{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/5423", "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": 5423, "subject": "Rajan and Food-Wolfe overview?", "messages": 2, "voices": 2, "first": "2009-04-30T15:13:56+00:00", "last": "2009-04-30T17:47:44+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "b sharp", "address": "bsharporflat at hotmail.com" }, "date": "2009-04-30T15:13:56+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Rajan and Food-Wolfe overview?", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "In following this debate I find myself stepping back a few paces to try to \ndiscern a larger pattern. In 5HoC we have Shadow Children who take on the form\nof what might be called their prey, humans, to varying degrees. Their original \nform was too ambiguous to really comprehend but those Shadow Children who become\nmost fully human lose their memory and sense of identity.\n \nThen we have BotNS (and perhaps the Latro books) in which I (perhaps alone) detect\na back story which tries to give a scientific (or science fiction) reality to the origin\nof ancient mythology. This involves the intrusion on Urth (and Earth) of interstellar \nentities which are capable of shape shifting to human and other forms, perhaps budding\noff small portions, etc. As is common in mythology this shifting (which includes DNA\nchanges) allows mating and even reproduction between aliens/gods and humans.\n\nAnd we have Long/Short Sun books which perhaps try to tie some of these ideas together. \nThough not religious myself, I have always had a puzzling religious question- If God \ndid all this work to create Earth and people and provide Salvation, what is the rest of\nthe universe for? Are there alien Bibles and Jesuses? I can imagine Gene Wolfe pondering\nthe same question.\n \nPerhaps Wolfe's idea is that there are these shape shifting entities, some malevolent, some\nbenign, travelling through the universe, finding all inhabited planets. This leads to a \nnecessary spiritual progression on each planet which involves infestation and corruption\nthrough interbreeding with the natives, a purifying flood, and the appearance of a Saviour\nin the form of a native with god-like power but partial or full amnesia regarding his connection\nto universe traversing entities.\n \nCould this idea be applied to explain the Bible, Jesus, Urth, Severian, Blue and Silk under \na single umbrella of thought? I dunno, but I'm trying. I'm the sort who solves a jigsaw\npuzzle by trying to get the outer framework solved first before tackling the difficult inner\nworkings. Any help is appreciated!\n \n-bsharp" } ] }, { "message_id": "<49F9E440.6050404@verizon.net>", "from": { "name": "David Stockhoff", "address": "dstockhoff at verizon.net" }, "date": "2009-04-30T17:47:44+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Rajan and Food-Wolfe overview?", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I think that's an excellent and provocative summary. I think Wolfe ponders questions of belief like yours constantly, always focusing on the precise details of who and what perfectly intelligent people believe or have believed, and what we believe or are willing to believe now. To him, they are all true, in that they all may lead to truth.\n\nSo gods/Gods, angels/demons, and ghosts/aliens are naturally going to be a theme for him. If there are forces out there, almost but not quite unseen, are they independent forces, or manipulated forces/manifestations, or somehow projections of our own capacity for evil/desire for good?\n\nSee Crowley's Aegypt tetralogy, btw, for an example of a godlike character first seen striding across the universe, then (perhaps, if it is he) trying to remember his origin beyond Earth---exactly as you describe.\n\nFor Crowley, the same question works out not to How does God show himself to us/hide himself from us, but more how does the true nature of the universe do the same. How do we overlook it/how do we discover it? At least that's how I see it." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "------------------------------\n\nMessage: 7\nDate: Thu, 30 Apr 2009 11:13:56 -0400\nFrom: b sharp \nSubject: (urth) Rajan and Food-Wolfe overview?\nTo: \nMessage-ID: \nContent-Type: text/plain; charset=\"Windows-1252\"\n\n\nIn following this debate I find myself stepping back a few paces to try to \ndiscern a larger pattern. In 5HoC we have Shadow Children who take on the form\nof what might be called their prey, humans, to varying degrees. Their original \nform was too ambiguous to really comprehend but those Shadow Children who become\nmost fully human lose their memory and sense of identity.\n \nThen we have BotNS (and perhaps the Latro books) in which I (perhaps alone) detect\na back story which tries to give a scientific (or science fiction) reality to the origin\nof ancient mythology. This involves the intrusion on Urth (and Earth) of interstellar \nentities which are capable of shape shifting to human and other forms, perhaps budding\noff small portions, etc. As is common in mythology this shifting (which includes DNA\nchanges) allows mating and even reproduction between aliens/gods and humans.\n\nAnd we have Long/Short Sun books which perhaps try to tie some of these ideas together. \nThough not religious myself, I have always had a puzzling religious question- If God \ndid all this work to create Earth and people and provide Salvation, what is the rest of\nthe universe for? Are there alien Bibles and Jesuses? I can imagine Gene Wolfe pondering\nthe same question.\n \nPerhaps Wolfe's idea is that there are these shape shifting entities, some malevolent, some\nbenign, travelling through the universe, finding all inhabited planets. This leads to a \nnecessary spiritual progression on each planet which involves infestation and corruption\nthrough interbreeding with the natives, a purifying flood, and the appearance of a Saviour\nin the form of a native with god-like power but partial or full amnesia regarding his connection\nto universe traversing entities.\n \nCould this idea be applied to explain the Bible, Jesus, Urth, Severian, Blue and Silk under \na single umbrella of thought? I dunno, but I'm trying. I'm the sort who solves a jigsaw\npuzzle by trying to get the outer framework solved first before tackling the difficult inner\nworkings. Any help is appreciated!\n \n-bsharp\n__________" } ] } ] }