{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/5746", "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": 5746, "subject": "Short Sun blog review", "messages": 51, "voices": 14, "first": "2010-09-21T14:05:43+00:00", "last": "2010-09-23T22:17:52+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Gwern Branwen", "address": "gwern0 at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-09-21T14:05:43+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "It's that time of the week again!\n\n---\n\n\"Notes on Gene Wolfe's \"Short Sun\" novels\"\nhttp://www.tommoody.us/archives/2010/09/18/notes-on-gene-wolfes-short-sun-novels/\n\n\"The novels' not-so-big revelation is that the Neighbors brought the\ninhumi aboard the Ark and are studying human interactions with the\nvampires there, on Blue, and on Green.\n\nIt's a twist on the cultural mirror idea. Humans want to meet an\nextraterrestrial species to understand what it means to be human. When\nthe inhumi suck human or Neighbor blood they become like their\nvictims. Thus they are not a true mirror--they become too much like\nus. The Neighbors want to see how human-influenced inhumi differ from\nNeighbor-influenced inhumi, so the Neighbors can understand\nthemselves. This seems awfully complicated: wouldn't it be easier to\njust cut the inhumi out of the loop? Especially since the book's other\nnot-so-big revelation is that the inhumi have a potentially\nrace-dooming weakness: they must suck the blood of an intelligent\nspecies or remain forever in a pre-sentient, tadpole stage.\n\nWolfe plays many unreliable narrator games with his protagonists. The\nability to transfer cybernetic pieces of people into other people or\nanimals makes for some confusion as to who is really talking and who\nis \"riding\" whom. Ultimately we don't care much. The novels leave too\nmany holes for fans to fill in with theories. The decision to have the\nArk narrative be set in the same timespace as the earlier \"New Sun\"\nstories, two multi-volume series back, seems like a nostalgic impulse\nWolfe shouldn't have succumbed to. Surely a culture that could produce\nan Ark to travel between star systems is an energetic young one, not\nthe miserable Byzantine world of the \"New Sun\" novels, set on an Earth\nso far in the future that the Sun has swollen to Red Giant\nproportions.\n\nWolfe is a good writer but I wouldn't call his work literature so much\nas eloquent, intriguingly convoluted post-new wave SF. Wolfe's\npenchant for Melville-like parables and analogies exists within a pulp\ncontinuum where faith in technology sits comfortably with faith in the\nsupernatural. Genre expectations are satisfied; the Ark we thought\nirrevocably broken will be repaired to colonize yet another group of\nworlds.\"" }, { "kind": "sig", "depth": 0, "text": "gwern" } ] }, { "message_id": "<726860.76604.qm@web84103.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "from": { "name": "DAVID STOCKHOFF", "address": "dstockhoff at verizon.net" }, "date": "2010-09-21T15:06:21+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Yes, \"ultimately we don't care much.\" Talk about unreliable---he could have been honest and said \"I, Tom Moody.\"\nWhat I especially don't understand is how the reviewer can see that the Sun books are constructed of literary references a la Nabokov or Borges, like a hall of mirrors, but can't stop from dismissing them because the references are derived from \"fanboy\" science fiction. It is in all an extraordinarily undeveloped, unreflective, and immature analysis. (And there aren't any \"laser swords,\" whatever that would be.)\nI like the Quetzal page though.\n\n--- On Tue, 9/21/10, Gwern Branwen wrote:\n\nFrom: Gwern Branwen \nSubject: (urth) Short Sun blog review\nTo: \"The Urth Mailing List\" \nDate: Tuesday, September 21, 2010, 10:05 AM\n\nIt's that time of the week again!\n\n---\n\n\"Notes on Gene Wolfe's \"Short Sun\" novels\"\nhttp://www.tommoody.us/archives/2010/09/18/notes-on-gene-wolfes-short-sun-novels/\n\n\"The novels' not-so-big revelation is that the Neighbors brought the\ninhumi aboard the Ark and are studying human interactions with the\nvampires there, on Blue, and on Green.\n\nIt's a twist on the cultural mirror idea. Humans want to meet an\nextraterrestrial species to understand what it means to be human. When\nthe inhumi suck human or Neighbor blood they become like their\nvictims. Thus they are not a true mirror--they become too much like\nus. The Neighbors want to see how human-influenced inhumi differ from\nNeighbor-influenced inhumi, so the Neighbors can understand\nthemselves. This seems awfully complicated: wouldn't it be easier to\njust cut the inhumi out of the loop? Especially since the book's other\nnot-so-big revelation is that the inhumi have a potentially\nrace-dooming weakness: they must suck the blood of an intelligent\nspecies or remain forever in a pre-sentient, tadpole stage.\n\nWolfe plays many unreliable narrator games with his protagonists. The\nability to transfer cybernetic pieces of people into other people or\nanimals makes for some confusion as to who is really talking and who\nis \"riding\" whom. Ultimately we don't care much. The novels leave too\nmany holes for fans to fill in with theories. The decision to have the\nArk narrative be set in the same timespace as the earlier \"New Sun\"\nstories, two multi-volume series back, seems like a nostalgic impulse\nWolfe shouldn't have succumbed to. Surely a culture that could produce\nan Ark to travel between star systems is an energetic young one, not\nthe miserable Byzantine world of the \"New Sun\" novels, set on an Earth\nso far in the future that the Sun has swollen to Red Giant\nproportions.\n\nWolfe is a good writer but I wouldn't call his work literature so much\nas eloquent, intriguingly convoluted post-new wave SF. Wolfe's\npenchant for Melville-like parables and analogies exists within a pulp\ncontinuum where faith in technology sits comfortably with faith in the\nsupernatural. Genre expectations are satisfied; the Ark we thought\nirrevocably broken will be repaired to colonize yet another group of\nworlds.\"" }, { "kind": "sig", "depth": 0, "text": "gwern" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Lee Berman", "address": "severiansola at hotmail.com" }, "date": "2010-09-21T16:27:31+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "<726860.76604.qm@web84103.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "The decision to have the Ark narrative be set in the same timespace as the earlier \n\"New Sun\" stories, two multi-volume series back, seems like a nostalgic impulse Wolfe \nshouldn't have succumbed to. Surely a culture that could producean Ark to travel between \nstar systems is an energetic young one, not the miserable Byzantine world of the \"New Sun\" \nnovels, set on an Earth so far in the future that the Sun has swollen to Red Giant \nproportions." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": " \nThis is the section which bothered me the most. Seems to ignore the possibility that The\nWhorl was created and sent during the heyday of the First Empire and misses the rather\nexplicitly explained idea that the sun was reduced in intensity rather rapidly, and likely \non purpose, at the end of this Empire.\n \nMakes me wonder about something. I think I've heard estimates the Whorl is at least 300 years \nold. Typhon was presumably alive on its launching and is still alive when Severian meets him\nstrapped to his couch. Quite a lifespan.\n \nI don't think Typhon is human so it isn't a problem for me but I wonder what others make of this.\nA body transplant every 20 years or so to maintain life and youth? Or some other explanation. \t\t \t \t\t " } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes", "address": "danldo at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-09-21T16:40:57+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Lee,\n\nThe Whorl is at leasdt 300 years old internally -- it is at least a\nthousand years old in sidereal time. And Typhon is not \"still alive\"\nwhen Severian meets him; he is either dead or in some sort of\nsuspended animation. Severian's presence revives him." }, { "kind": "sig", "depth": 0, "text": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Jack Smith", "address": "jack.smith.1946 at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-09-21T16:56:07+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "\" I think I've heard estimates the Whorl is at least 300 years\nold. Typhon was presumably alive on its launching and is still alive when\nSeverian meets him\nstrapped to his couch. Quite a lifespan.\"\n\nIsn't Typhon dead when found by Severian, who then resurrects him? Typhon\nseems to have dried out after lying on the cold, dry mountain for 1000 or\n2000 years (in contrast to Dorcas, who is soggy).\n\nSince the Whorl has traveled near the speed of light on its voyage, time has\nslowed down. So 1000 or 200 years can have passed on Urth, while only 300\nyears have gone by on the Whorl." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Tue, Sep 21, 2010 at 12:27 PM, Lee Berman wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "The decision to have the Ark narrative be set in the same timespace as the\nearlier\n\"New Sun\" stories, two multi-volume series back, seems like a nostalgic\nimpulse Wolfe\nshouldn't have succumbed to. Surely a culture that could producean Ark to\ntravel between\nstar systems is an energetic young one, not the miserable Byzantine world\nof the \"New Sun\"\nnovels, set on an Earth so far in the future that the Sun has swollen to\nRed Giant\nproportions." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "This is the section which bothered me the most. Seems to ignore the\npossibility that The\nWhorl was created and sent during the heyday of the First Empire and misses\nthe rather\nexplicitly explained idea that the sun was reduced in intensity rather\nrapidly, and likely\non purpose, at the end of this Empire.\n\nMakes me wonder about something. I think I've heard estimates the Whorl is\nat least 300 years\nold. Typhon was presumably alive on its launching and is still alive when\nSeverian meets him\nstrapped to his couch. Quite a lifespan.\n\nI don't think Typhon is human so it isn't a problem for me but I wonder\nwhat others make of this.\nA body transplant every 20 years or so to maintain life and youth? Or some\nother explanation.\n_______________________________________________" } ] }, { "message_id": "<186529.94340.qm@web84106.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "from": { "name": "DAVID STOCKHOFF", "address": "dstockhoff at verizon.net" }, "date": "2010-09-21T17:05:15+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Exactly. You'd think the reviewer would have checked this before blogging, since he makes a point of it. Instead, he assumes all his assumptions are fact.\nAlso, the sun is not a red giant in Severian's day, although I certainly assumed so on first reading, until it was explained.\n\n--- On Tue, 9/21/10, Lee Berman wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "From: Lee Berman \nSubject: (urth) Short Sun blog review\nTo: urth at lists.urth.net\nDate: Tuesday, September 21, 2010, 12:27 PM\nThe decision to have the Ark narrative be set in the same timespace as the earlier \"New Sun\" stories, two multi-volume series back, seems like a nostalgic impulse Wolfe shouldn't have succumbed to. Surely a culture that could producean Ark to travel between star systems is an energetic young one, not the miserable Byzantine world of the \"New Sun\" novels, set on an Earth so far in the future that the Sun has swollen to Red Giant proportions." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": " \nThis is the section which bothered me the most. Seems to ignore the possibility that The\nWhorl was created and sent during the heyday of the First Empire and misses the rather\nexplicitly explained idea that the sun was reduced in intensity rather rapidly, and likely \non purpose, at the end of this Empire.\n " } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Gwern Branwen", "address": "gwern0 at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-09-21T17:08:14+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Tue, Sep 21, 2010 at 12:56 PM, Jack Smith wrote:\n\"?I think I've heard estimates the Whorl is at least 300 years\nold. Typhon was presumably alive on its launching and is still alive when\nSeverian meets him\nstrapped to his couch. Quite a lifespan.\"\nIsn't Typhon dead when found by Severian, who then resurrects him? ? Typhon\nseems to have dried out after lying on the cold, dry mountain for 1000 or\n2000 years (in contrast to Dorcas, who is soggy).\nSince the Whorl has traveled near the speed of light on its voyage, time has\nslowed down. ?So 1000 or 200 years can have passed on Urth, while only 300\nyears have gone by on the Whorl." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I don't remember if our past discussions went into the technical\ndetails, but it's pretty unlikely the Whorl got any significant\nslowdown.\n\nUseful link: http://www.projectrho.com/rocket/rocket3aj.html#relativity\n\nNotice that to get a slowdown of even 1/3, you need to get up to\nsomewhere around 0.97 or 0.98 _c_. Given that we're talking an entire\nhollowed-out asteroid, and one which needs to slow down to rest at the\nend... Well, the energy requirements would be absolutely fantastic.\n(And I mean fantastic as in, you'd better have an entire other\nanti-asteroid made of anti-matter for propellant.)\n\nDunno if Wolfe took all this into account, though." }, { "kind": "sig", "depth": 0, "text": "gwern" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes", "address": "danldo at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-09-21T17:27:51+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Tue, Sep 21, 2010 at 10:08 AM, Gwern Branwen wrote:\nNotice that to get a slowdown of even 1/3, you need to get up to\nsomewhere around 0.97 or 0.98 _c_. Given that we're talking an entire\nhollowed-out asteroid, and one which needs to slow down to rest at the\nend... Well, the energy requirements would be absolutely fantastic.\n(And I mean fantastic as in, you'd better have an entire other\nanti-asteroid made of anti-matter for propellant.)\n\nDunno if Wolfe took all this into account, though." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Nor do I. However, this is assuming that the energy sources available\nto Typhon are limited to those we know and love in the 21st Century.\nThe Whorl may be powered by zero point energy or even the infamous\nhandwaving drive." }, { "kind": "sig", "depth": 0, "text": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Lee Berman", "address": "severiansola at hotmail.com" }, "date": "2010-09-21T18:11:57+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Dan'l- Typhon is not \"still alive\" when Severian meets him; he is either dead or \nin some sort of suspended animation." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Jack Smith- Isn't Typhon dead when found by Severian, who then resurrects him? Typhon\nseems to have dried out after lying on the cold, dry mountain for 1000 or 2000 years." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": " \nSorry, I should have been more clear. I was not speaking of that encounter. I was speaking\nof the encounter in UotNS where Severian meets living monarch, Typhon, still strapped to\nhis couch, presumably because Piaton still has some voluntary control over his muscles.\n \nI am interested in people's thoughts. I think maybe there is some presumption that The Whorl \nwas sent right around the time of this encounter? Perhaps, as the blog suggests, it was meant \nto serve as a sort of Ark to preserve humanity in the face of impending destruction. (if so I \ncan agree that Typhon and his ilk look upon humanity as Noah did his passengers, as animals)\n \nMy not fully developed alternate idea would be more along the lines that Blue (and/or maybe Green)\nis a sort of home planet for Typhon and his parasite family. Perhaps the Whorl served as a way to \nsend an excellent host species back the the Motherland for breeding and exploitation. (humans being\na much better prospect than those pesky, advanced Neighbors).\n \nIf so, The whorl could have been sent much earlier than the final days of Typhon's reign. Good\nquestion on whether time dilation was invoked so that 300 years of Whorl time equals 1000+ years of\ntime on Urth.\n \nWhen people on Blue dream-travel to Urth, is there evidence either way that time travel is or isn't\ninvolved? Is it possible or likely that Silkhorn lives in the same exact time as young Severian? \t\t \t \t\t " } ] }, { "message_id": "<4C98FB91.7000608@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "James Wynn", "address": "crushtv at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-09-21T18:38:09+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Jack Smith-\n\" I think I've heard estimates the Whorl is at least 300 years\nold. Typhon was presumably alive on its launching and is still alive when\nSeverian meets him\nstrapped to his couch. Quite a lifespan.\"\nIsn't Typhon dead when found by Severian, who then resurrects him? Typhon\nseems to have dried out after lying on the cold, dry mountain for 1000 or\n2000 years (in contrast to Dorcas, who is soggy).\nSince the Whorl has traveled near the speed of light on its voyage, time has\nslowed down. So 1000 or 200 years can have passed on Urth, while only 300\nyears have gone by on the Whorl." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Gwern-\nI don't remember if our past discussions went into the technical\ndetails, but it's pretty unlikely the Whorl got any significant\nslowdown.\nUseful link: http://www.projectrho.com/rocket/rocket3aj.html#relativity\nNotice that to get a slowdown of even 1/3, you need to get up to\nsomewhere around 0.97 or 0.98 _c_. Given that we're talking an entire\nhollowed-out asteroid, and one which needs to slow down to rest at the\nend... Well, the energy requirements would be absolutely fantastic.\n(And I mean fantastic as in, you'd better have an entire other\nanti-asteroid made of anti-matter for propellant.)\nDunno if Wolfe took all this into account, though." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "In the Urth List Q&A, Wolfe said:\n\n/Q: About how far, really, is the New Sun series set in our future (or \nthe future of the previous universe)? How much time elapses between \nTyphon and Severian?/\n\nA: That is never specified in the books. My offhand guess is between \n1000 and 2000 years. I would have to reread the books with care to \nperhaps trim the estimate up a little bit.\n\nHowever, since Dream-travel can involve Time-travel, all of this might \nbe academic as far as the Rajan's visits to Urth go.\n\nu+16b9" } ] }, { "message_id": "<4C98FDFC.7090908@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "James Wynn", "address": "crushtv at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-09-21T18:48:28+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Jack Smith-\nIsn't Typhon dead when found by Severian, who then resurrects him? Typhon\nseems to have dried out after lying on the cold, dry mountain for 1000 or 2000 years." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Lee-\nSorry, I should have been more clear. I was not speaking of that encounter.\nI was speaking of the encounter in UotNS where Severian meets living monarch,\nTyphon, still strapped to his couch, presumably because Piaton still has\nsome voluntary control over his muscles.\n\nI am interested in people's thoughts. I think maybe there is some presumption\nthat The Whorl was sent right around the time of this encounter?\nPerhaps, as the blog suggests, it was meant to serve as a sort of Ark\nto preserve humanity in the face of impending destruction. (if so I can agree\nthat Typhon and his ilk look upon humanity as Noah did his passengers, as animals)" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": " From the Urth Q&A again:\n\nQ: /What was Typhon's purpose in launching the Whorl and was the \nBlue/Green [solar] system the intended destination?/ --\n\nA: Knowing Typhon as I do, he probably had at least half a dozen \npurposes; but certainly one of the chief must have been \nself-aggrandizement -- to return human kind to the stars would be a very \ngreat thing indeed. Yes, the Blue-Green system was the intended destination.\n\n\nThis answer would require some finessing given the evidence in the Book \nand Urth of the New Sun that human-kind is already spread across the \nheavens, that Typhon himself was born or reared extraterrestrially, and \nthat at some point he was still free to leave. Perhaps he means \nreturning Urth humanity to the stars. The self-aggrandizement must mean \nhe wanted to wow the humanity left on Urth, not the humanity being sent. \nBecause he deprecates his memory among the colonists.\n\nThere is the possibility that Wolfe never really thought hard about why \nTyphon sent out the Whorl.\n\nu+16b9" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes", "address": "danldo at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-09-21T18:55:07+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "<4C98FDFC.7090908@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Tue, Sep 21, 2010 at 11:48 AM, James Wynn wrote:\nThere is the possibility that Wolfe never really thought hard about why\nTyphon sent out the Whorl." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I suspect that the sequence went something like this...\n\n1. Wolfe decided to write what became tBotLS, a book about a\ngeneration ship that actually succeeds in getting its \"cargo\" to its\ndestination. (Note that the series was originally called\n\"Starcrosser's Landing,\" as indicated in the first HC edition.)\n\n2. Possibly at the same time, he decides to write about \"a good man in\na bad religion.\"\n\n3. The two collide in the story of Silk and his false gods.\n\n4. Wolfe thought, \"Wouldn't it be cool if the chief god was\nTyphon...?\" and thus tied the whole thing to tBotNS.\n\n5. Years later, someone asked him why Typhon sent out the Whorl,\ncausing him to really think about it for the first time." }, { "kind": "sig", "depth": 0, "text": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes" } ] }, { "message_id": "<456901.5378.qm@web84102.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "from": { "name": "DAVID STOCKHOFF", "address": "dstockhoff at verizon.net" }, "date": "2010-09-21T20:26:09+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "<4C98FDFC.7090908@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Since there must have been an ancient period of slowboat colonization of at least several nearby star systems---probably more than Typhon ruled---the mere sending of a colony ship for the first time in chiliads would have been a symbolic act of self-aggrandizement, like any attempt to associate a current regime with past empires.\nAs such an act, it would have dwarfed the Holy Roman Empire, the Italian Renaissance, and the Mussolini's attempt to restore Rome, among others.\n\n--- On Tue, 9/21/10, James Wynn wrote:\n\nFrom: James Wynn \nSubject: Re: (urth) Short Sun blog review\nTo: urth at lists.urth.net\nDate: Tuesday, September 21, 2010, 2:48 PM\n\n\n\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n\n \n \n Jack Smith- \nIsn't Typhon dead when found by Severian, who then resurrects him? Typhon\nseems to have dried out after lying on the cold, dry mountain for 1000 or 2000 years.\n\n \n \nLee-\nSorry, I should have been more clear. I was not speaking of that encounter.\nI was speaking of the encounter in UotNS where Severian meets living monarch,\nTyphon, still strapped to his couch, presumably because Piaton still has\nsome voluntary control over his muscles.\n \nI am interested in people's thoughts. I think maybe there is some presumption\nthat The Whorl was sent right around the time of this encounter? \nPerhaps, as the blog suggests, it was meant to serve as a sort of Ark\nto preserve humanity in the face of impending destruction. (if so I can agree\nthat Typhon and his ilk look upon humanity as Noah did his passengers, as animals)\n\n \n \n\n From the Urth Q&A again:\n\n Q: What was Typhon's purpose in launching the Whorl and was\n the Blue/Green [solar] system the intended destination? ? \n\n \n A: Knowing Typhon as I do, he probably had at least half a dozen\n purposes; but certainly one of the chief must have been\n self-aggrandizement — to return human kind to the stars would be a\n very great thing indeed. Yes, the Blue-Green system was the\n intended destination.\n \n\n This answer would require some finessing given the evidence in the\n Book and Urth of the New Sun that human-kind is already spread\n across the heavens, that Typhon himself was born or reared\n extraterrestrially, and that at some point he was still free to\n leave. Perhaps he means returning Urth humanity to the stars. The\n self-aggrandizement must mean he wanted to wow the humanity left on\n Urth, not the humanity being sent. Because he deprecates his memory\n among the colonists.\n\n \n\n There is the possibility that Wolfe never really thought hard about\n why Typhon sent out the Whorl.\n\n \n\n u+16b9\n\n \n\n \n\n \n\n\n-----Inline Attachment Follows-----" } ] }, { "message_id": "<369471.63258.qm@web37605.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "from": { "name": "Craig Brewer", "address": "cnbrewer at yahoo.com" }, "date": "2010-09-21T21:44:51+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I'm a bit confused by his summary:" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Wolfe is a good writer but I wouldn't call his work literature so much\nas eloquent, intriguingly convoluted post-new wave SF. Wolfe's\npenchant for Melville-like parables and analogies exists within a pulp\ncontinuum where faith in technology sits comfortably with faith in the\nsupernatural. Genre expectations are satisfied; the Ark we thought\nirrevocably broken will be repaired to colonize yet another group of\nworlds.\"" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I don't understand his distinction between \"literature\" and \"genre\" here. \nBecause there's optimism about technology and optimism about faith, the books \ndon't count as literature? So only cynical works count as literature? On the one \nhand, this seems to ignore the fact that there are all kinds of crises of faith \nand ambiguities about the cultural value of technology in the books, especially \nif the inhumi's \"evolution\" is considered technology from a different \nstandpoint. But on the other hand, why does this just become \"eloquent, \nintriguingly convoluted post-new wave SF\" if it doesn't ultimately belittle \ntechnology and/or show that faith can't exist alongside that?\n\nI just find the line of thought here particularly weird. It seems to come down \nto: I didn't like the books' take on the themes, so I won't value it with the \nterm 'literature'.\n\n\n\n " } ] }, { "message_id": "<65620.35194.qm@smtp819.mail.ukl.yahoo.com>", "from": { "name": "Mo Holkar", "address": "lists at ukg.co.uk" }, "date": "2010-09-21T22:03:21+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "At 19:55 21/09/2010, Dan'l wrote:\n4. Wolfe thought, \"Wouldn't it be cool if the chief god was \nTyphon...?\" and thus tied the whole thing to tBotNS." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "At that point, the answer really could have been \"No, maybe it \nwouldn't actually\", imo.\n\nWhen, on reading the books, it became apparent, my reaction wasn't \nthat delightful feeling of opening up of possibilities and of \nideational space, but more a wary sinking feeling. I was slightly \nmollified by the clever stuff that turned up on revisiting Urth, but \neven so I feel it would probably have been more conceptually \nsatisfactory to have kept the worldspaces separate.\n\nBut is that just me? Do the rest of you feel that it all ties \ntogether brilliantly?\n\nMo\n\n\n# ~ # ~ #\n\nWolfeWiki -- a wiki about Gene Wolfe\nhttp://www.wolfewiki.com/pmwiki/ " } ] }, { "message_id": "<4C993AFC.1060808@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "James Wynn", "address": "crushtv at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-09-21T23:08:44+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "<65620.35194.qm@smtp819.mail.ukl.yahoo.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Dan'l -\n4. Wolfe thought, \"Wouldn't it be cool if the chief god was \nTyphon...?\" and thus tied the whole thing to tBotNS." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Mo -\nAt that point, the answer really could have been \"No, maybe it \nwouldn't actually\", imo.\nWhen, on reading the books, it became apparent, my reaction wasn't \nthat delightful feeling of opening up of possibilities and of \nideational space, but more a wary sinking feeling. I was slightly \nmollified by the clever stuff that turned up on revisiting Urth, but \neven so I feel it would probably have been more conceptually \nsatisfactory to have kept the worldspaces separate. But is that just \nme? Do the rest of you feel that it all ties together brilliantly?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Given the reoccurring themes of transformation and an autopsy of the \nnature of the human soul, it is useful that one of the Whorl's gods has \nbeen already been met by the reader in his/her original state. Other \nthan that, Pas could have been anyone...unless Silk is a clone of \nsomeone _else_ referred to in \"New Sun\" (ahem). In that case, \"Long Sun\" \nis like \"Urth of the New Sun\". It offers additional (perhaps vain) helps \nto divine the original story.\n\nAnyway, putting Typhon in the Whorl also gets Wolfe's publishers off his \nback about writing another Urth novel.\n\nu+16b9" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Matthew Knight", "address": "jacobeiserman at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-09-22T00:46:55+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "<369471.63258.qm@web37605.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I've never been a fan of this rhetorical strategy, and judging that we have\nall chosen to join a mailing dedicated to an SF author, I imagine that I'm\nmerely speaking to the choir here. But separating the wheat from the chaff\naccording to genre distinctions, to me, belongs in a now-discredited world\nof presumed canons and aesthetic distinctions based on assumptions that have\nnever been critically examined. Hope my post-structuralist grad school\nconfusion isn't intruding too obviously here.\n\nTwo problems: why doesn't Wolfe qualify as literature--what is the\ndefinition of literature and according to whom? Doesn't this artfully use\nlanguage in a way that provides insight into the human condition through the\nportrayal of well-drawn characters, however the fantastic the situation?\nAnd secondly, even if we accept the arbitrary division that literature\nrefers to realistic and SF refers to (as yet) unrealistic (problematic for\nall sorts of reasons, but...yeah), who decides that only the realistic\napproach is legitimate? Can't SF arise to greatness on its own terms?\n\nDon't have time to get into this more, and I'm sure many blog posts, fanzine\narticles, and dissertations have already been and will be written on these\ntopics.\n\nRegards,\nMatt" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Tue, Sep 21, 2010 at 3:44 PM, Craig Brewer wrote:\nI'm a bit confused by his summary:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Wolfe is a good writer but I wouldn't call his work literature so much\nas eloquent, intriguingly convoluted post-new wave SF. Wolfe's\npenchant for Melville-like parables and analogies exists within a pulp\ncontinuum where faith in technology sits comfortably with faith in the\nsupernatural. Genre expectations are satisfied; the Ark we thought\nirrevocably broken will be repaired to colonize yet another group of\nworlds.\"" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I don't understand his distinction between \"literature\" and \"genre\" here.\nBecause there's optimism about technology and optimism about faith, the\nbooks\ndon't count as literature? So only cynical works count as literature? On\nthe one\nhand, this seems to ignore the fact that there are all kinds of crises of\nfaith\nand ambiguities about the cultural value of technology in the books,\nespecially\nif the inhumi's \"evolution\" is considered technology from a different\nstandpoint. But on the other hand, why does this just become \"eloquent,\nintriguingly convoluted post-new wave SF\" if it doesn't ultimately belittle\ntechnology and/or show that faith can't exist alongside that?\n\nI just find the line of thought here particularly weird. It seems to come\ndown\nto: I didn't like the books' take on the themes, so I won't value it with\nthe\nterm 'literature'.\n\n\n\n\n_______________________________________________" } ] }, { "message_id": "<4C995526.1050109@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "António Pedro Marques", "address": "entonio at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-09-22T01:00:22+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Matthew Knight wrote:\nAnd secondly, even if we accept the arbitrary division that literature\nrefers to realistic and SF refers to (as yet) unrealistic (problematic\nfor all sorts of reasons, but...yeah), who decides that only the\nrealistic approach is legitimate?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Wolfe himself has answered that eloquently.\n\nAccording to such clever 19th century definitions of 'Literature', the \nOdissey or Hamlet or pretty much anything in the history of Literature isn't \n'Literature'." } ] }, { "message_id": "<4C996BAA.80406@verizon.net>", "from": { "name": "David Stockhoff", "address": "dstockhoff at verizon.net" }, "date": "2010-09-22T02:36:26+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "<65620.35194.qm@smtp819.mail.ukl.yahoo.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": " I guess disagree with the \"cool\" proposition in the first place. I \nalso disagree with Moody in calling the \"return\" to the Urth-Sun \nuniverse \"nostalgic.\" Why should Wolfe create a new universe every time \nhe writes a novel?\n\nWhat I find interesting about BotNS in the context of the Urth-Sun \nuniverse is that we see it all through Severian's telling. It's like \npeeping through a keyhole. But there is a whole universe out there that \nSeverian does not know and that does not know Severian. Typhon is one of \nthose phenomena, except for a brief time.\n\nSo what if there is no legend of the Whorl for Severian to report? It \nhad no role in his story, and is merely an inconsequential and \ninevitable part of the backdrop. We know Typhon ruled worlds and wanted \nto rule more. We know there had to be colonists. The universe is vast.\n\nTrying to find concordances between LS/SS and NS is useful and fun if it \nuncovers facts that are useful and fun, but NOT finding concordance is \nevidence of very little by itself. For me, it hardly needs to tie \ntogether at all, let alone brilliantly." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On 9/21/2010 6:03 PM, Mo Holkar wrote:\nAt 19:55 21/09/2010, Dan'l wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "4. Wolfe thought, \"Wouldn't it be cool if the chief god was \nTyphon...?\" and thus tied the whole thing to tBotNS." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "At that point, the answer really could have been \"No, maybe it \nwouldn't actually\", imo.\n\nWhen, on reading the books, it became apparent, my reaction wasn't \nthat delightful feeling of opening up of possibilities and of \nideational space, but more a wary sinking feeling. I was slightly \nmollified by the clever stuff that turned up on revisiting Urth, but \neven so I feel it would probably have been more conceptually \nsatisfactory to have kept the worldspaces separate.\n\nBut is that just me? Do the rest of you feel that it all ties together \nbrilliantly?\n\nMo\n\n\n# ~ # ~ #\n\nWolfeWiki -- a wiki about Gene Wolfe\nhttp://www.wolfewiki.com/pmwiki/\n_______________________________________________" } ] }, { "message_id": "<4C9973FB.40505@io.com>", "from": { "name": "Jeff Wilson", "address": "jwilson at io.com" }, "date": "2010-09-22T03:11:55+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Planet of the Inhumi", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On 9/21/2010 11:40 AM, Dan'l Danehy-Oakes wrote:\nLee,\n\nThe Whorl is at leasdt 300 years old internally -- it is at least a\nthousand years old in sidereal time. And Typhon is not \"still alive\"\nwhen Severian meets him; he is either dead or in some sort of\nsuspended animation. Severian's presence revives him." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Typhon/Piaton would be the beneficiary of the natural mummifying process \nof the Andes' higher elevations, that have preserved so many Incan \nbodies and lesser remains for us to find. His pause in reference to this \nmay be because of the negative associations with the primitive native \npeople, or out of vain revulsion at what his ruler face must have looked \nlike in that state.\n\nTyphon's age is a puzzle. He must have been fairly old for some organs \nto be beyond repair with the impressive technologies still available on \nUrth, but my suggestion that he looks like a conventional octagenarian \nturned out to have little support. Typhon's sub-venerable cosmetic age \nmight be due to just that: cosmetic treatments, though as I recall it \nhas often been the style among Hellenic and Roman era dictatorships to \nemphasize the late middle age of the ruler in coinage and statuary as a \nsymbol of wisdom and stability.\n\nI wonder if the question of time frames might be addressed by tarting up \nmy old PLANET OF THE APES hypothesis with a reverse plot-twist: Instead \nof Green and Blue being Lune and Ushas, maybe the conventionally driven \nWhorl was intended as some kind of round-trip sleeper mission for the \nbenefit of Typhon's plans for the Urth, but the Outsider/the Yesodis \nredirected it to Blue and Green instead, so that it serves the \nIncreate's purpose as a mission mission to the Inhumi and the Neighbors." }, { "kind": "sig", "depth": 0, "text": "Jeff Wilson - jwilson at io.com\nComputational Intelligence Laboratory - Texas A&M Texarkana\n< http://www.tamut.edu/CIL >" } ] }, { "message_id": "<004b01cb5a09$51d7e520$64d24a0c@rclackey>", "from": { "name": "Roy C. Lackey", "address": "rclackey at stic.net" }, "date": "2010-09-22T03:50:31+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "<4C98FDFC.7090908@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "James Wynn wrote:\n From the Urth Q&A again:\n\nQ: /What was Typhon's purpose in launching the Whorl and was the\nBlue/Green [solar] system the intended destination?/ --\n\nA: Knowing Typhon as I do, he probably had at least half a dozen\npurposes; but certainly one of the chief must have been\nself-aggrandizement -- to return human kind to the stars would be a very\ngreat thing indeed. Yes, the Blue-Green system was the intended\ndestination.\n\n\nThis answer would require some finessing given the evidence in the Book\nand Urth of the New Sun that human-kind is already spread across the\nheavens, that Typhon himself was born or reared extraterrestrially, and\nthat at some point he was still free to leave. Perhaps he means\nreturning Urth humanity to the stars. The self-aggrandizement must mean\nhe wanted to wow the humanity left on Urth, not the humanity being sent.\nBecause he deprecates his memory among the colonists." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Lemur said:\n\"A certain ruler, a man who had the strength to rule alone and so called\nhimself the monarch, built our whorl, Patera. It was to be a message from\nhimself to the universe.\" (LAKE, 298)\n\nThe people on Urth would never see the _Whorl_, never receive the message.\n\nTyphon was raw ego. Mt. Typhon's sole purpose was to flaunt his face and\ngratify his ego. He did not deprecate his memory or that of his family among\nthe colonists, he just changed the family names to reflect the new reality\nof their digitized existence as gods in Mainframe. On Urth they had been\nflesh and blood, and the first walking Cargo on the ship had known and\nremembered that, until their memories were tampered with. To go from royalty\nto deity is hardly a step down in status.\n\n-Roy" } ] }, { "message_id": "<006a01cb5a1c$13841b00$64d24a0c@rclackey>", "from": { "name": "Roy C. Lackey", "address": "rclackey at stic.net" }, "date": "2010-09-22T06:04:47+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Planet of the Inhumi", "in_reply_to": "<4C9973FB.40505@io.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Jeff Wilson wrote:\n[snip]" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I wonder if the question of time frames might be addressed by tarting up\nmy old PLANET OF THE APES hypothesis with a reverse plot-twist: Instead\nof Green and Blue being Lune and Ushas, maybe the conventionally driven\nWhorl was intended as some kind of round-trip sleeper mission for the\nbenefit of Typhon's plans for the Urth, but the Outsider/the Yesodis\nredirected it to Blue and Green instead, so that it serves the\nIncreate's purpose as a mission mission to the Inhumi and the Neighbors." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "The ship was never intended for a round-trip mission. The internal time that\npassed since launch was 332 years, as indicated by the date on that letter\nthat Quetzal had sent out to all the manteions endorsing Silk as Calde. The\ninfrastructure had been failing for decades; the retreating lake, messed up\nweather, the Long Sun on the fritz, few living civilian chems, few working\nglasses, etc.\n\nHammerstone figured that Pas had planned for the ship and things in it to\nlast for 200 or maybe 250 years. At the time he spoke, the ship had been\ncooling its heals in the Blue-Green system for at least thirty years, since\nthe rebellion in Mainframe by the gods who didn't want their worshippers to\ngo away and leave them.\n\nSo much time had passed on Urth since Typhon died (unfettered, btw) behind\nhis curtain on Mt. Typhon that Nessus had grown far beyond the part where\nRigoglio had once lived, such that the neighborhood was in ruins and long\nabandoned.\n\nWolfe said in the List Q & A that the Blue-Green system was the ship's\nintended destination. It wasn't designed to make a round-trip.\n\n-Roy" } ] }, { "message_id": "<4C9A0A7E.7080401@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "António Pedro Marques", "address": "entonio at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-09-22T13:54:06+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "<4C996BAA.80406@verizon.net>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "David Stockhoff wrote (22-09-2010 03:36):" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I guess disagree with the \"cool\" proposition in the first place. I also\ndisagree with Moody in calling the \"return\" to the Urth-Sun universe\n\"nostalgic.\" Why should Wolfe create a new universe every time he writes\n a novel?\n\nWhat I find interesting about BotNS in the context of the Urth-Sun\nuniverse is that we see it all through Severian's telling. It's like\npeeping through a keyhole. But there is a whole universe out there that\nSeverian does not know and that does not know Severian. Typhon is one of\n those phenomena, except for a brief time.\n\nSo what if there is no legend of the Whorl for Severian to report? It had\nno role in his story, and is merely an inconsequential and inevitable\npart of the backdrop. We know Typhon ruled worlds and wanted to rule\nmore. We know there had to be colonists. The universe is vast.\n\nTrying to find concordances between LS/SS and NS is useful and fun if it\n uncovers facts that are useful and fun, but NOT finding concordance is\nevidence of very little by itself. For me, it hardly needs to tie\ntogether at all, let alone brilliantly." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I agree with everything - and IMO much more 'tying' would make it all feel a\nbit artificial. What next, turn the books into an annotated cross-referenced\ntimeline and ditch the narration altogether? The narration is part of the\nwork. We have Severian in 1st person, maybe a different Severian in 1st\nperson, a Horn about Silk in 3rd person, and a Horn who is also Silk in 1st\nperson. Not to mention all the storytellers. All these have their strengths\nand limitations, *on purpose*.\n\nI also don't think the intent of the books is for someone to uncover their\n'secret'. They are full of materials amenable to decipering, but I don't\nthink they are 'clues' as people like to refer to it. I think they obviously\nhint at more complex readings, but I don't think their reason to be is to\npoint to one grand solution, which IMO is an impoverished way to look at it.\nThey enable discussion, speculation and layering, and I think those\nprocesses, *where enriching*, rather than any specific result, are what matters.\n\nDuring tyhe Agia discussion I mentioned we all agreed everything Wolfe wrote\nwas extraordinary, and had Jerry protest. I never got the leisure to reply\nto that message and will leave any ideas to the next time Agia appears, but\nI'd like to clarify, and I'll make use of Google's dictionary to do so,\n\nex?traor?di?nar?y\n1. Very unusual or remarkable.\n2. Unusually great.\n\nthat what I meant was the first sense. Of course my opinion of what I know\nof Wolfe's work is quite high, but the bit I had intended to mean we'd all\nagree on was that his writing is never ordinary - or, at least I've never\nmet any work of his that followed customary patterns. In all of it there is \na naturalistic care with the meta-diegesis that I just don't find almost \nanywhere else, and nowhere with the same coherence. I think that's an \nobjective assessment." } ] }, { "message_id": "<4C9A1B01.2090003@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "James Wynn", "address": "crushtv at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-09-22T15:04:33+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "<004b01cb5a09$51d7e520$64d24a0c@rclackey>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": " James Wynn wrote:\n From the Urth Q&A again:\n\nQ: /What was Typhon's purpose in launching the Whorl and was the\nBlue/Green [solar] system the intended destination?/ --\n\nA: Knowing Typhon as I do, he probably had at least half a dozen\npurposes; but certainly one of the chief must have been\nself-aggrandizement -- to return human kind to the stars would be a very\ngreat thing indeed. Yes, the Blue-Green system was the intended destination.\n\nThis answer would require some finessing given the evidence in the Book\nand Urth of the New Sun that human-kind is already spread across the\nheavens, that Typhon himself was born or reared extraterrestrially, and\nthat at some point he was still free to leave. Perhaps he means\nreturning Urth humanity to the stars. The self-aggrandizement must mean\nhe wanted to wow the humanity left on Urth, not the humanity being sent.\nBecause he deprecates his memory among the colonists." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Roy-\nLemur said:\n\"A certain ruler, a man who had the strength to rule alone and so called\nhimself the monarch, built our whorl, Patera. It was to be a message from\nhimself to the universe.\" (LAKE, 298)\n\nThe people on Urth would never see the _Whorl_, never receive the message." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Isn't this like saying that the Apollo lunar missions would never be \nseen by Americans or Soviets or the other nations it was intended to \nimpress? It certainly isn't true for the Apollo missions. Why would it \nnecessarily be so for the Whorl mission?" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "[snip]To go from royalty\nto deity is hardly a step down in status." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "To go from royalty to deity is a step up. But have the new worshipers \nFORGET your deeds as royalty is something that would be done only by \nsomeone ashamed of his flesh-and-blood deeds -- unless it was \nabsolutely necessary. Since Typhon probably does not fit the bill for \nthe first category, he must be in the second.\n\nThere is no evidence that the non-cargo passengers on the Whorl \nworshiped the Nine. They saw the for what they were -- system interfaces \nthat had gotten buggy. Only the wakers and sleepers had their memories \ntinkered with AFAIK. So the system of gods was a practical issue, just \nas Lemur described it.\n\nu+16b9" } ] }, { "message_id": "<4C9A1EB8.2050508@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "António Pedro Marques", "address": "entonio at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-09-22T15:20:24+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "<4C9A1B01.2090003@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "James Wynn wrote (22-09-2010 16:04):" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Roy-\nLemur said: \"A certain ruler, a man who had the strength to rule alone\nand so called himself the monarch, built our whorl, Patera. It was to\nbe a message from himself to the universe.\" (LAKE, 298)" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "The people on Urth would never see the _Whorl_, never receive the\nmessage." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Isn't this like saying that the Apollo lunar missions would never be\nseen by Americans or Soviets or the other nations it was intended to\nimpress? It certainly isn't true for the Apollo missions. Why would it\nnecessarily be so for the Whorl mission?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "The Apollo missions wouldn't be as impressive if they hadn't really been\nshown to reach the moon. The landings on Blue/Green weren't televised back\nto Urth." } ] }, { "message_id": "<4C9A2469.4030209@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "James Wynn", "address": "crushtv at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-09-22T15:44:41+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "<4C9A1EB8.2050508@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 3, "text": "Roy-\nLemur said: \"A certain ruler, a man who had the strength to rule alone\nand so called himself the monarch, built our whorl, Patera. It was to\nbe a message from himself to the universe.\" (LAKE, 298)\n\nThe people on Urth would never see the _Whorl_, never receive the\nmessage." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "James Wynn-\nIsn't this like saying that the Apollo lunar missions would never be\nseen by Americans or Soviets or the other nations it was intended to\nimpress? It certainly isn't true for the Apollo missions. Why would it\nnecessarily be so for the Whorl mission?" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Ant?nio Pedro Marques-\nThe Apollo missions wouldn't be as impressive if they hadn't really been\nshown to reach the moon. The landings on Blue/Green weren't televised \nback\nto Urth." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Let's try a different analogy. Do the governments of Pakistan and Iran \nneed to use a nuclear weapon for their nuclear weapon projects to \ninspire patriotism?\n\nImagine footage of the construction of Whorl...the carving of the \nasteroid, the building of the cities, the prospect of sending thousands \nof Urthlings to a distant planet that could be freely portrayed as a \nfertile Eden, a lucrative opportunity, and a Land of Adventure. The \nactual landing of the colonists was almost irrelevant. What mattered \nwas the huge propagandist art based on the construction project and the \n/aspirations/ of its purpose. The Whorl would be a monument...the Hoover \nDam, the Golden Gate Bridge, and Mt. Rushmore to the third power. It \nwould definitely capture the imagination of the masses and *portray \nTyphon's rule as one of affluence, technology, and limitless power*.\n\nIn Lan Wright's \"The Last Hope of the Earth\" (which has far to many \nparallels to the LS/SS to be coincidental), the colonization project was \nthe central support for Earth morale even though no one on Earth had \nseen any of the actual colonies. Typhon would not have been saddled with \n/their/ limitations. And to the extent that realities of the project was \nless than inspiring, the Whorl was far enough away that he could make \nstuff up.\n\nu+16b9" } ] }, { "message_id": "<871823.14148.qm@web84106.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "from": { "name": "DAVID STOCKHOFF", "address": "dstockhoff at verizon.net" }, "date": "2010-09-22T15:58:09+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "<4C9A2469.4030209@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I agree. Point taken about the probable lack of television exposure as we know it, but an even better comparison might be to the Tower of Babel---whose building was an act of hubris, but which could be looked on with genuine pride by all who saw or heard of it. It's the kind of thing that cements the reputation of a king as a statesman, or an emperor as a god.\nMaybe the peasants of the time didn't know or care, but the important people would have seen what was going on and understood why it was important. No king can be overthrown who actually restores the glory of a national past.\nI wonder how much the glasses were able to transmit back home during the voyage, or if they were designed to do so at all.\n\n--- On Wed, 9/22/10, James Wynn wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 3, "text": "From: James Wynn \nSubject: Re: (urth) Short Sun blog review\nTo: \"The Urth Mailing List\" \nDate: Wednesday, September 22, 2010, 11:44 AM\nRoy-\nLemur said: \"A certain ruler, a man who had the strength to rule alone\nand so called himself the monarch, built our whorl, Patera. It was to\nbe a message from himself to the universe.\" (LAKE, 298)\n\nThe people on Urth would never see the _Whorl_, never receive the\nmessage." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "James Wynn-\nIsn't this like saying that the Apollo lunar missions would never be\nseen by Americans or Soviets or the other nations it was intended to\nimpress? It certainly isn't true for the Apollo missions. Why would it\nnecessarily be so for the Whorl mission?" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Ant?nio Pedro Marques-\nThe Apollo missions wouldn't be as impressive if they hadn't really been\nshown to reach the moon. The landings on Blue/Green weren't televised back\nto Urth." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Let's try a different analogy. Do the governments of Pakistan and Iran need to use a nuclear weapon for their nuclear weapon projects to inspire patriotism?\n\nImagine footage of the construction of Whorl...the carving of the asteroid, the building of the cities, the prospect of sending thousands of Urthlings to a distant planet that could be freely portrayed as a fertile Eden, a lucrative opportunity, and a Land of Adventure. The actual landing of the colonists was almost irrelevant. What mattered? was the huge propagandist art based on the construction project and the /aspirations/ of its purpose. The Whorl would be a monument...the Hoover Dam, the Golden Gate Bridge, and Mt. Rushmore to the third power. It would definitely capture the imagination of the masses and *portray Typhon's rule as one of affluence, technology, and limitless power*.\n\nIn Lan Wright's \"The Last Hope of the Earth\" (which has far to many parallels to the LS/SS to be coincidental), the colonization project was the central support for Earth morale even though no one on Earth had seen any of the actual colonies. Typhon would not have been saddled with /their/ limitations. And to the extent that realities of the project was less than inspiring, the Whorl was far enough away that he could make stuff up.\n\nu+16b9" } ] }, { "message_id": "<4C9A2FF3.1000403@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "António Pedro Marques", "address": "entonio at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-09-22T16:33:55+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "<4C9A2469.4030209@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "James Wynn wrote (22-09-2010 16:44):" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Antonio wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "James Wynn wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 3, "text": "Roy-\nLemur said: \"A certain ruler, a man who had the strength to rule\nalone and so called himself the monarch, built our whorl, Patera." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 4, "text": "It was to be a message from himself to the universe.\" (LAKE, 298)\n\nThe people on Urth would never see the _Whorl_, never receive the\nmessage." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 3, "text": "James Wynn- Isn't this like saying that the Apollo lunar missions\nwould never be seen by Americans or Soviets or the other nations it\nwas intended to impress? It certainly isn't true for the Apollo\nmissions. Why would it necessarily be so for the Whorl mission?" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Ant?nio Pedro Marques- The Apollo missions wouldn't be as impressive if\nthey hadn't really been shown to reach the moon. The landings on\nBlue/Green weren't televised back to Urth." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Let's try a different analogy. Do the governments of Pakistan and Iran\nneed to use a nuclear weapon for their nuclear weapon projects to inspire\npatriotism?\n\nImagine footage of the construction of Whorl...the carving of the\nasteroid, the building of the cities, the prospect of sending thousands\nof Urthlings to a distant planet that could be freely portrayed as a\nfertile Eden, a lucrative opportunity, and a Land of Adventure. The\nactual landing of the colonists was almost irrelevant. What mattered was\n the huge propagandist art based on the construction project and the\n/aspirations/ of its purpose." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "If you ask me, it's quite the reverse. The only thing that mattered would be\nthe landing, otherwise it's just a massive waste of taxpayers' money. At\nleast that's how I see people reacting to every huge speding in public\nworks. Once it results in something, it's great. Before that, it's a white \nelephant in the making. I'm also not so sure people would be thrilled at the \nidea of their fellow urthlings being 'cargo'." } ] }, { "message_id": "<4C9A307D.9070008@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "António Pedro Marques", "address": "entonio at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-09-22T16:36:13+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "<871823.14148.qm@web84106.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "DAVID STOCKHOFF wrote (22-09-2010 16:58):" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I wonder how much the glasses were able to transmit back home during the\n voyage, or if they were designed to do so at all." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "That reminds me of Helliconia and the Avernus." } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes", "address": "danldo at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-09-22T16:49:46+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "<4C9A2FF3.1000403@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "2010/9/22 Ant?nio Pedro Marques :" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "If you ask me, it's quite the reverse. The only thing that mattered would be\nthe landing, otherwise it's just a massive waste of taxpayers' money. At\nleast that's how I see people reacting to every huge speding in public\nworks." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "That's a very modernistic/democratic approach ... people in feudal\nsocieties don't wonder where their taxes are going, they are grateful\nthey aren't higher." }, { "kind": "sig", "depth": 0, "text": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes" } ] }, { "message_id": "<4C9A36E0.9080806@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "António Pedro Marques", "address": "entonio at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-09-22T17:03:28+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes wrote (22-09-2010 17:49):" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "2010/9/22 Ant?nio Pedro Marques:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "If you ask me, it's quite the reverse. The only thing that mattered would be\nthe landing, otherwise it's just a massive waste of taxpayers' money. At\nleast that's how I see people reacting to every huge speding in public\nworks." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "That's a very modernistic/democratic approach ... people in feudal\nsocieties don't wonder where their taxes are going, they are grateful\nthey aren't higher." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Don't know... taxes used to go to tangible things or waste. The Whorl is not \nwaste but isn't much tangible either. It's clearly something that is visible \n- like, say, a cathedral - but unlike a cathedral, it doesn't serve its \npurpose just by being there." } ] }, { "message_id": "<4C9A39D8.600@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "James Wynn", "address": "crushtv at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-09-22T17:16:08+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "<4C9A36E0.9080806@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Dan'l-\nThat's a very modernistic/democratic approach ... people in feudal\nsocieties don't wonder where their taxes are going, they are grateful\nthey aren't higher." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Anotonio-\nDon't know... taxes used to go to tangible things or waste. The Whorl \nis not waste but isn't much tangible either. It's clearly something \nthat is visible - like, say, a cathedral - but unlike a cathedral, it \ndoesn't serve its purpose just by being there. " }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "As far as improving the life of any Urthling or colonist, it was surely \na tremendous waste. As a monument it was merely tremendous, which is \nwhat one desires of a monument.\n\nTo repeat my analogy, the Pakistani and Iranian nuclear weapons programs \nwill not improve the lives of any average citizen of those nations, nor \nhave they so far. That is not why they are popular there (and they are).\n\n\nu+16b9" } ] }, { "message_id": "<4C9A3B5E.2040406@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "James Wynn", "address": "crushtv at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-09-22T17:22:38+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "<4C9A39D8.600@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Anotonio-\n[The Whorl is ] clearly something that is visible - like, say, a \ncathedral - but unlike a cathedral, it doesn't serve its purpose just \nby being there. " }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Also, the Whorl is not going to \"just be there\". It's going to leave and \ncarry to the heavens the patriotic aspirations of the Urth. And Typhon \nbecomes \"The Calde Who Returned Us to the Stars\".\n\nBut since he died shortly after and Urth was soon divided into regions \nof alien influence, it all was irrelevant.\n\nu+16b9" } ] }, { "message_id": "<4C9A3C72.8080701@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "António Pedro Marques", "address": "entonio at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-09-22T17:27:14+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "<4C9A39D8.600@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "James Wynn wrote (22-09-2010 18:16):" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 3, "text": "Dan'l-\nThat's a very modernistic/democratic approach ... people in feudal\nsocieties don't wonder where their taxes are going, they are grateful\nthey aren't higher." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Anotonio-\nDon't know... taxes used to go to tangible things or waste. The Whorl\nis not waste but isn't much tangible either. It's clearly something\nthat is visible - like, say, a cathedral - but unlike a cathedral, it\ndoesn't serve its purpose just by being there." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "As far as improving the life of any Urthling or colonist, it was surely\na tremendous waste. As a monument it was merely tremendous, which is\nwhat one desires of a monument." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "But a monument serves its purpose by being there. The Whorl wasn't meant to \nstay there." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "To repeat my analogy, the Pakistani and Iranian nuclear weapons programs\nwill not improve the lives of any average citizen of those nations, nor\nhave they so far. That is not why they are popular there (and they are)." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "And what popularity would they enjoy if they were sent to somewhere out of \nreach?" } ] }, { "message_id": "<4C9A40A4.9000408@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "James Wynn", "address": "crushtv at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-09-22T17:45:08+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "<4C9A3C72.8080701@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "James Wynn -\nAs far as improving the life of any Urthling or colonist, it was surely\na tremendous waste. As a monument it was merely tremendous, which is\nwhat one desires of a monument." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Antonio -\nBut a monument serves its purpose by being there. The Whorl wasn't \nmeant to stay there." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "James Wynn -\nTo repeat my analogy, the Pakistani and Iranian nuclear weapons programs\nwill not improve the lives of any average citizen of those nations, nor\nhave they so far. That is not why they are popular there (and they are)." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Antonio -\nAnd what popularity would they enjoy if they were sent to somewhere \nout of reach?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "They *are* out of reach. They will never be used. They will never be \nseen. Their locations will never be known. They are pure ideals of their \nnations as Great Powers. They are far worse monuments than the Whorl. \nWhen the Whorl leaves orbit around Sol, in the minds of Typhon's \nsubjects it has already arrived at its destination. Think of the \npropaganda films! Every painting of Typhon would portray him as a \ncolossus straddling the cities of the Whorl, his head (only one I \npresume) surrounded by fabulous planets. Those left behind on Urth would \ngreatly envy the lot of those lucky enough to be selected for the trip. \nEverything is anticipation and imagination.\n\nu+16b9" } ] }, { "message_id": "<229289.64149.qm@web84108.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "from": { "name": "DAVID STOCKHOFF", "address": "dstockhoff at verizon.net" }, "date": "2010-09-22T17:48:07+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "<4C9A307D.9070008@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Indeed!\n\n--- On Wed, 9/22/10, Ant?nio Pedro Marques wrote:\n\nFrom: Ant?nio Pedro Marques \nSubject: Re: (urth) Short Sun blog review\nTo: \"The Urth Mailing List\" \nDate: Wednesday, September 22, 2010, 12:36 PM\n\nDAVID STOCKHOFF wrote (22-09-2010 16:58):" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I wonder how much the glasses were able to transmit back home during the\n? voyage, or if they were designed to do so at all." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "That reminds me of Helliconia and the Avernus." } ] }, { "message_id": "<006a01cb5a89$9e42fa00$82d04a0c@rclackey>", "from": { "name": "Roy C. Lackey", "address": "rclackey at stic.net" }, "date": "2010-09-22T19:08:53+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "<4C9A2469.4030209@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "James Wynn wrote:\n____________" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Let's try a different analogy. Do the governments of Pakistan and Iran\nneed to use a nuclear weapon for their nuclear weapon projects to\ninspire patriotism?<" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Imagine footage of the construction of Whorl...the carving of the\nasteroid, the building of the cities, the prospect of sending thousands\nof Urthlings to a distant planet that could be freely portrayed as a\nfertile Eden, a lucrative opportunity, and a Land of Adventure.<" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "____________\n\nIf that were the scenario, then people should have been clamoring to go.\nMamelta said: \"We had to volunteer. They were--you couldn't say no.\" (LAKE,\nchap. 9, 251)\n\n___________" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "The" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "actual landing of the colonists was almost irrelevant. What mattered\nwas the huge propagandist art based on the construction project and the\n/aspirations/ of its purpose. The Whorl would be a monument...the Hoover\nDam, the Golden Gate Bridge, and Mt. Rushmore to the third power. It\nwould definitely capture the imagination of the masses and *portray\nTyphon's rule as one of affluence, technology, and limitless power*.<\n___________\n\nThere isn't the least suggestion in the Urth Cycle that the Whorl project\neven existed, not even when Severian was there while Typhon was still alive.\nIf there had been a massive propaganda campaign to promote the project, it\nwas a monumental failure.\n\nI realize that the lack of evidence for a propaganda campaign in the Urth\nCycle doen't prove anything, but neither does your supposition of such a\ncampaign prove that it existed.\n\n-Roy" } ] }, { "message_id": "<4C9A6537.4010902@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "James Wynn", "address": "crushtv at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-09-22T20:21:11+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "<006a01cb5a89$9e42fa00$82d04a0c@rclackey>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Me -\nImagine footage of the construction of Whorl...the carving of the asteroid,\nthe building of the cities, the prospect of sending thousands\nof Urthlings to a distant planet that could be freely portrayed as a\nfertile Eden, a lucrative opportunity, and a Land of Adventure." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Roy-\nIf that were the scenario, then people should have been clamoring to go.\nMamelta said: \"We had to volunteer. They were--you couldn't say no.\" (LAKE,\nchap. 9, 251)" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "This only means that the desire to go or stay was irrelevant. But it is \nsimply not conceivable that there were not more people on Urth \n_willing_ to go (people who would gladly have traded places those who \nwere selected to be Cargo or Sleepers) than there were slots to go. But \n_wanting_ to go was not the criteria. The Whorl was probably not such a \nbad place to live when it was first launched with plenty of chems to do \nthe work. The use of cards as money might suggest that money wasn't even \nseen as necessary initially because the designers did not expect \nscarcity of basic essentials. Still, a young woman with prospects on \nUrth would probably not want to go. An established member of the ruling \nclass would not want to go. I seriously doubt that any among Typhon's \ncourt were clamoring to go. They went out of duty or they went because \nTyphon (or some sub-ruler ordered to procure people with defined \ncriteria) was ready to be rid of them. Members of the ruling classes \nrarely volunteer for war if there is a reduced chance of coming back to \nmedals and accolades." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Roy-\nThere isn't the least suggestion in the Urth Cycle that the Whorl project\neven existed, not even when Severian was there while Typhon was still alive.\nIf there had been a massive propaganda campaign to promote the project, it\nwas a monumental failure." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Two reasons: 1) Wolfe had not invented the Whorl when he wrote of \nSeverian's encounters with Typhon.\n2) Typhon died shortly after the Whorl was launched, and his empire was \nquickly divided between competing alien powers who had no interest in \npromoting Typhon as a Great Man who had Returned Humanity to the Stars. \nYou know all this." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Roy-\nI realize that the lack of evidence for a propaganda campaign in the Urth\nCycle doen't prove anything, but neither does your supposition of such a\ncampaign prove that it existed." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I never claimed that there was anything detailing Typhon's reasons for \nthe Whorl Project. Wolfe has already implied that he didn't consider \nthat question much himself. I was merely responding to the following:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Roy-\nThe people on Urth would never see the_Whorl_, never receive the message.\nTyphon was raw ego. Mt. Typhon's sole purpose was to flaunt his face and\ngratify his ego. He did not deprecate his memory or that of his family among\nthe colonists, he just changed the family names to reflect the new reality\nof their digitized existence as gods in Mainframe." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I was trying to show that the Whorl _would have been_ a useful monument \nto Typhon's ego for his subjects on Urth, even though I argue that it \nwas not really much of a monument to his ego for those who left.\n\nIncidentally, there is a conversation between the Rajan and Hound that I \nthink touches on some of this:\n\n \"You're saying that everybody could have been asleep? All of us? No\n houses and no people, just trees and animals?\"\n \"No, I'm saying Pas must have considered that and rejected it as\n unworkable, or at least undesirable.\"\n Hound nodded. \"He'd have had nobody to worship him.\"\n \"That's true, though I'm not sure it was a consideration. If it\n didn't seem so impious, I'd say now that the Chapter and the\n manteions seem almost to have been a joke, that Pas made himself our\n chief god largely because it amused him.\n [snip the parable of the farmer meeting Pas in Mainframe]\n \"Pas wished to mold and guide us; and for him to do it, we had to be\n awake. As our chief god, he was ideally situated, though the false\n memories given the sleepers may have been intended to serve the\n same purpose. Like the farmer we complain of storms, but Pas must\n have foreseen that there would be storms--and things far worse--on\n the new whorls. How could we cope with them if we never saw snow, or\n a wind storm?\"\n\n One thing though. I have said that Typhon deprecated the memory of\n his Terrestrial achievements among the colonists so they would not\n remember who sent them and try to return. An obvious question would\n be, then why did he mess with the memories of the sleepers?\n ~ page 131 of RTTW pb.\n\nThere's more as well, including an argument for why Pas's construction \nof the Whorl was not purely malevolent or egotistical (\"Pas was made by \nthe Outsider\"). Remember that _Pas_ could not be a god on the colonized \nplanets. Even the Writings made it clear that the Nine were only gods on \nthe Whorl.\n\n~ u+16b9" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Andrew Mason", "address": "andrew.mason53 at googlemail.com" }, "date": "2010-09-22T21:24:12+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "<4C9A6537.4010902@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Regarding humanity returning to the stars: this theme comes up quite a\nlot in the _New Sun_ cycle - sometimes in those very terms, though at\nother times people say 'Men of Urth' or the like instead of\n'humankind' . Vodalus, at least ostensibly, has it as his ideal. The\nAutarch says it can't be achieved until humans change - he has one\nidea of how they should change, while the Ascians have another.\nMalrubius seems to say that the New Sun marks the beginning of the\nprocess by which humans will return to the stars.\n\nHow can we square this with the passages that imply that humans are\nalready out there among the stars, left over from the first empire?\nPerhaps 'returning to the stars' should be taken to mean not just\nbeing on other planets, but actually travelling among the stars (under\ntheir own steam, rather than as crew on ships captained by\nHierodules). It may be that the humans who are out there now are as\nisolated as those on Urth. We should also consider Severian's\nspeculation that the people on other planets will have evolved away\nfrom the form we know; they may not now be what we would immedately\nrecognise as human.\n\nTyphon: first, can someone point me to the evidence that he was not\nborn/raised on Urth? I'm not sure what the source for this is.\n\nTyphon says 'I ruled this planet and many more'. Severian''s immediate\nthought is that he is lying. I'm not sure if there is anything in _New\nSun_ itself that proves he is telling the truth. When you take _Long\nSun_ into account, he must have had some space-travelling capacity to\nbe able to launch the Whorl in the first place, but this might be\nrestricted to the solar system. Even if you take 'many planets'\nseriously, I would think, say, twenty would count as many in this\ncontext, so he need only have ruled the solar system and a few\nneighbouring ones.\n\nAs for the bit about the ships on which he might have left having\ngone, this suggests to me not a wide empire, in which ships would\nsurely be constantly coming and going, but a once-for-all expedition,\nthat once gone will not return. So it fits in quite well with the\nstory of the Whorl, though of course the precise form the expedtion\ntakes isn't made clear here. This may also link up with Valeria's\nstory - when her family moved into the Citadel they were 'waiting to\nleave Urth with the autarch of their time' - again this suggests a\nspecific expedition." } ] }, { "message_id": "<4C9A7CBC.6090607@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "James Wynn", "address": "crushtv at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-09-22T22:01:32+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Andrew Mason -\nTyphon: first, can someone point me to the evidence that he was not\nborn/raised on Urth? I'm not sure what the source for this is." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "For me, it is based on the story of \"Spring Wind\". I was rather \nsurprised to discover that it was at all controversial that \"Spring \nWind\" referred to Typhon. But I suppose there is little about these \nstories that is not controversial. If it seems reasonable to you that \nSpring Wind = Typhon, then the obvious implication is that he is \nextra-terrestrial :\n\nSword of the Lictor, Chapter 19\n\"*On a mountain top beyond the shores of Urth* there once lived a lovely \nwoman\nnamed Early Summer. She was the queen of that land, but her king was a \nstrong,\nunforgiving man, and because she was jealous of him he was jealous of her in\nturn, and killed any man he believed to be her lover.\nOne day Early Summer was walking in her garden when she saw a most beautiful\nblossom of a kind wholly new to her. It was redder than any rose and more\nsweetly perfumed, but its strong stalk was thornless and smooth as \nivory. She\nplucked it and carried it to a secluded spot, and as she reclined there\ncontemplating it, it grew to seem to her no blossom at all but such a \nlover as\nshe had longed for, powerful and yet as tender as a kiss. Certain of the \njuices\nof the plant entered her and she conceived. She told the king, however, \nthat the\nchild was his, and since she was well guarded, he believed her.\nIt was a boy, and by his mother's wish he was called *Spring Wind*. [snip]\nNow it happened that the chances of war often brought Spring Wind to \nUrth, and\nthere he came to know of two brothers who were kings." } ] }, { "message_id": "<4C9A8DA3.3050905@verizon.net>", "from": { "name": "David Stockhoff", "address": "dstockhoff at verizon.net" }, "date": "2010-09-22T23:13:39+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "<4C9A7CBC.6090607@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": " Plus, the fact that he \"chose to make Urth his capitol\" at least opens \nup the possibility that he's from somewhere else, not to mention that \nthe source of his powers is still unknown.\n\nHow many Roman emperors were born in Italy once the capitol shifted \neast---even before then? Very few, if any. Diocletian never set foot in \nRome. I am not sure about the example of Byzantium." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On 9/22/2010 6:01 PM, James Wynn wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Andrew Mason -\nTyphon: first, can someone point me to the evidence that he was not\nborn/raised on Urth? I'm not sure what the source for this is." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "For me, it is based on the story of \"Spring Wind\". I was rather \nsurprised to discover that it was at all controversial that \"Spring \nWind\" referred to Typhon. But I suppose there is little about these \nstories that is not controversial. If it seems reasonable to you that \nSpring Wind = Typhon, then the obvious implication is that he is \nextra-terrestrial :\n\nSword of the Lictor, Chapter 19\n\"*On a mountain top beyond the shores of Urth* there once lived a \nlovely woman\nnamed Early Summer. She was the queen of that land, but her king was a \nstrong,\nunforgiving man, and because she was jealous of him he was jealous of \nher in\nturn, and killed any man he believed to be her lover.\nOne day Early Summer was walking in her garden when she saw a most \nbeautiful\nblossom of a kind wholly new to her. It was redder than any rose and more\nsweetly perfumed, but its strong stalk was thornless and smooth as \nivory. She\nplucked it and carried it to a secluded spot, and as she reclined there\ncontemplating it, it grew to seem to her no blossom at all but such a \nlover as\nshe had longed for, powerful and yet as tender as a kiss. Certain of \nthe juices\nof the plant entered her and she conceived. She told the king, \nhowever, that the\nchild was his, and since she was well guarded, he believed her.\nIt was a boy, and by his mother's wish he was called *Spring Wind*. [snip]\nNow it happened that the chances of war often brought Spring Wind to \nUrth, and\nthere he came to know of two brothers who were kings.\n\n\n_______________________________________________" } ] }, { "message_id": "<4C9A8E9A.9010104@verizon.net>", "from": { "name": "David Stockhoff", "address": "dstockhoff at verizon.net" }, "date": "2010-09-22T23:17:46+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "<4C9A6537.4010902@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": " Such a propaganda campaign sounds more like Heinlein.\n\nAgain, think of the thousands of slaves that would have been required to \nbuild the Tower of Babel or any other great wonder of the world. Think \nof how Australia was settled by the scum of Britain. This would have \nbeen little different. It was a project built on brute force." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On 9/22/2010 4:21 PM, James Wynn wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Me -\nImagine footage of the construction of Whorl...the carving of the asteroid,\nthe building of the cities, the prospect of sending thousands\nof Urthlings to a distant planet that could be freely portrayed as a\nfertile Eden, a lucrative opportunity, and a Land of Adventure." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 3, "text": "Roy-\nIf that were the scenario, then people should have been clamoring to go.\nMamelta said: \"We had to volunteer. They were--you couldn't say no.\" (LAKE,\nchap. 9, 251)" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "This only means that the desire to go or stay was irrelevant. But it \nis simply not conceivable that there were not more people on Urth \n_willing_ to go (people who would gladly have traded places those who \nwere selected to be Cargo or Sleepers) than there were slots to go. \nBut _wanting_ to go was not the criteria. The Whorl was probably not \nsuch a bad place to live when it was first launched with plenty of \nchems to do the work. The use of cards as money might suggest that \nmoney wasn't even seen as necessary initially because the designers \ndid not expect scarcity of basic essentials. Still, a young woman with \nprospects on Urth would probably not want to go. An established member \nof the ruling class would not want to go. I seriously doubt that any \namong Typhon's court were clamoring to go. They went out of duty or \nthey went because Typhon (or some sub-ruler ordered to procure people \nwith defined criteria) was ready to be rid of them. Members of the \nruling classes rarely volunteer for war if there is a reduced chance \nof coming back to medals and accolades." } ] }, { "message_id": "<41AEC1CFC6D146A39474EC550DB68802@jill>", "from": { "name": "Gerry Quinn", "address": "gerryq at indigo.ie" }, "date": "2010-09-22T23:28:26+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "<4C9A7CBC.6090607@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I don't see anything in that story to suggest that Spring Wind was Typhon. It does appear that Spring Wind is extraterrestrial. He fought on Urth, and sometimes his armies caused devastation among humankind (and food for wolves), at least locally. But in the long history of Urth there must have been many such. Where is the indication that Spring Wind conquered or ruled the planet? What characteristics, other than his being a reasonably dominant warrior/leader, and some doubtful etymology, induce you to associate him with Typhon?\n\n- Gerry Quinn\n\n From: James Wynn \nAndrew Mason - \nTyphon: first, can someone point me to the evidence that he was not\nborn/raised on Urth? I'm not sure what the source for this is.\n\n For me, it is based on the story of \"Spring Wind\". I was rather surprised to discover that it was at all controversial that \"Spring Wind\" referred to Typhon. But I suppose there is little about these stories that is not controversial. If it seems reasonable to you that Spring Wind = Typhon, then the obvious implication is that he is extra-terrestrial :\n\n Sword of the Lictor, Chapter 19\n \"On a mountain top beyond the shores of Urth there once lived a lovely woman\n named Early Summer. She was the queen of that land, but her king was a strong,\n unforgiving man, and because she was jealous of him he was jealous of her in\n turn, and killed any man he believed to be her lover.\n One day Early Summer was walking in her garden when she saw a most beautiful\n blossom of a kind wholly new to her. It was redder than any rose and more\n sweetly perfumed, but its strong stalk was thornless and smooth as ivory. She\n plucked it and carried it to a secluded spot, and as she reclined there\n contemplating it, it grew to seem to her no blossom at all but such a lover as\n she had longed for, powerful and yet as tender as a kiss. Certain of the juices\n of the plant entered her and she conceived. She told the king, however, that the\n child was his, and since she was well guarded, he believed her.\n It was a boy, and by his mother's wish he was called Spring Wind. [snip]\n Now it happened that the chances of war often brought Spring Wind to Urth, and\n there he came to know of two brothers who were kings." } ] }, { "message_id": "<00dc01cb5aeb$36b46ec0$2ace4a0c@rclackey>", "from": { "name": "Roy C. Lackey", "address": "rclackey at stic.net" }, "date": "2010-09-23T06:47:31+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "<4C9A6537.4010902@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "James Wynn quoted and wrote:\nRoy-\nI realize that the lack of evidence for a propaganda campaign in the\nUrth\nCycle doen't prove anything, but neither does your supposition of such a\ncampaign prove that it existed." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I never claimed that there was anything detailing Typhon's reasons for\nthe Whorl Project. Wolfe has already implied that he didn't consider\nthat question much himself. I was merely responding to the following:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Roy-\nThe people on Urth would never see the_Whorl_, never receive the\nmessage." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "And I was refering, in that line, to Lemur's comment:\n\"A certain ruler, a man who had the strength to rule alone and so called\nhimself the monarch, built our whorl, Patera. It was to be a message from\nhimself to the universe.\" (LAKE, 298)" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Typhon was raw ego. Mt. Typhon's sole purpose was to flaunt his face and\ngratify his ego. He did not deprecate his memory or that of his family\namong\nthe colonists, he just changed the family names to reflect the new\nreality\nof their digitized existence as gods in Mainframe." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I was trying to show that the Whorl _would have been_ a useful monument\nto Typhon's ego for his subjects on Urth, even though I argue that it\nwas not really much of a monument to his ego for those who left." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Wolfe's answer in the Q & A was:\n\" Knowing Typhon as I do, he probably had at least half a dozen purposes;\nbut certainly one of the chief must have been self-aggrandizement -- to\nreturn human kind to the stars would be a very great thing indeed.\" Lemur's\ncomment speaks directly to the self-aggrandizement issue. The universe is a\nlittle bigger than Urth, and Urth itself would never receive that message.\nTherefore, the message Typhon sent to the universe by launching the _Whorl_\nwas intended for a larger audience than the people of Urth, who already\nlived under his tyranical rule." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Incidentally, there is a conversation between the Rajan and Hound that I\nthink touches on some of this:\n\n \"You're saying that everybody could have been asleep? All of us? No\n houses and no people, just trees and animals?\"\n \"No, I'm saying Pas must have considered that and rejected it as\n unworkable, or at least undesirable.\"\n Hound nodded. \"He'd have had nobody to worship him.\"\n \"That's true, though I'm not sure it was a consideration. If it\n didn't seem so impious, I'd say now that the Chapter and the\n manteions seem almost to have been a joke, that Pas made himself our\n chief god largely because it amused him.\n [snip the parable of the farmer meeting Pas in Mainframe]\n \"Pas wished to mold and guide us; and for him to do it, we had to be\n awake. As our chief god, he was ideally situated, though the false\n memories given the sleepers may have been intended to serve the\n same purpose. Like the farmer we complain of storms, but Pas must\n have foreseen that there would be storms--and things far worse--on\n the new whorls. How could we cope with them if we never saw snow, or\n a wind storm?\"\n\n One thing though. I have said that Typhon deprecated the memory of\n his Terrestrial achievements among the colonists so they would not\n remember who sent them and try to return. An obvious question would\n be, then why did he mess with the memories of the sleepers?\n ~ page 131 of RTTW pb.\n\nThere's more as well, including an argument for why Pas's construction\nof the Whorl was not purely malevolent or egotistical (\"Pas was made by\nthe Outsider\"). Remember that _Pas_ could not be a god on the colonized\nplanets. Even the Writings made it clear that the Nine were only gods on\nthe Whorl." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "The list of characters in RTTW says Typhon was \"the ancient tyrant whose\npersonality became PAS\". Whatever rehabilitation of character he *may* have\nundergone in Mainframe as Pas has no bearing on the *fact* that he was an\negotistical tyrant when he was scanned and when he conceived, constructed,\nstocked and launched his \"message from himself to the universe\".\n\n-Roy" } ] }, { "message_id": "<4C9B16CB.3030607@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "James Wynn", "address": "crushtv at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-09-23T08:58:51+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "<00dc01cb5aeb$36b46ec0$2ace4a0c@rclackey>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Roy C. Lackey-\nThe list of characters in RTTW says Typhon was \"the ancient tyrant whose\npersonality became PAS\". Whatever rehabilitation of character he*may* have\nundergone in Mainframe as Pas has no bearing on the*fact* that he was an\negotistical tyrant when he was scanned and when he conceived, constructed,\nstocked and launched his \"message from himself to the universe\"." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I'm not convinced he was rehabilitated at all. I have heard Wolfe say \nrepeatedly that the best villain is someone who falls just short of \nbeing a hero. I think Pas is Wolfe's alternate take on Typhon. \nSeverian's experience with Typhon is one POV. But Severian as The \nDestroyer of Urth was the POV of the sailors on the Time ship.\n\nAnother take on Typhon IMO is William Ries. Refer to Gideon Chase's view \non Evil.\n\nu+16b9" } ] }, { "message_id": "<4C9B2A00.4010300@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "James Wynn", "address": "crushtv at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-09-23T10:20:48+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "<41AEC1CFC6D146A39474EC550DB68802@jill>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Gerry Quinn-\nI don't see anything in that story to suggest that Spring Wind was \nTyphon. It does appear that Spring Wind is extraterrestrial. He \nfought on Urth, and sometimes his armies caused devastation among \nhumankind (and food for wolves), at least locally. But in the long \nhistory of Urth there must have been many such. Where is the \nindication that Spring Wind conquered or ruled the planet? What \ncharacteristics, other than his being a reasonably dominant \nwarrior/leader, and some doubtful etymology, induce you to associate \nhim with Typhon?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I think the etymology is not dubious at all. To me, it's a fairly overt \nreference. Not at all subtle. It's analogous to, say, having a story in \nthe Brown book that refers to a black cloaked figure named The One Who \nDivides.\n\nDemanding more evidence than this from a story that didn't even overtly \nidentify Severian as the Conciliator or the New Sun seems to be \ndemanding something one would never expect to get.\n\nu+16b9" } ] }, { "message_id": "<4C9B3F89.4080906@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "António Pedro Marques", "address": "entonio at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-09-23T11:52:41+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "<4C9B2A00.4010300@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "James Wynn wrote (23-09-2010 11:20):" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Gerry Quinn-\nI don't see anything in that story to suggest that Spring Wind was\nTyphon (...) What characteristics, other than his being a reasonably\ndominant warrior/leader, and some doubtful etymology, induce you to\nassociate him with Typhon?\n\nI think the etymology is not dubious at all (...)" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I should emphasize that it's the actual etymology of 'typhoon' that is\ndubious, but that is no reason why it shouldn't be used in the story, or in\nfact it's one more reason why it should." } ] }, { "message_id": "<5EF8BDB415864C9F8EDE9981F601FA6B@jill>", "from": { "name": "Gerry Quinn", "address": "gerryq at indigo.ie" }, "date": "2010-09-23T12:27:40+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "<4C9B2A00.4010300@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "From: James Wynn \n Gerry Quinn-\n I don't see anything in that story to suggest that Spring Wind was Typhon. It does appear that Spring Wind is extraterrestrial. He fought on Urth, and sometimes his armies caused devastation among humankind (and food for wolves), at least locally. But in the long history of Urth there must have been many such. Where is the indication that Spring Wind conquered or ruled the planet? What characteristics, other than his being a reasonably dominant warrior/leader, and some doubtful etymology, induce you to associate him with Typhon?\n\n I think the etymology is not dubious at all. To me, it's a fairly overt reference. Not at all subtle. It's analogous to, say, having a story in the Brown book that refers to a black cloaked figure named The One Who Divides. \n\n Demanding more evidence than this from a story that didn't even overtly identify Severian as the Conciliator or the New Sun seems to be demanding something one would never expect to get.\n\nBut typhoons ae not particularly associated with Spring (they occur year round and in fact it is in Spring that they are least frequent), so all we have is 'Wind', which is hardly a strong connection. Spring Wind has a son Frog, and the story is mostly about him. There is no reference to his father in the rest of the story. You'd think if Frog's dad ruled Urth and other worlds and had another family, it would have been mentioned somewhere.\n\n\"Wind\" and \"fighting\" don't add up to a definition of Typhon, in my view. (Wikipedia tells me there's a Marvel Comics superhero called Wind Warrior, for example.) Typhon's characteristic signature is a second head; he even keeps it when translated to digitised form. If Spring Wind had any indication of a second head, I'd have no problems with the identification.\n\nI don't agree with the concept that everybody in BotNS has to be everybody else in disguise. \n\n- Gerry Quinn" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Lee Berman", "address": "severiansola at hotmail.com" }, "date": "2010-09-23T13:03:45+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "<5EF8BDB415864C9F8EDE9981F601FA6B@jill>", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Gerry Quinn: I don't see anything in that story to suggest that Spring Wind was Typhon...\ntyphoons ae not particularly associated with Spring" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I don't think typhoons are at all relevant. The Greek monster Typhon was mostly\ncharacterized by being multi-headed and dragon/snake-like. But his Egyptian\ncognate, Typhon-Set was not quite as monstrous and very explicitly associated\nwith hot desert winds and drought. Sirocco storms are most frequent in spring and \nautumn. I note that drought and hot winds are a part of the Long Sun story and perhaps\nserve a Pas/Typhon purpose.\n \nThe Naviscaput story is explicitly associated by Severian with Abaia. By parallel I could \nsee the possibility that Spring Wind is a benign name and story associated with Typhon\nand his origin. Gets a solid \"maybe\" in my book. \t\t \t \t\t " } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Gerry Quinn", "address": "gerryq at indigo.ie" }, "date": "2010-09-23T13:44:23+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "From: \"Lee Berman\" \nGerry Quinn: I don't see anything in that story to suggest that Spring \nWind was Typhon...\ntyphoons ae not particularly associated with Spring" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I don't think typhoons are at all relevant. The Greek monster Typhon was \nmostly\ncharacterized by being multi-headed and dragon/snake-like. But his \nEgyptian\ncognate, Typhon-Set was not quite as monstrous and very explicitly \nassociated\nwith hot desert winds and drought. Sirocco storms are most frequent in \nspring and\nautumn." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Not a strong 'Spring' association. And if we lose the 'typhoon' \nassociation, the wind connection is even weaker." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I note that drought and hot winds are a part of the Long Sun story and \nperhaps\nserve a Pas/Typhon purpose." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "The drought (as well as any unexpectedly hot winds) is a consequence of the \nblockage of some of the Whorl's ventilation tunnels over time; it is an \nindication of the decrepitude of the Whorl. The Whorl as built by \nPas/Typhon did not suffer from drought." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "The Naviscaput story is explicitly associated by Severian with Abaia. By \nparallel I could\nsee the possibility that Spring Wind is a benign name and story associated \nwith Typhon\nand his origin. Gets a solid \"maybe\" in my book." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Certainly, Wolfe is inclined to put in such references. If there were \nstrong associations between Spring Wind and Typhon, such as a suggestion of \ntwo heads, I'd credit it. But I think it's a stretch to read an \nidentification into what we see here.\n\n- Gerry Quinn" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Jack Smith", "address": "jack.smith.1946 at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-09-23T22:17:52+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Sun blog review", "in_reply_to": "<4C98FB91.7000608@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "A few points about the speed of the Whorl;\n\n1. You have to travel very fast to get to any stars because of their great\ndistance. To reach even the closest star in 300 years, you would need a\nspeed of about 1.5% of light (10,000,000 MPH). You would need some\nfantastic source of energy to get the Whorl to even 1.5%, a source that\nwill only be found in the future. Wolfe says the long sun is powered by\nnuclear fusion, but he doesn't tell us what propels the Whorl. I think that\nis because he knows that no such power source exists yet.\n\n2. 95% of light speed requires even more energy, of course. But as long as\nwe are tapping into an unknown power source, we might as well go as fast as\nwe can.\n\n3. A travel speed close to the speed of light explains why only 300 years\nhave elapsed on the Whorl while 1000 to 2000 years have gone by on Urth.\n At 95% of speed of light, Whorl time would be 300 years for 1000 Urth\nyears. At 99% of speed of light, Whorl time would be 300 years for 2000\nUrth years.\n\n4. Of course, it's more complicated than traveling the whole way at one\nspeed. You have to accelerate the ship up to a high speed, and then\ndecelerate to stop at Blue-Green system. The rate of acceleration has to be\nslow, or the cargo would be pressed against the back of the ship.\n\nAcceleration would have to be very low. At an acceleration of 1/100 G,\nit would take about 97 years to get up to about speed of light. You could\nthen coast for 100 years, and then decelerate for 97 years, making a total\ntime of about 300 years." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Tue, Sep 21, 2010 at 2:38 PM, James Wynn wrote:\n\n Jack Smith-\n\" I think I've heard estimates the Whorl is at least 300 years\nold. Typhon was presumably alive on its launching and is still alive when\nSeverian meets him\nstrapped to his couch. Quite a lifespan.\"\nIsn't Typhon dead when found by Severian, who then resurrects him? Typhon\nseems to have dried out after lying on the cold, dry mountain for 1000 or\n2000 years (in contrast to Dorcas, who is soggy).\nSince the Whorl has traveled near the speed of light on its voyage, time has\nslowed down. So 1000 or 200 years can have passed on Urth, while only 300\nyears have gone by on the Whorl.\n\n Gwern-\nI don't remember if our past discussions went into the technical\ndetails, but it's pretty unlikely the Whorl got any significant\nslowdown.\nUseful link: http://www.projectrho.com/rocket/rocket3aj.html#relativity\n\nNotice that to get a slowdown of even 1/3, you need to get up to\nsomewhere around 0.97 or 0.98 _c_. Given that we're talking an entire\nhollowed-out asteroid, and one which needs to slow down to rest at the\nend... Well, the energy requirements would be absolutely fantastic.\n(And I mean fantastic as in, you'd better have an entire other\nanti-asteroid made of anti-matter for propellant.)\nDunno if Wolfe took all this into account, though.\n\n\nIn the Urth List Q&A, Wolfe said:\n\n*Q: About how far, really, is the New Sun series set in our future (or the\nfuture of the previous universe)? How much time elapses between Typhon and\nSeverian?*\n\nA: That is never specified in the books. My offhand guess is between 1000\nand 2000 years. I would have to reread the books with care to perhaps trim\nthe estimate up a little bit.\n\nHowever, since Dream-travel can involve Time-travel, all of this might be\nacademic as far as the Rajan's visits to Urth go.\n\nu+16b9\n\n\n_______________________________________________" } ] } ] }