Allan Anderson wrote:
> I should ask my sister the youth librarian what she thinks. She's 
> pretty much of the, "hey, if it gets them to read, it's okay" school 
> when it comes to sex and swashbuckling in novels. But would it draw in 
> and reward a Young Adult audience, that slippery category?
>>  
>> book tries to explore.  But also, the woman in question was his 
>> wife.  Why he made such a vow in the first place, I don't know; but 
>> the idea of breaking it bothered him enough to mention it in his 
>> "confession".
>>
> husband! On the up side, you have someone to help take care of the 
> baby (possibly with a lot of loot). On the down side, you've traded in 
> your handsome young man for someone much older (something you ran away 
> from, if I recall). Plus, there's this priest who keeps checking out 
> your ass.
>

It is necessary for the welfare of society that genius should be privileged to utter sedition, to blaspheme, to outrage good taste, to corrupt the youthful mind, and generally to scandalize one's uncles. 
  -- George Bernard Shaw

---

From: Dan'l Danehy-Oakes <danldo at gmail.com>
Date: Mon, 20 Apr 2009 15:59:43 +0000

2009/4/20 "Fernando Q. Gouv?a" <fqgouvea at colby.edu>:
> I don't quite remember the rules, but isn't there some special provision for
> men who were married before becoming priests?

There have been a few exceptions granted for clergy from other denominations
converting and becoming priests, but that is very rare.

The relevant question here -- and it's one which I don't know the
answer to -- is,
"what if a widower becomes a priest and it turns out his wife isn't dead after
all?" My guess is that this would become an exception, because neither the
sacrament of matrimony nor that of holy orders can be "undone."

-- 
Dan'l Danehy-Oakes

---

From: Fred Kiesche <recursive_loop at yahoo.com>
Date: Mon, 20 Apr 2009 16:25:39 +0000

If you are a deacon (we have four in our RC parish) and your wife dies, you've made a committment to become a priest...

F.P. Kiesche III
"Ah Mr. Gibbon, another damned, fat, square book. Always, scribble, scribble, scribble, eh?" (The Duke of Gloucester, on being presented with Volume 2 of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire.) Blogging at The Lensman's Children and TexasBestGrok!

--- On Mon, 4/20/09, "Fernando Q. Gouv?a" <fqgouvea at colby.edu> wrote:

From: "Fernando Q. Gouv?a" <fqgouvea at colby.edu>
Subject: Re: (urth) PF as YA
To: "The Urth Mailing List" <urth at lists.urth.net>
Date: Monday, April 20, 2009, 11:29 AM

Fernando

Allan Anderson wrote:
>>> See my other comment about "YA". I'm not sure what
that means any more. But I still think the themes in PF are appropriate for
young adults, and especially young men. This seems to be a concern of
Wolfe's. Our society seems no longer interested in "manliness",
but Wolfe is.
we'd be talking about the same thing.  I agree.  I hadn't thought the
novel was intended for a younger audience, but it could have been.  I think the
spectre of "Treasure Island" helps that impression.
> I should ask my sister the youth librarian what she thinks. She's
pretty much of the, "hey, if it gets them to read, it's okay"
school when it comes to sex and swashbuckling in novels. But would it draw in
and reward a Young Adult audience, that slippery category?
>>  
>>> That is my reading as well, though I think that we're also
expected to see that some of Chris's choices are pretty bad choices. The
business at the end about the vow of celibacy is a particularly discomforting
one.
>>    I didn't get the part about Chris making bad choices.  His plan
to break the vow of celibacy, for instance- didn't disturb me.  At that
point Chris was long past having decided that his own relationship with God was
unique.  Perhaps the danger of that is part of what the book tries to explore. 
But also, the woman in question was his wife.  Why he made such a vow in the
first place, I don't know; but the idea of breaking it bothered him enough
to mention it in his "confession".
> 
> It's still creepy. Hey, you know that old monk guy who's living
with you? Well, he's really the same person as your dashing teenage pirate
husband! On the up side, you have someone to help take care of the baby
(possibly with a lot of loot). On the down side, you've traded in your
handsome young man for someone much older (something you ran away from, if I
recall). Plus, there's this priest who keeps checking out your ass.
> At what point does Chris wearing the cassock become seriously deceitful?

-- =============================================================
Fernando Q. Gouvea             Carter Professor of Mathematics   Colby College 
                   Editor, MAA FOCUS
5836 Mayflower Hill               Editor, MAA Reviews
Waterville, ME 04901              http://mathdl.maa.org/mathDL/19/
http://www.colby.edu/~fqgouvea

It is necessary for the welfare of society that genius should be privileged to
utter sedition, to blaspheme, to outrage good taste, to corrupt the youthful
mind, and generally to scandalize one's uncles.  -- George Bernard Shaw

      
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From: Matthew Weber <palaeologos at gmail.com>
Date: Mon, 20 Apr 2009 16:32:32 +0000

Eastern Catholic (and Orthodox) priests may marry before their ordination,
but married men cannot be bishops in either jurisdiction.

In the various Anglican and Old Catholic jurisdictions, any clergy may marry
at any time.  The more conservative will not allow divorce and remarriage,
but there are otherwise no restrictions on wedlock, nor any requirement of
celibacy.

The Roman Catholic Church has, on occasion, reordained married Anglican
clergymen into the RC priesthood (the official RC position is that Anglican
orders are not valid, so they are re-ordained if they are to function
clerically).  Otherwise, only perpetual deacons are permitted to be married,
and they must be married before they are ordained.

On Mon, Apr 20, 2009 at 9:25 AM, Fred Kiesche <recursive_loop at yahoo.com>wrote:

> If you are a deacon (we have four in our RC parish) and your wife dies,
> you've made a committment to become a priest...
>
> F.P. Kiesche III
> "Ah Mr. Gibbon, another damned, fat, square book. Always, scribble,
> scribble, scribble, eh?" (The Duke of Gloucester, on being presented with Volume
> 2 of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire.) Blogging at The Lensman's
> Children <http://theeternalgoldenbraid.blogspot.com/> and TexasBestGrok<http://texasbestgrok.mu.nu/>
> !
>
>
> --- On *Mon, 4/20/09, "Fernando Q. Gouv?a" <fqgouvea at colby.edu>* wrote:
>
> Waterville, ME 04901              http://mathdl.maa.org/mathDL/19/http://www.colby.edu/~fqgouvea <http://www.colby.edu/%7Efqgouvea>
>

-- 
Matt +

If liberty and equality, as is thought by some, are chiefly to be found in
democracy, they will be best attained when all persons alike share in the
government to the utmost.
Aristotle (384-322 B.C.), Politics, bk. IV, ch. 4
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From: Dan'l Danehy-Oakes <danldo at gmail.com>
Date: Mon, 20 Apr 2009 16:49:40 +0000

That's weird. In our diocese there's a clear distinction between
"transitional deacons"
who expect to become priests and "permanant deacons" which are the married men
who assist in parishes.

On Mon, Apr 20, 2009 at 9:25 AM, Fred Kiesche <recursive_loop at yahoo.com> wrote:
> scribble, scribble, eh?" (The Duke of Gloucester, on being presented with
> Volume 2 of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire.) Blogging at The
> Lensman's Children and TexasBestGrok!
>
> discomforting

-- 
Dan'l Danehy-Oakes

---

From: Jerry Friedman <jerry_friedman at yahoo.com>
Date: Mon, 20 Apr 2009 21:24:23 +0000

--- On Mon, 4/20/09, Allan Anderson <rubel at goosemoon.org> wrote:
...

> You make some very good points! Hey, do you think he took
> his vow partially because he thought, "there can be no
> other woman for me but Novia"? IIRC, he doesn't
> figure out that he can possibly go back until after doing
> so; I'm not 100% on this chronology, though.
...

That's an interesting question.  I don't remember anything
about when he makes the decision. or when he figures out
that he can go back.  It could be as soon as he finds out
what year he's returned to.

> At what point does Chris wearing the cassock become

Another interesting question.  Maybe the second he puts
it on?  He seems to want to help people, which is important
to me, but as I said in an earlier post I remember no
evidence that he believes in Christianity, which seems
important to the question of deceit.  and again, he has
even less trouble breaking his vows of poverty and
obedience than he does his vow of chastity.

I would also imagine that somebody would talk to a
prospective priest about his vows, and say something like,
"This vow means, for example, that if there's a woman you'd
go back to if it ever became possible, you're giving up on
her."  If this subject or something like it is raised,
it's really time for Chris to think about Novia and whether
he could ever go back to her, if he hasn't thought about
that already.

Jerry Friedman

---

From: Jerry Friedman <jerry_friedman at yahoo.com>
Date: Mon, 20 Apr 2009 21:33:24 +0000

--- On Mon, 4/20/09, Dan'l Danehy-Oakes <danldo at gmail.com> wrote:
...

> sacrament of matrimony nor that of holy orders can be

As I recall, there's such a thing as a conditional baptism.
You're making me wonder whether there's a conditional
ordination in cases where there's some doubt about whether
the wife is really dead.  Of course, if there's much
doubt, I imagine the widower couldn't be ordained, but
what about the case of a shipwreck or plane crash where
it's practically certain that no one survived, but no
bodies were recovered?

Getting back to /Pirate Freedom/, though, obviously
Chris isn't going to tell anyone in the 21st-century
Church about Novia.

Who here wishes Wolfe had included Chris's letter to
Bishop Scully resigning his post?

Jerry Friedman

---

From: Matthew Weber <palaeologos at gmail.com>
Date: Mon, 20 Apr 2009 21:42:10 +0000

> Bishop Scully resigning his post?
No, a conditional ordination would be when there's doubt that a person has
been ordained validly.  Sacraments *sub conditione *are administered when
there is some kind of doubt as to the validity of a previous bestowal (as
also with baptism or confirmation; the RCC will conditionally re-baptize or
confirm if an initiate is unsure whether he has been previously baptized or
confirmed, or if the person has been baptized with a non-Trinitarian
formula).  There's no provision for "taking back" any sacrament once it's
been conferred; even ordination, once it's been given, can never be taken
back.  A so-called "defrocked" priest hasn't been deprived of the
priesthood, just his ability to legally exercise it.  Likewise, a
declaration of a marriage's nullity doesn't cancel the sacrament--it says
that it never actually occurred.

There is no dogmatic or doctrinal prohibition against married priests in the
RCC.  It is purely a matter of discipline.  A married man *can* be a priest;
the Roman Catholic Church just doesn't ordain married men.  There are a
number of explanations why this is so; the most frequent ones are 1) being a
priest is a demanding job which requires the full attention of the person
who exercises it, leaving no room in his life for a family; and 2) paying
the additional amount required to support a wife and children would divert
money that the Church needs for other things.

-- 
Matt +

Inferiors revolt in order that they may be equal, and equals that they may
be superior.  Such is the state of mind which creates revolutions.
Aristotle (384-322 B.C.), Politics, bk. V, ch. 2
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From: Jerry Friedman <jerry_friedman at yahoo.com>
Date: Tue, 21 Apr 2009 04:26:27 +0000

--- On Mon, 4/20/09, Matthew Weber <palaeologos at gmail.com> wrote:

> From: Matthew Weber <palaeologos at gmail.com>
> To: jerry_friedman at yahoo.com, "The Urth Mailing List" <urth at lists.urth.net>
> Date: Monday, April 20, 2009, 3:42 PM
> > > The relevant question here -- and it's one
> which I
> > > don't know the
> > > answer to -- is,
> > > "what if a widower becomes a priest and it
> turns out
> > > his wife isn't dead after
> > > all?" My guess is that this would become an
> exception,
> > > because neither the
> > > sacrament of matrimony nor that of holy orders
> can be
> > > "undone."
> >
...

> confirmed, or if the person has been baptized with a
> non-Trinitarian formula).
...

Thanks for the information.  It seems that if they could
baptize on that condition they could administer other
sacraments on other conditions, but I believe you that
they don't.

> the Roman Catholic Church just doesn't ordain married
> men.

So occasionally they face the question of whether a
supposed widower really is one.  If I understand you
correctly, accidentally ordaining a married man wouldn't
be a disaster, so this may not be that big a deal.

I didn't think about, but the question must come up
far more often in the case of supposed widows and
widowers who want to marry again, and I'm sure ways
of dealing with that have been developed.

Jerry Friedman

---

From: Matthew Weber <palaeologos at gmail.com>
Date: Tue, 21 Apr 2009 04:33:51 +0000

> sacraments on other conditions, but I believe you that
Oh, they do; but an ordination sub conditione isn't the circumstance of
"we're ordaining you presuming that you're single," but the condition of
"we're re-ordaining you because there is reason to doubt your first
ordination."  In other words, an ordination isn't invalidated if the cleric
is found to be married after all (and never could be).

-- 
Matt +

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From: Adam Thornton <adam at io.com>
Date: Fri, 24 Apr 2009 03:03:28 +0000

Been awfully quiet around here lately.  Did everyone get eaten by a  
werewolf?

Adam

---

From: Lane Haygood <lhaygood at gmail.com>
Date: Fri, 24 Apr 2009 03:04:07 +0000

I might have been.  I'm not making promises.

-L.

On Thu, Apr 23, 2009 at 10:03 PM, Adam Thornton <adam at io.com> wrote:
> Been awfully quiet around here lately. “Did everyone get eaten by a
> werewolf”
>
> Adam

---

From: Bryan Alexander <bryan.alexander at gmail.com>
Date: Fri, 24 Apr 2009 03:05:14 +0000

I've been rereading the stories Clute listed as his favorite Wolfe, mostly
novellas.

-- 
Bryan Alexander
http://infocult.typepad.com/
http://twitter.com/BryanAlexander
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From: brunians at brunians.org <brunians at brunians.org>
Date: Fri, 24 Apr 2009 03:08:20 +0000

Shhh.

We're meditating.

.

---

From: Adam Thornton <adam at io.com>
Date: Fri, 24 Apr 2009 03:12:20 +0000

Outside of a dog, a book is a man's best friend.

Inside a dog (or presumably other canid), it's too dark to see.

But perfect for meditation.

Adam

---

From: brunians at brunians.org <brunians at brunians.org>
Date: Fri, 24 Apr 2009 03:20:19 +0000

But then, how to answer the question;

Where wolf?

??

.

---

From: John Watkins <john.watkins04 at gmail.com>
Date: Fri, 24 Apr 2009 03:28:55 +0000

Where wolf?

Wolf here!

Good wolf!

On Thu, Apr 23, 2009 at 11:20 PM, <brunians at brunians.org> wrote:

> ?
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From: Craig Brewer <cnbrewer at yahoo.com>
Date: Fri, 24 Apr 2009 04:03:04 +0000

Oreb, you seem so...hairy and...canine...

________________________________
From: John Watkins <john.watkins04 at gmail.com>
To: The Urth Mailing List <urth at lists.urth.net>
Sent: Thursday, April 23, 2009 10:28:55 PM
Subject: Re: (urth) Is this thing on?

Where wolf?

Wolf here!

Good wolf!

Where wolf?

??

.

      
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From: hammstu at sbcglobal.net <hammstu at sbcglobal.net>
Date: Fri, 24 Apr 2009 04:46:42 +0000

I'm in the middle of 5 countries in 10 days in SE Asia...don't know if GW has fans in Malasyia
Here's one...what happened to Mucor at the end of SS? Why didn' she leave to the Whorl with the rest???
------Original Message------
From: Adam Thornton
Sender: urth-bounces at lists.urth.net
To: The Urth Mailing List
ReplyTo: The Urth Mailing List
Sent: Apr 23, 2009 8:03 PM
Subject: (urth) Is this thing on?

Adam

Sent from my BlackBerry? smartphone with SprintSpeed

---

From: David Stockhoff <dstockhoff at verizon.net>
Date: Fri, 24 Apr 2009 14:21:30 +0000

Good Wolfe!

------------------------------

Message: 8
Date: Thu, 23 Apr 2009 21:03:04 -0700 (PDT)
From: Craig Brewer <cnbrewer at yahoo.com>
Subject: Re: (urth) Is this thing on?
To: The Urth Mailing List <urth at lists.urth.net>
Message-ID: <683893.66923.qm at web37601.mail.mud.yahoo.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

Where wolf?

Wolf here!

Good wolf!

Where wolf?

??

.

>>> >>> Been awfully quiet around here lately.  Did everyone get eaten by a

---
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Virus Database (VPS): 090423-0, 04/23/2009
Tested on: 4/24/2009 10:21:31 AM
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---

From: Dan'l Danehy-Oakes <danldo at gmail.com>
Date: Fri, 24 Apr 2009 15:46:01 +0000

On Thu, Apr 23, 2009 at 8:05 PM, Bryan Alexander
> I've been rereading the stories Clute listed as his favorite Wolfe, mostly

Where's this list?

-- 
Dan'l Danehy-Oakes

---

From: Adam Thornton <adam at io.com>
Date: Fri, 24 Apr 2009 17:25:36 +0000

Hey, random Oreb sighting!

http://www.questionablecontent.net/view.php?comic=532

Panel 3.

Well, sorta.

Adam

---

From: don doggett <kingwukong at yahoo.com>
Date: Sat, 25 Apr 2009 00:25:40 +0000

I've been on a strange noir kick, re-reading 100 bullets (the series is finally done, sniff), Ed Brubaker's Criminal, and Kris Saknussemm's Private Midnight (which is fantastic until the last thirty pages, but wraps things up too neatly at the end) I thought it was going to be like Sharp Teeth (speaking of werewolves) but they have nothing in common really except the noir angle. Sharp Teeth is f'ing awesome btw. LA werewolf noir in iambic pentameter. You have to read it to believe it.

Don

Doggerel
www.don-doggett.blogspot.com
Monkeypish
www.monkeypish.blogspot.com

--- On Thu, 4/23/09, Adam Thornton <adam at io.com> wrote:

> From: Adam Thornton <adam at io.com>
> Date: Thursday, April 23, 2009, 8:03 PM
> Been awfully quiet around here
> lately. Did everyone get eaten by a werewolf?
> 
> Adam